By now, Agent Mandalay and the security officer were almost immediately at my back. I could feel them close, and I heard their voices as they argued.
“What’s he doing to her?” the officer was saying.
“Stay back,” Constance told him. “He knows what he’s doing.”
“That doesn’t look like an epileptic seizure to me,” he pressed.
“It’s going to be fine,” she replied, but I could hear the trepidation in her voice, and I’m sure he could too. “Just stay back.”
“I’m calling the paramedics,” he returned. “There’s something wrong here.”
Felicity continued to whimper as she writhed in the seat. Again, her jade green eyes locked with mine while she shook through a shallow tremor. Her mouth opened as if she was trying to say something, but no words escaped, only the high-pitched gurgle of absolute physical torment.
She tried again, attempting to force a word through her trembling lips, “B-b-b-bbbbb…”
I wasn’t sure if the person trying to speak to me was Felicity or the channeled Kimberly. I shook my head and tried to shush her as I continued struggling to ground.
She kept shaking, her motor reflexes no longer cooperating as she persisted in her attempt to speak. In the end, she managed only to make a convoluted noise that sounded vaguely like ‘hmmm’.
Then, without warning, her head snapped back as she once again arched against the safety harness, her guttural howl piercing the crisp afternoon air.
“THIS ISN”T WORKING!” I screamed in bitter frustration.
I was beginning to lose the battle, and I knew it. A feeling of panic was spreading rampantly through my chest, fighting to assume control and reduce me to a blithering idiot. I loosened my grip on her wrist and twisted my palm toward her pulse point then quickly clasped it tight once more, seeking a better connection. I could feel my feet getting hot, and I was beginning to dance from one foot to the other as the burn intensified.
I looked around, searching for nothing in particular but everything in general, all but begging for an answer to fall from the ether. My own fear was taking hold, and I knew I couldn’t afford to let that happen. I had to think, but emotion was building an impenetrable storm front in my brain, and all rational thought seemed to be trapped behind the squall line.
As I continued shuffling in place, I panned my anxious gaze around. My feet felt as though they were on fire now, and I wasn’t sure how much longer I could stand it. When I happened to look down, I saw the thick, rubber soles of my shoes.
Whether by actual realization or simple reflex, I kicked my right toe against the heel of my left shoe and began yanking my foot upward. I struggled against the tight laces of the ankle high tennis shoe until I managed to pull my foot free and then quickly plant it against the asphalt.
Coolness seeped upward through my sock but was immediately overtaken by the heat. I closed my eyes and concentrated as best I could on forming the connection between earth ground and myself. In my mind’s eye, I could see a shaft of light, extending from me and leading down into the center of the earth. Or, at least I thought I could. I wasn’t sure anymore because nothing was changing.
I opened my eyes and saw that Felicity was still writhing against invisible bonds. When I looked closer, I saw that patches of blood were starting to spread where her shirt was pulled taut across her chest.
In my clouded mind, I began wondering if I had done the unthinkable when I had made my cursing demand of Cerridwen. I was no longer thinking clearly, and the idea took vicious hold. I snapped my head to the side and squeezed my eyes shut, unable to look into Felicity’s tortured face any longer, distraught by the belief that I had brought this upon her.
Emotion joined with pain, and I felt hot tears running down my cheeks. I blinked hard, and my blurred vision fell upon the back of the passenger seat inside the van as I allowed my head to hang. My body was beginning to shudder with the first wave of sobs, and I was losing control. I stared forward, continuing to blink as tears formed and overflowed onto my cheeks.
It was then that the ether finally gave up the answer.
In front of me, peeking from the top of the pocket on the back of the seat was a small silver dome, fitted with a ring. Extending from it, wrapped by bailing wire, were faded yellow-tan bristles expanding horizontally into a triangular fan.
It was a whiskbroom.
Felicity’s attempt to stutter a word ran through my brain and joined with an arcane thought that had somehow managed to escape the muddy swirl that was supposed to be my rational mind. At its root, magick was a simple thing, and sometimes the simpler the better.
I reached out and plucked the broom from the pocket, flipped it over so that the bristles now pointed upward, and plunged it back into place.
“Goddammit, GO AWAY!” I screamed.
And, for me, the day turned into night.
Light became darkness.
Then consciousness became a distant memory.
The diesel engine of the life support vehicle was thrumming away at idle, sending a gentle vibration through the floorboards. The back door was hanging open, and looking outward through it, I could see the emergency lights flickering across the cars on the parking lot. To my right, in the cab, the two-way radio would occasionally burp with static and a stream of tinny voices, too faint for me to understand, before falling back into momentary silence.
True to his word, the security officer had called paramedics, and they had arrived within moments of my losing consciousness. When I awoke, I had a throbbing headache but other than that, seemed none the worse for wear. Felicity, too, was showing little or no signs of distress from what she had just been through, other than the fact that she was growing more anxious with every moment that passed. I suspected, however, that we were both running on residual adrenalin and the effects would eventually catch up to us. Fortunately, it was nothing a good, long sleep wouldn’t fix.
“I told you we don’t have time for this!” Felicity spat, her voice an audible indicator of her agitation. “We have to go!”
“I just want to check you over,” the paramedic calmly told her.
“What for? How many times do I have to repeat myself?” she demanded. “I’m telling you that I’m just fine, then.”
“Felicity, just let them check you out,” I said, looking over in her direction, only to have my head gently turned back forward by a latex-gloved hand and a penlight unceremoniously shone into my eye.
“Ma’am,” the paramedic tending my wife said, trying to calm the auburn-haired tempest in front of him. “Listen to your husband. We just want to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’ve already told you I’m okay,” she snipped, her faint Celtic lilt taking on the hard edge of a full-blown brogue. “That should be good enough for the both of you.”
“Ma’am,” he appealed. “You have blood all over your shirt.”
From the corner of my eye, I could see that he was motioning toward her chest with his gloved finger.
“I told you those are just stains.”
He shook his head. “They don’t look like stains, ma’am.”
“Aye, and your point?”
He gave a shallow laugh as if he couldn’t believe he was having the conversation. “Ma’am, that’s fresh blood. Usually where there’s blood, there’s an injury.”
My wife raised an eyebrow and cocked her head at the young man.
“You’re wanting to see my chest?” she asked with a perturbed bob of her head. “Is that it?”
Before the paramedic could reply, Felicity crossed her arms and ripped her shirt upward. In a single motion, she pulled it quickly over her head with a snap, revealing that she was braless underneath.
Tugging one arm loose from the sleeve, she reached up and pulled her long hair back over her shoulder with the free hand, then thrust her chest outward.