Kitty in the Underworld (Kitty Norville 12)

Zora pointed at a spot, one of the branches of the star. I didn’t recognize any of the markings there, nothing that particularly meant “Regina Luporum” or anything else. It could have been scribbling, random symbols copied from a Wikipedia article. If I asked Zora what the symbols meant, would she know? Or would she tell me I couldn’t possibly understand? I wanted to remember this, the symbols and patterns, everything, so I could ask Cormac and Amelia about it later.

I’d wanted to know what all this was about. Fine. This was it.

“We won’t hurt you,” Sakhmet whispered as she moved past me to her own place on the circle. Her smile was meant to be reassuring, and in spite of myself, I was reassured. I liked her. If only we could have coffee together in my favorite diner and have a normal conversation. This setting was damaging my judgment.

When Zora finished lighting torches, she joined us in the circle. Five points to the star, a place for each of us to stand. Kumarbis, then me, then Zora, then Enkidu and Sakhmet. I could see their faces, watch their expressions. They all showed calm, but their bodies were tense with anticipation. I scented their sweat, which gave the air a ripe, musty odor. We are the sacrifice. The sudden thought might not have been wrong, either. I was well into the cave, away from the tunnel. I’d have to get past Kumarbis to escape. That was probably intentional. Or was it critical that Regina Luporum stand in this spot and no other?

I was supposed to be concentrating on the ritual. I was supposed to be cooperating. I was feeling dizzy, slipping out of my own body.

A B-grade horror flick featuring an ancient magical ritual might have done something similar to what Zora cooked up. She brought her toolkit with her and worked industriously, scooping dried herbs out of a wooden box, putting them in a brazier, pulling crystals out of a velvet sack, along with sticks and wands and carved symbols, little sphinxes and Eyes of Horus and Ganeshas and Chinese symbols that I felt like I should have recognized.

I wanted to say something, to poke at her and the obvious theatricality of what she was doing. Like she wasn’t sure exactly what worked so she was going to try it all. But I kept quiet. My jaw hurt, I clamped it shut so tightly in my effort to keep quiet.

Then things took a turn. The next item she drew from her kit was a dead bird—an all-white dove, stiffened, eyes missing. It smelled musty rather than corpselike. Mummified. Next, a sheet of yellowed paper, or maybe parchment, that appeared to be blank. And a jar, containing a very much alive mouse, peach size and gray, skittering up the sides of the glass. There appeared to be holes punched into the lid. These three items she placed in the center of her ritual space, on top of a spiraling shape that must have had some specific meaning.

She moved around the circle, placing crystals and totems, little piles of herbs and salt, sprinkling us all with water from a copper bowl. I blinked and winced when the water hit my face, suppressing a growl. I hoped the others understood the heroic efforts I was making here to be good and quiet. I entertained myself by imagining what Cormac might say about all this, and I decided he wouldn’t say anything. He wouldn’t have to; the smirk on his face would be epic. And what would Amelia say? I didn’t know her as well as I knew Cormac, but I imagined she’d be smirking just as hard. The two of them got along for a reason.

I needed to stop thinking about Cormac and Amelia, and how they could help me if they were here. But I also needed to remember as many details as I could about all this, so I could tell them, so they could help me ferret out the meaning of this. I had to have faith that I would be able to talk to them about this later. So I tried to pay attention to the details they would want to know. The dove, the mouse, the torches, the symbols. My vision was swimming from the smoke.

Zora was saying prayers under her breath. A consecration, I realized. A cleansing, a blessing.

She went to Kumarbis last, leaving talismans for his place on the circle, saying her prayer. Last, she held out her hand, and he pulled the coin on its cord over his head and gave it to her. Like giving the bloodhound something to scent.

Was it crazy that this was starting to make sense?

She placed the coin in the center circle, with the dead dove, the sheet of paper, and the live mouse. Finally, she returned to her place on the star and circle, raised her arms, and began to chant. “Munde Deus virtuti tuae, confirm thy power in us, oh spirit of the world, confirm thy power against our enemy, may his paths be uncertain, let the spirit of the world persecute him, El, Elohim, Elohe, Zebatth, Elion, Escerchie, Adonay, Jah, Tetragrammaton, Saday…”

And so on. She moved from English to Latin to languages I didn’t recognize. Probably Hebrew and Arabic, and a few others besides. Whatever language, whatever she was saying, she spoke like she meant it, and her conviction brought a strange weight to the room, as if the air grew thicker, and breathing grew more difficult. Enkidu’s and Sakhment’s chests moved visbly; they, too, were taking deeper, more purposeful breaths. Enkidu’s expression was set, frowning, determined. He watched Zora as if he could make her succeed by force of will alone. Sakhmet, also determined, full of faith, was watching Enkidu.

Kumarbis wasn’t breathing at all, because he didn’t need to. Of all of us, he was relaxed, arms loose at his sides. His head was tilted back, and he smiled. It was a look of triumph. He had been planning this for centuries, and finally, finally, his great scheme was coming to fruition. Of course he looked triumphant. So, what would he do if nothing happened?

Because apart from her chanting, the wavering light of the torches, and the psychological influences that prompted us to think we’d entered another world, nothing was happening. Movement kept catching my gaze—a spark of reflected light in the thumb-size crystal she’d put on the ground in front of me. The pale yellow stone was catching the flickering light of the torches and throwing it back at me. Swirling patterns in the air were only smoke, writhing, thickening. The burning incense drifted, gathered, growing dense. The light from the torches played against it.

I could almost imagine I saw shapes in the light and shadow, the haze in the air. Claws and legs, fangs and black eyes.

Zora’s voice became ecstatic, as if she really was getting off on this. “The window opens, spirit of the world, give us the strength to tread on serpents, to smash the power of our enemy, that none may hurt us. The window opens, spirit of the world, show us our enemy!”

So help me, I saw something in the smoke, with eyes, looking back. Something male and wicked. I could almost smell it—cold, like stone. Vampirically cold, weighted with age and purpose. It seemed to look around the circle, studying each of us. Marking us, for future reference.

Wolf braced as if cornered. We wouldn’t scream, we wouldn’t run, because it wouldn’t do any good. We would face it and fight.

This was the power of suggestion at work, nothing else. This was Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, and we were trying to draw meaning from half-perceived images, building worlds out of shadows. But Wolf’s hackles were rising, a shivering down the back of my spine that told me something was watching us. The urge to run grew. Yes, let’s, please. I ought to listen to Wolf more often.

Kumarbis’s eyes were closed, his arms spread, basking in the radiance of the ritual. Enkidu’s jaw was taut, and he held himself in the rigid stance of a cornered wolf. He was feeling much like I was, then. I gathered he didn’t know what to expect out of this ritual any more than I did. He had committed to all this without knowing details. Did that make him loyal, foolish, or both? Sakhmet also watched the patterns in the smoke, but every now and then she glanced at Enkidu, and her fingers clenched as if she wanted to reach out to him and take his hand.

Zora moved to the center of the circle. In one hand she had a dagger, a clearly ceremonial piece with a slender, shining blade and a carved bone handle. Kneeling before the collection of items she’d placed there, she opened the jar and grabbed the flailing mouse. She held up the mouse in one hand and dagger in the other, beseeching the smoke rising into the expanse above us.

“Show me our enemy, show me the future!”

She dug the point of the dagger into the mouse and wrenched, splitting open the tiny body. Expertly, as if she had done this before, or often, she twisted the knife again, digging out a brick-red chunk of flesh the size and shape of a peanut. Its heart. The mouse squealed, a brief and shockingly loud sound. There was surprisingly little blood.

She dropped the mouse and ate its heart. Still hot. Zora chewed twice and swallowed. The body of the mouse was still twitching.

I stared, too shocked to react. The torches crackled and sparked. Zora’s eyes were closed, and she clasped the dagger before her, point down. A few drops of blood dripped onto the paper.

By then, we were all holding our breath. I thought I heard a voice, a murky sound to go with the smoke and shadows. A soft, mocking chuckle. It didn’t come from any of us. Zora’s chants had spoken of defeating our enemy. But someone was laughing at us.

I caught Enkidu’s gaze, tried to ask the question—who?—but he gave his head a small shake. “Zora—” I growled at the magician, questioning.