Hoodoo Woman (Roxie Mathis Book 3) (21 page)

Peggy dragged me through the woods with just a gesture. Her men flanked us on the sides. The pungent smell of the lake grew stronger. Water. We were headed for the water. Panic clawed its way up my throat. It would take Daniel time to heal enough to get those stakes out of his body. Even once he did, would he come to my aid, or would the blood lust and his body’s needs drive him to find a meal? I didn’t want to think about what that bag of blood, and who it came from, might drive him to do.

I tried slowing my feet. The binding spell wrapped itself tighter, squeezing the breath from me. Wetness slicked my skin around the worst of the pain. Blood. I was bleeding from the incorporeal barbs created by the spell. Branches still devoid of growth snapped and bit as I was pushed through them. I tripped over something, hitting the ground hard. Sharp pain radiated from my knees up to my thighs and hips. A pair of hands tried to pull me up from behind. I fought, landing an elbow in soft flesh. A man cried out, then swore.

I had one foot on the ground and was trying to push the other in place when someone hit me across the face. I tumbled backward, a stone digging into my back and my head ringing from the blow. Unable to see or think straight for a long moment, I lost momentum and was dragged up by the arms.

The water line got closer. Along this part of the lake shore there was no dock, no beach, no place people were likely to congregate, especially on a cool early spring night. Just woods and then water. Water higher than I was tall, and I wasn’t a strong swimmer. In fact I could barely swim at all, something I’d learned in the flood. I screamed for help I knew would not come, the sound of my voice tinny and flat. The older witch had placed some sort of muffling spell around us.

Indistinct shapes moved in the dark. My glasses were lost, probably when I wound up on the ground after being struck. Pockets of gray shimmered in the inky blackness. Orange and red streaks popped in and out like candle flames suddenly lit and just as quickly doused. The marshy stink of the water clogged my throat and burned my sinuses.

I could feel it under my boots when the ground became a mixture of hard packed dirt and the soft sandy earth deposited by the occasional rising of the lake. I pushed my will against the binding spell again, to no avail. It only cut deeper.

We left the woods, abruptly reaching the lake’s edge. Water lapped at the bottom of my jeans. I screamed, “Why are you doing this?”

Peggy came to stand to just inches from me. The smell of rotted strawberries blended with the lake funk. Tangled together with panic and fear, it was a wonder I didn’t vomit right then. She said, “Daddy can’t have what he wants. Not this time.”

“You’re not making any sense. I won’t be a part of his plan. I won’t have anything to do with him.”

“The card reader. The one who hides behind a veil of alcohol. You. The little girl who talks to trees.” Peggy looked out over the water. It was a moonless night. If not for my auric vision I might not have been able to see anything. An oily smudge of energy draped around her like a tentacle. “Those are the ones left. Touched by the same foulness.”

She meant magic. The knowledge hit me in a deeply visceral sense beyond instinct. After a lifetime of her father and his dark magic, Peggy could not conceive of any magic being anything but evil. She wanted to do more stop her father. She wanted to cleanse the town of any and all witches she could find.

I planted my feet firmly in the earth. “Did you kill your niece?” I believed I already knew the answer but for some reason I wanted to hear her say it out loud. I wanted someone to take responsibility for Britney’s murder.

“No,” Peggy said. She looked at me, flames dancing in her eyes. “I killed my daughter.”

With a nod, her two accomplices took my arms and dragged me to the water. I took the deepest breath I could, trying not to panic, knowing what was coming. A roar exploded in my head as the panic came anyway, then there was only water.

Cold. So cold it knocked that deep breath right out of my lungs. Thrashing against the spell and the men both, I kicked up a froth of water and sand and debris. My feet could find no purchase. Pressure at my back held me under. Unable to speak, I sent out a silent call with every ounce of my will.
Stack!
Over and over and over.

My spirit familiar did not answer. I was completely alone.

My lungs burned for air. Pain rippled through every part of my body, from the spell and the lack of oxygen. A single image, unbidden and surprising, snapped into focus. Dark hair, blue eyes, a haze of earthy green aura. I used that image to ground myself, and held it like a precious memento as I forced my body to go slack. Fighting would not get me what I needed but suppressing the instinct was difficult. The face in my thoughts gave me an anchor. I let it pull me down, through the water and the fear and the panic. Down through the memories both good and bad, down through murky darkness and flashes of white. Down past the gift of fire I’d been born with, the air I desperately needed, the earth that eluded my feet. Down into the very heart of the water.

Peggy Parker thought to drown herself a witch. What she didn’t know was this witch had made water her bitch.

For months after the flood I’d had nightmares about it. Not only was losing my home traumatic, but nearly dying in that rush of chaotic energy had left a mark on me that went further than bruises and heartache. The flood water that almost killed me carved a path right through me, through my psyche and my magic and the most basic elements that made me
Roxanne
. Working with Stack helped somewhat, but even that wasn’t enough. No, what finally brought the nightmares to heel was turning the tables and learning how to carve a path right back through the water. Night after night of soaking in the tub, dunking my head under for longer and longer periods. I practiced every spell, every incantation, everything I could find to do with working with water, until I found my own way. It’s the way I’d always practiced magic and I’d had some success.

The lake was no bathtub, though. I’d never had to do these things in an environment that was out of my control.

I focused my intention, then pushed my will outward. A wave traveled through the water like the wake of a boat, but not strong enough. I did it again, then a third time. That was the charm. It buoyed me upward with such force I was able to wrench myself away from Peggy’s lackeys. I gulped in much needed air as I struggled to get back on solid ground.

A blinding flare of reddish orange lit the night. A shockwave of magic slammed me back under the water, the binding spell constricting my limbs as good as any rope. Unable to speak, I repeated the spell in my head over and over.

Call the thunder, call the lightning. Call the thunder, call the lightning. Call the thunder, call the lightning.

The pressure in my chest threatened to explode. Darkness beckoned. The image I held onto winked out. A quiet stillness wrapped around me, cold and pure and peaceful. I hung suspended in the sensation for the space of a heartbeat, tempted to accept what it offered.

My feet found earth. I must have drifted down while unable to struggle, caught in the binding spell. The contact gave me just enough strength to bring the image back to mind and repeat the spell.

A rumble of thunder rattled in my bones. I used it to push against the spell and fight my way upward. Again and again I called on thunder and lightning. Storm magic was dangerous and chaotic and unpredictable. I could wind up drowning, or turning myself into a human lightning rod. A storm might not materialize at all.

Or blue-white lightning might crack open the night, bathing the area with light and breaking the binding spell.

I dragged myself out of the water, collapsing on solid ground. Shaking, I tried to push onto my back and couldn’t. Things darker than the night slithered through my auric vision. Lifting my head, I traced the murky lines of power to the witch standing twenty feet away.

Peggy raised her hand. Reddish orange tendrils spread from her fingertips.

“Call the thunder, call the lightning. Call the tempest, call the squall.” As the words spilled out in a rush I opened myself up to the energy around me, drawing it to me and acting as a conduit for it. A surge of magic rocketed through me. I focused everything I had left on conjuring a storm, willing one into existence out of sheer desperation.

Another flash of lightning split the dark, this time directly between me and Peggy. It shook the ground. I convulsed for a few seconds as if I’d stuck my finger in a light socket. The red-orange light rebounded on the other witch, hitting in the center of her body. She dropped to the ground with a scream.

The sky opened, spitting out a hard, furious rain.

Mired in mud and sand, soaking wet, I managed to turn my aching body over and lay on my back. Rain pelted me in a solid sheet. Leftover energy glowed like phosphorescence in the auric field, the only illumination in the night.

Time passed but I had no notion of how much. It took effort to clear my head enough to realize I needed to get out of the rain. The thought made me laugh. I was so disconnected from reality, the sound coming out of my own mouth startled me.

Exhaustion seeped into my body. Sleep seemed like a great idea, except for the rain, and the mud, and other vague things that niggled at the back of my brain. A warning instinct urged me into a sitting position, then pressed me to go further. I knew that meant standing but it seemed like an impossible goal, especially with nothing to hold on to. Maneuvering onto my hands and knees, I decided to crawl until I ran into something I could use to pull myself up.

Fortunately it didn’t take long for my shoulder to come in contact with a tree. I reached with one hand to grip the surface, hoping it would be sturdy enough to help me up. My hand slid down smooth wet cloth.

Unless trees had suddenly started wearing pants, I was in a shit ton of trouble. The witch had lackeys, I remembered then. Two men who didn’t look or act like the brightest lights on the Christmas tree but might still be too much for me to handle in the state I was in.

“Bitch! What’d you do to our Miss Peggy?”

Jesus Christ, he sounded like she dug him up out of a holler fifty years ago. I pushed myself up to stand on my knees, finally seeing the man. At first I thought his aura was cloaked by a spell but then I realized it was just too damned dark and murky to see in the soup of rain and night. “With any luck.” I had to pause to take a breath, wiping my muddy hands on my clothes. “I turned Miss Peggy’s own hex on her.”

Jethro T. Stereotype shoved me to the ground sideways and I landed on a rock. “You ain’t fit to speak her name.”

My hip throbbed. “Fuck you.” Not my best work but it was all I could come up with at the time.

“Trash mouth slut! You’ll be held to account.”

A yellow-gold aura shot through with pulsing red approached from behind Jethro at preternatural speed. “I prefer harlot,” I said. “And you’re about to be a midnight snack for a vampire.” I rolled, both to get out of the way and to keep from seeing.

I could hear it, though. God, I could hear it. A guttural scream that came to an abrupt end was followed by the sounds of a starving animal tearing into a meal. Growling and sucking noises almost drowned out the man’s cries. Gradually the sucking became faster and the crying petered away to nothing, then came a thump as the body hit the ground.

Scared to move, I huddled in the mud, hoping Daniel was in his right mind enough to know who I was. If he wasn’t, this was going to be over quick.

He knelt beside me. “How bad are you hurt?”

I didn’t realize I’d shut my eyes until I opened them to look at him. Blood ran from his mouth as the rain beat hard enough to wash it away. Red swam in my vision but his usual yellow gold was still strong enough I knew I was safe. “I’m kinda fried. You?”

“Hungry.” He took my hand and pulled me up. Standing made the world look wrong and my head tilt sideways. He said, “I’m taking you back, then I’m going hunting. If that’s a problem you better say so now.”

By hunting he meant feeding, and by problem he meant Peggy Parker and her second minion that was out there somewhere. After having a hole shot in his chest and being left staked to the ground, Daniel was in no mood to pretend he was anything but what he was - a vampire. Maybe it was wrong of me but right then I didn’t care. “I need to get to town. Can you get me back to the house quick?”

“Can you drive in your condition? In this storm?”

“I made this storm. I’m not scared of it.” That wasn’t an answer to either of his questions but it would have to suffice.

In minutes I was finally out of the rain, huddled in the driver’s seat of the SUV. Daniel left me the keys before he disappeared without a word, fangs out. It took some time for me to get control of my shaking body. I spent most of that time holding my hands over the vents, soaking in the heat. Once I felt steady enough to drive I remembered my glasses were lost. Screw it, I could drive nearsighted with my auric vision.

My bag was still in the floorboard of the passenger seat. I dug out my phone, dialing Ray as I drove to the highway.

“Where are you,” was his terse greeting.

“On my way back into town. Peggy Parker tried to kill me.”

He swore. “Every law enforcement in the county is on the way to the Parker house. Someone there called 911, there’s reports of shots fired and screaming in the back garden. And a storm just came up out of nowhere. I don’t know if that’s connected but -’’

“The storm was me,” I said. “Listen, Peggy wanted to kill all the witches in town. I don’t know if she started with me or what.” The connection cut out briefly, a precipitous drop in static. “I’m almost to the dead zone, Ray. The call will drop.” Several miles between the lake house and town was an area with no cell service.

“Go to my house and stay out of this. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

That would likely take hours. It didn’t matter, this was as much my problem as his. I wasn’t waiting another night to find whatever Andrew Parker used to bind Britney’s spirit and set her free. After that, I had no plan other than do whatever it took to put a stop to the madness in that house. If it meant one or more of them either in jail or a psychiatric ward, so be it. I wasn’t going to let them hurt anyone else.

I said, “You can’t take Andrew Parker on by yourself. Wait for me.”

“I’m almost there.” The line cut out again, then came back. “ - don’t know anything about this kind of stuff. At least I know a little.”

Thunder boomed to my left, over the lake. It rattled the windshield. “Ray? Ray? Are you still there?”

The call had dropped. I closed the phone and put it in my lap. Lightning lit up the road in front of me. A gray form stood in the middle of the lane. I jerked the wheel, swerving as fast as I could. Once back in my lane I shook my head, amazed at how instinctual some things were. That gray form was not a living person, it was a spirit. I’d seen him with my auric vision.

I saw more spirits on the drive into town. Most were echoes of wrecks on the highway but a few were far older. I focused on the road as best I could, my nearsightedness giving me a headache. The storm continued unabated.

By the time I turned into the cul-de-sac where the Parker house was located, my hands ached from gripping the steering wheel so hard. The power was out in the neighborhood, street lights and all the houses dark, but the collection of police and emergency vehicles painted the night with red and blue lights. I left the SUV parked at the curb and searched for Ray. Shouts and radio squawks were muffled by the heavy rain. Uniformed people ran to and fro as if desperately needing to do something, as their training called for, but they didn’t know what to do in this situation. Whatever this situation was - all I could tell so far was a nasty ring of sulfurous energy encircled the house. It made me glad for the rain keeping the tainted magic from clinging too tightly to my skin.

A familiar voice called out. I whirled, finding Ray knelt over a younger officer who appeared to be having an asthma attack. EMTs rushed to the younger man’s side and Ray stepped away to give them room. He saw me as I headed in his direction, dodging another officer who tried to stop me. The cop followed but the sight of Ray taking me in his arms probably sent the officer looking for something else to do. I barely noticed, too busy holding on to Ray.

“I told you to go home,” he said without much conviction.

“You know you need me here.” Reluctantly, I pulled away and pointed at the house. “What’s going on?”

He removed his jacket and helped me into it. “A bunch of calls, most from neighbors reporting shots fired and screaming from inside the house. Only one call from inside the house and it was cut off from their end. We can’t get anyone to answer a phone or come to the door. We try to send anybody in, they can’t get inside. Something happens when they try. What happened to you?”

“Peggy tried to drown me. I’m okay. Have all the doors and windows been tried?”

Brow furrowed, he grimaced. “I couldn’t make out everything you said on the phone. Are you sure you’re the only one who can deal with this?”

I laughed. “I’m not sure I can deal with it at all.” I surveyed the scene again, trying to work around my auric vision being a watercolor mess. “Can you pull everybody back? I’m going to see if I can get through the wards.”

Ray looked even more displeased, if that was possible. “You got anything on you? A talisman, a charm, whatever?”

“No,” I said. A black rectangle of oily magic framed the front door. Might as well try that first. “I got nothing.”

He reached into a pocket and came out with the mojo hand I’d made for him years ago, now recharged. He drew me close and pressed it into my hands, cupping the back of my head as he kissed me. “You better come out of there in one piece. We got a lot to talk about.”

“I will.” I stowed the mojo hand in my pocket.

He jerked his chin. “Now go before I change my mind.”

I nodded once, taking one last look at him before turning to face the house. As I took the steps up to the front door I zipped the over-large jacket, huddling inside it as if it too could protect me. Briefly I considered knocking, then I shrugged and wrapped my hand around the door knob. The ward delivered a nauseating gut punch but I’d been expecting some form of punishment, so I gritted my teeth, rode out the pain, and turned the knob.

The door swung open. I steeled myself and stepped over the threshold. This time there was nothing. Somebody wanted me in the house. I picked my way carefully through the foyer, the floor littered with broken glass and pottery. As soon as I was clear the door slammed shut.

“Gonna have to do more than that to spook me,” I said.

A long narrow rug in a black and white abstract pattern ran from the door to the end of the hall. Not caring if I left mud all over it, I walked where I pleased. A crunching noise under my boot first made me think I’d stepped on some of the debris, then I saw the black lines of the abstract design begin to squiggle into definite forms.

Scorpions. Tarantulas. Things that looked like massive roaches. They burst from the carpet fiber with wet pops, leaving trails of ectoplasm in their wake as they scurried around. “Bugs,” I said. “Why did it have to be bugs?”

Wishing Daniel was there to play his part, I added, “Very dangerous. You go first.”

A scorpion birthed itself from the carpet and skittered toward me. I stomped it, so glad to be wearing boots I could have danced across the rug. A sibling followed, then a tarantula, another scorpion, and one of those nasty roach looking things. All headed right for me and all met the hard sole of my boot.

Then they started getting bigger. Of course, because that’s the way things go for me. It’s never a regular scorpion. It’s always a supersized motherfucker with glowing eyes and a mutated double stinger. Very quickly the nasties were too big for one stomp and it was time to come up with a better plan before something crawled up my leg and bit me.

A nice controlled burst of my favorite element seemed like a good idea. I moved to the hardwood and raised my hand, palm down, over the carpet, channeling energy from all around and directing it at the rug as I called on fire. Like an old friend, it answered, giving me a nice jet of flame that ate up the carpet and it’s creepy crawly offspring. Satisfied the creatures were dealt with, I closed my palm and focused my will on extinguishing the fire.

The smell of burnt bugs filled the room, foul with an acidic taste scraping at the back of my throat.

I called out, “That all you got, old man?”

The walls burst into flame.