The Red Witch (Amber Lee Mysteries Book 6) (17 page)

“Mirror, mirror, on the wall,” Frank said in a mocking voice, “Where’s that red witch at?”

“Really?” Aaron asked. Frank couldn’t see him, but the tone of his voice gave shape to his bemused expression well enough.

Frank grinned. “What? You were expecting a long, convoluted rhyme? Not for this. I don’t need—”

The attic window flung open letting the crisp, autumn air come rushing in. On the back of it came a mess of reddening leaves, twigs, and chirping swallows. Aaron removed his hand from Frank’s shoulder and went to the window to close it, but it came back around and shut on its own with a loud slam.

Aaron stood there, motionless for a moment, watching the window. Then he whipped his head around and stared at the corner of the room. From deep within the back of his throat came a low rumble.
A growl?
Frank thought. Only what was he growling at? Frank couldn’t see anything in the corner of the room Aaron was so fixated upon and neither could Damien.

Then a cold chill, like a finger made of ice, crawled down the back of Frank’s spine. He turned his attention, slowly, back to the mirror, inching his way around in a motion that seemed to last an age. It was the same kind of slowness usually brought on by apprehension or dread; a kind of slowness that exists as if almost to prepare you for something. Sometimes it was nothing; you would think you’ve seen someone walking around in the hall and so you move toward the door, careful, quiet, and look both ways only to find it empty.

This had happened to Frank before. A couple of times, in fact. He had lived in his fair share of haunted houses and he had also lived in run-down neighborhoods, and in both types of residencies people walk around in the dead of night. Whether it’s a drunk who can’t remember what floor he lives on, or a ghost trying to get his attention, Frank had felt that feeling of slow dread creep into his heart more than once.

The difference now, though? He knew he was about to see something in the mirror he had been looking at a moment ago. And as he turned around in that slow, creeping motion, all he could think about was this:
he’s just like Scooby-fucking-Doo; so I guess that makes me Shaggy.

But Frank didn’t shout "Zoinks!”
when the mirror came into his field of vision.
Frank couldn’t do much of anything but keep his eyes fixed on the shape in the corner of the room. No.
Shapes.
There were two. One of them was a man—
no, a shadow
!—tall and broad shouldered, surrounded in a miasma of darkness as if he were made of ink and the air around him were water. And he was holding onto someone.

The figure struggling against the dark thing was female. She was white ink to his black, but in the intermingling colors Frank detected brief flashes of orange. Immediately he knew.
Amber.
Frank rose to his feet so fast he sent the stool he had been sitting on crashing to the ground on its side. He stared at the mirror, concentrating, willing for his mind to give the shapes more substance in the same way that staring at someone for a long time can make their features melt away into nothing.

“It’s Amber,” he said, “Damien, can you see this?”

“I can,” Damien said.

“Aaron, what can you see?”

Aaron was quiet. Frank could see him in the reflection, stalking across the room, taught as a bow-string. His fists were closing. Opening. Closing. Fingers flexing. It looked like he was about to throw himself at a wall, only there was nothing there for him to attack. Nothing in the material world, anyway. Aaron would charge and end up doing no more than making a great big Aaron shaped hole in the wall, but still… he could sense whatever was there, and that was new to Frank.

Suddenly the shadows in the mirror’s reflection started to take shape. It was Amber alright, and whatever was holding her back had six arms; two wrapped around the torso, two wrapped around her mouth, and two wrapped around her ears. She was struggling against it, but she wasn’t scared; her eyes didn’t convey alarm. Frank wasn’t sure if that was a good or a bad thing.

If he had been given more time maybe he would have been able to force the entity holding Amber to show itself, to come forward and leave her alone, but whatever Magick Frank had used to call the image soon evaporated like so many clouds of steam, and the shadows were gone. And just like that, Aaron relaxed, Damien let go of Frank’s shoulder, and Frank’s breathing returned to normal.

A couple of swallows had remained inside the attic, chirping, probably anxious to get out. Aaron went to the window, opened it, and the swallows went rushing out into the world again.

“What did you see?” Frank asked again.

“I didn’t see anything,” Aaron said. His voice was stern and hard. “But I felt it.”

“Was there something really there?” Damien asked, “Or was it only in the mirror?”

Frank glanced to the mirror, then to Aaron, then to the corner of the room. “It must have been here,” Frank said, “The mirror must have been a conduit.”

“So now what do we do?” Aaron asked.

“Let me think, will you?” Frank asked. He rubbed his temples, which were throbbing hard now, and took a moment to think.

“It was the demon, wasn’t it?” Damien asked.

Aaron didn’t move, didn’t speak.

“I don’t know,” Frank said, “I just don’t know. I need more information.”

“More?” Aaron asked, “How are you going to get more? It’s not like we can talk to her. Fuck, this is just like last time.”

Last time
.

The words echoed in the back of Frank’s mind. Aaron was right. This smelt like
last time
. Last time, a demon was in play. Last time, Amber was cut off from the world. Last time, everything went to shit before things got any better.
Christ. I thought we were done with all that.
The truth was that Frank didn’t know if they really were done with all that. He hadn’t even considered the possibility that
it
may have come back, but he guessed it was possible.

After all, no one had done an exorcism that he knew of.

“I need more information,” Frank said. “You two need to leave.”

“Leave?” Aaron asked. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Frank shot him a glare. “You’re both going to get the fuck out of this room and let me do my thing. Neither of you can be here for what I’m about to do. Understand?” Aaron didn’t like being told what to do, he knew, but he would have to listen to him now. He simply didn’t know what would happen to them if they were around when he…

“Just go,” Frank said, “And whatever you see, whatever you hear, don’t you come into this room or leave the house.”

CHAPTER 18

No.

The word clanged like church-bells across the silent night my mind had become.
No. No. No.
We had come all this way, given him the things he wanted, showed him our determination to do the right thing; to end Linezka before she hurts somebody else. And when we asked him to come out of hiding for us, to help us in the fight, he Luther—the other Necromancer—had said no.

He wouldn’t help us.

Couldn’t?

Wouldn’t.

He had been given a choice. To stand up, fight, and do what was right, or to slink back into his hidey hole, pick his fruits and vegetables, hunt whatever game he could find, and live out the rest of his days as a hermit. In the tug-of-war between bravery and fear, fear had won and thrown bravery to the ground.

And I had been sent reeling.

I couldn’t think, could barely register Collette’s hand on my elbow, and couldn’t sense that we had crossed the barrier from Luther’s pocket realm to the real world. I just kept hearing that word over and over again.
No. No. No.
We hadn’t come here to enlist his help, but I would have been lying if I said my heart hadn’t soared when I learned of Collette’s plan to bring Luther into the fold.

Having another Necromancer on our side would have… well, I didn’t know exactly what it would have done for our cause, but two Necromancers were better than one, right? I had seen Collette’s power. Felt it. Lived it. I knew what she was capable of and doubted, even if Linezka had the power to take one down, that she could take two. Heck, Luther was living proof of that.

I mean, here was a witch that had managed to destroy every other witch she pleased. And yet Luther, the only Necromancer Collette had mentioned ever coming into direct contact with her, had survived. It stood to reason, then, that Necromancers were harder to kill than regular witches. Maybe it was their Shadow Magick Linezka couldn’t stand up to, or maybe death itself picked Necromancers up and held them in his embrace until it was their time and not a moment sooner; whether the bitch liked it or not.

I snapped back into myself when the car door slammed shut. Blinked. Looked around. “We’re here?” I asked. “How did we get here.”

“We walked,” Collette said.

I glanced at her but she wasn’t looking at me. Her head was down, chin close to her chest as if some weight were resting on the back of her head and pushing her into the ground. This was the face of someone who believed she had failed at something. I had seen it before in myself and in others. It was always the same, and so it was easy to spot.

Collette, who usually kept herself as pristine as a porcelain doll, had been shattered.

“Collette…”

She tilted her eyes to me.

“Are you alright?”

“I’m sorry, ma cherie. I thought he would help.”

“Hey,” I said, taking her hand and squeezing it. A catch was starting to build in my throat. I could feel my lip trembling. “Don’t, okay? This wasn’t your fault. You didn’t know.”

“I should have.”

A single tear sparkled into existence at the base of Collette’s left eye and then raced down the side of her cheek. I watched it trail a line across the landscape of her perfect skin, pool beneath her jaw, and then drip to her lap. Time itself seemed to have slowed to a crawl as if to allow me to witness that moment with perfect clarity. It was as if time had said
here you go, Amber, drink this moment in.

Why? I didn’t know then. Not as I was watching. But the moment that tear hit her lap, something started to happen.

First, my chest started to buzz as if I had stuck my finger in a power socket. Then all manner of orange and brown leaves threw themselves at the car windshield, assaulting it seemingly with the intent to crack the glass itself. A moment later, the sky darkened, churned, and roared. Collette’s face lifted, and her eyes went wide.

I didn’t know what she saw in them then, or what it was that scared her, but she said “Amber… my hand… you’re hurting me.”

In one quick movement I released her hand, opened the car door, and marched around it and right back into the woods. The cold autumn wind was whipping at my face as I walked, but the leaves and twigs being picked up by the gust seemed to avoid me entirely. Around me they swirled as if caught in a tempest of my own creation. And maybe I
had
created a tempest and not known it. But I was running on
instinct
now.

And I was mad as all hell.

Mad at Luther, mad at Aaron, mad at myself, mad at Linezka. But most of all, I was mad at fear.

It was fear of missing my chance at vengeance which drove me to summon the succubus against Kyle after he cheated on me. It was fear of being with the wrong type of man which blinded me to the fact that the right man—Aaron—had been there all along. It was fear of losing my best friend that had kept me up so many countless nights these last couple of months. And it was fear that had caused Luther to abandon his responsibilities as a witch, and as a human being, and choose to hide when the right decision, clearly, was to fight.

High above, the sky growled and snarled in a song to match my growing anger.

“Amber!” Collette’s voice ripped through the wind, which had now kicked up to a howling bluster.

When I reached the old withered tree, I stopped and turned around to look at Collette. The wind was pushing outward from me, pulling and tugging at her black hair and dress. Her tears were gone, now. On her face, her beautiful, sad face, all that remained now was concern and protest.

“You have to stop!” she said.

“Why?” I asked, and thunder cracked as if in to echo my.

“Zis isn’t ze right way!”

“I’m tired of the right way, Collette,” I said, raising my voice above the sound of the wind. “We need his help, and we need to kill Linezka to secure our future.”

“What are you going to do?”

The roar of the wind and the thundering boom from high above dulled down to a muted hum just for a second, for the briefest of instants, like clouds parting to reveal a lick of daylight on a dark day. And in that moment, I remembered a song I had heard a bunch of times as a child. In that moment I felt like I was floating outside of myself and looking down at a copper—
fire—
haired girl surrounded by a tempest of whipping and whirling twigs and leaves. I saw, then, what Collette could see now and what she had seen back at the car. It was in my eyes and all around me; it was in my hair and in the orange and reds of autumn.