Black Magic Friday by E Frost (books to read fiction .TXT) 📗

and feel that smear of blood. Separate but still part of me. Full of my essence; full of my magic. I dig my hands into the floor, feel it soften, then pull my hands apart, tearing opening a hole in the planes. I build an image in my mind. Where I want this hole to end. A tower with burning walls. Standing on a hill of ash. Surrounded by a moat of tears.

As the image becomes so strong I can feel the gritty ash that billows off the hill flick against my cheeks, smell the smoke from the burning walls, I hear an agonized roar. I glance at the imp, but he’s silent, watching me with wide eyes. “There, go,” I whisper to him.

The imp nods and when I push with my magic, slips down into the rift between the planes.

I pull my hands out of the floor, but not before I feel the touch of Jou’s mind. A gentle brush, like the stroke of his hand. Sweet meat, he thinks. His pet-name for me, and descriptive, given how he thinks of humans.

Jou, I respond warily. I still have nightmares from the last time he spoke into my mind.

I miss you.

I hesitate, not sure how to respond. I miss him, too. But the reasons I sent him back to Hell are all still there. Keeping us apart.

His thoughts turn harsh. Lashing across my nerves. I shy away from him, cowering like the imp, and finally scream when his thought becomes a searing whip, scourging my mind.

“No!” I push with my hands and my magic. Closing the rift. The floor smooths under my palms. I bend over for a moment, catching my breath after using so much magic. I feel a cold drop hit the back of my hand. Wipe it off on my jeans. I’ve cried too many tears for Jou. I promised myself I wouldn’t cry any more.

I stand shakily and brush myself off. The shoppers around me are still blurred ribbons of color, but the ribbons are getting shorter, more like shadows than parade streamers. Time chewing inexorably toward the end of the loop.

I turn to find Lin and realize there’s someone else that wasn’t affected by the stitch. It’s a little girl, maybe eight or nine. She wears jeans with holes in the knees and a Christmas sweater a size too small for her. Tears streak her cheeks. She stands stock still, clutching the maroon streamer next to her. Who brings a kid to Filene’s Basement on Black Friday?

“Hey, hey,” I say in what I hope is a soothing tone. I pull my sunglasses back down so my eyes don’t terrify her.

She snuffles and stares but doesn’t say anything. I kneel so I’m not towering over her. Put a hand out, but she flinches away. Since she probably saw me juggling lightning, I can understand why she wouldn’t want me touching her.

“Hey,” I repeat. “My name’s Tsara. What’s your name?”

“’Cole,” the girl says, with a pronounced lisp. I see she’s lost her two front teeth and I grin, remembering the years I went without mine after they were knocked out during a particularly rough ball game with my cousins. The girl smiles back uncertainly.

“Nicole, can you see things other people can’t see?” I ask.

The girl nods and clutches tighter at the maroon ribbon. It’s so short now I can see the details of the form behind the blur. A gray-haired woman in a long maroon coat and dark slacks, carrying too many bags.

I’m running out of time. I fumble in my messenger bag, pull out one of my business cards. It’s a cream and black card, that says, “Tsara Elizabeth Faa, Licensed Midwife,” to anyone without the Sight. Nicole will see “Tsara Elizabeth Faa, Witch,” and my private number. I offer her the card and she takes it hesitantly.

“I can see those things, too, Nicole. Same as you. If you ever need to tell someone what you see, or if you see something that really scares you, you can call me at the number on that card. Do you know how to use a phone?”

The girl nods and puffs out her thin chest as she contemplates my card. She should be able to see the charms that shimmer across it. “I know my number and my Gramma’s number, too. By heart,” she says.

“That’s excellent, Nicole. You can learn my number by heart, too.” Memorizing my number will seal the card’s protective enchantments to her. “And you can call me any time, okay?”

She nods and clutches the card to her chest.

I glance up at the woman Nicole is clinging to. I can see her clearly. The stitch is almost over. “It’s going to go back to normal in a moment, Nicole,” I say. “It’s going to be okay.”

She watches me with huge eyes as I rise from my crouch. “You looked like the monster,” she whispers, over the rising hubbub of the crowd. “I thought . . . you were one.”

“What?” I’m not sure what she means.

“When you were there.” She points to where I was crouched near the group fighting over the coat. “You looked like him.” She lifts two fingers above her bobble-hatted head.

“Did you see . . . did I have horns, Nicole?”

She nods. “And a tail. And wings. Big wings.”

Wings? I’ve recently discovered that I can shape a second Element: Air. But I don’t have wings and I can’t fly. Not even on my grandmother’s broom.

“Like a fairy, or an angel?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “They were red.”

Red wings. I’ve seen red wings before. In a vision I had of Jou, through the bow of a key that might open doors through Time. Either Nicole was seeing a reflection of my vision, or the mark Jou carved into my body and soul has more far-reaching consequences than I ever imagined.

I reach out to Nicole and this time she doesn’t flinch away. I pat her shoulder. “Learn my number, okay? And if you ever, ever need me, call.”

She