A Circle of Ashes (10 page)

Petra thought. Why hadn’t the girls told her this? Embarrassed? She looked at Sophie. “Has he told you anything about what happened between them?”

“We don’t really talk,” Sophie said, twisting a ring around one finger.

“Sophie,” said Ouida gently. “It’s been too long,
cher
.”

Sophie looked at Ouida, her eyes wide. “How can you say that?
You
—”

Ouida reached out to put her hand on Sophie’s. “It was a very long time ago. He was young and foolish and selfish. I’ve made my peace with him. He’s a different person now, and so am I.”

Sophie didn’t look up. “We just don’t get along.”

Across the table, Petra met Ouida’s eyes.
Drop it,
she told her silently.
You’ll get nowhere.

“Okay, so we have someone trying to harm or possibly even kill the twins,” said Petra. “We have the Luc thing, which I’ll get to the bottom of. We have Daedalus and his rite. Where do you two stand on that?”

“I don’t want to do it,” Sophie said, surprising Petra. She still didn’t meet Petra’s eyes, which meant she was hiding something.

“I’m not sure,” Ouida said slowly. “My first reaction was no way. But as I think about it, I wonder if it could be used to sort of, well, heal things. Heal
us
.”

Petra nodded. “I know what you mean. Personally, I don’t trust Daedalus. I’m not sure how I feel about the rite. I can see both sides. Thais and Clio haven’t told me what they would decide, and I still need to figure out how hurting them would benefit anyone, or benefit or hurt the rite.”

“It would hurt
you
,” said Ouida. “And we need both of them to do the rite, to be thirteen.”

“So it could be someone who wants to specifically hurt Petra but in an emotional way, not a physical way. Or it could be someone who doesn’t want the rite to happen,” said Sophie. “I mean, besides me.
I’m
not trying to hurt the twins.”

Petra nodded again. “I know. I just can’t figure it out. The girls did a
réléver la griffe
but got nowhere. I’m going to have to work on it. In the meantime, I’ve been thinking about the rite, and it seems like it would be prudent to get, well, insurance, in a way. Something on our side so Daedalus can’t pull the rug out from under us. Here’s what I was thinking.” She outlined her plan, and both Ouida and Sophie nodded thoughtfully.

“I agree,” said Ouida. “That’s a good idea. I’ll help you.”

“Me too,” said Sophie. “It can’t hurt, and it would be good if we get it.”

“Okay, then.” Petra sat back in her chair. “We’ll go tomorrow. Then … there is one more thing,” she said slowly, wondering if she should even bring it up. She felt Ouida and Sophie watching her and decided to take a chance. “The thing is … Thais is starting to learn a bit of magick. She’s worked a little with Clio and also with me. And … almost every time, her magick goes big and unpredictable.”

Ouida frowned. “What? In what way?”

“It’s hard to say,” Petra continued. “In a way I haven’t seen before. It happens fast. And—they’ve told me—twice, in the middle of a spell, they’ve actually gotten blown across a room. Through a circle and physically across the room.”

Her two friends stared at her.

“Nooo,” Ouida said doubtfully, and Petra nodded.

“I talked to Azura Copeland—the mother of one of Clio’s friends. She was in her house when the girls were out in the their workroom, in the backyard. And from inside the house, she felt a big clap of magick, like lightning, and when she ran out there, the three of them were lying on the floor, in separate corners, stunned.”

“But just ordinary magick?” Sophie asked, looking concerned. “Nothing dark, nothing … dangerous?”

Petra shook her head. “No. I even did a
réléver la griffe
on Clio. Nothing dark came up at all. They were working relatively small, totally ordinary spells. And then, when Clio was working much harder and bigger spells with Melysa, everything was fine.”

“What are you saying?” asked Ouida. “You think it’s something about Thais?”

Petra hated what was coming next, but she really needed their input. “What if… what if… Thais is a dark twin?”

Petra saw Ouida blink, saw Sophie’s eyes widen.

“Oh God,” Ouida said, a look of dismay on her face.

“That doesn’t happen very often,” Sophie said. “I mean, I’ve never known anyone—”

“I know it’s rare. And I’m hoping it’s impossible,” said Petra grimly. “But how they’re describing Thais’s magick—what else could it be?”

“I’ve met her,” said Ouida. “I didn’t pick up on anything dark from her at all.”

“Me neither,” said Sophie.

Petra shrugged, feeling hopeless. “She might not know it. Not yet. For seventeen years nothing magickal has touched her. Now she’s starting to tap into her powers for the first time. Maybe a crack has appeared in her. Maybe it’s getting worse.”

Ouida shook her head. “I just don’t know. They both felt balanced to me, in the short time I was around them. They both had elements of light and dark, mostly light.”

“I know,” said Petra. “I feel that too. And I don’t really know how a dark twin works. I’ve heard that it’s when the one egg splits, and instead of it separating into two even halves, with both positive and negative forces, one twin gets all the light and one gets all the dark.”

“Which would be bad,” said Sophie.

“Not irredeemable,” said Petra. “Not one hundred percent inevitable, but often bad and always a struggle.”

Ouida looked up at her. “You just moved her into your house.”

“I know. And I’m praying I’m wrong. Most likely I am,” said Petra. “But can you help me, keep an eye on her, get close to her, try to pick up on anything?”

Ouida nodded, looking upset.

“All right,” said Sophie. “I’ll try.”

“Thanks. And whatever happens, do not tell anyone else about this. No one. Understood?”

Sophie and Ouida nodded, then the three of them sat lost in thought. The only sound was the rhythmic click of the ceiling fan, going around.

O
n Saturday Clio and I did errands together, hitting the plant store, returning a pair of shoes. I looked out the car window, still learning how New Orleans looked and smelled and felt. Huge live-oak trees lined St. Charles Avenue, which was where the main streetcar line ran. The tree branches almost met over the center of the median, making an incredibly green, lush tunnel to drive through. Dad would have loved it. Maybe he’d seen it before.

Dad. I still missed him so much. Despite everything that had happened, there were a hundred times every day when I turned to say something to him, wanted to ask him something, wondered when he would be home for dinner.

He hadn’t looked much like me. His hair had been dark, but mine was darker. He’d had brown eyes. But he’d felt so totally mine, my blood father, the one constant in my life since I was born. Realizing all over again that Clio had never known him was sad. I decided I would make her a little scrapbook, with pictures of him in it, and I would write about him in the pages so she would know him.

“Well, can you choose just one thing to work with?” I asked Clio.

It was almost dinnertime, and we were sitting at the kitchen table. Petra—I still didn’t call her Nan; it felt too strange—hadn’t come home yet.

“Yeah,” she said. “A lot of people have a favorite assortment of materials to work with, like if they have a special affinity for herbs or crystals or metals. And you can do powerful spells with just those. But Nan always said that the best spells, the strongest ones, are balanced, with elements of each. Though there are also some spells that specifically don’t need crystals or herbs or candles or whatever.”

“And you know everything about all this?” I felt dismayed by how ignorant I was, how much I had to learn.

Clio grinned. “Not everything. Talking to you helps me realize how much I actually do know. But I’ve been studying this since I was really little. You’ll catch up.”

This was so depressing. “It’s like every plant in the world has some use.” I groaned. “How can I learn them all? I mean,
trig
is too much for me.”

“Me too,” Clio said. “But with magickal things, it’s like any other subject—you learn it a little bit at a time. And yes, many, many plants in the world can be put to some kind of magickal use or have certain attributes. Pretty much everything does. Every grain of sand, every drop of rain, blah, blah, blah. Magick is in everything, yours for the taking. And then of course, certain human-made objects can also be very powerful.”

“Uh-huh,” I said glumly. “Like, give me a plant example.”

Clio looked around, thinking. “Okay, something easy and common. Holly.”

“Like we have outside? Christmas holly?”

“Actually, we call it Soliver holly,” Clio told me. “Soliver is our winter holiday. In Wicca it’s called Yule. Yule log, et cetera. At roughly the same time, the Christians have Christmas. Jews have Hanukkah.”

“I’m a Christian, sort of,” I said. “We don’t have Christmas?” This was not good news.

Clio looked at me like I was an idiot. “We have Soliver,” she said patiently. “It’s a lot of fun. It’ll be okay. Very festive. Do you want to know about holly or not?”

I sighed. “Tell me.”

“Okay, holly.” Clio looked at the ceiling, thinking. “The broad Latin name is
ilex
. You learn the Latin name because it’ll be the same in most languages. It’s the scientific name and helps you be precise. Then you have its true name, which for the kind of holly we have outside, but not for other types, is
bestgriel
. You use its true name in some kinds of magick. It’s considered a masculine plant, not because it actually has a gender, though it does, but because its properties align along the masculine scale. The element associated with holly is fire, our element. Which would make it a bit more effective or appropriate for us than for someone whose element is something else. Mars is the planet associated with it, so certain spells can take Mars’s orbit or properties into account. And mostly, holly is used for protection, all sorts of protection. And good luck. At Soliver we decorate the house with it, and it helps us have good luck in the coming year.”

Until now, my main knowledge about holly had been “prickers.” “And you know this kind of info about a lot of plants?”

“I better. It’s going to be a big part of my rite of ascension.”

I breathed out. “So maybe when I’m thirty.”

“Maybe.” Clio looked smug, but not in a mean way. I decided to change the subject.

“You know who’s good-looking? Kevin LaTour.”

“Sylvie’s friend?” Clio considered it. “Yeah. He is. You hung out with him the other day, right?”

“And Sylvie and Claude. Kevin seems nice, too.”

“I’ve never talked to him.” She looked at me speculatively. “Are you… interested in him?”

There it was again. The unspoken gulf between us. Luc. I hadn’t told her a lot of how I felt about him, and she had her secrets too, I was sure. They’d probably even slept together, but I didn’t let myself think about it, because it made me feel sick.

Anyway, Luc was behind me. I was moving on, facing the future. A future without him.

“
Interested
is a strong word,” I said cautiously. “I’ve just noticed that he’s nice and also really good-looking.”

“Yeah. Well, more power to you if you like Kevin.”

I looked into her eyes, identical to mine, as if I might see what she was thinking behind them. Was she hoping I would forget about Luc? Did she still want him? I looked away.

I shrugged. “We’ll see.”

We worked silently for a few minutes, each with her own thoughts.

“Do you think there’s something wrong with me?” I hadn’t meant to ask the question, but it just popped out.

“In a general sense or just your clothes?”

I made a face at her, and she smirked. “I mean my magick. Is it just because I have no idea what I’m doing? Do spells go that wrong very often?”

“No. Hardly at all that I’ve heard of,” said Clio, more seriously. “I mean, maybe they won’t work or they’ll work but in a skewed way. But getting knocked out of a circle? Doesn’t happen.”

“So it’s just me, then. Something about me.” That idea upset me, even though I still hadn’t totally embraced
Bonne Magic
as a way of life.

“Hmm,” said Clio, looking at me.

“What?”

“I just remembered a spell I heard of once,” Clio said thoughtfully. “It was, like, to see someone’s aura. I mean, during a circle, you can usually see everyone’s auras, and some people can see them on other people all the time, just walking around. But I remember reading about a
spell where it reveals a person’s inner state, like an x-ray of your soul. Sort of. I remember thinking it was pointless because people usually know their inner state and express it if it’s good—if it’s bad, they wouldn’t do the spell in the first place and let anyone see.”

“Uh-huh,” I said. “You mean you want to do that with me? Nan said we shouldn’t—”

“Nan said we shouldn’t try any twin-magick magick,” said Clio, standing up and heading to the workroom. “But this would be more diagnostic. Besides, we’ll do it outside so we won’t get thrown into a wall. Your eye’s finally better—don’t want to do
that again
.”