A New Source of Magic, page 9
part #3 of Anaïs Blue Series
She growled fiercely at the Ethnarch, ‘We will see about that!’
She clenched her fists, digging her nails deep into her palms. She wheeled on one foot. He reached out to grab her, but then retracted his hand, unsure of how to deal with her. She marched to the door.
‘Anaïs, stop!’ His voice rang in her ears, loud like before, filling the chamber.
She shut her ears to it, digging her nails deeper into the soft flesh of her palm. The pain helped her focus.
Screw you, buddy. I’m out of here. Nobody tells me what to do! Especially not you!
She turned the handle and wrenched on the door. It would not budge. She strained with all her might. It moved, but was heavy, as though it were held in place. Putting one foot against the wall for leverage, she cracked it open, creating a gap large enough for her to slip through. With both hands on the door and her back against the post, she squeezed through the opening. Once through she released her grip on it. The door slammed shut, smacking her in the shoulder and almost toppling her over.
She stumbled into the corridor and quickly regained her footing. The sound of the door slamming rolled down the long passageway. It grew in volume as it reverberated on the walls. Sweeping back, the sound slapped her in the face. She rocked on her heels.
Coated in hot sweat, she frantically searched in her beret for the promptuary. Finding it, she clasped the handbook to her breast for comfort. Her free hand shaking uncontrollably, she fumbled with the beret. She flipped it onto her head and pulled it down low over her brow.
Stepping backwards, she placed one hand flat against the door behind her. She squinted, training her eyes to the far end of the corridor. She saw nothing, her vision clouded by a red mist, her mind running wild, her heart pounding.
Who did he think he was? Telling her those things, dictating to her what she should do. Father or not, the guy had crossed the line.
I will bow to nobody. I’ve done it alone up to now. I’ll keep doing just that. Nobody is going to push this little witch around.
Grounding her feet, she fought with all her might to subdue the anger welling inside her.
She failed.
RAGE
The little witch faltered, momentarily giving in to the rage simmering inside her. It was a mistake.
She knew it the moment she gave it free rein. She tried to temper it. She was too late. It had already taken control. It swelled from her stomach and shot upwards through her body, flushing her face. Her ears burned. She gritted her teeth. She shook all over, trying to control it, her entire body a quivering mass just as it had been in the chamber with the Ethnarch.
The exasperation and fury grew further, expanding inside her. She opened her mouth wide to let it out. At first no sound came. She forced her vocal cords to respond. Her voice box squeaked. Then a guttural noise slowly grew in her throat. It ran up tonally through the registers, turning from a whine into a howl and finally a scream.
‘Eeouw! Curse you all!’
Gripping the promptuary fiercely with both hands, she dug her fingers into its cover. They plunged deep into it, right up to her cuticles, her fingertips practically touching her thumbs on the other side. The book felt so fragile. It would be easy to tear it to shreds if she wanted to. She could not do that. She could not destroy the book. Yet she felt she had to be rid of it.
Raising her arms above her head she stretched full-length, standing on the tips of her toes. She brought her arms down hard and, with them, the rest of her body. Slamming her heels flat to the floor, she sank through her knees. She splayed her fingers, releasing the book.
The promptuary smacked the floor between her feet. The impact was tremendous. As it struck the tiles a low whomp sounded. The floor heaved. The handbook buried itself deep into the tiling. It ploughed down until the front cover was flush with the surface. It sent out a wave of oscillations that ran the length of the corridor. The vibrations numbed her soles. She watched the tiles along the corridor rise and fall, undulating and rippling as if a stone had been dropped in still water, causing a wave.
The reverberations did not dissipate but continued to echo loudly up and down the corridor, growing in volume. The pressure in the room dropped noticeably. Her lungs drained as if the air and been completely sucked out of them.
Then there was a blast.
An enormous gust of wind emanated from the promptuary. It blew the beret off her head, lifted her into the air and pressed her body flat against the door. The entire room swelled. She felt the door become concave. The walls ballooned, as did the sheets of glass in the windows. They disintegrated. Starting with the window pane nearest Anaïs, one after another they shattered. The destruction ran down the full length of the corridor, like dominos falling.
Shards of glass blew outwards into the garden. Outside, a gale-force wind beat against the building. It caught the remnants of the panes and fed the fragments back through the empty frames.
Glass swirled around the corridor. The small particles filled the space. Anaïs saw only a white cloud. It was like standing in the middle of a blizzard. The particles spiralled around the little witch. She remained untouched. None of the splinters pierced her. Protected by an invisible impervious skin, the shards of glass bounced harmlessly off her.
It took mere seconds. The promptuary held its embedded position in the floor only momentarily. It ricocheted upwards, shooting back into her outstretched hands and sucking her palms to its cover. Her elbows locked, the reunion sending a shockwave through her shoulders.
The force of the handbook returning to her grasp lifted her further into the air. She remained suspended about a metre off the ground. Time seemed to stop. Then, the force of the initial connection with the promptuary subsided. She dropped back to the floor, her legs folded under her and she crashed down on her knees.
The wind outside died. The glass stopped in mid-flight. The debris hung in the air for a moment before dropping to the floor. The sound of it raining down, deafening, like hail on a tin roof.
The shock of it all took her breath away. Wow! She began to giggle uncontrollably. Great guffaws of laughter shook her tiny frame.
She attempted to calm herself. Pull yourself together, Anaïs.
Stifling laughter, she breathed slowly through her nostrils. She shook her head in disbelief at what had just happened. It was disturbing. Where had this power come from? She was astounded by the force she had created. That she was capable of such destruction unsettled her. Expressing uncontrolled feelings of rage was clearly dangerous.
She looked down the corridor at the damage she had ravaged. An even layer of glinting, shattered glass covered the floor. She would have to be more careful. This, the thing she had just unleashed, was truly frightening. If she could not control her urges someone might get hurt. Someone who was undeserving. Someone innocent.
‘Hey!’
The shrill voice of a woman snapped her out of her thoughts. Slowly she turned to seek the voice’s owner. The first thing that caught her eye was the familiar yellow livery of the vehicle parked outside. However, apart from the colour, there was very little comparison to the Bambina. A highly customised bus stood in the garden. Its chrome finish glinted in the sunlight.
The vehicle was unfamiliar but the owner of the voice was not. She stuck her head through the driver’s window. A head adorned with fluffy hair and a face obscured by a set of jewel-encrusted sunglasses.
‘Well, what are you waiting for?’ yelled the librarian. ‘Get in!’
Anaïs stood, mouth agape, staring through the destroyed window frame.
‘What’s wrong with you? Do you like it in there or something?’ Immi’s voice dripped with sarcasm. ‘Move, why don’t you!’
HATE
I have mentioned before that witches have special abilities. One of them is the power to harness particular sections of the brain. These are usually the bits mortals don’t know what to do with or mistakenly feel are superfluous. There are, however, bits that all entities use—usually to their own detriment. One of these is hate.
Hatred is borne out of frustration. In Anglo-Saxon cultures this is confused with the frustration being directed at someone or something. In Latin cultures there is a difference. They are aware that this emotion is self-propagating. They even say ‘I have hate’ instead of ‘I hate’. It is directed inwardly instead of being projected onto something else. Essentially, hate is an entirely personal experience and has no place in the real world. It is a pity people react to it and don’t treat it as a product of a twisted imagination.
Ultimately, as a negative emotion, it can only be turned in on itself with another cause of frustration: love. We've already discussed love. Going further into it is far too complicated. Hate is easier to deal with. Ok, maybe it’s not easy, but the solution is. It’s simple: stop blaming others for the way you feel.
The reason witches have a problem controlling hatred is because on a neural level it is impossible to harness. The cerebral effects of it are too widespread. Medical studies have shown that feelings of hate cause activity in many regions of the brain. It courses from the base of the skull at the spinal cord all the way through to the frontal lobe. The thing just runs riot. No wonder then that if you succumb to feelings of hatred it feels like your head will explode. And not surprisingly the aftermath tends to give you a royal headache.
Hate manifests itself in various forms. The most destructive is pure rage. Rage leads to violence. The only goal of hatred is, in fact, just that: destruction. One serious problem is that hate leads to more hate. It snowballs. The hateful desires of the few are often retaliated against by the hateful desires of the many. It’s self-perpetuating. Just because someone expresses their form of hatred does not necessitate that another should throw their own form of it back at them. Both are wrong.
Just as in the witch community, naturals have laws against it. There is prosecution for hate crimes, hate speech and other forms of prejudice. But you can’t effectively put hate itself on trial. You can only prosecute the perpetrator. In some cases, the question has to be raised: are the prosecutors any better than the prosecuted? Or are they in fact counteracting hatred with a form of punishment grounded in hatred?
For a moment there I thought love was more complicated. Perhaps I was wrong. But then, hate and love are uneasy bedfellows.
Hate is dangerous. Particularly if you’re a witch. It has a power all of its own. It must never be released, for even a witch cannot control it. Anaïs had just experienced a small sample of its power. There were other emotions just as powerful. She would have to deal with them all soon enough.
Witches have at least tried to find a way to counteract hatred. They try to nip it in the bud before it can do any permanent damage. They attempt to turn it inwards so that it will crush itself, rather than spread beyond the individual.
Back in Amsterdam, Anaïs had already experienced this.
Although Caput Mortuum was furious at Anaïs for actions which had led to the death of her daughter, the other members of the Organisation had held sway. They had managed to temper it and made sure the witch controlled her emotions. Anaïs was, after all, a novice and could not always be held accountable for her magical mishaps. In particular, those that were genuine mistakes. It fell back on the Organisation to ensure she was protected from herself. Thankfully, there were enough calm heads to make Caput aware of this.
The bigger problem of the central witch family was something else. The hatred that festered there had been left unattended for far too long. For equilibrium to once more be attained in the universe, witches needed to get a handle on their own emotions. Just like mere mortals, frustration and animosity had to be dampened before they exploded and affected others.
Preternatural and natural are alike. If we could all control hatred, and repurpose its power, then that would be truly magical.
RESCUE
The little witch had overcome her initial surprise at the repercussions of her actions. Anger had once again crept in.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ snarled Anaïs.
The librarian curled the edges of her mouth in mild irritation. She shrugged. ‘Busy,’ she said.
‘Busy?’
‘Yeah, busy,’ said Immi nonchalantly.
‘What have you been doing? I thought you were supposed to help me?’
‘What do you think I’m doing?’ The librarian protested. ‘I am helping you.’
‘Yeah, but you’re a little late.’
‘Late?’ The librarian’s irritation escalated to the point of annoyance. ‘What?’ she spat. ‘What do you mean late? Are you on some kind of timetable? I’m not a bus service, you know.’
Anaïs smirked. ‘You could have fooled me.’ She ran her hand over the sleek polished aluminium and chrome edge of the bus door. She glared up at the librarian from the foot of the stairs. ‘You certainly look like one to me.’
The librarian’s eyes darted around the cabin. She pushed her sunglasses up her nose with a manicured fingernail. ‘Ok. You have a point. But whatever! Enough discussion! Get in here.’
‘Fine, I’m coming.’ Anaïs waved at her to calm down as she mounted the stairs. ‘What I meant is, I was in trouble and you disappeared.’
‘Oh that,’ said Immi, curling her lip. ‘The dude with the dogs was kind of scary.’ She leaned over and pulled the lever to close the door behind Anaïs. She released the handbrake and guided the bus alongside the palace. Anaïs heard the crunch of glass under its tyres. There was a great deal of damage to the building. Not one window was intact. Some of the frames were gone altogether. Others hung in tatters from the stone lintels. Again, she was reminded of the power she had exerted.
‘I thought it best I stay out of it,’ Immi continued. ‘Anyway, it’s not something I could deal with alone. I needed help. On top of that, he stole the car.’ She hunched her shoulders. ‘What was I supposed to do? I’m no witch. That’s your department.’
‘Department?’
‘You know what I mean.’
‘So, who helped you?’
Immi took off her sunglasses and laid them on the dashboard. Her brow furrowed with concentration, she kept her eyes fixed on the path ahead. Grunting on the big steering wheel, she guided the bus around the rubble next to the building. Negotiating her way out into the ramshackle garden, she drove between lifeless trees and shrubs. It was slow going. The bus barely fit through a narrow corridor between the trees. They headed towards a large gap in the garden wall. Once they had passed through it, the librarian guided the bus onto a roughshod track.
With no answer forthcoming, Anaïs’s patience got the better of her. ‘Well?’
‘Well, what?’ said Immi, raising an eyebrow.
‘Who helped you?’
The librarian took her eyes off the road and flashed them at Anaïs. She cocked her head towards the rear of the vehicle. ‘Her,’ she said.
Anaïs climbed the last two steps to the top of the stairs. She looked down the aisle. Seated towards the rear of the bus was a woman dressed as an air hostess. The little witch’s mood lightened. She grinned broadly at the woman. ‘Sojourner! I’m so glad you’re here. It’s so good to see you.’
The air hostess turned from looking out the window and eyed Anaïs. She shook her head. ‘I’m not Sojourner.’
‘Oh!’ The little witch’s smile receded. ‘Who are you then?’
The woman stood and moved down the aisle towards Anaïs, holding onto the handles on the seats for support as the bus slid around on the uneven surface. ‘It’s me,’ said the hostess. ‘Caput Mortuum.’
The smile faded completely from the little witch’s face. ‘Oh.’ She reddened. ‘My mistake.’
‘It’s one that’s easily made.’ Caput Mortuum slipped into the seat behind Immi. ‘Sit down, Anaïs.’
Without taking her eyes off the older witch, Anaïs climbed onto the seat across the aisle. ‘Ahem,’ she began. ‘About your daughter …’
‘Yes, my daughter,’ Caput Mortuum interrupted, nodding grimly.
‘I’m really sorry,’ said Anaïs with a pained look on her face. ‘I lost her again.’
‘You’re making a habit of this.’ There was a touch of bitterness in the older witch’s voice.
Anaïs blushed again. The redness on her face deepened. She rubbed her forearm nervously. ‘I’m afraid it was a bit out of my control.’
Stony-faced, Caput was unmoved by Anaïs’s genuine attempt to apologise. ‘You’re very good at making excuses.’
Anaïs began to simmer. ‘I have to be good at something,’ she said sarcastically, hissing through her teeth. ‘I will get her back.’
‘You also have a tendency towards bravado.’ Caput crossed her legs and stared out her window. ‘How do think you will achieve that?’
Anaïs twisted her lip. ‘I’ll find a way.’
‘I don’t think you will, Anaïs.’ Caput twisted in her seat. She looked Anaïs in the eye. ‘This is not easily solved. Unfortunately, and this goes against my better judgement, we may have to work together on this one.’
‘Where have I heard that one before,’ murmured Anaïs.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I just had a conversation with your husband.’
‘My husband?’
‘He called himself Deus Omnibus.’
Caput Mortuum stiffened. ‘He is not my husband.’
‘According to him, he once was.’
‘That much is true, but that was a long time ago.’
‘He didn’t tell me when it was,’ said Anaïs. ‘Although, he did tell me a lot of other things.’
‘I bet he did. What else did he say?’
‘He called himself the Ethnarch.’
‘Pff!’ Caput sat back in her seat and crossed her arms. ‘What a pompous ass!’
