Franny left a folded piece of red paper in each of the four corners of the room. On all four she had written the incantation to cast away evil.
Omnis spiritus laudet dominum. Habent Moses et prophetas.
Exurgat deus et dissipentur inimici ejus.
When they had done all they could, Sally pulled up two spindly chairs so they might continue to observe Ian. The intensity of their combined gaze was daunting. Ian closed his eyes and wished he could disappear, which unfortunately was not within his abilities. Nothing seemed to be in his command, not even his damn prick, which always knew his mind before he did.
“He’s an interesting man,” Franny mused. “Certainly not average. But who wants average?”
Sally shot her aunt a curdled look. Franny knew full well that Sally had been trying to be average her whole life long. As always, Franny derided her wish. “Why on earth would you want to be normal?” she always asked. “As if there was such a thing.” Still, as a girl, Sally had chosen the most ordinary pastimes, she had even joined the Girl Scouts and gone hiking, contracting poison ivy and cursing the rocks in her shoes, miserable from the start. All the same, she had sold cookies for the Scouts with a ferociousness that surprised everyone in her troop, and was mortified when Jet bought every box, so that they had Thin Mint cookies for breakfast for nearly a year.
“You’re looking at him quite closely,” Franny noted.
“He’s supposed to help us find Kylie. I’m watching for signs of life.”
“Oh, he’s alive,” Franny said with a chuckle. “That’s certain.”
Franny had been the one to send Sally here, after all. She’d seen something in the palm of her niece’s hand in the shape of a crow. Flight and freedom in a language that some women were able to decipher. Sally, herself, had a particular affinity for birds, and could call them to her from the treetops with a whistle. As for Franny, she’d had a beloved familiar when she was young, a crow named Lewis that rarely left her side. What this cursed man had to do with crows, Franny didn’t yet understand. She recognized the meaning of several of his tattoos—the magic circle from The Book of Solomon, the triangle of elemental fire. “I’ll bet he’s gone over to the left every now and then. I wouldn’t put it past him.”
Sally threw her aunt a look. “He’s hearing every word.”
“Let him. I’m just saying he’s not an angel.” Franny assessed Ian with a gaze so direct it made most people squirm, Ian included.
“It doesn’t matter what he is. All that matters is that he’ll help us.” Sally noticed that Ian could now move his fingers and toes. She felt disoriented as she watched the afflicted man fight off the hex. As for Ian, he experienced the effects of the Draco resin, the blood returning to his limbs, his heart no longer seared with pain, his thoughts no longer fractured. He might soon be able to speak, but he was not quick to do so. Even in his weakened state, he was shrewd enough to know it was best if he bit his tongue. The old woman was a witch as well, and a clever one.
“We should question him while he’s still in this state,” Franny suggested. While he was vulnerable and might tell the truth.
“Give him a minute,” Sally suggested. “Let him catch his breath.”
He did exactly that, inhaling so deeply that he shuddered, stunned to discover how good it felt to have air fill his lungs. Breath was life and this woman Sally had returned that to him, and now he was in her debt, and they both knew it. She fixed him chamomile tea, always healing to the mind. Ian was now able to drink on his own, taking sips, and slowly he was restored. He was vain enough to be beset by real embarrassment when a tawny blond woman and a handsome older man were called in by the two witches, and more of his shabby chairs were brought into the bedroom, so that he was soon surrounded by a semicircle of strangers.
The older man was well dressed and sounded vaguely French as he explained that a girl had disappeared, the dark-haired woman’s daughter, and they feared what she might do on her own. They needed an expert in left-handed magic, and Ian had come highly recommended. The facts of Kylie’s disappearance drifted down and he did his best to comprehend, though his head was throbbing. Ian was suspicious and grateful in equal measure, which meant he kept his own counsel and didn’t reveal that most of his senses had returned to him, and could now speak if he wished to. The older man introduced each of them, but all Ian heard was the name Sally, the luminous, perpetually distressed dark-haired woman who had saved him. As Ian listened, he was reminded of a dream he was often plagued by on nights before he had to lecture in public. There he would be, calmly discussing the dichotomy between the paths of magic, white and black, right and left, only to look down and discover he was naked, with the ink on his body dissolving into blue pools, leaving him without the printed armor that protected him from evil.