“Raven?”
At first, it seemed like Raven hadn’t heard Maureen. Then the short woman turned, her multicolored hair fluttering in an unfelt wind. “The music will not hold Him. It failed before. It will fail now.”
Goose bumps broke out all over Maureen’s body. The voice coming from Raven’s mouth did not belong to the secretary. It was deeper. Older. So old. So ancient. What could one do against something so powerful? She gave her head a violent shake, making her fluffy white hair fly. “That’s enough of that.”
Pulling a bundle of herbs from her satchel, she lit it with an arcane word. When the bundle burned enough to smoke, she blew the flame out, leaving the fragrant herbs to smolder. Maureen blew the smoke into Raven’s face.
Raven took an involuntary breath and began to cough. Whenshe looked up, her eyes got wide with confusion and terror. “Maureen? What?” She looked around. “Why am I here?”
“You’re dreaming.” Maureen blew more smoke into Raven’s face, making her flinch back. She cupped the younger woman under the chin and forced her face up. When their eyes met, she said, “You’re dreaming. It was scary but it’s fine now. You’re going to go home. You’re going to leave now. You’re not going to stop, though you’ll obey all traffic laws. When you get home, you’re going to sit in your car and wake up. You were exhausted. Do you understand?”
Raven nodded as Maureen forced the compulsion deep. She hated doing things like this. But, like it or not, sometimes Felicia’s pragmatic ways were necessary. Right now, it was more important to get the innocents out of the building than to be gentle about it. They’d never know what danger they’d narrowly avoided.
Though, Maureen considered, as she closed and locked the rear entrance behind Raven, she would have to watch everyone on staff for remnants of whatever it was they were about to expel from her museum.
With Raven escorted out, and a final check that the building was actually empty, Maureen returned to Felicia. The other witch had been busy. She sat outside Harold’s office with her colorful satchel at her side. From it, she’d taken some of her personal implements—her ritual knife; incense that was burning; several small bags of salt, now open but still full. There was more, but Felicia struggled to her feet. “Good. I need you to find a wind instrument. A pipe. A flute. Something that you can play.”
“Are you going to tell me what we’re doing?”
“As soon as I figure it out. And that starts with you getting yourself something you can blow.”
“All right. All right.” Maureen thought about it. “There’s an exhibit of modern-day Pacific Northwest Native American instruments...”
“Maureen?”
She focused on Felicia.
“I don’t care. Just get it. Things are getting worse, if you hadn’t noticed.”
Now that she mentioned it, Maureen could feel the tightness of a headache at her temples. “Right.” She hurried away. The museum felt abandoned and desolate, even though the evening lights were on. Things seemed to watch her from the shadows as her steps echoed against the tile floor. Yes, things were getting worse. Strong enough to get through her wards.
Fortunately, the specific exhibit she was thinking of was only behind a rope barrier and not behind glass. Maureen didn’t want to think what would’ve happened otherwise. The museum was scraping by as it was. A damaged exhibit could be the end of things. She shook her head. “Don’t borrow trouble. You have enough to deal with already.”
As Maureen moved through the dim hallways she felt watched. She stopped and listened, trying to find the source of her disquiet. Something whispered in her ear, words too low to understand. She whirled around. Nothing but shadows. Again something whispered in her ear. This time she heard it.
Weak.
She turned to catch sight of movement in shadow.
Invisible old woman.
“No.” Maureen shook her head. “Not that.” She turned again as a shadow hand stripped her of her satchel.
Useless, unwanted, unloved.
The shadows grew all around her until she could see nothing of the exhibit she’d been headed toward. She stepped backward but the shadows were solid behind her. They closed in, muttering, covering, smothering her.
Weak, old, worthless. Wicked, unwanted, hated. Nothing to this world.
Maureen pushed against the whispers as much as she did the slowly constricting shadows. Her breath came in pants as she felt squeezed physically and mentally. Everything disappeared.
Hag. Hated. Witch. You will die alone and unremarked.
Anger flared at those last words. Maureen forced herself to calm. She knew the whispers were using her own fears against her. The fears of an old woman in a society that does not love or revere the wisdom of age as it once did. The hatred of a society that prized youth above all. The fear of a child rejected by a father who did not want her to follow in her mother’s footsteps, who had followed the path of the women in her family for generations.
“Hag, you say? Weak, old, useless? I will show you what this witch can do.”
Maureen closed her eyes, blocking the shadows from sight. Tilting her face upward, she found the light within that burned inside all of the women of her family and cupped her hands before her. She felt the warmth of her inner light before she sensed it glowing from her palms. Harnessing her anger and fear, she funneled it through that light and let it be transformed. Peace descended and she opened her eyes.
