Original Sin (38 page)

Rafe would be scared. Hurting. She could do it. She didn’t want to—she’d spent years building up her shields so she didn’t feel the emotions of others—but to save Rafe she would.

Just in case she was wrong, she grabbed the files for all three properties before leaving the room.

Back downstairs, she realized at once something was very wrong.

Magic, active magic, vibrated off the walls. Moira could practically
see
the energy building in the room. Where was it coming from? It wasn’t directed at her, and it was coming from all around. Coming
into
the building.

She was at the center of an energy vortex. Someone was drawing in the energy. This didn’t happen spontaneously.

But no one was here.

She listened, then discerned the voice chanting. Downstairs? There was a
basement?

Moira searched for another door, but there wasn’t one inside the building. She pictured the alley next to the church. And there
had
been another door to the right of the church’s rear entrance. She should have checked it out, but she hadn’t planned on being here this long.

She ran outside. The door was closed but not locked. She said a prayer, along the lines of
I hope you’re in a helpful mood, Big Guy, because this feels very bad right now
.

Moira pulled open the door. Incense swirled around her as she silently stepped inside. Candlelight flickered down below.

From the top of the stairs, she recognized that this was a permanent ritual spot. Many spells had been cast here, most so black that fear nearly made Moira run. How could she, one person, fight such dark magic?

She hesitated, listened to the voices. Felt the magic around her. Most of the spells were old. Lingering, but harmless. She focused on the spell being cast now. The energy being drawn into this room, the energy she saw upstairs. The vortex.

Ari Blair
.

Was Jared still with her? Among the shadows and candle flames Moira couldn’t clearly see what was happening down below. Then she heard a male voice chanting along with Ari.
Jared
. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or pissed off or worried. Probably all three.

Ari was calling on a variety of names to aid her, using a mixture of Latin and English, common among amateur Wiccans. Moira listened to the words, and only a moment later realized what Ari was doing.

It was a reversal spell. Relatively simple and easy if a witch wanted to reverse a curse or illness, but trying to recall the Seven Deadly Sins? Ari was not only going to get herself killed, she was risking the release of more demons.

Moira rushed down the stairs. Ari and Jared knelt in a pentagram surrounded by a double circle, candles all around them.

“Stop!” she shouted.

Ari looked up from the chalice she was incanting over. Fear, then irritation, crossed the girl’s face. Jared saw Moira and sighed in relief.

Ari scowled. “You need to leave.” She tried to sound tough, but Moira heard the hesitation in her tone.

“You need to stop right now. Turn over the chalice and tell me exactly where those three altars are so I can destroy them.”

“No!” She glared at Moira. “They killed Chris!”

“One of the Seven Deadly Sins killed Chris, and one or more of them are going to kill or possess you if you don’t stop playing around with black magic.”

“I’m a white witch.”

Moira shook her head. “That’s what I used to think. Until a demon used me to kill my boyfriend.”

Ari sucked in a sob. “I didn’t kill Chris!”

“You might as well have. It was a demon from the cliffs who touched him.”

“But Chris wasn’t there.”

“You were, though you were safe in the protective circle. Everyone else in the world is in jeopardy.”

Ari was listening, and Moira was relieved. The magic was stagnant now, without the continuing ritual to build it up.

But Ari was unconvinced. “That’s why what I’m doing here is so important! I’m sending the demons back so they can’t hurt anyone else. I didn’t know what was going to happen. I never wanted anyone to get hurt.”

Moira continued to walk forward. She stood on the outside of the circle. “I believe you. You don’t want to harm anyone.”

“Do no harm
. That’s what we believe.”

“That’s what
you
believe. It’s noble. You didn’t want to hurt anyone. I don’t think you planned on releasing demons.”

Ari nodded. “I want to do good. I created the energy vortex. I researched it, plotted it out, and it’s working! Don’t you feel it?” She put her arms up. The crystals on her wrists drew in the energy, practically drugging the teenage witch.

Moira was losing the argument. “I feel it. And you need to stop it right now.”

“No,” she snapped petulantly.

Moira said to Jared. “Follow me.”

“Please don’t go, Moira,” Jared pleaded. “They have Lily! They’re going to hurt her just like they did Abby.”

Moira said, “Jared, Lily is with Anthony. Safe. No one can get to her.”
I hope
. “Ari is playing with fire, and she doesn’t want to listen to the truth.”

“Lily’s okay?” Jared asked, rising from the floor and walking over to Moira.

“Jared, no!” cried Ari. “Don’t go. None of you understand the power that I have!”

Moira lost her temper. “You don’t think so? I understand it better than
anyone
, even better than Fiona. I know what the power does to people. To people I love and care about. I also know what it does to you. You feel invincible. You believe you can do anything. You’ve probably left your body, floated among the clouds, watched people. That was my favorite part of being a magician. Flying. And I still miss it.”

“Then help me if you can!”

“I’m trying.”

“You’re trying to stop me, not help me!”

“That’s the only way I can help you. I have to stop this now.” For the last several minutes Moira had been feeling the energy turn from neutral to black. Something was coming. She had to convince Ari to break the circle and destroy the chalice. If Moira walked into the circle, the energy would be drawn to her, because of her blood. “The energy is changing. Don’t you feel it, Ari?”

But Ari was already drunk with the power, and said, “I’m getting stronger.”

“You’re losing control!”

Ari put her arms up and chanted the end of the ritual.

“Under the stairs!” Moira commanded Jared. She didn’t have to tell him twice.

A tornado of dark gray smoke rotated along the perimeter of the circle in which Ari stood. Ari held her hands up and commanded the spirit to go back where it came from.

The whirlpool of evil rotated faster. Every candle went out except those within the circle. Moira’s hair blew all around her; she could barely stand upright against the pressure. She had her flashlight in hand, but it was all she could do to hold on to it.

The entity didn’t obey Ari’s commands, just as Moira feared. She had no idea whether the demon was one of the Seven or a completely different devil. But with all the energy being directed into the center of Ari’s circle, the demon either didn’t know Moira and Jared were there or didn’t care.

Moira’s arsenal of weapons wouldn’t work until the demon took a physical form. She knew the exorcism prayer by heart, but the demon wasn’t trapped. As soon as she began it, it would turn on her. She wouldn’t be able to help Ari, or Jared, or save Rafe, if she were dead.

Ari held up a crystal.

“Smash it!” Moira screamed at her. “Break the crystal and you’ll break the spell!”

Whether Ari couldn’t hear her over the demonic winds or whether she ignored her, Moira couldn’t say, but Ari said, “I command thee, as it is above, it is below. I command thee to come—”

“No!” Moira shouted helplessly. “Don’t!”

It was too late. Ari had invited the demon into her circle. The girl screamed silently as the demon invaded her body. The resulting silence as all the air seemed to be sucked out of the room terrified Moira.

The possessed Ari stared at Moira, her eyes a red-tinged opaque.

“I know
you
,” it said.

Fiona cast the circle, but nothing was working the way it was supposed to. Her anger mounted as her coven grew wary. They were doubting her, she felt it in her pores, and that doubt, that mistrust, infuriated her nearly as much as the weak circle at the Rittenhouse furniture showroom.

She turned to Serena. “This isn’t working! We should have returned to the cliffs.”

Serena was upset, as she should be since her error had cost them valuable time.

“We leave. Regroup tomorrow night at the cliffs—”

“Wait,” Serena said.

Fiona despised being interrupted or contradicted, but she stopped just short of backhanding her daughter. Serena was in a half-trance, pulling information from the psychic energy in the region.

“It’s Ari,” said Serena. “Her magic. I told you she was stronger than you wanted to believe!” Serena put her hands up, trying to discern what Ari was up to. “She’s drawing energy to her location. She created a …” She closed her eyes, her fingers on her temples as if in pain, but Fiona pushed.

“What?” she demanded.

Garrett stepped over to her. “Fiona, let her be.”

She glared at Garrett. He was too soft on Serena. He stepped back from them, and Fiona turned back to her daughter. “Serena, what did Ari do?”

“A triangle. She is drawing in all energy within a perfect two-dimensional prism.”

“How can that little witch do it?”

Serena didn’t answer. Instead, she said, “All the energy is being directed toward Good Shepherd Church.”

“The fool!” Fiona paced. “She doesn’t know what she’s doing. Only the strongest of magicians should attempt even the most minor spells. All our work! She’s going to destroy it! Garrett, you and Nicole. Go.”

“I could do it faster,” Serena said.

“I need you here. We’ll work together to break the triangle.”

Serena stared at her, mouth open. “You’ve never said that before.”

“What?”

“That you needed me. That we are stronger together.”

Fiona frowned. “Of course I have.” Had she?

Serena shook her head. “Maybe you thought it, but I can’t read your mind.”

“That must be it.” Fiona touched her good daughter on the cheek. “I am hard on you, Serena, but that is necessary to make you strong. Let’s continue.”

Serena smiled. “Yes, Mother.”

Though Anthony wanted to leave Father Philip and Lily at the mission, where he felt it was safest, he worried that leaving them alone anywhere was just as dangerous as bringing them with him.

The tabernacle he needed was in a secure storage room of St. Francis de Sales in downtown Santa Louisa. Two years ago, the parish priest died of a heart attack. Since then there had been five priests assigned, all leaving for a variety of reasons, which now seemed odd. The priest with the longest duration was Father Isaac, who had come out of retirement to tend to the dwindling flock. Anthony had never before considered that witchcraft had been involved in keeping the sole Catholic church inert and inactive, but now it seemed the only logical reason—other than general human apathy.

It was after seven p.m. when Anthony arrived. The church was dark; the parish house next door had a single light in the living room. Father Isaac would retire for the night by eight. Anthony brought Father Philip and Lily with him to the door, not wanting to leave them alone in the car.

Father Isaac took several long minutes to reach the door. When he opened it, Anthony felt the waves of pain coming from the old man, who looked even older now than he had when Anthony arrived in town two months ago. “Are you well?” he asked.

“I’m old,” Isaac replied. “My suffering is less than many.”

“Father, this is Philip Zaccardi of St. Michael’s in Sicily.”

Isaac’s eyes widened as if he were meeting a saint. “Reverend,” he said with a deep nod. “It is truly an honor.”

Isaac had been a supporter of St. Michael’s efforts, but like most priests not affiliated with the Order, he remained quiet about it.

“Thank you,” Philip said humbly. “We are in need of a tabernacle.”

“The original from the mission,” Anthony clarified.

Isaac nodded. “Of course. It is in the vault.”

“We also need a eucharistic ceremony. Can you do it, or may I have permission?” Philip asked.

“Let’s share in the consecration.”

“We don’t have much time,” Philip said. “I baptized Lily earlier today. This will be her first Eucharist.”

Isaac smiled solemnly. “I know the prayers in my heart; let us proceed expeditiously. Anthony, you know how to get into the vault. I will begin preparation.”

Anthony pulled his phone from his pocket and frowned at the message from Moira. He pulled up the image she’d sent. As soon as it loaded, his heart froze.

“Father,” he said to Philip. “Moira found this.”

Father Philip crossed himself as he looked at the picture. “The Mark of Cain.”

Anthony stared. “So help us God.” He wasn’t surprised—Fiona’s coven had the power behind it to suggest they were in deep—but seeing the sigil was chilling. Covens who invoked Cain were vicious, ruthless, and unstoppable until death.

Lily looked at the photo and stifled a scream. Her hands flew to her neck as she swayed in terror. “No. No!”

Anthony caught the girl as she fainted.

THIRTY-FIVE

There were two ways—at least, two ways Moira knew about—to exorcise a demon while keeping the victim alive.

Moira didn’t have time for a traditional exorcism. Not only was Rafe still in grave danger, Ari’s ritual would have already attracted the attention of Fiona and her merry band of witches.

But stabbing Ari, though effective and fast acting, didn’t appeal to Moira, either.

Damn, damn, damn!

Moira started the exorcism rite, keeping her dagger firmly in hand.

“Deus, in nómine tuo salvum me fac, et virtúte tua—”

The demon laughed, Ari’s voice deep and unnatural.
“Andra Moira.”

She ignored his intimidations and continuted her invocation.