Serpent's Kiss: A Witches of East End Novel (12 page)

“Listen, you don’t have to apologize, Matt. I’m the one who acted rudely, and I’ve been feeling awful ever since,” she said earnestly. “Except I’m worse because I didn’t even try to call you. Crikey, what was I thinking?”

“No, it’s my fault,” he said, picking up on the thirties lingo she’d suddenly adopted. “I had to go and act like a copper.”

“Why are we talking like this?” she asked, thinking that any minute now scratchy music might start swelling in the background.

“Well, you started it,” said Matt. “I was just picking up my cue.”

They laughed. So they had that in common, too, not just classic American novels but sprightly golden age of Hollywood movies starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, a yen for sweet but gritty black-and-white romance.

“Can we try it again, again?” he asked. “You and I? We really ought to. You’re so swell and peachy, Ingrid.”

“Stop it,” she said, giggling.

“I can’t,” he said. “You’re aces.”

“I’d like to give it another shot. I really would, Matt,” she said huskily, just like a heroine in a film noir.

Ingrid was certain the pixies were behind all those missed calls. They had probably messed with her phone. She wouldn’t put it past them. And that piece of paper with that girl’s number on it? Most likely another of their mischievous pranks. After work, she was going to give those mooching pixies a piece of her mind. She had to find out where they were from, pronto, so she could send them back there as soon as possible.

It was a few days before Halloween. Joanna had been so distressed about the spirit trail that she had barely noticed anything else, not least of which that the house was slowly sinking into its former squalor since Gracella had stopped working for several weeks now. She had also forbidden Tyler to visit the house for fear that he would be possessed by evil spirits. Joanna had mentioned it to Ingrid the other day, and her older daughter had muttered something about “refugees” and “I’m taking care of it.” Joanna had been looking forward to celebrating the holiday with her “adopted” grandson, carving pumpkins, buying candy for the trick-or-treaters, creating a real haunted house. But there was no time for that now.

She set out, a backpack on her shoulders, Gilly leading the way to the trail of wilted flowers. They arrived at the clearing in the exact spot where Harold had called her name. It was a cloudless day, around two in the afternoon, when the sun reached its zenith, shining through the pines and lighting up the glade. In the middle was the path left by the spirit that was trying to make contact with her. The grass along it slanted in different directions, crunching into powder underfoot as Joanna followed it. Of course, it would be quicker to go straight across the glade, but she wanted to keep an eye on the path itself in case she came upon any new clues.

When she reached the end of the clearing, she saw that the trail continued among the evergreens, but there it turned black; the pine needles blanketing the forest floor were scorched. She crouched down and studied them, picking up a handful, inspecting, sniffing; they were indeed charred and turned to soot in her hand. She clapped her palms to rid them of the black dust, then continued to climb the hill. Gilly flew ahead.

She stumbled on a bed of stones, then got back to her feet, ascending to the top, where the ground leveled off. Here the path came to an abrupt halt, but straight ahead in this small upper clearing stood a large gnarly oak, and beneath, in the shadows of its sprawling branches, rose a singular mound with a grave marker. Gilly flew and alighted on top of it.

Something like glass caught the light on the mound. Joanna strode ahead until she was standing before it. The stone marker had no name or epithet inscribed on it—just a blank weathered and pockmarked tombstone. But there on the mound, arranged neatly on the dirt, the pine needles and leaves pushed aside, was a message.

The spirit had used six rune stones, two Scrabble tiles, and two dice that were missing from a fancy backgammon set that had been a gift from Ingrid. The wooden Scrabble tiles could have belonged to anyone, but the runes, made from the same matter as her dragon-bone wand, which she noticed was there, too—the spirit had used it to underscore the message—were unmistakably hers.

She had not noticed that the runes were missing. She usually kept them in a red velvet pouch on the desk in her study. Once in a while she would consult the runes to sort out a conflict or look into the future. Unlike Ingrid, Joanna couldn’t directly tap into a person’s lifeline but instead needed the aid of these ancient Norse stones to act as an oracle.

Joanna took care not to touch anything at first. She removed her rucksack from her back, found a pen and notebook to begin copying down the message so she wouldn’t forget it and could study it further at home. Obviously the spirit was using the runes to tell her something.

Gilly cawed excitedly, and the sound echoed through the woods.

“Yes, Gilly,
X
marks the spot,” she said. “Well, more like an
E
? Hmm … kind of. Thank you for bringing me here. You did well.”

Runes were an alphabetic script, and each letter etched onto the small tablet possessed a special meaning, like tarot cards. The order in which each rune was laid out also held significance. At first glance, she saw that none of the runes was reversed, which heartened her because this meant this was most likely a propitious portent. Usually when a rune was upside down, it took on a negative meaning.

The runes had been placed in a straight horizontal line that included the Scrabble letter tile
A
. There was a gap after the first three runes, then another three followed, the
A
among them. In the practice of ancient oracles, such as runes, tarot, or I Ching, the number
3
was commonly used for divination purposes, denoting past, present, and future, a triangle that was complete, the trinity within—blood, water, spirit. A three-rune spread was known as the Norn spread, representing the Norn sister triad, goddesses of past, present, and future, who presided over the fates of gods and men. But why the roman letter
A
in there, too?

Beneath this first line was another composed with the two dice,
1
then
5
, followed by an upside-down
L
Scrabble tile. Was the reversed
L
meant to be a
7
? This would then indicate the number 157. What could that be? Could it be a year—BC or AD? So long ago! Because objects other than runes had been introduced, she knew this message would require more than a reading of runes to decode it; this was a puzzle to be solved.

She sketched it out on her pad:

When she was done with the sketch, Joanna searched around the gravesite for other clues—a stray rune or letter, maybe even another object—but she didn’t find anything, so she folded the runes, tiles, and dice up in the kerchief she kept in her bag, then knotted the pieces of the puzzle together inside it, so she could pore over the reproduced message at her desk.

The temperature had dropped and the wind had begun to lash at the pines and maples.

“We are done here for now, Gilly,” she said, shouldering her pack.

“Caw, caw!” responded the raven, lifting off to lead the way back to the house.

There were fewer kids than last year, Freya thought as she put away the candy bowl. Halloween had come and gone, and it wasn’t the same, not without Tyler, whom they had been looking forward to spoiling. Joanna hadn’t decorated—their mother was not herself lately—and Ingrid didn’t approve of the “commercialization” of one of their high holy days, although it had been a long time since they’d celebrated a proper All Hallow’s Eve. It was a shame. Since the Restriction had been lifted there was nothing to stop them from really getting down and dirty and—
pagan
. Ah, well, maybe next year.

Freya’s phone vibrated. It was a text from Killian.
<>

They hadn’t seen each other since that last stupid fight on the
Dragon
. It was as if Killian had disappeared, and Freya had kept an eye on the
Dragon
in the evenings to see if the lights went on, but it had remained dark since she had last set foot there. This was the first she was hearing from him.

That day after Killian had left, Freya had gone back to searching every corner of the boat, which had felt like a deplorable act of betrayal. She believed she had found all the secret hiding places, opened every last Chinese box, but the search, which lasted till dawn, had once again yielded absolutely nothing.

Ever since Freddie had introduced doubt in her mind, Freya had been rattled. She’d been seeing things in Killian: malevolent flickers, evil intent when she had almost slipped off the footbridge. But what if it was just her imagination? She was very impressionable after all. Her emotions clouded everything. What if she was seeing things that weren’t there?

She had holed up in her New York apartment every night, not wanting to bump into her mother or sister. They would fret and pry, and she was too vulnerable, on the verge of confiding everything. She had made a promise to Freddie that she wouldn’t reveal his secret—that he was back, that he had escaped from Limbo. If it were anyone other than Freddie, she would have told by now, but she always kept her twin’s secrets. They were sacred, no matter what, no matter that it was killing her. Already, Joanna and Ingrid were getting suspicious about her actions.

The worse of it was that she missed Killian. She felt as if she were missing a limb, as if some part of her had been severed, and she lay there bleeding out. It felt as if she’d lost him just as she’d found him again, but now, with this message, she felt a glimmer of hope.

Besides, there was nothing on that godforsaken boat. Freddie was welcome to search it himself if he didn’t believe her.

<>
she texted.

When Freya arrived at the footbridge, Killian was waiting for her on the other side, casually leaning against the railing. His face was unreadable. She hurried across, but no sooner had she reached him than he hushed her and gently slipped a white scarf over her eyes. The feeling of his fingers putting the blindfold in place, making sure not a sliver of light crept through, calmed her. He placed his hands softly on her shoulders and whispered, “Can you see?”

She shook her head no. She knew this was his way of asking her to trust him, give him her blind faith, and at the moment she was so relieved and thrilled to be in his presence, to feel his touch again, that she would have gladly let him lead her straight to the edge of a precipice to push her off.

He made her spin around, doing five revolutions, then spun her the other way. He took her hand. “Come on,” he said.

He guided her along, but after all that spinning, she wasn’t sure whether they were moving toward the dock or in the opposite direction. Either way, she could still smell the brine on the air. But eventually the ocean scent thinned, so she deduced they were moving away from the water. Now he was behind her, his hands at her waist, pushing her slowly ahead, and she sensed she was on a path among trees; she heard birds chirping overhead. She guessed they were moving away from Fair Haven.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked.

“Shh,” said Killian. They walked silently for a while but soon he was making her stand in place. “Okay,” he said. His hands undid the blindfold, slipped off the knot at the back of her head.

The scarf fell and she opened her eyes. They were on the southeast side of Fair Haven, where a greenhouse abutted a wall of the manor.