Smoke on the Water (24 page)

“I never transported anyone until Mary.” Quickly I explained how I'd done it, each incident being different and somehow “more.”

“And the last time, last night, you transported yourself
and
Sebastian,” Raye murmured.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “What was that?”

“Practice makes perfect,” Becca said. “The moon adds a boost. Full moon even more so. So does blood.”

“And we got here yesterday.” Raye indicated the cabin. “This place is only a few miles from the mental health facility.”

“Why here?” I asked.

The two exchanged glances.

“We scried for your location,” Raye said. “I'd tried before and gotten nothing. But the two of us together saw this place. It was conveniently available for rent, and considering the
Venatores Mali
had already found both of us, we thought we should all get out of Dodge.”

“You were just going to hang out until I showed up?”

Raye shrugged. “We didn't plan that far.”

“Roland was pretty close. How'd that happen?”

“How'd he wind up in the same forest?” Becca asked. “No clue. How'd he wind up in the twenty-first century and not in hell?” She glanced at Raye. “You should probably explain that.”

“Roland's been whispering to a lot of people from beyond the grave.”

“Like Mary.”

“Like Mary,” Raye agreed. “I'm not sure why they're listening to a voice that tells them to kill, brand, and burn witches, but they are.”

“Roland's got his own serial killer club,” Becca muttered.

“The
Venatores Mali,
” I said.

My sisters nodded.

“Until Roland returned,” Raye continued, “the leader of the
Venatores Mali
was the one with the most witch kills.”

“Exactly how did he return?”

“The first time they tried to raise him it was blood of a witch, shed by the leader of the
Venatores Mali,
as worthy believers chanted skyclad beneath the moon.”

“The first time,” I repeated. The rest was kind of gibberish.

“They used my blood. Didn't work. He…” Raye waved at the air above her. “Pushed against the sky. Nearly made it, but didn't.”

“Then another nut job had delusions of grandeur,” Becca continued. “He killed their leader, Mistress June, and became the new boss. Did the ritual, killed me. Voilà. Roland is free.”

“Killed you?” I glanced at Raye, wondered momentarily if Becca was a ghost, but I couldn't see them. Raye smiled as if she could read my mind, then shook her head. Maybe she could read minds, though she hadn't mentioned that in her list of witchy-powers.

“I'm alive,” Becca said, “thanks to the power of two—”

“Maybe three,” Raye interrupted. “Remember that storm?”

They both looked at me, and I knew instinctively what they meant. There was some kind of triplet telepathy going on here that felt both strange and wonderful, and weirdly, completely normal.

“I had a vision of clouds that were women.” The third woman falling, the pain in my chest. “You were stabbed.”

“Yes,” Becca answered.

“I felt it.”

They lifted their eyebrows at the exact same time. Pru, who lay with her snout on her paws, gaze flicking to each of us as we spoke, growled low.

“And you sent the storm,” Raye said.

“I did. It was the first time I sent one instead of bringing one. I never controlled it before.”

“It helped. We merged—Becca and I. I healed her, but Roland was already out.”

“Now what?” I asked.

“Now—” Raye offered her hands. Becca did the same.

I set down the wineglass I'd continued to hold though I hadn't taken another sip, and put my palms against theirs. A low hum filled the air. I'd have thought I imagined it, except our hair lifted and began to swirl together just like the cloud sisters' hair had in my vision.

“Now, we put him back,” Raye said. “Any ideas on how?”

“Me?” I was so startled I let their hands go. Our hair fell back to our shoulders the instant we stopped touching.

Pru, who'd been watching our hair swirl with the avidness of a wolf watching a rabbit, yipped. I really wished I could understand her. While I was at it, I wished I could see Henry.

“You're the one with the visions,” Raye said.

“I never had much control over them—when they came, how they came, what I saw. But I've gotten better at it.”

Becca's head turned toward the corner. “Henry says—”

“Wait a second,” I interrupted. “I thought Raye saw ghosts and you talked to animals.”

“That instant when we merged, our powers merged,” Raye explained. “But not completely. I can understand Pru, but no other animals. Becca can see Henry, but no other ghosts.”

“Make it so I can too.”

Pru growled.

“Hush,” Raye said. “I know.”

“What?”

“Becca died. I did what I had to do to save her, but it was dangerous. We can't do it again and risk losing one of us. Only together will we have enough power to end this. To end him.”

“Says the woman who can see her father and understand her mother.”

That I believed I had a ghost for a father and a wolf for a mother was something I didn't pause to dissect. They were my parents. I knew that as surely as I knew these women were my sisters and that Sebastian was my soul mate. I loved them all with a strength and surety that some might call wrong, if not insane, but that I knew to be as right and sane as anything I'd ever felt before.

Pru set her head on my knee again, and I ran my palm over her fur.

“She saw you once,” Becca said.

“In my carriage, in the park.”

“Right. But then she could never locate you again.”

“How'd she locate me that time?”

“She's a wolf, but she's also a witch. Her senses are much sharper than any wolf alive. She tracked your scent.”

“If that was the first, the only time she ever saw me, then how did she have my scent?”

“She had ours,” Becca said. “Close enough.”

“Bobby did a search for abandoned babies around the time I was found and got no hits but me,” Raye continued. “Why didn't he find you?”

“Foster system didn't have the best records back then.” I wasn't sure they had the best records now. “He didn't find any mention of Becca either?”

“I was never formally adopted, nor reported as found.” Becca shook her head. “Long story. Where did you go after the park/carriage incident? Why couldn't Mom ever find you again?”

“I don't—” I began, and then I remembered the candles, the tub, the chant. “Protection spell.”

“You did a protection spell from the cradle?”

“No, my foster mother was a witch. After she saw a wolf with its head in my carriage, she cast a spell of protection.”

“A very good one,” Raye said. “I'd like to talk to her.”

“She's dead.”

“Doesn't usually keep me from talking to people. What happened?”

“Tortured, murdered, branded, and burned.”

“Hell.”

“Pretty much.”

“Is that why you didn't stay with them?”

“They sent me back. When you foam at the mouth every time you take a bath, people get twitchy.” At their identical expressions of concern, I lifted a hand. “Kidding. I did scream, thrash, and freak out, but there was no actual mouth foaming.”

“If your foster mother was a witch,” Raye said, “you'd think she would understand.”

“You'd think.”

“Maybe she was trying to protect you. Figured you'd be safer away from her.”

“Safe from what? How long have the
Venatores Mali
been back?”

“As far as we know, only a year or so. Then again, who's to say Roland hasn't been trying to get his club going since we arrived.”

“Do you know how a spell of protection can be removed?” I asked.

“Why would you want to remove it?” Raye asked.

Same question Peggy had asked. She'd cast a spell of protection around the facility, and us, yet she was dead, just like Sadie.

“I just wonder how Sadie—my witch foster mother—and her husband got dead. Same thing with Peggy Dalberg. They both did spells of protection.”

“I don't—” Raye paused when Pru lurched to her feet, staring at Becca.

“She says that a protection spell can be weakened by a location spell. Shit.” Becca's gaze flicked to Raye. “We got Peggy killed. First Raye tried to locate you and couldn't. So we tried again later, together, and probably melted the magic away like wax. Mom says it's always a good idea to renew a protection spell every so often, just in case they've been weakened.”

“They died because of me,” I said.

“A protection spell isn't going to stop a knife,” Raye insisted.

“No.” Becca sighed. “But if we hadn't weakened it, Mistress June probably wouldn't have been able to find Peggy.”

“Mistress June. Big woman. Long hair?”

My sisters nodded.

“She's dead now?”

Another dual nod.

I shouldn't be glad, but I was. I'd seen her do some terrible things.

“We're sorry,” Raye said. “We just wanted to find you.”

“How could you know that searching for me would lead to people dying?” I asked.

“We are flying blind,” Raye agreed. “But that doesn't make Sadie or Peggy any less dead. They aren't haunting you. If they were pissed about it, they would be.”

Well, goody. No vengeful ghosts on my heels—one less thing.

“Couldn't the
Venatores Mali
do a location spell and find us?” I asked.

“They aren't witches,” Becca said. “They're witch hunters.”

“They seem pretty witchy to me,” I muttered.

“She's right,” Raye said. “Raising Roland was magic—black magic, but still magic. Back in the day he was righteous, he never would have stooped to fighting fire with fire—” She rolled her eyes. “So to speak. But once his family died, he lost his teeny-tiny mind. Being unable to have his revenge sent him over the edge. He went to the dark side. He'll do anything, including magic, to kill us. We should probably recast the protection spell every night, just to be sure.”

“Works for me,” I said. “Do you have…” I tried to remember what Peggy had used. It would have been a good idea to bring along her
Book of Shadows
. I wondered where it was now. “Peppermint, lavender, chamomile…”

My sisters looked at each other, then at me.

“Why?” Becca asked.

“That's what Peggy used.”

“Every witch has a different way.”

I had a flash of the roses floating in the bathtub at Sadie's and carnations in a pot at the facility.

“Okay,” I said. “What's yours?”

“Ours,” Raye said. “The protection spell of the Taggart family.”

She tilted her head as if listening, and from the way Pru stared at the nearest corner, I knew she was listening to Henry. Our father.

It gave me a both a tingle and a chill to hear myself referred to as a Taggart. A tingle because I had always wanted to belong to something, to someone. A chill because being a Taggart had marked me. At least it hadn't marked
only
me. There was power in numbers. There was power in us.

“I am air.” Raye's hair fluttered in a breeze that couldn't be since every window and door was closed. She offered her hand to Becca, who took it.

“I am fire,” Becca said, and the fire in the fireplace whooshed upward, reminiscent of the way the pyre had whooshed upward and obscured Henry and Pru all those centuries ago.

Becca offered her hand to me at the same time Raye offered hers.

“I don't—” I began.

They took my hands in theirs and suddenly I did understand.

“I am water,” I said, and outside, rain began to fall.

“Protect,” Raye whispered.

“Us,” Becca murmured.

“All,” I finished.

Lightning flared. Thunder crashed. The wind howled, or maybe it was wolves. Then the fire went out.

“That oughta do it,” Raye said.

 

Chapter 18

“We'll start fresh in the morning.” Raye's gaze drifted to door number one, behind which Bobby Doucet waited. I could understand her eagerness.

“Start what?” I asked.

“Looking for Roland.” Becca's gaze was equally captured by door number two and the promise of Owen McAllister.

“Locator spell?” My own gaze flicked to door number three.

“Henry wants to set a trap,” Raye said.

My eyes flicked back. “He thinks Roland's going to fall for a trap?”

“If it's baited right.”

“Ah.” I knew exactly what bait they meant.
Us.

“We'll be fine.” Becca set her hand on my arm. “Owen's a marine. Just because he was in K-9 Corps doesn't mean he can't shoot a gun.”

“We're going to shoot Roland?”

“Not we,” Becca said. “Owen and/or Bobby.”

“Bobby's a pretty good shot,” Raye continued. “Saved my life.”

Could it be that simple? Could we dangle ourselves as bait, then shoot the bad guy and end it all? I had my doubts. But I was too tired to voice them, and what did I know? I was late to this party.

“Grab what you want out of my bag.” Raye indicated an overnight case in the dining area.

“Or mine.” Becca pointed to a duffel nearby.

I guess we
were
all the same size, or close enough.

“Here.” Raye offered me a clear bottle half filled with green flecks.

I frowned and didn't take it. “I gave that up.”

At her confusion, I mimed smoking a joint.