DoubleDown V (29 page)

“The potion with the skull in it?”

“Yes.”

“Is that what Pete was missing?”

“No. Without my knowledge, he had obtained a skull himself.”

“Then what was he missing?”

“Well, there are two parts of the spell. The first prepares the body to welcome the spirit to inhabit it, to meld the new spirit with the body, but the other part of the spell has to do with selecting the spirit to be installed in the body, calling the spirit if you will. That requires something very personal.”

“Personal? You mean like a personal item that belonged to Bobby? Like an article of clothing or a favorite book?”

Penelope shook her head. “I’m talking much more personal than that. I mean something that came from his body.”

Karen held up her arm to showcase the bracelet she wore. “You mean like the hair you used in the talismans.”

“Hair is not potent enough for this kind of magick. It has to be something from inside.”

“Inside? You mean like an internal organ? How do you expect to get something like that?”

As if reading Karen’s mind, Penelope laughed and said, “Don’t worry, there will be no more need of grave robbing. I already have something that will do.”

“Like what?”

“When Bobby was a little boy, he had to have his tonsils out. The doctors gave them to me in a jar. I don’t know if they still do that sort of thing, but they did back then. I’ve kept them all these years.”

“His tonsils?”

“Yes, and I’ll use them in the spell to get Bobby in Pete’s body, and then I’ll finally have my son back.”

Penelope started to weep softly, and Karen thought about what Bobby had said at the cemetery, how his mother clung so tightly to him and just wouldn’t let go. What would happen if something went wrong and the spell didn’t work? There was no doubt that Penelope would try again. She would keep trying, no matter what it took, for the rest of her life.

And this made Karen think of her promise to him.

Karen stood, and Penelope composed herself and said, “You should shower here and change, I have some clothes that’ll fit well enough. If you go back to the dorm looking like…well, like you just dug up a grave, might draw unwanted attention.”

“Okay. Where’s Bobby?”

“He’s out back, said he wanted to be alone. He told me to tell you good-bye and to remind you of your promise.”

Karen had started toward the hallway but stopped suddenly, and instantly put up a mental shield around her thoughts. This was one of the first things Penelope had taught her, and she’d gotten quite adept at it.

“What promise was that?” Penelope asked in a casual tone. Too casual.

“I just promised him that I would make sure we got him back.”

“I promised him the same thing, and we’re going to keep that promise. Come hell or high water, the two of us are going to keep that promise.”

*   *   *

After scrubbing in the shower and changing into a pair of sweats that were a bit too big but serviceable, Karen left. She was happy to be away from Penelope, and even from Bobby, for the moment. What they had done, combined with the nightmare that lingered in her mind, had left her shaken and unsure of herself, unsure if she was doing the right thing.

Perhaps the coven was right. They had said that what Penelope planned was unnatural and wrong, and Karen had scoffed. After all, what could be wrong with a mother wanting her son back?

But after digging up a grave and severing the head of a corpse, even if Karen herself hadn’t done the severing herself…well, that certainly felt unnatural and wrong. In fact, what could be more unnatural and wrong than desecrating someone’s final resting place and defiling their body?

But there was context here, an ultimate goal that justified the means…didn’t it? This was all for Bobby, to restore him to life, to give him the chance that the car robbed him of all those years ago.

Or was that reasoning too much like “two wrongs make a right”?

Karen pondered these things on the drive back to campus, her thoughts circling like dogs chasing their tails. She kept thinking how different her life had been a year ago. Then she’d been a relatively normal girl with a strange gift to make objects move. She’d thought the problems she’d had then—her lack of friends other than Brittany, kind but indifferent parents—had been huge, but now she recognized how petty they were.

Now she was a full-fledged witch about to undergo a massive spell that could alter several lives, including her own. She was messing with life and death, something she’d been raised to believe was the domain of God alone.

And the only people she had to talk to about all of this was an older witch who had been known to keep things from her, and a boy who had been dead for years.

Whom she loved.

As Karen pulled into the student lot, she decided to take a page from Scarlett O’Hara. She wouldn’t think about it, at least not for the rest of the day. Her brain needed a break. Even though she’d slept so long at Penelope’s, she felt she could sleep more. She wasn’t only physically exhausted but also mentally drained.

She would trudge to the dorm, take another, longer shower, then crawl under the covers until morning.

She had just reached the dorm and was about to go inside when she thought she heard her name. Faint but distinct. She glanced around. It was dark, but the campus was well lit, and she saw no one. Probably her overworked mind playing tricks on her.

*   *   *

From the shadows of a cluster of nearby trees, the indistinct form tried to call out to Karen again but no sound carried on the night air. After she disappeared inside the dorm, the figure simply faded away.

The winter had been mild, much milder than the West Virginia winters Karen was used to. There had been a little ice, a few snow flurries that didn’t accumulate, but no real winter in the strictest sense. She did get a kick out of the way people in South Carolina bundled up when it was only forty-five degrees out; they’d run to the store to stock up on milk and bread at the mere mention of snow, as if they feared they’d be trapped in their homes for weeks with no way to get provisions.

Now spring was knocking at the door, making its presence known with budding flowers and birdsong. A time of renewal, of rebirth…normally it was Karen’s favorite season, but this year it filled her with a mixture of hope and dread that left her slightly nauseated.

The second week of March, she was walking along the Swamp Rabbit Trail toward Traveler’s Rest, Bobby tagging along beside her. They had taken to having daily walks. Because the warm weather was bringing out joggers, power walkers, and bicyclers by the droves, they didn’t get to talk much during these walks, but that was okay. It was enough just to be with him. It made her feel better about…well, about everything really.

Halfway to Traveler’s Rest, Karen veered off the trail, Bobby following. They took a small paved path into a recently built physical fitness park. Instead of the usual equipment one might expect, this one contained work-out equipment, metal contraptions like torture devices, that would use your own weight to help you work your arms and legs.

The park was usually deserted. As it was today. Karen sat on a bench at the far end of the park, Bobby settling next to her.

“So,” she said, “are you getting nervous?”

Bobby laughed and said, “Oh yeah. Big time. Although I’m not sure if I’m more nervous that the spell won’t work…or that it will.”

“Why would you say that?”

“I don’t know, it’s weird. I’ve been stuck in this limbo state for so long, the very idea of being in a flesh and blood body again terrifies me. I mean, maybe I had my time and should just gracefully bow out.”

“Bobby, you were only nineteen when you died. You barely got started.”

“Plenty of people die younger than I was. Why should I get a second chance when they don’t? Some people die young, some people live to a ripe old age. It might not be fair, but it’s the natural way of things.”

“There’s nothing natural about getting run down by a car.”

Bobby opened his mouth but closed it without saying anything.

“Look, I know you’re nervous,” Karen said. “I’m nervous, your mother is nervous. But I believe this is going to work. In just over a week’s time, I’m going to take you out to dinner and we’re going to walk through downtown hand in hand. You want that, don’t you?”

“You know I do. It’s just….”

Bobby trailed off as if he’d lost his train of thought, but his eyes widened as he stared over Karen’s shoulder. Karen felt a chill run down her back like a stream of water. Something told her she didn’t want to turn around and see what had captured Bobby’s attention, but she did so anyway.

She was totally unprepared for who she saw standing at the entrance to the park.

“Jacoby,” she said, jumping to her feet. It was him, right down to his unkempt beard, but he seemed…insubstantial. Faded, like an old photograph. In fact, while she stared at him, he seemed to flicker.

“I don’t think I have long,” he said, his voice sounding tinny and faraway.

“What are you doing here?” Karen said, stepping closer to the thought form, who at this point seemed more thought than form. “I bound the powers of everyone in the coven. How did they conjure you?”

“They didn’t, I conjured myself.”

Karen glanced at Bobby, but he shrugged and said, “I’ve never heard of a thought form conjuring itself.”

“I don’t know how I’m doing it,” Jacoby said, his voice fading in and out like a radio with the speaker going bad. “Maybe because the coven has used me so many times I’ve developed more of a consciousness than is typical for a thought form. I just know that I have been very worried about you. I’ve tried several times over the past couple of weeks to manifest to you but I couldn’t draw enough energy. And I don’t know how long I’m going to last now, I’m burning out quickly, but there is something I need to tell you.”

“Jacoby, I know you mean well, but I’ve made up my mind, I’m going to do the spell.”

“This isn’t about the spell. Not directly. There’s something I think Bobby has a right to know.”

“Me?” Bobby said, narrowing his eyes suspiciously. “What could you possibly have to tell me?”

“Simply this. The reason you don’t see any other spirits is because spirits don’t typically stick around on this plane. Contrary to what those paranormal TV shows would have you believe, the world is not full of ghosts. There is an order to things, and once this life is over, you move on to the next stage.”

“And what is that?” Bobby asked.

“I don’t know. No one who hasn’t gone there knows, and no one who goes there comes back. I just know you should have moved on years ago, but you are stuck. Your mother has trapped you here.”

“What?” Karen and Bobby said simultaneously.

“The reason you’re stuck here as a ghost is that your mother performed a spell to keep you from moving on, to keep you bound to her. I don’t know all the specifics of the spell, but I heard the coven say that it involved her keeping a piece of you.”

“His tonsils,” Karen said in a whisper.

“You’re saying my mother has intentionally kept me from moving on,” Bobby said, but he didn’t sound incredulous.

Jacoby faded, becoming transparent, and Karen thought he was going to disappear altogether, but he seemed to regain himself. “She can’t let you go, Bobby. Even though she is preventing you from taking a journey that is rightfully yours. The only way you can be free is to destroy the piece of you she possesses.”

Then Jacoby turned his translucent eyes on Karen. “You know, you made me feel almost human. You made me
feel
…more deeply than I ever had before. I could almost believe I was a real person when I was with you. I’m going to miss you.”

Jacoby reached out and placed his fingers on Karen’s cheek. They weren’t solid, they weren’t flesh, but she could still feel them, a minute pressure on her skin. Phantom fingers. She reached out to touch his face, but he was gone. Suddenly and completely, not even a Cheshire-cat grin lingering after. She felt his touch on her cheek for a moment more, then it too faded.

“Did that really just happen?” she said to herself, then turned toward Bobby. He was frozen in place, his expression unreadable. “Bobby, are you—”

“Did you hear what he said?”

“Yes, I heard it. Do you believe it?”

“I don’t want to, I want to think it’s just a trick…but it makes too much sense. She couldn’t let me go, so she kept me here. She kept me here so I couldn’t move on, all these years, until she could find a way to shove me into another body. It’s exactly the kind of thing she would do.”

Karen opened her mouth but wasn’t sure what she would say. Truth was that it did seem exactly the kind of thing Penelope would do. “Even if what Jacoby said is true, it’s also understandable. She just didn’t want to lose her son.”

“She did what she always does. Lies, manipulates. She’ll get what she wants, no matter what she has to do to get it, who she has to hurt.”

“Bobby, calm down. Let’s talk about—”

“You don’t know, Karen, you don’t know the things she has done to make this happen. And I kept her secrets, which makes me complicit. Oh God, how did I ever let it get this far?”

“I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

Bobby stared at her with such intensity that it frightened her. He made several attempts to speak before finally getting the words out. “Derek…he didn’t attack you.”