Harvest of Changelings (7 page)

Thomas backed out of his father's driveway at exactly 10:45 P.M. They had told him to be punctual and arrive not a minute before or a minute late. He had timed the trip to Clemmons State Forest twice
before. He should be at the forest entrance at 11:35. He would sit in the car until 11:42 and then walk down the path to the fire. He glanced over at the Tyson's. Front light on, the living room. Awful late for Ben to be expecting company, he thought as he drove off.

Thomas shook his head. How could he have been so blind all these years? The Ruggles had moved next door to the Tysons when Thomas was fourteen and he had never suspected, never even guessed just who and what Malachi was. Or who and what Valeria was. Or where she had gone. No, he hadn't really spent much time with his father from thirteen to sixteen—just a few weeks during the summer, every other Christmas and Thanksgiving. While his parents had their custody fights, Thomas had been forced to live with his mother. He shook, trying to get rid of those memories. But he had babysat for Malachi more than once when he had moved back after his mother's suicide, and he had never guessed. Sat right beside Valeria once—she had even touched him. But I was just a kid then, he thought. His father knew, and, Ben, of course. But they hadn't seen fit to tell him. No matter. His eyes had been opened; he knew.

He had felt the first twinge at Samhain, a brief spark, a rush of energy in the ether. It was his first time with the Glenwood coven and he had thought it was just the excitement of being there with the others, naked before the God and the Goddess. But then he had felt the energy rush a few days later, when he had gone home to retrieve some more of his books and ran into Malachi Tyson. In fact he had surprised Malachi in the backyard and Thomas was sure if he had surprised the boy a few minutes earlier, he would have seen magic in action.

“Hey, Malachi, what are you doing?” Thomas had yelled over the chain-link fence separating his father's and the Tysons' backyards. Malachi had jumped, startled, and then had run over to the fence to shake Thomas's hand. In that touch he had felt the charge again—almost like touching an electric fence. And he remembered: when he was thirteen and home for the summer and Valeria had touched him—the same charge.

There was no doubt now, Thomas knew: here was a tool provided for him, a way to access power, power that he had only dreamed of. That had been the only good thing he had gotten from the three years he had lived with his mother: power was essential.

Thomas pulled into the parking lot at the entrance to Clemmons State Forest at 11:36. Tonight was the Third Challenge. Once passed, Thomas would be a full initiate in the coven. He would be
a high priest of the mysteries of the Old Religion, the hidden knowledge of the God and the Goddess, knowledge older than Christ, knowledge those weakling Christians had suppressed and then denied ever existed. Fools. Now, tonight, the power that had been surging in him, simmering like water almost ready to boil, would be finally and fully awake; Thomas was sure of it. And with this power, taking Malachi and the greater power should be easy.

11:42.

Thomas got out of the car and walked across the graveled lot, the blue stones crunching beneath his shoes. He had timed this walk twice before as well. It was exactly 11:50 when he could see the flames flickering through the trees. The air was redolent with incense and smoke. He could smell the heat, as he inhaled, drawing fire into his nostrils. When Thomas could see the others, their bodies white and dark shadows around the fire, he stopped and looked for the shelter someone had told him would be nearby. Thomas undressed carefully, neatly folding his pants and shirt, then his underwear and socks, and everything in a tidy pile at the end of a picnic bench. Then he took the binding cord he had been given and wrapped the braided and knotted red cord around his waist, just as he had been taught, so that he could pull the frayed end through the loop.

There. He was ready.

Now he could feel the heat of the fire all over his naked skin. The fire's shadows bathed the bodies of the others and he could feel them, at the periphery of his aura, which shimmered all around him. The others were waiting for him, waiting for the high priestess to call Thomas for the Third Challenge.

Thomas.

Thomas walked down the last stretch of the path leading to the clearing and the fire and the coven. This time he could feel the sharp gravel on his feet. He took deep breaths as he walked; Thomas had never felt more alive in his life, more aware. The hot, perfumed air, heavy with incense, the insane insect chirping, the sweaty smell of all the bodies, and yes, even the trees, he could feel their awareness, old, profound, slow.

Thomas stopped walking three paces outside the circle. He felt the air shift when the others stepped aside and let him in to face the priestess and the stone altar.

The priestess's face was hidden behind a white mask; all Thomas could see were her dark, dark blue eyes, watching him, her black hair loose and curling with sweat. He focused on her and her alone,
her body shining in the firelight and candlelight, a single pale shadow. Everything on the altar between Thomas and the priestess had become different-colored shadows: the pentacle, the bell, and the cups were copper; the athame knife silver-white, and each of the black candles seemed to have disappeared except for their flames. Thomas inhaled and exhaled, filling himself with incense and nothing but incense, and with each breath, it seemed his skin was dissolving, his aura expanding to merge, one glowing filament at a time with all the others. And there were so many others, bits and fragments of their thoughts, feelings darting about and through him—needs, hungers, wants, desires. Behind the priestess the cauldron bubbled and boiled. Thomas heard footsteps behind him, but he didn't turn and look; he remained as still as possible. He felt fingers on his back, his neck, then a blindfold covered his eyes. His hands were pulled behind him and tied together, and then a cord was passed around his neck. His feet were tied together and then whoever was behind him stepped away. Thomas could see through the blindfold the red of the fire.

Then the priestess spoke:

Thomas answered, words he had practiced over and over and over again:

Somewhere a temple singing bowl was stroked and almost simultaneously the others began todrone:“
Aaaaaaaaaooooooooouuuuuuuuuiiiiiiiieeeeeeeee
.” A drum began to beat. Thomas heard, barely, other footsteps in front of him, and then something cold and metallic and sharp pricked his skin between his navel and his groin, his erect penis.

“Thomas, you stand on the boundaries between the known world and the world of the Dark Ones, the Dread Lords, the world of power. Are you ready? Are you prepared? Are you brave?”

“I am ready. I am prepared. I have the courage.”

Thomas felt pressure then, first above his heart, then on the opposite side of his chest, then to the right and left of his navel. With each touch the high priestess spoke: “We mark you, then, with Air, with Fire, with Water, with Earth. You are ours.”

Behind him Thomas could hear the others moving, their breathing fast and hard. The weaving dance began and someone drew Thomas in and everyone was touching, being touched, everywhere. His blindfold was taken away, and there was no part of his skin that was not touched, caressed, felt by hands and mouths. And Thomas touched and stroked and caressed with his hands and his mouth. The high priestess sang:

Thomas ran, trees all around him, close, dark, green, black. A full moon marked his path as he ran, his feet slapping the earth, cobwebs catching his skin, snagging his hair, branches slapping his
chest, cutting his skin. He was bleeding; he could feel his own warm blood on his chest, his arms, his face. The trees moved in a rhythm that matched his heart, the pulsing of his blood. Finally, his chest burning, Thomas came to a bramble of thick, close branches, with thorns that pricked and drew more blood. He cupped one hand over his genitals and pushed his way through the bramble into an open glade. He stood still, panting and bleeding, the warm air tingling his skin. He could still smell the cinnamon of the altar incense, the aroma of the cauldron, the body of the priestess. She stood in the middle of the glade, Aradia, the Goddess, and soon everything, every smell, every echoing touch, was gone: only the Goddess remained. He was Thomas, he was Herne, the Horned God, and he took her there in the tall grass, the earth, the moonlight and the starlight.

 

The first witch Thomas met was Donald, the roommate with whom Thomas shared a North Raleigh apartment. He had met Donald at the Central Carolina Bank, after reading a note on a bulletin board advertising for a roommate. Donald was from a small mountain hollow deep in the Smokies and he was different from anybody Thomas had ever met. Donald spoke differently, moved differently, and he even smelled differently. A faint touch of spice, of cinnamon, sometimes clove, lingered in any room in the apartment after Donald had been there.

Thomas learned Donald was a witch the second day after he had moved in. He came home after work and walked into an aromatic spicy cloud. The odor led him back to Donald's room where he found his roommate busily arranging things on a small table covered with a midnight-blue cloth. Incense burned on the dresser and the night table. Thomas stood behind Donald, watching as the other man took two white candles out of a leather bag and set one on either side of a curiously carved silver cup. Then he pulled out a silver disk inscribed with a five-pointed star and placed it before the cup.

“What are you doing? What's all this stuff?” Thomas asked as Donald next pulled out two knives from the bag, one black-handled, the other white-handled.

“Setting up the altar,” Donald said, sounding surprised. He laid the two knives on the table and turned to face Thomas. “You really don't know?”

“Altar? Know what? Are you in some sort of weird cult?” Thomas asked and sat down on Donald's bed.

Donald pulled out of his bag a slender stick of light-colored
wood. “You really don't know? I don't believe it. When we first met, when we shook hands, I could feel you'd been around magic. The stuff is all over you; your aura is so charged with magic that you glow. You're pulling my leg, right? This,” Donald said and waved his stick at the table, “is a Wiccan personal altar. This stick is a wand. I'm a Wiccan, a witch. Aren't you?”

Thomas shook his head. “The closest I've ever come to magic was Dungeons and Dragons in high school and college. And I quit playing because it was just a game; it wasn't real. All this is the real stuff? Are you crazy or what?”

Donald said nothing for a long moment. Then he tucked his dark hair behind his ears and took two small, silver bowls out of his bag. “You've been near magic for a very long time; you didn't know it, but you have been near it. And I'm not crazy and this is real. I'll prove it to you. My coven meets tonight. Come with me. Hey, you've got nothing to lose, right? And everybody's naked,” Donald added, grinning.

“Everybody?”

“Everybody.”

Thomas shrugged. What did he have to lose? Hanging out with naked women couldn't be so bad, now, could it? And if this was real—well. Thomas had liked playing Dungeons and Dragons the most when he was the gamemaster, when he was the one telling the others what to do and when and where to do it. It had been the power Thomas had liked the most. But it wasn't real; it was only a game. Thomas wanted real power, power he could touch, move, taste. He wanted to be filled with power. He wanted never again to be as powerless as he had been when he had lived with his mother. And as for the magic Thomas was supposed to have been near—what was Donald talking about? His aura glowed with magic? And why did all this make him think of Valeria, the long-gone wife of his father's best friend, Ben. Valeria? Power? Maybe going to Donald's coven could help him figure it all out.

Donald's coven met in a large, open room at the NC State McKimmon Center. Thomas was amazed. “You mean the university lets witches meet on campus?” he whispered to Donald as they entered the building.

“Sure. They have to. Freedom of religion, you know. State university, paid for by public funds. Other religious groups meet on campus. C'mon, I want you to meet some people, then I'll show you where to leave your clothes.”

Donald introduced Thomas to an engineering professor, her
husband, and their teenaged daughter and son. An English professor who wrote poetry. Two graduate students in crop science, who were working on a joint dissertation on the effects of the moon on the growing season of corn. A couple of undergraduates—one from Durham, the other from Salisbury.