Cora grimaced, pulling her sweater closer around her. Apparently it didn’t matter that she felt ill. That she was still recovering from what happened earlier that night at the ceremony. That her face still throbbed after they’d reset her nose. She’d awoken in pain, an alarmingly wide gap in her memory. From the moment they’d closed the circle and begun the chant to the moment Grandma King had woken her—sweat-soaked, her entire body jerking in violent muscle spasms—she could recall nothing.
Maybe drinking the vial Gran had given her had been a terrible mistake.
Someone, or something, had taken the controls and moved her body like a puppet. A god, most likely, but one they hadn’t invited into the circle.
What if it was still out there, waiting to jump back into her skin?
The thought made Cora feel ill, flashes of hot and cold buzzing over her skin. She glanced around the clearing. The forest was silent, stretched with long shadows.
“Pay attention, girl.” Grandma King was scowling at her. “Your mind is still on the ceremony, isn’t it? I warned you this would be dangerous. You drank the vial; you wanted this.”
“What happened back there?” Cora glared at her. “And why can’t I remember any of it?”
Grandma King ignored the question. “This is only the first part of your training, and here you are feeling sorry for yourself. Shall I pick up where I left off with Meiner?”
“No.” The rush of anger made her words sharp. “I can handle it. I’m stronger than Meiner.”
“Not yet.” Grandma King glanced down at the basin between them, which was filled with the same rust-red liquid that had been in the glass vial. Frankly Cora still didn’t want to know what it was, but she could guess.
“What happened to me?” Cora started, fists clenched. “Why won’t you—”
Grandma King clapped her hands together sharply, startling Cora into silence. “Do you want power? More than the others, more than Meiner?”
“I— Yes.” Cora squared her shoulders, her scowl furious. Of course that’s what she wanted.
“Well, then. We’ll speak no more of this.” Grandma King smiled grimly and jabbed a crooked finger at the bowl. “Wicked deeds best done after dark. If you want this coven, you’re going to have to do better.”
Cora swallowed hard, forcing herself to change the subject. “What god will I pledge to? The…uh, the one you used to worship when Meiner and I were young?”
Grandma King cackled, slapping her knees. “Oh aye, witchling, I’d love to see you try. The god I worshipped would tear a little thing like you limb from limb.”
That hardly answered her question. Cora frowned when Grandma King reached into the bag, pulling out a flat metal tin. She dipped it into the liquid, filling the bottom.
Grandma King shut her eyes, her face expressionless. “Drink.”
Cora stared at the tin, lip curled. The vial had been disgusting, like drinking salt and copper. “What is it?”
Grandma King’s eyes snapped open. She smiled, a sharp, unpleasant expression. “Are you sure you want to know?”
Cora paused, pressed her lips together until they paled. She reached out to take the tin.
The liquid tasted the same, like pennies and rust, and she gagged and swallowed hard, eyes watering. The tin fell noiselessly to the grass, and Grandma King laughed.
“Now the grimoire.”
It took her a moment to obey. She leaned forward on her hands and knees, stomach heaving. Nothing came up, though, and after a second she sat back and wiped her mouth with a groan. That taste was still on her tongue, and for the first time she wondered if she should have turned down the old woman’s offer.
Then she thought about Meiner. The scornful way she looked at Cora. Brushing her off like she was unimportant.
She stiffened her back and reached for the leather bag. Pulling the heavy tome out, she slid it across the grass to Grandma King, letting go as quickly as possible. The grimoire was thick, and the binding was done in black leather. There was a sigil etched in silver on the front, one that Cora didn’t recognize, and energy was rolling off it in waves, making the hair on her arms stand up. In all the years she’d been part of this coven, she’d never seen the book.
Grandma King rocked back on her heels, strangely agile for someone who had to be helped down the stairs.
“There you are, a ghra. It’s been years.” The old woman spoke not to Cora but to the book, smoothing a wrinkled hand over the pages as though she touched a lover.
Cora frowned. Was the woman having another lapse?
She rocked forward, hands clutching the grass, trying to see what was in the book. The pages were dry and yellowed, and they crackled as Gran turned them carefully. Cora could make out the upside-down words well enough to know they weren’t English.
“Your rise to power will be different. Longer, full of trials,” Grandma King said. “But you’ll be far more powerful when it’s complete. Pay attention to the words I teach you and how we set the altar.”
“How many trials?” Cora sat up straight, a flush of excitement running through her. “How long will it take?”
Grandma King only stared at her in return, and Cora frowned, resisting the urge to reach out and shake her. She could see the glassy look had returned to the old woman’s face. “Gran?”
“Hmmm?”
Cora felt like a coiled spring, the tension about to burst out of her in a scream of rage. “How many trials?” she repeated. “My rise to power, remember?”
Thankfully Grandma King seemed to shake herself out of it. “Oh yes. Trials. You will face more than your fellow witchlings, and none of them will be easy. You will have to work. To fight for your power tooth and nail. That is why they are asleep in their beds and you are here.” She nodded gravely. “The others will ascend and go no further, but you…for you the ascension is only a gateway to more power. But”—she held up a finger—“you will have to be stronger than you’ve ever been.”
Cora straightened her back and nodded. She wanted this. She was willing to do whatever it took.
The old woman fished in the bag once more, laying out several objects on the wooden altar between them. A piece of rock on a chain—Flint, Cora thought—dried sticks of kindling, a glass bottle filled halfway with water, a smooth oval stone, as black as ink. And lastly, a small glass box with gold trim that held a single strip of dried leather. These the old woman set out side by side. The kindling she placed in an empty glass basin, stained red on the bottom.
Grandma King bent over the basin, striking the flint against the black stone. Sparks showered onto the kindling, and the wood caught, glowing embers flaring to life.
“Shut your eyes,” Grandma King said. “Repeat after me. No matter what happens, keep chanting.”
Cora was about to ask exactly what might happen, but Grandma King had shut her eyes and was swaying on the spot.
Her voice was flat and cold, though the words that spilled out were strangely melodic. “Talamh, uisce, tine, fola. Teacht domsa, Caorthannach.”
Cora’s voice was halting and hesitant, and she stumbled over the words. She was pledging herself to someone. To something, she knew. It was reckless and stupid to not know exactly what, but right now she didn’t care. She just wanted.