Page 102 of A Sorceress Comes to Call
Cackling alerted them to Falada shifting position again. “Don’t do it, horse,” called Imogene.
“Salt,” muttered Hester. “Salt, salt, how do we…”
“Don’t worry about that,” said Imogene, with another feral grin. “We’re all full of it.”
“What?”
Alice returned, holding a bundle of sodden fabric. Her undershift, Cordelia thought. She dropped it into Hester’s hands with a wet splat.
Cordelia passed the flask to Alice. “Pour this into your hands,” she said. “A little at a time. And don’t drop it.”
Alice met her eyes, and Cordelia was struck by the memory of the older girl saying “It will be all right.”
It will, she thought. But only if we can make it so. Right here, right now.
She drew a deep breath and began to speak.
By my knowledge and my will
By water, wine, and salt…
Hester squeezed water from the cloth into her mouth, and the water-note rang out, loud and clear, filling the space around them.
In the name of Hermes Trismegistus…
Crimson bloomed on Imogene’s face as she bit savagely into her own lower lip. Cordelia remembered the taste of salt in her own mouth. Would it be right? Was it enough for alchemy?
Apparently it was, or perhaps more than the sigils was based on belief. The salt-note came in, thin at first, but gaining strength, echoing off the water-note, the two of them a harmony that grew louder, calling for the third.
Let gold return to base metal…
She waited for the wine-note in hope and dread. Perhaps a ghost couldn’t do it. Perhaps brandywine wasn’t enough. Perhaps Penelope had thought better of things and fled.
And then Alice jerked, as if someone had grabbed her outstretched hand, and the wine-note flooded the air around them, so loud and so strong that it drowned out not just sounds but smells and colors and the feeling of the grass under Cordelia’s knees.
Let all that glitters fade away…
Water, wine, and salt came together in a harmony that spiraled outward and became a whirlwind. Cordelia could feel that wind pulling at her, stripping away things that she hadn’t known were there, as if it sought to refine her down to her very essence, or possibly just down to bone.
“No,” said a small voice in the center of the maelstrom. Her mother, struggling to lift her head. Willard was a shadow behind her, his knife hand slack as he battled to keep his own footing in the storm.
“By my knowledge and my will,” Cordelia repeated. “By water, wine, and salt.”
“No!” Evangeline thrust out her hands toward her daughter. Her voice was a harsh croak. “Stop! He’s too close! You’re going to unmake it all!”
“In the name of Hermes Trismegistus—”
“I won’t be able to hold him!”
“Let gold return to base metal—”
Her mother lunged. Willard grabbed for her shoulders, too late. Evangeline’s eyes blazed the blue of the hottest part of the flame and she flung herself at Cordelia, reaching for her daughter in a parody of an embrace.
It didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt. That must have been the wind, drowning out pain as effectively as everything else.
Cordelia wrapped her arms around her mother. She could smell that scent again, her mother’s skin, unforgettable. Perhaps she was very small again. Perhaps the wind had washed away the last fourteen years and they could start again.
It was a pleasant thought. She held it for a moment, then let it tumble away into the roaring of the whirlwind. Not even alchemy could change the past.
