No Dominion The Walker Papers - By CE Murphy Page 0,87
I didn’t know how, but I was sure she’d figured out the truth somehow. Intuition, or me being a real bad liar, or something, but I’d let too much slip and she knew. But I couldn’t ask ‘cause if it was my imagination running wild and she didn’t know, then asking would mean the jig was up too. I was starting to blush, and I hadn’t done that in thirty years.
The corner of her mouth turned up just a little. “All right, dear. If you say so. Now, what was I saying. Oh, the cheetah. A cheetah, for heaven’s sake. It’s something a seventeen-year-old girl would want, not a seventy year old lady. The other was—”
“A stag. I kinda saw that one, darlin’. Got a glimpse, anyway.”
“Positively ridiculous,” she said. “Virile and masculine. Why on earth would creatures like that want me?”
I had a hard time pulling my eyebrows outta my hairline. Annie laughed, blushed, and laughed again. “That’s very flattering, but really, Gary, I am seventy years old.”
“Don’t see what that’s got to do with anything. ‘sides, it all kinda fits together. You saw that picture your pa painted of Cernunnos, the horns on him and all. I don’t figure it’s a coincidence a stag came your way, is what I’m saying. You’re feeling stronger, that’s what matters, right?”
“Strong enough to take the fight to this enemy.” The color in her cheeks wasn’t from blushing anymore. It was the fire of battle getting ready to meet. “Gary, I can’t just let it go out into the world, or the Upper World, wherever you want to say, and let other people be hurt by it. But if I’m strong enough to hold on a while, maybe we’ll win something. Maybe if I can hold this evil inside of me just a little longer than it expects, maybe it’ll mean I take one wrong thing out of the world when I go. That’s worth dying for, Gary. If I’m going to die anyway, I want to make it worth something.”
“You ain’t gonna—”
“Everybody does, sweetheart. Whether it’s tomorrow because of this sickness or thirty years from now from old age, everybody dies. I don’t want to leave you, but if I have to, I’m going to take as much darkness out of the world as I can when I go.”
There wasn’t much I could say to that, so I didn’t try. There was no arguing with the woman at the best of times, an’ this was that, and the worst too. We shut ourselves in together, whispering like kids ‘til way too late in the night, telling secrets about power animals and spirit journeys and doing our best to take ourselves there without anybody helping. I didn’t know what time we fell asleep, but we didn’t wake up until Hester knocked on the door a couple minutes after ten the next morning.
Pretty sure she thought we were too old for the state of dishevelment we came to the door in, but her sour face getting even sourer made me and Annie both laugh. I cooked everybody breakfast while Annie got herself put together.
We spent the whole day doing the rounds, everything Annie usually did. Hester’s eyes went as gold as Jo’s did when she turned on the mojo, which kinda surprised me. I’d figured everybody would have their own color, maybe something to do with their auras, though Jo’s aura wasn’t gold at all, which shot that idea fulla holes. I chuckled at myself, making both women look at me, but I shrugged it off. Explaining any more about future memories was more than I wanted to try.
All three of us got tense when we dropped into the yoga studio, figuring a spiritual center was the most likely place for a magic user, even a dark one, to hole up. Annie introduced Hester around to the teachers, an’ one by one they came up clean, even the new one we’d been laying our bets on. It was coming on toward night again by then, and stronger or not, Annie was wrung out. Hester had to come home with us, ‘cause she’d left her car there, but the drive back was full of her tension and apologies she wasn’t making out loud. Annie finally reached between the front seats and patted Hes’s knee. “It’s not your fault, Miss Jones. Maybe this is a natural illness after all.”
“No. I’ve taken a lot of people to the Lower World to battle their sicknesses, Mrs. Muldoon.