27 - Iona
T he darkness is warm and inviting. It cradles her, pacifying her until she’s numb to anything but her screaming thoughts.
She fights against its tranquilizing effects, pushing herself up onto her feet and running wildly into the abyss until her foot gets caught and she crumples to the ground.
Pulling at her leg, she manages to dislodge it, only to run straight into another tangle of strings that cling to her skin.
Writhing and bucking, she tries to free herself, but her movements only further entoil her until she’s unable to move.
Then she squeals at the alarming prickle of tiny legs running across her back, to her shoulder.
The spider perches there, and when Iona tries to shake it off of her, it only seems to startle the creature into running aimlessly over her captive form, until she’s utterly repulsed.
She cries out for help, but her only answer is the echo of her own sobs, until she hears the distant sound of footsteps. She abruptly swallows her cries, pulling at her arms and legs in a vain effort at escape. The spider creeps away, and Iona envies its freedom.
A bright, blinding light permeates the darkness, making Iona flinch away, until she sees who holds the glowing beacon in their palm.
The Crone stares up at her where she’s strung up in a tangle of threads, and though the old varlet’s face is still concealed by bandages, they shift distinctly to indicate her menacing smile.
Iona screams, tries to cast any spell she can remember, but she looks down at her chest, it is bare. The pendant is gone.
To her greater horror, the malefician approaches her, reaching out a mangled hand to run a cracked nail against her cheek, taunting her, making her squirm away in disgust. The wheezing, gloating laugh of the malefician only fuels her outrage.
“Let me go!” Iona cries. “Let me go! Let me go…”
The light extinguishes, cloaking the malefician in darkness again, though her horrible laugh persists.
“Let me go!” Iona cries, startling herself awake.
A fluttering of wings comes from overhead as a group of startled birds soar to more peaceful branches. Petrichor fills Iona’s lungs with every gasping breath, mixed with the faint odor of smoke from the campfire.
“Nightmare?” Jacira asks.
Iona glances at her where she stands ankle deep in the Rio Paraná.
“Of sorts,” Iona says glumly, sitting up and rubbing her face. Wisp’s nose pokes at her hands until she lets them fall away. The fox licks at her face, sniffing at her intently.
She mistakenly thought her dreams wouldn’t scare her any longer now that she knows where they come from, but her subconscious mind is not so rational as all that. She trembles with fevered perturbation, the pinpricks of the spider’s tiny legs still ghosting over her skin, making her itch.
“Come.” Jacira beckons her closer.
Iona eyes the water warily. “Is that wise?”
“Do not concern yourself with wisdom. You’ve decades yet to amass it,” Jacira says.
“Was it not you who said to beware of the river-“
“Without me,” Jacira finishes for her.
“Very well.” She stands and twists her back to stretch her spine, until it lets out a satisfying crack.
Then she approaches the very edge of the water and gathers up the skirt of her chemise. Very carefully, she dips one foot into the cool water. She waits, but nothing happens.
“All the way,” Jacira says impatiently.
Iona puts her other foot in, then wades through the water to where Jacira stands.
“That’s it,” she says, closing her eyes.
Iona follows suit and takes a deep cleansing breath. She waits, but Jacira doesn’t give further instructions.
“What now?” Iona asks.
“Hmm?” Jacira asks.
Iona cracks open an eye. “Should I… incant something? Or-“
“There is no spell or incantation,” Jacira says. “Simply enjoy the water. Let it renew you.”
“Oh,” Iona says, slightly disappointed.
“Magic cannot solve every one of your problems,” Jacira says. “You must find peace within yourself.”
They stand there in meditative silence for an unknowable amount of time.
Iona’s thoughts drift to the limitations of magic, the potential of it, the temptation to numb herself with it.
She could have another witch take her memories away, as Moira did to the Satos.
She is accumulating yet more friends whom she cannot bear to face.
At the next ritual she will be surrounded by those she’s forsaken, and she cannot even beg their forgiveness.
Worst of all the haunting anamneses is the memory of Ariadne’s battered form when she’d returned from Japan.
She’d been covered head to toe in blood, cuts, and bruises, a near corpse.
Iona’s heart had raced at the sight of her beloved so completely broken, barely conscious enough to notice her presence beside her.
It was all she could do to heal her as well as she was able before she departed.
Those hours alone in the villa had been torturous.
She’d removed herself from Ariadne’s mind, not wanting to see her felled or afflicted.
It had never once occurred to her until then that she had no knowledge of how to create a portal, as Ariadne always makes them for her.
Mere manifestation hadn’t worked, even when she’d tried to quell her tumultuous thoughts enough to focus on where she wished to go, nor did she know the incantation to compel the magic forth.
It was in search of that incantation that Iona had flown to the villa’s library.
She’d poured over the many tomes and scrolls, tossing them aside in a pile on the floor in her haste, but she could scarcely concentrate enough to read the words, to comprehend their meaning.
They may as well have been in a foreign tongue.
Many of the books were indeed written in Italian, Greek, Arabic, Latin, rarely ever English.
Even so, it was shocking to her that in that sprawling library, not one single book could aid her. She could have sworn there were once many more books crowding the shelves and wondered if perhaps Xiomara had taken a choice few for her own research, then she decided it did not matter.
Her efforts, it seemed, were futile and she’d collapsed on the library floor, relenting her utter impuissance.
She’d tried to cry, but no tears would come, which allowed her to think instead.
In that time, she’d determined that Ariadne’s lack of belief in her is well founded, though she still greatly resents Ariadne’s choice to cast her aside as she had.
Moira’s criticism of her is not misled, either. She cannot take a life, but the Crone has no such qualms. She cannot possibly hope to oppose such a formidable foe without the use of force, and the very thought of it sickens her.
When Moira had looked her over with utter repugnance and asked, “Where were you?” Iona had been overcome with shame, as she had no answer.
She now reckons with the possibility that Hecate has indeed placed her trust in the wrong witch. She is not strong in the way Zerynthos witches are. Perhaps in time she may come to adopt their strengths and virtues, but the Crone is growing too strong.
She cannot help feeling a sense of inequity in her plight.
Ariadne had been right in saying she cannot possibly learn a lifetime of spells, technique, and instinct in mere weeks or even months.
Ariadne always praises her for her natural proclivity for magic, but that is not enough when faced with a brutal maven like the Crone.
It is as Xiomara feared. Maleficians are depending on Iona’s inexperience to wreak their havoc while they can. She’s failed to inspire fear in their hearts, the way Katrin had. She is not Katrin. She could never be. Morgan hadn’t expected her to be, when she’d sought her out on Samhain.
She’s been going against her own nature for so long, she’s almost forgotten who she is anymore.
And so, she left for Brazil, borrowing one of the Zerynthos’ carriages to make the journey, so that she might continue to improve her healing magic with Jacira. Perhaps in that she can be of some use.
“Arrange these in their proper order,” Jacira instructs, conjuring a full set of human bones.
Iona sighs inwardly but leans forward to sort the bones in piles.
“Now tell me what is troubling you,” Jacira says.
“I do not wish to burden-”
“Enough of that pitying drivel,” Jacira snaps. “We are all of us burdens at one time or other. That is the very purpose of community. It is no sin to rely on the good will of others, but crumbling in silence is pernicious indeed.”
Iona frowns, thinking on the many times Ariadne has done just that, withdrew from others to suffer in silence.
“I miss my mother,” Iona says.
Jacira’s eyes soften. “Samhain is fast approaching.”
“It would be just my luck that some other renowned figure of historical significance should visit me instead,” Iona says, then sighs, “inundating me with their cryptic demands.”
“Then refuse them,” Jacira says.
Iona’s brow furrows. “I cannot, when I have the power to protect the innocent.”
“You don’t owe your power to anyone,” Jacira says.
“But I do.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I cannot sit idly by while others suffer,” Iona says stubbornly.
“No one is asking you to,” Jacira says, “but do not wail and whimper at your misfortunes when you decided to involve yourself. Do not offer your assistance only to let resentment fester in you. No one forced that pendant around your neck.”
Tossing a femur into the dirt, Iona looks down at her pendant and considers her great aunt’s words.
“I should like to take a walk,” she says, beckoning Wisp to follow her.
“The bones,” Jacira starts to say.
With a frustrated wave of Iona’s hand, the bones scatter in all directions. “I’ll fix them upon my return.”
“You needn’t bother,” Jacira says.
Iona goes to ask why, then her mouth falls open at seeing the assemblage of the bones in the shape of a full skeleton laid out on the ground. She hadn’t intended it, which somehow makes it all the more infuriating.