Chapter 15

The reliefon Grams's face when I showed her the picture was palpable.

"Why didn't she put a return address on it, silly woman?"

"She's grieving, Grams. Cut her some slack." I set the photo on the shelf I kept all my family pictures on. There was one of my mother, and one of her and my father when she was pregnant with me. One of Grams and me together, and one of Bree.

"Aunt Ciara told me that Owen reminded her of my mother. Always needed validation through others. I just wish he would have come to me before…" I hesitated, not wanting to use the word. But I couldn't tiptoe around the truth. "Before he committed suicide. I would have done my best to help. I don't know if I could have changed matters, but I wish I had the chance."

"Oh, you're a sweet one, Elphyra," Grams said, sounding melancholy. "But when people are ready to take that step, they're usually not thinking about ways to overcome the pain they're in, other than to remove themselves from the struggle. He wasn't thinking clearly by then."

I flopped down on the sofa, and the cats came bounding in. They bounced on me,66 Gem nuzzling my neck and Silver curling up on my chest. "I suppose so. I think I'd understand better if he was in physical pain—like an incurable disease, or chronic pain that doesn't stop."

"But he was in pain, my dear. It just wasn't visible. Mental health issues, depression, it's all real and not just ‘in the mind' usually. There are physical aspects that play into it. Saying, "Just smile, just try harder, you'll feel better" is like putting a bandage on a bleeding artery. It won't stop the flow of blood. You might as well scold the severed vein and order it to close. That's not going to happen."

"I guess you're right. I had no idea how deep of a hole he was in. Ciara said he just didn't have the strength to pull himself out and that she couldn't convince him to commit to counseling." I kissed my fingers and pressed them lightly against the glass, over Owen's face. "I still wish I could have done something."

"The best you can do now for him is to pay him respect, and perhaps to contribute to a suicide prevention campaign, to help someone else from following in his footsteps." Grams snaked her arm around my waist and hugged me sideways.

We stood there for a moment, then I headed for the kitchen. My phone rang as I was making myself a latte. It was Bran.

"Hey, dude, how goes it?" I stared at the rain cascading down outside. "You soaked through, yet?"

"Yeah, I am. So's my mother. We've done what we can for now. Thanks to a few friends, we were able to salvage a few things—a saddle for the horse, some tools that managed to escape the flames. But most of it's gone, up in smoke and ashes." He sounded distraught. "How would you like to go out to dinner with me tonight? I need a change of pace. Mom is going to call Grams and ask if they can get together—she'll come over to your place, if you want. We both need distractions."

I didn't feel like going out, so I said, "Why don't the two of you just come over for dinner? I'm not up for a fancy restaurant. We can order takeout and watch a movie and try to forget about all the crap happening lately."

"That sounds good. Let me talk to Mom and I'll get back to you." He hung up.

I headed into the living room. "May and Bran might be coming over for dinner. They need a night away from thinking about the fire, and gods know, I need to escape thinking about everything that's happened to me."

"I just talked to May on the phone. She told me—and yes, they're both going to come. What should we serve?"

"I'm thinking takeout. Something easy enough that we don't have to cook. Pizza…maybe. Oh, I know! There's a great fried chicken place in town, and they make the best sides. They opened up about a month ago. Jo-Ann's Pluck-and-Cluck. Kitschy name, fantastic food. I'll go pick it up, and I'll grab something for dessert too. Maybe a cake or something." I glanced at the clock as my phone rang. It was Bran.

"Hey, Mom said that sounds good. We'll be over around six-o'clock, if that's all right?"

"That's fine. We'll see you then. Chicken all right?"

"Chicken sounds great." He hung up.

I glanced at the clock. It was going on one-thirty. "You were going to teach me how to work with earth elementals?"

"You want to learn now? We can, but it's going to be wet and cold."

I looked at my weather app. "The clouds are supposed to lighten up in about an hour, and the sun comes out in less than another after that."

"All right, if the clouds lighten up by two, we'll take a walk in the woods and work on the spell." She motioned to the kitchen. "For now, let's grab a quick bite to eat. We'll want to be grounded when we head out."

As we ate lunch, I kept thinking that I should fill every minute of every day, but the ridiculousness of that thought bounced off me. I returned to making my coffee, and thanked my lucky stars that Grams was with me, and that she was watching out for me.

* * *

Sure enough,the rain let up by two-fifteen, so Grams and I packed our tools and headed for the woods. I brought one of those waterproof picnic cloths for us to spread on the ground, and we dressed warm. It was chilly enough, but Grams promised that we'd work up enough energy to stave off the cold. Knowing Grams, I believed her, although I also knew that her definition of cold was a wee bit more stoic than mine.

We hiked across my yard, shivering as the breeze sprang up. Autumn in the Pacific Northwest was wet, no matter whether you lived in the city or the country. The moisture was palpable in the air, it felt like a clammy hand against my skin.

The smell, though—the smell of petrichor was thick around us, permeating the air with the tangy scent of rain-soaked soil. And beyond the overwhelming fragrance, I could smell the water, complete with seaweed decay, of kelp and clams and all things belonging to the sea. I stopped, breathing in deeply, holding the scents of home deep in my lungs, then slowly exhaled, letting my breath stream out to join the breath of the world.

"This place…it has a life of its own, I'll give it that," Grams said. "It feels young here, compared to Scotland, and vibrant and hormonal. The land may not be young, but it's alive and steeped in the aura of wildness."

We reached a clearing in the woods on my land, and I spread the blanket down on the moss-covered soil. Grams spread out her tools on the blanket, sitting cross-legged on one side. She had brought with her a crystal ball, her athame, a small brass bowl, and several other items. She had bade me bring my dagger, as well, and I had also brought a portable fire pit.

Lightweight and small enough to carry, the firepit stood barely a foot tall, and less than that wide, but it still gave off a nice amount of heat when lit. Wood, charcoal, and pellets all worked with it, and it was easy enough to carry a bag of the wood pellets for my stove along with it. As I set it up on a fireproof mat that had come with it, and lit the fire. The faint smell of smoke drifted up. But with it so wet, if there were any sparks, I could count on them not escaping anywhere.

We warmed our hands over the flames as the fire took the edge off the chill. It was still uncomfortable, but not terribly so, now, and the pellets seemed to burn hotter than regular wood.

"What now?" I asked.

"I'm going to teach you how to summon up an Earth elemental," Grams said.

I felt my stomach lurch. I'd never done anything as powerful in my life, and the thought made me nervous, but Grams was doing me a favor, and she was expecting me to follow through. I didn't want to disappoint her.

"All right," I said. "I'm ready."

"Place your hands on the earth beside you and let your roots grow deep—you know what I'm talking about."

I did. My magic was grounded in the earth, and I knew how to sink myself into the ground, how to spin my soul deeper and deeper through the soil to become one with the earth, to become one with the Mother. I placed my hands on the ground and dove deep, tendrils of energy weaving out of my hands, spiraling through the dirt and the soil, taking root around the rocks and the stones of the world. I pushed further, burrowing through stone and bone and crystal, roots and soil, the backbones that held life above ground stable. And yet—there were fractures, none directly beneath us but they were close, where the pressure built, where time ticked like a bomb, waiting for the sudden jarring that would set the world around us in motion. It wasn't here yet, but it was coming, and I was cautious to leave well enough alone around that energy, not wanting to set off a quaking I could not stop.

I could faintly hear Grams's voice, but once I was bonding with the soil, it became difficult to listen. I knew that some part of me still tuned into her guidance, however. There was part of me that would always listen. Once a witch accepted someone as her teacher, that bond was strong and overrode most rash actions.

From a long distance, I heard Grams tell me to look around, to see if I could sense any sentient forms. So, I did. I reached out, casting a web, asking if anyone around could sense me. Oh, not in words, but in energy, in a questing that shivered along the network threading everything in the world together.

Lines of energy shimmered and shone through the brilliant energy of the earth—verdant green and living, infusing all creatures and beings that made the planet their home. The energy fused with that of the lifegiving sun. Even the fungi, the mushrooms of the world, needed that spark to live, and the creatures long hidden from the daylight, so deep in the caverns that they had lost their eyesight and some, even their eyes. These creatures, too, needed a certain amount of warmth in order to thrive and function.

As I sent a question through the soil—is there anybody there—the energy stirred and someone responded. I felt it waking at first, from what felt like a long slumber, and then it opened its eyes. Neither male nor female, neither human nor spirit, it came from the earth and was part of the earth. As the creature roused, it rumbled the ground beneath us, shaking as it woke to consciousness. But then, a wave of irritation rolled toward me, and I realized too late that perhaps I'd woken the wrong being.

As the land jolted again, I opened my eyes and turned to Grams, frantic. "It's mad—it doesn't want to—crap!" I leapt to my feet, helping Grams up. The ground was rolling around us, but it wasn't a natural earthquake. No, I'd managed to rouse the wrong elemental. First, there was no guarantee they liked people. And second, I was pretty sure Grams expected me to find a young one, not some behemoth sleeping beneath my land.

"We have to get out of here—" I started to say, as I lunged for the portable stove and threw water into it, setting up a steam bath as the flames sputtered, flickering out. The last thing we needed was to start a fire—especially out in the woods.

Grams held out her hands, whispering an incantation that wove seamlessly through the trees, through the bushes. But the rolling continued as a large crack formed beneath our area, widening by a couple inches. A figure began to form, coming out of the soil. It formed from the edges of the crack itself, rising into a liquid, muddy mass that took shape and solidified.

The elemental reminded me of the Thing from Marvel's Fantastic Four comic books. It looked like clumps of mud and soil bound together in a bipedal form. Its eyes burned with an unnatural light the color of spring green, and its body was as big as the Hulk, and moved in a way that seemed to mimic human motion but there was something off about it. It let out a roar, and I saw that it had teeth, but they were shaped like tusks or fangs. It lurched forward towards Grams, who was still casting her spell.

"Holy fuck, move!" I lunged toward her, catching her and knocking her sideways out of its reach as it swung one massive club-like arm toward her. As we rolled to the ground, I frantically tried to plan out what to do next, but my mind was so paralyzed by fear that all I could think of was that we needed to run.

Grams was on her feet before I was, and she held out her hands, whispering, "Calm…calm…"

I wasn't sure what kind of magic she was using, but it wasn't working. "It's not working, come on!" I grabbed her by the hand and began to drag her through the woods, avoiding the trail, which would be easy access for it. I plunged into the thicket, but the vines on the ground began to move, writhing up to wrap around my legs. I let go of Grams, trying to tear them off, but as soon as I had ripped one vine away, another rose to take its place.

Grams pulled a lighter out of her purse and flicked it alight, holding it toward a nearby bush. "Back off, or we'll set your land aflame!"

"Cripes, you think that will—" But I shut up as the vines suddenly let go of my legs and withdrew. I stumbled back to her side. "What now?"

"We have to send it back to sleep, but I'm not sure what to do. You woke it up, but I?—"

At that moment, the bushes near us parted and Bran broke through into the clearing. "Did you—oh, hell!"

May was right behind him and she let out a yelp, stepping back. "I take it he's our problem?" She pointed to the elemental.

Grams and I both nodded. May held out her hands, and a slow steady energy began to flow from her into the clearing. I wasn't sure what she was doing, but in seconds, my energy went from frantic to calm, and the elemental backed up a step, looking at us closely.

Grams hustled over to May's side and, with a knowing look, took hold of her hands. The moment the two older women touched hands, the energy in the area changed. It shifted, stronger, and I realized that May was buoying up Grams, she was infusing her own energy into Grams so that Grams could direct it. Basically, May was acting as an amplifier.

Grams turned to the elemental, who was looking around. I could feel it—anybody who worked with earth energy could have—and it felt confused. The anger shifted as puzzlement took over. I suddenly felt sorry for having woken it, and I sent out a wave of apology toward it.

The elemental looked in my direction, took a couple steps, then stopped again. I sent it the one suggestion I could think of—to return to sleep. Grams and May caught hold of the energy I was projecting and they put all their force into it.

After a moment, the elemental turned back toward the crack in the ground and began to liquify, like Terminator 2, it oozed into a viscous river of mud, sliding back into the fracture and vanishing from sight. Another minor quake shook the ground, and the crack sealed once again, with little sign that anything had happened.

Yet another moment and the creature was gone, leaving the air clear and the energy of the forest at rest.

I dropped to the ground, breathing deeply. "Thank gods. I didn't mean to wake it up—I was just searching for signs of an elemental like Grams told me to." I wasn't blaming her, but, when I thought about it, none of this would have happened without her coaching.

"My fault, and I take responsibility," she said. "We should have started out in a controlled environment. I didn't expect anything like that to happen—in Scotland, the elementals run deep, but the older ones, the bigger ones, tend to stick near sacred sights. I had no clue they'd be randomly scattered in the forests here." Grams shook her head. "I have to apologize. I should have assayed the situation first."

"Well, no harm, no foul. We're all safe and the rumble didn't break anything in the house. It did, however, scare the crap out of me," May said.

"And I'll bet it's going to confuse some of the seismologists. That was big enough to feel for a ways. Though, we're on a bunch of fault lines in this area so they may just take it in stride," Bran said. "We were just coming over early to offer to bring dessert before you order the takeout for dinner.

"You know, let's just order everything. We all need a break, and right now, I think we just need to chill," I said, wrapping an arm through his.

Bran kissed the top of my head, then he motioned for the three of us women to return to the house. "I'll pick up your gear and bring it back safe, if you'll trust me. Go home, get warm. I'll be there in a few minutes."

As we gratefully headed down the trail back to my house, I wondered what was going to happen next, although part of me was afraid to think about it because the last thing I needed was to jinx myself.