The Water Witch (31 page)

“We are waiting for your answer, Dr. Delmarco.”

“No,” Frank said, “I wasn’t. But it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t change
who
she is.”

“But it does.” Adelaide’s voice was almost soft now. “She merely had to say her true name to make you swoon. Who knows what effect her power has had on you, or how it has compromised your judgment?”

“I have never wielded my power over Frank,” Soheila cried. “Nor over any other man—not for decades. I have abstained from that sort of contact for more than sixty years.” Soheila lifted her chin.

“Ah,” Adelaide purred, “but you just said you don’t have control over your power. Merely saying your name is a prelude to seduction. It is what you are. The Grove cannot blame you for that, Dr. Lilly, but it can take steps to protect humanity from you.”

Beside me Liz made a noise that started as a sob but then turned into a snort of laughter. “Humanity!” she cried, rising to her feet. “This proceeding is a mockery of humanity. I call for a recess …”

“We all have to agree to call a recess,” Delbert Winters said. “And I, for one, would like to hear what Dr. Lilly has to say.”

Liz glared at Winters. “This is my college. I won’t stand by and let my teachers be interrogated.”

“And yet you stood by and let an incubus prey on one of your teachers. Your judgment has been rendered invalid, Dean Book. As has Dr. Delmarco’s. You have both been seduced by those creatures from whom you are pledged to protect humanity. Why, less than one week ago you, Dean Book, let into this world an undine who has been rampaging through the woods, preying on young men.”

“That wasn’t Dean Book’s fault,” I said, rising to my feet. “I let in the undine—inadvertently—and Dean Book has done everything in her power to apprehend her. In fact, this rogue undine was apprehended last night. She’s being held under guard until tomorrow when she will be escorted to the door and brought back to Faerie. It’s that kind of cooperation between witches and fey that makes Fairwick work. If we close the door and force part of our population to leave, the town and college will lose its heart. We’ll be diminished.”

“A very heartening sentiment, Dr. McFay,” Delbert Winters said, his voice thick with disdain, “but since you are not a member of the governing board of IMP, you have no standing in these proceedings.”

“She’s been called in as an expert witness—” Liz began.

“I hardly think that writing a book about the sex lives of vampires makes her an expert in anything but …” Delbert Winters sneered. “… 
sex
. If anything, her proclivities make her a suspect witness. Didn’t she have a relationship with an incubus last year?”

“That was months ago. I banished him—”

“And yet you still wear the marks of your dalliance with him!” Adelaide waved her hand and I felt something rough brush against my cheek. I was reminded of an incident when I was fourteen and Adelaide caught me wearing makeup to
school. She’d scrubbed my face with a washcloth. I felt the same shame now, coupled with a tightening of my wards as I realized that Soheila’s protective makeup had been wiped from my face, but I held my head up.

“This was no dalliance,” I said. “It was an attack from a creature I was attempting to unmask.”

“However you acquired the marks, dear, it’s clear you are unable to protect yourself, let alone your friends and neighbors.” She looked down at the report in front of her. “Since coming to Fairwick, you’ve let in a liderc who fed on students and faculty. You let in an incubus who fed on
you
. And now you’ve let in an undine that has been attacking fishermen.”

Adelaide snapped her fingers and the slide projection of a bucolic wood changed to a graphic depiction of a body of a young man, his legs twisted at an unnatural angle, his arms splayed out to either side, lying beside a forest stream. His face and chest were covered with blood and gore. Lydia Markham and Talbot Greeley gasped.

“This body was found in the woods near the source of the Undine,” Adelaide said into the stunned silence of the room. “As was this one.” She snapped her fingers again and another corpse appeared on the screen, this one without a face.

Frank stood up and moved closer to the screen, the red gore spreading over his own face as he scrutinized the picture.

“Do we know for certain that this was done by an undine?” Liz asked.

Adelaide shot her a cool stare. “They were found near where Lorelei was last spotted.”

“Still, that doesn’t mean she did this to those men,” I said.

“This isn’t how undines usually behave,” Soheila added, staring at the gruesome image. “Something’s wrong.”

“Yes,” Adelaide agreed. “Something is
very
wrong. Those woods have become a breeding ground for creatures from the
other world. These aren’t cute fairies and brownies—these are monsters. Not only has Fairwick failed to control the traffic of immigration from Faerie, it has created an atmosphere in which such creatures thrive. It has been suggested by some members of this council that the only solution is to shut down the entire town.”

“You mean,” Liz said, blanching, “like Fluges?”

“It’s your own fault for hiring so many otherworlders,” Delbert Winters hissed at Liz, his face dyed red from the slide projection. “I’ve warned you about that before.”

“Clearly there should have been stricter monitoring structures in place,” Lydia Markham remarked, her face also a mask of blood.

“This is what happens when the avenues of discourse are severed due to self-fulfilling paradigm shifts,” Loomis Pagan remarked enigmatically.

“ ‘Violence is the last resort of the helpless,’ ” Eleanor Belknap quoted somebody. “These creatures need help.”

“Otherworlders who cannot control their urges—as the rest of us have—need to be escorted from this world and never let back in again,” Talbot Greeley said, adjusting his now crimson bow tie. “Lest they ruin it for the rest of us.”

I turned toward each board member but saw only bloody, scared faces, their voices mingled with the restless rustling sound that seemed to be growing and coming from everywhere. It sounded like a stampede—or a flock of angry birds. Frank was standing with his back to the table, still staring up at the slide. The Grove members were talking among themselves, Garnette Davis leaning toward Adelaide, whispering in her ear. Adelaide shook her head several times, then nodded once and held up her hand. Instantly the room went quiet.

“My esteemed colleague, Garnette Davis, has another suggestion. If we announce that the door is to be closed and the
captured undine is escorted under the armed guard of the Stewarts to the door, the majority of otherworldly creatures in the forest will also leave this world. It may take some time to clean up the woods entirely, but we may be able to save the town and the college.”

The IMP board members murmured their approval.

“That is, if Dr. McFay is willing to close the door for us,” Adelaide added.

“And if I don’t?” I asked.

“That would be regrettable,” Adelaide said severely, “but I assure you we have our ways of doing it ourselves. You won’t be able to stop us.”

“What about the otherworlders living in Fairwick?” I asked. “What will happen to them?”

“The creatures who have made their homes here are free to choose which world they will live in,” Adelaide replied.

“That seems eminently fair,” Talbot Greeley said with a relieved sigh. “Don’t you think so, Delbert?”

Delbert Winters snorted. “Too fair by half, but I suppose it will do.”

“But if the door is closed forever, many will be forced to choose Faerie,” Liz said.

“So they’ll have to choose,” Lydia Markham said brusquely. “We’ve all had to make hard choices. Why should fairies be any different?”

“And what of those who have used Aelvesgold to lengthen their life spans?” Liz asked. “Or to control illnesses? Lydia, didn’t your mother receive treatment when she was sick last year? And you, Talbot, I know you don’t maintain your physique through going to the gym.” Neither professor met Liz’s gaze.

“Vanities,” Eleanor Belknap remarked. “We’ll learn to do
without them. Are we ready to take a vote? All those in favor of closing the door forever, raise their hands.”

Five of the six board members raised their hands. Liz kept her hands clasped in front of her, fingers knotted together.

“Very well, then,” Adelaide said, smiling. “We’re agreed. The door will be closed forever.”

“When?” Soheila asked, the single word gusting from her mouth with a force that snapped the window blinds and chilled the room.

Adelaide smiled. “Since tomorrow is the solstice, it seems a fitting time. The door will be closed tomorrow morning at dawn.”

R
ising as one, the Grove members began to file out. The IMP board members got up more slowly, but they too left the room, avoiding looking at Liz, who remained in her seat. Soheila got up and started walking toward Liz and me. At the same time, Frank turned around from the slide screen and started toward her, his arms out as though to grab hold of her.

“Soheila, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know …”

She held up her hands. I think she only meant to ward off Frank’s apologies and to keep him from touching her—maybe she was afraid of what effect her touch might have on him in her highly emotional state—but the motion caused a gust of wind that blew him backward. He hit the wall, his arms splayed out to steady himself, in a pose eerily like the twisted limbs of the murdered fisherman. Soheila made a sound like a wounded bird and fled the room. With a pained look on his face, Frank watched her go and then addressed himself to Liz. “I had no idea that the information I was collecting would be used by the Grove. It looks to me like IMP has been compromised by the Grove.”

Liz nodded. “We’re in agreement there,” she said. “I don’t understand how they can turn their backs on the fey. Even Loomis Pagan and Talbot Greeley have turned on their own kind.”

I filled Frank in on what I’d learned from Jen Davies about the club in London that the Grove had joined forces with.

“The Seraphim Club?” he repeated. “I’ve heard something about them …” His voice drifted off. He was staring at me, his eyes narrowed. “What
did
happen to your face, McFay?”

“Oh,” I said, embarrassed. “It’s a long story—” Before I could finish he stepped closer and put his hand up against my face, but the wards on my skin sizzled and popped. He kept his hand there, though, even though the wards were beginning to smoke and I smelled singed flesh.

“Frank, don’t!” I grabbed his hand and pushed it away. He looked at me, then down at his hand. The coils had been seared into his flesh. He nodded once, as if what he saw confirmed something he’d long suspected. Then he turned and left without another word.

Liz’s face sagged. She seemed to have aged a decade in the hour we’d been inside this room. I was afraid she was going to cry, but instead she asked the last question I wanted to hear. “Can you stop them from closing the door?”

“Yes,” I said with more confidence than I felt. “I read in Wheelock that there’s a way for a doorkeeper to create a bond with the door to keep it open.”

“I’ve read that footnote in Wheelock,” Liz said, “but only a doorkeeper can access the spell.” Her face looked troubled. “I’ve also heard that doorkeepers have died in the attempt to prevent a door from closing.”

“It won’t come to that,” I told Liz.

She held my gaze for a moment, then nodded. “Let’s hope not.”

•  •  •

I walked quickly across the campus, my anger at the Grove pumping in my veins. They had tricked and manipulated us. Clearly they had gotten to some of the IMP board members and influenced their votes. The others had been swayed by those awful pictures of undine attacks. The Grove was using fear and prejudice to control us. Well, I wouldn’t be controlled. I was the doorkeeper. There had to be a way I could keep the door open, despite the Grove’s intention to close it—and the answer was in Wheelock.

When I reached my house I opened my briefcase and took out the spellbook. Standing on the porch I opened to the marked section, reread the footnote, and then depressed the magical icon. Instead of pages filling with text as had happened before, I felt a sharp stabbing pain in my right eye, as if a hot cinder had blown into it. I blinked and a red film covered my vision. It took a moment to realize that words were imprinted on the film and that they were scrolling across my vision.

In order for a doorkeeper to gain complete dominion over a door to Faerie and prevent others from closing it she may cast a correlative spell that links her own person to the door. This can be accomplished by spilling a drop of her blood on the threshold of the door. Once the bond is established she only has to repeat the words
Quam cor mea aperit, tam ianua aperit
(“Just as my heart opens, so the door opens”) in order to cancel out any opposing closing spells. The best time to perform this ritual is at dusk on the eve of the summer solstice
.

“Eureka!” I said aloud, blinking my eyes three times. The words
There is one caution …
flashed as I blinked but then began to fade.
Shoot!
Blinking three times was probably the way to end the transmission. Never mind, I thought, I knew enough to make the bond. It was nearly dusk now. I had to go
to the door right now to establish the bond before tomorrow morning.

Without bothering to change out of my suit and pumps, I took off into the woods, walking as fast as I could in heels to the clearing where the door to Faerie stood. As rushed as I was, I ground to a halt when I reached the edge of the clearing. I’d stood here before in the middle of winter and thought it was magical when glazed with ice and snow, but I’d never seen it before in full summer, on the eve of the summer solstice. The trees were draped with honeysuckle vines in full bloom, their white and yellow blossoms filling the air with sweet honeyed scent. The vines had twisted themselves into an arch directly across from me. Heavy wisteria blooms hung over the arch like a fringed curtain. The air inside the arch shimmered like the skin of a soap bubble. I approached it warily, feeling my resolve waver with the undulating colors. I was going to bond myself to
this
, I thought, a portal to another world? I was already a mess of conflicting desires. What would it do to me to connect myself to an unstable, volatile entity?