Into the Woods: Tales from the Hollows and Beyond(8)
Author: Kim Harrison

My pulse quickened. "You said it was an eight-hundred-level spell."

"Yeah? So what?"

I thought for a minute. "And if he says I should join the I.S.?"

"I’ll sign the application myself. Mom gave me your guardianship right after Dad died."

I couldn’t seem to get enough air. It was a way out. "And if I can’t do it? What then?"

"Then you come out to Portland with me and get your master’s so you can do every single charm in that book. But you have to do the spell yourself. Front to back. Start to finish."

I took a deep breath and looked at it. At least it wasn’t in Latin. How hard could it be?

"Deal," I said, sticking my hand out.

"Deal," he echoed. And we shook on it.

TWO

Squinting, I crouched to put my gaze level with the graduated cylinder, knees aching with a familiar fatigue as I measured out three cc’s of white wine. It was this year’s pressings, but I didn’t think that mattered as long as the grapes had been grown here in Cincinnati, in effect carrying the essence of the land my dad had lived and died on.

My mom’s light laughter from the other room pulled my attention away at a critical moment, and the wine sloshed too high. She was cloistered in the living room with Robbie under the impression that I was making a last-minute solstice gift and the kitchen was totally off limits. Which meant I was trying to figure out this crappy spell without Robbie’s help. See, this was why I wanted to be a runner. I’d be so damn good, I could afford to buy my spells.

I grimaced as I straightened and looked at the too-full cylinder. Glancing at the hallway, I brought it to my lips and downed a sip. The alcohol burned like my conscience, but when the liquid settled, it was right where it was supposed to be.

Satisfied, I dumped it into Mom’s crucible. She had gone over it with a fine-grit sandpaper earlier this afternoon to remove all traces of previous spells, as if dunking it in salt water wasn’t enough. She had been thrilled when I asked to use her old equipment, and it had been a trial getting everything I needed amid her overenthusiastic, wanting-to-help interference. Even now, I could hear her excitement for my interest in her area of expertise, her crisp voice louder than usual and with a lilt I hadn’t heard in a long time. Though Robbie being home might account for that all on its own.

I leaned over the textbook and read the notes at the bottom of the page. WINE AND HOLY DUST ARE INVARIABLY THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF CHOICE TO GIVE SPIRITS SUBSTANCE. Scratching the bridge of my nose, I glanced at the clock. This was taking forever, but I’d do anything to talk to my dad again, even if the spell only lasted until daybreak.

It was getting close to eleven. Robbie and I would have to leave soon to get a good spot at Fountain Square for the closing of the circle. My mom thought Robbie was taking me to the Takata concert, but we needed a whopping big jolt of energy to supplement the charm’s invocation, and though we could find that at the concert, the organization of several hundred witches focused on closing the circle at Fountain Square at midnight would be safer to tap into.

I had really wanted to go to the concert, and sighing for the lost chance, I reached to snip a holly leaf off the centerpiece. It would give the spell a measure of protection. Apparently I was going to open a door, and holly would insure my dad’s essence wouldn’t track anything bad in on the soles of his feet.

Nervousness made my hands shake. I had to do this right. And I had to do it without Mom knowing. If she saw Dad’s ghost, it would tear her up-send her back to the mess she was in almost five years ago. Seeing Dad was going to be hard enough on me. I wasn’t even sure by the description of "desired results" how substantial a ghost he’d be. If we both couldn’t see him, Robbie would never believe that I’d done it right.

Standing at the table, I used my mom’s silver snips to cut the holly leaf into small segments before brushing them into the wine. My fingers were still shaking, but I knew it was nerves; I hadn’t done enough to get tired, low fatigue threshold or not. Steadying the crucible with one hand, I ground the holly leaves with all my weight behind it. The lemon juice and yew mix I had measured out earlier threatened to spill as I rocked the table, and I moved it to a nearby counter.

Lemon juice was used to help get the spirit’s attention and shock it awake. The yew would help me communicate with it. The charm wouldn’t work on every ghost-just those unrestful souls. But my dad couldn’t be resting comfortably. Not after the way he died.

My focus blurred, and I ground the pestle into the mortar as the heartache resurfaced. I concentrated on Robbie’s voice as he talked to my mom about how nice the weather was in Portland, almost unheard over some solstice TV cartoon about Jack Frost. He didn’t sound anything like my dad, but it was nice to hear his words balanced against Mom’s again.

"How long has Rachel been drinking coffee?" he asked, making my mom laugh.

Two years, I thought, my arm getting tired and my pulse quickening as I worked. Crap, no wonder my mom quit making her own charms.

"Since you called to say you were coming," my mom said, unaware it was my drink of choice at school as I struggled to fit in with the older students. "She is trying to be so grown up."

This last was almost sighed, and I frowned.

"I didn’t like her in those college classes," she continued, unaware that I could hear her. "I suppose it’s my own fault for letting her jump ahead like that. Making her sit at home while she was ill and watch TV all day wasn’t going to happen, and if she knew the work, what harm was there in letting her skip a semester here or there?"

Brow furrowed, I puffed a strand of hair out of my face and frowned. I had been in and out of the hospital so often the first four years of public school that I was basically homeschooled. Good idea on paper, but when you come back after being absent for three months and make the mistake of showing how much you know, the playground becomes a torture field.

Robbie made a rude noise. "I think it’s good for her."

"Oh, I never said it wasn’t," my mom was quick to say. "I didn’t like her with all those damned older men is all."

I sighed, used to my mom’s mouth. It was worse than mine, which sucked when she caught me swearing.

"Men?" Robbie’s voice had a laugh in it. "They’re not that much older than her. Rachel can take care of herself. She’s a good girl. Besides, she’s still living at home, right?"

I blew a strand of my hair out of the mix, feeling a tug when one caught under the pestle. My arm was hurting, and I wondered if I could stop yet. The leaves were a gritty green haze at the bottom. The TV went loud when a commercial came on, and I almost missed my mother chiding him. "You think I’d let her live in the dorms? She gets more tired than she lets on. She still isn’t altogether well yet. She’s just better at hiding it."