Vicious Circle

Chapter 22

Menessos, Goliath. Please…come inside.”

Menessos put his foot onto the first tread, unhurriedly, then stepped up onto my porch. I wanted to retreat, to backpedal to the door and inside. I shouted at myself mentally: Do not show him fear! Even if you are afraid, you’ll fight it with every breath, every beat of your heart! Fear isn’t weakness, but giving in to it is. My feet were planted between the vampire and my front door.

He stood there expectantly, gazing into my eyes, though I stared at his lightly bearded square chin. In a fluid motion, Menessos glided right up to me, invading my personal space. I retreated, and he moved with me at the same speed and distance, as if we were dancing. Then my back was against the porch roof support post.

In that instant, I learned something: people’s fears are odd things. Some people won’t go boating or swimming because of a fear of the water. Some people won’t wear turtlenecks or anything tight at their throats. Some people avoid big dogs. I’d always attributed these kinds of things to past-life events, like drowning, hanging, being attacked by animals—whatever would account for the fear. I’d never discovered a specific fear of my own like that—until now, as I stood with my back pinned against a solid post. I wondered if a past life of mine had ended with a post at my back and kindling under my feet.

“Thank you, Miss Alcmedi, for having faith in my word.”

“You’re welcome.” It sounded a lot more confident than I felt.

“You’re an uncommon woman.”

“What does that mean?” It sounded like praise, but a vampire’s praise was a worrisome thing.

“People generally reside in one of two categories. Either the group who think vampires are…cool”—he made it sound like an expletive—“and offer up thoughtless invitations incessantly, or those with a terror of vampires so intense they offer only intolerance and hate. Most of both categories are imbeciles, and we would never seek their companionship.” He touched me, lightly, to smooth my hair. I could not tell if his touch was cold or calloused, but I wondered. “But you…Persephone.” He whispered my name, and I felt the warmth of a summer breeze on my bare skin. “You are intelligent and brave. If only there were more like you…”

From the doorway, Johnny cleared his throat, a sound that ended with a prolonged low growl. I was suddenly embarrassed, angry with myself, and angry that Menessos would try seduction while my friend lay dying for our help. “There is little time,” I said, gesturing toward the door.

Menessos whispered, “Vampires have forever.”

“Theo doesn’t.”

He made a gracious gesture of capitulation. “Remove the stake from your home, out the back egress, please.”

“Wait here.” I could have given Johnny a signal and he would have seen that it got done, but I wanted to get away from Menessos. “Excuse me.” I slipped past him and went inside, forcing Nana to back up to allow me through. Johnny moved only enough to be out of the way, surely to keep an eye on the vampires.

In the kitchen, I lifted the lid on the stake’s storage box to be sure it was still inside. Such a remarkably common-looking thing; a muddy stick. The sharpened tip gave it an ominous flair, though. And it was pale, the wood’s tip, like a fang. Nana touched my shoulder, and I jumped. My muscles were so tight. “When this leaves the house, we have no defense against him,” I said.

“And we’ll need none.”

I looked at Nana; something strange in her expression told me that her words were not simply stating her hopes as if they were pep-talk facts. She must have seen my confusion on my face. “He made a blood oath to you.”

“He what?” Celia nearly shrieked.

They shared a long look that I couldn’t read. Then Nana explained, “He drew his own blood, marked your porch with it, and swore to our safety.”

Celia watched me, expression curious. “What?” I asked.

“What did you say to him?” Celia asked back.

Had I done something wrong? “That I’d remove the stake from the house and, after we do the ritual, I’d let him take Vivian and the book away. He’ll send someone for the stake tomorrow.”

“Rudimentary deal-making. What else?” Celia pressed.

“I asked him for a guarantee. He didn’t offer it.”

“Well.” She put her hands on her hips. “Whatever it was, you impressed him enough to make him draw his own blood. They don’t give up their precious fluid for any common reason.”

“Such an oath is more binding than any legal contract ever written,” Nana added. “And, so long as you hold up your end, more enforceable.”

“Enforceable how?”

“Later,” Nana said. “We haven’t much time.”

“Right.” So he was impressed. That explained why he had flirted with me. “I have to get this off the property. I’ll be right back.” After closing its lid, I lifted the box and slipped into the garage, then outside through what my Realtor had called the “man-door” in the rear of the garage. In the yard, my shoes made a shushing sound in the grass. There was little light, but I knew my way, knew every little hill and dip of the yard, so my steps remained firm and confident. The box was much heavier than the object it held, and I switched hands halfway through the yard. At the end of the grass, where the cornfield began, I sat the box down and slid it in between the stalks. I turned back to the house. It seemed so far, so small and bright with all the lights on. Everyone inside was waiting for me.

If I wanted to flee, now was the time.

The sound of a stick snapping caught my attention. Beholders in the field.

It was a good thing I didn’t want to flee.

Still, the thought that people were out there, dangerous people, made my back feel exposed—like I was it—so I jogged back to the house.

That was almost funny: beholders were dangerous enough to send me jogging back into the house where their masters were waiting for me.

Everyone was starting to assemble upstairs when I returned. Dr. Lincoln was with Theo, as were Celia, Erik, and Beverley. Nana was climbing the steps. Johnny motioned me on through the hall, and I joined him at the bottom of the steps. Menessos and Goliath remained on the porch.

I opened the screen door. “It’s time.”

Menessos eased toward me like water flowing to the shore. The metaphysical barrier that restrained his kind from places into which they were not invited seemed like a thick, transparent membrane that I could see stretching as he pressed his hand to it. I’d already said the magic words. The porch wasn’t technically “inside.” Now all he had to do was push.

His eyes met mine with the confidence of a king. Of Arthur. Too late, my brain screamed at me that I had met his gaze. But there was no power to it, no call in it. Just a man looking at me, into me, as if he’d just found what he’d been searching for. He was entering my home. The vampire was breaking the seal to my private space. Suddenly, this seemed very sexual.

He hesitated, the barrier stretched to the point of bursting. I felt it, felt it like it was part of me pressed intimately against the contours of his body. A hairbreadth more, and it would be gone….

People are sure air exists; we breathe it. We fill balloons with it. We feel it on our faces when the wind blows. We can’t see it, but we know it is there. In that instant, I was certain barriers existed—protections unseen, magical and mysterious, remarkable and real. I felt this barrier burst like a soap bubble, felt the tingly flick of its particles fading as the protective shield’s integrity evaporated.

Once the unseen dam was breached, everything it had held back came flooding in. Dread, like thick and velvety foam, poured across my floor and drifted against my leg. It would take a full weekend of witchy cleansings to be rid of it.

“Theo is upstairs,” I said as Goliath stepped in, his entrance lacking his master’s ceremony.

“I want to see Vivian.” Menessos strode toward my kitchen.

I didn’t like this. “No. After.”

He didn’t stop. I followed him. Menessos turned the corner and vanished from my view. “Awaken,” I heard him say. My pace increased. But I stopped short when I too turned the corner. It felt as though the air, that thick velvet dread, were being slowly crammed down my throat to suffocate me.

Menessos stood before her. I could not see his expression. Vivian’s face was white. Her eyes were as wide as half-dollar coins. Trembling claimed her arms, and her chest heaved with fast, shallow breaths. “Vivian,” he whispered. His index finger slid under her chin, and his touch jolted her like an electric shock. “Vivian.” This time the whisper sounded sad. He grabbed her chin roughly. She tried to pull away but couldn’t. “Betrayer!”

Tears showered from her eyes.

Whatever he did to her, I figured she deserved. She’d betrayed him. She’d murdered Lorrie. But his punishment wasn’t going to be doled out here. “Menessos,” I said.

He turned swiftly, as if he hadn’t known I was there. A single bloody tear had fallen from his eye.

I retreated two steps. He mourned this vengeance?

He turned back to Vivian and ripped easily through the clothesline cord. His motions were fierce and violent, yet gentle, like those of a lover who rips your clothes off but caresses your skin with soft adoration. We’d tied her arms down at her sides and then roped her to the chair separately, so I knew she wouldn’t be immediately free. “You took an oath—” I began.

He wheeled around. “One I will keep, Miss Alcmedi. But Vivian will not leave my sight. She may not be in the circle, but she will be near me.” He turned to her. “Won’t you?” He lifted her to standing position, and her weak limbs faltered as he embraced her in his arms. Her eyes above the gag remained wide, pleading with me.

I shook my head at her.

Vivian crumbled, sobbing. Menessos caught and lifted her, then faced me. “Let us go.”

“Wait a minute—”

“Vivian will remain thusly bound and outside your circle. And”—he fixed her with a stern expression—“she will behave. She will witness a real witch at work for once.”

I hesitated. Vivian was a real witch. He was insulting her. The mixed love and loathing he displayed for her confused me, but I’d have to sort it out later. In the hallway, I led him back to where Johnny and Goliath stood glowering at each other. It wouldn’t have surprised me to find two puddles on the floor, proof of a pissing contest.

I said, “C’mon.” They followed me. At the squeaky step, Goliath—bringing up the rear—stopped and bounced on it. I turned back at the top of the steps and looked daggers at him. He grinned.

Now was not the time to let him distract me. I hoped that in the circle, with Beverley participating, he would behave himself.

“Okay. Beverley, I need you to leave for just a second, while I cleanse the space.” She’d been sitting with Theo and obediently left.

Nana came to me at the doorway and produced a necklace from her pocket, which she offered to me. “Wear this,” she said.

Feeling the easy vibration of the charged gemstones in the palm of my hand, I lifted the necklace up. It was like a three-row choker of pearls, but the round stones weren’t pearls. “It’s moonstone.”

“Yes.” She smiled happily that I’d recognized it. “May I?” She put it on me. “I’ve empowered it for protection,” she whispered.

It covered the parts of my neck that a vampire would most like. That made me happy enough to forget that it was much too fancy to wear with a Superman T-shirt.

“Everything you need is on the tray,” Nana gestured, “or at the foot of the bed.”

She’d made a makeshift altar out of a bed tray and wedged it against the foot of Theo’s bed, which had been pulled far enough from the wall to allow me to circle Theo, and someone had been brilliant enough to duct-tape the monitor cords to the floor. The book sat open to the proper page, with the translation page atop it. Various altar items were placed around it. Practical, my nana. “Thanks.”

Dr. Lincoln had removed Theo’s oxygen and feeding tubes and cut the temporary casts down the front. Everything had been removed except the IV, which he’d said he wanted to leave in to continue giving Theo fluids.

Aware that the others were intently watching me, I lit a tall white pillar candle. Nana reached in and flipped off the electric switch. I took up the pentacle incense holder and, lighting the incense, I began blessing the space with the elements. First with the incense representing the element of air. Next, a red candle representing fire, and then a bowl of crystal-water—water that has sat out under the light of a full moon with a charged crystal in it—to represent the element of water. Last, I sprinkled grains from a bowl of sea salt to represent earth. I circled the room in a manner that witches call “deosil”—pronounced jessel—which simply means clockwise or sun-wise. I walked the circle once with each representation of an element to cleanse the area, then faced the door. “Enter now this sacred space. Let all who enter here bring with them only harmony and peace.”

The doctor entered first and took a position just to the right side of the head of the bed. Nana and Beverley came next, leaving a space where the moonlight was shining through the skylights.

Celia and Erik headed toward the stairs. “Where are you going?” Menessos asked.

“She’s going to call the quarters next. We have to avoid the energy,” replied Celia.

“If you want your friend restored, you need to stay here.” Menessos shifted his weight and blocked them from the stairs with Vivian’s body.

“It won’t do any good to save Theo if it costs the rest of us our lives,” Celia pleaded.

“I have already promised Miss Alcmedi that no one will be harmed. I would not negate that now.”

“But the energy—”

“I know this spell, dear, skittish wolf. You will not be harmed.”

Celia and Erik stepped into the bedroom and backed into the corner nearest the door. Johnny stayed with them.

My room was rectangular, longer than it was wide, so Menessos had room to lay Vivian down beside the closet. “Move not and make no sound,” he said to her in a voice so kind and loving that the words that followed—“or your suffering will triple”—seemed even more terrifying. He stood and stepped nearer the bed. Behind him, Vivian turned her face to the carpet.

Goliath moved to his master’s side.

Three deep breaths to ground and center. It’s like taking a minute to check a map of the universe and find out exactly where your soul lives, and then feeling yourself connected to every molecule of matter and antimatter filling up that enormous universe.

With everyone in place, I lit two white taper candles in gargoyle candleholders placed on either side of the book. Then, with my old ritual broom in hand—the newer one now hung above my front door—I chanted and swept a tight deosil circle just around Theo’s bed, containing all of us in the room except the wærewolves and Vivian. My sweeping became faster when I moved between the vampires and Vivian. When I returned to my starting position, I said, “As above, so below, this circle is sealed, so mote it be.”

Nana repeated the last part: “So mote it be!” Menessos repeated it after her.

After I drew an equal-armed cross in the air to further seal the circle, my eyes closed. I called up the sub-alpha state.

This was the point in the ritual where things became truly magical.