Spellbound: The Awakening of Aislin Collins (9 page)

I placed the cup to my lips and breathed in
the steaming tea. Calming myself, and pushing all thoughts out of
my mind, I returned to the scrying bowl.

I stared into the water for a moment, then I
closed my eyes and asked the Holy Mother, the Goddess, to send me
guidance during my visions—that all would be explained and that I
would learn from them. I opened my eyes and stared into the water.
It was now a dark, deep blue; almost black really. It reflected my
image back at me, but I did not move and I did not waver. I
continued to stare, my skin looked ghostly white in the dark water
and then, although the coloration of my pale skin stayed, the water
distorted and swirled. I was looking at a white dress now. Abigail
was wearing all white, her red hair pulled back from her face. She
was smiling and dancing with a much older man. Although she looked
happy, his expression was taught and ridged.
Her husband
the
spirits told me. I looked around the room where I was standing,
watching her twirl across the floor. I was standing next to
Zachariah, who was holding my hand. I was wearing a green dress and
with my free hand, I reached up and touched my garnet necklace.
Zachariah’s face contorted with anger as his eyes fell upon the
piece of jewelry and he reached toward me and snapped it off my
neck. It fell from his grasp and the garnet stone shattered on the
floor—the image faded away.

I went to pull away from the bowl but
another image appeared; still of Abigail. She was older now, and
surrounded by children. She lived on what appeared to be a
plantation of some kind. She looked sad and her arms were covered
in deep green and blue bruises.
The love of material possessions
above all else,
the spirit explained. I must have shed a tear
for Abigail because a ripple moved through the water, causing rings
to spread from the center of the bowl and move outward.

Abigail’s image faded away and I saw myself
in Greer’s arms. We were embracing in a room covered with stone
walls and old paintings. Furs were thrown on the floor and more
covered the four-poster bed where we lay. I looked into his
beautiful hazel eyes and cried out in fear, for they had turned
completely black, and a low growl came from his throat.
All is
not as it seems,
my guide said.

I gasped and fell back from the bowl. I was
shaken by what I had seen. I ran downstairs to find my mother
performing divination with sticks. I could not disturb her and even
if I could talk to her, I was not certain that revealing my vision
would be the best of ideas. She may forbid me to see Greer or she
may cast a spell to make me forget him.
No, I could not share
this with her.
I crept back to my room and stood near the
scrying bowl. Maybe I needed to see more; although I was not sure I
wanted to. A horrible, uninvited thought crossed through my mind.
What if Greer was the one who was hunting me? What if he was
playing with me as a cat plays with a mouse before it finally
becomes bored and consumes it?
I shook my head to banish the
words. I must be wrong—I had to be.

I gulped down the rest of the tea and went
back to the basin. I was determined to understand what I had seen.
I stared into the water and asked my guide to take me back to the
same image, as I gripped the basin at its sides, terrified of what
I might discover.
Watch carefully
.
All is not as it seems
then or now
, the guide reminded me.

The images moved slowly this time. I saw
that I was wearing the same garnet necklace. I saw Greer stroking
my dark hair with his fingertips. My head lay back as he moved in
to kiss my exposed neck. My eyes were closed and his touch was
gentle, but then something caught his attention from the corner of
the room. He was staring passed me now. I watched as my body
stiffened in his arms and he pulled me close to him, still looking
passed me, his hazel eyes darkened into total blackness. He growled
deeply at whatever was in the far corner, although I could not see
it. I had never heard a human make a noise like the one that
emanated from his very core. My eyes followed his to the corner,
and I felt my mouth go dry and my skin grow cold. There stood the
Grey Man; he was so tall and broad, that the wall behind him was
completely hidden by his massive form. He was smiling wickedly at
us. His sallow skin and grey hair glowed eerily in the firelight,
as he raised a gun from under his long black coat and fired a
single shot. I fell limp in Greer’s arms. I saw a red cloud slowly
covering my white dress. Greer was screaming. Tears trickled down
his cheeks as he rocked me in his arms, but the Grey Man did not
move. He turned his body so his eyes were looking straight at mine
as I stared into the bowl. I could see his face so clearly that I
even saw flecks of burgundy in his dark brown eyes. He had used his
magic to invade my vision. “You cannot escape me Aislin,” he said
to me in a deep and threatening voice.

I threw the basin off the table as I leaped
back from the image. Water spread across the floor and the bowl
shattered, cutting my leg as the fragments flew across the room. I
touched my chest where the bullet had penetrated me in the vision.
As far I could tell I was unharmed, but a burning sensation was
growing where the bullet had landed. My breathing was quickened and
my hands were trembling. I could feel blood dripping down my leg
from where the shard had sliced it open, but I could feel no pain
from the cut.

My mother threw the door open and ran to me,
“What happened?”

“He found me in my vision. He said I could
never escape him,” I replied through shallow breaths.

My mother opened the curtain to my window,
letting light pour into the room. She spotted the blood and pulled
up my dress. “Blood sacrifice,” she said, as she walked from the
room and pulled me alongside her.

In the kitchen, she mixed an herbal potion
and placed it on the cut.

“It is not deep. It just seemed so from the
amount of blood you spilled.”

“It was an accident,” I said.

“This was no accident Aislin. This was an
attempt to work a spell.”

She cleaned the drying blood off my skin and
lit another candle.

“This day is not only powerful for us.
Practitioners of dark magic have adopted it and use it as well. We
must ask our ancestors for their magic and protection.”

“Were we not going to do that anyway?”

She gave me a scathing look, “This is a day
to
honor
those who have come before us, but now we must ask
them for their help.”

Scrying had taken longer than I thought it
would. My father would be home soon. We gathered all the herbs,
potions, and extra candles and hid them from sight. I took the book
upstairs and placed it underneath my pillow and I stopped by the
window one more time to see if Greer had responded yet. He had not,
and my heart sank.

********************

Before my father came home, my mother placed
an extra place setting at the table. This was for our
ancestors—although my father would believe that Abigail would
possibly be joining us.

When my father walked in, he kissed my
mother and then stopped abruptly when he saw me. Things were still
very tense between us and when my mother left the room, an awkward
silence seemed to settle in the air.

“Are you well Aislin?”

I did not reply. Instead, I went into the
kitchen and helped my mother carry the food to the table.

After we were all seated and my father said
grace, he tried talking to me, but after a few minutes of enduring
my silence, he gave up. Instead, he talked to my mother as though I
was not even in the room.

“The Marthaler’s came into the shop today.
Apparently, a few of their horses have been found slaughtered in
the field behind their house. The entire town is filled with gossip
and suspicion. I printed the story for tomorrow’s paper, but the
Marthaler’s have told so many people that I feel I just wasted my
time today,” he said while he shoveled meat into his mouth.

My thoughts immediately led me to the Puca
and I felt my appetite decline.

“What was the cause?” my mother asked.

My father rubbed his eyes and shook his
head, “No one knows really. The oddest thing is that a few weeks
ago, the Indian Chief came into town asking if anyone had spotted a
strange animal lurking about. Apparently, some of their livestock
had gone missing. Well, of course we thought it was just silly
Native superstition.”

As my father spoke, my mother and I
exchanged a look. We both admired the Lenni Lenape people and
understood their way of life. Hearing my father speak in such
disrespectful tones made me furious. How could he speak this way
when we, and all the other immigrants, owed our lives to them? When
the winters were harsh, they brought the first settlers food and
warmth. When medicine was needed, the Lenape provided it. They
shared their land with us and we pushed them out. “Savages” we
called them, although we treated them much more savagely then they
ever treated us. For all my father’s worldly knowledge, he was
still ignorant and naïve.

“Anyhow, the most disturbing part of the
Marthaler’s discovery was that the animals were scattered, some
dragged up into tall trees, while others were dropped on the
ground. Even worse, all were drained of their blood. Not a single
drop was left.”

CHAPTER TEN

The Marthaler’s had lost one horse and two of
the goats that they used to keep their yard groomed. The Lenape
said that they lost much more than that, but it was over a longer
period of time. People were saying that the Marthaler’s livestock
was brutally attacked by an unknown creature. A hunt was organized
to begin at sundown each night and would continue until the beast
was captured and destroyed.

Martha and my mother both agreed that these
hunts would prove to be fruitless. The animal they sought was not
of flesh, and would not be found unless it wanted to be.

Women were held captive in their homes as
soon as the sun was beginning to set. The only exception permitted
was if they were accompanied by male companions. This decree of
sorts had no effect on me. I had not been allowed to walk outside
by myself in weeks, and had not seen the night sky except through
my bedroom window for an equal amount of time.

Tonight, my father would assist in the hunt
and so he left at dusk to join the others. I stared out my bedroom
window and watched the glow of the lanterns clustering together as
different groups of men gathered and collaborated in hopes of
catching their elusive prey. I knew that my mother was casting a
protection spell for my father, but I did not bother to join her.
My heart had grown cold toward my father.

My eyes flicked down to the windowsill, but
still no letter found its way to me. I had begun to fear that
perhaps the Puca had gotten to Greer. Maybe he was a victim of the
demon too.

I turned from the window. I did not want to
think about Greer being in danger; it was too much to bear.
Downstairs I found my mother furiously cleaning. It was what she
did when she was nervous.

“I tried to convince him to stay home, but
he would not listen to me.”

“He will be fine. I have had no visions of
anything involving father,” I said in an annoyed tone.

My mother did not seem to hear me. She was
deep in thought. Sneachta was rubbing against my legs and purring.
Outside, we could hear whistles from men as they tried to get each
other’s attention without startling their prey. As time went on,
the whistles grew further and further away from the house. Within
half an hour’s time, the sounds from the hunting parties had faded
all together. They were moving deep into the woods, away from
town.

As I polished my mother’s silver tea tray,
Sneachta jumped on the table that I was sitting at and meowed
softly. The she gave me an intense look, then leapt from the table
and ran up the stairs. I carefully placed the tray down and
followed her, leaving my mother to her cleaning. She would be
scrubbing the floor until my father returned and it was pointless
to try to stay any longer. The house was clean. She was just
keeping herself busy.

Sneachta went to the window and stood up on
her hindquarters. She was pawing at the latch.

“It is not safe for you out there,” I said
to her. She did not listen to me and kept pawing at the latch until
I picked her up and opened the window so she could look out. It was
then that I understood her intention. There on the ledge,
underneath a small rock, was a letter.

“How did you know?” I asked her. She purred
and hopped out of my arms, jumped on the bed and started kneading
my pillow. She waited for me to join her and read the letter.

I looked around to make sure that no one was
watching me from below and then I quickly grabbed the envelope and
closed the window. I went and sat next to Sneachta and she peered
from under my arm as we both read the words.

My beautiful Aislin,

I am aggrieved to learn of your father’s
arrangement with the Marthalers. When I first read your letter, I
planned on carrying you off into the night and leaving with you on
a ship at first dawn. My thoughts were in hast and I had to force
myself to stop with my plan before I reached your backdoor. I know
that what is hunting you will relentlessly search for you. It would
not matter where I took you, he would be only steps behind. Jamison
Lamont will not give up his hunt and therefore he must be
destroyed. That is his name Aislin. Although, I still do not
understand why he seeks you out as his prey. He is ruthless and
cunning and you are in grave danger as long as he lives.

If I take you from this place, I remove you
from the magical protection of your mother and Martha. I cannot
risk your life over my petty jealousy and I will not.