Mark of the Witch. Maggie Shayne

      “No. No, this needs to be private. There’s an occult shop in the Village. They have a tiny backyard.” She dug in her handbag, pulled out a pen and a business card, flipped the card over and wrote on the back. “I’ll get the coven together. Not all of them, just the Seconds and Thirds. If this is what I think it is, it’s serious stuff.” She slid the card across the table so I could see the address she’d written. “Be there by 10:00 p.m., okay?”

      Blinking, feeling a ridiculous burning sensation behind my eyes, I nodded. “Okay. Thank you.”

      “I’m a high priestess. This is part of my job.” She twisted her wrist to look at her watch. “My other job, that is, besides the one I’m late getting back to. But before I do, I need your permission to share what you’ve told me with one other person. Someone I trust more than anyone else in the world. You can trust him, too. And he might have information we need. All right?”

      “Is he a shrink?” I asked, and when she frowned at me, I said, “Yeah, permission granted. Go for it. Just try not to make me sound too warped.”

      She was already on her feet, using a napkin to pick up the remaining half of her donut, hoisting her bag, which, I’d just noticed, matched the shoes—same black leather, same silver zipper—higher onto her shoulder. “I’ve gotta run, Indy. Take care of yourself, okay? And trust me, we’ll figure this out.”

      I tried to smile. “Okay.”

      And then she was gone, clicking away in her fabulous shoes at high speed. She’d left a half cup of caffeine-laden brew at her seat. Reflexively, I started to reach for it, felt eyes on me, heard a throat clear, and saw a waitress looking at me.

      Sighing, I lowered my hand to my own cup of putrid tea. At least I had my donut.

       2

      “Father Dominick. You asked for me?”

      “In the office,” Dom called.

      Tomas entered and closed the front door behind him. The old priest’s entire house smelled like a combination of mothballs and muscle rub that always made Tomas’s stomach clench and his nose wrinkle. He forced himself not to allow the latter as he walked through the cluttered living room into what had probably been a den or a library when the old Victorian was built and now served as Dom’s office. Crucifix on the wall, books everywhere. Not just on the shelves—and there were lots of those—but in stacks and standing upright along the floor between every piece of furniture that could serve as a bookend. Old books, their bindings and pages overwhelming the smells in the rest of the house, much to Tomas’s relief. The smell of books was soothing. It was the smell of knowledge, preserved and passed on.

      Father Dom was sitting at his desk, facing his computer. “Come around here, Tomas,” Dom said. “I have someone who wants to talk to you.”

      Frowning, Tomas moved behind the desk. Dom nodded at the big monitor, and when Tomas looked, he saw the girl from yesterday, sitting up in her bed, smiling at them via Skype. “Hi, Father Thomas,” she said.

      “It’s Toe-MAHS,” Father Dom pronounced. “Say hello to Dora, Tomas.”

      “Hello, Dora.” He couldn’t believe his eyes. The girl looked fine. Oh, a little pale, a little tired, but her eyes were bright, and she appeared perfectly healthy.

      “You look much better,” he said.

      “I know. I feel better. I just wanted to thank you for helping me.”

      Shame rose, and he bowed his head. “I didn’t really do anything. It was all Father Dom.”

      “No, you were there. I remember. I don’t blame you for leaving. Mamma says it was awfully scary. But you came, and I’m better now.”

      Tomas glanced at Dom, who smiled and nodded at the girl. “Well, we’ll let your doctor be the judge of that,” he said. “You’re seeing him this afternoon, aren’t you, Dora?”

      “Yes, at two.”

      “Let me know what he says, will you?”

      “Of course. Bless you, Father Dom. Father Tomas.” She said it correctly that time, and then the on-screen window with her face inside it vanished.

      Dom rolled his chair away from his desk but didn’t get up. “Her doctor will give her a clean bill of health. Of course, he couldn’t find anything wrong with her to begin with.”

      Tomas nodded. Doubted, but nodded. “I’m sorry I doubted you, Father Dom. I just … in my experience … I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

      “I’ve seen it a hundred times. Exorcised more demons than any priest in the church. Which is why I inherited this assignment of ours to begin with. This quest.”

      “And I’m humbled that you chose me to be your successor.” He ought to tell him. He really ought to. But no, not yet. The wheels took time to turn, and this was going to be a huge and painful discussion when it happened.

      Dom grunted as if he doubted it. “You’re the least humble man I know, son. But you were chosen for this. Sent to me just for this. Sit, Tomas,” he ordered. “I don’t like looking up at anyone.”

      Tomas sat. The gruff old man was his mentor, his teacher and the closest thing he’d ever had to a father. Yes, he believed in things Tomas had come to consider unbelievable. But even he didn’t doubt the man with as much conviction as he used to. His doubts were still strong enough for him to know this was not the life for him, however. So he sat and tried to assume a humble demeanor. He loved the old priest, despite the fact that he’d always considered him a little bit crazy.

      “Pull your chair around here,” Dom said. “We’re not through with this machine yet.” He was clicking keys as he spoke—slowly. Hunting and pecking with a single forefinger, knuckles swollen from arthritis.

      Tomas nodded and moved his chair closer, turning it so he could see the computer screen again. It showed a lengthy series of astrological terms, symbols for the signs, abbreviations for alignments and conjunctions and oppositions at varying degrees. It stood beside a map of the solar system with lines and arrows and more symbols all over it. It looked like an NFL coach’s playbook. Astrology had never been his strong suit.

      “What am I looking at?”

      “This configuration. Right here.” Dom pointed. “In a week it will be exactly the same as it was in the beginning.”

      “The beginning …” Tomas looked up from the screen, meeting Dom’s aging but sharp cornflower-blue eyes as he finally got the old man’s meaning. “The beginning? The fifteen-hundred-BC beginning?”

      “More precisely, Samhain Eve, fifteen hundred and one BC. The day a high priest of the cult of Marduk imprisoned He Whose Name Must Not Be Spoken in the Underworld. If the demon is going to try to escape into our world again, Tomas, it will be soon. Samhain Eve, in fact. And I’m no longer strong enough to do what needs doing, though it pains me to admit it.”

      Tomas searched Dom’s face. “You’re not well?”

      Dom shrugged. “I feel fine.” He turned his head, gazing across the room at the oversize crucifix on the opposite wall. “But the Lord has spoken to me, told me it has to be you. This is the mission I’ve trained for all my life. Now it falls to my successor before his time. But that’s the way it has to be. So sayeth the Lord.”

      “All things happen for a reason, Father Dom.” But inside Tomas was thinking this couldn’t be happening. Now not, not when he’d finally made the decision to leave the priesthood and sent in the paperwork making the request formal.

      Thank God he hadn’t yet told the old man.

      “Watch and wait for the signs, Tomas. Watch for the witches of Babylon. The Demon’s whores. Each of them bound by oath and by blood to