Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Ranth explained the nuances of using crystals for magic on the way to Juke’s father’s warehouse, and Rose was at the opposite end of acceptance.
I was seriously concerned about her throwing Ranth under the BART as we exited.
The anger aura rolled off in waves. If we were gaming, she’d be leaving a fire trail.
Rose was disheveled and exhausted, but for the finding-spell, we’d need focus and unity.
“You need to chill out,” I whispered to Rose as we waited for the rideshare.
“Me? You mean him. He’s the problem. Walking into our lives and telling us everything we do is wrong. Things have changed. We have hundreds, maybe thousands of years of experience that his knowledge lacks. Magic now is faster, clearer, and more focused.”
“Less focused, less powerful, and from what I’ve seen, sloppy,” Ranth replied.
“You are calling my work sloppy?” Rose squared her shoulders and glared at him. “That’s it. I’ll walk or get another car. I’m not going in the same vehicle with that demon spawn.”
Ranth was about to start arguing with her when the car pulled up. I wasn’t exactly pleased with him, but I didn’t think it was the worst thing for Rose to cool off a bit. Whether I believed in what Ranth was saying, making Rose angry was not okay with me.
I opened the car door. “You coming?” I asked Ranth in an attempt to break the standoff. “Hey Rose, you know where we’re going, right?”
“Yup, and I’ll see you there.”
Her emphasis on “you” told me she was done helping Ranth.
“You’re really good at making friends, you know that?” I asked, glaring at him.
Ranth was quiet on the way, which was fine by me.
I could throw off negativity and not let it touch my aura.
I closed my eyes and did my three-minute refocus ritual.
As my breathing steadied, I let my mind wander and process all that had gone on, moving my thoughts to positive feelings of the next moment.
The tension left my shoulders as I was in my happy garden with hummingbirds and dandelion fluff, my skin warming from the sun.
I came back to the present with a silvery glow of peace, ready to take on the next phase of whatever we’d face.
Before I opened my eyes, Ranth’s fingers weaved into mine.
“I’m sorry to anger you. I’ve never met anyone like you. I think you are rather accomplished for your lack of training.”
“Well thanks, much.” I wasn’t going to let the sweetness of the apology tainted by criticism reduce my freshly centered focus.
Ranth could live with his negativity, but I could teach him a few lessons about interacting with others.
I tugged my hand away and unsnapped a belt pouch.
“You should take one of these just in case.”
“In case of what?” He took the bundle of yerba santa.
“If something goes wrong, and I have to go planar, you can draw enough power from that to reach the plane. At least, I think it should work for you.”
“I already told you I don’t use enhancements.”
“It’s not a drug.”
“It is, actually. You can become addicted to potions and herbs, as with anything you use in excess, until you realize you don’t need to use them.”
“You’re calling me an addict now?” I raised my voice, and the driver glanced in the rearview.
“Sorry, we’re all good.” I forced a smile and nodded at her that everything was in fact good.
I scooted away from Ranth, leaning my head against the door and trying to get the silvery glow back.
I closed my eyes again. What if he was right?
What if I actually had learned to support my ability the wrong way?
Witchcraft was all about positive energy.
Candles, herbs, crystals were all focus points.
Making connections. Creating spaces. I’d always thought enhancements would increase my access to my power, but what if I didn’t need anything?
Listing how herbs, tea, salad, and juices fueled me, proving they had a positive effect, I threw off my inner doubts.
The car slowed outside the warehouse fence. The driver glanced back at us, her sunglasses reflecting the light. “The GPS shows the number here, but there’s no number. Is this it?” the driver asked.
“Yep, all good. Anywhere here.” I could see Juke’s set-up in the distance. We’d have to walk around to the back to get through the gate, but the midday spring sun would recharge me. I tipped my face to the sun and tugged off the lavender glasses, letting the rays bathe my eyelids.
“You’re really beautiful,” Ranth said.
My eyes snapped open, ready to humble him really quick, but the expression of honest reverence on his face shut me up while butterflies danced where they had no business being. I shoved the glasses back on and opened the gate.
Juke’s tent was a white beacon in the parking lot, next to the warehouse her dad owned.
The circular structure she’d put together had white triangular panels that spiraled from the tips to wide bases.
Juke was hanging out under an awning, pink herringbone braids wrapped high in lime-green neon ribbons.
She pulled off her headphones, settling them around her neck. Her heart-shaped face lit up as we approached. “Hey, glad you’re okay. Come see.” She waved us toward her and held up a flap on the side of the round tent.
Ranth ducked inside, and I followed. Ranth stared up at the projection on the ceiling, rubbing his neck. “But the sun will not be visible? In the temple, there are panels on the ceiling which can be removed.”
“That’s for the final ritual thing. This is for the finding-map—but I’ve got you. I already thought of that.” Juke pushed a button. The top of the tent split open.
I squinted up at the sky. “That’s all levels of awesome.”
“Yup, I know. We have enough screening to see the map grid, or starscape, and you get your sunlight too. Everyone’s happy.”
“You’re amazing.”
“Hey, it’s what I do.” But her lips spread into a cat-with-cream toothy grin, and I was sure her eyes sparkled behind the chartreuse-tinted glasses. “Let me show you how the map works…”
Ihad to admit that Juke’s construction was pretty impressive. She had built a geo-dome meets Super-dome with a fiber-fed grid and retractable roof. The goats were in a pen with a flat of wheatgrass shorn to the quick. Someone had rigged an umbrella shade and given them a pool of water.
I crouched down, and the mama and baby skittered over to me, their hooves sliding on the asphalt. “Hey, girls. How’s your auntie treating you?” I petted the tops of their heads and was rewarded with a black-tongued lick to the inside of my wrist.
“Where are Ori and Freddie?” I asked Juke.
“They went to get some more grass. Can’t have Liesl’s Kashmir goats starving, right? Besides, I don’t want them going back to the cables.”
“Did we get goat-milking instructions?” I asked Juke, and she pushed her glasses up on top of her head.
“Uh no, figured you had that part nailed, since you used to live on a farm?” She handed me a bucket.
I stared into the bottom of the dull silver. “Yeah, no. Never done it. But guess we can figure it out.”
“I can do it,” Ranth said. I hadn’t realized he was behind me, which wasn’t good. Apparently, I wasn’t back up to full focus.
“You can milk… yeah, you would know how. Awesome. Okay, so it seems like we are ready.”
Juke zipped up her hoodie and looked around. “Where’s Rose?”
“She’ll be here. Ranth heated her buns. She’s cooling off.” I glanced at my phone and decided to text her.
Sorrel:
Are you good?
With the message delivered, I waited a couple of seconds but didn’t get a response. But Rose sometimes turned her phone off when she was with people.
“Hey, we need to get the finding-map online before the fog eats the sun,” Juke said. I stuffed the phone in my pocket, hoping Rose wasn’t angry enough not to help.
Ranth was already in the goat enclosure.
I marveled at how effortlessly he got the goat between his legs and milk shot into the bucket.
Apparently, the wizard also had mad animal skills.
My best nature skills were foraging for wildcrafting.
Mushrooms, nettle, and seaweed harvesting was literally part of my blood.
Not quite the same track, and probably all meaningless if I was considering what Ranth had said.
I walked into the tent. Juke was testing the lights on the side panels.
“Good to go?” I asked.
She nodded. “The tech is, at least. How it meshes with the magic part is not my specialty. If you connect this with an energy source to transmit data, you should get a result—in theory.” She stuck her hands in her hip huggers.
The snakeskin print clung to her svelte frame, and the bottoms ended in rolled pink socks and sneakers.
I loved her brand of style; it was so particularly her.
Her braids were pinned to the back of her head with an iridescent butterfly.
Ranth came into the tent with the milk.
Inside the chalk circle were a hunk of green stone, a bowl of freshly dried sea salt, a clay brazier and charcoal brick, a length of hemp rope, and the bottle of wine. I grinned. Freddie, as usual, had been his awesome reliable self.
“Needs to be a salt triangle,” Ranth said, shaking his head.
“It’s not a protection line. I drew the circle to give you an idea of range. The signal needs to come from within that boundary, preferably the center of it,” Juke replied, glancing at me for backup.
Ranth nodded thoughtfully.
I picked up the salt. “I’ll set up the triangle. What else can I do to help?”
“We need some fresh water. Spring water if you have it. Should have mentioned that. I have to assemble it myself or it won’t work,” Ranth said, setting down the bucket in the circle.
“We only do spring.” I walked over to Juke’s cooler and handed him one of the flasks from inside.
“I will need you to take the vessels away once I’ve set them up. Except the bucket. But I must cleanse it first, so it can stay with me. The wine needs to be open.”
Juke pulled the cork while I poured the salt in a triangle big enough to sit in comfortably. Ranth lit the charcoal disk, set it in the brazier, and handed me the matches. He picked up a ball of kyphi and sniffed. His nose wrinkled.
“Will it work?” I asked.
“It smells different but good. We’ll see.”
Watching him work was like watching myself… if I were precise and organized.
When the disk turned ashen, he dropped a ball on top. The resin warmed and spread, releasing a white smoke that curled upwards. Ranth dumped fenugreek seeds beside the brazier and handed me the baggie.
“Juke, it’s time to open the roof.” Ranth stood up. He stripped off the jacket and handed it to me while he talked. The T-shirt followed the jacket and then the shoes. He dipped his hands into his waistband.
“Holy Shastas, what are you doing?” I asked.
“It’s a nature spell. You can’t do it with worldly trappings!” He raised a disbelieving eyebrow at me, as if I should know this.
I grew up with people who believed that nature was the first clothing, but I’d lived in San Francisco since I was twelve. I’d gotten used to the clothed human form.
Juke had clicked the roof button, and the panels above us grated open as Ranth dropped his pants. That was about the time Ori and Freddie arrived. I don’t remember the exact time because when Ori yelped, I was scraping my tongue off the asphalt.
Freddie shielded his eyes. “Man, what are you doing! Put your clothes back on.”
I looked away, then looked back. If this was what it took, then fine—eyes front, job first.
Ignoring all our reactions, Ranth leaned over the pile of seeds, his muscles stretching and giving us a model-style view of male anatomy at its finest. Ranth selected three seeds and popped them into his mouth one after the other, then dropped three more onto the brazier.
I’d seen him naked before, but things were different now.
He was so comfortable in his skin, I couldn’t help the desire rolling off me. So so sexy.
Ranth picked up the bucket and sat cross-legged in the center of the circle. Then he dumped the bucket over his head. The milk sluiced down his skin, leaving white thread-like tracery. He tipped his face to the sun and chanted in a language I couldn’t place.
He glowed. I’d never met anyone like him, and I probably never would again.
“I think he’s speaking Assyrian, based on what he said,” Ori whispered to me. My vision swam, and I crouched down.
Juke was watching the controls of her map grid.
Juke’s grid would read and project; Ranth’s ritual would push the signal.
A green haze lifted from Ranth’s skin, and the curse scribed on his arm glowed.
The amulet in his upturned palm emitted a pink light.
The white tracery from the milky trails lifted and wrapped the air, connecting Ranth to the amulet.
The tracery spun outward as if attracted to Juke’s grid.
The kyphi turned sharp and honey-sweet as the light went white and spread to the flexible map.
The whole thing lit up like a billion-fiber optics firing at once. I covered my eyes.
I peeked out, squinting from the glare. The world was tinted amber, and sounds were elongated. Ranth sat in the triangle; the tracery was gone, and one point on the map glowed.
Buenos Aires.
The gold was in Argentina. That rooted itself deep as Ranth’s form glowed in front of me and blurred. I lay down on the asphalt, the rough blackness warm under my cheek.
I heard what might have been Ori’s voice, but the words swam in my head like fish I couldn’t catch.
Ranth’s voice cut through the haze, echoing oddly above the other layered whispers.
“I have taken too much from you. You will be okay. Sleep now.”
Familiar arms gathered me up, and trusting I was safe, I closed my eyes and slept.