A Lost Witch (A Modern Witch Series: Book 7) (11 page)

“You get all the easy ones.”  He leaned back, eating a couple of the fries that sat beside the last remnants of a burger.  And snickered as he followed her gaze.  “Don’t worry, I already ordered you one.  With extra onions.”

Whatever.  She only made a face with him.  Realtors didn’t eat onions while on duty and he knew it. 

His finger navigated one last droopy fry through a lonely streak of ketchup.  “So she knows she’s a witch now.”

For whatever that was worth.  “Magic probably sounds better than mental illness.”

His breath came out in a huff.  “Yeah.”

She stared at her coffee and joined him in the momentary, fervent wish that Hannah lit random fires or caused thunderstorms in her sleep.  Those, Witch Central could handle in a cakewalk.  And they didn’t fill mind-witch nights with recurring dreams. 

Lauren pushed those thoughts away.  Compartmentalize.  “What if we can’t help her?”

“We’ve managed precog before.”

The words would be easier to take at face value if he wasn’t mentally gritting his teeth.  Lauren smiled in thanks as her burger arrived, and then pushed some fries Jamie’s way.  Maybe they’d help the truth go down.  “Not like hers.  Not that strong.”

He sighed and dunked them morosely in her ketchup.  “What did you learn?”

With Hannah’s permission, Dr. Max had been more forthcoming this visit.  “The episodes started when she turned thirteen.  Only a couple that first year.”

Jamie nodded grimly.  “Puberty.  That’s when they usually hit, especially for girls.”

Dammit, they couldn’t walk into this fight with sad-sack witches.  “Don’t give up on her before we start, okay?” 

Fire hit his eyes—and then a good dose of self-recrimination.  “Sorry.  I’m used to being the guy with this annoying little talent that I get to whine about.  I’ll grow up now.”

It was a damn scary little talent, but she needed his fire.  “Her attacks, as she calls them, got a lot worse a couple of years later.  Her parents were having some marital issues, her older brother left home for college.  Then she had a seizure in the hallway at school while screaming the name of the captain of the soccer team.”

Compassion had joined fire now.  “What did she see?”

“Dr. Max says she has no memory of any of it.”  Lauren drained her coffee cup.  “The EMTs gave her some kind of sedative that sometimes affects short-term recall.  But the soccer player was in a car accident two days later.  Died.”

“Ah, hell.”

Lauren studied at his face and knew it was a look Hannah needed to see.  Deep empathy from someone who really knew.  “I think it’s time for your help.”

“You have it.  Anything—you know that.”

“I’m going back after lunch.  Come see her.”  This was the making-stuff-up-as-you-went-along part of the plan.  They hadn’t intended to introduce anyone new.

“I don’t have your mind skills.”  Jamie grimaced.  “Or any ability to control precog.  Hers or mine.”

Crap—that was a wrinkle she hadn’t considered.  “You think hers could set yours off?”

“Like, is it contagious?”  He shrugged, contemplating the idea.  “No clue.  Mom used to see stuff when I didn’t, so maybe not.”

Working with a sample size of two really sucked.  “Hannah didn’t have an episode today.  So long as she avoided looking at us, it seemed fine.”  They’d kept it short, though, and Hannah had never truly relaxed, even while she’d been drinking up Tabitha’s TLC.

“You were linked?”

“Yeah.”  Very gingerly.  “I didn’t feel anything like what hit her last time.”  And she’d been looking.  Hard.  “And touch is okay.”

His eyebrow rose. “I thought that was a lot later on the agenda.”  They’d made a very careful list of variables to test, one measured step at a time.

“Tab forgot.”  No, that wasn’t right.  The older woman had made a snap judgment, built on a lifetime of skill and instinct and compassion.  “Plan changed on the fly.”  Hardly a new thing in Witch Central.

“Tab’s not the only one with rock-solid instincts.”  Jamie reached for her fries, mind suddenly settled.  “If you think me being there will help, I’ll come.  Maybe bring Dev, too, in case you need to peel me off the sidewalk.”

One Sullivan brother loose in Chrysalis House was plenty.  “We’ll rig a bat signal.  Port you out that way if we need to.”

Jamie’s eyebrow was up again.

Lauren closed her eyes and told the truth.  “It hurts in there.  It’s a really nice place and everything, but…”

“Ah.”  The guy across from her nodded.  “And Dev’s the softest of all of us.”

It was pretty cool to come from a family that knew that.  Lauren smiled, grateful.  “You’re not exactly hard and crusty.”

Jamie snorted and slid down a little deeper in the booth, Sullivan relaxation mode finally kicking in.  “Neither is a certain realtor I know.”

She picked up her burger.  “Don’t let it get around.”

He only grinned.  And snagged the last of her fries.

-o0o-

They were back.  She could feel the disturbance in the air—strangers very rarely entered the closed wing of Chrysalis House.  Mason fluttered by, muttering about aliens. 

He wasn’t far wrong.

Hannah kept up the rhythm of shuttle and reed, but her eyes weren’t seeing the silken threads any longer. 
Witches
.  People with magic who maybe held the key to understanding the awful thing that had invaded and taken away her life.  Her hands worked faster now, building courage.

The footsteps were different than she expected.  Louder.

I brought you a visitor,
sent Lauren from the hallway. 
Okay if we come in?  Tabitha’s going to stay with Dr. Max in the observation room.  Keep the variables down.

She felt entirely like a lab rat, and she hated that feeling.  Hannah picked up a second color for her shuttle.  Time to stop being such a scared little mouse.  “So witches are scientists, huh?”

“Yup.”  A strange male voice came from her left.  “And gamers and artists and bakers and realtors.  Pretty much all the normal things.”

She smiled, liking the sound of him.  “Normal’s a swear word in these parts.”

“In my mom’s house, too.  You’d like her.  And I’m pretty sure she’d go nuts over that thing you’re weaving.”

It was only a sample square—an excuse to keep her hands busy.  “Does your mom like to do crafts?”  This was the strangest conversation ever. 

The man behind her snorted.  “I’m sorry.  Mom isn’t really huge on manners either, but we do usually manage to get as far as introducing ourselves.  I’m Jamie.”

That was one of the two names tattooed on her soul.  “You have it.  This magic that I have.”

“Yeah.”  He sounded unimpressed.  “Sucks, doesn’t it?”

Hannah’s silk lines swam hazily, unhinged by breezy understanding from a stranger.

“Ah, shit.”  He moved closer now.  “It’s got you locked up in this place, so I guess it’s a lot worse than sucky, huh?”

“You, um—” One of her kind was in the house.  She was damn well going to find the words.  “You live out there?  With other people?”

“Yeah.”  She could hear the smile in his voice—and the limitless empathy.  “I’m married to Nat.  She’s way smarter than I am and she can turn into a human pretzel and she makes me eat yogurt and stuff.  And we have a little girl, Kenna.”

Lauren laughed.  “Kenna’s smarter than he is, too.”

They sounded like brother and sister.  A world of family and friends and normal.  “You’re very lucky.”

His breath blew out, hard.  “Stupid lucky.  It could be me sitting in that chair, and I wouldn’t be creating gorgeous art and smiling at some realtor’s bad jokes.  We’re going to get you out of here, Hannah.  I’m sure I’m not supposed to promise that, but I’m saying it anyhow.”

He sounded like the kind of guy who kept his promises.  “I don’t suppose you have some kind of magic switch that can turn this precog thing off.”

“No.  But we’re really good at making shit up.”

Hannah grinned over at the observation screen.  Dr. Max would be laughing right about now—he was a big fan of pithy honesty.  “Okay, then.  What’s the first shit we’re going to try?” 

-o0o-

Oh, hell.

Jamie felt his fingers curling into fists.  She was strong and fragile and tortured and funny and all the things that made his knees knock.  And conversation wasn’t going to get them anywhere fast.  There was only one way to figure out how to stop Hannah’s attacks.

They had to see one, and sitting here quivering wasn’t going to change that.

He looked over at Lauren. 
Get your barriers up.  Tight.  And watch.

Not a chance.
  Her response was instant and furious. 

Stand down.  I’m going to ask.
 Even though it made him sick to his stomach. 
But you know what she’s going to say.

He could see her tangling with it. 
I’ll link with her.  We kept it at bay last time.

Not enough so she could leave this place.
  The churning in his belly got worse. 
And I can’t see like you can.  I need you to watch, but with enough distance that you don’t just get pulled under by what she’s feeling.

You want me to freaking watch?  While both of you go under that maelstrom?

Hell hath no fury like a pissed-off realtor. 
I’ll try to stay out of the way. 
It wasn’t a lie—he would try.

Like hell you will. 

He tried to collect his brains and his guts—he was going to need all of both, very shortly. 
We need data, sister mine.  And you’re the best one to collect it.

It was the sister thing.  A whole bunch of stuff inside Lauren wobbled, and then righted. 
Okay.  Ask her. 
A pause, and a last wobble. 
And I love you too.

He was going to be holding very tight to that for the next few minutes.  Jamie girded his loins and looked over at the woman on the loom. 

She smiled down at her weaving.  “You two done talking to yourselves yet?”

His snicker caught him by surprise.  “Pretty smart for a baby witch, are you?”

Hannah’s grin was real this time.  “I’m used to it.  Lots of people around here have conversations in their head.”

Yeah.  And anyone who’d held on to a sense of humor for twelve years in this place deserved to get the heck out.  He didn’t sugarcoat it—she’d earned that, too.  “We need to see one of your attacks.”

She didn’t hesitate.  Just started sliding her stick through the loom threads again.  “I figured.”

He could feel her fear—and her shame.  The first pained him.  The second nearly undid him.  And pulled words out that he’d never planned to say.  “I know what it’s like.  To have your brain kidnapped.”

Her hands jerked on the loom.

He kept going.  “To feel all that crap flooding in, and not know if it will ever leave.  If you’ll ever get to be you again.”

Her knuckles were white now.  But the shame had gone.

Jamie gulped.  Checked in with Lauren.  And sat down a few feet from Hannah’s loom.  “When you’re ready, I want you to look at me.”

He heard her rasping breath.  Saw her head begin to move.  Noticed that her eyes were a really pretty blue.

And then the world shredded into tiny, ragged bits and blue didn’t matter anymore.

-o0o-

It was the saddest, scariest, most deeply human thing Lauren had ever witnessed.

Two people, drowning in a blaze of images and visions and swarming magic.

With nothing touching except for their eyes.

It took everything she had not to jump in with them.  Not to try to throw a flotation device, however puny and inadequate. 

Instead, she did as the man tottering on his chair had asked.  And watched.

Hannah’s brain literally imploded.  Neural channels unplugged and rerouted, creating a terrible, alien road for the massive, charging surges of energy.  Ripping, tearing at the landscape that was Hannah Kendrick.

No.  That was how it felt to
Hannah.
 Lauren yanked her barriers tighter, shutting out the emotional hurricane.  Watch.  Observe.

The pulsing light in Jamie’s brain was far less intense—and it still had him white and trembling.

Look.  At.  Her.
 Three words, squeezed out through mental lava.
 I’m okay.

Like hell he was.  But none of this was worth anything if she didn’t learn something.  Fingernails carving trenches in her palms, Lauren looked again at the net of light seething in Hannah’s head. 

A living thing, and not like anything she’d ever seen.  Mind magic, net magic, elementals—nothing looked like this.  Alien.

There wasn’t much time.  Three minds, losing hold on consciousness.  And one doctor, barricading the door in the name of science.

Science.  Laws, principles.  Magic had principles.  It came from something, it went somewhere.  Lauren squinted her mental eyes, calling on her last reserves.  So many loops.  No end.

And then she saw it.  The place where magic began.  A thick loop that gave birth to all the rest.  And discovered that when a witch finally had a purpose, sometimes the last reserves weren’t really the end. 

Energy pounded into her channels, fueled by fury and justice and the fierce need to land a punch.  Just one.  She shaped a bolt and hoped like hell Jamie was still awake.

Am.  Give it hell.
 

She felt him brace—and fired, straight at the primary loop.  Pure mental hellfire.  It snapped out like a whip, curling around the base of the blazing monstrosity and cutting off access to the woman it tortured.

Their weaving witch’s brain shuddered—and then the lights went out.  Lauren dove for anything still alive in the dark mental shell.  And heard a single, drumming, victorious thought. 

I am Hannah Kendrick.

They’d won.

Barely conscious, Lauren leaned back against the wall.  Fed the magical clamp every last drip of power clinging to the walls of her empty tank.  And rejoiced.  They’d found a way to stop it.

Hannah would be able to leave now.

Chapter 9