Summary: Bruised and bloodied, you end up with the last person you thought you'd turn to, and the kudzu is speaking.
Word Count: 5.5k
Warnings: Car crash, mentions of broken limbs
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The wolf’s yellow eyes scrutinized her mistress before turning her gaze back to the water. “What will happen to them?”
Circe shook her head. “Would that I knew. I can only hope they get there in the end. We will need them for what’s to come.”
The journey from Circe’s island was even more oppressively silent than the trip there. In fact, the first time you or Sweeney spoke was nearly six hours after you’d left Florida and had passed into South Carolina.
Eventually, you couldn’t take it anymore.
“Why did you kiss me?” you blurted. “On the way to Circe’s.”
Sweeney, who was taking his turn in the driver’s seat, stayed quiet, but you saw his grip on the steering wheel tighten and watched a muscle in his jaw tick.
Your mind reeled as you considered his possible answers. What if—
“I heard somewhere that kissin’ someone, while they’re panicking, can help ‘em catch their breath.”
You stared at him. “You heard that? Where, Teen Wolf? What the hell is wrong with you?”
He glanced sidelong at you. “It worked, didn’t it?”
You wanted to backhand the smug expression from his face.
“If you don’t shut the hell up…”
Sweeney scoffed. “You’re just pissed because I’m right. An’ I didn’t see you complaining, besides.”
At that moment, you dearly longed to wrap your hands around his throat and squeeze, but, unfortunately, you were quiet for just a beat too long.
“You liked it, didn't you?” he said, a cheeky smirk pulling at the corners of his mouth.
You could feel the heat in your cheeks and knew your face had to be beet red. Maybe, for once, the old man would turn up when you actually wanted him to and end this moment.
If only the Norns would bestow that luck upon you.
A hundred witty remarks and jabs raced through your head, but all that came out of your mouth was: “Fuck you, you old cunt.”
Sweeney cackled and slammed his foot on the accelerator and your beloved car screamed down the freeway.
Passing through Boone in North Carolina, you finally felt like you could breathe a little more easily. The first fourteen hours of your journey had gone by mercifully without any incident. You knew better than to let your guard down, of course, but it seemed like Circe’s wards were holding.
The peace didn’t last. It never did. You were about two hours north of Boone when your luck finally ran out. You were driving, the needle on the speedometer hovering just around the 80mph mark, when something slammed into your car, sending it careening into a ditch and pitching you hard against your seatbelt. The material bit into your chest angrily and your skull slammed back against the headrest. You blinked stars from your eyes in time to see Sweeney’s head crash into the dashboard and hear the nauseating sound of bone snapping when he tried to brace himself.
“I told you to wear a seatbelt,” you managed to wheeze.
A groan was all you got in response.
Black was creeping around the edges of your vision, but you knew you both needed to stay awake. One or both of you having a concussion was not unlikely, and while dying would most certainly solve most of the problems you were currently facing, you knew that even death wouldn’t bring you peace.
You untangled yourself from your seatbelt and dragged yourself to the other side of the car, bracing yourself as you dragged Sweeney out onto the blacktop. He moaned pitifully, crying as you jostled his broken arm.
“Shit, shit, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you mumbled, your mind racing as you tried to sort through your options. First and foremost, you needed to splint Sweeney’s arm and check him for a concussion. You patted his cheek.
“How’s your head, chief? C’mere, follow my finger.”
His gaze managed to follow your finger steadily as you moved it back and forth across his field of vision. You braced a thumb against his eyebrow and peered into his eyes with the penlight in your pocket.
He flinched away, rubbing his eye with his good hand and shaking his head to clear it. “What, are you trying to blind me?” The red mark on his forehead where he’d smacked the dash was already fading.
You snorted. “There are better ways to do that. But the good news is it doesn’t seem like you have a concussion. Looks like your luck’s holding.”
He looked past you. “Yours is too,” he said. “Look at your car.”
You whirled around and saw her sitting on a mess of tangled kudzu vines and greenery. Her front bumper was dented, but other than that, there wasn’t a scratch on her. Or on yourself, for that matter. By rights, you and Sweeney should have been grease spots on the road, especially Mr. Seatbelts-Are-For-Pussies, and your car should have been a twisted hunk of steaming metal. And yet, here you were. Granted, a little worse for wear, but you were alive and present nonetheless.
You stared, bewildered, at your companion. “I’m fine?”
He cocked an eyebrow but remained silent. You chewed on the inside of your cheek trying to come up with a workable hypothesis, but before a thought could form, the mass of leaves and vines under your car began to snake towards you.
You tried to haul Sweeney to his feet but only succeeded in falling into his lap. The two of you scrambled backward, Sweeney’s face turning a sickly green with the pain of his arm.
“What the fuck is that?” you demanded. At this point, you didn’t even have it in you to be properly afraid of whatever the hell was happening now. Mostly, you were just annoyed.
“Ah, for fuck’s sake.” Sweeney’s good hand reached out and took hold of your bicep. Even with his broken arm, you could feel his muscles coil, readying for a fight.
As you watched, the kudzu surrounded you and began to take a humanoid shape. As it did so, vines shot out and wrapped around you tightly, effectively freezing you in place. Before either of you could react, Sweeney was bound and gagged. He looked at you with wide, bewildered eyes. This was certainly a new one for you both.
“Mad Sweeney and his witch.” The seething mass of plant matter spoke with a voice that resonated through the concrete and up into your body through the soles of your feet. “My lucky day.”
“You’re lucky, he’s lucky, I’m lucky, we’re all lucky!” you muttered.
A kudzu vine crawled across your cheek, the pale green tip of the tendril hovering just above your cornea. It darted forward and you flinched, hard, but it only brushed your hair away from your face.
“You don’t know who I am,” the kudzu said, disappointed.
The vine wrapped itself around the shell of your ear and began to probe at your ear canal. Desperately, you wracked your brain for anything that might help. There was a name and it danced on the tip of your tongue, just out of reach.
“Please, Elder,” you gasped. “Forgive me. I know not your name, but I know you. I know you in the creeping dark, I know you on lands abandoned. You are the kudzu, what remains when all else is gone.”
The vine uncoiled from your ear. You took a deep breath.
“Please, hear us—“
A green shoot stabbed into Sweeney’s shoulder and he roared against the mess of plant matter crammed into his mouth.
“I care not. What could you have to say that would be of any import to me? No, I think I will consume your dear friend here.” The kudzu gag unfurled from Sweeney’s mouth and was replaced by a tendril snaking down his throat. You could hear him gag and choke and it made your palms sweat.
You opened your mouth to scream for your leprechaun when a name finally surfaced in your memory. You remembered lying on the parlor floor of Ibis and Jacquel with Bast curled against you, purring like an engine. You were reading a book on ancient East Asian deities. If you could just…
“Baku.”
The amalgamation of vegetation stilled. You pressed on, praying you were right.
“My lord Baku,” you said breathlessly, “forgive me. We meant no disrespect.”
The old god peered at you. Or at least, you thought it did. “You ought to be more careful,” it hummed. “The Black Druid has promised a great reward for the one to deliver you into his custody.”
Your mouth went dry. After everything else, now there was a bounty on your head? Was an asteroid going to strike you next?
“My lord, please, listen to me. The Dark Man will not deliver on his promises.”
The concrete vibrated with Baku’s voice. “Even if that were true, I could still consume you. Between you and your leprechaun, you would more than satiate the emptiness of being forgotten. Although, I suppose it would be a tragedy to lose such a legacy.”
You blinked. “Legacy?”
Baku raised an eyebrow. “Your legacy. You’re ——— “ His next words disappeared under the sound of cracking static.
Never in your life had you been more confused. “Excuse me? How did you make that sound? What the hell are you talking about?”
Baku came closer. “Oh, now this is interesting,” it mused. “You can’t understand it, can you?”
“I can’t understand when I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Baku chuckled. “I think you will find out. Sooner rather than later, I should think.”
You stared at him and then shook your head, trying to clear your mind like an Etch-A-Sketch.
“I grow bored of this,” Baku announced. The vines around Sweeney began to squeeze and the vine in his throat twitched, making him gag again. You felt ill. Baku squeezed even harder and Sweeney’s face began to turn a sick shade of purple, his eyes rolling back in his head. If he hadn’t lost consciousness yet, he would soon.
“Wait!” you screamed. “My lord, please.” You had no earthly idea what you were going to say next, but the god’s attention was on you and the vines around Sweeney had stopped squeezing. You scrambled to find your words.
“Lord Baku, what if I told you I could give you something that the Dark Man never could?”
The vines around you yanked you forward until your face was inches from the silhouette that was Baku.
“What would that be?”
You swallowed. The next words from your mouth were going to be insane, possibly one of the stupidest things you could say, but you didn’t know what else to do.
“I can give you belief.”
A stillness swept over that stretch of highway. The god was listening. You could barely hear yourself think over the blood pounding in your ears. You had promised the one thing old gods like Baku craved. Power. Sustenance. Belief.
“How would a thing like you manage to keep such a promise?”
At this point, the inside of your cheek felt like it had been through a paper shredder, but you kept chewing on it.
“The people here, they don’t see the kudzu for what it could be,” you began slowly, grabbing the words one at a time, “only as something that consumes and suffocates. They don’t see the life it brings, the sustenance it provides. Please, give me a chance to show them what the kudzu could be.”
The old god tilted its head, considering you carefully. After a few moments, the kudzu around you loosened and set you down gently on the pavement.
“You promise me believers?
You swallowed. “Yes.”
“How many?”
You shifted your weight from one foot to the other. “I can’t promise an exact number. I can’t even promise that the number will be significant. But I can promise that I will find them.”
Kudzu snaked up your neck and around your ears again, probing gently at your temples and cheeks and lips as though searching for any ill intent.
“You have a deal,” Baku said eventually. “But do not tarry. The kudzu will give protection as far as my borders. When you pass Massachusetts in the north or out of east Texas, towards the west, there will be nothing more I can do for you.”
You knelt before the kudzu, bowing and touching your forehead to the ground.
“Thank you, my lord,” you said as you clambered to your feet.
The kudzu retreated from Sweeney and he collapsed on the concrete, retching and moaning.
You bowed again to the old god and then dashed to your car, pulling Sweeney’s bottle of Jameson from the glove compartment and sprinting back.
“An offering, my lord,” you intoned as you let the whiskey spill onto the road and into the soil.
Baku hummed approvingly. “Do not forget our deal, witch,” its voice reverberated in your skull. And then the old god of the kudzu was gone, disappearing into itself in the brush on the side of the highway.
As soon as you were sure it was gone, you let out a breath you didn’t realize you had been holding and ran to Sweeney, who was barely clinging to consciousness as he lay in the dirt.
“Fuck, dude,” you hissed.
“I can’t believe you poured out my Jamo.” His voice was hoarse like he’d been gargling gravel.
“We were already pushing it, we needed an offering,” you told him.
“Can you just get me patched up please?” he rasped.
“Right, right.” You darted back to the car, digging through your duffel until you unearthed your first aid kit.
“Okay, let me just—“
“Splint my fucking arm first, I’m about to black out.” His voice was muddy and his words weren’t as clear as they should have been. You groaned and chucked a roll of gauze at his head.
“I should just let you bleed out,” you snapped.
“Hm.”
You rolled your eyes and went hunting for a stick that was the right size to splint his arm. When you found it, you first held it out to him. He looked at you with an expression that said What the hell am I supposed to do with this?
“Bite down,” you instructed. “I have to set the bone and it’s going to hurt like a bitch.”
He sighed and did as you said, squeezing his eyes shut.
“Okay, ready?”
He nodded.
“On three. One—“
Crack!
Sweeney snarled against the stick, his body jerking away from you. “You bitch,” he hissed, spitting the wood from his mouth. “That wasn’t on three.”
“You’re welcome. Now stay still, shitass,” you murmured as you set about placing the splint.
“Fuckin’ hurts,” he mumbled.
“Well, if someone had worn their seatbelt like I told him to—“
“Enough about the goddamn seatbelt!”
You glared at him. “Fine. Maybe next time I’ll get lucky and you’ll go flying through the windshield.”
He glowered right back. “Just fix my shoulder so we can go.”
“Ungrateful,” you muttered, but you still cleaned the jagged hole in his shoulder, gingerly picking out the leaves and plant matter that had been left in his flesh. You carefully taped a square of gauze over the wound on his front and his back and sat back, assessing your work. “Honestly, it probably needs stitches, but this was the best I could do. It’s gonna leave a nasty scar.”
He shrugged. “What’s one more?”
You snorted and hauled him up by his good arm, helping him into the car.
Back in the driver’s seat, you white-knuckled the steering wheel, wringing it nervously. The silence in the car was tense. He was mad at you.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Sweeney demanded eventually, his brash voice shattering the silence like a bowling ball thrown into a china cabinet. “Have you lost your mind? Where do you get off promising him believers?”
You slammed your palm against the wheel and pointed at him, anger and annoyance flooding your veins like lava. You’d had it.
“How about a thank you for keeping the kudzu from fucking consuming us?” you snarled. “What the fuck was I supposed to do? The Dark Man has a bounty on my head now, I had to do something.”
The leprechaun groaned in disbelief. “So you promised him believers? Are there worms in your head?”
You snapped your teeth at him before stomping on the accelerator, relishing the thwack of his head hitting the headrest as the car leaped forward. “I didn’t want to watch you become a shriveled husk on the side of the road or watch you get ripped apart from the inside, although I cannot for the life of me remember why,” you bit out. “Why are you picking a fight with me, anyway? Did you decide it had been too long since you got on my fucking nerves?”
“Because I’m worried about you!” he shouted. “You’ve got this thing in your head that no one seems to be able to figure out, you’re making deals that you can’t possibly hope to keep with beings that could obliterate you with a snap of their fingers. You’re wound tighter than a nun’s bunghole—“
“I’m wound up?” you shrieked. “You’re the one that’s about to snap like a goddamn rubber band!”
“You’re watching my back,” he snapped. “I need you to pull it together. I know all of this is shit and it’s scary, but if you get me killed, I’m—“
“You’re taking me with you,” you mocked. “I’ve heard that one before. Can you please just be quiet until we stop for the night in D.C.? I’ve got a connect there, we can crash with them.”
“Who? Charles Entertainment Cheese?”
“No, fucknut. Hester’s there.”
He blinked. “Now how in the hell did you make that connection? No one’s seen her in forever.”
“Wouldn’t you like to know.” You smirked.
He glared at you and pulled a clove cigarette from his shirt pocket, tucking it behind his ear. Then, he paused and stared at you with a petulant and mulish look on his face. You knew that look.
“Don’t you dare,” you growled.
Moving slowly and deliberately, he brought the cigarette to his lips and then put a lighter to the cigarette. The cloying odor of cloves and tobacco filled your car as he blew a thick cloud into your face.
You coughed and slammed the brakes, the stink of burning rubber mingling with the miasma of the cigarette.
“Get out,” you snapped.
He stared at you. “What?”
“Did I stutter? Get. Out.”
His head kicked back. “You’re not serious.”
You reached across him and opened the car door. “Don’t make me repeat myself again. I’m sick of being disrespected. I’ll see you in D.C.”
Sweeney’s jaw hung open. “What, I’m s’posed to walk the three hundred miles?”
You shrugged. “Or take a bus. Might be faster.”
He spread his hands. “After everything I’ve done for you, this is what I get? You’re the most ungrateful—“
“Ungrateful?” you snarled. You climbed out of the car and circled to the other side so you were standing over him and stabbed a finger at his chest. “I barely wanted you to come in the first place!”
The two of you stared each other down, glares matching in ferocity and anger.
“And you’d be dead without me,” he spat. “Aside from everything else, haven’t you noticed your luck? You think that’s a coincidence? You think that doesn’t have anything to do with me?”
You didn’t answer and he scoffed, standing so he towered over you. “You know, you’re more like the old man than you want to admit.”
You shoved his chest with both hands, not caring about his arm or the kudzu wound. You’d absolutely had it. He stumbled backward and when he regained his footing, surprise was written all over his face. The two of you had fought and argued before, but you’d never actually laid hands on him.
“I thought something had changed after Circe,” you seethed. “I thought maybe you’d finally pulled your head out of your ass, but good to know you’re just as obnoxious and disrespectful as ever.”
“You’re the one that came to me for help in the first place!”
Your laugh was verging on hysterical. You’d been awake for far too long and you were dying to take a swing at him. “I wouldn’t have asked for your help if I’d known you would keep throwing it in my face.”
He loomed over you, but you refused to be intimidated. You’d had enough of his bullshit, friends or not.
“Get to D.C. on your own,” you said as you got back in the car. “Or don’t,” you added. “Fuck if I care.” And you sped off, leaving him alone on the side of the highway like an abandoned dog.
As soon as he was in your rearview, you let yourself burst into tears. You cranked your stereo, rolled your window down, and screamed into the night, all the fear, anger, and frustration you’d been feeling tearing from your throat.
Why was he like that? Why did he have to pick fights and antagonize you and argue with you like that? Although, come to think of it, why did you? You were no better than he was, the way you’d kicked him out of the car, an action that you were already regretting. He just had a way of burrowing under your skin and playing your nerves like a goddamn fiddle. It was infuriating that he’d gone and made himself important to you and it disgusted you, how much you relied on him. Because he’d been right. You would be dead without him, and you’d gone and left him and his luck on the side of a highway in the middle of the night.
You groaned. “Ah, fuck.”
You yanked the steering wheel, executing a U-turn that almost flipped your car, and sped back the way you’d come.
He was going to be insufferable. You’d kicked him out, only to immediately come back. You were never going to hear the end of it.
But he wasn’t there. You were where you’d left him, but your ginger giant was gone.
You cursed loudly, beating your palm against the steering wheel. That asshole.
Throwing yourself from the car, you walked in circles calling his name, but no answer came. You swallowed your growing panic and focused instead on your anger. Granted, you’d told him to walk, but you should’ve known that he actually would. Jackass. Fine. If he wanted to disappear, you weren’t going to look for him.
That didn’t stop you from sitting in your car for an hour and a half, hoping that he’d come stumbling through the trees.
“Fuck this,” you muttered. You turned the key and your car’s engine roared to life. You’d either see him in D.C. or you wouldn’t. No skin off your ass.
And yet…and yet. You couldn’t shake the regret, nor the expression of genuine hurt on his face beneath the surprise and outrage.
You flicked through the radio stations, but everything you landed on felt like nails on a chalkboard. Eventually, you gave up and spent the next few hours in silence.
Halfway between Mt. Airy and D.C., somewhere in Virginia, you stopped for gas. You leaned against your driver’s side as the tank filled. Two pumps down, a guy was filling his truck's tank. You could feel his eyes on you, but you didn’t look up. Regardless of who or what he was, you didn’t feel like dealing with it. You just wanted to get to Hester’s. If she’d even let you stay with her. Your relationship was…tenuous at best.
From the corner of your eye, you saw the guy moving towards you. You swore under your breath and fingered the cool metal of the knife in your pocket. You really needed to get a proper weapon for situations like this so you could defend yourself with more than just a dinky utility knife.
Especially now that you’ve chased off your bodyguard, said a voice in the back of your head.
You shoved the thought from your mind and turned to the stranger. “May I help you?” Your tone was polite but icy.
He held up his hands and stopped ten feet from you. “Actually, I was thinkin' I might be able to help you.” You arched an eyebrow. “You’re Wednesday’s gofer, right?”
You bristled. “I am not his gofer. What’s it to you, anyway?”
He shoved his hands into the pockets of his coat and leaned against the gas pump. He looked you up and down, his gaze appraising. You hated it.
“I’m sure you know by now that everyone and they mama is out to get you for the Dark Man’s bounty.” His voice was smooth and rich, like butter tea, and he had a thick Appalachian accent.
“And you aren’t?”
He shrugged. “The guy hasn’t actually specified what the reward is. I don’t trust like that. And I don’t work for Wednesday either,” he added, seeing your mouth open.
You studied his face carefully. The guy was huge, easily several inches over six feet, with broad shoulders to match. His strawberry blond hair was carefully braided away from his face and his beard was also tidily plaited and finished with a silver bead. His gray eyes were sharp, taking in every tiny detail. He was beautiful, but he set your teeth on edge. Something about him, his eyes in particular, felt familiar in a way that made your skin crawl.
Sensing your unease, he inclined his head. “An unfortunate family resemblance,” he said mildly and doffed his Appalachian State baseball cap. “Miley O’Danson.”
That couldn’t be right. “So…son of the son of Daniel? What kind of name is that?”
He just looked at you.
Miley O’Danson. Miley O’Danson.
Meili Odinson.
The pieces clicked and you groaned. “God. Dammit.” You wanted to tear your hair out. “When will you people leave me alone?” you asked tightly.
Miley chuckled. “You know, you’re lucky my father didn’t find you first.”
The growing lump of unease in your throat was threatening to choke you. “What do you want?” You were proud that your voice came out sharp and certain.
“You’re traveling, aren’t you?”
"In a warded car.”
Miley tilted his head. “Doesn’t seem to be doing a very good job,” he pointed out.
For a split second, you wondered how he knew about the drive to Florida, but then you saw him looking pointedly at the kudzu vines still trailing from your car’s undercarriage.
“I’ve already got protection,” you said firmly.
He pointed to the kudzu. “A dying god and magic that’s spotty at best. And I notice your attack dog is conspicuously absent. Where is that thumpin’ gizzard anyway?”
You flushed a dull red. “I’m not his goddamn babysitter.”
He smirked. “Right, of course not. Look, Baku’s protection will only get you so far. What about when you’re outside of his boundaries? What then?”
“How do you know—“
He tapped his nose. “The roads are mine, kiddo.”
You grit your teeth. “What do you want?” you asked again. “I already promised the kudzu believers, am I doing that for you too now? Am I some kind of proselytizer?”
“I don’t need believers,” he said. “I have plenty. Everyone that prays for safety on their journey is praying to me, whether they realize it or not.”
You snorted. “So you’re what, the god of car insurance?”
His eyes narrowed. “Do you want my help or not?”
“You still haven’t told me what you want,” you pointed out.
He pouted. “I can’t want to help from the goodness of my own heart?”
“Absolutely fucking not.”
He sighed. “I s’pose that’s fair.” He paused. “Nothing, for now.”
Your eyes narrowed. “But later?”
His expression was inscrutable. “If you ever get your memory back, give me a call. We’ll talk then.”
His words made no sense. Gods always wanted something and you knew better than to accept a vague deal.
“Nothing about this feels like it’s going to end well for me.”
Miley scuffed at the ground with his heavy work boots. “Think whatever you want. I’m just a guy with daddy issues trying to throw a wrench in his father’s plans.”
You snorted. “See, now that I believe.”
He spread his hands in front of you in what you assumed was meant to be a pleading gesture. Not that Odin or any of his sons would ever plead with anyone.
“Look, I’ll give you whatever protection I can. All I ask is that when I call, you answer.”
You still weren’t convinced. “Sounds like the job I already have with your dad.”
Miley’s jaw clenched and he flexed his hands like he was fighting the urge to swing on you.
“Christ, you’re spending too much time with that leprechaun,” he muttered.
“Watch it.”
Miley scrubbed his hands over his face. “This is getting us nowhere. Look, I’m not asking you to be at my beck and call, all right? This is a one-and-done deal.”
“So I’ll owe you a favor.”
He groaned. “Call it what you like. You can take my offer or you can spend your days constantly looking over your shoulder waiting for the Black Druid to break into your head.”
He was right, you both knew it. You needed all the help you could get.
You considered the man in front of you carefully. “You promise he won’t be able to find me?”
Miley shook his head. “As long as you’re traveling, he’ll have a hell of a hard time of it, but I can’t promise he won’t find you at all. Your magic will still act as a beacon, so use it sparingly.”
You said nothing.
“Do we have a deal or not?” he asked.
This was a bad idea, you knew it was, but what was the alternative? You held out your hand.
He grinned wolfishly and shook it. “And that’s the deal.” As he spoke, electricity raced up your arm from where his hand clasped yours. Whatever reservations you may have had, there was no backing out now.
Miley handed you a small amulet with a spoked symbol carved into it. “Wear this.”
“What is it?”
“It’s a protection sigil. You need as much help as you can get.”
You hung it around your neck. The amulet lay on your sternum right below the pendant Sweeney had given you, which laid snugly in the hollow of your throat. Your chest tightened.
“Take this, too,” he said, handing you a business card. It was a sleek matte black with three figures sitting cross-legged side by side, each holding a slender needle and what appeared to be an ink pot. Each figure was dressed in elaborate costume and their skin was decorated with ornate ink. The words Tatū Maya were embossed in metallic gold across the top.
“You’re not afraid of needles, are you?”
“Oh, I hate this. No, I’m not afraid of needles.”
He tapped the card. “How do you feel about getting some ink?”
“Excuse me?”
He spoke to you like you were an idiot. “Swing by this place and ask to speak with the owners. They owe me a favor, so just tell them I sent you and I’m cashing in.”
You stared at him. “You’re cashing in a favor for me? Why?”
“Same reason I offered to help in the first place,” came the response.
You clenched your jaw. You hated these stupid games, but once again, you found yourself backed into a corner. He may have been presenting it as a choice, but he wasn’t asking.
You ran your thumb over the raised letters on the card. “How will I…” Your voice trailed off as you looked up and realized Miley was gone. You hissed and kicked one of your tires. “I have got to start thinking this shit through better,” you mumbled to yourself.
You examined the card, searching for an address that would give you your next location, but there was only a phone number. Of course. It was nearing four o’clock in the morning, there was no way anyone would pick up. You briefly considered ignoring Melli’s request, but something told you that choice would not be well received.
Annoyed, you approached the payphone tucked near the air compressors and dialed the number on the card, cringing at the stickiness of the plastic receiver.
As you predicted, your call went unanswered, but the soothing voice on the recorded message, after thanking you for calling Tatū Maya, read off an address in Richmond, Virginia. Two hours south, when you needed to go north. It would throw off your timing to meet Sweeney in D.C., but you supposed it wouldn’t be by much.
You let your forehead rest against the casing of the payphone as you tried to steady your breathing.
“Well girl,” you said to your car, “I guess we’re headed to Richmond.” You threw yourself into the driver’s seat and revved her engine. “This should be interesting.”
I am curious as to why you chose Meili as the god of that sort of stuff. I couldn't find references to travel in regard to him, but I also wasn't looking very hard.
I do love how you involved Baku as the kudzu god who is willing to make a deal, and the Dark Man's unknown reward throws an interesting wrench in stuff, but it is expected, given how the reader is evading him. When Circe mentioned that she literally couldn't tell them what's going on, it is reinforced as we see Baku unable, literally, to tell them what's going on, which is a nice detail.
I love how Sweeney and the reader's relationship is, how push and pull it is as they figure shit out. They clearly care about each other, but both of them are so jaded that they're scared to admit it, even in a non-romantic way. Sweeney's hurt wasn't as palpable as I'd have thought, but staying in the reader's head and how they're feeling and how they turn around so quickly to go find him really shows how much they care, even if they don't understand why. I love them.
i found meili and his lore just sifting through different travel gods! i know, generally speaking, it’s odin in the norse pantheon, but he’s got his own role in this. plus, i figured a lesser known deity would be more inchresting
Summary: Bruised and bloodied, you end up with the last person you thought you'd turn to, and you're taking him to see an old friend.
Word Count: 12.3k
Warnings: Vomiting
Next Chapter
“What did you do before you worked for Wednesday?” he barked.
“I-I dunno. I don’t remember what I did, I don’t remember what my life was.” You were crying now. “Before Wednesday, everything is blank.”
He knew this. You had told him this before, that Wednesday had found you wandering through northern Minnesota, half-frozen and with no memory to speak of. But now…he had to wonder. Did Wednesday happen upon you by chance? Or had he lied? Knowing the old man, the latter was far from impossible or even unlikely.
He wrapped his arms around you and pulled you against his chest, pressing a kiss to the crown of your head. “I think we need to get some answers,” he murmured against your hair. “But first, let’s get you to bed.”
The next day, you woke to find yourself crammed into the backseat of your car with Sweeney’s gangly form sprawled beneath you, his chest rising and falling as his snores rattled the windows. You yelped and untangled yourself from him, opening the door and falling out backward in your haste to extricate yourself from the situation. Your face burned and a piercing headache threatened to cleave your skull in two as your vision swam. Groaning, you lay back on the cool asphalt of the bar’s parking lot and desperately wished that the world would stop spinning.
Sweeney sat up, peering blearily at his surroundings. “Sure, was I not comfortable enough for you?” he called down to you.
“Don’t fuck with me right now,” you begged. “All my energy is going to trying not to yak in this parking lot.”
He chuckled and flopped back on the seats. “Better out than in.”
“Fuck you.” Your head was stuffed with cotton and your mouth was all but glued shut, every word a struggle. You smacked your lips and rubbed the heels of your palms into your eyes in an attempt to rid them of the wretched sandpaper feeling and groaned again. “I think I’m dying. Is this what dying feels like?”
Sweeney unfolded himself from your car and stood over you, nudging you with the toe of his boot. “You’re not dying, mo chara, you’re hungover.”
You flung a dramatic arm over your face. “I’ve never had a hangover, I don’t think. I think I’d rather I was dead.”
Sweeney snorted and reached out to clasp your forearm with a massive hand and hauled you to your feet with a grunt, steadying you when you swayed slightly. He was watching you closely and you shifted uncomfortably under his gaze.
“What’re you looking at me like that for?”
He remained silent for a moment. “You’ve never been hungover?” he eventually asked.
You shook your head.
The look on his face told you he didn’t believe you.
“I’ve seen you drink, you must’ve had at least one.”
“I don’t know what to tell you,” you said. Your patience was wearing thin and you were beginning to get annoyed.
“You’ve never been hungover?”
“No. Do you want it in sign language?” You made a rude gesture.
He cocked his head to the side like an animal appraising something it didn’t understand. “D’you think it’s the healing thing?”
You pulled your lower lip between your teeth and chewed it thoughtfully. “I mean maybe? But then why do I have one now? What’s different?”
His eyes darted across your face as though searching for something. “What do you remember about last night?”
You shrugged, releasing your gnawed-on lip. “Dunno. I guess falling off the bar? I remember you yelling at me for some reason.”
Sweeney forced himself to look away from your mouth with a shake of his head. “D’you remember why?”
You shook your head and he sighed and scrubbed his hands over his face. “You said something about a battle that I was in.”
You raised an eyebrow. “So? We talk about that stuff all the time, why was that enough for you to go off on me?”
Sweeney looked like he wanted to shake you. “You’re not understanding me. You spoke about it like you were there.”
You blinked. “What, like a memory?”
“Sure, that’s what they’re usually called.”
You glared at him. “So…I remembered something I wasn’t supposed to and now I have a memory hangover? Or something?”
“Or something,” he muttered. You couldn’t put your finger on why, but you got the distinct feeling that there was something he wasn’t telling you.
“Anything else?” you prodded.
He clasped his hands behind his back and rocked back on his heels. “Nope.”
You opened your mouth to push further, but he curt you off. “We need answers,” he said firmly, “and I might know where we can find some.”
You rolled your eyes and gestured for him to continue.
“Portland.”
You looked at him blankly. “Oregon?"
He shook his head. “Maine. East coast.”
“What the hell and fuck is all the way up there?” you demanded.
“The Morrigan.”
A rat scrambled across your sneaker and you jerked your foot away, grimacing. The cool morning air was starting to warm with the inevitable heat of the day. There was a wad of what had once been bright blue bubble gum stuck forlornly to the concrete, specked with debris, the vivid color chewed to a muddy grey-blue, and a hypodermic needle lay some yards away with a used condom. “Come visit picturesque Kentucky,” you muttered to yourself as you scuffed your shoe over the ground, thinking of the poster you had seen at a bus station with the phrase. “I want to go to Circe,” you said.
Sweeney’s mouth gaped. “In Florida?”
You scoffed. “Like Maine is any closer. If someone’s going to dig around in my head, I’d rather it be someone I know.” you said.
If his mouth opens any wider, his jaw is going to dislocate, you thought mildly.
Sweeney snapped his mouth shut like he could read your mind. “Don’t tell me you trust her.”
“I’m not a moron,” you snapped. “I’d just rather not have a stranger rummaging around in there. Plus, she’s a millennia-old witch and we have questions about magic. And it’s my car,” you added.
The two of you stared each other down in that dingy parking lot for what felt like an eternity before he relented. You had dug your heels in and he knew better than to try to argue.
He pointed at you. “Fine. But if she can’t help us, we’re going to the Morrigan.”
You rolled your eyes. “Fine.”
“I’m driving.”
“Like fuck you are,” you told him. “Let’s get the lead out, my beautiful passenger princess.”
He glared at you before he slung himself into the empty seat and slammed the door with more force than was strictly necessary.
The nearly twenty hours to Florida dragged by impossibly slowly. You and Sweeney traded for the driver’s seat every few hours and your time in the passenger seat was passed either sleeping or poring over your journals and books in a futile search for answers. The two of you spoke little, save for your occasional questions about certain customs or rituals. Sweeney was uncharacteristically quiet, deep in thought and his brow furrowed so deeply that you could have put a pencil between them and it would have held there.
“You’re gonna give yourself a headache,” you murmured, reaching over from the driver’s seat and running a thumb over the wrinkles in an effort to smooth his forehead without taking your eyes off the road.
He grunted and swatted your hand away from his face. “I don’t like this,” he grumbled.
“Which part?”
“Any of it!” he exclaimed, gesticulating wildly. “All of this feels wrong. It feels like we’re missing something. Something isn’t right.”
You snorted. “When is it ever? Our job is secrets and lies, this isn’t anything new.”
Sweeney leaned back in his seat, flipping his coin across his knuckles and in the back of your mind you were painfully aware of how smoothly it rolled across the breadth of his strong hands. You forced yourself to think of something other than the freckles and the fine orange hairs that traveled from the back of his hand and up his wrist. Christ, you scolded yourself. Get a grip. The muscles of his shoulders flexed involuntarily under the fabric of his blue button-down and everything in his body language screamed anxiety and discomfort, from his constant fidgeting to the tension that arced through him, and you worried that he would snap like a rubber band wound too tightly.
You sighed. “Look, we’ll be at Circe’s in a couple of hours. Maybe we can start to get some answers.”
“Or maybe we’ll just be more confused and a three days’ drive from where we should be.”
You glanced over to snap back at him and your heart froze in your chest.
He blinked. “Y’alright there?”
The grass green eyes were gone. In their place were sightless black pits that wept a black viscous ooze.
“S-Sweeney?”
The black pits narrowed and the figure that had been Mad Sweeney leaned closer. You pressed back against the passenger door, seized in that moment with an absolute certainty that this man, this thing, was going to kill you.
His mouth moved, but no words came out. Instead, a heinous and inhuman keening issued from his lips and burrowed into your skull. You clutched at your head as if you could block it out and curled up against the door, making yourself as small as you could. You were in a speeding car with a demon changeling that had taken your leprechaun and wanted you dead. You were going to die.
The monster in the driver’s seat pulled the car to the shoulder of the highway and shut off the engine. You flattened yourself against the door, your eyes screwed shut as you willed this creature to disappear.
After a few minutes of silence, you cracked an eye open. Not-Sweeney was standing outside the car and watching you closely with those hideous eyes and you could feel your heart climbing up your throat.
You wondered if it really was possible to die of fright.
It opened its mouth, its jaw making a nauseating popping sound before dislocating, and again that horrible keening pierced your skull and it didn’t stop. It came closer to you and you scrabbled for the door handle, desperate for escape.
He came around to your side of the car and opened the door slowly. Someone was screaming and it was only after a moment or two that you realized the sound was coming from your own mouth. Not-Sweeney crouched in front of you, keeping a few feet of space between you.
You were aware that he was speaking, but your terrified mind refused to comprehend it. He reached out to touch you gently and you flinched so violently you nearly bit a hole through your tongue, but he didn’t remove his hand. Instead, his thumb began to rub the skin of your arm and he kept talking to you. After a few minutes of this, the blood roaring in your ears quieted enough that you could hear what he was saying. You kept your eyes glued to the ground, too scared to look into those horrible eyes, but you could hear his words now.
“— and I don’t know what you’re seeing right now, but it’s still me. I promise you, it is still me, and I will never hurt you.”
His voice was so soft and gentle and it instantly made your eyes well. You blinked, letting the tears roll down your cheeks, and looked up at him. That horrible face yawned before you and you cringed away from him, but in the blink of an eye, it was gone. The black pits had returned to their shining green and his jaw was back in one piece and covered with four-day-old ginger scruff.
Your relief at the sight of his face was so immediate and overwhelming that you threw yourself against his chest and buried your face in his shirt, your shoulders heaving with sobs.
His enormous hands rubbed small circles between your shoulder blades and stroked the back of your head.
You fought to breathe through your hiccuping sobs but couldn’t quite get enough air into your lungs. He guided your face up to look at him. His palms were rough with calluses, but they were warm and they were so, so gentle.
Before you could say anything, before you could even try to take a breath, his head dipped towards yours and he was kissing you. He was kissing you and he was holding you so tightly, like he was afraid you would disappear if he let go, with one hand on your face and the other against the small of your back, pulling you as closely as possible.
You clutched at him and he just felt so real under your hands. Clove smoke and liquor filled your nose and his scruff scratched at your lips in a way that made you shiver. This was real, he was real. Not the monster. Never the monster.
He broke away from you, leaving you staring at him wide-eyed and thunderstruck.
The sadness you saw in his eyes punched the air from your lungs.
“You were scared of me,” he said quietly, the despondency in his voice nearly cracking your heart in two. “What did you see?”
“I — what the fuck?”
Sweeney’s face flushed scarlet. He wouldn’t meet your eyes.
“‘M sorry,” he murmured, ducking his head. “Dunno what that was.” He got up and strode back to the other side of the car and climbed behind the wheel, gripping it so tightly his knuckles were bone white.
“Sweeney —“
“Don’t,” he said softly.
You stared at him mutely, your mind reeling. You didn’t even know what you wanted to say.
“Can we just —“
He started the car and whatever you were about to say was drowned out by the roar of the engine. The conversation was over.
If there had been tension in the car before, it was smothering you now. You couldn’t bring yourself to speak, not trusting your voice, and Sweeney hadn’t even looked at you since you had gotten back in the car. The trees outside had long since changed from oaks and beeches to towering palm trees that waved in the breeze as though they were welcoming you.
Unease crept up your throat, settling in the back with the unpleasant oily feeling that comes with nausea. You remembered that Circe had told you how Florida had been formed from the grit and dirt that had sloughed off the Appalachian Mountains and settled in the Gulf. You figured this was at least a partial explanation for all the weird and unsettling things you’d seen there. What else could you expect from somewhere that had been born from the blood and dirt of gods that were older than the Atlantic? Here, all bets were off, but whether or not that was a good thing remained to be seen.
The remainder of the drive passed in what felt like an eternity of that tense and anxious silence when, at last, you arrived at the ferry that would take you from Fort Myers to Key West. From there, you would take a small boat that would take you to Circe’s island, an uncharted islet that held the ancient witch’s home.
On the ferry, Sweeney seemed to come back to himself. He had disappeared the moment you stepped onto the deck and reappeared shortly with snacks and drinks clutched in his hands. He had gotten your favorite snacks from the vending machine along with two hot drinks from the small ferry cafe.
He held your snacks and one of the cups out to you. “Tea,” he grunted. “Help keeps y’from getting sick. Immune system boost or something.”
Whatever remaining anxiety you had from the drive melted away as you took his offerings. “Thank you,” you said, giving him a small smile.
He rubbed the back of his neck and wouldn’t meet your eyes. “Dunno if you can even get sick, but between the driving and the not sleeping I figure it can’t hurt.”
You inhaled the steam, letting it clear through your sinuses, and sighed contentedly. “Thank you,” you said again.
He nodded and sat down on the opposite bench facing you. “D’you have a plan for when we get there?” he asked.
You chewed on your lower lip. “Beyond just sort of showing up?”
Sweeney groaned and ran his hands through his hair. “Of course you don’t. S’pose you show up and she’s not there? Or s’pose she’s not willing to help?”
“I could ask the same of Maine,” you muttered.
He leaned forward and pointed a finger at you. “Sure, except I do have a plan for Portland.” He sat back. “Do you even have anything for her?” he asked. “You’re smart enough to know that she won’t give help for free.”
You patted your backpack. “I’ve got something I’ve been holding onto for her.”
Sweeney looked at you skeptically. “Like an offering something, or is this another. Gungnir situation?”
You glared at him. “It’s an offering, dickhead,” you snapped. The annoyance from earlier was suddenly back in full force. “Stop acting like I’m completely incompetent.”
“You’re the one that wants to drop in on her with no advance warning,” he pointed out. “I just wanted to make sure.”
“Sweeney,” you said, pinching the bridge of your nose and squeezing your eyes shut, “please, just shut up.” As you spoke, a shiver ran up your spine and the tip of your tongue tingled.
He moved to retort angrily, but it seemed that he couldn’t open his mouth. His green eyes bulged and your own widened as he clawed at his throat.
“Th-this isn’t funny,” you stammered.
Sweeney shook his head vigorously. He wasn’t messing with you.
“Fuck.” You tried not to panic. Clearly, this was your fault, but you had no idea how to undo it. Your hands fluttered as you tried to think of how to undo whatever it was that had been cast. “Um…Christ. Fuck, okay, um…speak,” you tried, like he was a dog that could be trained to bark on command. He looked at you in reproach and you winced. “Okay, yeah, sorry. I have no idea how to undo this.”
You tried again and again to no avail, succeeding only in further upsetting yourself. Your hands began to shake and your words stumbled over each other and you couldn’t quite catch your breath and oh god what had you done —
Warm hands covered yours and squeezed gently. He inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly.
You swallowed and took a shaky breath. He nodded and took another and you tried to breathe in tandem with him.
Your heart slowed and he nodded. He paused and thought for a moment and then he grabbed a pen and a notepad from your backpack.
“Hey!” you protested, but he paid you no mind as he scribbled something on the page in front of him and handed the notepad to you. You didn’t recognize the word he had written down.
“I have no idea how to pronounce this or what it means,” you told him.
He rolled his eyes and took the pad from you, once again scribbling something before handing it back to you.
You scanned his chicken-scratch writing. “’Just feel it’? What the hell is that supposed to mean?” you demanded.
He gave you a look that said try.
You stared at the page for a moment, not sure where to begin, and then took a deep breath and carefully sounded out the word. Nothing. “Did…did I say it wrong?” you asked cautiously.
He shrugged, which you took to mean It was good enough.
Eyes closed, you leaned back against the sticky brown vinyl of the seat. You knew this likely had to do with the tingling you’d felt when you accidentally cast whatever the hell this was, so you just had to get that back. Reaching forward, you tried again but still felt nothing. You cracked an eye open to see Sweeney staring at you expectantly. It hadn’t worked. Your shoulders sagged with frustration. “I’m sorry,” you said quietly. “Maybe it’s temporary?” You had been aiming for a light, joking tone, but your voice cracked and you had to press the heels of your trembling hands against your eyes in an effort to stop the dam from breaking. There was a pressure that had been building behind your eyes for several days, all the fear and anxiety and exhaustion piling up and threatening to spill over, but you couldn’t let it. You refused to cry in front of him.
The seat next to you dipped with new weight and you opened your eyes to see that Sweeney had moved to sit next to you. When his eyes met yours, they softened. He wasn’t mad at you, he knew this had been an accident.
Mortifyingly, your eyes began to brim with tears that quickly spilled down your cheeks. You realized that you wanted to hear his voice. You needed to hear him say that you would figure it out because that’s what you always did. You refused to meet his gaze, instead staring straight ahead and willing yourself to stop crying. Then, in a gesture that you had always understood to be unlike him, Sweeney put an arm across your shoulders and gently squeezed you against him.
The dam broke. You slumped against him and turned your face to bury it in his side, tears now flowing freely down your face and soaking into the fabric of his shirt. The feeling that you were overreacting to this comparatively small misstep in the grand scheme of everything else ate at you, but in the smaller scheme of right now, it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Your body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds and your hands were trembling.
Sweeney’s thumb gently brushed back and forth over your arm. The callused skin on the pad of his thumb snagged at the looser fibers in the flannel you wore. His head rested on top of yours and his breathing was slow and even. You did your level best to focus on the rhythm of the rise and fall of his chest and tried to sync your breath with his. The two of you sat like that for several minutes while you worked to stem the tide flowing from your eyes. Sniffling, you sat upright and swiped at your eyes.
“Maybe Circe can fix it.” You didn’t even bother to hide the misery in your voice. You were exhausted and there was an odd smell in the air that you initially attributed to a general Florida-ferry-scent, but upon further inspection, you realized that the odor was wafting from your own self and Sweeney. Never in your life had you longed for a shower and clean clothes more than you did at that moment.
A second wave of tears overcame you and you folded in on yourself, desperately wishing you could disappear and hating how weak you felt in that moment. You couldn’t even fix your own mistakes, between running to Circe to save you and Sweeney being the reason you had stayed alive long enough to get Gungnir to the old man. Sweeney being the reason you hadn’t died after you escaped the Jötnar and Sweeney being the reason, Sweeney being the reason, Sweeney being the reason. Fuck.
Your shoulders hunched forward and you stared at the linoleum floor of the ferry as you chewed at the dead skin of your nail beds. You didn’t understand why Sweeney was still by your side even after you had dragged him across state lines and nearly killed him. He’d said you were his best friend, sure, but everyone had their limits. How many strikes until you found yourself alone?
Sweeney laid a hand on your shoulder and gave what you could only assume was meant to be a reassuring squeeze, but it only threatened another round of crying. Again, you found yourself surprised at how badly you wanted to hear his voice.
The remainder of the ferry ride was filled with suffocating silence, Sweeney unable to speak and you unwilling. There was nothing you could say that wouldn’t feel depressingly hollow, so you buried your nose in your journal and scribbled down everything that had led to the right now in excruciating detail. You didn’t know if Circe would find it helpful, but you figured it couldn’t hurt. At the very least, she might be able to help you figure out where to even begin to learn to control whatever was happening to you.
The moment you stepped off the ferry, you were submerged into the hot Florida air, which clung to you like a second skin. The palms waved at you merrily and you glared up at their dancing fronds. They were where they belonged and you, most assuredly, were not. You couldn’t help but feel like you were being mocked.
There was a small marina beside the ferry terminal and it was there that the two of you headed next. You led the ginger giant down to where the boats bobbed gently in the saltwater and towards the farthest end of the marina. As you walked past yachts that increased in size the farther you went, you could see Sweeney’s eyes darting excitedly from vessel to vessel. He thought you were leading him to what had to be a spectacular super-yacht, you could tell, and your misery lifted long enough for you to make the decision not to tell him otherwise.
Despite the everything about how you were feeling in that moment, you couldn’t help but snicker when a small and rather dingy sailboat came into view and a look of dawning horror came across his face when he realized that you weren’t going to stop at one of the enormous sleek monstrosities that stood sentry on either side of the walkway.
Approaching the vessel, it became clear that it was even shabbier than it had seemed on first glance. The deep blue paint of the hull, which must have been breathtaking when it was new, was flaked and peeling with bare wood visible in places. The glass of the aft porthole of the cabin was spiderwebbed with cracks and appeared to be held together with duct tape and there was splintered wood everywhere. The gold-painted letters across the stern that had once proudly spelled “Aeaea” now read “Ae e “ in script that was just as faded and peeling as the rest of the boat. You didn’t need to look at Sweeney to know how he felt about your ride and he didn’t need to speak for you to know exactly what he was thinking.
“I know,” you told him, “but she’s never sunk before.”
He gave you a look and you knew then that it wasn’t just the boat that was giving him pause. The witch had turned him into a pig the last time they had crossed paths and there was nothing to say she wouldn’t do it again. You couldn’t really blame him for his reticence.
“I won’t let her turn you into a little pig boy again,” you teased. Both of you knew that it was not within your power to stop Circe from doing anything.
Sweeney’s shoulders hunched with reluctance and you gave him a gentle shove in the direction of the boat, mentally preparing yourself for the possibility of having to body-check him over the rail, but you were pleasantly surprised when he climbed aboard with no complaint. Not that he could complain even if he wanted to, but it was nice that he didn’t try to fight you over it.
The two of you sat on the cracked and yellowed vinyl seats that circled the perimeter of the deck. You folded your hands and waited patiently and Sweeney looked at you, clearly confused as to how this was supposed to work.
“Give it a sec,” you told him.
Sure enough, after a moment the boat lurched forward, its engine coughing and spluttering and belching black smoke. Sweeney’s face told you that he did not think that this was a good idea and you could see his reluctance only increase as the little boat trudged down the jetty. As soon as you were out on open water, a thick, unseasonable fog descended around you, obscuring everything from view.
“This is the only way to the island,” you explained. “I mean, it’s the only one I know of, at any rate. I’m sure there are other ways to get there, but this is the easiest and also the least dangerous.”
He gestured for you to continue.
You huffed out a breath. “Okay, I don’t know how well I can actually explain this, but I’ll do my best. Basically, the island is shielded. You know how in The Magicians, how the school in that has wards on it to keep people from finding it?”
He nodded. You had plowed through those books and made him watch the bad TV adaptation with you, he remembered how it worked.
“It’s not the same shielding, obviously, but it’s the same concept. Circe has a shielding spell on the island that keeps it hidden. The only people that can get to it are people who have been there before. The boat has an enchantment on it that will guide it to the island with the right person.”
You could almost hear his voice demanding that you explain to him how you’d gotten to Aeaea before and you knew that if you didn’t tell him now he would only be annoying about it later.
“You know I spent time with Circe, yeah?”
Sweeney nodded.
“Wednesday sent me to her after he found me. I didn’t learn anything major or super helpful, but he had her teach me basic protection magic and some other small things here and there. She was the one who helped me get my feet back under me.”
There was more to the story, and he could tell that you were holding something back, but that was a can of worms for another day. You lapsed into silence and leaned back against the seats and gazed out over the water. Even having been to Aeaea before, your breath still hitched when the fog cleared and the small dot of Circe’s island came into view. Memory had dulled the beauty of this place, you could tell even from a distance. The water that lapped at the hull of the boat was a bright, seemingly impossible shade of cerulean that almost hurt to look at in its brilliance. The fish that swam beside you seemed like something from a dream, so beautiful were they with bright orange crests arcing down their backs and sunlight glinting off of their silvery scales.
You leaned over the side and let your fingers trail in the warm water. A sea turtle slid gracefully through the water, close enough that your fingers could skim its shell, and you couldn’t help but gasp. In doing the work that you did, you saw so much ugly without reprieve and it was easy to forget that there was still beauty and wonder in the world. In spite of it all, there was still beauty. Even the little boat looked new, whatever enchantment that had disguised it now lifted, its blue paint glossy and no longer peeling and the wood polished to a mirror shine. The cracked porthole was now in one piece and the vinyl on the seats was now a soft beige and looked brand new.
You closed your eyes and tilted your face skyward, taking a deep inhale of the clean salt air. The rays of the sun warmed your cheeks and seagulls wheeled through the sky at incredible heights and you opened your eyes to watch them. You envied their freedom. They didn’t have to do anything, no one ever asked anything of them. They were free to go where they wanted when they wanted and answered to no one. You’d have liked to be a bird. When you had asked him about it, Sweeney had said that he didn’t remember much of his time as one, but he remembered the freedom and the feeling of soaring through the air, weightless and free.
You looked to the island. Now that you were closer, you were able to see some of the animals that lived among everyone there and among the bustle of the witches on the beach. You’d have liked to be an animal. You’d have liked to be anything other than…whatever it was you were. It was a cruelty, in some ways, that you had been given this life and this form. You looked to Sweeney, curious what was on his mind as you approached the white beaches, and found that his gaze was already burning into you.
The moment your eyes met his shocking green ones, all thoughts of wishing you had been made differently evaporated.
Sweeney looked away from you quickly and scratched the back of his neck. That moment passed in the space of a heartbeat, but you didn’t think you were imagining the flush that was creeping up from under his collar.
Before you could dwell on it for too long, the small vessel glided neatly to its dock. Waiting to greet you were three gorgeous women with jet black hair and clear gray eyes. They smiled at you in unison and you could see rows of needle sharp teeth, stark white against pink mouths. These women had been at the docks when you had last arrived years ago. They’d made your skin crawl then and they made your skin crawl now.
“She’s been expecting you,” they said as one. Their voices made your frontal lobe buzz unpleasantly. Their mouths moved, but their words felt as though they were being beamed directly into your mind. Judging from Sweeney’s grimace, he felt it too.
You cleared your throat and regained your bearings. “She knew I was coming?”
Sweeney moved to stand behind you and once again you were grateful for the solidity of him in the face of the Gray Women.
The Gray Women said nothing more, only turned and began to walk down the dock towards the beach. A look passed between you and the leprechaun before you followed. The sisters (Were they sisters? You’d never been sure.) led you to a cobbled path that ended at an enormous manor. It was an elegant building that you could only imagine was what the home she had grown up in looked like. Its façade of soaring columns and well-polished stones supported snaking vines with fragrant blossoms that were as big as your fist and there were gas light fixtures on either side of the massive oak doors that were banded with iron and sported heavy brass door knockers that had been cast in the heads of lions, their jaws agape in mighty roars.
The tallest of the three women raised one of the lion heads and let it fall against the oak with a boom that echoed through the house.
After a moment, the doors swung open of their own accord and you were hit with a gust of incense-perfumed air and woodsmoke. The women gave you one more eerie smile before vanishing back the way you had come and you stepped inside.
Sweeney moved to follow you, but you turned and placed a hand on his chest. “Maybe you should wait here,” you told him. “You know how she can be.”
He looked as though he very much wanted to protest and shook his head vigorously. He was not going to let you talk to the witch alone.
You patted him on the shoulder. “I’ll be right back,” you promised and walked down the hallway. You could feel Sweeney’s glare boring a hole in the back of your head.
Though it had been a while, you still remembered the layout of Circe’s home. It was approaching late afternoon and you knew she would be taking her tea in front of her hearth in the great-room as she attended to her rituals and the hearth would not be difficult to find.
You dodged the dryads that bustled around the halls, their hands full with rich fabrics, decadent dishes, and wine in jugs made from the most beautiful ceramic you’d ever seen. The walls were hung with vivd tapestries and patterned with intricate mosaics, both holding images that were so lifelike you half expected them to leap out at you. Treasures on pedestals lined the walls and glinted in the warm light of the sun. Carved chests were tucked into corners and soft rugs padded the cold stone floors. You ran your fingers along the cool marble of the windowsills and traced the intricate scrollwork of the wooden shutters. Undeniably, the home of the sorceress was breathtaking, but there was a cold, hard feeling that lurked beneath it all. You supposed centuries of forced exile would do that to a person.
Eventually, you got to where you wanted to be and, as expected, when you rounded the corner she was sat before the fire at her loom, her fingers deftly sending the shuttlecock back and forth with a glimmering thread. Another woman sat adjacent to her with her back to you. You couldn’t see her face but her auburn hair was intricately braided and threaded with silver beads. She waved her hand as if to illustrate a point and you saw silver rings adorning long slender fingers that were covered in inked symbols that were too small for you to make out.
From your backpack, you retrieved the bottle of 1869 Château Lafite that had been packed carefully at the bottom of your bag and set it on the long cypress table. You contemplated knocking on the table to make yourself known, but Circe spoke before you could.
“It’s rude to stare,” she said calmly without looking up from what she was doing. “Either speak or leave.” Her voice was cool and carried through the space so that it sounded like she was right next to you. You had never once heard the witch raise her voice, but she always made herself heard.
You picked up the bottle and made your way to the hearth, your cheeks burning. Like the rest of the house, the grand room was a thing of beauty: the high ceilings boasted intricate frescoes of what you knew to be scenes from The Odyssey. Columns stretched from floor to ceiling, the tops of which curled into delicate scrolls. Two stone lions bracketed the enormous fireplace and you couldn’t shake the feeling that they were watching you as you moved, and more rich tapestries hung on the walls. You could see threads of gold gleaming among the royal purples and bloody crimsons. Despite the oppressive heat of the day, there was a roaring fire blazing merrily before them.
“I apologize Teacher,” you said sheepishly.
She eyed the bottle of wine in your hands.
“Is that the 1869 Château?” she asked. Her eyes shone hungrily with the promise of an offering.
You nodded. “Yes.”
She snatched it from you. “Oh, well done indeed.”
You cleared your throat. “I know I come without invitation, but—“
“Dear one, have you met my friend?” She spoke as though you hadn’t said a word.
“I — no, ma’am.”
Circe indicated the woman beside her, who smiled at you kindly. Her ice blue eyes glinted and her smile actually reached her eyes. “This is Angrboda. She’s a dear friend and a fellow practitioner of the craft.”
At the woman’s name, your blood ran cold. The old man had told you stories about this witch. Mother of Fenrir and Jormungandr. Loki’s wife. A force to be reckoned with above all else, who had died at the hands of the Æsir more than once but now sat five feet from you. And yet, the woman before you didn’t seem as cold and wretched as Wednesday had made her out to be. Those sparkling eyes had crow’s feet and there were smile lines around her small mouth. This was a woman that smiled often, even with the aching sorrow you could see behind the twinkling in her eyes. You liked her immediately.
You gave Angrboda your name and she inclined her head.
“Pleased to meet you.” She was soft-spoken, her voice gentle and delicate, but like her Greek counter, she radiated power and authority.
“Likewise. Teacher, you —“
Circe held up a hand. “I know what you’re here to ask. Where’s that ginger giant of yours?”
You ground your teeth. “I left him in the front hall. I didn’t want to risk offense and, forgive me, but he’s still a little skittish after last time.”
She scoffed and tossed her head. “He ran his mouth, I set him right. The man has nothing to fear as long as he minds his manners. He’ll be brought in shortly, I should think.”
“Thank you,” you mumbled.
At that moment, the doors at the end of the hall banged open and Sweeney strode through, looking for all the world as if he owned the place. A harried dryad trailed after him but Circe waved her away and she made a quick retreat.
“Mad Sweeney!” Circe exclaimed in delight. She stood and spread her arms to hug him. “Lovely to see you,” she said, kissing him on both cheeks. It almost sounded like she meant it, but you didn’t miss the glimmer of disgust in her eyes.
Sweeney raised an eyebrow, but said nothing, and surprise flitted across her face. For a split second the witch was visibly annoyed, but she quickly wiped her face and plastered on a pleasant smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “No biting comment?” she teased. “Am I not worth your words, great king?”
You tensed but Circe waved her hand. “Sit down.”
An invisible force yanked you into one of the high-backed chairs like you were attached to a string.
Circe approached Sweeney, inspecting him like he was one of her cattle.
“Oh, now this is interesting,” she remarked. She prodded his jaw. “You can’t speak at all, can you?”
Sweeney’s face remained impassive. Circe waved Angrboda over. “Boda, come look at this.”
Angrboda rose from her seat and crossed the room with impossible grace. Her pale fingers delicately probed along Sweeney’s jawline and down his neck. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he gulped and you snorted derisively. Not that you could blame him though, Angrboda was otherworldly in her beauty.
“This is wonderful work,” she murmured, forcing Sweeney’s jaw open so Circe could stick her fingers in his mouth and poke around in his cheeks and under his tongue.
Circe removed her fingers and took a step back. “It’s rudimentary and a little crude, but it’s clean and to the point.”
Angrboda hummed. “It does feel unintentional, but it’s better work than some of your novitiates.”
The Greek witch turned to you. “Is this your doing?” You nodded. “I thought it felt familiar,” she said, more to herself than to you, “but if it is, it is stronger than it used to be.” She sniffed the air. “You smell different, too. Much more wild.”
You blinked at her.
“I don’t think they’ve come to be told they stink,” Angrboda said gently.
Circe cleared her throat. “Right. Why have you brought him to me? I know that this alone isn’t what brought you back to my shores.”
You swallowed. “I was hoping you could remove the enchantment. Please.”
She pretended to think hard. “I don’t see why I should. I like him better this way anyway. All of the strong and handsome brooding with none of the insufferable speaking.”
“I need him to help me find answers,” you said.
The witch looked at you in a way that made you feel naked and exposed. “It’s your spell, you should be able to do it yourself.”
Your eyes were glued to the floor and you let the sole of your boot scuff across the textured surface. She knew you well enough to know exactly why you hadn’t undone this, she just wanted to hear you say it.
“I haven’t…been able to,” you said reluctantly.
She scoffed. “You cast it, didn’t you? You can remove it.”
“The casting was unintentional,” you snapped. “I haven’t been able to figure out how to undo it. I don’t even know how it happened in the first place!”
“Did my teachings mean nothing?” Circe demanded. “Did nothing stick in that thick head of yours? I’ve seen you cast. You’re more than capable.”
“Only defenses and wards,” you protested. “It’s never been like this before.”
Angrboda regarded you carefully. “This unintentional magic, is it a recent development?” she asked. You nodded and she turned to Circe. “That could account for the wild smell, but why now?”
Circe scratched her chin and looked at you. “Have you had any particularly traumatic experiences lately?”
“Broad question,” you muttered.
“Let me rephrase. Have you had any experiences recently that go beyond what you would typically encounter?”
You looked to Sweeney, unsure it was safe, but he shrugged and nodded. Might as well, his body said. You reached around to hike up the back of your shirt to show the witches what the Jötnar had done. There were sharp intakes of breath as they took in the ruined flesh of your back, which was already beginning to scar over. Circe’s face hardened but Angrboda’s eyes went wide.
“Nine hells, it was you,” she realized.
Circe’s gaze snapped to Angrboda. “Explain,” she demanded.
Angrboda’s eyes didn’t leave your back. “I heard a rumor about a week back that one of the All-Father’s people had been taken by the Jötnar. They said they had trespassed and stolen something valuable.”
“Is it stealing if they stole it in the first place?” you muttered.
Angrboda ignored you. “I had no idea this is what they were doing.” Her voice was strained as she spoke. “Talk about traumatic. Child, I am so sorry.”
Circe bent to examine your wounds more closely. “I can heal the rest, but I can’t do anything about the scarring,” she said as she ran her fingers lightly over the angry intersecting cuts. “Boda, you said this was a week ago?”
Angrboda nodded and you piped up to confirm, “I broke out around then and found him.” You pointed to Sweeney.
Circe raised an eyebrow. “He was nearby?”
You nodded and she put you under that scrutinizing gaze. “Quite a stroke of luck, isn’t it?”
You shrugged. “I’d be dead if I hadn’t found him, so I’m choosing not to question it. We’ve got more pressing issues.”
Circe straightened. “I see. And I’m sure that you’ve figured out that you’re healing much faster than you should be?”
You nodded again and she turned to Angrboda. The two began conversing rapidly in a language you didn’t understand. When they had apparently reached a conclusion, Circe’s attention came back to you. “We have much to discuss and what remains of the day is passing us by. Let’s get started.”
She swept past you and Sweeney glared at you and coughed into his fist. Circe huffed in annoyance.
“Oh, right. Are you sure you want to undo this?” she asked you. “I really do prefer him this way.”
“Yes, please,” you said. “He’s…he’s my friend,” you finished lamely.
The knowing look on Angrboda’s face only served to add to the awkward anxiety that was railing against your mind.
Circe heaved a beleaguered sigh. “Fine. I’ll show you how so you can fix your own mess next time. You,” Circe pointed at you, “I need you to tell me exactly what happened in the moments that led up to the unintentional casting.”
Wordlessly, you reached into your backpack and handed her your journal. She took it from you with a raised eyebrow and flipped through the pages you had written on the ferry. When she finished she handed your journal back and looked between the two of you.
“You tried in English and Irish?”
You nodded.
“What did it feel like when you spoke the words?”
You didn’t understand and said as much.
“When you spoke the words that cast this and when you tried to undo it, how did it feel?” Circe asked, the way you would ask a small child a question with an obvious answer.
“Like…emotionally or physically?”
“Physically.” Her tone indicated a strained sense of patience.
You shook out your hand, remembering the pins and needles feeling that had danced across your tongue and the chill that had run through you. “It felt weird. Like, my tongue got kind of tingly and it felt like something was slithering up my spine.”
Angrboda nodded. “That’s the magic.”
“What about when you tried to undo it?” Circe asked.
You shook your head. “Nothing.”
She clicked her tongue and walked around you in a slow circle. “You were trying too hard,” she said as she came to a halt in front of you. “When you said it the first time, you did it without thinking. On instinct, no matter how endearingly misguided. The second time, though, you were trying too hard. You have to simply let yourself feel it.” Circe directed the two of you to stand before the fireplace and face each other. When you were arranged to her liking, you were staring into his green eyes. This close, you could see the faint ring of gold that circled his pupil between the black and the bright green and the freckles that were splashed across the bridge of his nose and scattered across his cheeks and his forehead.
You swallowed nervously.
“You also need to believe that this will work and that you can do it,” she said pointedly.
“I get it,” you muttered.
“Watch it,” the witch said sharply. Sweeney’s jaw flexed and you knew him well enough to know he was suppressing a smirk. Circe reached out and cuffed you both upside the head. “I can still send you both back where you came from,” she reminded you. You mumbled a sheepish apology. “The Irish word that he gave you, say that again, but this time chew on it. Feel the shape of the word and how your intentions mold it. Hold those intentions in your mind, look at him and hear his voice as you speak the word aloud.”
You closed your eyes and did as she said before speaking the word, but nothing happened and your shoulders sagged.
“See, it doesn’t work,” you told her, unable to keep the frustration from your voice. “If we keep going it’ll just piss me off.”
“You think if you don’t get it on the first go it won’t ever work? I never took you to be a quitter.” Circe’s voice was mocking and Angrboda glared at her sharply.
“It’s like anything else,” the Norsewoman told you, infinitely more patient than your hostess and teacher. “You need to practice.”
“Do it again,” Circe ordered.
You clenched your jaw and tamped down your growing frustration. Sweeney reached out and guided your eyes closed with the callused tips of his fingers and then took one of your hands in his and pressed the tips of your fingers against his chapped lips.
Your eyes flew open in surprise, but the sight of his face so close to yours was so disorienting that you quickly closed them again. Just feel it. You reached deep within yourself for the feeling from before and poured as much of your will into it as you could. You allowed yourself to feel its meaning beyond the literal translation. What it meant to you in that moment, and in that moment it meant his crude jokes, the obnoxious laughter, and his voice. Loathe though you were to admit it, it meant the feeling of safety that you had somehow come to find in that stupid brogue. You didn’t ever think you would miss it, but now that his voice was gone it was fucking untenable. He needed it back. You needed it back.
“Labhair.”
The word fell from your lips as naturally and as easily as breathing and you felt it. The tingle on your tongue and the chill down your spine, but this time it felt like it was twisting up and around your spinal cord and flooding your brain. The point of contact between your finger and Sweeney’s lips grew uncomfortably warm and you jerked away like you had been shocked, but as quickly as it arrived, the feeling dissipated. Green eyes met yours and your fingers tapped nervously against your thigh. You held your breath and you watched each other carefully. He was silent for what felt like an eternity and tears of frustration and disappointment pricked at the corners of your eyes. You covered your face with your hands.
“Sure you’re not after crying again, are you?”
Your head shot up so quickly you nearly broke your neck. Sweeney had an enormous shit-eating grin that nearly split his face in two plastered firmly in place.
“It worked?” you asked hoarsely.
“Unless I’m being puppeted,” he said easily, “I’d say looks like.”
Your knees jellied with relief. Part of you, a part that you had refused to fully acknowledge, had been afraid that it couldn’t be undone, but you had done it. You hugged him tightly, burying your face in his chest and gripping he fabric of his shirt so tightly that it was a wonder it didn’t tear in your fists.
Sweeney huffed out a laugh as his arms wrapped around you. He pressed a kiss to the crown of your head and you both missed the look that passed between Circe and the Norse witch.
“Jesus Christ,” you breathed. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—“
He palmed your forehead and gave you a playful shove.
“No blood, no foul,” he said simply.
To your exasperation, your eyes began to well once again.
Circe waved her hands. “Enough of that. We’ve fixed one problem, but I know that wasn’t all you came here for. You want to know what’s happening to you.”
You nodded. “This keeps happening. Magic that I can’t explain, incantations that I never learned.” You told her about the Bocánaigh in Missouri and the incantations that pulled themselves from somewhere deep inside you. Circe listened, the crease between her brows growing more defined the longer you spoke.
When you finished, the witch remained silent, though her fingers tapped nervously along her staff. She regarded you carefully as she chewed on the inside of her cheek, seemingly deep in thought.
“I don’t know that I can give you all of the answers you need,” she said at length, “but I think I may be able to offer some assistance. Come.” She swept from the hall with Angrboda in step beside her and led you back outside to the path that had led you up from the beach. You followed it further inland, taking a fork in the packed earth that led you to a sizable pristine white tent. Circe held one of the flap doors aside and gestured for you to step through. Inside, you realized that you were in the island’s infirmary. Lanterns hung from the ceiling, impossibly bright, with thuribles hung between them and from those drifted rivers of smoke that were scented with lavender and frankincense. The stone floor had been polished to a gleam and there was a stream that cut through it, neatly separating the space into two sides. One had a row of beds that were neatly made with creamy linen sheets, while the other held what appeared to be exam tables.
Circe exchanged a few words with her sister witch and kissed her on both cheeks before following you inside as Angrboda went back the way you had come.
“She’s going to see if any of her sisters might know anything about this,” Circe told you, answering the unasked question in your eyes. “As for you—“ She grabbed your shoulders and sat you in a plush armchair, whose immense royal blue cushions threatened to swallow you. “You,” she pointed at Sweeney, “outside.”
He snorted. “Like hell.”
“I wasn’t asking,” she said icily.
You looked up at him and tugged gently on the hem of his jacket. “It’s okay,” you said quietly.
He knelt before you and put a massive hand over your knee. “I don’t like it, mo grá,” he murmured. “I don’t trust her.”
You let your forehead rest against his. “We don’t have a choice,” you said softly. “I’m a big kid, I’ll be okay.”
Sweeney sighed and stood. “I’ll be right outside. If anything happens—“
“You’ll come charging in, I’m sure,” Circe said in a tone that conveyed utter boredom.
He shot her a glare and stood and gave you a pat on the shoulder before taking his leave. You watched him disappear through the canvas. You’d been feeling different in his presence since he had stitched you up almost two weeks ago, and it had only gotten worse since he’d kissed you. No longer was he the obnoxious and barely tolerable coworker that you’d put up with out of necessity. After nearly two weeks of his constant presence, you should have wanted to claw his eyes out, but to your mild horror, you realized that the thought of being separated from him now nearly made you nauseous. Two weeks that had felt like a lifetime.
“I truly don’t understand why you keep that troglodyte around,” Circe huffed after he had gone.
“He saved my life,” you murmured as you toyed with a loose thread in the arm of the chair. “More than once.”
She clicked her tongue. “Be that as it may, he’s crass and indelicate and I find him grating. Here, drink.” She had busied herself preparing a tonic, which she presented to you in a steaming willow-pattered mug. You inhaled the vapor and nearly choked on the foul scent of it.
Poison, hissed a voice in the back of your mind. Your head snapped up and your gaze shot to Circe. The chill, ethereal beauty of the sorceress was gone. Her flashing golden eyes had become the same sightless, weeping black pits that you’d seen on Sweeney’s face the day before. It oozed down her cheeks, the skin there now pitted and scarred. The planes of her face seemed to be melting, her skin turning a livid red before settling into a foul necrotic black as it sloughed off of her bones. Her fiery hair hung lank and matted and you were able to make out lice and squirming maggots weaving in between the strands on her scalp.
You knew in your bones that this witch was trying to poison you. She would not let you leave Aeaea alive.
You screamed, a horrible and inhuman sound that tore from your throat.
Sweeney burst into the tent, green eyes wild and searching for you, but you were already up and scrambling away. Like Circe, his face was twisted and terrible. They both sneered at you as they approached you.
They’re going to kill you. The voice was wailing now. You gripped your hair as your heart hammered against your ribs so hard you feared it would burst from your chest. Sweeney made for you, but you dodged his outstretched hand and somersaulted away from them both. You came up on the other side of them white-knuckling the knife that had been in your boot and sobbing with fear.
Sweeney was trying to say something to you, but you screamed in his face, drowning out his voice. He tried again to approach you. You lashed out and kicked him square in the chest and his breath left him with an oof. But even with the wind knocked from his lungs, he still managed to catch the next kick you aimed at him and pull you towards him in the same movement. His other hand shot out and grabbed your wrist, twisting and forcing you to drop the knife to avoid your bones being snapped.
You flailed in his hold, but he was still bigger and stronger than you were. Circe pointed at one of the tables and Sweeney hauled you bodily onto its surface. He pinned your hands to your sides and sat astride your torso, effectively holding the rest of you in place even as you bucked your hips and thrashed beneath him in an effort to unseat his massive frame and free yourself.
Your face was slick with sweat and tears. Your hair was plastered to your forehead and you tasted blood. You must have bitten your tongue, but you didn’t feel it and you didn’t care. You had to escape. Fear forced your throat to constrict, threatening to choke you with it and swallow you whole. Every nerve in your body burned. Sweeney was shouting at you, something you didn’t understand, and Circe was barking orders to the dryad nurses, but you processed none of it. Fear, animalistic and primal, had consumed you and erased all else.
Scream after scream ripped from your throat and tears that weren’t yours dripped onto your cheeks from above. You were going to die here, pinned and cornered like a wounded animal. Eventually your voice gave out and the only sound you could make was a pathetic keening as you writhed in the leprechaun’s grasp.
Then Circe was there, her face hovering inches from yours, and she was wrenching your jaw open and pouring something warm and oily down your throat. You had a moment to register Sweeney’s stricken, tearstained face before you rolled over and voided the contents of your stomach. After that, everything went black.
You woke tucked into the white linen sheets of one of the infirmary beds. The sky outside had darkened to a deep purple and you wondered how long you’d been out.
What the hell had happened? You had been fine one moment and the next you were being choked by overwhelming terror that—
Oh. The Dark Man. He had found you here, somehow, and filled your mind with abject terror. It had been him in the car, turning your leprechaun into something straight from a nightmare.
You desperately wanted to cry, but you were too spent to do even that. Your whole body ached and you felt as though your bones were made of stone. A memory swam before you: Sweeney’s tearstained face, twisted and grotesque and…scared. He had been afraid of you. You squeezed your eyes shut and let your head fall back against the pillows, wanting badly to disappear where no one could ever find you again.
A dryad bustled into the room with fresh linens. When she saw that you were awake, she smiled pleasantly, but her stance was still guarded.
“You’re awake!” she said brightly. “You gave us all quite a fright. How do you feel?” Her voice was soft and musical and carried the clipped vowels that you had come to associate with the tree nymphs.
“Sore,” you said truthfully, “and a little freaked out.”
She moved to stand at your bedside and briskly began checking your pulse, your skin, your throat.
“But none of the terror from before?” she asked as she peeled back one of your eyelids and peered intently into your eye with a penlight. You noticed that her eyes were green, but not the same green that you were used to. Your green eyes were the color of lush, sprawling leas. The eyes of this nymph were the deep green of oak leaves. You could smell the forest on her.
“No ma’am.”
The dryad straightened and scribbled something on her notepad. “Well, physically you seem all right. Circe will be pleased you’re awake.”
“Is my friend okay?” you asked.
“You mean that beefy leprechaun?”
You flushed and nodded.
“He’s fine,” she said dismissively. “Worried himself sick over you and Circe had to bar him from the infirmary just so he would get out of our way.” She shook her head. “He refused to let you out of his sight.”
You chewed on your lip. “Can I see him?”
She shook her head. “Not until Circe has had a chance to speak with you.”
You stared down as your hands, folded together in your lap, and deflated a little. “Oh.” Your voice was small.
Your nurse looked at you pityingly. “We’ve been given instructions not to tell him you’re awake.”
Her gaze was sandpaper against your skin.
“Okay.” Even to your own ears, your voice was hollow. “Could you get her?”
“I’ll let her know you’re awake, but she’s busy on the other side of the island. It may be a little bit.”
You laid back and stared at the canvas ceiling. Your eyes traced the curls of smoke that drifted from the golden thuribles. Couldn’t catch a fucking break. You were beginning to get angry, but it was the sort of anger that had no outlet. Anger that could direct itself at no one and so reflected inwards.
No. That wasn’t right. There was someone. The old man.
Your life had never exactly been easier for him being in it, but the recent string of bullshit you’d had to survive was almost entirely his fault. That one-eyed cunt.
“Okay,” you said again.
She nodded and left the tent, leaving you feeling small and alone.
After what felt like an eternity but likely was no more than an hour or two, Circe appeared.
“Hello child,” she greeted you, calm and unbothered.
You swallowed. “Teacher.”
She sat at the edge of your bed and presented you with a cup of the same malodorous tonic she had tried to give you before.
“It’s not poison,” she said, sensing your trepidation. “It’s not a hallucinogenic, either. It’s only some herbs meant to help you relax.”
Still not entirely convinced, you knocked it back all the same, your eyes watering at the taste. You coughed. “Christ, that’s foul.” But the witch hadn’t lied. As soon as it passed your lips, a soothing warmth spread through your limbs to the ends of your fingers and toes. You could feel your muscles relax as all of the tension and stress you had been carrying melted away, leaving you feeling lighter than you had in ages. You sighed.
“Better?” Circe asked.
You nodded. “How long was I out?”
“Almost two days. Your leprechaun has been insufferable.
You managed a weak smile. “Sounds like him.”
“Mhm.” Circe regarded you carefully. “What happened?” Her voice was soft and it made you want to throw something.
“You don’t need to speak to me like I’m made of spun glass,” you snapped. “I’m not going to fall apart just because someone used the wrong tone.”
“You tried to kill me and your friend because I gave you a tonic that smelled bad,” she said cooly. “I apologize if I attempt to be cautious.”
You said nothing.
“What happened?” she asked again.
You spread your hands in front of you, palms up, helplessly. “Do you really need to ask?”
A shadow crossed her face. “I’d hoped we were wrong,” she said heavily. “He shouldn’t have been able to find you here. I’ll need to reinforce the wards and I’ll see if I can’t add something to your defenses.
A horrible thought occurred to you. “Did I hurt anyone?”
Circe sighed. “Your knife caught that boy in the arm and he needed stitches, but aside from that, no,” came the reply.
You pressed the heels of your palms into your eyes.
She placed a hand on your knee. “It’s all right, child. He’ll heal. As for yourself,” she stood and circled the bed so that she was standing behind you, “there’s some things that need to be figured out.” She took your head between her cool hands, her slender fingers at your temples and just beneath the place where your jaw met your ears. She applied the smallest amount of pressure and you could sense her magic reaching out, trying to connect with yours.
The witch made a noise of frustration. “There’s a wall,” she murmured, more to herself than you. “Someone’s put up powerful wards, but if I prod it just right, I may be able to—“ Her fingers flexed and you could feel her poke at a place in your mind that you hadn’t even known existed. The moment she touched it, you pitched forward and vomited over the side of the bed and all over the polished stone floor.
“Oh dear.” Circe gently patted your back as your body heaved like it was trying to expel your stomach. After a few moments it passed and you looked at her with bloodshot eyes. You had never seen her look so concerned.
Sweeney chose that moment to burst in, looking panicked. His eyes widened when he saw you, but before he could do anything stupid, one of the dryad nurses shoved him back outside.
Circe beckoned the nurse, who approached with a crystalline glass of water that smelled faintly of mint and soothed the burning in your throat and calmed your stomach as you sipped it carefully.
“What the hell was that?” you managed to rasp once the glass was empty.
Circe furrowed her dark brows, her bright golden eyes distant. “A memory spell,” she said slowly, as though she was testing how the idea sounded out loud. “A powerful one.”
You blinked. “Can you undo it?”
She prodded again at the same spot, more gently this time but still enough to make a wave of nausea sweep over you, making you groan.
“I think the only one that can is the one who cast it,” came the reply. “The failsafes on this…I’ve never seen work like this. Someone really didn’t want you to remember whatever it was that they shut away.” She stood to face you and took your face in her hands, her narrow golden gaze examining you intently. “You don’t remember anything from before Wednesday?”
You shook your head. “I was actually hoping you might. Somehow. He sent me here after he found me, I thought maybe…” you trailed off and your shoulders slumped, the weight of your exhaustion returning. “I don’t know. I don’t know what I was thinking.” This was never going to work. If Circe couldn’t give you what you needed, if an ancient sorceress like her didn’t know, what hope did you have?
Circe gave a quick command in Greek and the nurse that had brought you the mint water left, reappearing momentarily with Sweeney in tow. His right forearm was wrapped in crisp white linen, but you could already see he was beginning to bleed through it. Your chest constricted painfully. You had done that to him. He looked at Circe expectantly.
“Well?”
“You might want to try manners sometime,” she said drily. “You’d be amazed at what it can do for you.”
Sweeney made a face and you shot him a warning glance.
Circe pretended not to notice. “What is up in your mind is a barrier of sorts,” she told you. “It’s nothing like anything I’ve ever seen, but parts of the casting feel familiar.” You waited, but she did not elaborate. “There’s someone who may be able to help where I cannot.” Her eyes flicked too Sweeney and then back to you. “Do you know the Morrigan?”
You didn’t need to look at Sweeney to know that he was giving a good run for the world record for “most smug grin.”
“If you say anything, I swear I will let her turn you into a pig and I will leave you here,” you snapped.
Circe raised an eyebrow. “I see you’ve already discussed that option, then,” she observed. “May I ask why you chose my island instead?”
You looked at the floor. “I felt better about someone I knew digging around in my skull.”
Circe hummed. “Well, touching as that is, whatever is going on is much more akin to their particular branch of magic. They will be better equipped to give you what you need.”
Circe saw the two of you down to the docks and watched as you boarded the small boat that had brought you to the island.
“Remember,” she told you, “see the sisters in Maine. Use your magic as little as possible until you get to them, otherwise you’ll as good as tell him where you are.”
You nodded and she patted your cheek. “Sweeney,” she called over your shoulder. “Do try to get them there in one piece.”
He snorted but stayed silent, to your immense relief.
. . .
She watched from the shore as the boat disappeared beyond the horizon and the island’s wards. Her old wolf sat beside her in the sand.
“Why didn’t you tell them?” the wolf asked. Her voice was low and rumbling. Circe imagined she could see the grains of sand dance whenever the wolf spoke.
The witch buried her hand in the thick fur along the scruff of her friend’s neck. “I couldn’t,” she said softly. “It wouldn’t have helped even if I could. They wouldn’t understand.”
“You can’t know—“
“You misunderstand me,” Circe said sharply. “The wards in their mind…any attempt to tell them anything would have been distorted. I physically cannot.”
The wolf’s yellow eyes scrutinized her mistress before turning her gaze back to the water. “What will happen to them?”
Circe shook her head. “Would that I knew. I can only hope they get there in the end. We will need them for what’s to come.”
Sweeney's concern, Circe's coldness but clearly caring for the reader, how everything is coming together. That last little section with Circe and her wolf just make me more curious. Bravo.
Summary: Somewhere in Appalachia, he watches as they drown her. It's none of his business.
Word Count: 1.4k
Warnings: Graphic depictions of gore and drowning
He was a good man. Well, good may have been a stretch, but he could at least say that he was a decent man. He never hurt anyone, he took care of his mother and his animals, and he minded his business.
He minded his business, which was why, at dusk on the lake that day, he pretended not to see. He pretended not to hear when he heard her screaming, and he pretended not to see when they dragged her to the edge of the docks and threw her in. He knew who she was. He knew what she was. So when the two men held her under the water as she thrashed and choked and screamed, he sat in his boat on the other side of the lake with his fishing rod and his tackle and felt only mild annoyance that this would likely scare the fish away, and he would come home empty-handed.
Eventually, the lake was quiet once more. He knew her body would be sinking to the bottom, would become tangled in the muck and the lakeweed, and that her bones would be stripped before her corpse would surface.
He huffed. Serves her right, the wretch, he thought. Dance with the Devil all you like, but don’t be surprised when he catches you.
He watched the men exchange a few words and then retreat back into the trees. Sighing, he settled back against the side of the boat, sipping from a small jar of moonshine that sat in the bottom of the boat. He winced against the burn as it slid down his throat, but settled as the warmth spread through his body. He pondered the jar, thinking about how he would very much like to try flavoring his next batch. Henry, just down the way, had told him about how he and his brother had added peaches to their still once, and it had been delightful.
He was shaken from his reverie by more screams, but these didn’t sound terrified like the ones of the witch. These sounded devastated, and much closer. From the treeline on his side of the lake came a girl sprinting at top speed. She skidded to a stop, bare feet kicking up dirt. Her eyes were wild and tears were streaming down her cheeks.
“Mama! Mama!”
He flinched. He’d forgotten about her daughter. He shouldn’t have, Rhea was a pariah after having a child out of wedlock, but the girl had slipped his mind.
The girl was wailing now. “Mama!”
“Hush, girl,” he called to her. “Your ma ain’t here and you’re scarin’ the fish.”
She turned her wild eyes on him, and he felt a chill run across his skin. “They took my mama, and they hurt her. You saw them. You saw them and you did nothing.”
He didn’t know what to do. “It wasn’t my business,” he sputtered.
Her brown eyes narrowed. “You best watch yourself, mister,” she said, her voice hoarse and hollow. "He's coming, and you’re gonna get what’s comin’ to you.”
He scoffed. Was he meant to be afraid of this girl? Yet, as she went back the way she had come, he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was watching him. That something had eyes on him.
The feeling persisted as he hauled his little rowboat onto the shore. It continued as he slung the day’s catch across his back, and it endured as he began the walk back to his home. He turned in a slow circle, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever it was, but saw nothing.
“You’re actin’ a fool,” he muttered to himself. “Ain’t nothin’ there.”
But as he started the trek home, the woods seemed darker than usual. The trees seemed closer than they had when he’d walked through them not three hours earlier. A twig snapped, sounding like a gunshot in the stillness of the night, and he fairly jumped out of his skin, almost dropping the basket on his back. His breath was coming in short bursts now, and his heart was hammering in his chest as he picked up his pace, eager to get out of the dark and into the warmth of his cabin.
His blood froze when he heard the unmistakable sound of the footsteps of something very large following him. He was beginning to feel as though he was being hunted. The underbrush shifted, and he caught a glimpse of eyes in the bushes, glowing the red of hot embers. He froze, captured by their gaze. Unable to move, he watched as a creature, as big as any bear he’d ever seen, stood, unfurling itself to its full height. Its terrible eyes were sunken into an equally terrible face, one that was scarred and twisted and sneering. Its teeth were as long as his finger and were dripping with saliva, and huge, wickedly curved horns branched from its skull, dripping with gore and viscera. It blew hot, foul breath into his face and grinned.
“Run.”
With that, the spell was broken. He dropped his tackle and his fish and ran as fast as he could, adrenaline and fear such as he had never known pumping through his blood and driving him faster, faster. If he could just get home, if he could just make it through the door, he’d be safe.
He heard the beast’s wild, howling laughter as it chased after him. He pushed himself to go faster than he ever had before, pouring on speed, but he was a farmboy. He was strong, but he’d never been much of a runner. Branches and thorns scratched at his face and his arms, tore at his clothes, cut his skin, but he kept going. Home couldn’t be much farther.
Just make it home, just make it home, just make it home.
Then, there! Through the trees, he saw the light from the lantern he’d lit before he left. He was almost there, he was so close. He gave one last push and sprinted to the porch, tumbling through the door and slamming it shut behind him, heaving the heavy wooden beam across. He snatched his rifle from its place above the mantle and backed against the wall, breathing hard.
He waited, but there was only silence, no indication that the beast had followed him all the way home, and sent a silent prayer to his grandmother. He’d mocked her for placing her silly charms and symbols all over his home and his property, but now he was grateful for even the smallest thing that might keep the beast at bay.
He released a breath that he hadn’t realized he had been holding and struck a match to light his lamp, and screamed when the light revealed what the dark had hidden. The men from the lake were sitting side by side on his couch, each one mutilated in a different, but equally horrific way. One’s jaw had been ripped off, leaving his tongue lolling sickeningly from his mouth; the other’s face sported empty, bloody sockets where his eyes had once been.
He fell to his knees, retching. He hadn’t realized it in his frenzy to lock the door, but the entire room reeked of blood and gore. The metallic scent seemed to cling to him, to claw its way down his throat as though it were trying to suffocate him.
The floorboards creaked, and hot, foul breath fanned across the back of his neck. He turned, his whole body trembling with the knowledge of what was in his home. His eyes lit upon the beast, with its glowing eyes and horrible face, with its dreadful horns, and he pissed himself.
He began to sob. “Please,” he blubbered, “don’t hurt me. What do you want from me? What have I done?”
It grinned that wretched grin.
“It’s not your business.”
It bowed its head and charged, spearing him onto its horns and lifting him into the air. He screamed so loudly it tore his throat, but he kept screaming as it pinned him against the wall, blood bubbling from his mouth and gushing to the floor from his torso. He no longer had words, only pain and fear. Fear. His entire world had disappeared. All he knew, all he had ever known, was fear.
The beast jerked its head, tearing his body asunder and spraying the room with gore. Shaking its head clear of any remaining bits of him, it knelt before what remained of the corpse of this decent man, this man who always minded his business, and began to feed.
I'm losing it... Last night I dreamed about my friend running a big luxury hotel with the best pastry chef in the world. They were hosting the pastry championship and had bakers and adjacent companies there to promote their products and brands. And there were all kinds of high class people invited. And while I was browsing all the stalls... a guy started talking/flirting with me. He looked just like a normal guy. No fancy clothes, no pretentious behavior. Turns out, he apparently was royalty from a small country. It was MAD SWEENEY!
Summary: Bruised and bloodied, you end up with the last person you thought you'd turn to, but now you've lost track of him.
Word Count: 6.3k
You felt dirty. What the fuck were you doing? It wasn’t as if you had all the time in the world, and you knew you needed to get back on the road, so why did the idea of going make you dizzy?
Maybe it wasn’t the idea of going, maybe it was the idea of going alone.
You ground your teeth and looked at the road atlas you kept in your glovebox. Two hours to D.C. The protection sigils that dangled from your rearview mirror glinted in the sanguine light that was slowly crawling its way to its place in the sky, and you ran your thumb over the etched metal.
“Meili, please,” you whispered. “Just…please.”
The air around you crackled with energy, and you hoped he’d heard you and understood.
You’d made it about forty five minutes without incident when you found yourself passing through a small town nestled within the hills. There was nothing about it that struck you as particularly odd, but something pulled at you and then you were in the parking lot of what was probably the one gas station they had, with no memory of making the decision to do so.
You scrubbed your hands over your face and sighed. “One day,” you grumbled. “I just want one fucking day where some weird shit doesn’t happen.” There was no reason to stay here and you had places to be. “Let’s get this fuckin’ show on the road already.”
Turning the key in the ignition, your car proceeded to make the worst noise you’d ever heard and you all but launched yourself out onto the blacktop. You stumbled backwards, staring at your car and breathing heavily.
“Car trouble, darlin’?” came a voice from behind you.
You yelped and leapt a foot in the air. When you whipped around, an older man was looking at you with his hands in the air.
“Wh—“
“Amos, what’d I tell you about scarin’ strangers like that?” A woman who looked to be the same age as the man before you was walking across the pavement towards you. “Do I gotta remind you what happened last time you snuck up on someone like that?”
Amos scowled and rolled his shoulder. “How was I s’posed to know he’d yank my shoulder out?”
The woman snorted. “You came up behind him while he was taking a piss! You can’t be doing that to a man.”
“He was pissing on our tree line!” Amos exclaimed indignantly. “We have a perfectly good bathroom inside!”
She raised an eyebrow. “I never said it was right, just that you should’ve know better than to sneak up on a man when he’s got his Johnson in his hand.” She shook her head. “Well, seeing as your car was making that yowlin’ cat sound, I’d imagine you do need some help.” This was directed at you.
The sparse knowledge you had of engines decidedly did not cover whatever the hell that noise had been, and Amos’s, judging by his grease-stained coveralls and callused hands, probably did.
“Lord knows I wouldn’t be able to figure it out myself,” you told her.
She clicked her tongue. “Well here, why don’t you come inside and I’ll get you some sweet tea while Amos takes a look under the hood. What’s your name, sugar?”
You gave it to her and she smiled. “I’m Esther, pleased to meet you. Hell of a place to break down, all the way out here. What brings you this way?”
“I’m running an errand for someone,” you murmured as you followed her into the little store. It was nice inside, the space doubling as a cafe with sparkling linoleum and gleaming Formica. The pleasant aroma of blueberry pie filled the place, and the walls were lined with trinkets and knickknacks. You picked up a small white bone and examined it curiously.
“Is this a—“
“Raccoon penis bone, dear,” Esther finished for you.
You raised an eyebrow. “Big raccoon penis bone market around here?”
She shrugged. “We get all types out here.”
Something itched at the back of your mind. Who were these people? They weren’t anyone that you worked with, that you could tell, but they weren’t in the dark, either.
You looked more closely at the curios around the store. Coyote claws, rabbits’ feet, a jawbone here and there, and a whole mess of dried herbs. Esther moved to the counter and grabbed a pitcher of sweet tea. You watched her reach up to tap the iron horseshoe above the doorway, and then it clicked.
“You’re a witch,” you said.
She hummed. “What gave it away?”
That itch at the back of your mind again. Abruptly, you realized why you were here.
“How are things out here?” you asked. Your next words needed to be chosen with great care.
Esther sighed. “It’s not been great, I can’t lie to you,” she said, handing you a glass. The ice clinked, and your eyes tracked a drop of condensation as it slid down the side. “Amos’ll say I’m being dramatic, but this place is dying.”
“What do you mean?”
She sat on one of the stools at the counter and gestured for you to sit beside her.
“Well, since the strip mining started, it’s been getting worse. People have left, sure, but people have been leaving for a while.” She took a dainty sip from her own glass of sweet tea. “But the land is dying,” she continued. “The runoff from the mines is poisoning everything. Used to be you could go down to the creek and fill your cup and catch some fish for the table. Now, though? It’s a great way to wind up in the hospital, that’s certain. We lived off this land. We took care of it, and it took care of us, but now there’s hardly anything left.” There was a sadness in her voice that made your heart ache.
“So why stay?” you asked. “If everything’s poisoned and dying, what’s left?”
Esther traced a crack in the countertop, her eyes unfocused. “We can’t leave. Even with everything, we just haven’t been able to bring ourselves to leave. There’s Green here, however little, and it has to be tended.”
“It’s your home,” you said softly.
She nodded.
You were silent for a moment, thinking.
“You said there’s Green here? What does that mean?”
She gestured around her. “My mama used to say it’s what keeps us and protects us, but really it’s just…life. It’s the blood of these hills, but it’s getting weaker every day. I can see it in the animals, in the trees. Our water is undrinkable and it’s a bitch getting crops to grow, if you’ll pardon my French.”
There was no way. It couldn’t be this easy, dumped in your lap like that.
You anxiously picked at the calloused skin of your palm. “I might know a way to help,” you said quietly, “but I’m not sure how you’ll feel about it.”
She remained silent and you took that as your cue to continue. Christ, you were going to sound like an evangelical. Have you heard the good word?
“The kudzu.” You didn’t have anything to say beyond that, but there was no way to pitch an old and dying god of a fiercely invasive species to an old woman who was trying to protect her home.
Sure enough, her face soured. “How on God’s green Earth would that work? That stuff…it suffocates everything it touches. It consumes and it suffocates. I’ll not invite that into my home.”
You took a deep breath. “I know. I know it’s invasive, I know that it will take over everything if we let it. But we can use it, you can use it.” You could tell your words were not helping and you spoke faster before she could say anything. “The kudzu can help. It can filter and purify. I know the kudzu devours, but it can bring life. It could help restore this place, restore the Green to what it was.”
The look on Esther’s face was enough to make you reconsider your promise to Baku.
“You are out of your mind. You want me to use a virulent invasive species to save a dying land? I’m trying to save my home, not kill it faster.” The old woman was incredulous and you winced. Since the words had left your mouth, you’d known that keeping your promise was going to be a challenge, but facing down this woman you realized it was going to be much harder than you’d anticipated.
“I know it sounds insane, but—“
“You’re damn right it sounds insane. You’re telling me we can use the kudzu to purify these hills, but it would consume them entirely first. Absolutely not.”
On the shelf above her was a jar containing a powdered substance labelled “Kudzu,” and you pointed at it. “Look, you already use it medicinally, right? So it’s edible. You said you’re having a hard time getting things to grow, but this shit will grow anywhere, and it’ll leave the soil more productive.” You were grasping for anything you could think of. “It can protect you from the mining.”
This got Esther’s attention and she looked at you intently. “Now just how in the hell would it do that? Is it gonna crush the diggers? It’s a plant.”
A demonstration, then, you decided. Your shoes squeaked against the linoleum as you hopped down from your stool. “Come outside.”
She looked at you suspiciously, but followed you out the door into the field behind the gas station. You could see Amos’s feet sticking out from under your car, and he had propped open the hood.
This was going to make you look like a moron if it didn’t work.
You cleared your throat. “Um, Baku?”
Esther looked like she wanted to hit you with a wooden spoon.
“Lord Baku,” you tried again, “I have someone with me who could use your help.” This would have worked better if you’d had an offering, you thought. You should have brought the pitcher out with you.
As you turned to apologize to Esther for wasting her time, the dry grass under your feet crackled and shifted as something wound its way through the dirt to you. Even knowing what it was, you found the movement of it hard to watch.
The vines in the grass began to amalgamate, quickly becoming a familiar, shambling silhouette that towered between you and Esther, casting you both in its shadow.
“Hello again, little witch.” Like before, you felt, more than heard his voice.
“Jesus Mary!” Esther shrilled. “What on earth—“
“Esther,” you cut her off, “this is Baku, Lord of the Kudzu.”
The configuration leaned down to peer at Esther. Or would have, you assumed, if it had eyes.
“Speak.”
Esther turned her saucer-wide eyes to you, and you nodded. She looked back at the tangle.
“You…our home is being poisoned,” she said. “This one,” she gestured to you, “thinks you can help.”
Baku was silent for a moment. “This land is sick,” the resonant voice acknowledged. “I can help your soil heal, and I can purify your water.”
“That’s all well and good, Lord knows we need it,” Esther conceded. “But the mining camps will poison it all again as soon as you’re done, you watch.”
Baku hummed. “Then they must be stopped.”
You grinned. Finally, you were getting somewhere.
Esther wasn’t convinced. “You’re going to tear down their whole operation? If you could do that, why haven’t you?”
The vines twisted restlessly. “I do not have that strength. But your home, that I can protect. The camp nearby, that can easily be remedied.”
“In exchange for what?” Esther asked coolly.
“What any god wants.”
The old woman contemplated the entity before her. “I will think about it,” she said finally.
The green shadow bowed its head. “You know where to find me,” it said, and then dissolved into the earth.
Esther’s face was unreadable as she looked at you.
“You’re an interesting one, I’ll give you that.”
You shrugged.
The two of you went back to the gas station. Amos was out from under your car and was staring at the engine like he could will it to speak to him. When he saw you coming, he let the hood slam shut and wiped his hands on the legs of his overalls.
“Hell of a ride you’ve got here.”
You tensed. “Gets me places in one piece,” you said warily.
He favored you with a sly smile. “I’d imagine she does. Nothing wrong with her engine, though. She’s in remarkable shape, you take good care of her.”
“There’s nothing that could’ve made that noise?”
He scratched his nose. “Well, usually I’d say it’s probably your serpentine belt or some such, but like I said, she’s shipshape. Couldn’t tell you what happened.”
He tossed you the keys and you climbed behind the wheel to turn the ignition. True to form, the engine turned over with no problem at all. You leaned out the window and smiled at the couple. “This was a wonderful stop, thank you for your help.”
Amos shrugged. “Dunno how much help we were, but either way, you’re welcome.”
You nodded. “And thank you for the sweet tea, Ms. Esther. Best I’ve had in a long while.”
She leaned down and patted your cheek. “You come back anytime, darlin’. I think we’ve got a lot to talk about.”
You leaned into her touch. “I’ll be back,” you told them. “I promise you that.”
The rest of the drive to D.C. was relatively uneventful, but you couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. You saw flashes of movement from something big and terrible out of the corner of your eye every so often, but when you turned to look, there was nothing but trees and heavy, grey sky speeding past. You knew something was there, and it was following you. You shuddered and didn’t let the needle of your car’s speedometer dip below eighty until you were well within the city limits of Washington, D.C., and you didn’t stop until you were parked in front of a red brick walk-up apartment.
The building was beautiful. It almost reminded you of Circe’s home, but this was much less grandiose and instead possessed more of a quiet dignity. The bay windows that shaded the bush of deep purple and crimson hydrangeas were trimmed in a dark wood that gleamed in the sun, and elegantly carved brick arches beckoned you inside. A delicate Chaste tree was carved into the keystone, mirroring the full-sized one that stood sentinel near the front of the garden, its purple blossoms gently waving in a nonexistent breeze.
As you passed, you let your fingers skim the soft petals of the hydrangeas. Their color seemed impossible, and you wondered what pH the soil would have to be to get them to such bloody shades of red and purple. Nothing natural, surely.
Walking up the steps, you existed somewhere else, somewhere outside of your body. The snap as the sole of your shoe met concrete stairs, the smooth, cool surface of the mother of pearl doorbell, the muffled melody that sang beyond the door, it all existed at a distance.
You were so tired.
“Just a moment!” rang a voice. Footsteps sounded and the door opened on a plump woman with wide bright eyes and thick gray hair that had been corralled into a bun, held by a hair tie that looked as though it would snap at any second. Like her home, she had an understated beauty that put you at ease.
The woman looked at you in vague surprise. “I didn’t think I’d be seeing you again.” Her pearl drop earrings swayed as she spoke.
You bowed your head. “Hester.”
Hester looked you up and down and her soft face softened even further. She stepped back to welcome you. “Well, come in then.”
The instant you stepped over the threshold, your body relaxed and warmth flooded you. You sighed in relief.
“Sit, sit,” Hester pushed you in the direction of a sofa, the color of which could only be described as “squashlike.” “I’ll put the kettle on.” She disappeared into the kitchen and you could hear her bustling around with the kettle and mugs. You let yourself drop onto the unconscionably plush velvet pumpkin and buried your face in an earthen brown and gold brocade throw pillow.
She came back into the room with a tea tray set with delicate willow-patterned teacups and a teapot to match. Beside the china was a plate of almond cookies and another of cucumber sandwiches. As soon as she set the tray down, you snatched several of the tiny sandwiches and crammed them into your mouth, realizing you were absolutely ravenous.
Hester studied you with vague distaste, and when you looked up at her, she narrowed her eyes.
“You stink of sex.”
You shrugged and swallowed your mouthful of sandwich. “I’m an adult,” you said primly.
Her aquiline nose wrinkled delicately. “You could’ve had the decency to shower before stinking up my home.”
Now it was your turn to pull a face, and she scowled.
“Why are you here?”
“Shit to do up north, needed somewhere as a stopping point. Here seemed safest.”
She raised a thick, sculpted eyebrow. “You weren’t concerned, after our last meeting?”
You chewed on your lower lip, ripping away dry flakes of skin with your teeth. “I was hoping to appeal to your better nature?”
She cocked her head and fixed you with a scrutinizing gaze. “Have you been sleeping at all?” she asked.
You blinked. “Sure.”
She stood and bent over you, taking your chin in a manicured hand and turning your face this way and that as she inspected your features. “You look dreadful.”
You grimaced and jerked your face from her grasp. “Thanks.”
Hester pushed another cookie at you. “Deflect as much as you’d like, but whatever it is that you’re running from will only have to wait a few days before you run yourself into the ground. You need rest.”
You laughed mirthlessly. “I’ll get right on that.”
She shook her head. “You’re not understanding me. You need to rest, or your body will do it for you, and I can’t say it’ll be pleasant.”
You knew your hostess was right. There was nothing that you could have said or done that would hide the bruise-like circles under your eyes.
You rose, not bothering to hide your irritation, but stopped when you caught sight of your reflection in the large mirror above the couch. Your hair was lank and greasy, the sight of it made you itch; your cheeks were sallow and your lips were chapped.
But it was your eyes. The bags that looked like you’d been boxed square on the nose aside, your eyes were hollow and unfocused. You looked worse than you’d realized.
You slumped back onto the couch, eyes brimming with tears, and looked up at Hester. “I don’t have time,” you said weakly. “I have to find—“
“That ginger brute. I figured.” She waved you off. “I was wondering where he was. Since he hasn’t broken my door down by now, I’m sure he’ll be fine if he has to wait a little longer.” She cradled your cheek with a warm hand bedecked in rings with numerous stones. “You’re no good to him dead, beloved.”
Your head fell forward. “Fuck.”
Hester squinted. “What happened? Why isn’t he with you?”
“Why did something have to happen?”
“Because you’re usually joined at the hip.”
Your face flushed. “We are not.”
She looked at you knowingly, and you became very interested in the rug under your feet.
“What happened?” she repeated.
You told her everything that had happened since you’d encountered Baku, and the look on her face made you feel like a misbehaved child.
“Well,” she sighed, “I can’t say you shouldn’t have dumped him on the side of the road, but that wasn’t exactly the smartest move on your end, was it?”
You glared at her. “Can you help me find him?”
“No.” Her tone brooked no argument.
“Why n—?”
“Don’t you have your own magic?” she asked sharply. “I’ve yet to see any proof of that. Do you always wait for other people to solve their problems?”
The sound of your molars grinding against each other rattled your skull and your cheeks grew hot. “Fucking excuse me?”
“You’re excused.”
You bit back the ugly retort that danced on the tip of your tongue. “My magic isn’t—“
She took a step closer. “Yes, it is.”
“How would you know?” you hissed.
Hester spread her arms wide. “Word travels fast.”
Your stomach felt like it was in free fall. “What the fuck does that mean?”
Hester eyeballed you, her expression complicated. “I know you have something.”
You were quiet, watching her and trying to decide what to do next. “I only have the one locator spell,” you said begrudgingly, “but I don’t think it’ll work, it’s tied to the wards on my car.”
“Do you have a connection with it?”
“With the car, or…?”
Her hand darted out and smacked you upside the head.
“Hey!” you exclaimed, indignant.
“Oh, shut up. Do you have a connection with your car?” she asked.
“Well, yeah.”
“That’s all you need,” she said. “I’d guess the locator wards act as a focal point, but you don’t necessarily need them. You just need the connection.”
You were beyond exhausted with all of it. It was all one cycle that never ended, Orobouros eating its tail, and you didn’t know how much more you could take. “So what am I supposed to focus on?”
That look again.
“Do you need everything spelled out for you? For fuck’s sake, your connection with him.” She shook her head and clucked her tongue. “Come on now, you’re smarter than this.”
You worked your jaw and clenched your fists so hard your knuckles cracked, but Hester didn’t flinch. Instead, she tossed an enormous wine red pillow on the floor and pointed. “Sit.”
“I’m not a fucking dog,” you muttered, but you did as she said, folding your legs and placing your hands palms up on your knees, and looked up at her. “I’ve only ever done this one other time, and that was for something that had the wards. What if it doesn’t work?”
Hester shrugged. “Then it doesn’t work and you try something else.”
“But if I’m missing half the spell, how am I supposed to—“
“Stop making excuses,” she snapped. “You’re powerful, as much as you don’t want to admit it. If you want to find out what it is that everyone seems to know about you, you need to use the tools at your disposal.”
Once again, she was right, but the fear of what you would find if you kept pushing had rooted you to the spot.
Hester knelt in front of you and took your hands in hers, soft and dry, and you could see small burn scars peppering her hands.
“Listen to me,” she said gently. “You have to stop running.”
“Running?” you snapped. “Fuck you.” Her face was the picture of calm, and you felt like smashing the heinous yellow vase that sat on the end table. “I’m not running from anything.”
Her mouth formed a thin line, but she refused to rise to your bait. “You’re afraid of yourself.”
You shot to your feet. You could feel your pulse thrumming in your scalp. “You don’t know fuck all. Think about the bullshit I’ve been through in the last three days alone, do you think I would put myself through all of this trying to find answers if I didn’t want them?”
She shrugged and you wanted to backhand her. “Whatever answers you might find won’t mean jack shit if you’re too afraid to do anything with them. Take ownership of what you are, or bastards like Wednesday and his ilk will never stop using you to get what they want.”
You sank to your knees and leaned your forehead against her legs. “How am I meant to do that when I barely know what it is that I’m supposed to be owning?” Your voice was so small and the pressure of tears was building behind your eyes, and you bit your tongue to keep them from falling. Crying couldn’t be your response to everything.
“Focus on who you are now, not who you were. You can’t know what you don’t know, so focus on what you do.” She sat back and gazed at you. “Now, find your leprechaun.”
You stared at her for a moment, her words worming into your mind. It made sense. You wanted answers, and you had a right to them, but even without that knowledge, you were still you, and that had to count for something.
You closed your eyes and let yourself slip into that space between awake and dreaming. In your mind, you held the image of Mad Sweeney as he held your face when he had stitched you up. The impossible green of his eyes and the place on his cheeks where the coarse hair of his beard transitioned into the velvety soft hair on his temples. You focused on the feeling of that coarseness and softness beneath your fingers. He’d always whined when you scrubbed your hands over his shaved head, knowing it would piss him off, but he never stopped you. You ran your fingers over his chapped lips and watched his pupils dilate. Pretending you hated him was useless. You weren’t fooling anyone.
You let all of the things he’d made you feel flood your chest and fill your lungs. The irritation and frustration, the odd sense of camaraderie and knowing there was someone who understood, but more than anything, there was safety. The safety of his broad form and his rough, low voice and the warmth of his presence. There was no point in pretending you didn’t need him. You were inextricable and inseparable.
Clove smoke and whiskey filled your nose and you were rewarded with a flash of an image of the inside of a dingy motel room. You pushed harder, sharpening your focus, the need to find him constricting your lungs. You couldn’t do this without him, any of it.
Massive warm hands landed on your shoulders and you leaned into him.
You needed him. The jackass.
More images came. A neon sign that read "Riverwood Motel" and a road sign that read “Eagle Point, Indiana” in bold white letters. “Pop. 3,085” was spelled out in smaller letters beneath.
You knew where he was.
Your eyes flew open. “I found him. May I use your phone?”
Hester pointed to the landline, and you leapt for it, stabbing the buttons with such force that it was a wonder the plastic didn’t shatter in your hands.
“Thank you for calling, etcetera, etcetera,” answered a bored voice.
“I’m calling to speak with one of your guests, but I forgot his room number. Could you put me through?”
“Name?”
You sighed. He was almost certainly using an alias, and you knew which one it was. You pinched the bridge of your nose and nearly choked on your next words, furious that he would make you say it to this poor motel employee.
“He should be checked in under Dixon B. Tweenerlegs?”
The person on the other end guffawed. “I know the guy. Hold, please.”
There was a click, a brief silence, and then another click.
“Hullo.”
You squeezed the phone as your heart rate picked up. “Where the hell and fuck are you?” you demanded. “You were supposed to meet me in D.C., why aren’t you here?”
“Didn’t seem like you wanted me to.” His voice was unsteady and a sense of shame hit you like a freight train. You staggered under the weight of it.
You swallowed the shame that wasn’t yours. “Answer me.”
“On an errand.” His words were slurred and you could smell the whiskey on his breath. “How’d you know where I was?”
“Mind your business,” you said. “Can you meet me in Cairo tomorrow?”
“I s’pose.”
“Okay then.”
The line fell silent.
“Are you okay?” you asked softly.
“Mhm,” he hummed. “Peachy.”
You chewed the inside of your cheek. “Don’t bullshit me. You’re shame drinking.” It wasn’t a question. “What happened?”
“Mind your business.”
You didn’t push it. Something was wrong, but trying to pull it from him would be like trying to pull a stick out of tar. “All right. I’ll see you soon.” You hung up and promptly vomited into the potted plant beside you. When you lifted your head, wiping vomit from your mouth with the cuff of your sweatshirt, you saw Hester watching you.
“I have-I have to leave. Now.” Even a deaf man would’ve heard the tremor in your voice.
Hester shot to her feet and snatched the phone from you. “Absolutely not. Not until you’ve had a hot meal and a proper night of sleep.” Her nose wrinkled. “And a shower.” She reached out and plucked at the ratty T-shirt you wore. “While we’re at it, let’s do some laundry, too.”
The urge to go, go, go slowly subsided, and you reluctantly submitted to her ministrations.
“Hop in the shower, leave your clothes on the floor, and use whatever’s in there,” she instructed.
You grumbled, but did as she said, and turned the shower on as hot as you could stand it.
The bathroom, like the rest of the house, was restrained and lovely. A clawfoot tub occupied one side of the room while a rain shower took up the other. Bottles and bottles of various oils and lotions, gels and creams, and god knew what else filled the glass-door cupboards. Skimming your fingers over the bottles, you realized that you had no earthly idea what most of it was for. You finally grabbed a bottle of shampoo, conditioner, and a bar of soap. No need to get any fancier than that.
With the water sufficiently heated, you peeled off your shirt and jeans and left them in a puddle on the floor before stepping under the steaming water.
The instant the hot water hit your skin, you nearly cried in relief. The water pressure was perfect and the heat of the water served as a baptism, in a way, washing off the grime and stress and anxiety of the last few weeks. You took your time washing your hair and your body, savoring the feeling of being truly clean, not just motel shower clean.
When you finally stepped out, you saw that your clothes were gone, and in their place was a bathrobe and a towel made of the same plush white terrycloth. You dried off and wrapped yourself in the obscenely luxuriant robe before you padded back downstairs to the kitchen, feeling newly made. You had to admit, a hot shower and clean clothes really did make a world of difference.
In the kitchen, Hester was standing over a pot that was bubbling away on the stove. When she saw you, she wordlessly spooned whatever was in the pot into a bowl and handed it to you.
“There’s bread on the table,” she pointed, “and wine, if you want it.”
You sat and looked down at your bowl. The creamy broth and shredded chicken sang to you and the smell of lemon and dill drifted with the steam from its surface. You took a mouthful and groaned.
“Holy shit, Hester.”
She beamed. “Avgolemono,” she told you. “You needed some soup.”
You continued to eat, and Hester watched you carefully.
“So what happened?” she asked eventually.
You swallowed your mouthful and tapped your spoon against the side of your bowl. “What do you mean?”
She made an exasperated sound. “Why isn’t your leprechaun with you?”
“Had a fight,” you answered around a mouthful of bread.
“Care to specify?”
You didn’t look up from your food. “No.”
An annoyed cluck. “Where were the two of you heading?”
The crust of the bread snapped and crackled as you tore off another hunk and dunked it in your soup. “We were heading to Maine.”
She slapped you upside the head.
“Hey!”
“I am not in the mood to sit here and pull answers from you all night. Tell me what happened,” she said crisply.
You rolled your eyes. “I’ve had some…memory stuff going on, and Sweeney thinks that his cousins can help. We tried Circe first, but she told us the same thing.” The wine was making your head feel heavy. “But I guess I’m going to see the Egyptians first.”
Hester didn’t say anything, merely tapped an elegant index finger on her chin.
“What?” you pressed.
“Nothing,” she hummed. “I’m just not sure how helpful those girls in Maine will be. From what you’ve told me, I think you need someone who specializes in memory.”
You groaned and thunked your head onto the table. Chasing after a kite in a storm would have been easier than whatever the hell it was you were trying to do.
The end of your spoon fit neatly between the leaves of the table. “Any suggestions?” you asked sourly.
“Don’t scratch my table,” she responded. “And no, unfortunately, but I’d imagine your friends in Cairo might have a few.”
The chair you were sitting in crashed to the floor as you slammed your spoon down and leapt up. “All I’ve been getting are false leads and maybes!” you wailed. “Everyone wants me dead and anyone that doesn’t wants to use me!” The tears were back with a vengeance and you swiped angrily at your eyes. “Maybe I should save everyone the trouble and just fucking kill myself and get it over with.”
In a flash, Hester was across the table and holding your face in her hands. “Enough.” Her voice was so intense that it shocked you out of your spiral. “You and I have had our problems, but I don’t ever want to hear that out of your mouth again.” Her eyes were flaming, boring into you.
“Why not?” you asked miserably. “Everywhere I go, it’s the same shit.” All of the fight went out of you, and you sagged in her grasp. “I’m fucking exhausted, Hester,” you whispered. “I can’t keep doing this.”
Her gaze softened and she pulled you into a hug. Almost immediately, you collapsed against her, crying so hard you could barely breathe.
The woman of the hearth guided you to her unforgivably orange couch and sat with your head in her lap. As you cried, she gently ran her nails across your scalp and began to sing a soft lullaby.
Eventually, you fell asleep.
When you woke, it took you a moment to remember where you were. The couch you had fallen asleep on was now a queen-sized bed laden with down pillows and a heavy quilt that was embroidered with an enormous Chaste tree that left you wondering who could have possibly possessed the dexterity that the delicate blossoms and entwined branches required.
Swinging your legs over the side of the bed, you let yourself have a brief moment to bask in the astounding softness of the sheepskin rug and the warmth and cleanliness of the room. It had been forever since you’d slept somewhere that wasn’t the seat of a car or a motel room that left you genuinely wondering if you needed to get checked for fleas. It would be a while until you would get to sleep somewhere like this again.
As you stretched out the stiffness of sleep, you were amazed to notice that, for once, you actually felt well-rested.
Downstairs, you found no sign of Hester, but there was a plate of fresh biscuits on the counter next to a note and a burbling coffee maker. You poured yourself a cup and sipped at it as you read over the note:
I’m sorry I couldn’t be here to see you off, but help yourself to pastries and coffee. There’s little something for you on the console in the entryway, I hope it helps!
Safe travels,
Hester
Curiosity piqued, you lunged for the table by the front door and the bundle of crimson silk that lay on it. When you snatched it up and tore away the fabric, a cool weight tumbled into your hand and upon further inspection, you saw it was a dagger. The sheath was rather plain, save for the gold chape, but the leather was rich and buttery, stitched together firmly. When you pulled the blade from its home, your breath caught in your throat. The handle was exquisitely carved from what seemed to be olive wood, and it fit in your palm as though it had been made for you. The pommel and the hilt were wrought in the same gold as the chape of the sheath, gold that also ran up the center of the triangular blade. The blade itself was a masterfully crafted and honed to a razor’s edge. You gave it a few experimental swings and it responded as though it was part of your arm. You knew the motions, you knew the dance of it all, easy as breathing.
You stared at your reflection in the gleaming metal. Finally, a weapon proper.
As you turned the blade to examine it more closely, you noticed an odd series of crossed lines etched into the fuller.
You knew what it said. How did you know what it said?
You ran your fingers over the inscription, and the same tingling feeling that you had experienced when you accidentally cast tore through you, amplified tenfold.
You tried to say it aloud, but your mouth couldn’t form the word.
And yet, you knew. Somehow, you knew what it said.
Your next steps weren’t clear. You didn’t know where you needed to go and you didn’t know who you needed to find, but you finally had something real to chase.
Whatever Caorthann meant, you would be god damned if you weren’t going to find out.
Summary: Bruised and bloodied, you end up with the last person you thought you'd turn to, but now you've lost track of him.
Word Count: 6.3k
Warnings: Vomit, suicidal ideation
You felt dirty. What the fuck were you doing? It wasn’t as if you had all the time in the world, and you knew you needed to get back on the road, so why did the idea of going make you dizzy?
Maybe it wasn’t the idea of going, maybe it was the idea of going alone.
You ground your teeth and looked at the road atlas you kept in your glovebox. Two hours to D.C. The protection sigils that dangled from your rearview mirror glinted in the sanguine light that was slowly crawling its way to its place in the sky, and you ran your thumb over the etched metal.
“Meili, please,” you whispered. “Just…please.”
The air around you crackled with energy, and you hoped he’d heard you and understood.
You’d made it about forty five minutes without incident when you found yourself passing through a small town nestled within the hills. There was nothing about it that struck you as particularly odd, but something pulled at you and then you were in the parking lot of what was probably the one gas station they had, with no memory of making the decision to do so.
You scrubbed your hands over your face and sighed. “One day,” you grumbled. “I just want one fucking day where some weird shit doesn’t happen.” There was no reason to stay here and you had places to be. “Let’s get this fuckin’ show on the road already.”
Turning the key in the ignition, your car proceeded to make the worst noise you’d ever heard and you all but launched yourself out onto the blacktop. You stumbled backwards, staring at your car and breathing heavily.
“Car trouble, darlin’?” came a voice from behind you.
You yelped and leapt a foot in the air. When you whipped around, an older man was looking at you with his hands in the air.
“Wh—“
“Amos, what’d I tell you about scarin’ strangers like that?” A woman who looked to be the same age as the man before you was walking across the pavement towards you. “Do I gotta remind you what happened last time you snuck up on someone like that?”
Amos scowled and rolled his shoulder. “How was I s’posed to know he’d yank my shoulder out?”
The woman snorted. “You came up behind him while he was taking a piss! You can’t be doing that to a man.”
“He was pissing on our tree line!” Amos exclaimed indignantly. “We have a perfectly good bathroom inside!”
She raised an eyebrow. “I never said it was right, just that you should’ve know better than to sneak up on a man when he’s got his Johnson in his hand.” She shook her head. “Well, seeing as your car was making that yowlin’ cat sound, I’d imagine you do need some help.” This was directed at you.
The sparse knowledge you had of engines decidedly did not cover whatever the hell that noise had been, and Amos’s, judging by his grease-stained coveralls and callused hands, probably did.
“Lord knows I wouldn’t be able to figure it out myself,” you told her.
She clicked her tongue. “Well here, why don’t you come inside and I’ll get you some sweet tea while Amos takes a look under the hood. What’s your name, sugar?”
You gave it to her and she smiled. “I’m Esther, pleased to meet you. Hell of a place to break down, all the way out here. What brings you this way?”
“I’m running an errand for someone,” you murmured as you followed her into the little store. It was nice inside, the space doubling as a cafe with sparkling linoleum and gleaming Formica. The pleasant aroma of blueberry pie filled the place, and the walls were lined with trinkets and knickknacks. You picked up a small white bone and examined it curiously.
“Is this a—“
“Raccoon penis bone, dear,” Esther finished for you.
You raised an eyebrow. “Big raccoon penis bone market around here?”
She shrugged. “We get all types out here.”
Something itched at the back of your mind. Who were these people? They weren’t anyone that you worked with, that you could tell, but they weren’t in the dark, either.
You looked more closely at the curios around the store. Coyote claws, rabbits’ feet, a jawbone here and there, and a whole mess of dried herbs. Esther moved to the counter and grabbed a pitcher of sweet tea. You watched her reach up to tap the iron horseshoe above the doorway, and then it clicked.
“You’re a witch,” you said.
She hummed. “What gave it away?”
That itch at the back of your mind again. Abruptly, you realized why you were here.
“How are things out here?” you asked. Your next words needed to be chosen with great care.
Esther sighed. “It’s not been great, I can’t lie to you,” she said, handing you a glass. The ice clinked, and your eyes tracked a drop of condensation as it slid down the side. “Amos’ll say I’m being dramatic, but this place is dying.”
“What do you mean?”
She sat on one of the stools at the counter and gestured for you to sit beside her.
“Well, since the strip mining started, it’s been getting worse. People have left, sure, but people have been leaving for a while.” She took a dainty sip from her own glass of sweet tea. “But the land is dying,” she continued. “The runoff from the mines is poisoning everything. Used to be you could go down to the creek and fill your cup and catch some fish for the table. Now, though? It’s a great way to wind up in the hospital, that’s certain. We lived off this land. We took care of it, and it took care of us, but now there’s hardly anything left.” There was a sadness in her voice that made your heart ache.
“So why stay?” you asked. “If everything’s poisoned and dying, what’s left?”
Esther traced a crack in the countertop, her eyes unfocused. “We can’t leave. Even with everything, we just haven’t been able to bring ourselves to leave. There’s Green here, however little, and it has to be tended.”
“It’s your home,” you said softly.
She nodded.
You were silent for a moment, thinking.
“You said there’s Green here? What does that mean?”
She gestured around her. “My mama used to say it’s what keeps us and protects us, but really it’s just…life. It’s the blood of these hills, but it’s getting weaker every day. I can see it in the animals, in the trees. Our water is undrinkable and it’s a bitch getting crops to grow, if you’ll pardon my French.”
There was no way. It couldn’t be this easy, dumped in your lap like that.
You anxiously picked at the calloused skin of your palm. “I might know a way to help,” you said quietly, “but I’m not sure how you’ll feel about it.”
She remained silent and you took that as your cue to continue. Christ, you were going to sound like an evangelical. Have you heard the good word?
“The kudzu.” You didn’t have anything to say beyond that, but there was no way to pitch an old and dying god of a fiercely invasive species to an old woman who was trying to protect her home.
Sure enough, her face soured. “How on God’s green Earth would that work? That stuff…it suffocates everything it touches. It consumes and it suffocates. I’ll not invite that into my home.”
You took a deep breath. “I know. I know it’s invasive, I know that it will take over everything if we let it. But we can use it, you can use it.” You could tell your words were not helping and you spoke faster before she could say anything. “The kudzu can help. It can filter and purify. I know the kudzu devours, but it can bring life. It could help restore this place, restore the Green to what it was.”
The look on Esther’s face was enough to make you reconsider your promise to Baku.
“You are out of your mind. You want me to use a virulent invasive species to save a dying land? I’m trying to save my home, not kill it faster.” The old woman was incredulous and you winced. Since the words had left your mouth, you’d known that keeping your promise was going to be a challenge, but facing down this woman you realized it was going to be much harder than you’d anticipated.
“I know it sounds insane, but—“
“You’re damn right it sounds insane. You’re telling me we can use the kudzu to purify these hills, but it would consume them entirely first. Absolutely not.”
On the shelf above her was a jar containing a powdered substance labelled “Kudzu,” and you pointed at it. “Look, you already use it medicinally, right? So it’s edible. You said you’re having a hard time getting things to grow, but this shit will grow anywhere, and it’ll leave the soil more productive.” You were grasping for anything you could think of. “It can protect you from the mining.”
This got Esther’s attention and she looked at you intently. “Now just how in the hell would it do that? Is it gonna crush the diggers? It’s a plant.”
A demonstration, then, you decided. Your shoes squeaked against the linoleum as you hopped down from your stool. “Come outside.”
She looked at you suspiciously, but followed you out the door into the field behind the gas station. You could see Amos’s feet sticking out from under your car, and he had propped open the hood.
This was going to make you look like a moron if it didn’t work.
You cleared your throat. “Um, Baku?”
Esther looked like she wanted to hit you with a wooden spoon.
“Lord Baku,” you tried again, “I have someone with me who could use your help.” This would have worked better if you’d had an offering, you thought. You should have brought the pitcher out with you.
As you turned to apologize to Esther for wasting her time, the dry grass under your feet crackled and shifted as something wound its way through the dirt to you. Even knowing what it was, you found the movement of it hard to watch.
The vines in the grass began to amalgamate, quickly becoming a familiar, shambling silhouette that towered between you and Esther, casting you both in its shadow.
“Hello again, little witch.” Like before, you felt, more than heard his voice.
“Jesus Mary!” Esther shrilled. “What on earth—“
“Esther,” you cut her off, “this is Baku, Lord of the Kudzu.”
The configuration leaned down to peer at Esther. Or would have, you assumed, if it had eyes.
“Speak.”
Esther turned her saucer-wide eyes to you, and you nodded. She looked back at the tangle.
“You…our home is being poisoned,” she said. “This one,” she gestured to you, “thinks you can help.”
Baku was silent for a moment. “This land is sick,” the resonant voice acknowledged. “I can help your soil heal, and I can purify your water.”
“That’s all well and good, Lord knows we need it,” Esther conceded. “But the mining camps will poison it all again as soon as you’re done, you watch.”
Baku hummed. “Then they must be stopped.”
You grinned. Finally, you were getting somewhere.
Esther wasn’t convinced. “You’re going to tear down their whole operation? If you could do that, why haven’t you?”
The vines twisted restlessly. “I do not have that strength. But your home, that I can protect. The camp nearby, that can easily be remedied.”
“In exchange for what?” Esther asked coolly.
“What any god wants.”
The old woman contemplated the entity before her. “I will think about it,” she said finally.
The green shadow bowed its head. “You know where to find me,” it said, and then dissolved into the earth.
Esther’s face was unreadable as she looked at you.
“You’re an interesting one, I’ll give you that.”
You shrugged.
The two of you went back to the gas station. Amos was out from under your car and was staring at the engine like he could will it to speak to him. When he saw you coming, he let the hood slam shut and wiped his hands on the legs of his overalls.
“Hell of a ride you’ve got here.”
You tensed. “Gets me places in one piece,” you said warily.
He favored you with a sly smile. “I’d imagine she does. Nothing wrong with her engine, though. She’s in remarkable shape, you take good care of her.”
“There’s nothing that could’ve made that noise?”
He scratched his nose. “Well, usually I’d say it’s probably your serpentine belt or some such, but like I said, she’s shipshape. Couldn’t tell you what happened.”
He tossed you the keys and you climbed behind the wheel to turn the ignition. True to form, the engine turned over with no problem at all. You leaned out the window and smiled at the couple. “This was a wonderful stop, thank you for your help.”
Amos shrugged. “Dunno how much help we were, but either way, you’re welcome.”
You nodded. “And thank you for the sweet tea, Ms. Esther. Best I’ve had in a long while.”
She leaned down and patted your cheek. “You come back anytime, darlin’. I think we’ve got a lot to talk about.”
You leaned into her touch. “I’ll be back,” you told them. “I promise you that.”
The rest of the drive to D.C. was relatively uneventful, but you couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. You saw flashes of movement from something big and terrible out of the corner of your eye every so often, but when you turned to look, there was nothing but trees and heavy, grey sky speeding past. You knew something was there, and it was following you. You shuddered and didn’t let the needle of your car’s speedometer dip below eighty until you were well within the city limits of Washington, D.C., and you didn’t stop until you were parked in front of a red brick walk-up apartment.
The building was beautiful. It almost reminded you of Circe’s home, but this was much less grandiose and instead possessed more of a quiet dignity. The bay windows that shaded the bush of deep purple and crimson hydrangeas were trimmed in a dark wood that gleamed in the sun, and elegantly carved brick arches beckoned you inside. A delicate Chaste tree was carved into the keystone, mirroring the full-sized one that stood sentinel near the front of the garden, its purple blossoms gently waving in a nonexistent breeze.
As you passed, you let your fingers skim the soft petals of the hydrangeas. Their color seemed impossible, and you wondered what pH the soil would have to be to get them to such bloody shades of red and purple. Nothing natural, surely.
Walking up the steps, you existed somewhere else, somewhere outside of your body. The snap as the sole of your shoe met concrete stairs, the smooth, cool surface of the mother of pearl doorbell, the muffled melody that sang beyond the door, it all existed at a distance.
You were so tired.
“Just a moment!” rang a voice. Footsteps sounded and the door opened on a plump woman with wide bright eyes and thick gray hair that had been corralled into a bun, held by a hair tie that looked as though it would snap at any second. Like her home, she had an understated beauty that put you at ease.
The woman looked at you in vague surprise. “I didn’t think I’d be seeing you again.” Her pearl drop earrings swayed as she spoke.
You bowed your head. “Hester.”
Hester looked you up and down and her soft face softened even further. She stepped back to welcome you. “Well, come in then.”
The instant you stepped over the threshold, your body relaxed and warmth flooded you. You sighed in relief.
“Sit, sit,” Hester pushed you in the direction of a sofa, the color of which could only be described as “squashlike.” “I’ll put the kettle on.” She disappeared into the kitchen and you could hear her bustling around with the kettle and mugs. You let yourself drop onto the unconscionably plush velvet pumpkin and buried your face in an earthen brown and gold brocade throw pillow.
She came back into the room with a tea tray set with delicate willow-patterned teacups and a teapot to match. Beside the china was a plate of almond cookies and another of cucumber sandwiches. As soon as she set the tray down, you snatched several of the tiny sandwiches and crammed them into your mouth, realizing you were absolutely ravenous.
Hester studied you with vague distaste, and when you looked up at her, she narrowed her eyes.
“You stink of sex.”
You shrugged and swallowed your mouthful of sandwich. “I’m an adult,” you said primly.
Her aquiline nose wrinkled delicately. “You could’ve had the decency to shower before stinking up my home.”
Now it was your turn to pull a face, and she scowled.
“Why are you here?”
“Shit to do up north, needed somewhere as a stopping point. Here seemed safest.”
She raised a thick, sculpted eyebrow. “You weren’t concerned, after our last meeting?”
You chewed on your lower lip, ripping away dry flakes of skin with your teeth. “I was hoping to appeal to your better nature?”
She cocked her head and fixed you with a scrutinizing gaze. “Have you been sleeping at all?” she asked.
You blinked. “Sure.”
She stood and bent over you, taking your chin in a manicured hand and turning your face this way and that as she inspected your features. “You look dreadful.”
You grimaced and jerked your face from her grasp. “Thanks.”
Hester pushed another cookie at you. “Deflect as much as you’d like, but whatever it is that you’re running from will only have to wait a few days before you run yourself into the ground. You need rest.”
You laughed mirthlessly. “I’ll get right on that.”
She shook her head. “You’re not understanding me. You need to rest, or your body will do it for you, and I can’t say it’ll be pleasant.”
You knew your hostess was right. There was nothing that you could have said or done that would hide the bruise-like circles under your eyes.
You rose, not bothering to hide your irritation, but stopped when you caught sight of your reflection in the large mirror above the couch. Your hair was lank and greasy, the sight of it made you itch; your cheeks were sallow and your lips were chapped.
But it was your eyes. The bags that looked like you’d been boxed square on the nose aside, your eyes were hollow and unfocused. You looked worse than you’d realized.
You slumped back onto the couch, eyes brimming with tears, and looked up at Hester. “I don’t have time,” you said weakly. “I have to find—“
“That ginger brute. I figured.” She waved you off. “I was wondering where he was. Since he hasn’t broken my door down by now, I’m sure he’ll be fine if he has to wait a little longer.” She cradled your cheek with a warm hand bedecked in rings with numerous stones. “You’re no good to him dead, beloved.”
Your head fell forward. “Fuck.”
Hester squinted. “What happened? Why isn’t he with you?”
“Why did something have to happen?”
“Because you’re usually joined at the hip.”
Your face flushed. “We are not.”
She looked at you knowingly, and you became very interested in the rug under your feet.
“What happened?” she repeated.
You told her everything that had happened since you’d encountered Baku, and the look on her face made you feel like a misbehaved child.
“Well,” she sighed, “I can’t say you shouldn’t have dumped him on the side of the road, but that wasn’t exactly the smartest move on your end, was it?”
You glared at her. “Can you help me find him?”
“No.” Her tone brooked no argument.
“Why n—?”
“Don’t you have your own magic?” she asked sharply. “I’ve yet to see any proof of that. Do you always wait for other people to solve their problems?”
The sound of your molars grinding against each other rattled your skull and your cheeks grew hot. “Fucking excuse me?”
“You’re excused.”
You bit back the ugly retort that danced on the tip of your tongue. “My magic isn’t—“
She took a step closer. “Yes, it is.”
“How would you know?” you hissed.
Hester spread her arms wide. “Word travels fast.”
Your stomach felt like it was in free fall. “What the fuck does that mean?”
Hester eyeballed you, her expression complicated. “I know you have something.”
You were quiet, watching her and trying to decide what to do next. “I only have the one locator spell,” you said begrudgingly, “but I don’t think it’ll work, it’s tied to the wards on my car.”
“Do you have a connection with it?”
“With the car, or…?”
Her hand darted out and smacked you upside the head.
“Hey!” you exclaimed, indignant.
“Oh, shut up. Do you have a connection with your car?” she asked.
“Well, yeah.”
“That’s all you need,” she said. “I’d guess the locator wards act as a focal point, but you don’t necessarily need them. You just need the connection.”
You were beyond exhausted with all of it. It was all one cycle that never ended, Orobouros eating its tail, and you didn’t know how much more you could take. “So what am I supposed to focus on?”
That look again.
“Do you need everything spelled out for you? For fuck’s sake, your connection with him.” She shook her head and clucked her tongue. “Come on now, you’re smarter than this.”
You worked your jaw and clenched your fists so hard your knuckles cracked, but Hester didn’t flinch. Instead, she tossed an enormous wine red pillow on the floor and pointed. “Sit.”
“I’m not a fucking dog,” you muttered, but you did as she said, folding your legs and placing your hands palms up on your knees, and looked up at her. “I’ve only ever done this one other time, and that was for something that had the wards. What if it doesn’t work?”
Hester shrugged. “Then it doesn’t work and you try something else.”
“But if I’m missing half the spell, how am I supposed to—“
“Stop making excuses,” she snapped. “You’re powerful, as much as you don’t want to admit it. If you want to find out what it is that everyone seems to know about you, you need to use the tools at your disposal.”
Once again, she was right, but the fear of what you would find if you kept pushing had rooted you to the spot.
Hester knelt in front of you and took your hands in hers, soft and dry, and you could see small burn scars peppering her hands.
“Listen to me,” she said gently. “You have to stop running.”
“Running?” you snapped. “Fuck you.” Her face was the picture of calm, and you felt like smashing the heinous yellow vase that sat on the end table. “I’m not running from anything.”
Her mouth formed a thin line, but she refused to rise to your bait. “You’re afraid of yourself.”
You shot to your feet. You could feel your pulse thrumming in your scalp. “You don’t know fuck all. Think about the bullshit I’ve been through in the last three days alone, do you think I would put myself through all of this trying to find answers if I didn’t want them?”
She shrugged and you wanted to backhand her. “Whatever answers you might find won’t mean jack shit if you’re too afraid to do anything with them. Take ownership of what you are, or bastards like Wednesday and his ilk will never stop using you to get what they want.”
You sank to your knees and leaned your forehead against her legs. “How am I meant to do that when I barely know what it is that I’m supposed to be owning?” Your voice was so small and the pressure of tears was building behind your eyes, and you bit your tongue to keep them from falling. Crying couldn’t be your response to everything.
“Focus on who you are now, not who you were. You can’t know what you don’t know, so focus on what you do.” She sat back and gazed at you. “Now, find your leprechaun.”
You stared at her for a moment, her words worming into your mind. It made sense. You wanted answers, and you had a right to them, but even without that knowledge, you were still you, and that had to count for something.
You closed your eyes and let yourself slip into that space between awake and dreaming. In your mind, you held the image of Mad Sweeney as he held your face when he had stitched you up. The impossible green of his eyes and the place on his cheeks where the coarse hair of his beard transitioned into the velvety soft hair on his temples. You focused on the feeling of that coarseness and softness beneath your fingers. He’d always whined when you scrubbed your hands over his shaved head, knowing it would piss him off, but he never stopped you. You ran your fingers over his chapped lips and watched his pupils dilate. Pretending you hated him was useless. You weren’t fooling anyone.
You let all of the things he’d made you feel flood your chest and fill your lungs. The irritation and frustration, the odd sense of camaraderie and knowing there was someone who understood, but more than anything, there was safety. The safety of his broad form and his rough, low voice and the warmth of his presence. There was no point in pretending you didn’t need him. You were inextricable and inseparable.
Clove smoke and whiskey filled your nose and you were rewarded with a flash of an image of the inside of a dingy motel room. You pushed harder, sharpening your focus, the need to find him constricting your lungs. You couldn’t do this without him, any of it.
Massive warm hands landed on your shoulders and you leaned into him.
You needed him. The jackass.
More images came. A neon sign that read "Riverwood Motel" and a road sign that read “Eagle Point, Indiana” in bold white letters. “Pop. 3,085” was spelled out in smaller letters beneath.
You knew where he was.
Your eyes flew open. “I found him. May I use your phone?”
Hester pointed to the landline, and you leapt for it, stabbing the buttons with such force that it was a wonder the plastic didn’t shatter in your hands.
“Thank you for calling, etcetera, etcetera,” answered a bored voice.
“I’m calling to speak with one of your guests, but I forgot his room number. Could you put me through?”
“Name?”
You sighed. He was almost certainly using an alias, and you knew which one it was. You pinched the bridge of your nose and nearly choked on your next words, furious that he would make you say it to this poor motel employee.
“He should be checked in under Dixon B. Tweenerlegs?”
The person on the other end guffawed. “I know the guy. Hold, please.”
There was a click, a brief silence, and then another click.
“Hullo.”
You squeezed the phone as your heart rate picked up. “Where the hell and fuck are you?” you demanded. “You were supposed to meet me in D.C., why aren’t you here?”
“Didn’t seem like you wanted me to.” His voice was unsteady and a sense of shame hit you like a freight train. You staggered under the weight of it.
You swallowed the shame that wasn’t yours. “Answer me.”
“On an errand.” His words were slurred and you could smell the whiskey on his breath. “How’d you know where I was?”
“Mind your business,” you said. “Can you meet me in Cairo tomorrow?”
“I s’pose.”
“Okay then.”
The line fell silent.
“Are you okay?” you asked softly.
“Mhm,” he hummed. “Peachy.”
You chewed the inside of your cheek. “Don’t bullshit me. You’re shame drinking.” It wasn’t a question. “What happened?”
“Mind your business.”
You didn’t push it. Something was wrong, but trying to pull it from him would be like trying to pull a stick out of tar. “All right. I’ll see you soon.” You hung up and promptly vomited into the potted plant beside you. When you lifted your head, wiping vomit from your mouth with the cuff of your sweatshirt, you saw Hester watching you.
“I have-I have to leave. Now.” Even a deaf man would’ve heard the tremor in your voice.
Hester shot to her feet and snatched the phone from you. “Absolutely not. Not until you’ve had a hot meal and a proper night of sleep.” Her nose wrinkled. “And a shower.” She reached out and plucked at the ratty T-shirt you wore. “While we’re at it, let’s do some laundry, too.”
The urge to go, go, go slowly subsided, and you reluctantly submitted to her ministrations.
“Hop in the shower, leave your clothes on the floor, and use whatever’s in there,” she instructed.
You grumbled, but did as she said, and turned the shower on as hot as you could stand it.
The bathroom, like the rest of the house, was restrained and lovely. A clawfoot tub occupied one side of the room while a rain shower took up the other. Bottles and bottles of various oils and lotions, gels and creams, and god knew what else filled the glass-door cupboards. Skimming your fingers over the bottles, you realized that you had no earthly idea what most of it was for. You finally grabbed a bottle of shampoo, conditioner, and a bar of soap. No need to get any fancier than that.
With the water sufficiently heated, you peeled off your shirt and jeans and left them in a puddle on the floor before stepping under the steaming water.
The instant the hot water hit your skin, you nearly cried in relief. The water pressure was perfect and the heat of the water served as a baptism, in a way, washing off the grime and stress and anxiety of the last few weeks. You took your time washing your hair and your body, savoring the feeling of being truly clean, not just motel shower clean.
When you finally stepped out, you saw that your clothes were gone, and in their place was a bathrobe and a towel made of the same plush white terrycloth. You dried off and wrapped yourself in the obscenely luxuriant robe before you padded back downstairs to the kitchen, feeling newly made. You had to admit, a hot shower and clean clothes really did make a world of difference.
In the kitchen, Hester was standing over a pot that was bubbling away on the stove. When she saw you, she wordlessly spooned whatever was in the pot into a bowl and handed it to you.
“There’s bread on the table,” she pointed, “and wine, if you want it.”
You sat and looked down at your bowl. The creamy broth and shredded chicken sang to you and the smell of lemon and dill drifted with the steam from its surface. You took a mouthful and groaned.
“Holy shit, Hester.”
She beamed. “Avgolemono,” she told you. “You needed some soup.”
You continued to eat, and Hester watched you carefully.
“So what happened?” she asked eventually.
You swallowed your mouthful and tapped your spoon against the side of your bowl. “What do you mean?”
She made an exasperated sound. “Why isn’t your leprechaun with you?”
“Had a fight,” you answered around a mouthful of bread.
“Care to specify?”
You didn’t look up from your food. “No.”
An annoyed cluck. “Where were the two of you heading?”
The crust of the bread snapped and crackled as you tore off another hunk and dunked it in your soup. “We were heading to Maine.”
She slapped you upside the head.
“Hey!”
“I am not in the mood to sit here and pull answers from you all night. Tell me what happened,” she said crisply.
You rolled your eyes. “I’ve had some…memory stuff going on, and Sweeney thinks that his cousins can help. We tried Circe first, but she told us the same thing.” The wine was making your head feel heavy. “But I guess I’m going to see the Egyptians first.”
Hester didn’t say anything, merely tapped an elegant index finger on her chin.
“What?” you pressed.
“Nothing,” she hummed. “I’m just not sure how helpful those girls in Maine will be. From what you’ve told me, I think you need someone who specializes in memory.”
You groaned and thunked your head onto the table. Chasing after a kite in a storm would have been easier than whatever the hell it was you were trying to do.
The end of your spoon fit neatly between the leaves of the table. “Any suggestions?” you asked sourly.
“Don’t scratch my table,” she responded. “And no, unfortunately, but I’d imagine your friends in Cairo might have a few.”
The chair you were sitting in crashed to the floor as you slammed your spoon down and leapt up. “All I’ve been getting are false leads and maybes!” you wailed. “Everyone wants me dead and anyone that doesn’t wants to use me!” The tears were back with a vengeance and you swiped angrily at your eyes. “Maybe I should save everyone the trouble and just fucking kill myself and get it over with.”
In a flash, Hester was across the table and holding your face in her hands. “Enough.” Her voice was so intense that it shocked you out of your spiral. “You and I have had our problems, but I don’t ever want to hear that out of your mouth again.” Her eyes were flaming, boring into you.
“Why not?” you asked miserably. “Everywhere I go, it’s the same shit.” All of the fight went out of you, and you sagged in her grasp. “I’m fucking exhausted, Hester,” you whispered. “I can’t keep doing this.”
Her gaze softened and she pulled you into a hug. Almost immediately, you collapsed against her, crying so hard you could barely breathe.
The woman of the hearth guided you to her unforgivably orange couch and sat with your head in her lap. As you cried, she gently ran her nails across your scalp and began to sing a soft lullaby.
Eventually, you fell asleep.
When you woke, it took you a moment to remember where you were. The couch you had fallen asleep on was now a queen-sized bed laden with down pillows and a heavy quilt that was embroidered with an enormous Chaste tree that left you wondering who could have possibly possessed the dexterity that the delicate blossoms and entwined branches required.
Swinging your legs over the side of the bed, you let yourself have a brief moment to bask in the astounding softness of the sheepskin rug and the warmth and cleanliness of the room. It had been forever since you’d slept somewhere that wasn’t the seat of a car or a motel room that left you genuinely wondering if you needed to get checked for fleas. It would be a while until you would get to sleep somewhere like this again.
As you stretched out the stiffness of sleep, you were amazed to notice that, for once, you actually felt well-rested.
Downstairs, you found no sign of Hester, but there was a plate of fresh biscuits on the counter next to a note and a burbling coffee maker. You poured yourself a cup and sipped at it as you read over the note:
I’m sorry I couldn’t be here to see you off, but help yourself to pastries and coffee. There’s a little something for you on the console in the entryway, I hope it helps!
Safe travels,
H
Curiosity piqued, you lunged for the table by the front door and the bundle of crimson silk that lay on it. When you snatched it up and tore away the fabric, a cool weight tumbled into your hand and upon further inspection, you saw it was a dagger. The sheath was rather plain, save for the gold chape, but the leather was rich and buttery, stitched together firmly. When you pulled the blade from its home, your breath caught in your throat. The handle was exquisitely carved from what seemed to be olive wood, and it fit in your palm as though it had been made for you. The pommel and the hilt were wrought in the same gold as the chape of the sheath, gold that also ran up the center of the triangular blade. The blade itself was a masterfully crafted and honed to a razor’s edge. You gave it a few experimental swings and it responded as though it was part of your arm. You knew the motions, you knew the dance of it all, easy as breathing.
You stared at your reflection in the gleaming metal. Finally, a weapon proper.
As you turned the blade to examine it more closely, you noticed an odd series of crossed lines etched into the fuller.
You knew what it said. How did you know what it said?
You ran your fingers over the inscription, and the same tingling feeling that you had experienced when you accidentally cast tore through you, amplified tenfold.
You tried to say it aloud, but your mouth couldn’t form the word.
And yet, you knew. Somehow, you knew what it said.
Your next steps weren’t clear. You didn’t know where you needed to go and you didn’t know who you needed to find, but you finally had something real to chase.
Whatever Caorthann meant, you would be god damned if you weren’t going to find out.
Summary: Bruised and bloodied, you end up with the last person you thought you'd turn to, and you're due for a night out.
Word Count: 1.1k
Warnings: Drinking, one-night stand
You left the shop with a tin of tattoo balm and a pamphlet on tattoo care, feeling a little safer.
With some time to kill before you had arranged to meet Faery Barista, you decided to give in to your body’s cries for sleep. You parked your car in the back corner of the parking lot of the first supermarket you saw, leaned your seat back, and curled up. Even in that cramped and uncomfortable position, you were unconscious within a few minutes.
The Lakeside Tavern was further out than you had expected, but it was still only about twenty minutes from where you were.
The interior of the bar was on the nicer side of bog standard, and a man on the small stage in the corner strummed his guitar and crooned an old Hank Williams ballad into the microphone. He wasn’t half bad, you thought idly.
Faery Barista was waiting for you at the bar, drinking what looked like a vodka cranberry. She smiled when she saw you and waved you over.
“Hey, darlin’,” you hummed, placing a hand between her shoulder blades as you took a seat on the red vinyl barstool beside her.
She grinned at you, coyly stirring her drink with her straw. In the neon light of the Coors sign on the wall, her freckles stood out starkly against her skin, and you could see the sign reflected in her pupils. She really was beautiful.
“Hi.” She looked up at you through long lashes.
“What are we drinking?”
She offered you her glass, and you made a show of taking a sip and swishing it around in your mouth, swallowing, and looking up at the ceiling as though deep in thought. “Vodka soda with…something…”
She giggled. “Vodka soda with cranberry juice.”
“Very nice, good balance of trashy and cool,” you teased.
She giggled again and put a soft hand on your arm, leaning in, “Are you having anything?”
You waved over the bartender, a lanky twenty-something with an undercut and a lip ring, and gave them your most winning smile. “Another vodka soda with cran for the lady, and for myself…Lemme get a pint of that draft lager,” you pointed to the tap in question, “and a shot of Jamo.”
Your date looked up at you in surprise. “Jameson, huh? Wouldn’t have pegged you as the type. Although I never peg anyone as the whiskey type. Awful stuff, tastes like wood and ass.” She gave a delicate shudder, and you snorted.
The bartender set your drinks in front of you, and you toasted her with your shot before downing it without flinching. The whiskey burned as it hit the back of your throat and a vague taste of spice and vanilla spread over your tongue. It made your eyes burn and your heart twinge.
You ordered another shot and slammed that one too.
She trailed a finger up your arm. “That was kind of hot.” Her voice was low and rough with desire.
You didn’t really want to be here with her.
The haze of drink danced at the edges of your mind. You grabbed your date’s hand and turned it over, pressing a kiss to the inside of her wrist. “Starting strong then,” you murmured.
Even in the dim light of the bar, you could see her blush.
The rest of the night passed in a whiskey blur. You taught her how to play darts and shoot pool, even though you were pretty certain she knew what she was doing when she asked you to come behind her and show her how to hold the cue. But who were you to complain?
Finally, when you had reached the tipping point between pleasantly tipsy and the kind of drunk that ended with vomit down your shirtfront, she looked at you with heavy-lidded eyes.
“Come home with me,” she breathed in your ear, her hand finding the waistband of your jeans. You could smell the vodka and cranberry juice on her breath, but it wasn’t unpleasant. “I don’t live too far, walk with me.”
You slid your hand up her shirt, feeling the soft skin of her back beneath your palms as you ran your fingers over the divot of her spine. “Lead the way, sweetheart.”
She laced her fingers through yours and led you out onto the street. “Down this way,” she directed you towards the end of the block.
“Hol’ on, hol’ on,” you mumbled. “Wait, c’mere.”
She looked back at you, confused, but you tugged her against your chest and kissed her. It was a sloppy kiss, teeth clashing and tongues drunkenly swiping across lips, and, like everything else that night, it was pleasant, but it wasn’t anything special. You couldn’t deny that this was scratching the itch, at least a little, but it wasn’t enough. It felt hollow.
She took you back to her apartment, where the rest of the night disappeared into crisp sheets, soft skin and moans that were less so.
You almost felt bad as you snuck out while she slept. She was sweet, she really was. She was just a little too sweet for you.
You walked back to your car and slung yourself behind the wheel, letting your head rest against the cool leather of the steering wheel. You hadn’t even gotten her name, and you couldn’t bring yourself to care. You were too strung out to give a shit.
You felt dirty. What the fuck were you doing? It wasn’t as if you had all the time in the world, and you knew you needed to get back on the road, so why did the idea of going make you dizzy?
Maybe it wasn’t the idea of going, maybe it was the idea of going alone.
You ground your teeth and looked at the road atlas you kept in your glovebox. Two hours to D.C. The protection sigils that dangled from your rearview mirror glinted in the sanguine light that was slowly crawling its way to its place in the sky, and you ran your thumb over the etched metal.
“Meili, please,” you whispered. “Just…please.”
The air around you crackled with energy, and you hoped he’d heard you and understood.
Summary: Bruised and bloodied, you end up with the last person you thought you'd turn to, and you're due for a night out.
Word Count: 1.1k
Warnings: Drinking, one-night stand
Next Chapter
You left the shop with a tin of tattoo balm and a pamphlet on tattoo care, feeling a little safer.
With some time to kill before you had arranged to meet Faery Barista, you decided to give in to your body’s cries for sleep. You parked your car in the back corner of the parking lot of the first supermarket you saw, leaned your seat back, and curled up. Even in that cramped and uncomfortable position, you were unconscious within a few minutes.
The Lakeside Tavern was further out than you had expected, but it was still only about twenty minutes from where you were.
The interior of the bar was on the nicer side of bog standard, and a man on the small stage in the corner strummed his guitar and crooned an old Hank Williams ballad into the microphone. He wasn’t half bad, you thought idly.
Faery Barista was waiting for you at the bar, drinking what looked like a vodka cranberry. She smiled when she saw you and waved you over.
“Hey, darlin’,” you hummed, placing a hand between her shoulder blades as you took a seat on the red vinyl barstool beside her.
She grinned at you, coyly stirring her drink with her straw. In the neon light of the Coors sign on the wall, her freckles stood out starkly against her skin, and you could see the sign reflected in her pupils. She really was beautiful.
“Hi.” She looked up at you through long lashes.
“What are we drinking?”
She offered you her glass, and you made a show of taking a sip and swishing it around in your mouth, swallowing, and looking up at the ceiling as though deep in thought. “Vodka soda with…something…”
She giggled. “Vodka soda with cranberry juice.”
“Very nice, good balance of trashy and cool,” you teased.
She giggled again and put a soft hand on your arm, leaning in, “Are you having anything?”
You waved over the bartender, a lanky twenty-something with an undercut and a lip ring, and gave them your most winning smile. “Another vodka soda with cran for the lady, and for myself…Lemme get a pint of that draft lager,” you pointed to the tap in question, “and a shot of Jamo.”
Your date looked up at you in surprise. “Jameson, huh? Wouldn’t have pegged you as the type. Although I never peg anyone as the whiskey type. Awful stuff, tastes like wood and ass.” She gave a delicate shudder, and you snorted.
The bartender set your drinks in front of you, and you toasted her with your shot before downing it without flinching. The whiskey burned as it hit the back of your throat and a vague taste of spice and vanilla spread over your tongue. It made your eyes burn and your heart twinge.
You ordered another shot and slammed that one too.
She trailed a finger up your arm. “That was kind of hot.” Her voice was low and rough with desire.
You didn’t really want to be here with her.
The haze of drink danced at the edges of your mind. You grabbed your date’s hand and turned it over, pressing a kiss to the inside of her wrist. “Starting strong then,” you murmured.
Even in the dim light of the bar, you could see her blush.
The rest of the night passed in a whiskey blur. You taught her how to play darts and shoot pool, even though you were pretty certain she knew what she was doing when she asked you to come behind her and show her how to hold the cue. But who were you to complain?
Finally, when you had reached the tipping point between pleasantly tipsy and the kind of drunk that ended with vomit down your shirtfront, she looked at you with heavy-lidded eyes.
“Come home with me,” she breathed in your ear, her hand finding the waistband of your jeans. You could smell the vodka and cranberry juice on her breath, but it wasn’t unpleasant. “I don’t live too far, walk with me.”
You slid your hand up her shirt, feeling the soft skin of her back beneath your palms as you ran your fingers over the divot of her spine. “Lead the way, sweetheart.”
She laced her fingers through yours and led you out onto the street. “Down this way,” she directed you towards the end of the block.
“Hol’ on, hol’ on,” you mumbled. “Wait, c’mere.”
She looked back at you, confused, but you tugged her against your chest and kissed her. It was a sloppy kiss, teeth clashing and tongues drunkenly swiping across lips, and, like everything else that night, it was pleasant, but it wasn’t anything special. You couldn’t deny that this was scratching the itch, at least a little, but it wasn’t enough. It felt hollow.
She took you back to her apartment, where the rest of the night disappeared into crisp sheets, soft skin and moans that were less so.
You almost felt bad as you snuck out while she slept. She was sweet, she really was. She was just a little too sweet for you.
You walked back to your car and slung yourself behind the wheel, letting your head rest against the cool leather of the steering wheel. You hadn’t even gotten her name, and you couldn’t bring yourself to care. You were too strung out to give a shit.
You felt dirty. What the fuck were you doing? It wasn’t as if you had all the time in the world, and you knew you needed to get back on the road, so why did the idea of going make you dizzy?
Maybe it wasn’t the idea of going, maybe it was the idea of going alone.
You ground your teeth and looked at the road atlas you kept in your glovebox. Two hours to D.C. The protection sigils that dangled from your rearview mirror glinted in the sanguine light that was slowly crawling its way to its place in the sky, and you ran your thumb over the etched metal.
“Meili, please,” you whispered. “Just…please.”
The air around you crackled with energy, and you hoped he’d heard you and understood.
andulkaphoto
snowghoul
janainaart
yousharknotpass
