Water Witch (2 page)

“Nope. I would not.”
You fucking prick.
I kept packing, grabbing my journal, my crystals, and my box of essential oils from the nightstand. The herbs I could leave, my mother had plenty and they were the kind of thing cops often felt the need to investigate.

“So if you understand, why are you packing?” He was trying for charming, tilting his head at me with a half smile.

“I have to go home.”

He watched me pull out my jewelry, my digital camera and my iPod. Frowned as I packed my laptop. I brushed past him to the bathroom, where I stuffed my toiletries into a small bag.

“Vinny, please. Don’t make this kind of decision now. Think about it, first. Come on, let’s talk a while.” He reached out and wrapped his hand around my bicep. His hands were so big, strong and thick, his fingers could almost circle my arm. It used to turn me on, how butch he was, how muscular. Now it was a reminder of our differences, and of all the hours he spent at the gym while I stayed home alone, reading or watching TV or making dinner.

“Nothing to talk about. I’m done.”

He sighed and removed his hand from my arm, pushed his fingers through his hair, messing up the neatly combed style.
Just because he’s sexy doesn’t mean he’s right for you
. Fuck, hadn’t my mother said that exact thing two years ago?

“Is there anything I can do to make you stay?” If he’d shown even the slightest bit of sadness I might have stayed and talked to him. But as he asked his eyes shifted to the side, like he didn’t really care one way or the other.

“No. I’m sorry. I’m done here.” I zipped the second suitcase and took a quick inventory of the bedroom. There was more of my stuff in the room, of course, but nothing I really cared about.

I made a trip to the car and piled the suitcases in. My massage table was already in the trunk. I grabbed my bin of lotions and oils and the case of towels I used for work from the house and added those to the trunk as well. I still had room, the backseat could hold some stuff. I found an empty plastic bin in the garage and walked around the house, collecting framed photos, sunglasses, and other random items. Finally, the car was full and most of my belongings were out of the house. Scott was still watching, but hadn’t tried to stop me.

I stood in the foyer, took one more look around the house.
I’m really leaving.
The anger had drained from me during my little packing frenzy. Now I just needed to get out before I changed my mind. He held out a bundle of cords. The chargers for my phone and laptop. “Thanks.” I took them without making contact with his skin.

“I can’t believe you’re leaving like this.”

“I’m sorry.”

He frowned at me, the first genuinely sad expression he’d shown all afternoon. His eyes tilted down and he looked like he might cry, but he just said, “Okay.”

I hugged him anyway.
Merry part
, right? He was stiff and cool in my arms, and I had an urge to comfort him. I broke away quickly. 

On the highway, I realized I had no idea how to get home, or how long it would take. But the farther I got from Scott, the more surely I felt I was doing the right thing. I glanced into the rear view, at the backseat piled high with my stuff, and a wave of contentment passed through me.
Yes
. My blood sung in my ears, a faint ringing that I’d learned from experience meant I was on the right path. I hadn’t heard that in years. I laughed out loud.

I called my mom from the highway, and laughed again as I counted the eleven rings until she picked up.

“What happened?” She didn’t have the gift of foresight, but my mother had always known when something important was happening with me.

“I left him. I’m on my way home.”

“Thank the Goddess. Oh! Sorry, are you all right, baby?”

“I’m fine.”

I told her the whole story as I headed east on Route 40, then spent the next few hours singing along to the radio and smiling as the odometer ticked me closer and closer to home.

CHAPTER TWO

I was pulling off the highway, headed toward a Holiday Inn, when my phone rang. Scott. I ignored it. Once situated in my economy single occupancy room, I listened to the voicemail:
Blah, blah, I can’t believe you left, blah blah, please come back and give me one more chance.

I don’t think so, pal. I sent a text so I didn’t have to hear his voice tonight:
I’m not changing my mind. You know as well as I do this is the right decision for both of us. I’m sorry it was sudden, but I’m not sorry I left. I’ll call you tomorrow. At a hotel near Albuquerque now, going to sleep.

He texted me back:
okay :(

Sheesh.
I plugged my phone into the charger and stretched out on the cheap polyester bedspread. At least he hadn’t said, “I love you.” That would have been awkward. He rarely said it anyway, a quirk I hated but had learned to tolerate. I used to say it all the time, and feel a rush of pride on the rare occasions he returned the sentiment. But in the past year, I’d mostly said it as a joke when he brought home my favorite wine or did the laundry. Goddess, I should have left him a year ago. Or before that.

But I couldn’t regret moving west with him. We’d had fun, and getting away from my mom and grandmother had been good for me. I’d done things on my own for once, proved I could be independent. In the end, two years was too long. I needed my family closer. I needed the water. Our house was waterfront, with a rocky beach all our own. Technically we were on the bay, but close enough to the ocean that the water was clean and cold, and full of life. Most days the air was heavy with salt, and the mornings were often foggy and damp. I missed that almost as much as I missed the coven and my family.

Google maps promised I’d be home late Sunday night, if I drove twelve hours each day. I left my laptop on the charger, stretched out on the bed, and closed my eyes. That water Fae’s pale face flashed in my mind. I snapped open my eyes and shot up in the bed.
Damn.
He’s real
. Not a symbol or an allegory, a real creature. Or person? Whatever.

My phone rang, and I snatched it up, startled. The display said “home,” and I hoped like hell nothing had happened.

“Mom?”

“No, Vincenzo, it’s me.”

“Noni, is everything all right?” My grandmother rarely called anyone, and when she did it was a short, direct thing: relaying news or asking a question with no chit-chat.

“Your mother told me about your vision. I want to hear it.”

“Uh, okay.” I told her all of it, every detail, and even my sudden understanding that he was real. She listened silently. When I finished, she let out a sigh, but said nothing. “What do you think it means?”

“You are the only one who can know that. You should take your skill more seriously.” She clucked her tongue, and I flushed with guilt.

“I know, Noni.”

“Never mind. I think you should try to have another vision. Learn more about this Fae.”

“I don’t thin—”

“I know you are afraid. I’m a little worried myself. Visions should not go both ways. But the skill of the Fae are beyond ours. Powerful is not always dangerous.”

“Maybe we should ask Liliana?”

Her scoff told me what she thought of that. “She doesn’t know any more about the Fae than I do!”

“Okay, jeez! Just a suggestion.” Liliana was the head of our coven. Noni wanted my mother to do the job, but Mom wasn’t interested. Coven politics was one thing I hadn’t missed while living as a solitary for the past two years. “She might have an idea, is all.”

“Get more information first. We’ll go to Liliana if we have to.”

“Okay.” I pictured that face again, the sharp cheekbones damp and shining, the light blue eyes sparkling with mischief. I had been freaked in my vision—scared shitless if I was honest—but when I thought about it now he was more attractive than frightening. Noni was right. I had to get back in there, figure this out. “I’ll call you in the morning.”

“Good boy. Call me tonight if you need to, you know I stay up late.”

“I know. Love you.”

I stalled for an hour, ordering food from the restaurant across the street and taking it back to my room. I ate in front of the television, sitting cross-legged on the end of the bed, and tried not to think of the water Fae’s face. But at nine-thirty I decided to start before it got too late, just in case I had to call home.

Choosing a more focused method, I filled the insulated ice bucket with water and sat on the floor, holding it in my hands. Staring at the rippling surface, I cleared my mind, going through an abbreviated version of my meditation routine. I relaxed every inch of my body until my awareness narrowed to the gently rocking surface of the water. The first images were fuzzy, as if seen through greasy glass. But I kept concentrating, focused my skill, and they slowly cleared.

***

The chalice rolled across the wood floor. A hand, masculine but delicate, like a pianist’s hand, reached out to stop it. A spike of fear shot through me and the image wavered. I took a deep breath and blew it out with intention at the ice bucket, rippling the water, and the image returned. Long fingers wrapped around the old chalice and picked it up, tucking it into an arm already loaded with treasures. My treasures: my grandfather’s pearl handled Athame, Mom’s leather-bound Book of Shadows, an old holed stone we used to burn incense, a shallow silver bowl. Anger rose, heating my face, but I tamped it down before it interfered with my concentration.

The chalice was pretty valuable, made of solid gold and over one hundred years old. The bowl was real silver. I could understand why someone might want those things. But the other items were more sentimental than anything else. Stealing them was personal, like an insult or an attack. Again the Fae’s skin glistened as if it were damp, and again he left wet footprints on the dry wood floorboards. He walked to the window and with his free hand pulled aside the curtain to look out onto our little private beach.

My mother was knee deep in the water, dressed in her bathing suit. My grandmother sat in a beach chair, eyes closed, one hand resting atop her head. Neither of them turned to the window. He let the curtain drop.

The image buckled and wavered, filling with new colors until a clear picture of a grassy hilltop came into focus. I knew this place. The empty lot next door, owned by the coven and used for ceremonies and celebrations that could be done in public view: handfastings and picnics mostly. The property lacked the beach ours had, its strip of shore was rockier and sat several feet below the lawn, but the grassy ledge always caught a nice breeze, and it was a beautiful place to spend a summer day.

His long legs draped over the edge of the low bluff and he let my family treasures fall onto the grass beside him. He picked up the incense stone and turned it over in his hand. I knew the old rock well, but his hand enthralled me. His milk-pale skin, smooth and dry now, no longer shone with wetness.

I was able to see his face again then, and drank in the details. No jewelry, human looking earlobes, and the palest dusting of hair on his face, like a woman might have. No trace of a beard, no imperfections on his skin at all. He smiled at the stone, giving me the impression of affection. Did he covet these things? Want them for himself? Had he taken them just to admire?

He lifted his arm and threw the stone into the deep water below, and I almost jumped up. The water sloshed in the ice bucket, but the vision remained. “NO!” I shouted into the water as the rock hit the waves and sunk, lost forever. “No.” I almost sobbed it that time. The loss of that stone hit me like a fist to my chest as I sat there, powerless.

He watched it, too, his smile fading. In a strong clear voice he said, “Yes,” and turned to face me.

His cold blue eyes held mine. My hands gripped the ice bucket with white knuckles and I ground my teeth. I should have been scared, but my anger and sadness made me brave. “I will stop you,” I gritted out, curling my lip at him.

He shook his head and gave me a sad little smile. Then he pursed his lips and blew out a breath, rippling the water and dissolving my vision.

***

I sat there holding the ice bucket, stunned. How had he done that? It shouldn’t be possible. My vision wasn’t something happening now; it was a possibility, a future event. He shouldn’t be in it with enough presence to interact with me. He certainly should not be able to end it. But he was and he had. And if he was real, and powerful enough to do all that, then the events from those scenes might really happen.

I dumped the water out and paced the small room. I needed to be home. In the vision, my mom was swimming, and the sun was shining. That could happen anytime. It was warm enough now, in August, for that. I dialed home, and my grandmother picked up on the second ring.

“What did you see?”

I explained everything, in detail, while she breathed softly into the phone. When she didn’t respond, I asked, “What should we do? We could hide those things, maybe? Put them somewhere besides the cabinet?”

“Maybe. Or add some new charms to ward it. Though his powers…it might not matter what we do, Vincenzo. He might be too strong for us.” Her voice was small and unsure, not like her at all.

“Well, we have to try, at least. Talk to Mom in the morning. Do what you think is best, and I’ll be home as soon as I can. And please, if you go down to the water, make sure mom keeps her necklace on?”

“Mm-hmm.” She sounded distracted.

“What?”

“What else do you think…about him?”

I lay down on the bed and closed my eyes.
What did I think about him?
“I don’t know. He’s interesting. A little scary. I was angry at him, and…intimidated. But in this vision he didn’t seem as evil as the last time. Just really powerful. What are you thinking?”

“I wonder why someone would do what he was doing in this vision. Why take our things and throw them away? Why let you see him? You need to think on it. Maybe dream on it.”

Ugh
. As a kid I’d learned how to block my visions while I was asleep. I sometimes had flashes, or actual dreams, never full visions. Dream visions were impossible to control. They took me where they willed, and sometimes showed me things I didn’t want to see. I slept with a magically-charmed chain around my neck that helped, but most of it was training. “I really hate that, Noni.”

“I know, I know.”

After I hung up, I stood in the hotel bathroom, holding the charmed chain in my hand.
No. Not yet.
I clasped it around my neck and felt the spell settle over me like a heavy warm cloak, muffling my power. I’d spend the drive tomorrow thinking about the vision, and if I didn’t come to any conclusions, then maybe I’d try a dream-vision tomorrow night. Maybe.