But even as I finished my list and began to think about how to put it all together, I wondered if maybe trying to use a dollop of elf magic might be in order. Not that I was lazy, but asking a deity to mesh everything together would make it easier. More powerful, too. I’d already modified the spell Trent had once used to temporarily contain my soul to capture Nina’s so as to give it to Ivy. But I wasn’t sure it was safe to swim in that pool anymore.
I looked up at Jenks’s soft wing hum to see his low, dully glittering path just above the sanctuary floor. He was cold, and I held out my hand to give him a warm place to land. “Damn, it’s like Tink’s titties after a snow out there. Is this enough, Rache?”
A handful of long rootlets was in his grip, and I nodded. “Plenty. Thanks. Are you going to give me any flack about sitting tight as I get the rest?”
Jenks looked at my list, his brow furrowed. I cleared my throat, and he hesitated. “No,” he finally grumbled, and I smiled.
“Good.” I stood, and he settled on the rim of my cooling coffee. “Back in a minute.”
“Slug snot. I’m guarding the church,” Jenks said morosely as he sat on my cup, heels thumping and dust making an oily sheen on the bitter brew.
“At least you’re not the librarian!” I said over my shoulder as I strode to the front door, snips and black gathering scarf in hand. My heels clunked on the old wood in a familiar sound as I skirted the hole in the floor and slipped outside. The street was quiet as I hustled down the steps, arms about my middle as I dodged the plates of food and vases of flowers. The slate path leading to the back gate was covered in leaves, and the squeak of the hinges went right through my head. But then I was in the garden, and a smile found me as I worked my way through the traditional witches’ garden and into the more traditional witches’ garden among the tombstones. This was where I’d harvest the dandelion and cedar, where death and transition made them stronger.
I lost myself among the fallen leaves smelling of both earth and sky as I lifted soggy, cold, stunted plants to find the still potent sheltered rosettes, gathering what I wanted and folding them into the scarf. A soft glint of gray turned out to be one of my stone spoons, and pleased, I rubbed it clean and dropped it in a pocket. I’d probably be finding stuff for years, scattered when the vampires of Cincinnati had blown up my kitchen.
The fading scent of zombie among the tombstones brought me up sharp, and I wondered how Glenn was going to deal with this wrinkle. I knew he was withholding information from both me and Ivy. Not to mention from his dad at the FIB. His last words were not inspiring: trust him and keep a low profile? The trust I could handle, but when had I ever kept a low profile?
Thoughts swirling, I spun to go inside, halting when I saw the burned back of the church. The missing kitchen and living room had been added on in the seventies, and the original stone wall was scorched and ugly. Only the fireplace remained, but it was cracked and would have to be torn down. It was easy to see where pipes and conduits ran, and as I picked my way over the low wall separating the graveyard from the more ordered flower garden, I wondered if it might be possible to make an inspection-solid tulpa of my kitchen. If it was like any other tulpa, it would be real. Really real. Permit and inspection real.
But as with all things, I’d pay for it. Making a tulpa the size and complexity of the kitchen would put me out for a week. Al was the only demon I’d trust to pick through my mind and separate the construct from my psyche, not to mention watch over me as I recovered. We hadn’t made a construct since the mystics had talked to me. He seemed okay with how things were, but I wasn’t sure he was comfortable with being in my mind anymore. But as I looked at the ruin of my church, I decided I’d ask him after Thanksgiving.
If we both survive, I thought, my anger with Hodin