The Source (Witching Savannah, Book 2) (21 page)

TWENTY-NINE

“Are you ready to admit you need help?” Emmet’s voice came from behind me.

“Are you still following me?” I said, turning. Rather than feeling angry that I was being stalked—
again
—I was happy to see a friendly, if taciturn, face.

“Yes,” he said and sat down next to me. He leaned in closer, his warm breath tickling my ear. “You must understand. I’ve not only been tasked with teaching you. It is also my duty to protect you, at least until the families are sure you can protect yourself.”

“Or to spy on me and keep me in line until they can figure out a way to do away with me.”

He pulled away from me, his eyes wide, and his skin momentarily flashed back to the color of the gray dirt from which he had sprung. “No, Mercy. You must believe me. I believe I have made my feelings for you clear. Even if the families do not have your best interest at heart, you must realize that I would never assist in any effort to bring you harm.”

“At least not knowingly,” I said and watched his face as the possibility that the families had been lying dawned on him.

“They instructed me to follow you. I have been following you. Practically everywhere you’ve gone for months.”

I stopped and looked up into his stoic face. He had braced himself for a burst of anger, but I still had none. Deep down, I’d known it all along, even before Ryder had attested to Emmet’s constant, invisible presence. I’d felt him nearby, and had taken comfort from it. I shook my head and started to go, but he reached out and caught my forearm in his massive hand. “I was there Mercy. There when you encountered the Tierney man. There when your mother took you. And I was there in the Tillandsia house when the skylight crashed in on her.”

So it really
had
happened after all. “And you reported everything to the families?”

He shook his head. “Not all of it. Only as much as I felt necessary. That you accidently damaged the old man, yes. That a collector has come to Savannah, yes. That Peter is not human and that you have been meeting with your mother, no. That is why I denied having pulled you from the Tillandsia house. If I had admitted to being there, I might have been forced to share the truth about your interview with Emily.”

“So why the editing for my family?”

“Because I don’t know whom to trust, and you shouldn’t make assumptions regarding anyone’s goodwill for the time being either.”

“Even yours?”

He scooped up my forearm into his strong hand. “If it keeps you safe, if it makes you vigilant, then yes. Doubt me as well.” I tugged on my arm, and he released his grasp. “Show me the paper you hold. Please.”

In spite of his own warning to trust no one, I couldn’t bring myself to doubt his goodwill. I handed the card and the letter over to Emmet, who examined them minutely, as if they were a palimpsest whose secret text would reveal itself under scrutiny.

“I’m afraid that’s all she wrote,” I said.

“It would be foolhardy to attend,” Emmet said as he returned the papers to me.

“But I must. This could be my only hope of bringing Maisie home. Besides, if any of what my mother has said is true, she gave her life for this.”

“Perhaps it is true. And perhaps this letter is from your mother,” he said, pausing to consider his words. “But consider this: a woman capable of faking her own death once could certainly do so again.” I had not allowed this thought to surface in my mind, but now that it had arisen, I could not deny the possibility, even though I know what it meant. If she had done such a thing, I meant nothing to her. Emmet allowed me no time for reflection, no respite for my conflicted emotions. “I must inform you that your Aunt Ellen has gone missing. Neither Iris nor Oliver is overly concerned, as she has begun drinking again. Evidently, they consider disappearing part of her standard drinking behavior.”

I nodded. “That much is true, I’m afraid.”

“I am not so sure this time. I know you love her. Your devotion to her is evident, but for your own safety”—he seemed to sense my growing determination to knock down anything he might say against Ellen, so he went for the big guns—“and for the safety of your child, you have to consider that Ellen herself may have arranged Tucker Perry’s assassination to throw you off guard and lure you to Tillandsia.”

“No,” I said. I found it unthinkable that Ellen would do such a thing. When it came down to it, I felt a much stronger need to defend her than I did my own mother. “She loved Tucker, and she would have no motive for hurting me.”

“And you once believed that your sister loved Jackson, and that she’d never want to hurt you either.” That stung, especially since he was voicing my own repressed fears. “Listen to me,” he said, with an anxiety that I’d never heard before in his voice. “If Emily is truly dead—and I still think that’s questionable—who would have reason to kill her? Who was harmed most by your mother’s actions? Who else has been participating in Tillandsia all these years? Who knew the truth about the power generated by the group? Who would have the power to turn those same forces against your mother? Against you? Who else is a strong enough witch to turn that Ryder buffoon into a collector?”

“All right. Stop.” No longer caring that I might be seen, I crossed my arms and willed myself home. I found myself in the garden, Emmet still by my side. How he had managed to attach himself to me was a question for a later time. I scanned the house and garden to see if anyone was home, but we had the place to ourselves.

“I ask that you consider what I’ve said. Whoever gave the order to cause the dome to fall could at best be considered indifferent to your well-being. Perhaps you are correct in your convictions. Perhaps Ellen is an innocent.”

“She is.”

“If that is indeed the case, then you should question why Oliver is so eager to get his hands on the power that has been built up by Tillandsia.”

“He wants to use it to help Maisie,” I said, my growing irritation playing in my voice. “That’s his only interest in Tillandsia. And what do you have to say about Iris?”

“Well, your aunt is a widow now. Don’t you think it is possible that she may in some part blame you for that? No, it may be that your aunts and uncle love you and want to protect you, but are you willing to bet your life on it? Your child’s life?”

I considered his words. Yes. Yes, I would bet my own life on trusting my family, at least what remained of it, in spite of Maisie, in spite of Ginny, and in spite of my mother’s accusations against them. But no, I could not, would not, risk little Colin’s life by betting on any of them. “You’re right. I can’t take the risk.” There had been too many lies, whether well-intentioned or no. “I’m afraid there’s only one person I trust that deeply.” His black eyes warmed with hope, and I felt bad dousing their light. “I’m sorry, but I’m talking about Jilo.”

He covered his disappointment by tilting his head and trying to look as if he had just learned an interesting clinical fact. “Then we shall request her assistance.”

“I’m not sure she will help.” I’d never thought anything could frighten Jilo, but she had been terrified by what had happened with the gray rainbow. “And I’m not even sure what it is you are proposing.”

“The old woman will do anything you ask,” he said, and then added, “I think you are right to place your trust in her.” He crossed the garden and leaned over to touch the rose quartz in the flowerbed. It glowed as brightly as a lightbulb. “If I cannot dissuade you from attending Tillandsia tonight, then I propose we do what your uncle suggested, what your mother requested. Reach out and take control of the power of Tillandsia. We’ll do it without your family. We will do it on our own.”

“Okay, and then what?”

“We drain the power from Tillandsia and store it elsewhere, put it in our pocket so to speak, for use when we have a clearer view of who is pulling the strings and working against us. We use it to protect you. Then, once we know where we stand, I will not interfere with you retrieving your sister, assuming there is enough power remaining.”

“Assuming that there is power, and that we can access it, how or where could we store it?”

“Your friend Jilo has vacated her haint-blue cell. She designed it to hold energy.”

I thought about that. Of all the people I knew, Jilo had the most expertise when it came to siphoning off energy and finding a way to store it. At least since Ginny had died and stopped draining off my own power. “I will contact her and ask her to help. I have to do something.”

“I will do whatever I can to support you.” His eyes crinkled a bit. “But there’s one final aspect we must consider.”

“And that would be?”

“Your uncle seemed convinced that the only way to tap into Tillandsia’s power would be to enter into a sexual ecstasy.”

I had filed that little tidbit away as something to consider only when absolutely necessary. Even though the horse had broken well free of the barn, Peter and I had agreed, at my urging, to wait until after the wedding to make love again. Now I needed to show up and tell him he had to put out as part of a magical rite. I worried more about my own dignity than his willingness.

“Of course,” Emmet began, “it would be unwise to expose Peter to this untested magic. It might trigger his awareness.”

“His awareness of what?” I snapped.

“That he’s a changeling.”

“Damn it, Emmet,” I said. My head started hurting. I closed my eyes and tried to compose myself. “He can never know.”

“I understand, and that is why I am counseling you against bringing him tonight.”

Emmet was right. Again. “So what do you propose?”

“I offer myself—”

“Oh, no. You hold on right there.” I threw up both of my hands. “That is not happening. I am engaged to Peter. I love Peter. I will not allow anyone else to touch me that way.”

“I understand.” He drew nearer to me. I took a couple steps back, but then froze when his eyes locked onto mine. “I understand you wish to remain faithful to your fiancé. I won’t say that I would not like to lie with you as a man.” In spite of myself and my storming, guilty conscience, the image of our naked bodies straining against each other rose in my mind. “But I respect you and your commitment to Peter. I would never attempt to touch you that way as long as you honor that commitment.”

“Good,” I mumbled, trying to rid my mind of the thought of Emmet’s body, but still transfixed by his intense gaze.

“You must acknowledge, however, that if ensnarement is the intention of whoever sent you this invitation, they will be surprised to find that you have a very capable and coolheaded witch as your escort, rather than your impulsive carpenter.” I couldn’t deny that Emmet’s firepower might come in handy. He smiled, his eyes narrowing, lending a mischievous look to his normally serious face. “Besides, there are so many ways I can pleasure you without even touching you.” My temperature spiked as a vibration tingled through my body. “I can bring your pleasure centers to life with nothing more than a word, a thought.” I felt a surge rise up through my body, firing up each chakra as it passed into a tangible rainbow. Red, a shock, mercury rising. Orange, I felt a wave of shivering satisfaction swell up inside me. I should have protested what he was doing, but yellow, I felt so safe. Green, I knew I did have feelings for him; this wasn’t merely a carnal act. Blue. My pleasure expressed itself in a gasp. A soft moan. My eyes closed, and my head tilted back. Indigo. My eyes fluttered open to see the devotion on his face, the beautiful intensity of Bernini’s
David
made flesh, the purity of the feelings he held for me. The world around me turned violet, as he fully suffused me with his power. I fell forward into his waiting arms.

“Ahem.” Jilo banged on the top of the gate with her cane. I tore myself from Emmet’s embrace, startled and ashamed. “Wouldn’t mind a taste of that myself, mud pie.” She cackled and closed the garden gate with her stick. Both hands on its handle, she wobbled her way toward me. “Jilo understand you be needin’ her.” I looked from her back to Emmet, glowing in his smugness. In that moment, I hated him; in that moment, I knew that if it hadn’t been for Jilo’s arrival, I’d still be lost in his arms, my body demanding his.

THIRTY

“The game is afoot,” Emmet said, glancing over at me as we pulled up to the gates of the Tillandsia house. I rolled my eyes, and he smiled. He turned down the long drive, pulling near the oval, which had been a patch of dirt only a few days ago. Tonight, a decades-old magnolia stood there, fragrant in its full and miraculously timed bloom. The scent wafted in through my cracked open window. It intoxicated me, almost as much as the few times I’d allowed myself to glance over at Emmet. His piercing eyes burned, and despite their fire, they were even blacker than the tuxedo he wore. His hair was combed back in thick onyx waves. I fought the urge to run my fingers through them. My love for Peter was all that prevented me from acting on my desire.

I forced myself to concentrate on the matter at hand. Our plan was good, although I was not about to jinx it by thinking of it as foolproof. My job was to unlock the energy, and then Emmet would relay it to Jilo, who had ensconced herself in her haint-blue chamber and would be waiting to take charge of any magic we sent her way.

We pulled around the oval, where attendants were opening car doors and collecting keys. Emmet placed the car in park and turned to face me, a hint of a grin on his lips. “I’ve never driven before. Did I do okay?”

I laughed even though I shouldn’t have. I should have questioned his overly earnest request to act as chauffeur. Tonight, though, I didn’t want to ask too many questions of him. I was afraid of the answers. “You did great.”

Powerful searchlights crossing beams overhead and smaller lamps scattered throughout nearly turned the night into day. Peter’s crew had done no additional work since Tucker’s death, but the Tillandsia house shone, the very image of perfection. Only magic could have transformed it so quickly. The sad and peeling paint had been exchanged for a fresh and nearly luminescent white that coated the house’s Doric pillars as well as the building itself. The shutters had been enameled black. Only the door remained as it had been, the same black and red that the Tillandsia Society had evidently adopted as its symbol.

The attendant opened my door, and I stretched out my legs, making sure that my much higher than usual heels connected safely with the still fresh pavement. Emmet met me at the side of the car and offered me his arm. I let myself lean on it, enjoying the comfort of his strength. My fingers dug into his jacket as we stepped past the infamous door and over the threshold. My eyes darted nervously around the entranceway, but there was no visible dome overhead. The true architecture of the house fully honored the Georgian preference for symmetry—two stairways curved gracefully up to the top floor, one on each side.

Eyes fell on us from every direction, predatory and hungry—some for me, some for Emmet, and a good number for us both. I recognized some of the faces, including a teacher from my high school and a few business people and their respective spouses. Most of the faces were new, but all, the new and the known, glowed with the same carnivorous delight. Conversation stopped as a servant who was attired in a period costume, complete with a powdered wig, stepped forward. “Your invitation, please.” He held out a silver tray to receive it. I looked at Emmet with panic in my eyes. I’d forgotten to bring it. He smiled and produced the paper from his coat pocket. After he placed it on the tray, the servant picked it up. “Miss Mercy Taylor and Mister . . . ?” He paused, appreciating the dark wall of man next to me.

“My name is Emmet Clay.”

“Wouldn’t mind spinning that clay on my wheel.” A stage whisper floated down from a group of middle-aged ladies at the top of the stairs. The conversation picked up again in spurts and stops, soon reaching its previous volume and complexity, even though most eyes remained fixed on the two of us.

“A warm Tillandsia welcome to you, Mr. Clay,” the servant said and bowed.

Emmet leaned over and whispered into my ear. “They can’t take their eyes off you.” His warm breath tickled.

“I think you are the one everybody’s checking out.”

“No,” he said. “You are breathtaking in that dress.”

I bit my tongue to keep from turning it into a joke, from saying, “What, this old thing?” Instead I returned a simple “Thank you.” I wore another of Ellen’s finds, an ice-blue vintage cocktail dress with trails of slightly darker flowers that ran down the fabric in rows. It read as very sweet and demure, and my amplified cleavage was well hidden by the collarbone-high neckline and wide straps. Even with the pleated waist, it still covered me without drawing attention to my pregnancy. The skirt fell a little below the knee. I’d borrowed Ellen’s pearls, wearing them for good luck as well as a sign of my faith in her, and had my hair up in a loose bun. The entire effect came across as much more Sunday school than orgy. I surveyed the room filled with high slit skirts and deeply plunging necklines, and realized the seductive power my modest look held simply due to juxtaposition.

Even though I knew the participants were here of their own volition, the house had the feeling of a zoo or prison, each room as a separate cage. I reached up and touched my aunt’s pearls, focusing on them, using them to help me hone in on her energy. “Aunt Ellen is here,” I said to Emmet. “I can sense her.”

“Do you detect that she is in danger of any kind?”

“No, she doesn’t seem to be under any stress.” In fact, when I reached out to her, I experienced a sense of calmness, as if she were resting or medicated. Waiters walked around carrying glass after glass of Ellen’s favorite form of medication.

“Then let us focus for now on the power.” Emmet lifted his hand, using it like an antenna or maybe a dowsing rod. “There is much of it here, just waiting for us to tap into it.”

“I feel it too.” The power did not resonate like the smooth and vibrant energy of the line, nor did it sizzle like the nearly psychotic electricity that had built up at the old Candler Hospital, having fed off the pain and misery of those who had been lost there. It lay somewhere between the two, and it felt something like silk being pulled across a ragged rock. I gave a slight tug to the bond Emmet had helped set up between Jilo and myself. She tugged back.

“The real party is this way,” a naked man I recognized as a former state senator said with a grin, using his sex to point to the doorway of what had probably been the parlor or drawing room.

I felt the blood rise to my face as I watched his pasty buttocks pass through the arch of the door. I turned nearly purple when the servant who announced us approached. “If you’d prefer a more private setting, there are rooms upstairs. Although there will be several,” he said, giving Emmet a thoroughly appreciative stare, “who will be
very
disappointed if you don’t join the festivities.”

“We came here to ‘participate,’ ” I said, dreading the thought of crossing the barrier into that room.

“We don’t have to stay, Mercy. We can find Ellen and leave if that is what you would prefer.”

“If you are speaking of Mrs. Weber,” the servant said using the correct German pronunciation, “she is already in there with her friends.” He stretched his hand out to indicate the room into which we had just been invited. Emmet and I looked at each other, each reflecting the other’s uncertainty. “Don’t be shy. Dive on in,” the servant said. “The water’s warm.”

I nodded to Emmet, and he placed his arm around my shoulder and led me from the entrance into what I’d assumed was the party room. Once there, I realized that the old parlor was simply being used as a cloakroom. At one end, a female attendant, pretty close to my own age, stood perfectly naked and totally unashamed. At the other end, a muscular man, nude except for a gun belt, stood guard at the door that led from the cloakroom into what I now knew to be the party room.

“Welcome, y’all,” the attendant said, offering us rubber bracelets with numbers printed on them. “Here are your claim numbers when you are ready to head out tonight, so take care not to lose them.” She dropped both bands into Emmet’s large hand, and then held up two black vinyl garment bags with the corresponding numbers written on them.

“That’s all right,” I said. “I think we’ll keep our clothes on for now.”

“Oh, I am sorry. This must be your first time.” She smiled congenially at us newbies. “No one gets in without, well, displaying their goods.”

“In our case, you will please make an exception,” Emmet said in a calm voice. He wasn’t attempting to charm her magically, as Oliver would have done; he was simply stating his wish in his habitual, matter-of-fact manner.

“I am afraid we can’t do that, sir. Fair is fair. Besides, I am sure that neither you nor your pretty lady has anything to be ashamed of.” She smiled at me, her eyes asking me to talk some sense into my date. “Your lady friend can keep her pearls, if she likes. And her shoes,” she offered.

“When in Rome, I guess,” I said, and when Emmet looked at me, his eyes were filled with surprise. “We’ll only need one bag.”

“Oh, sweetie,” the attendant said, her shoulders relaxed. She seemed relieved by my surrender. “Don’t go making that mistake. You are a true beauty and all, but it’s quite a rarity for a couple that comes to Tillandsia together to leave together.”

Emmet’s face clouded over like a storm about to burst. His eyes narrowed and his brow creased. “I apologize. I believe when I used the word ‘please’ earlier, you thought I was making a request. I am telling you that in our case, you will make an exception.”

The woman lowered the bags as Emmet dropped the bands on her table.

“Listen here,” the doorman said, moving his hand to his holster. “Everybody’s just here to have a good time. Loosen up or leave.”

Emmet turned to face the guard. Even though the man was close to six feet tall and had the muscles of a professional bodybuilder, Emmet towered over him by nearly a foot. I could tell the guard feared Emmet might call his bluff and make him pull his pistol from its holster. Emmet stood firm, and after a few taut moments, the guard drew aside. Emmet placed his arm around my shoulder again and led me into hell’s second circle.

The hall, for you couldn’t simply call it a room, stretched out much larger than I had imagined it could, or perhaps the sense of size was an optical illusion created by the numerous gilt-framed mirrors that lined its walls and had been suspended from the ceiling. Still, even with the hall’s size, it felt close and claustrophobic. It had no windows, and the only perceivable exit was the entrance through which we’d just come. It was too dark to even determine the color of the walls, save in one corner where a bright spotlight illuminated a stage and the wall behind it. It had been painted plum—a good shade for debauchery, I decided.

Deep inhalations and sighs sounded from one end of the hall to the other, answered by soft moans and whispers and the occasional alarming cry of pleasure. I lowered my eyes, trying not to look at anything. But there, all along the floor, writhed piles and mounds and rows of bodies, lying together, caressing one another, in kaleidoscopic combinations. A heaving, groaning work by Bosch. A green scent like acacia in hot sun. Another, seaweed washed up on the damp shore. Tattoos and scars and every shade in the rainbow of flesh. Faces contorted with pleasure or contorted with pain, as per their inclination, appeared from the shadows only to be swallowed again by the darkness moments later. Waiters circled, offering any vice from alcohol to tiny packets of white powder to hypodermic needles loaded with God only knows what. Pillars of smoke floated in and out around us, some smelling sweet—cloying, even—others like vinegar. I tried not to breathe the smoke in, fearing the effect it might have on my baby. I should never have come here. I should never have risked Colin. I should have put him first, before Maisie, before my own selfish need to prove to myself that my mother loved me. I wanted to scream as the truth hit me. Regardless of my reasons, my justifications, that was the true reason I’d come. Well, I no longer cared. All that mattered was proving to my son that I loved him.

I turned and tried to push my way back to the exit, desperate to leave the hall, but dozens of revelers had followed us in and were crowding around us. I started to panic, striking out, slapping, clawing at those who surrounded me. Emmet picked me up and strode away from the center of the room, where we had somehow found ourselves. He sat me down with my back against the far wall, and used his own mass to shield me from those who would have crushed up against us. “I want to get out of here. I need to get out of here,” I cried into his ear. “Forget the plan.”

“I know, and I will find us a way to do just that.”

“Just get us to the exit,” I said, not comprehending why this wouldn’t show itself as the obvious solution.

“The wall behind us is where the exit was . . . Your back is directly against it.”

I felt around behind myself, feeling nothing but wall, but then I turned and saw my own eyes dimly reflected back at me by a mirror that had taken the place of the door. They mimicked the eyes of a trapped and desperate animal. Emmet put his hands on my shoulders and turned me back toward him. “Don’t panic,” he said. “It’s the magic in this room. It is seeking to master us, but we must take control and become its master instead . . . We must continue with the plan. You can do this. We can do this.”