“It could possibly be her,” Grams said. “Sometimes, spirits don’t retain the logic they might have in life. And also, she might be angry at Faron. She could be taking it out on anybody who comes near her. I mean, when you think about it, he destroyed her dreams. Even though it wasn’t deliberate, she might blame him. And she might blame him for her death.”
“That still doesn’t account for the tracks that Daisy saw leaving the car. The passenger door was open when they found the crash. Lucretia was dead and still belted into the driver’s seat. She certainly didn’t open the door.”
Grams froze. She turned to me. “What kind of tracks?”
I frowned. “I thought I told you. Daisy found tracks leading away from the car, and the passenger door was open. The tracks had a small foot, but round like an animal, with three long toes coming out of the pad. It wasn’t human, or even any shifter footprint that Daisy recognized. She texted me a picture of them and for the life of me, they look like some weird bird. But it would have to be a large bird — about the size of Fancypants.”
Grams motioned for me to follow her. She stopped at a bookcase, and as I took off my coat, she found the book she was looking for. She carried it over to a small round table to the side where she did her tarot readings. Gesturing for me to sit down, she slipped into the other seat and began thumbing through the pages.
The book looked old, and the pages crinkled as she paged through them. I thought they might be some special form of vellum, and they were covered with what looked like entries and drawings.
“What is that?” I asked.
“It’s the family grimoire—the bestiary of creatures and demons that we’ve encountered over the centuries. Now that you’re settled down and ready to study the magic of our family, I’m making one for you, as well. I can’t let this out of my house, however, so I’m slowly scanning in the pages. We should really have an e-Copy as well, in case anything should ever happen. There are only a few of these books in existence, and we can’t chance losing such a vital part of our history.”
I glanced over her shoulder. “I don’t understand the language. What good is that going to do me?” I couldn’t read a word of what looked like the chicken scratch on page.
“For one thing, I’m going to teach you this language. It’s called Kandelarium. This is the language of your ancestors. Every great witch family who has a greater purpose has their own language. No one else may ever learn it, or every relative and ancestor you have who’s been one of the great demon hunters will rein down havoc on your head. We’ll start our studies as soon as the new year rolls around.”
That was news to me. I didn’t even know that there were other families that—as Grams put it—had a greater purpose. In fact when I thought about it I knew very little of the history of witches. My mother had been lax on teaching me when I needed to know.
“Is my mother’s family also one of great witch families?” I asked.
“Yes, and she has chosen to walk away from that. Your mother isn’t a bad person, but she has very little sense of duty to history, and I do believe she has some form of personality disorder.” Grams glanced at me, and I could tell the subject made her uncomfortable.
“It’s okay, you can talk about my mother. I’ve known she’s been a narcissist since I was a little girl. She hated that I loved my father more, but I always knew she didn’t really want me. She wanted to be the only one in his life, and I don’t blame her that much. She didn’t want to be a mother and he pushed her into it.”
“I’m afraid your father was short-sighted when it came to her. He believed he could change her mind. That’s a big mistake—thinking you can change someone.” Grams sighed. “I wish I’d paid more attention to what was going on.”
“I know. But I’ve come to realize more and more, my mother has serious mental health issues. When I was dealing with the trauma of losing Rian, she was so short with me because I’d forget to do all the chores for her, and I’d forget to run the errands. She never explicitly said anything, but I think she felt that I should just move on and get over it.” I stretched back in my seat, frowning.
“Your mother’s deluded. You’ll never get over that. We can work on it, and we are, but there will never be a way to forget. You have to live with that reality, I’m sorry to say.” Grams went back to perusing the tome. After a few moments, she let out an, “Aha,” and tapped a picture on the page.
I scooted over next to her to check out what she was looking at. The drawing looked a lot like what I imagined house sprites to look like, only there was an uneasy grin on the creature’s face. It had small feet, with three long toes coming off of them, reminding me oddly of sharp carrots. Its hands were webbed, with sharp talons on the end, and it had a flat head, with long puppy dog ears, and wide oval eyes.
“What the hell is that?” I asked.
“It’s a comstod demon. And they hate shifters. They’re generally found in the astral realm, but they can manifest in the material plane. They feed on the volatile emotions that shifters have, and they also magnify insecurities and feelings of helplessness. They only target shifters to feed, though they’ll attack anyone who interferes. They especially prefer alphas because the alphas always seem to embody higher strung emotions.”
“So you think Lucretia attracted one? How long did she have it following her?” I asked.
“It’s hard to know. But the end result—if the demons aren’t exorcised—usually results in the death of the shifter. The comstod literally pushes them over the edge emotionally and they act out, doing something to harm themselves. Sometimes they’ll pick a fight with someone that they can’t possibly beat.”
“Or, they’ll run off the road, into a tree.” I let out a long breath, sitting back as I stared at the picture. “How do we destroy it? We can’t leave it there to wait for another shifter to feed on.”
“There is a way to exorcise it, and this is actually a good case to begin with. I’ll come with you because you can’t possibly exorcise the comstod alone. Not yet, that is. But we’ll take it on together. The comstod’s considered one of the sub-demons. They’re easier to take care of.”
I thought about it for a moment. “Do you think it reacted to me because I’m a demon hunter by blood?”
Grams considered the question, then nodded. “I think you’re on point. There is an energy field in your aura that marks you as one of us. Everyone in our family line has it, even if they don’t take on the role of a demon hunter. We are also more likely to be attacked by demons, so you should bear that in mind. You need to train so that you’re ready at all times, should one encounter you and decide to take you out.”
I groaned. “How lovely. I’m so looking forward to that,” I said. “So how do we fight this demon?”
“First, I teach you the incantation to exorcise it. It’s short and easy to remember. But the chant won’t work alone. You have to have the proper tools with you.” Grams stood, motioning for me to follow her. “Come on, we’ll get suited up.”
“Oh goody, do I get to wear a Batman suit?” I asked, grinning. I really needed to break the tension.
“Leather is always good for fighting demons. Cotton, not so much because it catches fire way too easy, and you’d be surprised at how many demons work with fire.” Grams led me into her ritual room. As I stood there, looking around, she walked over to a tall armoire. Inside, there were several robes and various other pieces of clothing hanging in the cupboard.
