Waking The Serpent. Jane Kindred

feeling he’d noted during the ritual definitely still lingered as the tires of his Escalade rumbled over the brick pavement of the parking lot. The heaviness increased after he’d crossed the courtyard and entered the nave to approach the altar. If Matthew was dead as Rafe feared and his shade lingered here among those the ritual had trapped, perhaps Rafe could reach him with the conjuring spell.

      Calming his nerves with a shot of bourbon from the flask in his pocket, Rafe set up the altar and undressed. He called the quarters first for protection, invoking Tezcatlipoca, god of night and invisible forces, as the Guardian of the North; Xipe Totec, god of force and rebirth, as the Guardian of the East; Huitzilopochtli, god of will and fire, as the Guardian of the South; and instead of Quetzalcoatl as Guardian of the West, he chose Chalchiuhtlicue of the Jade Skirt—goddess of rivers, seas and storms—for a more feminine aspect.

      As he called upon Matthew’s spirit to join him, however, the tattoo on his back began to itch. He thought he’d imagined it two nights ago as a hypnagogic hallucination at the brink of sleep, but now he felt distinct movement under his skin—the movement of a snake.

      Rafe turned to look over his shoulder in front of the small mirror above the altar. In the flickering flame of the temple candles, the ink was undulating, the scarlet scales of the serpent’s belly rippling over invisible terrain, reflected candlelight glittering off the teal and violet feathers as they fluttered in an unseen wind. Rafe touched his fingers to the ink. There was no doubt about it. Quetzalcoatl was moving.

      He’d called on the guardians for protection. Maybe this vision of Quetzalcoatl’s image was a message from his patron god. But he’d never heard of such a thing.

      After taking a few deep breaths, Rafe collected a dried cutting from the century plant in the entryway and returned to the altar. Whatever was happening, it was clearly magic, and he needed to channel it before it got out of hand.

      “I call on Quetzalcoatl, Lord of the star of the dawn.” He pressed the thorns of the agave spine to his tongue, letting the pain give him clarity. The old way involved a more intimate body part, but Rafe was interested in symbolic sacrifice, not masochistic fanaticism.

      As the blood rose around the thorns, he let it drip onto the dried edge of the spine, and then burned the clipping in the censer with the incense. “Invest me with your wisdom, O Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl, god of wind and light. Accept my sacrifice—chalchiuatl from my own veins—as your divine sustenance.”

      Invoking the wind-god aspect of Quetzalcoatl seemed to make the wind rise outside, the inner doors to the narthex rattling as though moved by it, though the outer doors were closed and locked. Gooseflesh raised along his skin, the hairs standing up, and something rushed him, a shade stepping into him. He thought for an instant it was Matthew, after all. But he’d felt this presence before. Jacob.

      * * *

      Branches whipped in the wind outside Phoebe’s front window as another monsoon storm began to brew above the brooding sandstone dome of Thunder Mountain. Over the sound of the wind, she heard the rumble of a truck on the gravel drive. Curled up in the papasan with a cup of tea and a paperback, Phoebe peered out, aggravated that someone would interrupt her moment of quiet. The black Escalade looked familiar, and it was definitely heading for her place. Phoebe lowered her cup. That was Rafe’s truck.

      Puddleglum protested in his best throaty, mournful moan when she moved him from her lap, but he wasted no time taking her spot.

      Phoebe set down the tea and went to the door, watching Rafe pull up in front of the carport. “What’s up?” She held the screen door open as he strode toward her with purpose. “Everything okay?”

      When he arrived in front of her, Rafe pulled her into his arms and kissed her hard enough to have knocked her on her ass if he hadn’t been holding on to her.

      With a sputter, Phoebe drew back from the unexpected greeting. “Are you feeling all right?” His eyes had a glossy, energized look.

      “I’m wonderful.” With his arms still hooked around her lower back, he nuzzled her neck, making her shiver. “This vessel has everything I need.”

      Not again. Phoebe peered into his eyes. “Jacob?”

      His face fell, bottom lip protruding almost like a child’s disappointed pout. “You’re not my Lila.”

      “No. And you have no business stepping into Rafe. If you want to talk to me, you talk to me. You don’t need to do it through him.”

      Rafe’s arms dropped away from her. “He was willing.”

      “I doubt that.” Phoebe regarded him expectantly, but Jacob only blinked at her through Rafe’s eyes. “Well? Are you going to release him?”

      He folded his arms. “No.”

      Phoebe sighed. Better to keep watch on him here than to leave Jacob on the loose with Rafe’s body, doing who knew what. “Then at least come inside.”

      Whether of his own volition or at Jacob’s direction, Rafe stepped into the house—barefoot, she noted—and let Phoebe close the door. “Where’s Lila?” He touched Phoebe’s face, drawing his hand sensuously along her jaw. “She was here. Recently. You smell like her.”

      “I smell like her?” He meant Lila as she’d been in life, obviously, but Phoebe grimaced at the idea of smelling like the dead.

      “You have the look of her, as well. Maybe I can draw her in.”

      Phoebe took a step back. “Or not. Why don’t we just talk? You could tell me what you know about the necromancer who’s been manipulating you. Rafe said you wanted his help to stop it.”

      Rafe’s eyes regarded her. “Tezcatlipoca is very powerful, and he’ll become more powerful still because of Rafael Diamante.”

      “Because of Rafe? Why? What does Rafe have to do with it?”

      “He’s a conduit.” Jacob strolled farther into the house, touching the surfaces of things—the walls, Phoebe’s knickknacks—running his fingers over them as if it were a luxury to be able to feel things through Rafe’s skin. Which it probably was. Phoebe tried not to think about what else those fingers had touched at Jacob’s direction.

      “A conduit for what? Not for shades? Is he a...an evocator? Like I am?” It seemed unlikely Rafe could have gone this long without being aware of such an innate skill.

      Jacob’s eyes narrowed, studying Phoebe with renewed interest. “No. Not an evocator. A conduit for energy. He bears the mark of the ancients.” Jacob began to unbutton Rafe’s crisp white shirt with slow, sensuous movements.

      “Jacob. What are you doing?”

      He turned and continued down the hall. The shirt fell from his shoulders and slipped down his arms to the floor, revealing the magnificent tattoo of Quetzalcoatl, wings flexing as Rafe’s arms swung easily with his gait.

      Phoebe couldn’t take her eyes off the ink. “Where are you going?” She raised her voice as he disappeared into her bedroom. Great. That was all she needed. Half-naked Rafe Diamante in her room, possessed by the shade of a smooth-voiced Lothario. “Jacob.” No answer.

      She followed him against her better judgment. If she could keep him talking, she might be able to discover the identity of the necromancer. In the dusky half-light of her room, Rafe—or Jacob, rather—reclined on her bed with his hands clasped behind his head. The position displayed his pecs to maximum advantage. Man, this guy was like a catnip mouse to her inner Puddleglum.

      Phoebe leaned against the door frame. “If the necromancer is so powerful, why does he need Rafe’s energy?”

      “How do you think the powerful become what they are? By taking the power of others.” Jacob ran Rafe’s tongue over his bottom lip and Phoebe felt her own lips clamping shut on a frustrated mewl. “Come here and I’ll tell you more.”

      “I’m not going to give you Lila. I can’t, even if I wanted to. She’s not here.