5 - Highsun 19 / 1 - Ash Moon 11
I kept falling in and out of sleep that afternoon and night. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the bride's imagined horror when her glamour melted away. By early morning, I gave up.
I went to the mirror and spoke until my hands burned from the magic of casting the reversal charm that failed again and again. My skin refused to cooperate, as if the spell had rooted itself beneath the surface, laughing at me for not being skilled enough to chase it away.
Then, I re-read the glamour potion's page until the ink fuzzed into a grey cloud that matched the ones under my eyes. My mind kept circling the same sentence in the small scribbles: lunar-stabilizer required under a waning moon. I cursed under my breath, searched every page for something that could help, and an hour later threw the useless, heavy book onto the floor. What could I do…?
Disguise spells? Too weak. Shape-shifting charms? Not strong enough to hold for more than minutes, and I wasn't skilled enough anyway. Stabilizers? I didn't even have moon-silk; the Duke's men would find me before I could beg the moon to spin me a thread.
My gaze returned to the book on the table: the small, black book that sat there like a coiled snake. Grandmother's warning echoed in my head: Only if the house is burning, little star.
Well…
The house might not have been on fire, but my life certainly was.
I went to a shelf and reached the top one for the blue-flame candle I knew to light before opening books like this black book… Trembling, I lit it and felt warmth and… purity fill the air around me. And then I opened the cursed book… The leather creaked under my fingers, as if unhappy to be touched.
The book emanated a smell like iron and dust and something faintly sweet I could not name. Inside, the ink was darker than night—pages covered in cramped handwriting and sigils that seemed to shift when I'd stare for too long. I turned the pages with reverence and dread, and came across a section named: "On Summonings: Deals with the Netherkind."
I read curse after curse and found one that sounded interesting enough, though not elegantly worded: a caller's rite. Not for the faint or the forgiving. A demon who grants wishes. One price, one pact.
My hands shook so hard, the page crinkled. You're not seriously— But I was. I had no more time, no more options, no more coin. If the Duke's men caught me, there probably wouldn't even be a trial.
"This is madness," I whispered. "Absolute madness…"
But I read every line anyway.
The instructions were fairly explicit, which I suppose is helpful when you're morally compromised and need to act quickly: offerings, a vessel, blood, a binding line.
My throat closed. I had once heard Grandmother talk about dangerous names the way one mentions storms—respectful and afraid. "Only in true need," she'd said once, "And only ever give something you can afford to lose." She hadn't meant possessions, she'd meant… well, I don't really know. I'd been a child of ten and the words had felt like a story. Now they felt like a ledger but I had no one to ask for clarification from.
I breathed in deep, shook my head, and returned to the ingredients list which read like a riddle. Slivered bone. A coin of true worth. Honey from a hive that saw three summers. Ash from a hearth that had never been quenched. A sacrificial, live animal. Something living's blood, fresh and willing, to bind the wish to a voice.
I scrawled the list of ingredients on a scrap parchment, tucked it into my sleeve, and set the book down. I wrapped my shawl around me like armor as I planned to head out now in the early hours of the day…
Though, I suppose the first ingredient I could manage without moral debate: a coin of true worth. I went to my coin purse and pulled out the prettiest one. Surly that would be enough…
Then next was honey. I had no honey… Haven't had any in nearly two years… And then, with a wince, I made a plan of where I'd get these things…
I crept to Old Mara's bee house, the hives humming faintly in the dark, and peered through the kitchen window. I saw Mara was asleep on the couch some ways away, and spotted near me the jars of amber gold glinting on the shelves. I left the scrap of cloth I had brought with me for this on her doorstep and took the jar. I told the world I was exchanging one thing for another—making it (almost) fair…
Slivered bone was harder. I could not steal a fresh bone from a butcher's block, so I went instead to the old cart path where one could occasionally find road-kill, or animals shot down by bored boys with slingshots. I searched and searched, almost giving up on this area, until, finally, half-buried in leaves, I found a small bird's skeleton. My fingers trembled as I wrapped it in linen. I… tried not to think too much about that one…
The ash required a hearth that had never been quenched. That would also be unwise to go asking for… So I went to the graveyard, found the mausoleum I had in mind, and there were the torches I'd seen lit before. Surely no one puts them out once they're lit, so this count, I suppose? I pulled down a few -they were heavy and didn't actually have much ash in them- and scraped the insides with my finger to pat the ashes onto another linen square. It wasn't much, and the ashes were moist and half soot, but good enough... no? After all, if intention counts, 'close enough' should count too, I told myself.
And then there was the animal.
The ritual called for a living sacrifice if one wanted a clean, strong reply. I could not. I would not—no way was I adding animal murderer to my growing list of failures. I walked another road, and searched. Surely, it wouldn't be hard to find another dead animal around—hell, even a beetle. After several minutes, beneath the hawthorn, there appeared the corpse of a (of course, black) cat, with sunken in ribs… It had most likely been run over. It was already cold and stiff, though the body was whole and the eyes were shut. I knelt and covered it with my shawl, gagging a couple of times, briefly wondering what would happen to it once dropped in the cauldron… I told it I was sorry. I whispered that I was trying to fix a wrong I'd made, that I would not be doing this if there were another way.
Finally, I took the path back home, wincing as I got a whiff of the cat carcass, and startled when I heard them.
Heavy steps. Voices. Not a bird in the trees, not wind. Men.
I crouched behind a low bush and whispered the simple concealment spell I had been taught as a child, one to hide when hunted… Through the branches, I caught the glint of armor between the trees. Two of the Duke's men walked slowly, scanning the undergrowth with the sharpness of hounds.
"Spread out," one said. "She could live somewhere in these woods. The Duke wants her alive—for now."
Alive for now.
My pulse slammed against my ribs. I pressed myself lower to the ground and imagined myself seeming like a stump to them if they laid eyes on me…
The closest passed within ten paces, the creak of leather and crunch of twigs so loud I could swear they'd hear my heart if it didn't quiet down. Mud smeared my hands, a thorn bit into my calf, but I didn't dare move.
When their footsteps finally faded deeper into the forest, I bolted. The bag carrying my things was pressed to my chest, my blouse snagging on branches but I couldn't care right now… By the time I slammed the gate behind me, I was panting like I'd run for miles, my body shaking as if it were freezing.
"They're close," I gasped. "Too close."
I didn't stop moving after that.
Hours blurred as I pressed my sharpest knife into the bones for slivers of it, lined the floor with salt and candle soot in a circle that would keep the voice contained, and chalked a spiral of symbols that made the air inside the circle hum faintly. I laid the book open with a weight on its page and rehearsed the cadence of the words I could not fully trust on my lips.
Once things were prepared enough, I looked at my table, noticing it looked like an accusation: a coin, a jar of honey, the slivers of bird bone in linen, a cache of ash, and the cat wrapped and folded at the far end. I had never felt so hollow with purpose…
I shook my head to stop those thoughts and breathed in deeply.
I arranged the cat in the cauldron, laid herbs in careful arcs over it, and measured the moonwater like it was gold. My fingers wouldn't stop shaking, no matter how many times I wiped them on my skirt.
At this point, it was night, and I was ready to begin… I whispered the lighting spell for the wood below the pot to begin burning, the flames low and steady.
The chant began spilling from my lips… too shaky and confused, even after practicing—Grandmother would've been horrified to hear me now…
Still, I continued… I added ingredient after ingredient, continuing my spoken words as I dropped them into the cauldron and stirred as instructed.
Finally, the moment came to offer my blood.
It was the last step…
I stared down at the knife. Just a small cut on the palm. Simple. I'd pricked my fingers thousands of times before for other potions.
Yet, this… this was different. This wasn't just potion—it was a promise. A door I couldn't close once opened.
My throat tightened and my face turned hot. "I can't," I whispered, "I can't—" The instruction was simple and terrible: break the skin, let the red meet the broth.
My hand lifted and froze. I could not do it. I could not will my own blood into that dark business. The thought of it made me nauseated, not from the gore but from the gravity of the bargain.
Then, the air shifted, whispers rose from the cauldron, and I felt encouraged to continue. The promise of help became too much temptation. I straightened up and leaned over the boiling, wretched-smelling stew, and my fingers wrapping around the knife, pressing it to my palm again…
But a sob escaped me as my hand trembled. And then, as if to confirm my cowardice, heavy tears spilled from my eyes down my face, unfelt in my moment of fear, falling into the water with soft plinks.
I startled—I hadn't meant to… I shouldn't've! I nearly begged the cauldron to spit out the tears, but it was too late…
White smoke bubbled up with a gurgling and hissing, and a thick, insistent fog poured from the cauldron like a tide. It smelled of dead blooms and a closed, rotting box—sweet, sour, with a metallic tang that made my throat ache. I coughed as the smoke found my lungs. My vision blurred, but I knew I had to continue…
I must have mangled another dozen syllables but I got through the spell… The moment the last phrase left my mouth, the circle around the cauldron flared into blue fires, but then more white smoke exploded outward, vertically this time, crashing with the ceiling and spilling everywhere around, filling the room in its choking, perfumed cloud. I stumbled back, coughing, eyes streaming as the disgusting smells wrapped around me like a noose. I panicked as the smoke seemed to extinguish the fires in my home, leaving me in the terrifying dark.
I lunged for the shutters and the windows, desperate for the moonlight, and flung them open. Thankfully, the smoke began moving out in a living wave. Unfortunately though, the cauldron continued producing more of it. I stumbled back toward the front door, tripping over my skirt, desperate for fresh air. I was still coughing out a lung, was blind, tears and snot running down my face from the stench, when I opened the door,
—and slammed straight into something solid.
For a second, my brain tried to explain it logically. A tree grew at the doorway. Yes. A tree. That makes sense…?
But as I pressed my hands to it, the shape didn't make sense; it felt nothing like bark… Then my fingers slid up and found a collar, a neck, and a chin tilted down toward me.
Then my hands reached up higher, still confused, and my fingers brushed something angled, warm, smooth—a nose.
I screamed.
The burning of my eyes was ignored as I forced them wide open. I tumbled down onto the floor on my backside with a grunt. Smoke now escaped through the door with the currents of wind coming though the room, and saw that the flames in the hearth had died, leaving only what could be illuminated by the moon.
And framed in that pale light was now a figure—tall, silent, eyes glowing a frightful gold. He didn't move. He didn't need to. His gaze pinned me where I sat, breathless and amazed.
I did not expect a… person? The world was full of shadows, and I had been summoning a being I had no right to call on; I had expected horns and sharp teeth, bulging eyes and claws…
For a second, I only saw him: tall, not dressed like a common man, nor dressed like a soldier. The smoke began to thin and the moonlight around him sharpened the stranger's cheekbones. The shape of him did not fit any face I'd known in town or its market. He looked dangerous in a way that had nothing to do with weapons—dangerous like a cliff, not inviting yet still intriguing…
I wanted to scream. I wanted to laugh. My heart hammered. My lips moved with words that failed to be created.
I settled for a scoff to start, and then I was able to whisper, "It worked." I found my voice thin and silly, "A demon—" I wanted to celebrate, but it came out more like a question than a declaration.
He tilted his head, as if the idea were new to him. The moonlight caught a few sparkles in his eyes, which kept my gaze on them… And then, he smirked—not cruel, not kind, only assessing.
Whether that had meant welcome or warning, I could not tell…
"It worked," I whispered again, assuring myself.