VenCo(66)

He pushed start and drove the car onto the highway, then turned towards the centre of town. Once there, he just needed to find a spot and listen. Sooner or later, they’d be loud against the established landscape. And then he would be on them.



He was on foot now, near the Salem Witch House. He thought the irony befitting—seeking witches near a house made to appear occult for the tourists who also came looking for witches. Piggybacking on intention was always a good way to get a boost. He planted his feet carefully, making sure he felt the pressure of the sidewalk through his Italian brogues. He shook out his arms, twisting his hands at the wrists, working out the tension in his muscles. He folded his hands together in front of him and took a breath so deep his shirt strained, then blew it all out. He closed his eyes, stopped smelling the air, refusing to acknowledge the breeze over his skin, and just listened.

This was how Prudence had taught him, so many years ago.

“Listen, James. Lean into it. Don’t use your ears.”

He’d laughed and said, “How am I to listen without my ears?” He found her especially beautiful when she tried to teach him her ways, before his family line was revealed, when he was still human, still mortal. She was fetching all the time, but in these moments she was painfully beautiful.

“Scoundrel!” She slapped his arm, and he felt it in his thighs. “Ears are only the beginning of listening. Most people are so lazy they stop there, but you can listen with your body and soul attuned to all the real sound in the world. That’s how the gods built us.”

This talk of multiple gods was heresy, as was this work they were practicing. Even out here, alone in the woods, he caught his breath at the risks they were taking. That he was deeply in love with this witch was even more troubling.

“For you, Prudence, I shall try.”

Every time he did let himself think about that afternoon on that English hillside with Prudence, even centuries later, he became weak with want. Even now, after the bliss of their affair had long ended, with the sting of her betrayal still lingering, standing alone and ancient in new Salem, Jay felt each rib in his chest vibrate with the pounding of his sick heart. At least he had this, if not the only woman he’d ever loved in his long life—he had the spells and ways of being she had taught him before the night she tried to take his life.

“Go away, old ghosts,” he hissed, trying to clear away the thoughts that clouded his hearing.

Birds. Cars. Dogs. Even cats purring. He heard low conversations in living rooms. The sound of one hundred and sixty-two toilets flushing. People typing on laptops, sneezing, scratching dry skin, pushing greasy hair behind downy ears. He tuned some in and pushed others out, moving the range of his hearing like he was rotating sensitive dials. He listened for expansion and contraction, the music of magic.

And then he heard it: a low thrum pushing back against the skin of life, altering the assigned boundaries. Fixed on that sound, he opened his eyes, went back to his car, and started driving. He had found a powerful woman, and he was on his way to her now.



It had taken a while to narrow in on a single point on the map, but he was here. The front door was closed, the windows covered with shutters, the walls solid. But what were walls to Jay Christos? He paused in the driveway, turned on La Bohème, and took a moment to remove his jacket, check his hair in the mirror, apply lip balm, and open up all his senses again. He didn’t know what kind of power he’d be encountering, and he needed to be ready to dominate it.

Then he opened the car door, unfolded to his full height, and walked towards the building, past the one other car parked in the lot. The girl, Lucky St. James, had been here. And the woman who helped her on her journey was inside—he was sure of it.

“Is this you, Meena?” he whispered. “Clever witch, leaving your home for the outskirts. But not clever enough to know how to muffle your melody.”

He pulled the handle, and the door opened. Inside, it was dim, and there was music, a soft undertone of cheerful rock—dreadful stuff. And there, behind the bar of the Trout Tavern, was a real, live Tender. Lucille saw him right away, really saw him, all the way inside him. She couldn’t hide the recognition, which overwhelmed her like a bad smell. And then he saw her, too—really saw her—all the way down the strands of DNA to her ancestors. He saw her mother at a bar in Boston, her grandmother pouring drinks in long skirts, and on, until he came to the Tender who, in 1892, led the witch Sarah to the Low & Co. warehouse, where she altered the spoons that were causing all this trouble now.

“Hello, great-great-granddaughter of Annie,” he cooed, sliding onto a stool. How lovely to run into the descendant of such a troublesome Tender. He was genuinely pleased. “I would recognize that scar anywhere.” He ran the tip of his index finger across his own throat, indicating the mark passed down to Annie’s female descendants, the mark of a woman who had carried power and swung from the rafters for it.

Suddenly, Lucille found it hard to breathe, as if her own feet were dancing on open air.



The Mother finally conceded. It was time to call the Good witch. It was time to warn her about the desert-dwelling wolf. He was too close not to.

The Maiden was inconsolable. She’d smashed the absinthe bottle against the wall, pushed over a chair, and was now sobbing, head down, at the table. Lucille had been a great Tender, but she had been an even greater friend, and now she was gone.