The Outlaw Demon Wails

The faint sounds of Ceri's steps crossing the tree-hidden road drifted through the slatted windows, and I sat up. Ivy was downstairs with her computer and spreadsheets, trying to use logic to find Kisten's murderer. She had gone very quiet at the sight of my complexion amulet, her tight face telling me she was not ready to talk. I knew better than to push her. If she was here, then we were doing okay for now. Jenks was with Matalina and the kids, avoiding the gargoyle. The church was quiet with the three of us doing our separate things. Peaceful.

I heard Ceri come in and call to Ivy, and I rose to pretend to dust the shelves. A fast skittering on the stairs turned into Jenks's cat, bounding in and sliding to a stop when it realized I was up here, standing with her tail crooked and staring at me with black eyes.

"Hey, Rex," I said, and the cat's tail bristled. "What?" I snapped, and the stupid feline darted back out the door. There was a feminine murmur of surprise in the stairway, and I smiled.

Ceri's light steps on the stairs grew loud, and chalk in hand, I looked at the unfinished ash floor to decide how big a circle I wanted to draw. The door to the stair creaked, and I turned, smiling. "Find a ring?" I asked, and she smiled as she held up a flat ring of gray metal. "Found it in Keasley's toolbox," she said, handing it over.

"Thanks," I said, feeling the weight of it in my palm. Rain glistened on her fair hair and spotted her shirt, and I felt guilty for making her come up here. "Really. Thank you. I wouldn't even try this if you weren't helping me."

Her green eyes glinted in amusement in the light from the candles, and something about her tonight flipped my warning flags up. It was as if she was up to something. Her voice was casual, but my instincts had been pinged, and I was watching her.

"I'm going to set a circle," I said over the hush of rain. "Do you want to be in or out of it?"

She hesitated as if to tell me I wouldn't need a circle, then nodded, probably remembering the first time she had taught me how to scribe a demon calling circle and my aura had unexpectedly pooled out. "In," she said, and when she stood to move, I gestured for her to stay. I would draw it right around the couch she had gone to sit on.

"You're fine there," I said, starting my circle a foot inside the hexagonal room's walls. My hair made a red curtain between us, and the feeling of wrongness coming from her strengthened. The hiss of the chalk mixed with the rain, and the breeze slipping past the open slats was chill. I couldn't shake the feeling that there was something she wasn't telling me. Finished, I stood straight and blew my hair out of my way. I met her gaze and narrowed my eyes in challenge. Sure enough, she glanced away.

My heart did a little flip-flop of fear. I wasn't going to do another charm Ceri taught me unless I knew exactly what it was before I did it. Finding out belatedly that the spells I'd used to go wolf and turn Jenks human-size were actually curses had been lesson enough.

"This isn't a normal charm, is it," I stated, and she looked up.

"No."

I sighed, slumping to sit backward in the folding chair. My gaze went to the chalk in my hand, and I set it on the green marble top of the dresser with a tap. "It's demonic, isn't it?"

She nodded. "There is no smut for this one," she offered. "You're not changing reality, you're just pulling on a line. It's similar to how you almost threw raw energy at Ivy. If you can do that, and pull it back into you without hurting yourself as you did, then you should be able to do this…."

Her sentence trailed off at the end, and I flexed my fingers, remembering the pain had lasted only a moment before vanishing in the chaos that had followed. Demon magic. Damn it back to the Turn.

"You might not be able to do it," she said, sounding as if she hoped I couldn't. "I simply want to know, and if you can, then you have something that might save your life someday."

My lips pressed together as I thought about it. "No smut?"

She shook her head. "Nothing. You're just modifying energy, not changing reality."

I was tempted, but there was still something she wasn't telling me. I could see it in her subtle motions, my ru

Ceri actually flushed, and a pulse of fear slid through me, pulling me straight. "I shouldn't be able to, should I," I demanded, and when she shook her head my gut twisted. "What in hell did Trent's dad do to me?" I said, panicked, and her eyes flashed.

"Rachel, stop," she said, rising and coming to me with the scent of damp silk. "Trent's father didn't do anything but keep you alive. You are you."

Her hands hesitated a bare second before taking mine, but I saw it and the fear slid deeper. "You are the same person you were when your mother birthed you," Ceri said firmly. "And if you can do a magic that no other witch can do, then you should become skilled in it so you can go where others fail. Great power does not corrupt a person, it only brings their true self into the light, and Rachel, you are a good person."

I pulled away from her, and she took a guilty step back. Mistrust, ugly and unwelcome, trickled through me, and I vowed to purge it right now. I couldn't lose her as a friend. I couldn't. "Promise me you won't tell Quen," I said. She hesitated, and I added, "Please, Ceri. If I'm different, I don't want anyone to know. Let me tell who I want, if I want. Please. Otherwise, I'm just…a pawn in someone else's game."

Looking miserable, she clasped her hands before her, and then slowly she nodded. "I will tell no one," she whispered.

Immediately my tension dropped to my gut like lead. I looked at the dresser top where the charm's tools were assembled, and with a tired regret for the lost chance that I could ever live a normal life, I stood. My reflection in the age-spotted mirror above the dresser stared back at me. I took a slow breath. "Do you want to show me first?"

Ceri moved so I could see her reflection behind me. "I can't do it, Rachel."

Swell.

It was as if a door had closed behind me. Before me was a great blackness, but it was wide and sweeping, and I had to believe that somewhere in my future was a happy ending. This is who I am, I thought with an overpowering sensation of finality. Wiping my hands on my jeans, I resolutely went to the dresser. Time to find out what I can do.

The candle on the dresser was reflected in the mirror, making two. Set to the side was the chalk, the metal disk, a spool of twine, a finger stick, and a vial of grapeseed oil. I had my ley line textbook there, as well, open to the dozen blank pages at the back for notes. At the top of one was a messy LIGHT CHARM BY CERI and the pictorial representations of the hand movements and phonetically spelled Latin that went along with them. I knew Ceri was disgusted that I didn't know enough Latin to read it normally, but I'd been focusing my attention on other things for the last few years—and I didn't expect that to change. But a class in hand gestures might have been in order.

"Well, then," Ceri said as she nervously eased up behind me. I eyed her candlelit reflection in the mirror, wondering how she was going to teach me a charm she couldn't do herself. The scent of ci

"We should tie your base ring up so we get a nice sphere instead of one half inside the dresser," she added with a forced brightness that made my head hurt. "Once it's set, you can't touch it, or you'll break the spell."