The Lost Enchantress (16 page)

“Like what?”

“Well, naturally something containing her blood or a lock of her hair would work best, but anything tied to her will do . . . a favorite book . . . a piece of clothing.” The irony of him explaining elementary magic to her wasn’t lost on Hazard.

“I can think of a dozen things,” she told him, “but they’re all at home.”

“Maybe there’s something in your car?”

“No. Wait . . .” From beneath her sweater, she pulled out a teardrop-shaped gem on a thin gold chain. A deep pink gem, Hazard noted.

“It’s a special kind of rose quartz known as the Morning Star.” She held it so he could see the delicate white star nature had embedded within. “Rory gave it to me because she’s named after Aurora, the goddess of dawn. I wear it all the time.”

“That should do. The map is upstairs in my study. We can work there. The turret is a magical hot spot. Has to do with ley lines and energy currents and—”

“No. I can’t . . . I’d rather do it down here.”

He nodded, asking none of the questions brought to mind by her sharp tone and suddenly rigid posture. “All right. I’ll fetch the map and meet you at the kitchen table.” He pointed. “The kitchen is right through—”

“I know,” she said, already moving in that direction.

When he returned with the map a few minutes later, she was standing at the kitchen sink, staring out at the backyard with a look of consternation.

“Are you worried because the sun has set?” he asked.

She didn’t turning around. “No. I was just looking at your garden.”

“I wouldn’t call that mess of weeds and stalks and overgrown paths a garden, but I guess it once was.”

“You’d be surprised,” she said softly, almost wistfully, and then whipped around to face him. “I mean you’d be surprised what a little time and elbow grease could do out there.”

“Do you like to garden?” he asked, wanting to know more about her.

“Me?” She laughed. “No. My grandmother is the gardener in our family.” She looked at the map open on the table and folded her arms tightly across her chest.

“You can do this,” he told her.

“That’s what I’m afraid of. Let’s just get on with it before I change my mind.”

Hazard handed her a cardboard canister of salt from the cupboard behind him.

“Salt?”

“For casting the circle,” he explained. “You have done that before?”

If she detected any wryness in his tone she didn’t let on.

“Yes, but not with salt.”

He shrugged. “Salt of the earth, to set your parameters . . . assuming she’s still in the earthly realm.”

“Don’t say that. Don’t even think it.”

“Sorry. I’m sure she is. Our other option would be to use actual earth, but that’s harder to clean up.” He pulled one bleached oak chair out from the table. “Once you close the circle, you sit here. You’ll need to take off your necklace so you can hold it suspended over the map and move it in a circular pattern, slowly, starting at the center.”

“And then?” Eve prompted when he didn’t say anything else.

“And then you call forth energy from wherever it is you call it from and focus it on connecting with Rory. And wait for your morning star to show you where she is at that instant.”

“I thought scrying was for seeing into the future.”

“It’s for seeing beyond what you’re able to see with your senses.”

He extended his arm in a silent invitation for her to begin and then stepped back so that he was outside the circle she was casting. She spoke quietly as she moved around the table, and with a gentle rhythm that made it seem as if her words were sliding over his skin and erasing all the tension inside him.

“I close this circle with pure intent, with hopeful heart and malice toward none.”

There was a subtle whoosh of air as the circle closed. It was different from the click he heard when Taggart cast a circle. Quieter, but somehow more forceful.

He looked on in silence as she sat and followed his instructions exactly. He counted only three slow circles before her arm jerked and there was another much louder whoosh of air; this one he felt as well as heard. It caught him dead center, just above his belt, carried him back ten feet and slammed him hard against the kitchen counter. Hard enough to make his knees buckle and force him to grab for the countertop with both hands. As soon as he’d stopped himself from landing on his ass, he swung his gaze to Eve.

Her hair looked windblown, but she’d kept her seat and he could see the chain still gripped in her fist.

“Oh my God, Hazard,” she exclaimed. “It worked.”

“I
f you’re upset about your map, I’d be glad to replace it.” Hazard didn’t reply. His attention remained fixed on the road ahead and a frown fixed on his face, the way it had been since they’d gotten into his car a few minutes earlier.

Eve suddenly remembered his claim to be a collector of unique treasures and her heart sank a little. “Unless it was a rare, one-of-a-kind, irreplaceable edition. Please tell me it’s not irreplaceable.”

“It’s not irreplaceable and I’m not upset about it.”

“You sound upset. I already promised to have your kitchen table refinished or whatever it will take to get rid of the scorch marks.”

“I told you that’s not necessary. I really don’t care about the map or the table.”

“Then what
are
you upset about?”

“I’m not upset. I’m . . .”

“Peeved?” she suggested while he searched for the right word. “Aggravated? Annoyed? Sorry you offered to help me?”

He glanced sideways at her and there might have been a flicker of amusement beneath the somber brooding. “Thinking. I’m thinking about what just happened. I’ve seen scrying before but never anything close to the show you put on.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean it’s the first time I’ve ever been blown across the bloody room or seen a hole burned straight through the map to what’s under it.”

“Oh.” She hesitated, torn between wanting to know more and wanting to forget it happened. This time the magic hadn’t been accidental, or a surprise. It had been a matter of choice, her choice, and the fact she’d done it only because she was desperate didn’t ease her misgivings. She would deal with that later, she decided; for now curiosity won out. “What usually happens when someone scrys?”

“It takes longer for one thing. Whoever’s doing it has to keep moving the object over the map until it eventually connects with the right spot and touches down . . . gently and without any sparks or smoke.”

“Oh,” she said again. “Why do you suppose it was different this time?”

“Obviously there was a lot more power there than the circle—or the room—could hold. But then, you already know that since you were the one generating it.”

“Not really,” she protested. “Not intentionally. All I did was follow your instructions.”

She didn’t have to turn her head or see the look on his face to know he didn’t believe her; she could feel his suspicion flowing like hot lava.

“Then how would you explain it?” he challenged.

“I can’t,” she admitted. “You said yourself things have been happening that don’t make sense.”

“Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it all makes perfect sense . . . just not any kind I understand.” He took a right onto Angel Street and slanted a speculative glance her way. “Yet.”

“Well, speaking for myself, I don’t need to understand it as long as it helps with the only thing that matters right now . . . finding Rory.”

“And the pendant,” he reminded her.

“Of course.” She managed a casual that-goes-without-saying shrug to hide the fact that she was so focused on Rory the pendant had slipped her mind.

If her power scrying had gotten it right, they were about to find Rory at Prospect Terrace, a small park not too far away, though with traffic crawling from red light to red light, it felt to Eve like they were driving cross country. Hazard had followed her out of the house as if it was understood he’d be going with her, and had taken her firmly by the elbow and steered her to his car as if it was also understood he would be doing the driving. After her initial surprise Eve just accepted the fact that she was glad to have his company—even if he was only there to protect his would-be investment in the pendant—and grateful to be cocooned in the quiet luxury of his car, with its new-car smell and cushy leather seats and subtly glowing, gadget-laden dash. If she wasn’t anxious enough to crawl out of her skin any second, she might have settled in and enjoyed the drive. Instead, she sat leaning forward, hands fisted, giving directions he didn’t seem to need.

Prospect Terrace was in the area of the city known as College Hill because there were several colleges nearby. It was also within walking distance of Braxton Academy, the private school Rory attended, and as Hazard pulled to the curb and parked, Eve had to wonder if maybe Rory was just hanging out with friends and the pendant’s disappearance had nothing to do with her. Maybe she’d been too quick to link the two. Maybe whoever said there are no coincidences was wrong and all of it—Rory, the pendant, the house—was just one big convoluted coincidence. That still didn’t explain what had happened to the pendant, of course, but first things first.

She was out of the car before the engine shut off and scanning the stretch of grass about a city block wide and half as deep. There wasn’t a lot to see, only a scattering of benches and tall, old shade trees and a view of downtown. Because the park was built on a steep incline, a waist-high black iron fence ran along the back of it to prevent someone from tumbling thirty or so feet of rocky, brush-covered terrain to the street below. On a platform extending beyond the fence were a granite arch and a towering statue of Roger Williams, gazing out over the land he’d founded.

At first the park appeared to be deserted, and disappointment formed a lump at the back of Eve’s throat that made it hurt to swallow. Then she ventured down one of the paths to where there were no trees blocking her view and she saw someone silhouetted against the twilight sky. Rory . . . Eve recognized the way she stood and held her head, and she started running.

Rory wasn’t alone. There was a boy with her, a tall, lanky kid straddling a ten-speed bike. At the sound of footsteps running toward them in the darkness they stiffened and turned their heads to look in her direction. It was dark away from the streetlights, so Eve was almost beside them before Rory realized it was her. Immediately her eyes went wide with surprise bordering on horror and her jaw clenched; it was the classic how-could-you-do-this-to-me expression of a teenager unexpectedly confronted by a parent—or reasonable facsimile—in public.

“Eve! What are you doing here?”

Rory didn’t sound happy. Eve didn’t care. In fact, she hardly noticed. She was too busy being relieved and overjoyed to see that she wasn’t bound and gagged or under attack by spinning blue lasers or worse. Like a new mother counting her baby’s fingers and toes, Eve did a quick inventory: two arms, two legs, head still attached and operational. Nothing missing or bleeding. Only when she was certain Rory was all right did she remember how upset she was with her.

“Me? You want to know what I’m doing here. Do you have any idea how worr—”

“I gotta bolt,” said the kid on the bike just as Eve was warming up. He deftly wheeled around her to get back on the paved walk. “See ya, Rory.”

“Toby, wait.”

But Toby didn’t wait, and for just a second Rory looked exactly as she had when she was five and the string attached to her balloon slipped through her fingers and the balloon floated away . . . a little surprised, a little wistful, her full bottom lip trembling almost imperceptibly. She’d watched until the balloon was out of sight; then she’d blinked and put her chin up and got on with her life. Now that she was older and more self-conscious, she threw in a casual head toss that sent her long dark brown hair sailing over her shoulder and revealed the trio of small shining silver studs in her left ear, a sun, a moon and a star.

As soon as the kid took off, Hazard stepped from the shadows close beside her. “Shall I bring the boy back?” he asked.

Eve shook her head. She had no doubt he could catch the kid, but she was less certain about what he’d do with him once he had. As far as she knew, whoever Toby was, he hadn’t done anything to merit finding out.

“Bye,” Rory called after him. “Don’t forget about Thursday night.”

“I’ll be there,” he called over his shoulder.

“Be where?” Eve asked. “What’s Thursday night? Rory, who was that?”

“Toby.”

“Toby who? And what were you thinking coming here alone with him at this time of night?”

“Seven thirty?” Rory countered, rolling her eyes as only a fifteen-year-old can.

Seven thirty? It had to be later than that. Eve checked her watch and frowned. It sure felt later. And time wasn’t the issue anyway.

“I don’t care what time it is,” she told her niece. “I still want to know what you were doing here alone with him and how you know him . . . and why he was in such a hurry to take off the minute he saw me.”

“Probably to avoid the inquisition,” Rory retorted. “God, Eve, Gestapo much?”

“Don’t be a wiseass. You don’t want me to ask questions? Don’t take off without telling me or calling or leaving a note so I know where to find you. You turned your cell phone off, for heaven’s sake. What if I’d needed you for some reason?”

“Is that why you’re here? Because you need me for some reason?”

“That’s not the point.”

“It never is,” Rory retorted, sounding exasperated. “You know as well as I do that if I were home now I’d just be sitting around by myself because Mom’s away and Grand had to go to her . . .” She stopped and waved her hand in the air. “Her whatever. And you always work late on Monday nights.”

“Not always,” Eve muttered.