Page 15 of A Circle of Uncommon Witches

THIRTEEN

Ada unrolled a piece of parchment and lifted it from a wooden chest in the cave on the northern side of the island. She thought of the many truths she kept tucked away, and of the lies littered throughout history. The parchment she currently held contained a drawing of a man who had not been much of a human.

King James VI of Scotland, also known as King James I of England, had been a sorry sack of bones. More scared of his own sexuality than the witches he’d hunted, he’d found a way to come after women stronger than him and prove his machismo to men weaker than him. The truth was, he had been a fearful, broken human.

It had been a joy for Ada to ransack his grave.

King James was never canonized, and he wasn’t saintly, not in his behavior. He thought witchery meant women were servants to a creature of the night. He had no idea it was all about connection with the world. With a source of energy. The man credited for transcribing the Bible had, in truth, done nothing more than order its translation. It’s funny how history remembered mediocre men for doing the hard work of others, for owning the world. When really, the world belonged to people like Ada.

Ada had known the wind as a child. She used to hide flowers and wait for the wind to find them, sending their petals and stems twirling back to her. Daffodils and clovers dancing in the air like ballerinas commanding the stage.

She didn’t have other children to play with, living as she did in a castle at the edge of the cliffs. She had the earth instead. She would lie on the ground, meet it back-to-back, and draw its energy up, up, up into her toes. Sip it into her shins, inhale it into her stomach, and drink it along her arms, until finally it filled her mouth and flowed through the rest of her. Ada’d wait until she was filled to the brim with the earth’s energy, before sending it plunging back down. Over and over, she and the earth. Each time sending a larger vibration, a cresting wave, until she was spent and slumbering, the rhythm of the world her lullaby. The hum of the earth was the highest vibration, a series of suspended chords as ethereal as the mist rising off the water and hovering in the air. That sound was deep in her soul.

Ada was protected in the arms of the earth. Safe. Loved. It looked after her, and she, it…

Until it didn’t, and then it was too late. Everything that mattered, the one person who truly mattered, was gone. So Ada did what no other witch before her had dared to do. She stole the song of her sorrow from the hum of the earth. Called it forth and took it without permission or remorse.

Then she set out to do what needed to be done.

In the low light of the cave, where flame flickered and shadows danced to an unhappy tune, Ada returned the parchment to the box and pulled a second from it. This one was newer. The ink on it was still tinged red from the blood pen she’d used to mark it. The face drawn here was young and clever. It was in the eyes, how unflinching the gaze was even in an illustration. She didn’t like how it felt in her hand, this scroll, but she needed it.

Ada drifted toward the flame burning in the center of the room. The flame did not flicker or fade, and she barely glanced its way until she was standing in front of it. Then she held the paper over the flame, wincing as it sparkled and lit. She stepped back right as it went up in a shooting blaze. Smoke billowed and poured out into the room. It soaked into the floor and then oozed back out, a slow drip of a haze coming from the stalactites hanging overhead. As the smoke spread out into the room, it took a shape that was very nearly human.

Like a photograph developing in a dark room, it came into the light slowly as the silhouette found focus and form.

“Hello, Eleanor,” Ada said, her smile a bulb turned up too bright.

Eleanor dusted herself off, looking down at the dress she wore. It was white and flowy, and nothing at all like anything she ever would have chosen for herself. “We both know that isn’t my name and this isn’t my dress.”

“No, but it could have been, if you had stayed put.”

“You found me regardless.”

“I always find you. All of you. You’re mine, after all.”

“We are all our own. You are a thief.”

“I would think you’d be grateful to be summoned.”

“Oh, yes, it’s such a silver lining in my eternity to be called by my own blood and bones that you stole and hid.”

“I told you,” Ada said, sounding bored. “You are mine. Bound by promise and blood.”

“What do you want from me, Queen of Bones?”

“Respect would be nice. But since you’re incapable, I want you to distract the new arrivals. Shouldn’t be too hard.”

Eleanor blinked. “You’re worried about them.”

“I worry about nothing.”

“Yes, you are, if you are sending me and not one of your shadows. You need the real deal instead of an echo of a spirit. Hmm. Why? Ah, I know. You think they’ll figure out the false trials. Return here and take your bones from you and command you to do their bidding. Oh, wouldn’t that be something.”

“It is a waste of the blood and bones I ground and use to call you if you’re just going to mouth off to me, child.”

“Don’t be so hasty.” Eleanor gave a slow curtsy. “As you will it, I will go. What else can I do?”

Ada waved a hand, and Eleanor stepped back to the stone wall. “It’s been hundreds of years, Queen of Bones. If you haven’t found her yet, perhaps you should stop looking.”

“And perhaps you should join the shadows,” Ada replied, not bothering to look at the spirit standing behind her.

“That’s the funny thing about how you’ve cursed us all,” Eleanor said as she faded into the cracks in the room. “We’re all part of the shadows now.”

Then she was gone, and Ada was alone once more, with only a box of fading parchments and broken memories for company.

Doreen stared at Margot, not believing her eyes. Her cousin was a mess, her hair blown back and her clothes dusty and smudged. Yet there she stood, blinking and coughing, before them.

“Dore?” Margot managed, as the air cleared.

That single word, with an inflection on the o , sent Doreen propelling herself out of the circle and throwing herself into the arms of her cousin. Margot was slow to respond, gasping for a moment, until finally she raised her arms and squeezed Doreen so hard she could barely breathe. “Is it really you?”

“If you mean am I really in a creepy underworld and you’re here too, then yes, it’s really me,” Doreen managed to say while being constricted by Margot as if she were a boa.

Margot released her enough to lean back and search her face. “Underworld?”

“I met Ada, the Queen of the Order of the Dead. She’s real and in desperate need of a facial and a boycott on chemical peels. The Order exists, Margs. Along with a slew of other terrifying things.”

“The Order exists,” Margot said, looking around for the first time. “But this isn’t the underworld. It can’t be.”

“How could you tell?” Ambrose asked, and Margot gave a start, spinning to face him.

“Holy gods,” she whispered. “Who chiseled him from stone?”

“Don’t let him hear you,” Doreen said under her breath.

“Is he going to try to attack?”

“No, he just has an ego the size of Manhattan.”

“Funny,” Ambrose said. “How did you know this isn’t the underworld?”

“Because it looks like Scotland. Not the fire of hells and desolate land,” Margot said. “I can hear running water.”

“It’s the sea,” Doreen said. “Beyond the trees are the cliffs.”

“We’re in the Forest of Forgetting,” Ambrose said. “Or a memory of it. It’s where I came the first time. For the first deal I made with Ada. I came here.”

“You made a deal before?” Doreen asked, swiveling on him.

He nodded. “Yes.”

“And you failed to mention this?”

“I was working up to it when you disappeared on me, and then I was stuck in a boulder suffocating, so forgive me for the delay.”

“What was the deal?”

“I think you know.”

“The curse,” she breathed the words.

Ambrose swallowed, looked beyond her. Doreen glowered at him.

“It’s the first of her trials,” he said. “The cave of echoes, voices of the past. She re-created them for us. Here.”

“I’m not in the underworld, right?” Margot said, her voice rising.

“No, it’s a bit worse than that,” Doreen said, not taking her eyes from Ambrose. “Think of it as Alternate Scotland. But with angry demon horses and our ancestors. What it really is, is a trap for us by the queen of the dead.”

“She wants to eat your souls,” Ambrose added.

“Our souls?” Margot whispered, her voice still shaky.

“It could be worse,” Ambrose said.

“How?”

“I don’t know, it seemed a nice thing to say.”

“Something nice coming from the fool who cursed us,” Doreen said, unsure what to do with him next. “I can’t believe you took me to her. Did you plan for her to trap me here?”

Ambrose stared at the two witches who faced him. Doreen, with skin as white as a porcelain doll and just as smooth. Her eyes honey brown and her hair a coppery red shade only an artist could dream up. Margot, with her chestnut curls and brown skin, her sapphire eyes, and lashes so long they mesmerized. They didn’t look like sisters, but they spoke and moved like them. Doreen had said they were cousins, but here stood a bond stronger than any he’d had with a single family member. It was in how they shifted closer together, their bodies responding without them ever making eye contact.

Both were prepared to move at him, to take him down. It was time to tell the truth before Ada’s forest told it for him. He couldn’t risk it replaying what had happened, using him as a puppet.

“I came to Ada after Lenora was sent from me, after I received word she had died. I was desperate and heartbroken.”

“And?” Doreen asked, her hands curled into fists at her side.

“And I made a deal.”

“With a ghost,” Doreen said.

“With the queen of the dead.”

“Who is the ghost,” Margot added.

“I made a deal,” Ambrose repeated. “And she gave me the spell for the curse.”

“The one you cast against us,” Doreen said.

“Against your family. You didn’t exist.”

“We barely get to now,” Margot said.

“You knew Ada,” Doreen said. “And you brought me to her, after she cursed my family.”

“She’s the only one who knew the way to the trials.”

“These aren’t those trials.”

“I didn’t know that!”

“Ah.”

“Ah?” Ambrose said.

“You wanted to do the trials, to transform. You never cared about helping me.”

“Why would he help you?” Margot asked.

“Doreen, you saved my life, you freed me,” Ambrose said. “I am bound to serve you, and I vow to be honest with you.”

“You’re her bodyguard?”

“He’s a pain in my ass,” Doreen said. “Did you already know about the trials when I let you out of the Dead House?”

“Yes.”

“What are the trials?” Margot asked.

“They’re a way to transform,” Doreen said. “Magically, I presume. And the way to break the curse.”

“The curse Ada gave him?” Margot asked.

“Apparently.”

“No, they are the way to make sure no one ever hurts me like your family did again,” Ambrose said. “That is what the transformation means.”

Doreen’s mouth dropped. “So the original trials don’t even break my curse ?”

“I’m the only one who can break your curse,” he said, raising his voice to match hers.

“What?” Doreen lifted her hands, and a violent wind blew cold as it crossed through the forest, bringing with it darkening clouds and the smell of ashes and roses in bloom.

“Dore?” Margot asked, holding a hand overhead.

“That’s not me,” she said, dropping her arms as the winds swept through, building as they blew, strong and harsh.

“It is a forgetting storm,” Ambrose said, and swayed on his feet. “We need to get into the cave.”

Margot raised a brow. “You want me to go into a cave with you, when you cursed my whole family and my Dean?”

“What’s a Dean?” Ambrose asked, putting one hand out as he slumped.

“It’s her husband,” Doreen said, glaring daggers at him. “The one enthralled to her. Thanks to your curse.”

“It’s not a thrall,” Margot said. “It’s real.”

“You can’t know for certain.”

“Are you two always like this?” Ambrose asked, running a hand over his brow, his color dropping from pale to practically see-through.

“You’re not looking good,” Doreen said, studying him.

“The storm is bad,” he said, before he swayed a second time and stumbled forward.

“Shit,” Doreen said, stepping into the circle and weaving an arm across the back of him. “Lean. Don’t you dare die on me before I have a chance to kick your ass.”

Margot stared, mouth wide open.

“Are you going to gawk at me or help?”

“I’m going to ask what the hell is going on.”

“We’re in an underworld prison, Ambrose was nearly dead for some time, and I am saving him now and maybe throttling him later. You showed up, and so did the storm, so unless we want to wait for it to start raining rabid cats or demonic horses—”

“Don’t you mean dogs?”

“Not after swimming in the moat. Unless you want to risk what will come next, we might want to get out of its way, and going into the cave is the only option I see.”

Margot sighed, dusted herself off, and walked over to where Doreen stood inside the circle. “How many times have you saved him, Dore?”

“A few.”

“Gonna be tough for him to balance the scales.”

“As long as he doesn’t hex anyone, we’re good.” She winced. “Bad joke.” She poked him in the side. “ Do not hex us again.”

Ambrose didn’t respond, having fully fainted, but a loud crack shook across the sky, and the temperature dropped another ten degrees.

“Okay, we really need to get him into the cave now .”

Margot stood on the other side of the circle, and Doreen steered him closer. Margot took hold of Ambrose’s other side, and they exited the circle, hurrying toward the cave as fast as they could whilst dragging a large man. Once they had him inside the entrance, they paused under the overhang to catch their breath. Ambrose was deadweight, unconscious and unmoving.

“He said he could break the curse. He’s known this whole time,” Doreen said. “I’m an idiot.”

“No, you’re not,” Margot replied. “You don’t know what it might cost if he does.” She paused. “I can’t believe I’m defending him.”

“Ha. Well, I’m going to find out the cost.” She looked up at the dark sky, shifting as she held Ambrose up. “He must really want the transformation.”

“What’s the transformation?”

“Ada used it to turn herself into the ghoul she is now.”

“She beat the trials to become a queen?”

“No.” Doreen rubbed her shoulder with her free hand. “She didn’t want to be whatever she is. She said she chose wrong.”

“Maybe he thinks he knows how to choose right.”

“Maybe he is full of shit.”

“He’s certainly full of something; gods, is he heavy,” Margot said as rain sleeted down and she staggered under his weight. “The storm is moving closer, and I don’t want to get hit by acid rain or whatever that might be. We need to go in deeper.”

Together they dragged him inside. A light flickered on, and Doreen and Margot shared a look.

“Is there electrical wiring in the caves of the underworld?” Margot asked.

“I’d like to say yes, but I am thinking no.”

“So what do we do?”

A shape shifted out of the shadows and stepped forward. “I think you may be running out of time,” Eleanor said, giving Doreen a small smile. “I had hoped things might be easier for you, but things so rarely are easy here.”

Doreen’s shoulders relaxed and she shifted her weight to better support Ambrose. “I was worried you were a kelpie who learned how to run.”

“Little is worse than the guardians of the waterways,” Eleanor said, wrinkling her nose. “Come inside, before the skies open and the forgetting begins.”

“The forgetting?” Margot asked. She looked from Doreen to Eleanor.

“Margot, this is Eleanor. One of our ancestors, the one who helped me when I was lost and explained what this place is and how we are all screwed, and how Ada is a queenly asshole.”

“The rain brings with it the ability to steal your memories; it will make sure you have forgotten what you must remember,” Eleanor said, sniffing the air. She nodded to Margot. “You are one of ours as well, though I do not think you were meant to be here.”

“My mom bound me out of the family line, and I was able to call myself to Doreen, though who knew I would be entering hell.”

“They did what?” Doreen said, shock skittering over her features and leaving her paler than Ambrose. “They’ve never unbound family before.”

“They unbound us both.”

Doreen blinked, her face pale and eyes bright.

“I’m sorry,” Eleanor said. “Come in, kin of mine, and bring that miserable bag of bones. We don’t want a single memory of yours to wash away; you can’t spare to lose any on this night.”

Eleanor shifted back into the cave, Margot and Doreen slowly hauling themselves and Ambrose in after her.