Page 24 of A Skirl of Sorcery
He knelt by the bedside and took Keres’ hand. She moaned slightly. ‘Don’t you worry now,’ he said. ‘My name is Fergus Boneward and I’m here to help you. I’m a witch who specialises in sickness and injury. I’ll take a quick look and see if I can find out what’s wrong.’ He leaned across her bed and inhaled deeply.
Dave stared, his expression growing more incredulous. ‘This is too strange,’ he muttered.
I waved my hand to tell him to stay quiet, but even I felt uncertain when Fergus spent the next five minutes sniffing every part of Keres’ body. At one point his face was so close to her skin that he could have licked her. Strange didn’t begin to cover it.
Eventually he pulled away and stood up. ‘Okay,’ he said to Dave and me. ‘Pay attention. There are several ingredients you need. Three tablespoons of dandelion essence. A teaspoon of sprigglewort – the powdered stuff, not the root. Spanish mistletoe, three and a half grams, no more, no less. You can buy the good stuff at the Pickover Witchery store. Simmer the ingredients for four minutes and stir them together using the bark from an alder tree that’s been harvested at midnight.Exactlymidnight. You’ll have to collect that ingredient yourself because it’s got to be fresh.’ He gave me a long, flat look. ‘I’d do that tonight, if I were you. Much longer and your friend here won’t make it.’
I nodded. ‘Will that cure her of whatever this is? Will she be okay?’
Fergus’s expression didn’t alter. ‘She won’t be cured and she won’t be okay.’
‘Then what’s the point?’ Dave demanded.
‘It’ll buy you some time. That’s the best I can do.’
‘That’s not good enough!’
I agreed. ‘What’s wrong with her? There must be other medicine we can use or somewhere we can take her.’
‘You can drag that poor ban sith all over Coldstream and shove as much medicine into her as you like but it won’t help. There’s only one person who can cure her now, and I doubt you’ll be able to find them in time.’
My eyes narrowed. ‘Who? Who do we need to find?’
Fergus sighed. ‘The person who stole her voice,’ he said reluctantly.
‘Stoleher voice?’ I repeated.
‘Her magical voice has gone – that’s why she’s sick and that’s why you can sense something evil inside her,’ Fergus explained. ‘Somebody has used magic to steal the essence of what makes that woman a ban sith, and the emptiness that remains is destroying her.’
‘Why would someone steal her magical essence?’
‘I can’t answer that.’ He shook his head sadly. ‘All I can tell you is that somebody has taken her power and now she’s being attacked by her own body. Unless you can retrieve her ban sith voice and return it to her, you can’t save her.’ He met my eyes. ‘Any medicine will be a temporary salve. Without her voice, she’ll die.’
I swallowed. ‘How long does she have?’
‘With the medicine?’ Fergus considered. ‘Two weeks, maybe a bit longer. Without it, less than three days. I’m sorry.’
Dave and I stared at him and, from her bed, Keres moaned again.
My anger gettingthe better of me, I stomped around my kitchen. What was happening to Keres seemed like a cruel andunusual punishment. Stealing someone’s life was one thing but ripping out the essence of who they were was far worse. My cat-sith powers made me who I was and I couldn’t begin to imagine the horror I’d feel if I could no longer access that part of my soul.
Keres was adrift in an ocean without a raft, a paddle or even a lifejacket. I tried to picture the thieving bastard who’d stolen her powers and failed. Even to me, such villainy was beyond the pale.
One problem at a time, I told myself. Focus on what you can changenow, not what you can’t.
I had sprigglewort and dandelion essence in my box of supplies and Dave went to buy some Spanish mistletoe from Pickover at the same time as Fergus left. Thankfully, the large witchery store was open 24/7.
The problem was the alder bark: in this part of the country, alder trees only grew in one of the dryads’ groves on the west side of the city and they controlled the supply of bark and essence. To harvest some fresh bark at midnight I would have to petition the dryad leaders for access, which would take more time than Keres had left. It would be far quicker to steal it.
Unfortunately, with the advent of the full moon, security around the groves would be heightened because some groups of fully transformed werewolves didn’t always pay attention to the niceties of normal society. Left unchecked, they had a nasty habit of trampling over the carefully cultivated plants and seedlings when they were under the moon’s control. It wouldn’t be easy to collect a section of bark without being noticed – I could do it, but I’d have to plan carefully.
All five of my cats had assembled in the kitchen, including He Who Roams Wide who was back from wherever he’d been. Tiddles, curious at the turn of events and no doubt affected by my angry mood, had joined them.
‘Yes, of course I’ll help her,’ I told them all. ‘I will find the bastard who’s stolen her magic and make them pay, but first I need to buy her some time.’
He Who Crunches Bird Bones and She Without An Ear looked dubious, He Who Must Sleep yawned, and She Who Loves Sunbeams began to groom herself nervously. He Who Roams Wide was already on all four paws, ready to go at a moment’s notice.
I nodded at him. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘That would be helpful indeed.’ He purred as Tiddles emitted a small questing miaow.
