Joy of Witchcraft (4 page)

Right. Like the Court was bound by common human decency. Somewhere, some time, some member of Hecate’s Court might slip up and show a hint of emotion. But I’d never seen a hint of ordinary human feeling from any of them in the past. They had one job: keeping peace among all recognized witches. Their word was final in all disputes. Beyond that, they refused to become involved.

“They left that behind,” David said. He nodded toward the marble altar. A single sheet of parchment was plastered to the stone.

“What the—” I pried it loose. The document was clearly ensorcelled—it didn’t tear, even though it was soaked through. And the ornate lettering was cast in some magical ink, a formula that didn’t run in the rain. I skimmed through the formal language to find the key phrase at the bottom: “All magicarium classes must be conducted on a regular schedule throughout said academic term, or said charter shall be immediately and permanently revoked.”

More interference from the Court. More intimidation directed at the Jane Madison Academy.

It hardly mattered, though. I fully intended to conduct my classes on a regular basis. I didn’t need dictates from Hecate’s Court to do what was right. I handed the document to David, who folded it in three parts and tucked it into his pocket.

Shaking my head, I rested my hand against the marble altar. It felt absolutely ordinary—like any other rain-washed stone. There wasn’t a hint of malevolence, not a whisper of the evil that had burst through with the satyr. Suddenly exhausted, I asked, “Where did that thing come from?”

“I told you,” Clara answered before David could. “A hellmouth. That’s what I learned in the course I’m auditing.”

“Course?” I asked.

“
Urban Planning and the Ancient World
. At the University of Maryland."

I shook my head. “Why are you taking classes at the University of Maryland?”

“Now that you’ve officially launched the magicarium, Jeanette, I want to be close by. In case you need help with your more esoteric courses. And as long as I’m on the east coast, I figured I’d take a class to help me plan Oak Canyon Coven’s nootuh.”

“New what?” Obviously, the banishing spell had taken more out of me than I thought. I seemed to be losing my hearing. I glanced at David for clarification, but he only shrugged.

“Nootuh,” Clara enunciated. “N-W-T-A. Nucleus with tentacles attached. It’s a form of planned community. We’ll have a central building for communal activities—meals and entertainment and rituals—that’s the nucleus. But each of us will have our own living quarters, our own private spaces.”

“The tentacles. Got it.” I turned to David and faked a sweet voice. “Did you know Clara was studying nearby?”

His scowl told me he’d known. And Clara’s adult education campaign fell squarely in the category of things where he refused to act as middleman between my mother and me. With a brittle smile, I turned back to my Clara. “So, your professor at the University of Maryland just happened to feature local hellmouths in his class?”

“Professor Kipperman didn’t
feature
hellmouths. This week’s lecture was about necropolises, cities of the dead built near ancient settlements. The lost necropolis of Epidauros in ancient Greece was built around a perfect circle of cleared earth. Scholars theorize the villagers excavated a hellmouth, a way for heroes to banish creatures back to Hades.”

I shook my head, unable to link mundane archeology with modern witchcraft. “And that relates to my ritual circle how?”

“We had a homework assignment, choosing a modern town and comparing its plan to an ancient one. I chose Parkersville.”

Everything became clear. “And let me guess. When you map Epidauros onto Parkersville, you end up with a hellmouth right here.”

“Oh Jeanette! I
knew
you’d be receptive once I explained! That’s what the turquoise means on the edge of your aura.”

David finally came to my rescue after my mother folded me into a sodden embrace. “Come on, Clara,” he said with a weary shrug. “You need to ground yourself too. Head back to the house, and fill everyone else in on Epidauros and the hellmouth. We’ll catch up in a minute.”

I barely waited until Clara was out of earshot before I hissed, “You don’t actually believe her!”

“Of course not.” He spread his hands above the centerstone, not quite touching the marble. “But I didn’t want her to worry.”

“Worry about what?”

“The real source of the satyr.”

“Which is?”

“Norville Pitt.”

The name sliced a greasy spiral into my belly. The Head Clerk of Hecate’s Court had been a thorn in my side since I’d founded my magicarium. More than just a thorn, actually—Pitt’s manipulation had nearly brought down the Academy not two months earlier.

Pitt and David had a tortured history together; each man had vowed to destroy the other. David and I had alerted Hecate’s Court to Pitt’s unlawful activities, including his taking countless bribes. But we’d only succeeded after David had been driven to the trembling edge of madness, building the case.

I tried to swallow a nasty taste in my mouth before I croaked, “What about Pitt?”

“He had something to do with that satyr. No,” he said to my frantic look around the circle. “He wasn’t here. He wouldn’t dare set foot on this land now, not with the inquest pending before Hecate’s Court.”

The inquest. The official inquiry into Pitt’s crimes. The investigation was set to begin in three days, the first Monday of the witches’ new year.

David said, “He couldn’t make the satyr materialize on his own. He’s a failed warder and a washed-up clerk, not a witch. But for just a moment, when the lightning struck, when the cordon broke… I sensed him here.”

“Was he working through Teresa?” The Washington Coven Mother and Pitt had teamed up before. That was all part of the case the Court would take up next week.

David shook his head tightly. “I don’t think so. She had her own reasons to keep you from succeeding. But I saw the look on her face when the satyr manifested. She and Ethan were as surprised as everyone else.”

“And she stepped forward,” I said grudgingly. “She helped me banish the thing when no one else could.” I extended my hands over the altar yet again, struggling to capture the signature David had sensed. I closed my eyes to better center myself, taking three deep breaths as I reached out with my powers.

Nothing. Nothing at all, not even when I forced myself to drag up old memories of Pitt, to hold his oily presence in my mind as I searched for the faintest sign that he’d been involved with the satyr.

I sighed and let my power dissipate. I knew my next question wouldn’t go over well, but I had to ask it. “Are you absolutely certain—?”

“Yes,” David interrupted.

“It’s just that with the inquest starting on Monday… With your history—”

“I said I’m certain!” David slammed his fist down on the altar, even angrier than I’d feared he would be. He winced at the sudden movement, though, and pressed his palm against his ribs.

“You’re hurt!” I said.

“I’m fine.”

“David—”

“I’m
fine
,” he repeated. “I’m a hell of a lot better than Pitt will be when I get my hands on him.”

“Let the Court handle it,” I warned.

“He brought that thing onto
my
property.”

I knew better than to start with
if he did
. Instead, I said, “He’s trying to provoke you. He wants you to break the injunction. He wants the Court to find against you before they ever get close to deciding his case.”

“He could have killed—”

I shook my head and settled a finger against his lips. “He didn’t.” David started to protest again, but I pressed harder. “He didn’t,” I repeated. “We’re safe. Pitt failed.” When David showed no sign of relaxing, I leaned in to brush a kiss against his cheek. “Besides,” I said, purposely making my voice light. “You have
much
more important things to worry about.”

“What could be more important than—”

“Clara,” I said, squeezing his hand. “Clara back in town.” Another squeeze. “Clara taking classes at the University of Maryland, practically in our own back yard.” One more clutch of my fingers. “Clara jabbering on and on and on, until my only choice is to go crazy or turn her into a toad.”

I felt the moment he made the conscious decision to set aside his tension. His shimmering anger crumbled, releasing his shoulders, relaxing his spine. After all, the satyr
was
gone. We’d defeated Pitt. Again.

David curled a finger beneath my chin, tilting my lips toward his. “She only makes you crazy because you let her.”

I pulled back enough to protest. “What am I supposed to say when she starts raving about ancient Greek
hellmouths
?”

“How about, ‘I’ll keep that in mind.’”

“Like that would work!”

“Try it,” he said.

I laughed and tightened my arms around his waist. I was surprised when he sucked in a sharp breath between his teeth. “You
are
hurt!” I said.

“I’ll live. That thing probably cracked a rib or two.”

“Let’s go,” I said, setting a fast pace across the grass. “I want Neko to take a look at you. He can tape you up, at least.” The fact that David didn’t protest made me realize just how injured he was.

I only started to relax as we approached the house. The curtains were open in the front room, and warm light splashed onto the porch. Inside, Neko was skirting the coffee table, balancing a tray that looked like it held enough food to feed a football team. “Looks like a trip to the grocery store is at the top of tomorrow’s agenda,” I said to David.

“But first, you have something more important to do,” a voice said. A shadow rose from the top of the porch steps, sleek and graceful as a panther in the night.

David’s hand tightened on mine, but he didn’t try to edge in front of me. I blinked hard, and the shadow resolved into a human shape, a woman’s body. Teresa.

“And what might that be?” I asked, edging my words with defiance. “What’s more important than caring for my magicarium?”

Teresa took the steps slowly, like she was sizing me up for a fight. “Paying your debts,” she said, closing the distance between us. “Jane Madison. Magistrix and witch. I hereby claim the right of benefaction.”

“For the everlasting love of Hecate,” I swore, not entirely succeeding in keeping my curse under my breath. I planted my hands on my hips and said to Teresa, “You have got to be kidding.”

“I never ‘kid’ about witchcraft.”

Of course she didn’t. Not when she was the strongest Coven Mother in the Eastern Empire. Not when she’d held that position since she was freaking ten years old. Not when she had me over an astral barrel.

“Fine,” I said. “But not until after I’ve checked on my students. And had a chance to change.”

“Of course,” she answered, her lips compressed into a superior smile. I couldn’t help but notice her dress was dry and every hair sat in perfect place on her head. She’d used magic to pull herself together, blatantly grandstanding that she had power to burn even after our near-disastrous working in the circle.

I brushed past her, barely resisting the urge to toss my dripping hair over my shoulder, to leave a trail of fresh raindrops across her immaculate handiwork. David followed close behind, guarding my back as Teresa, Ethan, and Connie also came inside.

Neko glanced up the instant we passed over the threshold. He’d been setting out food, piling treats high on the coffee table, but as soon as I entered the room he ceded all of his attention to me. I shook my head at his silent question. I didn’t need him to serve me. Not yet.

I was more concerned about Cassie.

She crouched on a wooden chair that had obviously been dragged in from the kitchen, pressed into service because Cassie’s soaked clothes were covered with mud. Her head was buried in her arms, and she slowly rocked back and forth. Tupa huddled beside her, one small hand balanced on her knee. Zach stood over both of them, his face drawn as he supported his broken arm with his good one.

Everyone else in the room studiously avoided looking at them, giving them some semblance of privacy in the crowded space. But I crossed over to my student, ignoring the fact that my dress left a wet trail on the hardwood floor, on the well-placed throw rug. “Cassie,” I said, kneeling before her and reaching for her shoulder.

She flinched before I could touch her. But she stopped rocking.

“Cassie,” I said again, dropping my hand. “I’m so sorry. Let’s get you to a doctor. There’s a hospital in Pine Ridge.”

“No,” she said, and her voice was thick, clogged with tears.

I wasn’t sure how to respond. Even if she looked like a naive little girl, she was a full-grown witch. She had autonomy over her body, just as she had the right to control her magic. She could decide if she wanted medical attention.

“You have to eat something,” I said. And Neko manifested by my side, holding a laden plate in one hand and a mug of fresh apple cider in the other. I glanced at the food—treats from the Cake Walk bakery, sent along by my best friend Melissa to celebrate the official launch of the Jane Madison Academy.

When she’d prepared the pasteboard box of goodies, Melissa couldn’t have predicted how welcome her Butterscotch Blessings and Lemon Grenades would be. How
necessary
they’d be. When witches stretched themselves to accomplish prodigious magic, they needed something to anchor them back in the mundane world—food and drink, consumed immediately after the effort. Given the horror Cassie had experienced, she needed the grounding even more than the rest of us.

“Cassie,” I whispered, edging the plate closer. “Please.”

When I got no response, Tupa took the mug of cider from Neko. “Cass,” he bleated, touching the rim to his mistress’s fingers.

The attention seemed to reach her when nothing else would. Her entire back tensed, and her neck grew stiff. But she raised her head enough to take the mug, to hold it in trembling hands. I barely squelched the urge to rub a streak of mud from her forehead, to smooth the spikes of blond hair that had worked loose from her braids.