Chapter 18 #2
As I do will it, so mote it be.”
As the words passed from her lips, the room took on a smell like the ozone before a thunderstorm, as well as the mineral smell of wet rocks. Moments later, the monstera flushed a brilliant green, its leaves plumping and lifting.
When Naveah finally acknowledged her presence with a glance, Hayleigh said, “Did you curse me?”
“Huh,” said Naveah, crossing her arms, “so the spell worked.”
“Did you think it wouldn’t?”
The other woman crossed the room breezily to adjust the misting controls. “Admittedly, I wasn’t sure. I’ve never cursed anyone before—you’re my first.”
“I’m honored.”
Naveah didn’t look up from her work as she asked, “I guess you’re here to ask me to lift it?”
“Yes, please,” said Hayleigh, taking an eager step closer. “You have no idea how grateful I’d be…”
“I think I’ve got a bit of an idea…but no.”
And then she swept back to the front room, forcing Hayleigh to follow her to a corner full of artfully arranged terrariums, where she set about pouring nutrients into a bubbling aquarium full of water plants. Snails traveled in slow glides across their glass walls, feasting on skins of green algae.
Hayleigh grabbed her by the arm, asking, “Why not?”
Naveah yanked free, and a nearby plant wrapped a vining tendril around Hayleigh’s wrist in a shockingly strong bind.
“Because you poisoned our groundwater. Lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury, all at dangerous levels. You promised me the resort wouldn’t disturb anything, but it disturbed everything.”
“Is Jayce okay…?”
Naveah’s eyes widened in brief surprise.
“Jayce is fine.” The vine at Hayleigh’s wrist briefly relaxed its grip before redoubling as the green witch’s face sharpened once again.
“But I spend a hundred dollars a month on filtered water to make sure that stays true, and every time he forgets and drinks from the tap, I spend all night managing panic attacks. We can’t drink the water.
We can’t eat anything we catch. Every spring, the river shores are filled with dead, rotting fish.
Your building did that to us. Your decisions. ”
A tense quiet settled between them as Hayleigh grappled with the weight of the suffering that had just been dropped into her lap.
“I didn’t know,” she said finally, her voice small. “They said they’d do assessments.”
“Yeah, well, if they did, they weren’t good enough.”
“Did you curse anyone else?”
With a sigh, Naveah said, “No. Just you.”
“I understand you’re mad, and I think you have a right to be, but why me? I wasn’t part of construction details. I wasn’t in charge of anything.”
Naveah looked her in the eye as she said, “Because you made me believe it would be okay.”
The statement hit harder than a smack to the face. She couldn’t deny it or defend it. “I’m sorry,” Hayleigh said finally in a whispery voice. “I really didn’t know anything like this would happen.”
“Then maybe you should’ve just kept your mouth shut.”
“Maybe so.” And then Hayleigh inhaled. “Please, though, your curse worked. I’ve been through hell.
I’ve lost everything. Goshen fired me. I’m broke.
My parents are forcing me to take back my ex, who…
who, well, he likes things a certain way.
He likes me a certain way, and the fact I don’t like me that way doesn’t matter.
Now Red, my horse, has cancer, and I…I can’t lose him. Please, don’t let it take him.”
Naveah looked a little spooked. “I didn’t mean for anything like that to happen. I didn’t think it would work that way.”
“Did you cast it yourself?” Stephan’s voice came from the other side of the room, where he leaned against a wall with his arms crossed.
“I did, yes,” said Naveah, looking his way with a nod. “Been a long time since I had a coven.” Her expression closed at that moment, and though Hayleigh sensed a story, she could also tell they weren’t going to get it.
Stephan nodded as if that made sense. “A spell like that’s big magic. Impressive you cast it yourself, but it also makes sense if you didn’t have complete control of how it worked out.”
The green witch crossed her arms and tapped her foot in agitation. “Spare me the lecture on safe magic practices. I know it isn’t ideal to work without a coven, but this…” She swept her hand through the room. “Is what I’ve got.”
“Okay,” said Stephan, holding up a hand. “Just saying that if ‘this’ feels like it’s not enough…it’s because it isn’t. It’s not supposed to be this hard.”
Naveah’s dark eyes regarded him in mild surprise, and then she just nodded stiffly and looked at the floor.
“If it’s not going the way you wanted it to, then can you just undo it?” asked Hayleigh. “If not for me, then for Red? Curse me again if you feel like you need to, but please leave him out of it.”
Naveah fidgeted with a shard of bone that dangled from a leather strap around her neck. “When I said before that I wouldn’t, I should have said…I can’t.”
A chill passed down Hayleigh’s spine. “What do you mean ‘can’t’?”
“My spell invoked a Wild Hunt. They won’t go away until they’re satisfied.”
“Well, that unfortunately makes sense,” said Stephan, lowering his head to shake it.
Hayleigh blinked in confusion. “A Wild Hunt?”
“A group of otherworldly beings called down to teach a mortal a lesson,” offered Stephan. “You, in this case. That’s why you keep seeing the other folk around when things happen.”
“Wait, you’ve been seeing them?” asked Naveah.
“Yeah, she has,” said Stephan, with a significant look.
Hayleigh glanced between the two of them. “Is that not supposed to happen?”
“I mean, it can,” said Stephan, “but the other folk have to choose to show themselves, and they mostly don’t unless they have a good reason.”
“What kind of creatures are these ‘other folk’?” asked Hayleigh.
“Depends,” said Naveah. “The exact shape the Wild Hunt takes has to do with you, and what you’ve done. A curse of your own making.”
Hayleigh pressed fingers to her temples. “So how do I ‘satisfy it’? And please don’t say ‘depends’ again…”
“Depends,” said Naveah with a flat expression.
“Imagine if karma had a debt collector,” said Stephan. “That debt collector’s the Wild Hunt. So it’s not going to be satisfied by something arbitrary. It’ll have to do with what you’ve done.”
“But how do I know?”
“You haven’t gotten any kind of guidance from them?” asked Naveah. “Sometimes the fae communicate in strange ways, but they’re also not exactly subtle.”
“No. Nothing, I—”
Her voice cut out. The crone. The archway in the trees. She hadn’t wanted to believe it, because the crone represented every corruption the stories taught you to fear, but there had been an air of invitation to the old woman’s visits.
Hayleigh put a hand to her forehead, squeezing her temples. “The only way to break the curse is to figure out what the Hunt wants…and do it?”
“Afraid so,” said Naveah.
Stephan’s smile was an apology. “Only way out’s through, Sunshine.”