More Than Magic (2 page)

“Right. Be sure to hang on to the movie options,” Matt replied.

For a moment the only sound in the office was the soft shushing from the air vents and the muffled voice of Matt’s admin on the phone out front.

“So, you’re still not cleared for duty then.” It was a reflection of their long friendship that Matt could read between the lines and get right to the heart of the matter.

And it was a reflection of how dog-tired he felt that Nick didn’t even bristle. “Not yet. The guys in the white coats told me to take it easy a while longer.”

“But…I thought you were…Uh—”

“You can say it, Matt. Driving a desk. Apparently they don’t even want me doing that at this point.” Nick shrugged. “Special assignment or no.”

“Well, whatever it is you are
really
here for, you can stay with us.”

Nick shook his head. “Not right off. I wouldn’t surprise Cheryl like that. But I’m going to be here a while. Got a cabin at some health resort up in the mountains.”

Matt’s mouth opened, then closed, then opened again. “You. Up
in
the mountains.”

It was Nick’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Hey. I know my way around in the woods.”

“Tropical forests maybe. Columbia. But you’re more at home in the canyons of the big city and the halls of power.”

“I was born down here, you know.”

“I know where you were born and trust me, you are a city-boy in every way that counts. Anyway, that proves it’s not an assignment. No one in their right mind would send Slick Nick into those hills. One of the locals would have your metropolitan hide tacked on the wall in no time, alongside the painter skin.”

Nick grimaced. Only Matt got away with bandying about that particular nickname. “I’m trying real hard not to visualize Van Gogh’s head mounted on a wooden plaque. They have something against art, these mountainfolk?”

“Art?” Matt seemed baffled. “Oh.
Painter
.” He snorted. “See? Perfect example. You
better
not be on a case.”

Another raised eyebrow from Nick changed Matt’s expression to a barely concealed smirk.

“A painter is a panther. A mountain lion really, but they’ve called them painters up there since the first settlers. Not many left in these mountains now, if any. But bears? We got tons of bears.”

Matt seemed to enjoy this far too much, but Nick couldn’t really blame him. He had done his own share of ribbing when the soft-spoken Southerner was stranded away from his beloved mountains in Nick’s more cosmopolitan canyons.

“So, do I need a translator or a shotgun or both?”

That succeeded in wiping the smile completely off Matt’s face. “Likely both, but not for the wildlife. Don’t get me wrong, the majority of folks up there are fine, upstanding citizens. But the isolation of those coves and hollers—hollows,” he managed not to smile, barely, “attracts some interesting individuals.”

“Attracts? You mean people move up there on purpose?”
 

Matt looked suddenly serious. “Maybe I
should
go up there with you.”

Nick grinned at the concern in his friend’s voice. “Nah. But you could loan me a dictionary. Smoky Mountainese. What is it, a dialect? Or do they have an official language up there?”

“I’d loan you mine, but it’s too big for you to carry around with you.” Matt glanced over at his bookshelf.

“You’re kidding.” Nick followed Matt’s gaze and walked over to find there was such a book: an academic looking hardcover of pretty good size.

“No joke. It’s a special place up there,” Matt said. “The culture and language of the settlers and the culture and language of the native tribes, then the land itself…well it created something a bit magical. Lots of New Age types attracted to it, plus the back-to-nature types, and the plain old completely off-the-grid types.”

“Magical huh? Off-the-grid and back-to-nature and New Age I’ve seen.”

Matt’s serious demeanor slipped back into that easy grin of his. “You ain’t seen off-the-grid till you see some of the serious self-sufficiency stuff going on up on the balds, and then there’s the way some of the folks back up in those hollers still live. Pure turn of the century.”

“Balds?”

“Hell Nick, why
do
you want to go up there?” Matt was obviously through with the banter. The concerned friend was showing again. “There’s
no way
you’ll be comfortable without at least some city life nearby. And if you’re supposed to be resting—”

If my boss is right, that is exactly what this is about—an excuse to get the sick guy out of his hair and off for a nice rest in the mountains.

“I’ve had enough rest. I need to get back into shape.
Someone
keeps telling me about the beauty of nature up in those mountains. I figure a few hikes, some fresh air, good food…”

“Stay down here. The fall color’s pretty much peaked out up there. And Cheryl’s on this vegan kick.” Matt patted a non-existent paunch. “I need to get out and do some walking myself. There are some excellent trails.”

Nick shook his head. “I already have a reservation. And from what they tell me, that place is pretty well known for good food and natural cures. And there’s a hot spring nearby where you can go soak your tired ass, which is sounding real good to me right about now.”

Matt nodded. “Patton Springs. I know the place. It was pretty famous back in the day. Lots of folks came for the ‘cure’ before it fell out of fashion.”

“The magic got used up?”

“Heh. No, it was more mundane than that. Curative waters weren’t so popular anymore. That, and the hotel kept going up in flames.”

Nick looked at the smoky hills again.

“Nothing sinister. Just bad luck and bad wiring.” Matt sounded resigned. “So, where
are
you staying up there?”

Nick smiled at Matt’s tone. “Some place called Woodruff Herb Farm.”

“Woodruff.” Matt hunkered over his keyboard once more. “That name sounds familiar for some reason.”

“And the old investigator raises his pointy head. I better get up the road before it gets dark and I get lost up in one of those ‘hollers’ of yours.” Nick replaced the photograph, picked up his jacket and headed for the door. “And before you find another reason I shouldn’t go up there.”

And before one of the gangs in Atlanta stumbles onto the source for Smoky Mountain Magic and all hell breaks loose right here in your own backyard.

Matt stood, coming around the desk. “Can’t you at least have supper and stay the night tonight? Cheryl’ll kill me if—”

“So don’t tell her. I promise I’ll come back. I have to meet this future quarterback of yours. Maybe Thanksgiving?”

Shaking his head, Matt sighed. “All right then. Thanksgiving. Absolutely.”

Nick started to open the door and Matt reached out to hold it shut.

Nick looked pointedly at the offending hand. “And I promise to bring a
good
bottle of wine this time?”

“Whatever’s really going on up there, whatever that sixth sense thing of yours is leading you into, be careful. You may not have a little quarterback waiting for you at home, but— Well, maybe you
should
. It kind of changes your perspective.”

I bet it does. But it’s not going to happen.

“And stay in touch with somebody this time. You know who your sister calls when she gets worried about you.”

“I’ve got my cell,” Nick said, then added quickly. “And before you tell me cells are useless up there, the place I’m going to has a cellular extender.”
Which is one of the reasons I narrowed my target down to that mountain.

Matt frowned. “Really?”

“Yeah. Really.” Nick grinned. “Now can I leave,
Dad
?”

Matt opened the door and waved him out. “Wait until you have one of your own,” he said to Nick’s back.

Nick rolled his eyes at Matt’s assistant, who returned a knowing smile as he left the outer office.

Despite the lecture, he was glad he’d stopped by. It was a good idea for the one person he had ever trusted with his life to know where he was. Not that he didn’t trust his boss, who was the only person who knew the details, or the local guys who only knew he was in their backyard on some special project. But even though Matt had left the Agency, Nick liked to think Matt still had his back. And with luck Matt would never need to know that Nick had pulled the wool over his eyes. He hoped that would be the worst part of this case, deceiving his closest friend. But his gut told him that wasn’t the worst part. Not even close.

His gut told him that, one way or another, he was a dead man.

“Poison.”
It was a whisper in the air, but when Grace spun around there was no one there. Nothing except the filthy blackness boiling along the forest floor, devouring everything in its path.

Grace ran on, slipping on leaves and damp rocks, listening desperately for signs of pursuit, hearing nothing but the mountain’s murmurs and her own ragged breathing.

“Blight,”
came the same soft voice, behind her again, but she knew she would see nothing if she turned.

She clambered sideways, up a rocky outcropping, her fingers slipping on the damp surface so that she nearly fell back into the shadowy miasma. For a moment she looked down at it coiling beneath her like some smoky serpent. She pulled herself up, barely, and staggered on, exhausted.

But no matter which way she went it followed her, slithering toward her home, toward everything and everyone she was trying to protect.

“Bane.”
The voice was urgent now and loud at her back and the mountain was singing again—that same raw, penetrating sound she had heard in the hospital.

Her own shadow loomed up before her, lurching wildly as if some bright light bloomed and faded behind her. Then the crackling of flames and the smell of burning fabric overwhelmed every other sense.

“Ward!”
The voice, from behind her once more, and the song rose to a crescendo
.

Grace spun to see the oily darkness stop and crest, like an ocean wave trembling over her, but moving and bubbling beneath the surface. In front of her stood a woman, her hand upraised, facing the reeking void. Flames leaped up her long skirts to catch her sleeve and then crawled up her long red hair.
 

Granny Lily?

Overwhelmed, Grace stumbled, falling sideways onto the forest floor as the black wave towered over them and Granny Lily screamed, shrieking defiance at the darkness as half of her face bubbled and burned.
“WARD!”

Grace started awake, the scream still ringing in her ears. Her heart pounded wildly as she jerked upright and caught sight of her own face, pale as smoke, wavering before her on the dark screen of her laptop. Another nightmare. She took a deep breath. And Granny Lily again. This had to stop or—

Another shriek had her shivering and rubbing her arms. She looked out at the garden.

Jamie tumbled around in the leaves outside with Pooka, giggling madly. Apparently
raking
said leaves had been abandoned in favor of some fun with the old hound. Not a nightmare then. A daymare. Grace sighed and took out her hair clip with unsteady fingers, pulling her hair into a sloppy pony tail. She watched her ghostly reflection disappear as the laptop woke up and the results she had been reviewing flickered onto the screen.

At least the numbers were moving in the right direction. Hard to believe that she would be glad to see the Goldenseal seedlings they worked so hard to propagate actually slow their growth rate. Hopefully, the rhizomes on this group weren’t developed enough to test yet, which would be further proof her efforts were paying off. It had been sheer luck that their last batch of herbs hadn’t been sent to their contract testing lab.

Grace’s cell phone chimed and she checked the display. Daniel.

“Hey, you,” she answered. “What time is it there?”

“
Konnichiwa
, sis. It’s tomorrow here.” Daniel didn’t sound like his normal self. But then again, nothing had been normal for a while now.

“And where’s here, other than in Japan somewhere?”

“Tsukuba. Just north of Tokyo. I’m at the National Institute of Livestock and Grassland Science, for the moment.”

“Continuing your never ending quest to learn to say ‘I love you’ in every language on earth,” she teased.

“Yeah, well. Would you believe I’m homesick for the mountain?” Daniel replied.

“So, if you’re so homesick, why are you there and not here?” she prodded, only half joking.

“I hope to get home sometime during the holidays,” he said. “Can you hang in there till then?”

Grace stood and paced to the sunroom doors. “You’ve been talking to Ouida. I’m fine.”

“You shut down production. You cancel the holiday rentals. You send Ouida and Eddie off on vacation. I don’t even think Eddie’s been off that mountain since he was born.”

“I had to overnight Ouida’s recipe card file to her sister’s place, so she seems to be settling in. And Eddie’s grandson texted me a photo that you will
not
believe of Eddie and a
very
large fish. So I think they’ll survive for a couple of weeks,” Grace sighed. “I just…I need some peace and quiet.”