Page 88 of Death Wish

I took the moment alone to really take in what was going on. Did I trust Laurence to do the spell? Did I really have a choice? If Marla was still here, I could have asked her, but it was doubtful she was even done with her afterlife orientation and readjustment. It would be some time before she was sent to her dimension and settled in. And even if she was, the afterlife wasn’t really the safest place for me right now, was it? Azrael could find me a lot quicker on the other side. The dead was his “thing” after all.

Nope, I was stuck with level one Laurence.

“Jade.” Laurence’s harsh whisper came from around the corner.

I followed it to find him sitting on the stoop again, a piece of paper laid out on his lap and Kay’s brush in his hand. “What’s up?”

“You can’t blame me if this doesn’t go right, got it? I’m doing all I can.”

I opened my mouth to say “Well, no shit” but stopped myself. In the time I had known Laurence, one thing was for certain: he had enough self-confidence to fill a grain of rice. He was always doubting himself and his magic. Maybe that was contributing to his mediocre spell casting?

Didn’t magic come from within, or some philosophical nonsense like that?

It was worth a try.

“Laurence, look at me.”

He did, and the worry in his eyes spoke volumes. My mind blanked. Dammit, I was awful at this stuff.

What would Kay say to him if she were here? Something encouraging and gentle, no doubt.

Be gentle, Jade.

I took a deep breath, trying to channel my inner Kay. “You can do this, Laurence. Don’t get in your head. It’s your own worst enemy.”

“I know that.” His voice rose in annoyance. “You don’t think I know that? I have to get this right. I have to. For her.”

“Listen to me here. There is no pressure.” He went to cut me off, but I held up my hand. “I know other ways to find her, but I want you to do it because I know you can. I just saw you conjure a fireball without being a level two sorcerer. That’s unheard of.”

Man, the lies were just rolling off my tongue now, but the sudden glint of hope in Laurence’s eyes kept me going.

“I know you love Kay, and she loves you, too. That connection is what we need. It’ll strengthen the location spell.”

It sounded as if that would work, but who knew if it made any difference at all? I wasn’t going to tell him that, though.

He plucked a couple of hairs from Kay’s brush and pulled off the necklace he’d been wearing. It was a white crystal wrapped in wire and then threaded with a rope. Holding the hairs in his palm, he muttered a few words in Latin, then placed the top of the necklace over them and closed his fist so the crystal could sway freely over the paper.

That’s when I noticed the paper wasn’t blank. Laurence had scribbled a large blob-like object with small random dots inside. It took me a second to realize the sketch was supposed to be Fairport, and the dots were all the major landmarks in the city. The harbor, city hall, cemetery, the war memorial, and Oh! Kay’s, where we stood now.

He said a few more words, and the crystal began to sway like a pendulum. It rocked back and forth by an invisible force and then around and around, skimming the crudely drawn map for a place to land.

But it never did. It just continued to swing.

I waited a few moments before saying, “What’s it doing?”

“I don’t know,” he said, frustrated. “It’s not supposed to take this long.”

Another minute of the necklace swinging, and he slammed it down. “It’s like it can’t reach her.” He sighed. “I’m sorry, Jade. I thought I could do it, but I obviously can’t.”

“Hey, stop that. You did great,” I said. “Maybe the map isn’t big enough. Maybe she’s somewhere—”

“What?”

My stomach clenched painfully. I knew exactly where Xaver had taken Kay.

“The spell didn’t work because of you,” I said as dread set in. “It didn’t work because Kay is no longer on this plane.”

Laurence’s face fell in horror. “What do you mean?”

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