Wicked Circle

CHAPTER THREE

I stood on a mist-shrouded shore in the dark. Not the shore of the rivers in Pittsburgh, however. The willow tree to my right meant this was the shore of my meditation world.

My view was limited to about a dozen yards in any direction. I made a full revolution, searching the thick white air for a telltale sign of Amenemhab, my totem animal, but the jackal was nowhere to be seen.

What am I doing here? I couldn’t remember slipping into what I called my “alpha state” and prompting this visualization. The white dress I wore didn’t help clarify anything for me. Am I dreaming?

A strange, trumpeting bellow made me spin toward the water again. It was not a sound I could readily identify.

The heads of two black dragons materialized from the mist before me. They floated side by side with their necks arched like swans, wings tucked down. Nothing like the eel-ish and smooth-skinned creatures at home in the barn, these dragons had scales and horns and gills. Silver crowns adorned the bases of their horns, and I saw a flash of crimson embedded in the metal. Strands of rubies and diamonds draped to a ring hooked on their rhinolike snout horns. A silver yoke linked them to a wide plank that ran between their long bodies.

It was connected to a tree they towed through the water. Not a log floating behind them, but a branched tree, upright. Squinting, I tried to make sense of what I saw. The trunk was dark, gnarled and angled, as if it had grown in shadow and had had to reach for light. As it neared I saw it was actually a cluster of trunks. In some places, the trunks were like stacked drainpipes, in other spots the bark had smoothed over like scarred skin.

By that, and the evergreen foliage, I identified it as a yew tree. The branches stretched twice as wide as it was high, and enclosed lanterns were hung along the outer perimeter. In their soft glow, black veils hung closer to the trunk and fluttered eerily, defining the base of the rectangular boat.

I noticed a woman sitting on the sloping tree trunk. Her somber pose reminded me of Waterhouse’s Ophelia. Her head was down, the gray hood of her cloak raised. Dark hair spilled down her chest like ink. Her fingers trailed in the water beside her, and her pale, smooth skin had the barest trace of phosphorescence.

The dragons neared the shoreline and lurched suddenly. As they sloshed forward I realized that in addition to their wings, they had four limbs! The dragons I knew didn’t have legs.

I retreated three steps as they brought themselves—and their passenger—right to me.

When they stood ankle-deep in the river, the wide plank plowed into the sandy mud and they halted. One shook his mighty head, and the gemstones flashed in the dim light. The other one warbled in response. The teeth in that mighty maw were as long as steak knives.

I went stock-still, thinking stupidly of the Jurassic Park movie. These aren’t tyrannosaurs, these are dragons.

Movement behind them caught my attention as the woman drew away from the water. Her dress, like mine, had long bell sleeves, but hers had been dragging through the water. They dripped as she gestured for me to join her in the boat.

The plank, it seemed, also served as a gangway, but the mere idea of walking between the dragons with their rows of sharp teeth wasn’t a notion that snuggled up to my sense of well-being.

Guardedly, I went forward. The beasts did nothing but benevolently watch me, so I dared onward. The plank creaked under my weight, and once past the dragon’s long necks, I raised my arms for balance.

Ducking under the foremost branches, I got a better view of the boat bottom. It seemed the tree roots had crawled free of the earth and woven together to form this slender, watertight vessel. At the bow I waited for my host to indicate if I should sit down or come closer.

Her hair had faded to gray. The skin on her hands was like spotted parchment. Her hood shifted slightly as her head rose and her chin jutted toward me. Her smooth cheeks had wrinkled and grown sallow. Her eyes remained hidden in the shadows of the hood.

Even so, I knew her. I had been witness to this transformation before and wasn’t surprised when the cloying fragrance of raisin and currant cakes filled my nostrils.

“Hecate.” I sank to my knees.

The dragons backed the boat onto the lake once more. I tried not to think of the shore that was getting farther and farther away.

For minutes we remained with me on my knees, the world silent except for the gentle splash of water as the dragons swam. When finally She spoke, Hecate said, “The company of men can be warm and pleasant, but men are willful where women are involved. More so when she is a woman of power. Like you.”

The Goddess brought me here to give me dating advice? Dumbfounded, I simply nodded.

“The vampire wizard marked you once, but here in this place, we reversed it onto him. When you showed him you would wield the power you had over him, when you put him on his knees before you, it prompted his planning.”

“Planning what?”

“Another way to control you.”

My brows lowered.

“In signum amoris. ‘A sign of love.’ ” She spat into the bottom of the boat.

In signum amoris, the spell Menessos had performed on Johnny and me. He had not asked permission, he’d just acted as he’d seen fit. At the time of the offense, he’d cooled the heat of my fury by explaining that it had created an important link between Johnny and me. “Because of that spell, Johnny and I have been able to communicate telepathically when touching.”

Hecate rose from Her seat and shuffled toward me. “A nice benefit to be sure, child, but the vampire did not tell you what else he did.” Her misshapen fingers gripped my chin and forced me to look at Her just as the breeze lowered Her hood.

The goddess’s eyes were the eyes of the moon, eyes that had stared into the sun for eons. They were the most bizarre color—the color I see in the dark after staring too long into a candle’s flame. I focused on Her face, which was haggard and hard but not unkind.

“He was a part of that binding. He can also hear your thoughts when he touches you . . . and yet he can shield you from his own thoughts.”

Bastard. He’d claimed that spell amped up the imprinting bond that already existed between Johnny and me. He’d said it was all for my safety, so Johnny could feel my strong emotions and ride to my rescue if necessary. The bond hadn’t been any help when the Rege had kidnapped me, but the concussion I’d suffered had probably interfered.

“It is vexing that he waited until there was nothing you could have done to oppose him. Disguised in your intimacy, the spell was complete before you knew it was happening.” She released me and made a flicking gesture that caused the tree roots to form a seat behind Her as She sat. “He knew the sorsanimus would become necessary. Because the three of you are now additionally bound tight with that soul-sharing, he can use his ‘sign of love’ to read you. Through it, he can learn what you would otherwise hide, and therefore, his words can manipulate you to his aims more efficiently.”

“Are You saying that his goal isn’t the same as Yours?”

“I see the past that was, the present that is, and all the possibilities that the future holds, but Menessos travels a road unlike that of any other man. His path is unceasing, like that of a god. His choices are bold and yet unavoidably bound to the slaking of an unquenchable thirst. His purpose is difficult to define.”

“I thought he was Your servant. At the Eximium, You told him he was forgiven.”

She cocked Her head. “Menessos serves no one but himself. Sometimes even that selfishness can become a path that aligns with the goals of a goddess.”

“What were You forgiving him for?”

Hecate’s cackle of laughter echoed across the lake. She made no effort to answer.

That didn’t surprise me. We weren’t here to discuss Menessos’s past. We were here to discuss what he’d done without my permission. Including Johnny in it made it doubly wrong—even if Menessos’s intentions had been pure, and he was evidently incapable of pure intentions.

“The triangular power base the three of you have formed now binds you to each other, but it will not be pliable forever.”

“What do you mean?”

“Like an infant’s bones, such constructs harden as they age. Your triangle will break if each side is not equal to the others.”

“It could break?”

“You are all striving to adjust to the pressure put upon you; should one grow too fast, it burdens the other sides. The sides of the triangle stretch as each of you grow. This forces a matched pace upon you all. If one stumbles or fails to meet your challenges, you risk collapse and the failure of all.”

I considered this. “So you’re saying the in signum amoris has to go.”

“Indeed.” She added, “The sides must be equal. Not even your side can dominate.”

“How do I get rid of it?”

Her strange gaze was a physical touch upon me, raising the hair along my arms and up the nape of my neck. “The sorsanimus binding is virtually impervious. That shielding links the three of you together. It is a protection like thick stone walls.” She sat forward and clenched Her hands to characterize strength. “And you will all need that. By comparison, the vampire’s ‘sign of love’ is but a wooden fence.” Her pose relaxed and though She sat back, Her chin remained elevated. “Yet even that could destroy you all.”

“And there’s no way for Johnny and I to grow to match this?”

“It gives the vampire an unfair advantage. Rather than try to re-create it for yourself and the wolf, remove it.”

“How?”

“You must unmake it. Burn his fence to the ground, so to speak.”

I stood, ready. “It’s here? A physical fence in this world?”

She motioned for me to sit. “You passed the test of fire here,” she said. “Passed the test of water.”

Fire was represented by the south. I’d witnessed my own burning at the stake in that test. Water corresponded to the west. I’d nearly drowned during that test. A deosil path around the pagan elemental compass would mean that earth was the next element, yet something in my gut nagged at me. She’d hauled me out on the water and away from land, away from earth.

“Air?” I asked.

“Air,” she said.