Chapter 41 #2
“Yeah, her.” Looking up at me, she shrugs and says, “After that, she took my sister Agatha with her. Every time they came back, Agatha was different for a few days. There was a haunted look in her eyes, and she’d just stand in the garden, not doing anything.
For hours. It was like her spirit was in her body, but her essence was depleted. ”
She’s quiet for a long moment, tracing patterns on my chest and working through the memories she tries so badly to forget.
“Agatha and I weren’t talking by that point, but I snuck into her room after the first trip.
I was so worried about her. She was quiet when I laid and held her, and she wouldn’t talk.
I begged her to tell me what happened.” She shudders and says, “She’d open her mouth like she wanted to say something, but couldn’t. ”
It’s similar to everything I’ve read about everoot in the past. It’s common knowledge how to find Calista’s island and the general powers she possesses, but everything else, including the details of visiting her, are a mystery.
Any time someone is asked about it, they physically can’t say another word.
Are there any books about the herb in Briarhollow? I have read The Story of an Exiled Demon twice back in Junimere, but it’s vague. She’s the only being to ever grow the plant, and her price isn’t monetary. That’s it—that’s all it says about everoot.
It mostly goes into depth about the many theories about why she was exiled to our planet over a millennia ago, and how her powers are similar yet much different than Gray and Divination Witches.
I remember the hefty sum my father paid to our local healer when Sybil and I were ten, and she caught a virus. They were worried it was decay fever, but it’s uncommon in younger witches.
However, other than common flu symptoms, it can drain the healing components in someone’s magic at a rapid rate. Sybil’s immune system has always been a bit weak. I don’t think she would have lasted another night.
The healer was reluctant to use his personal stash.
I remember thinking it looked almost painful when he scooped a teaspoon out of the jar.
Despite the guilt in his eyes, he insisted that the high financial cost equaled the means of attaining it.
I don’t know the exact amount. Even as a child, it made my head spin when I heard my parents talking about it.
“Maybe she couldn’t,” I say, thinking out loud. “I’ve only found one book about Calista but I haven’t been looking for sources on succubi demons in general. Maybe we can go look in the next couple of days?”
“Yeah, sure. What do you mean Agatha couldn’t tell me?”
“One of their abilities is compulsion. Calista has apparently used it on many of her lovers—at least, that’s what they like to tell their wives and families once she’s done with them. If she doesn’t kill them first.”
Rubbing her back, I try to remember everything from the book, but it’s all starting to get muddled in my mind. “Maybe Agatha was compelled to secrecy, along with every person who goes to barter for the herb.”
She sits up straighter, the sheet falling down her bare chest. Turning toward me and placing a hand on my stomach, she thinks it over before slowly nodding.
“Maybe she did. It would keep desperate and adventurous people coming back,” she says.
“It’s harder to say no once you’ve traveled thousands of miles to get it.”
She bites her lip. “But what is it?”
Laying her head back on my chest, she lets out a sigh, not expecting an answer.
Succubi have many abilities, including holding a spirit captive and immediate, bloodless death. The latter is self-explanatory, but the former is distinctly different from a Gray Witch’s magic.
Renata can summon spirits and demons from other realms, often assumed to be the afterlife.
No one is sure. She can resurrect a person if she has their body to reconnect with.
Putting a soul into someone else’s body is much more complicated, and closer to a possession than a resurrection.
She could do that, if she wanted. Deadwalkers are created, but not always controlled by, Gray Witches.
Calista, and all succubi demons, can hold a soul in their hands.
They can stop a spirit’s journey from a physical body to the afterlife, keeping it for themselves.
All they need is a vessel to put it in. The catch is, she can’t put the soul into a human body.
She can only keep it captive in a sort of purgatory.
I can’t remember anything else useful from the book. Maybe Renata will remember something, since she has seen the consequences of visiting Calista’s island. Taking her compulsion abilities into consideration, I worry there are many questions we won’t find the answers to.
The silence hangs between us. I think she fell asleep until she whispers, “I saw Nestor returning home, and Barrett was anticipating it. Petra was surprised; relieved and heartbroken to see him stumble through the gate.”
I don’t say anything. I set her cup down and pull her body flush to mine. She nuzzles into me, but her gaze is zoned out again.
“That’s when you found me—when Petra broke down.”
“That answers a lot of my questions,” I admit.
“Good. I’ll answer all of them tomorrow, I promise,” she says and tightens her hold around me. “Barrett said something weird… He said ‘not even binding the coven’s souls to the inn could save them.’ Do you know what that means?”
“No,” I answer quietly. “I’ve never been particularly good at binding spells.” Our magic tends to favor one of the recessive elements more than the others. For me, it’s always been fire magic. Sybil has always had a knack for water magic. “You are though.”
“I am,” she agrees and shrugs, letting out a frustrated breath. “But I’ve never heard of anything like that. Other than the Soul Tie Bond and a few other rituals, I’ve never read about how to bind someone’s soul to a place. Why would someone even do that?” she asks incredulously.
“Why wouldn’t someone?” I ask, trying to work through all the possibilities.
She looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. Tonight, I might have.
“Because,” she says slowly, “I don’t think a person could move on after death, at least not fully.”
“Like a ghost?” I ask. “Like Nestor?”
I glance around the room, realizing he’s been mostly absent since I arrived.
“Maybe—I don’t know. Nestor seems like a typical ghost to me. But I’m not positive,” she says.
“Okay love, we’ll figure it out,” I say and run a hand down the back of her head. “Get some rest.” I pull one of her legs across my thighs and hold her close.
She lets out a low, tired hum as she gets comfortable. “Tell me a story—one about you and Sybil as kids… A happy one.”
My lips tilt up as I go through the thousands of memories Sybil and I.
“Sybil was convinced she would marry a vampire,” I say with a chuckle.
Renata lets out a breath of amusement, but the claws of exhaustion pulling her down.
I continue, “We used to sneak out every night in search of one. Gods, we drove our mother mad until she charmed every inch of our house. A fly couldn’t get out of there undetected now, thanks to the two of us. ”
For the next ten minutes, I reminisce on all the times we explored the nearby forests in the middle of the night.
Junimere is small, but there are plenty of creatures in the forests—supernatural and otherwise.
We found vampires a few times, but they were always local, and knew our parents.
There was the time we stumbled into a hurt wolf.
He was about our age and scared. His injury was only a broken shin that his rapid healing would mend on its own.
Thanks to our mother, we knew how to set a bone from a young age.
When her breaths are slow and steady, I let my words trail off, and I stare at her.
Taking in her beauty, I’ve memorized each of her little freckles of starlight.
They remain one of my favorite features of hers.
Her brows crinkle, and she lets out a small whine.
It’s gone as soon as it comes, but the echo of it in my mind plays on repeat.
I consider how she’d feel about me manipulating her dreams. When another cry breaks through her lips and she digs her nails into my sides, holding tighter, I decide to act now and apologize tomorrow.
Kissing her temple and rubbing a hand down her cheek, I close my eyes and push my intentions into her mental space—replacing any lingering anxiety with the comfort and safety I try so desperately to provide her when she’s awake.
Once she lets out a sigh and relaxes against me, I pull away and take over my post of watching over her again, resolved to not get a moment of sleep in favor of making sure she doesn’t experience another second of fear tonight.