Hanging from a silver chain, and resting on her breastbone between the deep v-neck of a purple shirt, was a charm that Sunday recognized. Sunday kept a tab of her computer open to the photo and opened another tabs to run another search. She typed in a description of the charm and hit Enter. Something about it was familiar. It had sent her alarms soaring. It was dark. It had to be. But between a lifetime of learning about different traditions of magic, myths, rituals, charms, symbols, and spells, she couldn’t possibly remember them all. Sunday trusted her instinct, but she couldn’t unequivocally pin her suspicions on Michelle based on an unknown charm.
Before she was able to thoroughly research the search results, Constance’s red Toyota came around the corner and pulled into her driveway. Through the windshield, Sunday saw that Constance was talking on the phone. Constance’s face was pinched with a furrowed brow. She banged the steering wheel a couple of times, and hadn’t but hung up and thrown it into the passenger seat before she put the car in reverse. The tires screeching as she hit the brakes and shifted the car into drive. Sunday slammed her laptop closed and took off in pursuit.
Constance’s driving matched her mood. Her fiery sedan careened in and out of traffic, equally aggressively whether she was driving through residential streets or on the main highways. For twenty minutes, Sunday followed Constance into West Columbia and up through St. Andrews where Constance finally began to reduce her speed. She pulled into the parking lot of a hair salon and slammed her door shut as Sunday drove slowly past.
After crossing the block down the other end of which Sunday had parked her car, Constance disappeared into a store. Not wanting to get out of the car and give Constance a chance to make her, Sunday circled the block, all the while reading the shop signs to see where the witch most likely entered. Sunday chuckled and rolled her eyes when she read the sign for Bearers of Mystical Fruit. It was too obvious, she thought. A real life witch in a metaphysical trinkets and crystals shop.
When she parked the car, Sunday let the engine idle. She turned in her seat and stared at the door of Bearers. After about twenty minutes, Constance emerged from the shop with a flushed face, and the witch hastily walked back toward her car. A moment later, Constance’s car turned out of the lot in the direction she had come.
Sunday seized the opportunity to check out Bearers of Mystical Fruit. Chimes jingled as Sunday opened the shop door. At least two kinds of incense burned. Crystals hung from the ceiling and sat on shelves. A mural of a mermaid decorated the western wall, and the opposite wall was made up of floor-to-ceiling bookcases. The store was labyrinthine, cluttered with tables and display cases. One case was filled with different kinds of tarot cards, and another was filled with stone jewelry and decorative items. This was precisely the kind of New Age gift shop a wannabe witch would find herself irrepressibly drawn to. All it needed to be any more cliché was an Enya CD playing on nonstop repeat over the loudspeakers.
Behind all the incense and all the ridiculous charms for sale, however, the aura of authentic magic lingered. It wasn’t alive, or present. It was residual.
Sunday walked to the back of the store, cautiously aware that the jingling of the door would tip off any employee that someone had entered the store. She pulled on the other strap of the backpack she’d slung from a single shoulder in case she found herself having to suddenly duck or run out. She called once, asking if anyone was available to help her, but no one responded.
Edging closer to the back of the store, she slowly came up and looked behind the glass counter. She stepped into a hallway where a door lay closed. Sunday knocked as she turned the knob, and finding it unlocked, pushed the door open. It was a stock room. She called again, this time dropping her shields and extending her aura to seek the presence of anyone hiding in there.
Within a heartbeat of realizing what she was about to walk into, Sunday was assaulted by the panic and chaos of a life ended in violence. Death. Horrible, painful, deliberate death. It was a feeling with which Sunday was all too familiar.
She didn’t have to go any farther into the storeroom or leave her guard down any longer to know that she’d find a dead body in there. And from the aura it was emitting, the spirit that passed was one of a strong witch. Any thoughts of walking into the scene, finding a body, and calling the police to notify them of a crime were swiftly overridden by the sickness that overcame Sunday by the spirit of a freshly slaughtered witch. It battered against her defenses.
Without hesitation, Sunday turned and jogged out of the store, careful not to bump into any of the display cases or to leave her prints on anything that she passed. The last thing she needed was to have a murder traced back to her, and as Sunday was certain, a murder had recently occurred there. This time the murder wasn’t at her hands, but she didn’t intend to spend the night in jail until she proved otherwise.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Sunday was rounding her car when her senses tugged her to look down the intersecting road.
A man walked in the direction of the corner where she stood. She dropped the strap of her backpack and hurriedly searched for her keys. The man came to a halt, and he stared daggers at her. Darkly tanned skin, ebony hair slicked back, he wore a leather jacket and jeans. Something about him resonated. There was something about him…
She froze.
Werewolf.
And not just any werewolf. A werewolf that she’d encountered before. A werewolf that she hadn’t wanted to encounter again. In a panic, she flipped through her every memory with werewolves. Many had ended badly. This one, she was sure of it, had been present at one of them. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t lock onto a precise memory. It was somewhere hidden behind a cloud. No doubt, this werewolf was someone she had known before Bernadette had conjured her sorcery to erase Sunday’s memories.
Without moving a muscle, Sunday willed the werewolf down to the ground from well over ten feet. The man, easily taller and stronger than her, dropped to a knee and scraped the cement sidewalk with the nails of his curling fingers. She wasn’t causing him pain, just forcing him to his knees. Any pain he was experiencing was due to his fight. He was a fighter. They always were. Yellow eyes shot back at her, glaring with the threat of a werewolf about to transform. She sensed that he was aware of the risk of a daylight transformation among mundanes, but his wolf fought to assert its power.
The more she pushed him down, the more the wolf inside him wanted to lash out at her for dominating him. The more it threatened, the stronger Sunday’s will became to deny the wolf the satisfaction.
No.
Her lips hadn’t moved, but he heard her clearly. Her face was stone.
You will sit there, and until I get my answers, you will deal with the rage and the hunger.
As powerful as she was, this was nevertheless a dangerous game for Sunday to play. Her walls thoroughly lowered so that she could manipulate the wolf allowed her to utilize her abilities to a greater extent, but it also gave access to the energy of the world around her. Energy was drawn to her like a magnet. Sunday in a highly guarded state was a potent metaphysical conduit. With shields lowered, she was even more vulnerable.
In this state, Sunday was a gaping wound massed with nerve endings and receptors. She needed a second to gather her wits. She glared at the werewolf while she assessed the environment. With the werewolf in the mix, it was volatile. Beyond the usual mix of energy that gathered around was the angry ghost of a recently slain witch. Sunday was fortunate that there weren’t too many people around, thereby limiting her exposure to external forces. But she wasn’t altogether safe. The natural world had its own invisible forces eager for attention.
Sunday watched as the werewolf struggled against his invisible bonds. She drove another demand for him to comply. The werewolf collapsed onto the ground completely, curling into a fetal position.
I told you to stay put.
Putting the werewolf down, and keeping him there afforded Sunday time to acclimate to her surroundings and direct the flow of energy around them, but it wasn’t easy. Eventually, all the energy that her body would harness from being so open would need to be dispersed. Sunday wasn’t sure that she could do it in a way that didn’t draw attention to herself. Besides that, she also didn’t want to cause any collateral damage. It was the price of her gift. Having the ability to absorb power meant having the ability and the responsibility to use it. Holding it all in would destroy her. Confronted by a werewolf that inspired such echoes of her past, Sunday couldn’t afford to be wounded at the end of this. She had to be the in the condition to run, or risk being caught.
Being the Incarnate hadn’t come with an instruction manual, but Sunday had practice. She had mastered the art of her unique brand of combat. Lately, however, she realized that the year in Columbia had lulled her into a false sense of security. Clearly, she had grown complacent. Right now, Sunday didn’t have time to beat herself up about it. Warming the bench for a couple of years hadn’t dulled her ability. It had made her lazy, but not unable. She was the Incarnate, and all her innate potential didn’t just fade away. She just had to keep a level head and be smart about how she employed her power.
Sunday walked toward the werewolf willing any passersby to look the other way and ignore the man writhing on the sidewalk. She rarely allowed herself to indulge in the unabated flow of energy for fear that it would overwhelm her. But when she did, Sunday reveled in the power and invincibility. Despite the danger, she was invigorated. Looking down at the man on the pavement, she radiated authority. The werewolf was enraged, but his rage had been driven by fear. The Incarnate was in a position of dominance and her dominance was a heavy shadow under which the wolf’s rage was nothing.
“Tell me about the witch,” she demanded. Defying her was not an option.
When the man struggled at her feet, Sunday closed her fist. An invisible vise laced itself around the werewolf, and she pulled it tighter. Clenching his jaw, his body jerked against it.
“It’s against my every inclination to resort to violence,” she cautioned, “but you’re going to tell me what you’re doing here, or you’re going to know it’s like to really suffer.”
The man looked up at her with an expression that she couldn’t read. She resisted the temptation to look into his mind, knowing that his head was filled with images that she couldn’t stomach. If she touched him, they would flood into her and knock her over. She would lose her grip on him, and the power she was controlling would break free and manifest itself in ways she may not be able to stop.
Fire coursed through every vein in her body. She felt alive. Catastrophic. Anarchistic. As her body pumped with the growing fury of incalculable power, she fought against the thrill of it. There was more to her than violence and the desire to wreak havoc, but in the heat of battle, she was both the weapon and the wielder of it. The power was intoxicating.
The werewolf unleashed a growl as he once again fought his bonds.
“I don’t know any witch!”
“I know you,” she said. “I can’t remember how but I know you.”
She could believe that he didn’t know about the dead witch in Bearers, but she couldn’t believe that he could deny knowing who she was. The werewolf growled in the place of a suitable response.
You will tell me the truth
. Her voice in his head cast a spell. She forced him to tell her whether he’d wanted to or not.
“I’m asking you again, how do you know me? How do I know you?”
He clenched his jaw, face red and twisted, as he fought the words from coming out, but it was no use. When the Incarnate compelled it, there was no choice but to comply.
“I kidnapped you,” he barked. Rather than tighten her grip around him anymore, she let him bathe in the fear and waited for him to keep talking. “You were a kid, and the witch Bernadette hired us to find you.”
He attempted unsuccessfully to keep from talking by chewing into his cheeks. He grimaced at the strength of his own bite as sweat poured down his face.
“We took you to her, but you came willingly! You came willingly, you bitch!”
Sunday started to tremble. Tears welled in her eyes. For the first time since she’d been using her abilities against the werewolf, her resolve cracked.
“You lie!” she shouted.
“No!” he shouted back.
She believed him. He couldn’t have lied. Not to her. Not when the Incarnate was forcing her will on him. But she didn’t want to. Bernadette was dead. Everyone associated with Bernadette’s mission had been eliminated. Sunday hadn’t just been a witness to it, she had been the sole perpetrator of those deaths. Yet, what this werewolf was saying was true.
It was fact.
And it meant that Sunday was in more danger than she could have imagined.
If he had brought her to Bernadette, then she couldn’t pretend that their encounter now was a mere coincidence. The werewolf’s revelation only confirmed what she’d long suspected. Bernadette had sought her out as a kid. Bernadette had stolen her from her childhood home and family. Bernadette had used her magic to wipe Sunday’s mind clean of anything, before she’d imposed herself as Sunday’s sole caregiver.
Until this moment, it had all been assumptions and deductions Sunday had made. Facing the man who had brought her to Bernadette meant that Sunday’s history was something she could no longer avoid. Not only did this man find her once before, he had found her again.
Sunday’s eyes flew open, and her eyebrows shot up her forehead. The breath caught in her chest, and this time, it wasn’t the overwhelming sensation of all the energy the flowed through her. It was the images of Cyrus that flashed in the werewolf’s mind.
“Why are you thinking of Cyrus? How do you know him?”
The werewolf’s jaw dropped, and his eyes bulged.
Cyrus and the Incarnate? How did this happen? When did this happen?
The realization hit her then:
He doesn’t know about Cyrus and me, but he’s with him. Goddammit, they’re in this together.