Legacies (Mercedes Lackey) - By Mercedes Lackey Page 0,82

hope your Mage Gift doesn’t show up in the next week, or we are really, really in trouble. Look. Based on everything I’ve researched, a demon will sense magic, so it will sense me. That makes me the logical one to be bait. It-or-they will chase me to the spell-trap, and the spell-trap will hold it-or-them for a few seconds all by itself. That’s where you come in. I’ll set the spell-trap up in that little stand of woods up by the boundary stone. There’s less chance of somebody else coming across it ahead of time. Then—that night, when the Wild Hunt comes—you have to wait by the spell-trap for the demon-or-demons to enter it, and as soon as it-or-they’re caught, you do the spell. It-or-they won’t know you’re there, because your Mage Gift hasn’t shown up yet. That’s why it has to be you, and why it can only be you.”

“But Ms. Groves always says that the reason spells don’t work most of the time is because non-magicians do them,” Spirit blurted out, feeling more than a little trapped and desperate. “If ordinary people can’t make spells work, what makes you think I can?”

“Because you’re a magician,” Loch repeated patiently. “The power is in you. There’s no such thing as a false positive for magical power, okay? Just trust me. You can do it, Spirit. But you’ll need to learn it by heart—and every word has to be exactly right.”

Oh my God, no pressure, right? Spirit thought for the ten thousandth time since she’d come to Oakhurst. What if Loch was wrong? What if she did something wrong?

That was too unbearable to even think about. If there were demons—If they followed Loch—If she did something wrong—

Then both she and Loch were dead.

But did she have a choice?

“Okay,” she said, resigned. “Give it to me.” She was going to say she’d try, but then stopped herself.

If they turned out to really need this spell—and she screwed it up—it wouldn’t just be her and Loch who’d be dead. Once the demons got through with her and Loch, they’d be mad, and they’d go hunting, and they’d find whoever was out that night.

They’d all be dead.

The next several days passed in a blur for Spirit. Fortunately she had a good excuse when Ms. Smith took her aside after Math Class and asked her if she was feeling okay. Spirit forced a smile and said she was feeling a little down because of the holidays. It hurt to use her parents’ memories like that—as part of a lie—but she knew they’d have understood. Especially Mom. Mom had always agreed with Davy Crockett: “Be sure you’re right, then go ahead.” Mom had always had a saying for every situation. Spirit wondered which one she would have used this time, and knowing that she’d never know—that she’d never know what saying Mom would have applied in any situation for the rest of her life made Spirit want to lie down and howl.

But she was too busy.

The spell Loch needed her to learn was long. And it wasn’t in English. Most of it was Latin—which was okay, since she had Latin three days a week now—but a lot of the words in it weren’t even Latin.

And it wasn’t as if she had any more free time than she did before. She actually had less. The Christmas tree had been brought into the Main Entry on the twelfth, and the whole enormous room—including the balcony—was garlanded in pine boughs. There’d been a lottery to see who’d get to decorate the tree and the garlands, and of course it had been Spirit’s bad luck to be chosen, so there went more precious free time, because this was Oakhurst, and it wasn’t as if you could just hang a couple plastic balls around and throw on some tinsel and call it done. Most of the ornaments were glass, and looked as old as the house, and each of them was probably worth more than the White family’s entire decorated tree.

In addition, everyone in the school was learning Christmas carols, because they’d be singing them every Sunday from here to Christmas, and on the twenty-fourth, too, when presents from Oakhurst were handed out. There’d be a few other presents, too; because while they weren’t allowed to shop on the Internet even if they had money, there was no rule against making gifts for their friends, so Spirit had been making book covers and matching bookmarks, since they did a lot