“We’ll have to channel some serious power,” Kimi says. “Ella and I will help you, but of course the three of you have the closest connection with one another, and with Tia, so it will be down to you to make it work.”
She opens a velvet pouch and takes out three strips. They look a bit like the thermometer Mum used to use on my forehead when I was a kid, the ones that lit up to give a reading. “I’ve been planning to introduce you to these,” she tells us. “Samantha, I think you’ve used them once or twice at the Crux?”
Samantha nods. “They’re chakra clocks,” she says.
“Yes. They’ll show how much power you’re channeling. Until now, when we meditate and do our spells, we’ve concentrated on intention, which is of course all-important, but from now on we’re going to look more at your chakras and channeling the energy through them. As you know, when you channel, the energy from the Goddess enters through your crown chakra.” She gestures at a picture on the wall of a woman seated in the lotus position. A line runs down through her, intersected at key points with colored symbols—the chakras. Their colors correspond to those of the rainbow, and the crown chakra is violet, or sometimes white.
“Our aim is to channel this power down through our bodies to wherever it serves us best,” Ella says. “If we’re healing, we channel it down our arms and out of our hands. If we’re doing a love spell, we’ll concentrate on the heart chakra. Ultimately, though, we need to be able to channel it all the way down to the base chakra, and from there to the earth. Your aim is to do that and have your clock read one hundred percent, which means no energy is straying out through the chakras.”
“Can you channel one hundred percent?” Samantha asks them.
“Not quite,” Ella says. “I’ve made ninety on a good day, but never quite got to a hundred. Kimi does, though.”
“Damien taught me,” Kimi states, “when he first brought me to the Crux. It took a lot of work, and I remember being exhausted after each training session.”
“I bet you were,” Charlie says. I snort, and Samantha giggles. We’ve all heard the story about how Kimi and Damien blew the Exeter power grid when they first had sex.
Kimi gives her daughter a wry look. “You may laugh, but if any of you end up dating a shaman, you’re going to be in serious trouble.”
Her eyes meet mine, and then she stands and begins welcoming the four elements. I wonder what that look was for? I’m dating a police officer. He seems open-minded, but I can only imagine what he’d say if I told him some of the things I’ve witnessed in this room.
Kimi sits back down, and Ella casts the circle. I’m not as comforted by it as I was before, considering that someone invaded it to enter my vision, but it should still provide us with some protection.
We ready ourselves for whatever’s coming next. I can tell that Samantha and Charlie are as excited as I am to do some real magic. Tia, I think in my head. I’m coming to find you!
Chapter Seventeen
Persephone
“Before we attempt the spell,” Kimi says, “we’re going to practice channeling. Now, it’s essential that you don’t get disheartened if you see low numbers on your clock. What is important is that you understand how to improve, and that you practice at home, as much as you can.”
She hands out the chakra clocks and shows us how to stick them on the backs of our hands. Immediately, two bars of my strip light up violet and light purple, and the clock reads eleven percent.
“Oh…” Ella says softly. “Interesting. You’re channeling all the time, Persy.”
I show Samantha and Charlie the clock. “Is that a bad thing?”
“It means your crown chakra, and possibly the third eye chakra, are partly open all the time. That might be as a result of the accident. It means you’re not protecting yourself enough, and it leaves you vulnerable to psychic attacks. That’s definitely something we need to work on. Don’t worry about it now, though,” she adds at my concerned look.
“Easy for you to say,” I mumble.
Kimi smiles. “Okay, we’re going to imagine the energy entering your crown chakra as a beam of white light. Close your eyes.”
I watch the others do as she says, then close my eyes and imagine the light beaming down upon me.
“Now we slow our breath,” Kimi says. “Breathe in, two, three, four, five, six, and out.” She counts to eight this time, making our exhalation longer than our inhalation.
She continues doing this for a while. I’m used to this in our meditations, and I slowly relax each muscle of my body and let go of tension, from my toes, up my legs, uncurling my hands, dropping my shoulders, loosening my jaw.
“Look at your clocks,” she says after a few minutes.
We all open our eyes and check our clocks. Mine reads twenty-eight percent. Samantha’s is a little higher at thirty-two, which doesn’t surprise me, as she’s the most practiced of all of us at this sort of thing. Charlie’s shows eighteen. I’ve often been surprised that she’s not a more powerful witch considering who her parents are. Kimi says she has a lot of potential but is easily distracted, and Charlie confirms that now.
“Dammit,” she says. “I keep thinking about a new poem that’s going around my head.”
“Don’t worry,” Kimi says. “When you notice your mind wandering, just bring it gently back on track. Now, we’re going to start picturing the light passing down through our chakras. First through the third eye. The energy is like a river running through you. Picture the chakra as a light purple wheel, turning like a water wheel, pushing the water along the channel. This happens all the time, but we’re going to start spinning the wheel faster, increasing the flow of energy.”
I do as she says. I’ve never thought about it this way before. And I can feel it working. Power flows through me, making my fingers tingle, and the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.
“Check your clocks,” Ella says.
Mine reads thirty-one percent, and Samantha’s is now thirty-five. Charlie’s reads twenty-nine, to her delight.
“Okay, keep going,” Kimi tells us. “The wheel is pushing the energy down to your throat chakra. It’s a blue wheel, and now it’s beginning to spin faster, carrying the energy down toward your heart chakra.”
She continues like this, directing us to push the energy down to our green heart chakra, our yellow solar plexus chakra, then to our orange sacral chakra, and finally to our red base chakra, and from there through to the earth.
It’s tough to keep all the wheels turning in my mind—a bit like one of those performers who spins plates on top of poles. I just get to the last one and I have to go back and check on the first. But after a while, I get the idea. I run through the colors in my mind—violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, red, and down to the earth, and then I start all over again. My body heats, and I start to feel myself sweating. Wow. I never knew it could feel like this.
“Check your clocks,” Kimi says.
Now I’m at seventy-five, and I’ve beaten Samantha, who’s at seventy-four. Charlie’s reached sixty-nine, to her delight.