The Reluctant Goddess (The Montgomery Chronicles Book 2) (6 page)

Well, that wasn’t going to happen, was it?
 

I decided to revert to my other problem.
 

“I’m a vampire, but I had a period. I’m a vampire, but I’m hungry for food all the time. I’m a vampire, but I can function in daylight just fine.”
 

I turned my head and looked at her. “So what am I? Not a Pranic vampire because I don’t feed off people’s energies. What?”
 

"You will not let up until you're the death of me, will you? A fitting end, perhaps, since I defied everyone to protect you. They all said I was a fool.”
 

She scowled at me fiercely. I stared right back. Words couldn't affect me anymore. I needed information and I didn't have time to feel pity or compassion or any of those other softer emotions that might end up getting us both killed.

“I don’t know what you are, Marcie.” She reached out and grabbed the silver pendant around my neck, holding the Celtic symbol against her palm. “I gave this to you when I thought it would do some good. I was a fool there, too.”
 

“Why, did you put a spell on the pendant? Something to make me ignore vampires?”
 

I was trying to remember if I’d worn it the night I met Doug.
 

She smiled that odd smile again.
 

Since I was a little girl, my grandmother had arranged her white hair in a coronet around her head. Her pure white hair was thick and long and probably a source of vanity.
 

Now she reached up and pulled out a silver bobby pin, one of those old fashioned things with the rubber tips. As I watched, she pulled the tip off one end and used it to pry the pendant apart.
 

I didn’t even know it could be separated.
 

“I made it to protect you against vampires.”
 

“It would have been nice to know about it. Why didn’t you tell me?”
 

She looked over at me. “I thought you were free of your mother’s fixation. You never evinced an interest in vampires to my knowledge. Why did you start?”
 

“It was once,” I said, annoyed.
 

She gave me a look but didn’t answer. A moment later, she pried the two halves apart and I looked at the inside of the pendant I’d worn for years. It took me a minute to figure out that what I was seeing was a small needle, folded to fit inside the diameter of the pendant.

“What is that?”
 

“If you press the outside like this,” she said, “the needle will pop up.” She pressed a spot on the pendant and the needle stood straight up.
 

“What is it?”
 

“Something to protect you from vampires.”
 

“What, no holy water?”
 

“You know, as well as I do, that holy water is just a myth. Nor are crosses or religious artifacts of any use against vampires. You’d be better served to use your common sense.”
 

She was right. In Orientation, I’d learned that most of what I knew about vampires was wrong, the result of Hollywood myths and novelists’ imaginations.
 

“Push this into a vampire’s skin.”

"And it will kill him?" I asked in surprise.

She didn't even kill spiders. How low on the totem pole do you have to be to rank beneath a spider?

"It will make them feel numb for a number of days," she said, thereby reinstating my faith in my grandmother. “But initially, it will incapacitate him, giving you a chance to escape.”
 

I wished I’d known about the pendant the night Maddock gave me a date rape drug.
 

"Have you ever killed a vampire?" I asked, thinking of my stepfather. Had she and the coven actually been responsible for his "accident"? Had my mother been right?

"Marcie, sometimes there are questions for which there are no answers."

"Which means you’re not going to tell me."

She didn't respond.

“Is it poisonous to me?”
 

“I don't know," she said, staring down at the needle. She closed both halves and I wrapped my hand around the pendant, almost daring myself to touch it.
 

I didn’t know whether to keep wearing it or give it back to her. On one hand, if I was accosted by Maddock again, I might need it, but how safe was it? Could I stick myself and end up a drooling pile of Marcie?
 

“Come inside,” Nonnie said. “We’ll have tea.”
 

“Is it safe?”

We exchanged a long look. My grandmother’s face was solemn, the expression one of sorrow.
 

I wanted to get sick again and it wasn’t the potion this time.

C
HAPTER
S
IX

The dog barks, but the caravan moves on

Nonnie turned and led the way to the back door of her house. I hesitated at the stones, but after a quick look at her, I stepped over them, Charlie following me. He’d been a perfect dog up until then, sitting at my side, ignoring the squirrel chittering at him from the fence, and paying no attention to the butterflies flitting near the bushes.
 

We followed my grandmother up the three steps to the back porch.
 

I hesitated at the threshold, wondering if I was going to be zapped. Nonnie had always been my bulwark, my supporter, and the one person in the world I trusted.

Not anymore.

I raised one foot, cautiously placing it on the other side of the threshold. I didn't feel any humming at all, no incipient headache. I wasn't feeling any different from the countless times I’d come into the porch as a child.
 

She’d erected a clothes line from one end of the long porch to the other to use when the spirit moved her. Ever since she'd gotten a new dryer, the spirit evidently didn’t move her all that much. She used to say that things smelled so much better when they were dried outdoors and never commented on the stiff, razor like towels or the sheets with the odor of mildew.
 

A stack of bath mats were piled in front of a green, old fashioned metal chair, the kind that bounced when you sat in it.
 

My grandmother changed bath mats like you changed underwear. I think she had a different set for every day of the week, the colors ranging from bright yellows to rich burgundies that worked well in both stark white bathrooms. Next to the chair was a brand new washer and dryer with cockpit like controls.
 

Large Amazon boxes were piled in the corner of one side of the porch. I wondered if she was saving those to return merchandise to the online retailer or if she simply didn't like breaking down boxes.
 

We entered the kitchen, but I waited until Nonnie waved me toward the table before going to sit at my usual place, Charlie flopping to the floor beside me.

The wall was to my back, the window overlooking the backyard to my right. Directly to my left was the door to the dining room used only during holidays. Ahead of me was the long kitchen stretching the length of the house. At the end of the room was a staircase to the second and third floors. One day Nonnie might find it difficult to mount the steps, but I couldn't imagine her living anywhere but here.

How many times had I sat here on the banquette against the wall, staring through the filmy white lace curtains at the backyard, feeling peaceful, calm, and at home?

Everything was the same except for the feelings. Any warmth had been replaced by anxiety and a touch of fear. I wasn't a fool, after all. I knew of at least twelve women who weren't kindly disposed of me. And one mother.
 

"If you’re a witch, can you be a Christian?"

My grandmother attended church every Sunday, was a member of the Ladies Guild, and occasionally taught Sunday school.

She glanced at me from her position in front of her electric kettle. She was making tea as she always did. Summer or winter, Nonnie enjoyed her hot tea. Never the iced variety, though.
 

"How can I not believe in God knowing what I do?"

"Don't witches also believe in a goddess?"

She brought the teapot to the table along with the mugs, sugar and lemon.
 

"You didn't come here to ask about my faith, Marcie,” she said.

Her lips were pursed, her eyes narrowed. The same look I’d been given when I did something wrong as a child. I'm not talking a small infraction, either. I only got that look when I had done something like steal a pack of gum from Aunt Susan's purse. I had been trotted in front of Susan, made to apologize profusely and offer my services for an entire day.

Susan had taken advantage of the situation. I'd had to vacuum and wash her car. The washing hadn’t been a problem because although the Cadillac was huge, the job went quickly. But Susan was a packrat, holding onto everything rather than throw it away or, God forbid, litter. So she left it in her car.
 

I found junk mail from two years earlier under the passenger’s seat. I also discovered gum wrappers, old gum wrapped in bits of tissue, clumped up wadded napkins from a fast food place, the desiccated remnants of french fries, and one mummified maraschino cherry.
 

Aunt Susan was also a slob.

But I had gone past the age of doing penance for my misdeeds. Besides, all I'd done was ask a question.

"Consider this a job interview," I said. “Perhaps I'm interested in becoming a witch."

"You can't."

As an answer, it lacked a little something, like an explanation.

"Why can't I?”
 

I didn’t want to be a witch, but I felt like being argumentative. Childish, I know.
 

“My mother has witch blood. You’re a witch, unless you aren’t my grandmother after all.”
 

I had her ears and her funny little earlobes. I also had her hairline with the widow’s peak. Perhaps I even had her obstinacy.

"You can't be a witch because you’re a vampire. They’re in direct opposition. It is like thinking you can be both a lioness and a gazelle."

"Why do I have the feeling I’m the gazelle in this instance?”
 

She sat, poured a cup of tea for me first, pushing it across the table, the sound of earthenware against painted wood comforting and familiar. I dumped three large spoonfuls of sugar and a squirt of lemon into it, taking my time to stir, concentrating on the little whirlpool I’d created in the cup.

She sipped her tea and studied the surface of the cracked white paint of the table.

“I know nothing of vampire lore or even their legends. I don’t know of this Pranic vampire you mentioned. Nor have I ever heard of anyone like you. All I can tell you is that from your birth you’ve been the essence of magic.”

"I'm not magical."

“No? You are the essence of magic. You should not exist, but you do. You violate every natural law." She sighed. “And now you violate every vampire law.”
 

 
I put my cup down, folded my hands on top of the table, and studied her.
 

"Did you tell your coven about me?"

"I have shared certain facts with my sisters of the faith, yes."

“Are they coming after me?”
 

“Do you pose a danger to us?” she asked.

“Not that I know of. Not on purpose.”

“Then we shall not bother you.”
 

She stretched her hand across the table. Dark purple veins wriggled on top of her hand, punctuated by liver spots. She'd aged in the last month. Hadn’t we all? Okay, maybe not me.

“I suspect you have tremendous powers, Marcie. The exact nature of them, or how powerful you truly are, I don’t know."

I wish I could say the rest of our conversation consisted of recounting tales of my youth, bonding in that way that grandmothers and grandchildren do. She didn't ask me anything about my life and I countered by not asking about her coven.
 

Charlie made a little sound, not a whine or a whimper, just a reminder to let me know that he was still here. I leaned down and petted him, feeling his head pressed against my knee.

"He's a good dog," Nonnie said.

"He is."

"Could he have a treat?"

"It doesn't have a potion in it, does it?"

She sent me a wobbly smile. “Linda has a Pomeranian. I keep them for her. They taste like bacon.”
 

I felt Charlie sigh against me.

He might not be a shape shifter, but I swear he spoke English.

"I think he would love one," I said.

She stood, went to the counter and opened a pottery canister. Up until then, I hadn't noticed that it said
Dog Treats
across the front and had a handle shaped like a bone.

She retrieved two treats, returned to the table and bent underneath. Charlie left my side faster than you could say bacon and sat in front of her.
 

"Good dog," she said.

I suddenly wanted to remind my grandmother about all those times we’d spent together. Her favorite movies had become mine, goofy things that were impossible to find nowadays.
The Private Eyes, Blazing Saddles, Murder by Death
were all movies we loved and watched repeatedly.