Page 101 of A Sorceress Comes to Call
Imogene looked ready to argue. Willard frowned, then closed his hand over Evangeline’s throat. His lips moved as if he was counting to himself. When he reached twenty, he released his hold and Evangeline sagged, her face flushing bright red.
“You have some very unusual skills,” Lord Evermore observed, slightly muffled by the bloody shawl.
“As I said, I am a butler. Now, may I suggest that you perform this ritual immediately?” asked Willard. “I do not know how long I can prolong her unconsciousness without causing serious damage.”
“But we can’t perform it,” said Imogene. “We don’t have the circle and the symbols and the triangles and all that.”
She doesn’t need it. They don’t do anything. They aren’t real. No more than any other drawing, anyway. And the church didn’t have them.
“But we don’t have a church either!” said Imogene, when Cordelia relayed this. “We need holy ground. That’s how it works.”
“No.” Cordelia pinched the bridge of her nose. “No, it’s not. You said it yourself, ages ago. You said that maybe holy ground was only holy because people believe in it.”
Imogene’s angular face drew into sharper lines as she frowned. “I suppose I might have said that, but—”
“The lines don’t do anything.” Cordelia waved her hands, trying to get the words out. “They’re just there to make you believe they do something. You believe in it the way you believe in holy ground, because they’re all twisty and impressive, but that’s all they do. I didn’t feel them do anything and Penelope didn’t feel it and Falada laughed when he saw us drawing them!”
“So we need to find a church?” said Hester.
“No!” It was so clear to her but she didn’t know how to make them understand. “You just have to believe this is holy ground! Right here! Or magic or consecrated, whatever you want, just believe it!”
They all stared at her as if she’d lost her mind. “Penelope says I’m right,” she said weakly, quailing under the weight of all those looks.
“We can’t all just believe something on command,” said Imogene.
“The hell we can’t!” Hester snapped. She wheeled on Imogene. “You’ve seen sorcery and a dead horse walking and you felt the magic when we did it earlier, and this is where you draw the line? That this ground isn’t holy enough?”
Imogene swallowed. “Well,” she said. “When you put it like that, I guess…”
“You all believed my mother was a lady,” said Cordelia. “There was no proof of any of it. You just believed it and you introduced her to other people that way and that made it true. It’s all the same!”
Hester nodded. “Alice, bring us water.”
“But miss, I don’t have a bucket or—”
“Soak your skirt in the lake. We don’t need much, but we don’t have time. Run.”
Alice sprinted.
“We also don’t have any wine,” said Imogene. “Do we have time to get it?”
Evangeline mumbled something, her eyelids fluttering.
“No,” Willard said.
“Don’t you tell me you don’t have a flask of brandy on you, Imogene,” Hester said. “I’ve known you too long.”
“Brandy isn’t—no, wait, I suppose it is wine, isn’t it? Wine that’s, err, gotten ambition.” Imogene laughed, half-incredulous. “It’ll do.” She handed it to Cordelia.
“Can you see this?” Cordelia asked the air above her, dumping brandy into her palm.
I can’t—no, wait! Yes! There! I can see it!
“Cor… del…?” Her mother shifted. Willard tightened his hold.
“I suggest that you do not move, madam,” he said.
“My… head…”
