A Fistful of Charms. Ким Харрисон

in a freaking anthill.”

      I watched to make sure he was going to be okay, reaching out when he started weaving once he lost the guidance of the walls and was in the open space of the sanctuary. His kids were with him, adding to the noise as they shouted encouragement and advice. Hoping he took the time to walk down the steps instead of trying to jump them, I headed for the kitchen. Ivy was hot on my heels, Kisten close behind, quiet and pensive.

      “Rachel,” Ivy said, and I stood in my kitchen and stared at Ceri, trying to remember why I had come in there. “I’m going with you.”

      “No, you aren’t.” Oh yeah. My stuff. I grabbed my shoulder bag, with its usual charms, then opened the pantry for one of the canvas carry bags Ivy used when she went shopping. “If you leave, Piscary will slip into your head.”

      “Kisten, then,” she said, desperation creeping into her gray-silk voice. “You can’t go alone.”

      “I’m not going alone. Jenks is with me.”

      I jammed the three demon books into the bag, then bent to get my splat gun from under the counter where I kept it at crawling height. I didn’t know what I would need, but if I was going to use demon magic, I was going to use demon magic. My chest clenched and I held my breath to keep the tears from starting. What in hell was wrong with me?

      “Jenks can hardly stand up!” Ivy said as I ran a hand through my charm cupboard and scooped them all into my shoulder bag.

      Pain amulets, generic disguise charms…Yeah, those would be good. I pulled myself to a stop, heart pounding as I looked at her distress.

      “You’re not feeling right,” Ivy said. “I’m not letting you walk out of here alone.”

      “I’m fine!” I said, trembling. “And I’m not alone. Jenks is with me!” My voice rose, and Kisten’s eyes went round. “Jenks is all the backup I need. He is all the backup I ever needed. The only time I screw up royally is when he’s not with me. And you have no right to question his competency!”

      Ivy’s mouth snapped shut. “That not what I meant,” she said, and I pushed past her and into the hall. I almost ran Jenks down, and realized that he’d heard the whole thing.

      “I can carry that,” he said softly, and I handed the bag of demon texts to him. His balance bobbled, but his head didn’t hit the wall like last time. He headed down the dark hall, limping.

      Breath fast, I walked into Ivy’s room, kneeling on the floor by her bed and pulling her sword out from where I’d seen her tuck it once. “Rachel,” she protested from the hallway as I straightened up, gripping the wickedly sharp katana safe in its sheath.

      “Can I take this?” I asked shortly, and she nodded. “Thanks.” Jenks needed a sword. So he couldn’t walk without running into things. He’d get better, and then he’d need a sword.

      Kisten and Ivy trailed behind me as I slung the sword over my shoulder to hang with my bag and stomped down the hall. I had to be angry. If I wasn’t angry, I was going to fall apart. My soul was black. I was doing demon magic. I was turning into everything I feared and hated, and I was doing it to save someone who had lied and left me to make my partner’s son a thief.

      Leaning into my bathroom in passing, I snapped my vanity case shut. Jenks was going to need a toothbrush. Hell, he was going to need a wardrobe, but I had to get out of there. If I didn’t keep moving, I was going to realize just how deep into the shit I had fallen.

      “Rachel, wait,” Ivy said after I reached the foyer, snatched my leather jacket from its hook, and opened the door. “Rachel, stop!”

      I halted on the stoop, the spring breeze lifting my hair and the birds chirping, my bag and Ivy’s sword hanging from my shoulder, my vanity case in one hand and my coat over an arm. At the curb, Jenks was fiddling with the van’s sliding door, opening and closing it like a new toy. The sun glistened in his hair, and his kids flitted about his head. Heart pounding, I turned.

      Framed in the open door, Ivy looked haunted, her usually placid face severe, with panic in her dilated eyes. “I bought a laptop for you,” she said, her eyes dropping as she extended it.

      Oh God, she had given me a piece of her security. “Thank you,” I whispered, unable to breathe as I accepted it. It was in a leather case, and probably weighed all of three pounds.

      “It’s registered to you,” she said, looking at it as I slung it over my free shoulder. “And I already added you onto my system, so all you have to do is plug in and click. I wrote down a list of local numbers for the cities you’re going to be passing through to dial up with.”

      “Thank you,” I whispered. She had given me a piece of what made her life sane. “Ivy, I’ll be back.” It was what Nick had said to me. But I’d come back. It wasn’t a lie for me.

      Impulsively I set my case on the stoop and leaned forward to give her a hug. She froze, and then hugged me back. The dusky scent of her filled my senses, and I stepped away.

      Kisten waited quietly behind her. Only now, seeing Ivy standing there with one arm hanging down and the other clasped around her middle, did I understand what he’d been trying to tell me. She wasn’t afraid for me, she was afraid for herself, that she might slip into old patterns without me there to remind her who she wanted to be. Just how bad had it been?

      Ire flashed through me. Damn it, this wasn’t fair. Yeah, I was her friend, but she could take care of herself! “Ivy,” I said, “I don’t want to go, but I have to.”

      “Then go!” she exploded, her perfect face creasing in anger and her eyes flashing to black. “I never asked you to stay!”

      Motions stiff, she spun with a vamp quickness and yanked open the door to the church. It boomed shut behind her, and left me blinking. I looked at it, thinking that this wasn’t good. No, she hadn’t asked me, but Kisten had.

      Kisten picked up my case, and together we went down the stairs, my laces flapping. Nearing the van, I awkwardly dug in my shoulder bag for the keys, then hesitated by the driver’s side door when I remembered Kisten hadn’t yet given them to me. They jingled as he held them out. From inside the van came the excited shrieks of pixies. “You’ll keep an eye on her?” I asked him.

      “Scout’s honor.” His blue eyes were pinched from more than the sun. “I’m taking some time off.”

      Jenks came from around the front of the van, silently taking my coat, vanity bag, and the sword—the last bringing a growl of anticipation from him. I waited until I heard the sliding door shut, then slumped at the sound of Jenks’s passenger-side door closing.

      “Kisten,” I said, feeling a twinge of guilt. “She’s a grown woman. Why are we treating her like an invalid?”

      He reached out and took my shoulders. “Because she is. Because Piscary can drop into her mind and force her to do just about anything, and it kills a piece of her every time he does. Because he has filled her with his own blood lust, making her do things she doesn’t want to do. Because she is trying to run his illegal businesses out of a sense of duty and maintain her share of your runner firm out of a sense of love.”

      “Yeah. That’s what I thought.” My lips pressed together and I straightened. “I never said I would stay in the church, much less Cincinnati. Keeping her together is not my job!”

      “You’re right,” he said calmly, “but it happened.”

      “But it shouldn’t have. Damn it, Kisten, all I wanted to do was help her!”

      “You have,” he said, kissing my forehead. “She’ll be fine. But Ivy making you her lodestone wouldn’t have evolved if you hadn’t let it, and you know it.”

      My shoulders slumped. Swell, just what I needed: guilt. The breeze shifted his bangs, and I hesitated, looking at the oak door between Ivy and me. “How bad was it?” I whispered.