I sat alone in the bell tower of my church, while Bis ran interference with the pixy children. I looked over the demonic texts that lay in their bookshelf, gathered in secret by my dad (the only dad who counted, the one who raised me) for the day when I would need them. It bothered me that he knew that I'd need them, even while he and Trent's dad worked to cure me of the Rosewood Syndrome. He knew, and yet he'd gotten Mr. Kalamack to cure me anyway, despite the fact that the Elves had cursed us with it in the first place. It was a genetic check to ensure that if a witch was born with the ability to use both kinds of magic together, Earth and Leyline, that witch would die before they could reproduce. They did it to ensure the stunted genome would remain that way in their seemingly endless war against demonkind. My kind. Whether I chose to admit it or not.
The familiar wash of adrenaline stayed my hand with the clippers. My heart began to pound, loud enough for Ivy to hear, had she been home. I stared hard at the innocuous little pair of wire cutters, poised to remove the charmed silver that had been Trent's way of apologizing for what his father had done to me, for the lack of choice I'd had in what I'd become.
And that's what this all was. A choice. How many times in the last six months had I agonized over it? I'd worked so hard to survive, all my life, all while working even harder for a normal, better existence. How odd that these two things were mutually exclusive. Sure, I could remain ley-line neutered, hiding from the ever-after and my own genetics, rescuing familiars out of trees, and dying slowly inside, or I could claim who I was, deal with the demon politics, and use every weapon in my arsenal to make people who wanted to use me leave me alone by force.
I had plenty of time to think about all this. For too long, I'd been cooling my heels as asked while Ivy and Jenks made all the runs. No one wanted my personal touch when calling for our help. Those that did call for me did it on a dare, as a joke, or for help in things I wanted no part of. I had played it smart, had stayed out of trouble, and hadn't gotten any new injuries in the process, but the result had me feeling useless and empty. I couldn't even make amulets for my partners. Ivy was still wary of my witchery, and Jenks was too damn small. I felt powerless, made redundant, and I didn't like it.
I put the clippers down for the thousandth time and ran a trembling, sweaty palm over the upholstery of the fainting couch where Marshall and I had done that power-pull. It had been a beginning of something, perhaps that normal life with a witch who could put up with all the crap my life dished out, but my shunning had put a quick end to that, too. And for what? For trying to stay alive? And while I was no longer shunned, I was a self-proclaimed demon. What kind of stupid ran through my brain when I'd made that particular little proviso for saving the coven, San Francisco, and the world from Ku'sox? While the Whithon's check had allowed me to exist for the last six months semi-solvent, Vampiric Charms had never quite recovered from the blow of one of its partners being a demon. My bank account was dwindling and no amount of incentives or enticements from Trent was going to make me work for him. I felt better off dealing with demons.
After the first month, I'd gotten over the relaxation. I was ready to work again. Sadly, the rest of reality wasn't ready for me. Bill after bill got pushed through on my behalf, and I did nothing to repay the kindness. The fact that I could go to the corner market again had lost most of its appeal after the second month. I spent the third month glorying in having a driver's license again, playing cabby to my partners when they went on their runs or ran errands. They let me, sensing my need to feel as if I was DOING something. It was rather embarrassing, their pity.
I think I'd made up my mind to do this somewhere around month five of my elf-charmed-silver-enforced vacation. I'd read through every last one of the demon texts in my attic belfry, waiting for things to get better. I'd let the pixy girls braid my hair every day for want of something to help me feel better. I languished and I waited, and I promised to be good. I found myself gritting my teeth when my offers to help were turned down by Ivy. I got the pack tattoo David had been wanting for me, never having the heart to tell him that I planned to return to twisting demon curses before too long, and that it would be erased from my skin like all my scars and my freckles. Getting the news that Robbie's wife was pregnant was like a slap to the face, even while I pretended to be happy about it while my mother gushed over the phone. It brought home how alone I was and that I would never have babies of my own, unless I wanted them to be like me.
And what was wrong with me? I had to admit that even though I'd been afraid of demons most of my life, having met quite a few of them and dealing with Al had ratcheted the fear back from mind-numbing terror to wariness. Even my dislike of Trent and his methods had taken their blows through the years, until I trusted him to put my soul back together with my body. Ceri's brilliant happiness with her new bouncing baby girl and Trent's fatherly love showed me that even flawed people could be great parents when given half a chance.
Did I want to form and hold a new soul inside of me, cursing my baby with the protections he or she would need in order to survive the Collective on its own, in the way demons were made? It was nothing like what I'd pictured motherhood being when I'd been given a clean bill of health instead of the death sentence I'd lived with my entire childhood. When I had been given the chance to hope for a future, I thought it would be just like a regular witch pregnancy, with a witch daddy and witch babies. The fact that I knew now that I could do it the demon way, that I knew I could not only hold another soul within my own, but could fill the entire collective with my memories made it not-so unfathomable, but when I thought of Al and his big bait and tackle, the idea of letting anything a demon had in his pants anywhere near me, much less making a child with him, still gave me the willies.
No, I didn't want to make a baby. But I did want to create. I wanted to make something lasting that would live long past me, if my stupid decisions caught up with me in a permanent way. Before I ran and hid from the everafter and the Collective, I had orders to make new things rolling in. I had what every demon over there wanted: I could breathe new life into their stale existences. I could even deal with the smut that it would generate, now that I knew what the blackness in my aura really was: the imbalance I'd be creating in nature. The only thing staying my hand at the moment was the uncertainty of how the demons would react to my sudden presence in the Collective once more. Trent's missing fingers and broken leg could attest to what kind of reaction I could expect when I faced Al once more, after six months of pretending not to exist.
And what of the reactions of the rest of the Collective? They all thought I was dead, but that could change the first time Al was summoned out by anyone who knew I was alive, willing to use that information as coin for dealing with the demon. It was unrealistic to think I could hide forever. Oh God, what about Pierce? Had Al killed him for failing to protect me? The thought weighed heavy on my conscience. I had to know.
Again, I lifted the clippers, sliding them between the silver and my skin. No one knew what I was about, except perhaps Bis, who knew me well enough to know what I was doing even when I didn't. My scrying mirror lay on my lap. Birds chirped in the bare branches of the trees, the Solstice weeks away. I gave pause to consider what a crappy Solstice gift I was giving to my friends and family. I counted under my breath, willing my heart rate to slow while the pulse of wild magic swirled against my skin in juxtaposition to my own and made me feel a little ill. I contented myself with the knowledge that the hated feeling would soon enough be gone: my Solstice present to myself.
"Ms Morgan?" Bis called softly, scrabbling up the stone wall behind me.
"Hi, Bis," I murmured, a feeling of calm coming over me.
"Have you done it?" he asked, edging around the couch to look.
"Not yet. I was just about to."
"Would you like me to go?"
"No. Please, stay if you like." I nodded to the end table beside me and Bis made his way to sit, gripping the edge, his tufted ears perked with his curiosity.
"I can watch?"
"Yes, Bis. You can watch," I smiled, tired from the unspent adrenaline I'd been subjecting myself to. It felt better having someone with me, sitting on hallowed ground. Smarter, maybe. I was learning to be smarter.
I let out a long breath, applying the barest hint of pressure, feeling the blades of the clippers bite into the metal. Wild magic swirled in warning that I was about to break the charm. I smiled an ugly smile; the warning seemed oddly panicked. With a harder grip, I cleaved the rest in two. The ting of metal sounded as the broken circle hit the floor, rolling for a moment, rattling to rest on the boards. I closed my eyes as sweet freedom lit through me.
"Ms Morgan?" Bis asked and touched my arm in concern.
I gasped as every ley line in Cincinnati blazed in all their glory through my thoughts. "I'm fine, Bis," I breathed out, holding back the tears that threatened. I felt them all, so sweet and full of power. I had missed them, and now I had them back. I turned a watery smile to Bis, who nodded and eased back onto his table perch. I bit back a sound of regret when the contact ended, but sent my thoughts to the line running through my graveyard, humming with a familiar energy.
I had taken one, maybe two breaths, before I sneezed. Laughing, I placed my hand on my calling circle, wondering if Al had had a start big enough to stop his little demon heart. I opened the connection before I could sneeze again. I felt my consciousness widened by the Collective, Al's fury foremost in my thoughts.
"Rachel's line," I smirked, speaking aloud for Bis's benefit. I felt Al calm himself slightly, though a low-banked rage simmered in the background.
Rachel Mariana Morgan! Damn my dame, it really is you. You're supposed to be dead, love.
Shit. Al was really pissed off if he used all three of my names along well one of his pet endearments. "Hi, Al. Did you miss me?"
I saw you with my own eyes. You were brain-dead, without a soul. His mental tone held dark promise of finishing the job for me.
"You saw my body without my soul, Al. That much is true. I got it put back in after my aura recovered enough to house it."
That's what you've been doing for the last six months, witch? Recovering? Why in the seven hells didn't you come through with Ku'sox? Thanks for that, by the way. Right into my lap, kicking and screaming and on fire.
He was beginning to calm down. That was good. "I didn't come through because I didn't want to be there. He'd just tried to eat my soul and memories to leave me naked in the middle of the lines, Al. Give a girl a break."
Make room, girl. I'm coming through.
"Ah, you can't, Al. I'm on hallowed ground. And it's daytime"
You little tart! Just going to hide in your church while I catch all the hell from the rest of the Collective? I don't think so. When I get my hands on you…
"Al! Relax! That wasn't the plan! I wanted to wait until you'd calmed down just a bit, and then I was coming back to work!"
Back to work? he blinked. His ire deflated.
Back to you teaching me, back to making tulpas, back to the everafter. Back doing all of it.
You really want to come back?
I've been reading all the demonic texts in my library over the break, so you'll have a little more to work with, I thought soothingly. I haven't been able to put any of it into practice, so it's all theory at this point.
I could feel his eyes narrowing at something I'd said. You've been conscious?
"Ah, Al, about that…"
That lousy Elf! This has his stink all over it.
"You can't touch Trent. Remember? On that note, what have you done with Pierce?" I was getting a little angry over his threats.
He's here. I had to salvage SOMETHING when my meal ticket, errr… student was a loss. Should I give him the good news, love? he purred, relishing the idea of using me to make Pierce even more miserable.
He's… sure. Go on and let him know that I'm alive.
He knows, doesn't he? He all but growled.
"He and Trent knew when he went with you, yes. They wanted to give me a choice."
Between witch and demon? Ha! Sorry, love, but you are what you are.
Yes, I am what I am. I know. So how about it? Just like the good old days?
No. I could hear the wheels turning beneath the surface of his thoughts. One night a week isn't going to cut it. They almost put me in jail again over this farce. Thankfully, I had Ku'sox to hold accountable, so he went in the pokey and I got levied a fine. You've got a lot of rooms to earn back, sweet, so I hope you enjoyed your vacation. I want you over here full time.
Two nights, I countered, relishing the feeling of bargaining with Al again. My choice.
Six nights and days. I'll give you your Saturdays back. Eight hours for lessons and five for networking.
Five nights a week, with at least one meal in reality and I keep my weekends and sleep in my own bed.
Done, Itchy Witch. I'll see you in your graveyard as soon as the sun sets. He seemed far too pleased with the arrangement. There had to be something he knew he could exploit.
Al? Wait a minute…
We have a lot of time to make up for. Do not make me come drag you out.
Shit. I really must have forgotten something. Al, really… wait, I whined.
You have no idea the trouble you are in, my sweet little Itchy Witch. It's good to have you back. Don't forget your gargoyle.
He closed the connection and I was suddenly in my bell tower again, alone with Bis.
"That sounded like that went well," Bis offered.
"It definitely could have gone worse."