Teddy led me over to the firepit. The willowy, ethereal young woman had a surprisingly strong grip, and she strode with a sense of purpose. Unlike yours truly, she knew what to do and how to do it because of my dead grandmother.
Thank you, Nonna.
The fire flared briefly in the copper fire bowl, well-contained but burning brightly.
I grinned in that direction, knowing Nonna was nearby.
“We’ll need to move the perimeter of the circle so that Katie can lie down, and I can sit beside her. She needs to be in solid contact with the earth.”
“All righty.” Mimsey sounded cheerful, and I could tell she was relieved to have Teddy’s help as well. “Let’s shift things so you two can be on the grass. Those rocks around the fire would be far too uncomfortable.”
She began moving the candles so that the sacred circle would now have the firepit on one side, with an open space on the other for Teddy and me. The others moved to shift the table and its contents, declining Declan’s help. He returned to watch from his seat with Mungo, an audience of two.
Teddy sat cross-legged on the ground by the outer edge of where the circle would be cast and patted the grass beside her.
I went over and said, “I’ll come over after we’ve cast the spell.”
She directed a questioning look toward the fire, then nodded. “Your grandmother says the others will cast the spell,” she said. “You need to be here, relaxed and ready when it’s finished.”
Frowning, I said, “But I need to help—”
“Nonsense,” Mimsey said from behind me in a tone that brooked no argument. “Your nonna’s spirit is right. Your job is to journey to the other plane and bring back Connell. Teddy’s job is to keep you tethered to this plane. And our job is to cast the spell that sends you on the journey. Lie down, Katie.”
“Okay,” I said, but held up a finger in the universal just-a-minute sign. “I need to talk to Lucy first.”
I went over to where my aunt was rearranging the items on the table. She kept glancing toward the fire, and I knew she wished she could see her mother standing there. When I approached, she looked up and smiled.
“Feel better about things?” she asked.
I let out a whoosh of breath. “You have no idea. Listen, I need you to add this to the burning spell.” I handed her the envelope. “Because apparently I’m going to be relaxing while the rest of you work.” Not being part of the spell work felt strange.
Lucy gave a little laugh and took the envelope. “What is this?”
“It’s a direct link to Connell. That’s the intention I put on it, anyway.”
She didn’t ask for particulars, just simply put the envelope on the table with everything else.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Of course.” She gave me a tight hug. “It’s going to be fine.”
“I know.”
Sort of.
Back where Teddy was waiting, I lay down on my back, arms straight beside me. “Like this?”
She snorted a laugh. “Is that how you relax? Katie, you need to get into a meditative state. Close your eyes. Take some deep breaths. Ready yourself for travel.”
“The idea of astral projection is anything but relaxing,” I grated out.
Bianca came and stood over me. “Try breathing through only your left nostril.”
Jaida joined her. “Try inhaling to the count of four, then hold to the count of seven, and exhale to the count of eight.”
Cookie elbowed her way between them. “Look at her. Yikes. Anyone have a valium?”
“Leave her alone, girls.” Mimsey’s tone was mild.
“Thank you,” I called to her, sparing a mild glare for my coven mates.
Cookie grinned.
“I’m told you can go ahead and close the circle,” Teddy said, ignoring all of us.
“Come along,” Mimsey said.
I turned my head and saw she was already standing at the easternmost set of candles. The others drifted away. Determined to calm down, I closed my eyes again.
I heard the lighter click. Seconds later, Mimsey said, “We call upon the archangel Raphael and the element of air to protect and aid us.” There were footsteps on rocks and then she said, “We call upon the archangel Michael and the element of fire to protect and aid us.” As she lit the next candle she called upon the archangel Gabriel and the element of water, and finally the archangel Uriel and the element of earth. I knew she’d finish the circle by walking to the now-lit black and white candles in the east.
“Above, below, and within,” the others intoned together.
The ritual was familiar and predictable. Comforting. I found my muscles loosening as I listened. Next, they would gather by the fire and contribute the different elements of the spell. Turning my head slightly, I slitted my eyes open enough to see what they were doing. First Mimsey added her flowers, then Lucy tossed in the herbs. Bianca contributed the resinous frankincense and myrrh. The air filled with their intense, heady scent, and I inhaled deeply, again and again. Jaida added the tarot cards then, and Cookie sprinkled a bit of graveyard dirt on the new flames. As each new item was added, the fire became smokier and smokier.
Then Lucy added the picture of Connell in the envelope, and the smoke coalesced into a narrow column that rose from the center of the fire. The five witches stepped back, forming a ring around the fire. They clasped hands, and I felt their powers flare as they combined with each other and with the innate power of the elements.
“Katie,” Teddy said beside me.
I closed my eyes again, seeing that hazy column of smoke in my mind’s eye.
“Follow it, Katie,” Teddy said. Her fingers closed firmly around my wrist, solid and real. “Follow the smoke. Ride with it. Rise with it.”
How the heck am I supposed to do that? I can’t. I just can’t.
Panic began to build in my throat.
Then I heard a word, soft, so soft, almost inaudible. No, actually inaudible. It came from within the circle and yet beyond the circle.
Trust.
It was Nonna. She said it again, a mere breath of meaning in my mind. Trust.
“She’s right,” Teddy said. “You have to trust us all. It’s all right. I won’t let go. I promise.”
Low and steady, the word rose now, coming from the lips of the spellbook club members as if they were in a trance.
Trust, trust, trust.
The sibilance of the word drew out, turning into a hiss that reminded me of the curls of smoke rising from the fire.
Ride the smoke. Trust Teddy. Trust that I can do this.
I breathed in the scents of fire and spice, of frankincense and myrrh, of rowan and rosemary, of passionflower and lotus. I took them in, filled my consciousness with their miasma mixed with . . .
. . . smoke.
The ground became nothing, falling away from my awareness though I knew I still lay on it. I could see, though I knew my physical eyes were closed, and I could still feel Teddy’s fingers wrapped around my wrist. Rather than seeing the other women or Declan and Mungo or my own backyard, I saw a swirling nothingness, a kind of colorless fog filled with light and dark. Some of the dark billowed into a human shape, but then was gone. Another section of gray mist loomed, then disintegrated.
I was standing upright, I realized as I looked down and saw my own feet below me, resting on . . . nothing. However, I took a step, and felt something solid beneath my soles. I was walking. Lifting my arm, I saw the only shred of color anywhere in the grayscale smokescape: a bright scarlet cord tightly wrapped around my wrist.
A tether.
Teddy.
“I’m on the other side of the veil,” I said out loud to myself.
I could hear the sound of my voice. Was I really speaking? Could the others hear me? I didn’t think so, but I couldn’t be sure. It didn’t matter, because I had to call.
“Connell!”
I waited. There was no response.
“Connell!” Louder this time.
Still no answer. The silence was so thick it filled my mind. A panicky claustrophobia tried to claw up from my subconscious. I pushed it back down.
Not now!
I took a few steps and called again. Nothing. I began to slowly walk, but not in a particular direction because there didn’t seem to be a particular direction. Instead, I chose to move away from where the cord trailed from my wrist, figuring that I would be moving farther into the veil. The tether snaked along with me, keeping track but not holding me back.
There was no ground, yet I walked. I heard the sound of no sound. None of the pungent fragrances from the spell fire reached me. There was only the odd caress of something like air against my cheek.
I called again.
No answer.
I walked faster, calling Connell’s name. The scarlet cord trailed out behind me, tight around my wrist, keeping me safe. I began to run, still calling.
Suddenly the tether grew taut. It wasn’t trailing anymore; I was pulling on it.
I stopped, frightened by the tension of the cord. Desperate, I screamed, “Connell!”
Was that a far-off voice?
I screamed his name again, putting everything I had into it.
This time the response was a little closer.
I called one more time.
There was movement in the gray. Then more. Connell emerged, grinning wide.
“Lassie, am I ever so glad ter see ya!”
“Oh, Connell.” I took a step and reached for him.
As I did, I felt the cord loosen. Looking down, I saw it begin to unwrap from my wrist. I screamed and reached for it with my other hand.
Missed.
No longer tethered to me, the scarlet line slithered away. I started after it.
In a flash, Connell leaped ahead, grabbed it with one hand, and then grabbed me.
Sobbing in relief, I grasped the tether with both hands. Together, we followed it back the way I’d come. Gradually, after a time, the cord wrapped itself around my wrist again, but I kept the fingers of my hand curled around it for good measure. Connell kept step with me, one hand clasping my shoulder, while the other held my free hand.
The sound of alarmed voices and a dog barking filtered through the nothingness. We kept going toward them. Suddenly Connell stopped.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
He pointed.
I turned to look. “Nonna!” She appeared in full color and looked like my memory of her when she’d been alive. Her long auburn hair was streaked with bright white, and her green eyes gleamed with affection. Her laugh lines deepened as she smiled at us.
She wasn’t alone, either.
“Welcome back, Katie,” she said. “And you must be Connell.”
“Indeed I am! Charmed ter know ya!”
I smiled. How could I have forgotten that Connell shouted more than he spoke, and every word was laced with his heavy brogue?
He waggled his considerable eyebrows at Nonna, and she laughed.
“Stop flirting,” I told him as I turned my attention to the woman beside her. Spirit. Whatever. I recognized her as Leigh Markes—which made sense, really, because she was sticking with Teddy, and Teddy was here. There. Wherever.
Leigh looked more relieved than pleased that I’d made it back.
“Please don’t worry,” I said. “I’m working to find your killer.”
She reached out a pale hand toward me in apparent supplication. It held the dragonfly scarf, and even though I didn’t technically have a body on this side of the veil, I shivered.
“Can’t you simply tell me who it is?” I begged.
I mean, it was the logical question. I’d tried to get a spirit to tell me who had killed him before, and it hadn’t worked. That had been the séance that brought Connell out of the woodwork. But now I had the actual ghost of a murder victim right in front of me, as it were.
She shifted and wavered, and I suddenly just knew, out of nowhere, that she couldn’t tell me. Maybe couldn’t remember. That was why she needed me.
“Why can’t she talk to me like you can?” I asked Nonna.
“You and I have a magical hereditary connection, Katie. She’s new and was never trained. Most spirits aren’t like me.”
No doubt.
“Goodbye, my darling,” she said. “Know that I’m always around when you need me.”
“Wait, Nonna! Can’t you—”
She shook her head.
“It’s time. The others are frantic with worry. They almost lost you, you know.” She and Leigh both stepped back, and the veil took them. The last thing I saw was the end of the blue and green dragonfly scarf.
Connell squeezed my shoulder, and we started moving toward where the tether led. Moments later, I saw the backyard and the sacred circle with the spellbook club members still standing in a ring around the fire, though now they were talking back and forth and did, indeed, sound frantic. Next to Declan, Mungo was whining. Teddy sat on the ground, hunched over me. Suddenly, she looked up, and I could tell she saw me.
“Oh, thank goodness,” she said.
Mungo fell silent. He was looking at me, too.
Pop!
The ground felt cold against my back, and the night air had grown quite chilly. Shivering, I struggled to sit up. Teddy called to the others, and they rushed over to help me. Declan was standing next to the chair, looking worried. Mungo bounded to the outside of the circle.
Yip!
“Oh, Katie.” Lucy’s voice trembled as she bent over me.
I patted her hand. “Don’t worry. I’m okay. Connell?” I called. “Connell, are you here?”
“Quickly, girls,” Mimsey said. “We must open the circle.”
She trotted to the eastern candles and blew them out, muttering thanks to Raphael and air, then widdershins around the circle to the north, the west, the south, and back to east, blowing out candles and giving thanks as she went.
Bianca and Jaida helped me up, and I ran out to where Declan was standing, Mungo on my heels.
My handsome husband held out his arms to me. I fell into his embrace, soaking up its comfort for a long moment, then stood back and searched his face. His throat was working, and his eyes were wet.
Stunned, I put my hand on his cheek. I’d been so sure it had worked. “Oh, Declan,” I stammered. “I thought . . . I thought . . . He was right here with me.”
Something shifted in his gaze, in the planes of his face, in the way he held his body. I recognized the shift, and joy pierced through me.
“Ah, things are not always as they seem, lass!”
Oh, that brogue.
Connell/Declan laughed and gave me a huge hug that lifted me off my feet. “Thanks ter ya, lass! So happy ter be back here, where ah belong, with yer man!” He let me go and turned to Teddy.
She was staring at him with a combination of wonder and dismay on her face. When he ran over and swooped her off her feet, she gave a little cry of surprise.
“Also, my gratitude ter this one!” Connell shouted. “Fer holdin’ on ter tha red cord for our Katie here!”
“Connell,” I admonished him, “you’re scaring her.”
“Hey!” a voice came drifting from the house on the other side of Margie’s. “Be quiet, or I’ll call the police. It’s the middle of the night!”
And like that, Connell was gone and my own sweet Declan was looking out from behind those beautiful blue eyes. He was grinning like a fool as he stepped back from Teddy.
“Er, sorry. That wasn’t really like me.”
Lucy put her hand over her mouth, but her eyes were dancing. She snorted out a giggle, then another one. Cookie was next, then me, until we were all laughing hysterically, releasing the tension still riding the air, relief passing through the group like a virus.
“Shh,” I finally managed. “I don’t know how we could explain this if that guy actually calls the police.”
When we’d managed to get ourselves under control, Teddy said to Declan, “No, it wasn’t like you. It wasn’t you.” She took a deep breath. “That’s amazing.”
He nodded happily. “It really is.”
Then he came over to me, and took me in his arms, and I felt his love and gratitude filling my heart.
“You can feel that he’s there?” I asked.
Declan nodded. “He’s back.”