Law removes the covers from my legs and helps me place my legs over the side of the bed. Holding me under the elbows, he holds me steady while I stand. Once I’m on my feet and sturdy, Law lets go of my arm.
“Not yet. Help her walk,” Shante scolds Law, and I chuckle.
“Yeah, fool. Help me walk.”
This time, Law joins me in adolescent behavior by sticking his own tongue out at me. I snicker at his boyish grin. When we breach the threshold separating my room from the rest of the house, I inhale in wonder. I haven’t left the room behind me since I woke. There hasn’t been a need. Whatever magical spell Shante had placed to help me sleep—and heal—also made it so that I didn’t need to use the restroom, apparently.
Could she make that a more permanent thing?
I’ve been confined to these four walls for days and I had too much time to inspect the dilapidated room. I thought we were in a rustic old cabin in the middle of the woods, but seeing the rest of the space, I can hardly call it old or dilapidated. The place is breathtaking.
The open floor plan features a two-story stone fireplace at the back center of the cabin.
Beams line the vaulted ceiling from both sides, meeting at the edges of the fireplace. To the right is an impressive gourmet kitchen. It wouldn’t take a chef to realize the opulence of the room with top-of-the-line appliances and granite countertops.
“They’re birch,” Law says, from my side. “The cabinets,” he explains, as though he knew my inner thoughts.
“Whatever that means.”
To the left is a massive wood dining table with seating for eight. A wine rack, fully stocked, lines the wall behind it. As we make our way toward the back, past the dining area, the room opens up even more to a living space, furnished with a rich leather sofa and overstuffed chairs. Now past the wine rack, I have a perfect view of the wooded lot through the floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors that open out to a cedar deck.
This place is impressive.
“How the hell is my room in such bad shape when this place is amazing?” I say, dumbstruck.
He shrugs. “I never use that room. It’s been closed off until you arrived.”
“You’re a terrible host,” I tease, and Law rolls his eyes.
Shante takes a seat at the large dining table and motions us toward it.
“Sit, Marina,” she commands, and Law helps lower me into the seat across from her.
“So you want me to call to your sister, Maggie?” she says, jumping right to the reason she’s here.
“Yes,” I croak, feeling a tightness in my chest.
I’ve seen and talked to Maggie a few times, but something about this is different. Before, I only suspected she was dead. Having Shante call to her spirit drives the point home.
“We want to know why she jumped,” Law says, voice suddenly raw with emotion.
He said they were friends, but friends don’t look the way Law does. His eyes are pinched and his lips smashed together, as if he is in excruciating pain. There was something more between them.
Shante’s sharp blue eyes are focused in on Law curiously, likely coming to the same conclusions I am. She nods in acknowledgment.
“Tell me what she looked like the last time you saw her,” she instructs me.
I don’t need to think about it. The image is burned into my mind. I recall every detail of the way my sister looked that day.
I give her the same description I’ve given a million times. Yellow dress, white ribbon, both things that were signature for Maggie.
“Place your hands in mine,” Shante commands, leaning across the table and extending her arms, palms up. I do as instructed, and she closes hers around mine, squeezing once for reassurance.
She closes her eyes and begins murmuring something in a language I don’t recognize. “Close your eyes, Marina. Concentrate. Call out to your sister in your mind. Visualize her all the while.”
I slam my eyes shut, calling upon images of Maggie.
“Maggie if you’re here, let your presence be known. Talk to me. Tell me why you jumped,” I beg my sister’s spirit.
Minutes go by and I remain with my eyes still firmly shut, continuing to call to my sister telepathically. When nothing seems to be happening, I chance a glance by peeking my right eye open. Shante’s are still closed.
Her eyes are pinched at the corner and her jaw is clenched.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, but she shakes her head.
Shante begins chanting in that same foreign language. Sweat builds at her temple and a vein bulges in her neck.
“Shante,” Law warns, but she doesn’t stop chanting. The grip she has on my hands becomes painful as she squeezes. Heat radiates from her palms, growing from uncomfortable to unbearable.
“Shante,” I yell, trying to pull my hands from hers. “You’re burning me.”
Smoke begins to rise from our palms, and I scream. Law’s firm arms yank me by the shoulders out of her grip, disconnecting her hold on me.
Her eyes open and she slouches back in the chair, breathing heavily.
“What was that?” I bellow in outrage, hands still red from the burn her touch created. “This has never happened before,” she says almost angrily. “Spirits are easy to call upon. A part of them is tethered to the earth, and when a piece of their past calls upon them, they easily come,” she says to nobody in particular. It’s almost as if she’s trying to remind herself of how things are supposed to be. Law and I remain quiet, listening to her rationalize whatever the heck just happened.
“I tried to call upon the goddesses to show me her location, but all I saw was fog. The further into the fog my mind went, the warmer it became. It was as if I were stepping right into a fire.”
I scrunch my nose. “That’s never happened before?”
She shakes her head. “Never has anything like that happened.” She shares a glance with Law, who seems just as perplexed.
“What do you make of it?” he asks Shante.
She whistles. “A strong magic.”
“What does that mean?” I press, not understanding how magic would play into the spiritual realm. Then again, what the hell do I know about any of this? I just found out that vampires exist.
“Someone”—she bites her lip in concentration—“or something,” she corrects, “doesn’t want us to know where Maggie is.”
“We know where Maggie is,” I stress. “She’s dead, Shante.”
She scrunches her nose as if she’s not so sure.
“Shante?”
A moment of hope springs forth and is dashed in a second with her next words. “Yes . . . but a force is keeping her from speaking with us,” she explains. “This is impossible for someone who is dead,” she mumbles to herself.
“Black magic could do it. Right?” Law asks, and she tilts her chin, closing her eyes again and concentrating. She bites her bottom lip, drawing blood, before finally sagging back once more.
“It’s not black magic.” She takes several deep breaths, staring into space. “But whatever it is, it’s very powerful.”
“What do we do?” Law asks, sounding concerned, whether for Shante or whatever magic is keeping Maggie from us, I don’t know.
“I need to call my sisters. This is beyond my power.”