Song of the Ancients (Ancient Magic Book 1) (7 page)

"Are you okay?" she asked. "Did you catch a cold?"

"I think so, just the sniffles." I didn't need to fake the huskiness in my voice. I'd been crying on and off all morning. "I'm sure it'll be gone tomorrow." I hung up, put the pillow over my ears and burrowed deeper under the covers.

I lay face down and studied the dust balls behind the head-board. I lay face up and memorized the scrollwork of the tin ceiling. I didn't want to think about the night before, but Nicholas's words spread inside me like a creeping sickness.
"There is only failure in you."
I seemed to disappoint all the men in my life. My father. My husband. Nicholas. I swallowed the lump in my throat and buried my face in the pillow, willing my mind back to sleep. What's the easiest thing to do? Nothing. Prove him correct.

The storm passed around midnight, leaving a chorus of toads croaking happily in its wake. I took my pillow and blanket out to the patio, dried off a chaise lounge, and let their night sounds lull me back to sleep.

I dreamt of my mother and remembered her never-faltering love for me. When I was little, she'd called me her blessed accident. She had me just before turning forty so I had her undivided attention, unconditional love and unwavering support growing up. I awoke certain she would never wish me harm. I had nothing to fear from her in life—or in death.

While the idea of seeing the dead seemed incomprehensible, the prospect of talking with my mother was oddly comforting. I hadn't been with her when she died. In the three years since, I often thought of little things I wished I could share with her. A perfect bunch of sunflowers in a cobalt blue vase she would surely want to paint. An apology for a thoughtless comment I'd made on her birthday. A book she would enjoy. Who knew, maybe she felt the same way.
Do the dead still feel?

I ran a finger idly across the faint scratch marks on the back of my hand. I hadn't hallucinated, nor had I imagined the look of sadness and concern on her face. She wanted to tell me some-thing. Finally, I wanted to hear her. Maybe I could prove Nicholas wrong.

The next morning I opened the windows and shook out my depression with the fresh sheets. A mug of steaming hot coffee in one hand, I picked up the phone and dialed the number Rod Standing Bear had written on his flyer.

The message on the machine said, "Tell me what you want." Abrupt and to the point. What could I tell him and not sound crazy? I settled for my name and number, saying simply, "Standing Bear said to call."

The deep voice that called back belonged to John Green Raven Sinclair. He was full Lakota Sioux, despite the Americanized name. "My people are up north in the Oglala land," he said, "but the desert called me here many, many years ago." He didn't seem surprised Standing Bear had given me his number. "Not many people hear Spirit speak to them. When you hear it, you got to stop and listen."

"I'd never heard the language before," I told him. "I looked it up and translated snatches of it. But I have no idea what the message means." The reply caught in my throat. I was so relieved to find someone who
believed
me and accepted my experience without question.

"Don't worry. I will help you understand," he answered simply.

Sinclair told me he had lived outdoors since the age of five, to be closer to the elements. He gave me directions to an unnamed low plateau on the outskirts of town. I parked at the base and hiked to the top.

Sinclair sat facing the setting sun with his eyes closed, his face a timeless mask, as weathered and pitted as ancient wood. His long black hair was mingled with strands of silver. It was pulled back to reveal high cheekbones, and fell in a braided rope between his shoulders. He wore a leather vest and a loose-sleeved shirt, open at the throat, and a necklace of intricately carved stones interspersed with black feathers and what looked like canine teeth.

"Sit down." He didn't open his eyes. His voice was raspy and thin, as if he hadn't spoken out loud in a long time. "Do you understand why Standing Bear sent you to me?"

I sat on the rocky ground next to him. "No. He just said to tell you I'd heard the Song of the Ancients."

"He told you nothin' about me?"

"No."

Sinclair bowed to the setting sun, touching his forehead to the red soil, before turning back to me. He studied my face for a long moment.

"Standing Bear and I are of different tribes. I grew up in Dakota country. He's Yavapai. Grew up near here. But we traveled a common path. When I was a boy, I did a quest ceremony lasting four years, until my official manhood, a fifty-two moon quest of knowing." He spoke so softly I had to lean closer to hear. "So did Standing Bear. At the end of his fifty-two moons, he started painting the visions he saw during his quest. Rod is a vision seeker. Painting his visions is his life's journey."

"I went to his gallery." I nodded. "Yes, I can see visions in his painting."

"I'm an old man. My spirit journey happened a long time ago." Sinclair rested his eyes on the horizon. "But it sent me to these red mountains, on a path to a wife from another tribe."

He faced me. "And so, like a stone thrown into a stream, here you are. Sent by my nephew."

I felt the power emanate from him in shimmering waves. In-voluntarily, I leaned away.

"So, you're sensitive to energy." He studied me again, with more interest this time. "Very few, outside of my own people, recognize the
wakhan
, the energy, of a medicine man."

His eyes were pure black pools, pulling me into their depths. I wrenched my gaze from his and shook my head to clear it. Instead I concentrated on drawing circles in the loose dirt between my boots.

He erupted in a deep, unselfconscious belly laugh. "A new
bruja
, are you? You recognize power, but don't know what to do with it."

"A what?"

"
Bruja
," he repeated. "Witch."

I stopped drawing in the dirt, shocked into stillness. "What? No, I'm not!"

His black stare no longer showed humor. "Yup, you are," he said. "I didn't choose my life. The Ancients chose this path for me, as they have revealed a path to you." He grimaced, showing a row of yellow, tobacco-stained teeth. "Somethin' happened to you just recently. Tell me."

Bruja. Witch.
I tried on the labels in silence. I'd read about individuals finding spirituality and personal callings in a flash of insight or through a dream. Was my situation much different?

So, I took a deep breath and told the old man about the wind singing on Cathedral Rock. He didn't seem surprised, so I told him about my mother's spirit, backtracking to Nicholas and the cloak. As I talked, Sinclair stood and we slowly walked the perimeter of the plateau.

Finally, every bit of emotion wrung out of me, I ran out of words.

He gestured for me to sit down and instructed me to close my eyes. I felt him reach over and put his hand on mine. An odd gesture for this gruff man, but immediately I felt relaxed, almost drowsy.

"You're scared. New stuff is happening to you, coming at you fast from all directions." His voice was no longer raspy, but a soothing song. He put his face near mine and sniffed my hair, drawing in my scent with a long, noisy inhalation. "I sense the presence of powerful medicine. It's closing around you. Can't see why. Not yet."

He removed his hand from mine, brushing his palms together as if wiping off grit. Cold sweat formed in my armpits. It dampened my tee-shirt and ran down my ribcage.

"You can't let what's comin' take you by surprise. You have choices. Don't focus on the fear. Focus on what you know, what you can influence. Knowledge will come to you as you need it. Act with intention. Be patient."

I thought of my dark night in the middle of the road with Nicholas. "What if I fail?"

"There's no right or wrong in life, girl, only choices," he said in a quiet voice. "But remember, a choice is a decision, even if you choose to do nothing. Read the signs presented to you to make your decisions. All of nature sings to us and reveals her secrets. Listen to the earth. Don't shut out the lessons she is trying to teach you."

"I'm trying to be open to everything happening to me. But what am I supposed to do?"

Sinclair's face was calm. "Think. What's the strongest sign you've got so far?"

I hesitated. "My mother's ghost?"

He nodded. "What'd she say? Was she tryin' to help you?"

I ducked my head and swallowed hard. "I don't know. Maybe. I think so, but I panicked and ran."

"Then you know the first thing you have to do."

"You mean I have to go back?"

"I mean," he chided gently, "you have to talk to her. Now figure out how to do it."

He seemed so calm, so unruffled by the fact I'd seen a ghost, like this was an everyday occurrence for him.

"Would you help me?"

Sinclair stood and brushed the dirt from his pants.

"Nope. You have to contact your own mother. She's your guardian spirit. You go make your own plans. But this time, be prepared."

Chapter 10: Elder Law

The sheer white curtains billowed gently in the open French doors, an undulating backdrop to the black grand piano and the quiet runs of Beethoven's first movement of Moonlight Sonata. Nicholas played with his eyes closed, his long fingers holding the left hand octaves with ease, allowing his right to bring in the plaintive, ghostly minor melody, as from a distance. Beethoven had dedicated the Sonata to his seventeen-year-old student, a
countessa
with whom he had fallen in love. Nicholas shook his head, eyes closed, to rid himself of Samantha's face.
You are such a sot.

He finished the last chord and dropped his hands in his lap as the phone rang in the hall.

It was his boss.

Nicholas had a pretty good idea why he was calling. Most of the Wiccan community didn't believe their religion had any governing group, preferring to operate independently, using the 'do as you will, if it harms none' credo as their only rule. Elders of the Grand Council preferred to keep it that way.

The Council, a secretive group, handled enforcement of the entire magical community in the background, recruiting their enforcers from within their own ranks. Each family in the tiny hive of Traditionals, including the Orenda family, had its own area of specialization, traits learned through centuries of practice. The Laveaus were healers and still ran a strong voodoun community. The Dyers produced seers, while the Blights were soul eaters, a specialization Nicholas hoped he would never need. The remaining Nutter daughter was the reigning expert in herbalism. The Ravencrofts, whose eldest son lived nearby, were renowned curse breakers. His boss's family, the Hunsleys, were superb spies and dealt in every imaginable kind of secret. They had helped Nicholas out of a tight spot once, extracting him so deftly he simply disappeared.

The Orenda clan raised hunters. The ability to perceive dangerous patterns and dark connections where others saw only random chance was a family gift.

Right now, to Nicholas, it felt like a curse.

"We haven't heard from you for some time. Are you having difficulties?" Elder Kaspar Hunsley's greeting, short and to the point. His tone warned he would accept no excuses.

"I've found him in Sedona, Arizona."

"Does he know who you are?"

"It won't take long for him to figure it out. But we have an-other problem, possibly just as sticky. A new witch has surfaced."

The voice on the other end grunted impatiently. "And why is this our…rather…your problem?"

"It appears she's connected somehow to Aunt Bella."

A longer pause this time. "Any sign of dear Bella?"

"Nothing. But this new woman bought her shop." Nicholas paused. Revealing more than necessary to the Elders could be dangerous. There are no 'do-overs' with this group. "I, ah…in-advertently conjured a relative of hers at Samhain. Her mum, I believe."

"I thought you were going to keep a low profile," Elder Huns-ley snapped, his voice an irritated growl.

Nicholas clenched his teeth, remembering how the cowardly girl broke from the circle and ran; then ground them in frustration at his loss of control afterwards. Arguments and accusations would only make it more difficult to befriend her and become her confidant. He sighed and rolled his neck to ease the tension, keeping his voice level. "She may also be connected in some way to my target."

Elder Hunsley's voice dropped even lower. "Perhaps it would be wise if you used your time to eliminate your target. You know he won't stop with two victims. And the more he kills, the stronger he becomes. Worry about this woman later, Nicholas. Keep your eye on the target."

"I understand sir."

But he didn't like it. He would be leaving Samantha completely exposed. He wasn't sure how much she knew and how much she had simply blundered into, but he had no doubt anything bad Samantha got into would end up involving him. Even if he didn't get involved, didn't even help her, it would spill over on him through sheer physical proximity.

Bloody hell.

Chapter 11: A Message Revealed

Jumbled thoughts swirled through my head, fragments of our conversation.
Magic enclosing me.
What exactly had the old medicine man seen? I nibbled nervously on my thumb.
Don't be a pawn. Don't focus on the fear.
I cringed, recalling Nicholas's words: "There is only failure in you."

"This must stop! Calm down." I chastised myself out loud. So much had happened in the last three weeks, my brain struggled to process it all. I took a deep breath and willed my mind to relax and change directions.

Positive thoughts. What can I do?
Sinclair had said to act with intention.
Yeah, well, the crazy medicine man also says talk to a ghost. But I don't believe in ghosts. Time to quit kidding yourself. You believe now, at least more than you disbelieve. Okay, I have officially admitted it. I believe in the supernatural. And Sinclair doesn't seem crazy.

Rumor was helping the only customer in the store, so I retreated to my office, pulled a writing pad and pencil from a drawer and sat down at the desk.
If John Green Raven Sinclair says talk to a ghost, what the hell. It's worth a try.