Song of the Ancients (Ancient Magic Book 1) (6 page)

I fingered my tears away and looked down the candle-lit table. Most of the diners had their heads bowed, and a few dabbed at their eyes and sniffed quietly as they composed themselves.

Except for Nicholas. He was watching me. When I met his eyes, he squeezed my hand again and nodded, his eyes bright with unshed tears.

When we left, stopping by our ancestor's plate on the way out to nod goodbye, I wondered if such a ritual would be comforting for families who had lost loved ones in recent tragedies around the world.
So many dead, so violently and abruptly ripped from the land of the living. What of their souls? Are they still staggering, lost between the worlds? Have they found rest? Did they have a chance to say goodbye?

I kissed my fingertips and caressed the back of an empty black chair. "Blessed be all," I whispered to those souls as we silently filed past the row of vacant seats.

* * * * *

At midnight, we moved into the nearby grove for the Samhain ritual. The firs flanking our clearing stood tall and regal, their shrouded limbs giving privacy and protection. A thin mist crept upon the ground and swirled around the altar table, softening the candlelight from clear flames to soft yellow glow.

The temperature had dropped. I shivered and tucked my hands under my cloak. Nicholas had disappeared as silently as he had appeared by my side at dinner. Rumor, still beside Nuin, motioned for me to join her. I took a step forward, but then I looked at Nuin. His scowl readily showed his disapproval. He must still be pissed at having Nicholas as High Priest, or mad because we'd sat together. I decided to let him get over it alone, and stepped back.

Maya lit the bonfire in the center, and the flames rose to the sky, spitting sparks. We drew closer around her clasping hands. A woman to one side of me lifted her booted foot over mine and placed it next to my instep; I did the same to the person on my other side. The movement rippled around the line, linking the circle by both feet and hands.

The Priestess placed her palms on the black leather-bound book in which we had signed the names of our deceased. Eyes closed, she spoke, murmuring the names we had written. From a pocket of her cloak, she withdrew a handful of herbs and threw them into the flames, making the fire pop and crackle. Mist and fragrance rose in a cloud. I shut my eyes and inhaled the elemental scent, breathing slowly, as she intoned, "I call on the power of these herbs to bless this space and the spirits who come to visit."

A second figure stepped from the ring to join Maya in the center. As the hooded man stood before the fire, the embers rose and orbited round him like tiny moons, tumbling and floating. The two leaders raised their arms and clasped hands, index fingers extended, pointing to the fire.

"Mother wise and Mother strong,

Wake to greet your mighty throng.

From your vortex now give birth,

To magic spirits round our girth."

The embers swirled higher around us, spinning faster and faster, blocking the forest outside the circle, until we were contained within a cone of spinning golden light. I strained my neck to look around. The circle perimeter glowed, and I felt as if we were standing within a campfire ring.

"As above, so below!" Maya called out. "This circle is sealed!" The embers dropped to the ground, sizzling. Inside the circle, it was so quiet I could hear my own breathing.

Maya's partner knelt beside a mound of dirt, digging his hands deep, cupping the soft red earth and lifting it as he stood and began to chant.

"Dust to dust,

The rocks in time dissolve

Into the oneness of the Universe.

I call forth the Ancient Ones

To join us and impart their wisdom."

Nicholas's voice sounded different from his normal soft, formal speech. He raised his arms in front of him and parted his fingers, allowing the soil to fall between them to the ground. As he looked to the heavens, his hood fell away, revealing his shoulder-length black hair.

His intensity and power was palpable. The hairs on my arms raised in response to the energy pulsing around him. My heart beat in my chest like a trapped bird. Time slowed to a crawl. I watched the breeze ruffle Nicholas' hair in slow motion. I smelled the earth, tangy with pine resin, as it fell, grain by grain, between his long, pale fingers. As I watched, the soil began to swirl like a tiny dust devil in a powerful wind. The whirlwind grew larger, then separated and bloomed, multiplying into individual twisters. Dozens of ghostly dust plumes swirled around him, nearly obscuring his form in the center.

Suddenly Nicholas stepped outside the dust storm, turned and looked directly at me. I swayed back as though he had pushed me in the chest. He held my gaze for several seconds, mouthing words only he could hear. The dust devils, now nearly filling our ring of human bodies, spun faster, seemingly excited by his voice. Again he raised his eyes to the dark sky, moving his arms in a sweeping motion, as if catching and gathering something. When he flung his hands outward, the candles on the altar danced wildly with the force of the motion. Nicholas yelled, to be heard above the noise of the swirling dust and sand:

"At this time the veil between the worlds thins.

The gates are thrown open.

I welcome the spirits who have gone before,

The Others who pass between two worlds.

Ancestors of old, arise now!

Join the human bridge awaiting you!"

From the shadows cast by the flickering fire, I watched one of the dust devils separate from the others and spin toward me. Its outline had changed. I stared at the top of the swirl. Two glowing eyes stared back. An arm formed, then a second, reaching toward me. The air in the circle had become unbearably hot. I wiped sweat out of my eyes and was slammed with a sudden vision of a person inside the swirling dust, so clear it stopped my heart for one terrified beat.
This can't be happening!
The wraith bore the face of my mother, dead for three years.

I tried to get away, but my feet tangled with the woman on my left. The ghost grabbed for me, raking the back of my hand with her fingernails as I fell. I screamed, sucking my breath in ragged pants. She reached for my face with both hands, but I scrambled away from her outstretched arms and hid my face behind the legs of the old woman next to me. The ghost dropped her arms and stepped back, her eyes filled with sadness. Terror gripped my mind like a vise, I could think of nothing but escape. I flailed and kicked and crawled from the circle until I could stand, and run.

* * * * *

The pain under my ribs finally slowed me to a walk. Panting in panicked, shallow breaths, I stumbled alone along the narrow lane leading back to the highway, trying to stop shaking. What had I seen?
Nothing but the wind
.

I took a deeper breath of the cold air and straightened my back, raising my eyes from the dark road to the endless stars above my head. What I
thought
I saw. I kept hold of rationalization, clung to it like a life raft in a stormy sea.

The bright moon and the concentration of putting one foot in front of the other in the dark slowly calmed me.
Of course the whole thing was an illusion. The atmosphere of the ritual affected everyone. It ignited my imagination. Or maybe there was a hallucinogen in the incense.
I heard the words in my head and pre-tended they were spoken by one of my old Midwest friends.

But I wasn't in my old home. I walked on a dark road, by myself, running from something I couldn't escape. Every time I tried to think, the image of my mother's face appeared in my mind. She looked so real and so worried. Had she really been there? I ran my fingers across the welts on the back of my hand.

As I walked, the adrenaline-fueled terror drained out of me, leaving empty numbness. I lectured myself and filled the numb-ness with shame.
What did you expect tonight?
The truth punctured my ego.
You were just play-acting. You didn't expect to have a true psychic experience. You had no idea how deep this magic stuff really goes, well beyond this physical world.
I blinked back the tears welling in my eyes. Faced with a concept outside the realm of my reality, outside the border of my boring, ordinary life, what did I do?

I ran.

Gradually I noticed the silence. Birds, insects, all of the nighttime noises around me had stopped. The hairs on the back of my neck lifted and fear ran shiver-fingers down my back. Someone was here. I clenched my hands into fists, staring at the blacktop road stretching into the darkness, straining to see as adrenaline again twanged my muscles taut.

Ahead, a dark figure strode toward me, black robe billowing behind with every stride. He was furious, I could sense it even from this distance. His anger built as he approached, like a summer thunderstorm, pulling into it the very air surrounding him. I willed myself to stand my ground and wait for him, not to run away again.

Nicholas grasped me with steel fingers and pushed me into the shadows of the trees on the side of the road.

His face was hidden by his hood. But his scent, the remnants of our ritual bonfire incense, still clung to his robes, along with the faint scent of pine needles and dirt.

"You called her, didn't you?" I whispered. "You looked right at me and—"

"What did you expect?" He grabbed my hair and pulled my head back to look into my face.

I gave a stifled sob, and fought to free myself. His breath rasped hot on my face as he leaned over me, much closer than comfortable.

"You have no idea what you have stumbled into," Nicholas hissed, "and even less how to get out of it. You think this is but a whimsical diversion from your sad, lonely life? Why did you come here? You foolish, foolish little girl."

His words stung like a slap. "How dare you," I answered in a shaky voice. "You don't know anything about me, or my life."

"Indeed?"

He bent further over me, arching my back, one hand still tangled in my hair. I instinctively closed my eyes and fought to control my urge to struggle. After several heartbeats, he whispered into my ear. "I'm afraid I've made a grave mistake. You have neither the skill nor the intellect to be taught. There is only failure in you."

We remained frozen together, his breath on my throat, his hair trailing softly against my cheek. I kept my eyes closed, not wanting to see the loathing I heard in his voice. Eventually, his hands left my hair, moved to my shoulders and pulled me upright. He pushed me away, and I took a stumbling step backwards.

He looked past me to the road over my shoulder. His hand dropped and he stepped away as headlights washed over us
.

Rumor's familiar convertible pulled alongside.

"Oh, Sam, we were so worried about you." Rumor turned to Nicholas. "Thank you! Is she hurt?"

Nicholas shrugged, his eyes averted.

Rumor turned to me. I shook my head. My throat felt too constricted to speak without crying. I tried to rub my eyes, but my hand shook so much I couldn't raise it to my face. In fact, I realized, my whole body was shaking. Rumor had the car door open, and I climbed into the back seat as my legs gave out. She wrapped a blanket around my shoulders, and rubbed my arms until my tremors subsided.

"I think she's in shock," Rumor said to Nicholas, who stood by the driver window. "What on earth happened? Why did she run from the circle?"

"I really have no idea," he murmured. The liar. He'd looked right at me before conjuring my mother's ghost. "Take her home, make some hot tea for her. She'll be better after a fair night's rest."

"Do you need a ride back to your car?" Rumor asked Nicholas.

"No, thank you. The walk will clear my head."

I curled into a fetal position, my lips trembling, and stayed in a whimpering ball while Rumor drove in silence. She reached into the back seat every few minutes to rub my leg and murmur, "It's okay. You're safe now."

Finally she pulled into my drive and turned off the engine. "Let me help you inside. Nicholas suggested tea."

I shook my head vehemently. "Nicholas said a lot of things." I shook my head again. "He doesn't give a
shit
about my best interests." Tears welled then and I fled up the steps and inside without looking back.

Inside, I rammed hard into the table I'd moved into the entryway the day before. Damn redecorating. Bent over the table and rubbing my bruised hip in the dark, the dam broke. Racking sobs wrenched my chest. I cried and wailed, gasping for breath, as I collapsed in a heap on the floor.

I'll never be able to face these people again. They will know I'm a failure. Hell, even my own mother knows
.... I thought of Nicholas, and silent tears again ran down my cheeks.
Damn him. Damn him and this power he has, to see inside me and throw my fears in my face. I failed at my marriage. Now I'm failing at this new life, this new magical challenge, whatever it is.

As much as it hurt to admit, I knew he wasn't wrong. Perhaps I made a mistake by leaving home and my familiar surroundings, bleak as they seemed at the time. Perhaps I made a mistake experimenting with witchcraft, and had fallen deeper into the un-known than I could handle. Perhaps he really did see failure in me.

Unable to shake the despairing thoughts, I stood up, stumbled into the bedroom and crawled into bed fully dressed.

I dreamt of a twisted pinon tree growing in red earth, a raven winging past a full moon shrouded by dark storm clouds, and an old Indian raising his arms to the sky, fingers spread.

I woke, perspiring and shaking, my shirt cold with sweat. I heard the wind chimes' melancholy tinkling outside my window and knew I'd dreamt of death.

Chapter 9: Void of Course

I woke to the steady pat, pat, pat of rain dripping off the tile roof. Sedona had nearly three hundred days of sunshine a year. This was not coincidence.

"Haven't you learned yet?" The memory of Nuin's voice mocked me. "There is no coincidence."

I called the shop and told Rumor I was staying home for a couple of days. I didn't want to explain last night, at least not until I'd worked through it in my own head.