The Price Guide to the Occult(54)
Nor and Gage inched their way around the lake, whose icy limbs twitched like the whiskers on a sleeping beast. It raged with a kind of vengeance that made Nor uneasy.
“Is this because of your mother?” Gage shouted to Nor.
Nor shook her head. “No,” she said. “I think it’s because of me.” The hostile plants, that eerie fog, the sudden lightning storm, all brought to mind the way the body’s immune system, in its desperation to destroy an invading virus, could go so far as to destroy itself. Was it possible that Nor’s fear — of her mother, of herself — had grown so large that she’d infected the entire island with it?
Nor shuddered when the wall of ice swept over a maple tree as if it were nothing more than a blade of beach grass.
And now it might be too late. The island, she realized, might no longer care who it had to fight off.
It might just destroy them all in its desperate attempt to save itself.
The air out on the ocean stung, cold and merciless. Nor could barely feel the tips of her fingers. After turning her face away from the wind, she wiped strands of wet hair from her cheek and looked back at Anathema Island. All she could see of it was the aegises looking out across a haze of smoke.
Gage pulled the skiff up to the dock at Halcyon Island. Like the rest of Halcyon, the marina was quiet and empty; only a small dinghy remained afloat. The rest of the boats had sunk and stuck out of the water at odd angles, like sinking graves in an abandoned cemetery.
“You sure this is it?” he asked.
Nor nodded. Before them loomed the abandoned hotel, the quintessential witch’s castle in a dark and twisted fairy tale.
“Then I think we both know why that body was found here last fall,” Gage said. He paused to stare at the limp rope in his hand, trying to decide if more pain would come from hoping to live or from preparing to die. “You know,” he said, “there’s no guarantee we’ll get back to Anathema.”
Nor ripped the rope from his hand and wrapped it around the post. “Quit being so damned dramatic,” she said, as if saying so would quiet the sound of her own hammering heart.
They climbed the steps of the marina and had to fight their way through a thicket of fast-growing thistles. They had barely made it to the top when the entire stairway was swallowed by it, and a vine even shot out and grabbed Nor’s ankle. She dug at it with her fingers but couldn’t break its hold. With effort, she pulled out the knife wedged in her boot and hacked at the vine.
It yelped, let go of Nor’s leg, and dragged itself back into the carpet of foliage choking the dock. Nor tossed the knife onto the ground and bounded after Gage, the plant’s screams echoing in her ears.
They found their way into the hotel’s open courtyard. There, a bonfire raged. At first, Nor thought it was lawn furniture that was burning.
“Bones,” Gage said flatly. He was right: a pile of bones stacked and lit like sticks and branches.
Nor was quite certain they were the bones of the Resurrected. The Resurrection Spell didn’t last very long, and the only thing to do once the spell had worn off was to burn the undead.
Vines covered the old hotel’s stone facade, and most of the windows were broken. “You should stay out here,” Nor suggested.
Gage rolled his eyes. “Now who’s being dramatic?”
Except for a few disemboweled couches, the lobby inside was empty. A chandelier hanging in the center of the round room swung eerily, and the mirror behind the lobby desk was shattered. The walls were covered in crude graffiti.
They crept up the stairs leading to the second floor. Suddenly the staircase rocked and bucked. Nor lost her balance and started to fall, but Gage caught her. He wrapped his arms around her, bracing them for another quake. Nor felt the wild beat of his heart against her back. The tremor lasted only a moment, and then, with the world steady once more, Nor pulled away from Gage.
They took the stairs two at time. At the end of a long hallway, an ornate door was marred with carved gashes. They walked down the hallway, wondering if they’d find someone on the other side of that door.
The room had been meant for happy occasions: weddings, formal dinners, cocktail parties. It had once been decorated with large waving palm trees, and the walls had been covered in tiles the color of rich jewels, reminiscent of a Turkish bath. Only bits and pieces of those palm trees and brightly colored tiles remained and were scattered across the floor.
The few people inside the room moved as if drugged. One writhed across the floor. Another looked like a robotic toy whose batteries were running out. A woman stared into a piece of cracked mirror she held in her hand, transfixed by her skeletal reflection. Next to her, a man walked into a wall again and again on a permanent repeat. A low moaning filled the room: the sound of despair and desolation.
From out of a darkened corner stepped Fern, tattoos unfurling sensuously from her porcelain skin. They rose and arced over her head, like Medusa’s hair of snakes. Nor and her mother locked eyes. The ferns retracted, whipping through the air with a snap.
“Nor,” Fern crooned, putting on a honeyed smile. “I am so glad you came to see me.” Fern moved closer, followed by Catriona. Nothing was left of the jovial girl who used to sell fish at the farmers’ market on Saturday mornings. A scarf covered her face, but did little to hide the angry red tattoos that spread across her cheeks and forehead.