call it an inspection working, one that lets me see overlays of magical energies. Nothing is clinging to him. Whatever the circle was, the curse working had dissipated before he got there.”
“Occam,” Jo asked, “did you feel anything from the circle when you were there or anything like a calling last night? A need to go catty?”
“Not a thing. It was a peaceful night.” His eyes traveled slowly to me, and when they met mine, he gave me a Mona Lisa smile, his expression reminding me what we had been doing when the call came in. “Very … peaceful.”
“Stop it, Occam,” Tandy said, clearly embarrassed. “Please.”
“Yeah. It’s hot enough in here already without you two starting up whatever you were doing last night when I texted you,” JoJo said.
“Ummm. Details later, bestie,” T. Laine said to me.
Blood fought to heat my cheeks. The women in the church never talked about the night before on the day after. It just wasn’t done. I didn’t know how to respond and so simply lowered my eyes, mortified.
“So Rick was the only werecat called,” Jo went on, either oblivious to my embarrassment or ignoring it.
I pushed away my discomfort and said, “We know that Paka bound him magically and that she used were-magic in her binding. I sorta bound him in some way to heal him. Twice. It’s possible”—almost certain, but I didn’t want to say that—“that I tied him to Soulwood. And maybe, through his own cat and the tattoos, and the were-magic Paka used, he’s more susceptible to spells that deal with cats?”
“I like,” T. Laine said, her eyes going unfocused and distant.
“And why don’t we just ask him?” I added.
Both T. Laine and JoJo hooted with laughter. Jo said, “The boss doesn’t talk about his tats. Like not ever.”
Occam was still giving me that faint smile and I couldn’t meet his eyes. My awkwardness about the previous night, added to my prevarication about tying the werecats to the land, was amusing to him. He could feel the pull on his magics; he knew I had tied him and Rick both to the land when I healed them. When I brought him back from the dead.
“Back to your comment about him being susceptible to cat spells. Twisty, but possible,” Jo said, taking a slice of toast. “And in my opinion, tied to your land is better than being dead.”
T. Laine said, “My personal worry is that his unfinished tats and blood magic, mixed with our old friend Paka’s spells, may have created a magical opening into Rick’s soul, an opening that’s still there.”
Occam sat up, swinging his feet to the wood floor, sliding Cello to his lap. “You’re telling me Rick’s psyche might be open? That any witch worth her salt, or maybe any fanghead strong enough, can reach in and take him over?”
“Yes,” JoJo said.
“No,” T. Laine said at the same time. “Not exactly.” She swung her leg off the chair arm, to the floor, and sat up in the rocker, her motion mimicking Occam’s and making her dark bob swing. “Okay, it’s like this. And though none of this is a secret, it stays in this room until further notice. Verbal discussion only.”
We all nodded.
“You know how Rick has music he plays during the full moon. He got it to help keep him sane back when he couldn’t shift into his cat. And you know how it eases all the shifters who’ve tried it.”
The music was a big part of the full moon protocol in HQ. Occam nodded slowly, his fingers sliding down the cat body. The cat started purring.
“When Rick was turned, things happened fast. He was bitten by a black leopard and the taint got into his system, starting the change. Immediately he was kidnapped by werewolves and they chewed on his tattoos. Think about it. There was werewolf taint in his flesh while he was going through the change into a black wereleopard. That had to cause problems on a first moon-calling, and we all know he couldn’t shift into his cat for two or three years.” She leaned in. “Rick was still with Jane Yellowrock at that time and Jane is the one who got the music for him. Jane is friends with Molly Everhart Trueblood, of the Everhart witches, but Molly is not an air witch. I’m guessing that Molly found an air witch somewhere and got her to make the music spells that disrupted the magic in Rick’s unfinished black-magic tats.”
The magical music also