bigfoot's boyfriend

“He got here last night, reeking of liquor, and has been unconscious in my library for,” Mr. Ibis checked his watch, “sixteen hours.”

No greeting, straight to the point. They were pissed.

You could feel your pulse throbbing between your eyebrows and you pinched the bridge of your nose. “I got it.”

Cheap whiskey mingled with clove smoke singed your nose hairs before you even opened the door. Inside the library, it was so strong that it made your eyes water.

Sweeney was sprawled in the middle of the floor and snoring loudly. A book lay open on his chest, but when you tried to read the title, the letters swam across the cover.

The throbbing between your eyes got worse.

“Oi.” You nudged him with the toe of your boot. When he didn’t move, you kicked him. “I said, oi!”

He groaned and with immense effort lifted his head to squint at you and let it drop back onto the hardwood with a soft thunk. “Didn’t think you’d show,” he slurred.

“If I knew I was going to be assaulted with chemical weapons, I wouldn’t have.” You crouched by his head, hovering over his face, and prodded his ribs. “That whiskey breath’s unforgivable.”

He cracked one green eye and scowled. “Not all of us had the luxury of a toothbrush and a real shower.”

You shifted so that you were sitting cross-legged. “You were supposed to meet me there.”

“We were fighting. And I had to run an errand for the old man.”

The brittle quality of his voice threw you off. You knew something was up, that much had been clear from your phone call, but now you could tell that something was really wrong. His face was pale, and the ever-present bags under his eyes were even darker than usual. Patches of his beard were missing from where he had pulled it out, and his hair had been cut and shaved unevenly, like he’d gone at it with a trimmer and a pair of safety scissors. He probably had.

You placed a hand on the crown of his head, absentmindedly carding your fingers through his thick, fiery locks.

“What happened?” you asked quietly.

When he remained silent, you sighed and lay beside him with your hands folded on your stomach. The silence of the library was at once comfortable and smothering.

“What happened?” you asked again.

“Why did something have to happen?”

You sat up sharply. “I am not playing this game with you, you old bitch. Either tell me what happened or leave before Mr. Jacquel turns you into jerky.”

He didn’t answer and you scoffed, moving to climb to your feet, but paused when you felt his hand close over your wrist, gently, like he was afraid he’’d bruise you. Or that you’d leave. “Wait.”

You didn’t lay back down, but you didn’t get up.

A loud exhale. He didn’t look at you.

“She’s dead.”

“Who’s dead?”

“Some cunt’s wife.” He took an unsteady breath. “I promised, I promised myself that I’d never—“ His voice cracked. “I can’t—I can’t come back from this.”

The silence was suffocating.

“Are you going to say anything?” he asked. “Tell me that I’m a sack of shit for doing what he said?”

You looked at him. A bead of sweat rolled down his temple, despite the cool air of the library, and his chest rose and fell too quickly. You pulled his head onto your lap.

“Did he tell you why?” you murmured with your lips against his forehead. His beard was coarse under your fingers as you traced his jaw.

He pressed his face against your thigh. “Something about needing someone for a coming war.”

“Oh, christ,” you groaned. “That can’t be good.”

He huffed out a laugh. “Never is, is it?”

“Mhm. Come on.” You slapped his chest and dumped his head from your lap. “I’m hungry. You coming?”

He hummed and pulled himself to standing.

As you followed him out of the room, you couldn’t stop yourself from grabbing the book he had been reading when you came in.

“Hey.”

He turned and you held the book out. “What is this?”

“You can’t read it?”

You shook your head and he stepped forward to take it. “It’s—“ The rest of his sentence was drowned out by a horrible static. He saw your face and blanched. “Oh. Right.” He tucked the book into his arm. “I’m sure the bird has dinner on, let’s get out there.” He was out the door and down the hall before you could say anything else.

“Wait, get back here!” you yelled, trotting after him. When you entered the dining room, he and Mr. Ibis were having a quietly heated argument on the other side of the table, while Mr. Jacquel watched you intently from the doorway to the kitchen.

“Does anyone want to tell me what that’s about?” You pointed at the book that was now in the hands of Mr. Ibis.

Mr. Jacquel moved to stand beside you and inhaled deeply.

Unnerved, you shifted away. “Weirdo.”

“Your magic is getting stronger, isn’t it?” he asked with a tilt of his head. “Can you control it now?”

You blinked, too surprised to give a snippy response. “Yeah, actually. Not consistently, but more than I used to.”

“The smell of it is all over you. How you made it here unscathed, I don’t know. You’re a beacon of power.”

You shrugged. “Met the right people, I s’pose. Is anyone going to answer my question?”

Mr. Ibis finally looked at you. “First, you both need to eat.”

After you had sucked down three bowls of Mr. Ibis’s koshari, you were at the sink, helping with dishes. The water was scalding and the steel wool was rough in your hand. You tried to commit the sensations to memory.

“I’d like to talk to you about the book that Mad Sweeney found in my library,” said Mr. Ibis. His voice was calm and unassuming, but his eyes betrayed him. They flicked from your face to the dishes and back again, as though trying to gauge your reaction.

“I mean, I can’t even read the title.” Your attempt at nonchalance failed miserably. You both knew what that meant.

His next words were slow and calculated, like he was testing to see if you could understand him.

“That’s because it is yours.”

Water splashed onto your shirt from a spoon. “So it can give me answers?” His lips flattened to a thin line and you ground your teeth. “Right. Of course not.”

“We don’t get to read our own stories,” he said gently.

“Shut up, you old bird.” Your throat felt like it was closing up. You were so fucking sick of the world’s worst wild goose chase.

“Let me see the blade that Hester gifted you.”

You didn’t even bother asking how he knew. You just rinsed your hands and retrieved it from your rucksack.

Mr. Ibis, who now sat again at the dining table, held out his hand for the blade and unsheathed it, slender fingers skimming the gleaming steel. “You can read this?” He tapped the etchings. You nodded and he drummed his fingers on the table, his eyes searching your face or your soul. You never could tell which.

“But not this?” He indicated the book that lay before him.

You nodded again.

His dark eyes were fathomless. There was something that you were missing that felt just out of sight, like fireflies blinking in and out of existence at dusk.

Your eyes moved from him, to the dagger, to the book, and back.

Could it be that simple?

“It’s the same inscription?”

A knowing smile curled the corners of his mouth. “Now you’re getting it. Do you know what it says?”

The lines in the dagger glinted in the dim light of the dining room. “Yes,” you said slowly.

He held it out to you. “Can you tell me what it means?”

“I haven’t been able to—“

He cut you off. “I asked you to tell me what it means, not what it says.”

Everyone was in on the riddles, it seemed.

“Can you just say what you need to say?” you asked, exasperated.

He leveled you with that calm gaze. “Do you remember learning how to read?”

“I don’t remember fuck all,” you muttered.

He was patient. “Sound the word out. I know you know the letters, tell me what they mean.”

You sat in the chair beside him and squinted at your knife. A pressure built in your head as you tried to read them aloud, but you were able to manage it. One at a time, you read the etched letters up the fuller. “Hazel, white fir, gorse, elder, holly, hawthorn, white fir again, and ash twice in a row.” You looked up at him. “So it’s trees?”

“This is an alphabet known as Ogham, the language of the trees. That you can understand and read it is indicative of much. Though, you can’t say the word, can you?”

“No, and I can’t read that cover, either. Trying to do either gives me the same feeling, like I might puke.”

He hummed. “There are very few that can read this. That you can means that you’re getting closer.” Your eyes widened and he regarded you carefully. “I am going to break a rule.” He handed you the book. “I want you to read the first few pages.”

The book was huge and heavy with what must once have been a beautifully embossed cover. But in your hands, the cover was battered and scarred and the gilded edges of the pages had dulled and worn off. You were surprised the cover hadn’t fallen off entirely.

“I thought librarians were supposed to care for books.”

His eyes narrowed. “Focus.”

You bit back a retort and tried to read the raised letters of the title. They blurred in front of your eyes, and it made your head hurt terribly, but you forced yourself past it. It felt horrible. Nausea swelled up at the back of your throat, oily and disgusting, and your head was pulsing.

And then there it was. The same careful lines as the ones on your dagger.

“Holy shit.”

That searching gaze again. “Read the first few pages,” he said.

You opened the massive book with extreme care. The book was falling apart, pages brittle and images dulled. The writing inside was utterly illegible, with some pages torn out and others scribbled on until nothing of the original text remained. You showed Mr. Ibis and his face pinched in consternation.

“I feared as much.”

“Can you please just get to the point?”

He took the book from you gingerly, afraid to damage it further. The expression on his face was unreadable. He thumbed to the very first page, a tangled illuminated image of—

The world slowed, and your ears began to ring unbearably loudly and it drove you to your knees. The hair on your arms stood on end and you tried to look up at Mr. Ibis, but his face was gone. In its place was an imposing avian head with an elegantly arced beak and an expertly woven headdress of a deep midnight blue. Gold threads glinted in the fabric and his eyes…you knew you would never forget them. They were fathomless black, letting no light escape his all-seeing gaze, and they burned into you.

You were aware that the bird was speaking, but you couldn’t hear him over the ringing in your ears.

The last thing you saw before the creeping darkness at the edges of your vision consumed you was Sweeney bursting into the room in a whirlwind of fury.

. . .

“Suibhne, do not do this.”

The king tossed his mane. “This is my land, and they are not welcome here.”

“This won’t end well.”

“It matters not. I cannot let this stand.” He swept from the hall with finality, but you darted after him, snatching at his cloak, but it came unraveled in your hands.

Yet, this did not stop the king. He marched onwards, stark naked, for the swath of land beside the lake where the new church was being built.

“Suibhne!” You pelted after him, but he was not to be deterred, and in his rage was already approaching. Horrified, you watched as he accosted the priest.

“—our land!” he was roaring when you finally caught up. “Your God has no place here!”

The priest was watching him serenely. “The word of the lord has a place in all.”

Furious, the king grabbed the psalter that the priest held and threw it into the lake with all his might.

“Suibhne!” You were screaming now. “Stop this!”

His wild eyes pinned you in place. “We have to put an end to this before they put an end to us. It is my duty as king to protect our people, as it is your duty to serve your king.” He grabbed the smaller man and made for the lake.

“This will get us nowhere!” You trailed after him, energy crackling around you as you became increasingly agitated.

He rounded on you. “I never knew you to be such a coward,” he sneered.

You reared back. The rage that had surfaced at the sight of their church being built on your sacred ground now directed itself at your king.

. . .

Your hearing was the first thing to return as you began to regain consciousness. Two voices, one angry and abrasive, one cool and measured, were arguing. As the world came back to you, you realized it was Sweeney and Mr. Jacquel.

The light of the morgue was cold and blinding, and the slab underneath you was freezing. Sweeney had his back to you and was gesticulating madly.

“—will fucking kill them,” he was saying. “Is he out of his fucking mind?”

Mr. Jacquel looked at him, his calm visage never wavering. “If we are to help them, we need to know how they’re being affected. Once that has been determined, we’ll have a better idea of what to do.”

“Then ask,” Sweeney snarled. “You cunts won’t be able to do anything if they’re dead.”

Mr. Jacquel’s eyes found yours, and he favored you with a gentle smile. “I suppose we can do that now.”

A nod in your direction had Sweeney spinning so fast that he nearly fell over.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” he demanded. “Circe just poking had you vomiting your guts up, and you want to look at your book? How stupid are you?”

You were too dazed to answer. As you had seen the true form of Mr. Ibis, now you saw Mr. Jacquel. Large ears and thick black fur with a headdress similar to the one you had seen on the bird, and those same haunting, jet-black eyes.

And Sweeney. Golden light radiated from him and you saw a man with wild eyes, gripping a spear that matched him in height. His flaming hair drifted around his face, and swathes of blue paint spiraled across his skin and disappeared under the pelts he now wore.

He was beautiful and terrible.

The king waved a hand in front of your face. “Did you hear me? What is the matter with you?”

“I just wanted answers,” you told him miserably.

“You’re an idiot,” he snapped. But despite his anger, there was fear in his eyes, fading now, but there all the same.

“Man, fuck you.”

He growled and stormed from the room.

“He was worried,” Mr. Jacquel told you softly.

You stared up at the ceiling, furious with yourself and with him. More than anything, though, you were furious with the universe and the sick cosmic joke it made of your life.

Muffled yelling came from upstairs and Mr. Jacquel sighed. “He will have to leave if he cannot collect himself.”

You snorted. “Good luck with that.”

Mr. Jacquel shone a penlight in your eyes and then tested your reflexes, chuckling when you nearly kicked him in the groin.

“It looks like we’re all good there.” He gave you a last once-over and decided that, physically, you seemed to be fine.

The two of you climbed the stairs and the shouting got louder. In the dining room, Sweeney was cursing out Mr. Ibis, whose tranquil demeanor only seemed to be making him angrier.

“Physically fit as a fiddle,” Mr. Jacquel interrupted.

Sweeney’s gaze was scrutinizing as he scanned you, searching for anything the jackal may have missed.

You couldn’t look away from the rich blue swirling up his arms and across his face.

When he could find no fault, Mr. Ibis stepped forward. His bill carved through the air as his head bobbed. “I believe that relegates you to my purview,” said he.

Sweeney grabbed you by the arm, hard, and yanked you behind himself.

“After what just happened?” he asked incredulously. “Not a chance,” he looked at you, braids floating, “especially since this one doesn’t have two brain cells to rub together.”

You couldn’t speak. The three of them stood before you in the glory of their true forms, and it was overwhelming you. They were all so beautiful, it made your soul ache.

Finally, you swallowed and managed to find your words, eyes trained on the floor. Anywhere but the three of them.

“I wanted answers,” you hissed. “I’m dead with or without them, and if this gets me closer, then I’m taking that risk.”

“You don’t know—“

“I don’t care!” Your voice cracked, but you pressed on. “I do not give a shit. I’m the one who’s got a target on their back, I’m the one with no idea who they are.” You were in his face now, the fear of their terrible beauty replaced by anger and annoyance. “This is my fucking life. If I want to risk it—“

“I can’t watch you die!” he roared. “You have a fucking death wish, and it is killing me!”

“Then don’t,” you snapped. “You’re grown. No one’s forcing you to be here. Like I said, I’m dead no matter what I do, but one death is a little less certain than the other.”

“Get the fuck out of my face,” he spit, “you ungrateful—“

“I’m ungrateful?” Your shriek was bordering on hysterical. “You stupid fucking—“

“Enough!” Mr. Ibis shouted. It was such an alarming thing to hear the old bird raise his voice that it shut you both up immediately. “Enough,” he repeated, calmer this time. “Get it together, the both of you. You’re running out of time, these ridiculous shouting matches must cease. You cannot separate yourselves again, do you understand me?”

“No!” you cried. “I can do this myself.”

“You cannot,” Mr. Jacquel spoke up. “You need him. You will play a crucial role in what is to come, and you cannot do it without him.”

Sweeney looked at you smugly.

Before you could knock the teeth out of his head, there was a tapping at the window that made all four of you jump.

A massive raven stood expectantly on the sill, its feathers a deep, oily black, and a small scroll was tied to its leg.

Bast yowled furiously.

Sweeney crossed the room in two long strides, threw up the sash, and started yelling.

“Get the fuck away! Get out, go!” The raven bit him, and Sweeney let out a string of profanity that made Mr. Ibis wince. He clutched his hand and spat at the bird, who ignored him in favor of you.

“Caorthann,” it croaked.

Your blood ran cold.

“Caorthann,” it croaked again. It wanted you.

You moved towards it with every fiber of your being screaming at the wrongness of it all. It stuck out its scaly leg that had the scroll tied on with a black silk ribbon that easily came undone when you tugged on it. You unfurled the note. There wasn’t much on it, only a hastily scrawled note.

Jack’s Crocodile. Tonight, 10pm. Don’t be late. -W

You crumpled the paper and threw it across the room.

“You,” you pointed at the raven. “Which one are you?”

It opened its beak. “Memory is a strange bell. Memory is a strange bell,” came its hoarse voice.

And then it flew into the night.

You laughed, mania creeping into the sound. “Muninn. I fucking hate him, I hate him.”

Mr. Ibis was watching the whole exchange with a shrewd expression. “The books on memory are on the southern wall of the library,” he said simply. “I’d recommend starting with ‘M’.”

You and Sweeney looked at each other and bolted down the hallway.

Trawling through the vast library of Ibis and Jacquel was no small task. Shelves ran ceiling to floor and wall to wall and held more books than you thought ought to fit in such a space. How the bird kept it all organized and managed to keep track of everything, you had no idea.

“You got anything yet?” you called down from where you were on a ladder. He was further down the row on his hands and knees, inspecting the titles closer to the floor.

“Nuthin’,” came the response. “Fat lot of good that clue did, there’s enough to keep us here for years.” You glanced down and saw his sour expression as he looked over the myriad titles before him. “You’d think someone like them would have a system that made more sense.”

“Yeah, well, it’s….” Your voice trailed off as your eyes landed on a thick volume bound in black leather and embossed in silver, and something in your mind clicked. “Hey!” you hollered. “I got it!” You plucked it from the shelf and tossed it down to him, jumping down after it and landing neatly on your feet.

“What the fuck is a—“ he squinted, “—Mímir?”

You took it from him and flipped it open. The pages were thin and vellumy beneath your fingers, and the script was thin and precise. “God, you’re dumb.”

He made an indignant noise and you rolled your eyes.

“Seriously? The guy that took Odin’s eye so he could drink from the well of holy shit.” You were starting to see the bigger picture.

Sweeney raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“The well, the fucking—that bastard.” Blood pounded in your skull and white-hot rage bubbled inside of you. You looked up at your leprechaun and handed him the book with trembling hands. It was open to an article that had been published in 1982. You tapped the title. Waters of Memory, Waters of Forgetfulness. “I just found the motherfucker that took myself away from me.”

His eyes widened. “So the old man—“

“Had this guy root around in my head, yeah.”

Sweeney flicked through the pages. “A Jötnar.”

“What?”

Once again, the book was passed between you. “He’s a frost giant.”

“This feels like a fucking bit. We’ve been going for how long in circles? And it was right here.” Your whole body was starting to tremble.

He watched you with a raised eyebrow.

“We need to get to Jack’s,” you said.

Sweeney, who was taking his turn in the driver’s seat, stayed quiet, but you saw his grip on the steering wheel tighten and watched a muscle in his jaw tick.

Your mind reeled as you considered his possible answers. What if—

“I heard somewhere that kissin’ someone, while they’re panicking, can help ‘em catch their breath.”

You stared at him. “You heard that? Where, Teen Wolf? What the hell is wrong with you?”

He glanced sidelong at you. “It worked, didn’t it?”

You wanted to backhand the smug expression from his face.

“If you don’t shut the hell up…”

Sweeney scoffed. “You’re just pissed because I’m right. An’ I didn’t see you complaining, besides.”

At that moment, you dearly longed to wrap your hands around his throat and squeeze, but, unfortunately, you were quiet for just a beat too long.

“You liked it, didn't you?” he said, a cheeky smirk pulling at the corners of his mouth.

You could feel the heat in your cheeks and knew your face had to be beet red. Maybe, for once, the old man would turn up when you actually wanted him to and end this moment.

If only the Norns would bestow that luck upon you.

A hundred witty remarks and jabs raced through your head, but all that came out of your mouth was: “Fuck you, you old cunt.”

Sweeney cackled and slammed his foot on the accelerator and your beloved car screamed down the freeway.

Passing through Boone in North Carolina, you finally felt like you could breathe a little more easily. The first fourteen hours of your journey had gone by mercifully without any incident. You knew better than to let your guard down, of course, but it seemed like Circe’s wards were holding.

The peace didn’t last. It never did. You were about two hours north of Boone when your luck finally ran out. You were driving, the needle on the speedometer hovering just around the 80mph mark, when something slammed into your car, sending it careening into a ditch and pitching you hard against your seatbelt. The material bit into your chest angrily and your skull slammed back against the headrest. You blinked stars from your eyes in time to see Sweeney’s head crash into the dashboard and hear the nauseating sound of bone snapping when he tried to brace himself.

“I told you to wear a seatbelt,” you managed to wheeze.

A groan was all you got in response.

Black was creeping around the edges of your vision, but you knew you both needed to stay awake. One or both of you having a concussion was not unlikely, and while dying would most certainly solve most of the problems you were currently facing, you knew that even death wouldn’t bring you peace.

You untangled yourself from your seatbelt and dragged yourself to the other side of the car, bracing yourself as you dragged Sweeney out onto the blacktop. He moaned pitifully, crying as you jostled his broken arm.

“Shit, shit, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you mumbled, your mind racing as you tried to sort through your options. First and foremost, you needed to splint Sweeney’s arm and check him for a concussion. You patted his cheek.

“How’s your head, chief? C’mere, follow my finger.”

His gaze managed to follow your finger steadily as you moved it back and forth across his field of vision. You braced a thumb against his eyebrow and peered into his eyes with the penlight in your pocket.

He flinched away, rubbing his eye with his good hand and shaking his head to clear it. “What, are you trying to blind me?” The red mark on his forehead where he’d smacked the dash was already fading.

You snorted. “There are better ways to do that. But the good news is it doesn’t seem like you have a concussion. Looks like your luck’s holding.”

He looked past you. “Yours is too,” he said. “Look at your car.”

You whirled around and saw her sitting on a mess of tangled kudzu vines and greenery. Her front bumper was dented, but other than that, there wasn’t a scratch on her. Or on yourself, for that matter. By rights, you and Sweeney should have been grease spots on the road, especially Mr. Seatbelts-Are-For-Pussies, and your car should have been a twisted hunk of steaming metal. And yet, here you were. Granted, a little worse for wear, but you were alive and present nonetheless.

You stared, bewildered, at your companion. “I’m fine?”

He cocked an eyebrow but remained silent. You chewed on the inside of your cheek trying to come up with a workable hypothesis, but before a thought could form, the mass of leaves and vines under your car began to snake towards you.

You tried to haul Sweeney to his feet but only succeeded in falling into his lap. The two of you scrambled backward, Sweeney’s face turning a sickly green with the pain of his arm.

“What the fuck is that?” you demanded. At this point, you didn’t even have it in you to be properly afraid of whatever the hell was happening now. Mostly, you were just annoyed.

“Ah, for fuck’s sake.” Sweeney’s good hand reached out and took hold of your bicep. Even with his broken arm, you could feel his muscles coil, readying for a fight.

As you watched, the kudzu surrounded you and began to take a humanoid shape. As it did so, vines shot out and wrapped around you tightly, effectively freezing you in place. Before either of you could react, Sweeney was bound and gagged. He looked at you with wide, bewildered eyes. This was certainly a new one for you both.

“Mad Sweeney and his witch.” The seething mass of plant matter spoke with a voice that resonated through the concrete and up into your body through the soles of your feet. “My lucky day.”

“You’re lucky, he’s lucky, I’m lucky, we’re all lucky!” you muttered.

A kudzu vine crawled across your cheek, the pale green tip of the tendril hovering just above your cornea. It darted forward and you flinched, hard, but it only brushed your hair away from your face.

“You don’t know who I am,” the kudzu said, disappointed.

The vine wrapped itself around the shell of your ear and began to probe at your ear canal. Desperately, you wracked your brain for anything that might help. There was a name and it danced on the tip of your tongue, just out of reach.

“Please, Elder,” you gasped. “Forgive me. I know not your name, but I know you. I know you in the creeping dark, I know you on lands abandoned. You are the kudzu, what remains when all else is gone.”

The vine uncoiled from your ear. You took a deep breath.

“Please, hear us—“

A green shoot stabbed into Sweeney’s shoulder and he roared against the mess of plant matter crammed into his mouth.

“I care not. What could you have to say that would be of any import to me? No, I think I will consume your dear friend here.” The kudzu gag unfurled from Sweeney’s mouth and was replaced by a tendril snaking down his throat. You could hear him gag and choke and it made your palms sweat.

You opened your mouth to scream for your leprechaun when a name finally surfaced in your memory. You remembered lying on the parlor floor of Ibis and Jacquel with Bast curled against you, purring like an engine. You were reading a book on ancient East Asian deities. If you could just…

“Baku.”

The amalgamation of vegetation stilled. You pressed on, praying you were right.

“My lord Baku,” you said breathlessly, “forgive me. We meant no disrespect.”

The old god peered at you. Or at least, you thought it did. “You ought to be more careful,” it hummed. “The Black Druid has promised a great reward for the one to deliver you into his custody.”

Your mouth went dry. After everything else, now there was a bounty on your head? Was an asteroid going to strike you next?

“My lord, please, listen to me. The Dark Man will not deliver on his promises.”

The concrete vibrated with Baku’s voice. “Even if that were true, I could still consume you. Between you and your leprechaun, you would more than satiate the emptiness of being forgotten. Although, I suppose it would be a tragedy to lose such a legacy.”

You blinked. “Legacy?”

Baku raised an eyebrow. “Your legacy. You’re ——— “ His next words disappeared under the sound of cracking static.

Never in your life had you been more confused. “Excuse me? How did you make that sound? What the hell are you talking about?”

Baku came closer. “Oh, now this is interesting,” it mused. “You can’t understand it, can you?”

“I can’t understand when I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Baku chuckled. “I think you will find out. Sooner rather than later, I should think.”

You stared at him and then shook your head, trying to clear your mind like an Etch-A-Sketch.

“I grow bored of this,” Baku announced. The vines around Sweeney began to squeeze and the vine in his throat twitched, making him gag again. You felt ill. Baku squeezed even harder and Sweeney’s face began to turn a sick shade of purple, his eyes rolling back in his head. If he hadn’t lost consciousness yet, he would soon.

“Wait!” you screamed. “My lord, please.” You had no earthly idea what you were going to say next, but the god’s attention was on you and the vines around Sweeney had stopped squeezing. You scrambled to find your words.

“Lord Baku, what if I told you I could give you something that the Dark Man never could?”

The vines around you yanked you forward until your face was inches from the silhouette that was Baku.

“What would that be?”

You swallowed. The next words from your mouth were going to be insane, possibly one of the stupidest things you could say, but you didn’t know what else to do.

“I can give you belief.”

A stillness swept over that stretch of highway. The god was listening. You could barely hear yourself think over the blood pounding in your ears. You had promised the one thing old gods like Baku craved. Power. Sustenance. Belief.

“How would a thing like you manage to keep such a promise?”

At this point, the inside of your cheek felt like it had been through a paper shredder, but you kept chewing on it.

“The people here, they don’t see the kudzu for what it could be,” you began slowly, grabbing the words one at a time, “only as something that consumes and suffocates. They don’t see the life it brings, the sustenance it provides. Please, give me a chance to show them what the kudzu could be.”

The old god tilted its head, considering you carefully. After a few moments, the kudzu around you loosened and set you down gently on the pavement.

“You promise me believers?

You swallowed. “Yes.”

“How many?”

You shifted your weight from one foot to the other. “I can’t promise an exact number. I can’t even promise that the number will be significant. But I can promise that I will find them.”

Kudzu snaked up your neck and around your ears again, probing gently at your temples and cheeks and lips as though searching for any ill intent.

“You have a deal,” Baku said eventually. “But do not tarry. The kudzu will give protection as far as my borders. When you pass Massachusetts in the north or out of east Texas, towards the west, there will be nothing more I can do for you.”

You knelt before the kudzu, bowing and touching your forehead to the ground.

“Thank you, my lord,” you said as you clambered to your feet.

The kudzu retreated from Sweeney and he collapsed on the concrete, retching and moaning.

You bowed again to the old god and then dashed to your car, pulling Sweeney’s bottle of Jameson from the glove compartment and sprinting back. “An offering, my lord,” you intoned as you let the whiskey spill onto the road and into the soil.

Baku hummed approvingly. “Do not forget our deal, witch,” its voice reverberated in your skull. And then the old god of the kudzu was gone, disappearing into itself in the brush on the side of the highway.

As soon as you were sure it was gone, you let out a breath you didn’t realize you had been holding and ran to Sweeney, who was barely clinging to consciousness as he lay in the dirt.

“Fuck, dude,” you hissed.

“I can’t believe you poured out my Jamo.” His voice was hoarse like he’d been gargling gravel.

“We were already pushing it, we needed an offering,” you told him.

“Can you just get me patched up please?” he rasped.

“Right, right.” You darted back to the car, digging through your duffel until you unearthed your first aid kit.

“Okay, let me just—“

“Splint my fucking arm first, I’m about to black out.” His voice was muddy and his words weren’t as clear as they should have been. You groaned and chucked a roll of gauze at his head.

“I should just let you bleed out,” you snapped.

“Hm.”

You rolled your eyes and went hunting for a stick that was the right size to splint his arm. When you found it, you first held it out to him. He looked at you with an expression that said What the hell am I supposed to do with this?

“Bite down,” you instructed. “I have to set the bone and it’s going to hurt like a bitch.”

He sighed and did as you said, squeezing his eyes shut.

“Okay, ready?”

He nodded.

“On three. One—“

Crack!

Sweeney snarled against the stick, his body jerking away from you. “You bitch,” he hissed, spitting the wood from his mouth. “That wasn’t on three.”

“You’re welcome. Now stay still, shitass,” you murmured as you set about placing the splint.

“Fuckin’ hurts,” he mumbled.

“Well, if someone had worn their seatbelt like I told him to—“

“Enough about the goddamn seatbelt!”

You glared at him. “Fine. Maybe next time I’ll get lucky and you’ll go flying through the windshield.”

He glowered right back. “Just fix my shoulder so we can go.”

“Ungrateful,” you muttered, but you still cleaned the jagged hole in his shoulder, gingerly picking out the leaves and plant matter that had been left in his flesh. You carefully taped a square of gauze over the wound on his front and his back and sat back, assessing your work. “Honestly, it probably needs stitches, but this was the best I could do. It’s gonna leave a nasty scar.”

He shrugged. “What’s one more?”

You snorted and hauled him up by his good arm, helping him into the car.

Back in the driver’s seat, you white-knuckled the steering wheel, wringing it nervously. The silence in the car was tense. He was mad at you.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Sweeney demanded eventually, his brash voice shattering the silence like a bowling ball thrown into a china cabinet. “Have you lost your mind? Where do you get off promising him believers?”

You slammed your palm against the wheel and pointed at him, anger and annoyance flooding your veins like lava. You’d had it.

“How about a thank you for keeping the kudzu from fucking consuming us?” you snarled. “What the fuck was I supposed to do? The Dark Man has a bounty on my head now, I had to do something.”

The leprechaun groaned in disbelief. “So you promised him believers? Are there worms in your head?”

You snapped your teeth at him before stomping on the accelerator, relishing the thwack of his head hitting the headrest as the car leaped forward. “I didn’t want to watch you become a shriveled husk on the side of the road or watch you get ripped apart from the inside, although I cannot for the life of me remember why,” you bit out. “Why are you picking a fight with me, anyway? Did you decide it had been too long since you got on my fucking nerves?”

“Because I’m worried about you!” he shouted. “You’ve got this thing in your head that no one seems to be able to figure out, you’re making deals that you can’t possibly hope to keep with beings that could obliterate you with a snap of their fingers. You’re wound tighter than a nun’s bunghole—“

“I’m wound up?” you shrieked. “You’re the one that’s about to snap like a goddamn rubber band!”

“You’re watching my back,” he snapped. “I need you to pull it together. I know all of this is shit and it’s scary, but if you get me killed, I’m—“

“You’re taking me with you,” you mocked. “I’ve heard that one before. Can you please just be quiet until we stop for the night in D.C.? I’ve got a connect there, we can crash with them.”

“Who? Charles Entertainment Cheese?”

“No, fucknut. Hester’s there.”

He blinked. “Now how in the hell did you make that connection? No one’s seen her in forever.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” You smirked.

He glared at you and pulled a clove cigarette from his shirt pocket, tucking it behind his ear. Then, he paused and stared at you with a petulant and mulish look on his face. You knew that look.

“Don’t you dare,” you growled.

Moving slowly and deliberately, he brought the cigarette to his lips and then put a lighter to the cigarette. The cloying odor of cloves and tobacco filled your car as he blew a thick cloud into your face.

You coughed and slammed the brakes, the stink of burning rubber mingling with the miasma of the cigarette.

“Get out,” you snapped.

He stared at you. “What?”

“Did I stutter? Get. Out.”

His head kicked back. “You’re not serious.”

You reached across him and opened the car door. “Don’t make me repeat myself again. I’m sick of being disrespected. I’ll see you in D.C.”

Sweeney’s jaw hung open. “What, I’m s’posed to walk the three hundred miles?”

You shrugged. “Or take a bus. Might be faster.”

He spread his hands. “After everything I’ve done for you, this is what I get? You’re the most ungrateful—“

“Ungrateful?” you snarled. You climbed out of the car and circled to the other side so you were standing over him and stabbed a finger at his chest. “I barely wanted you to come in the first place!”

The two of you stared each other down, glares matching in ferocity and anger.

“And you’d be dead without me,” he spat. “Aside from everything else, haven’t you noticed your luck? You think that’s a coincidence? You think that doesn’t have anything to do with me?”

You didn’t answer and he scoffed, standing so he towered over you. “You know, you’re more like the old man than you want to admit.”

You shoved his chest with both hands, not caring about his arm or the kudzu wound. You’d absolutely had it. He stumbled backward and when he regained his footing, surprise was written all over his face. The two of you had fought and argued before, but you’d never actually laid hands on him.

“I thought something had changed after Circe,” you seethed. “I thought maybe you’d finally pulled your head out of your ass, but good to know you’re just as obnoxious and disrespectful as ever.”

“You’re the one that came to me for help in the first place!”

Your laugh was verging on hysterical. You’d been awake for far too long and you were dying to take a swing at him. “I wouldn’t have asked for your help if I’d known you would keep throwing it in my face.”

He loomed over you, but you refused to be intimidated. You’d had enough of his bullshit, friends or not.

“Get to D.C. on your own,” you said as you got back in the car. “Or don’t,” you added. “Fuck if I care.” And you sped off, leaving him alone on the side of the highway like an abandoned dog.

As soon as he was in your rearview, you let yourself burst into tears. You cranked your stereo, rolled your window down, and screamed into the night, all the fear, anger, and frustration you’d been feeling tearing from your throat.

Why was he like that? Why did he have to pick fights and antagonize you and argue with you like that? Although, come to think of it, why did you? You were no better than he was, the way you’d kicked him out of the car, an action that you were already regretting. He just had a way of burrowing under your skin and playing your nerves like a goddamn fiddle. It was infuriating that he’d gone and made himself important to you and it disgusted you, how much you relied on him. Because he’d been right. You would be dead without him, and you’d gone and left him and his luck on the side of a highway in the middle of the night.

You groaned. “Ah, fuck.”

You yanked the steering wheel, executing a U-turn that almost flipped your car, and sped back the way you’d come.

He was going to be insufferable. You’d kicked him out, only to immediately come back. You were never going to hear the end of it.

But he wasn’t there. You were where you’d left him, but your ginger giant was gone.

You cursed loudly, beating your palm against the steering wheel. That asshole.

Throwing yourself from the car, you walked in circles calling his name, but no answer came. You swallowed your growing panic and focused instead on your anger. Granted, you’d told him to walk, but you should’ve known that he actually would. Jackass. Fine. If he wanted to disappear, you weren’t going to look for him.

That didn’t stop you from sitting in your car for an hour and a half, hoping that he’d come stumbling through the trees.

“Fuck this,” you muttered. You turned the key and your car’s engine roared to life. You’d either see him in D.C. or you wouldn’t. No skin off your ass.

And yet…and yet. You couldn’t shake the regret, nor the expression of genuine hurt on his face beneath the surprise and outrage.

You flicked through the radio stations, but everything you landed on felt like nails on a chalkboard. Eventually, you gave up and spent the next few hours in silence.

Halfway between Mt. Airy and D.C., somewhere in Virginia, you stopped for gas. You leaned against your driver’s side as the tank filled. Two pumps down, a guy was filling his truck's tank. You could feel his eyes on you, but you didn’t look up. Regardless of who or what he was, you didn’t feel like dealing with it. You just wanted to get to Hester’s. If she’d even let you stay with her. Your relationship was…tenuous at best.

From the corner of your eye, you saw the guy moving towards you. You swore under your breath and fingered the cool metal of the knife in your pocket. You really needed to get a proper weapon for situations like this so you could defend yourself with more than just a dinky utility knife.

Especially now that you’ve chased off your bodyguard, said a voice in the back of your head.

You shoved the thought from your mind and turned to the stranger. “May I help you?” Your tone was polite but icy.

He held up his hands and stopped ten feet from you. “Actually, I was thinkin' I might be able to help you.” You arched an eyebrow. “You’re Wednesday’s gofer, right?”

You bristled. “I am not his gofer. What’s it to you, anyway?”

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his coat and leaned against the gas pump. He looked you up and down, his gaze appraising. You hated it.

“I’m sure you know by now that everyone and they mama is out to get you for the Dark Man’s bounty.” His voice was smooth and rich, like butter tea, and he had a thick Appalachian accent.

“And you aren’t?”

He shrugged. “The guy hasn’t actually specified what the reward is. I don’t trust like that. And I don’t work for Wednesday either,” he added, seeing your mouth open.

You studied his face carefully. The guy was huge, easily several inches over six feet, with broad shoulders to match. His strawberry blond hair was carefully braided away from his face and his beard was also tidily plaited and finished with a silver bead. His gray eyes were sharp, taking in every tiny detail. He was beautiful, but he set your teeth on edge. Something about him, his eyes in particular, felt familiar in a way that made your skin crawl.

Sensing your unease, he inclined his head. “An unfortunate family resemblance,” he said mildly and doffed his Appalachian State baseball cap. “Miley O’Danson.”

That couldn’t be right. “So…son of the son of Daniel? What kind of name is that?”

He just looked at you.

Miley O’Danson. Miley O’Danson.

Meili Odinson.

The pieces clicked and you groaned. “God. Dammit.” You wanted to tear your hair out. “When will you people leave me alone?” you asked tightly.

Miley chuckled. “You know, you’re lucky my father didn’t find you first.”

The growing lump of unease in your throat was threatening to choke you. “What do you want?” You were proud that your voice came out sharp and certain.

“You’re traveling, aren’t you?”

"In a warded car.”

Miley tilted his head. “Doesn’t seem to be doing a very good job,” he pointed out.

For a split second, you wondered how he knew about the drive to Florida, but then you saw him looking pointedly at the kudzu vines still trailing from your car’s undercarriage.

“I’ve already got protection,” you said firmly.

He pointed to the kudzu. “A dying god and magic that’s spotty at best. And I notice your attack dog is conspicuously absent. Where is that thumpin’ gizzard anyway?”

You flushed a dull red. “I’m not his goddamn babysitter.”

He smirked. “Right, of course not. Look, Baku’s protection will only get you so far. What about when you’re outside of his boundaries? What then?”

“How do you know—“

He tapped his nose. “The roads are mine, kiddo.”

You grit your teeth. “What do you want?” you asked again. “I already promised the kudzu believers, am I doing that for you too now? Am I some kind of proselytizer?”

“I don’t need believers,” he said. “I have plenty. Everyone that prays for safety on their journey is praying to me, whether they realize it or not.”

You snorted. “So you’re what, the god of car insurance?”

His eyes narrowed. “Do you want my help or not?”

“You still haven’t told me what you want,” you pointed out.

He pouted. “I can’t want to help from the goodness of my own heart?”

“Absolutely fucking not.”

He sighed. “I s’pose that’s fair.” He paused. “Nothing, for now.”

Your eyes narrowed. “But later?”

His expression was inscrutable. “If you ever get your memory back, give me a call. We’ll talk then.”

His words made no sense. Gods always wanted something and you knew better than to accept a vague deal.

“Nothing about this feels like it’s going to end well for me.”

Miley scuffed at the ground with his heavy work boots. “Think whatever you want. I’m just a guy with daddy issues trying to throw a wrench in his father’s plans.”

You snorted. “See, now that I believe.”

He spread his hands in front of you in what you assumed was meant to be a pleading gesture. Not that Odin or any of his sons would ever plead with anyone.

“Look, I’ll give you whatever protection I can. All I ask is that when I call, you answer.”

You still weren’t convinced. “Sounds like the job I already have with your dad.”

Miley’s jaw clenched and he flexed his hands like he was fighting the urge to swing on you.

“Christ, you’re spending too much time with that leprechaun,” he muttered.

“Watch it.”

Miley scrubbed his hands over his face. “This is getting us nowhere. Look, I’m not asking you to be at my beck and call, all right? This is a one-and-done deal.”

“So I’ll owe you a favor.”

He groaned. “Call it what you like. You can take my offer or you can spend your days constantly looking over your shoulder waiting for the Black Druid to break into your head.”

He was right, you both knew it. You needed all the help you could get.

You considered the man in front of you carefully. “You promise he won’t be able to find me?”

Miley shook his head. “As long as you’re traveling, he’ll have a hell of a hard time of it, but I can’t promise he won’t find you at all. Your magic will still act as a beacon, so use it sparingly.”

You said nothing.

“Do we have a deal or not?” he asked.

This was a bad idea, you knew it was, but what was the alternative? You held out your hand.

He grinned wolfishly and shook it. “And that’s the deal.” As he spoke, electricity raced up your arm from where his hand clasped yours. Whatever reservations you may have had, there was no backing out now.

Miley handed you a small amulet with a spoked symbol carved into it. “Wear this.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a protection sigil. You need as much help as you can get.”

You hung it around your neck. The amulet lay on your sternum right below the pendant Sweeney had given you, which laid snugly in the hollow of your throat. Your chest tightened.

“Take this, too,” he said, handing you a business card. It was a sleek matte black with three figures sitting cross-legged side by side, each holding a slender needle and what appeared to be an ink pot. Each figure was dressed in elaborate costume and their skin was decorated with ornate ink. The words Tatū Maya were embossed in metallic gold across the top.

“You’re not afraid of needles, are you?”

“Oh, I hate this. No, I’m not afraid of needles.”

He tapped the card. “How do you feel about getting some ink?”

“Excuse me?”

He spoke to you like you were an idiot. “Swing by this place and ask to speak with the owners. They owe me a favor, so just tell them I sent you and I’m cashing in.”

You stared at him. “You’re cashing in a favor for me? Why?”

“Same reason I offered to help in the first place,” came the response.

You clenched your jaw. You hated these stupid games, but once again, you found yourself backed into a corner. He may have been presenting it as a choice, but he wasn’t asking.

You ran your thumb over the raised letters on the card. “How will I…” Your voice trailed off as you looked up and realized Miley was gone. You hissed and kicked one of your tires. “I have got to start thinking this shit through better,” you mumbled to yourself.

You examined the card, searching for an address that would give you your next location, but there was only a phone number. Of course. It was nearing four o’clock in the morning, there was no way anyone would pick up. You briefly considered ignoring Melli’s request, but something told you that choice would not be well received.

Annoyed, you approached the payphone tucked near the air compressors and dialed the number on the card, cringing at the stickiness of the plastic receiver.

As you predicted, your call went unanswered, but the soothing voice on the recorded message, after thanking you for calling Tatū Maya, read off an address in Richmond, Virginia. Two hours south, when you needed to go north. It would throw off your timing to meet Sweeney in D.C., but you supposed it wouldn’t be by much.

You let your forehead rest against the casing of the payphone as you tried to steady your breathing.

“Well girl,” you said to your car, “I guess we’re headed to Richmond.” You threw yourself into the driver’s seat and revved her engine. “This should be interesting.”

“Fuck you.” Your head was stuffed with cotton and your mouth was all but glued shut, every word a struggle. You smacked your lips and rubbed the heels of your palms into your eyes in an attempt to rid them of the wretched sandpaper feeling and groaned again. “I think I’m dying. Is this what dying feels like?”

Sweeney unfolded himself from your car and stood over you, nudging you with the toe of his boot. “You’re not dying, mo chara, you’re hungover.”

You flung a dramatic arm over your face. “I’ve never had a hangover, I don’t think. I think I’d rather I was dead.”

Sweeney snorted and reached out to clasp your forearm with a massive hand and hauled you to your feet with a grunt, steadying you when you swayed slightly. He was watching you closely and you shifted uncomfortably under his gaze.

“What’re you looking at me like that for?”

He remained silent for a moment. “You’ve never been hungover?” he eventually asked.

You shook your head.

The look on his face told you he didn’t believe you.

“I’ve seen you drink, you must’ve had at least one.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” you said. Your patience was wearing thin and you were beginning to get annoyed.

“You’ve never been hungover?”

“No. Do you want it in sign language?” You made a rude gesture.

He cocked his head to the side like an animal appraising something it didn’t understand. “D’you think it’s the healing thing?”

You pulled your lower lip between your teeth and chewed it thoughtfully. “I mean maybe? But then why do I have one now? What’s different?”

His eyes darted across your face as though searching for something. “What do you remember about last night?”

You shrugged, releasing your gnawed-on lip. “Dunno. I guess falling off the bar? I remember you yelling at me for some reason.”

Sweeney forced himself to look away from your mouth with a shake of his head. “D’you remember why?”

You shook your head and he sighed and scrubbed his hands over his face. “You said something about a battle that I was in.”

You raised an eyebrow. “So? We talk about that stuff all the time, why was that enough for you to go off on me?”

Sweeney looked like he wanted to shake you. “You’re not understanding me. You spoke about it like you were there.”

You blinked. “What, like a memory?”

“Sure, that’s what they’re usually called.”

You glared at him. “So…I remembered something I wasn’t supposed to and now I have a memory hangover? Or something?”

“Or something,” he muttered. You couldn’t put your finger on why, but you got the distinct feeling that there was something he wasn’t telling you.

“Anything else?” you prodded.

He clasped his hands behind his back and rocked back on his heels. “Nope.”

You opened your mouth to push further, but he curt you off. “We need answers,” he said firmly, “and I might know where we can find some.”

You rolled your eyes and gestured for him to continue.

“Portland.”

You looked at him blankly. “Oregon?"

He shook his head. “Maine. East coast.”

“What the hell and fuck is all the way up there?” you demanded.

“The Morrigan.”

A rat scrambled across your sneaker and you jerked your foot away, grimacing. The cool morning air was starting to warm with the inevitable heat of the day. There was a wad of what had once been bright blue bubble gum stuck forlornly to the concrete, specked with debris, the vivid color chewed to a muddy grey-blue, and a hypodermic needle lay some yards away with a used condom. “Come visit picturesque Kentucky,” you muttered to yourself as you scuffed your shoe over the ground, thinking of the poster you had seen at a bus station with the phrase. “I want to go to Circe,” you said.

Sweeney’s mouth gaped. “In Florida?”

You scoffed. “Like Maine is any closer. If someone’s going to dig around in my head, I’d rather it be someone I know.” you said.

If his mouth opens any wider, his jaw is going to dislocate, you thought mildly.

Sweeney snapped his mouth shut like he could read your mind. “Don’t tell me you trust her.”

“I’m not a moron,” you snapped. “I’d just rather not have a stranger rummaging around in there. Plus, she’s a millennia-old witch and we have questions about magic. And it’s my car,” you added.

The two of you stared each other down in that dingy parking lot for what felt like an eternity before he relented. You had dug your heels in and he knew better than to try to argue.

He pointed at you. “Fine. But if she can’t help us, we’re going to the Morrigan.”

You rolled your eyes. “Fine.”

“I’m driving.”

“Like fuck you are,” you told him. “Let’s get the lead out, my beautiful passenger princess.”

He glared at you before he slung himself into the empty seat and slammed the door with more force than was strictly necessary.

The nearly twenty hours to Florida dragged by impossibly slowly. You and Sweeney traded for the driver’s seat every few hours and your time in the passenger seat was passed either sleeping or poring over your journals and books in a futile search for answers. The two of you spoke little, save for your occasional questions about certain customs or rituals. Sweeney was uncharacteristically quiet, deep in thought and his brow furrowed so deeply that you could have put a pencil between them and it would have held there.

“You’re gonna give yourself a headache,” you murmured, reaching over from the driver’s seat and running a thumb over the wrinkles in an effort to smooth his forehead without taking your eyes off the road.

He grunted and swatted your hand away from his face. “I don’t like this,” he grumbled.

“Which part?”

“Any of it!” he exclaimed, gesticulating wildly. “All of this feels wrong. It feels like we’re missing something. Something isn’t right.”

You snorted. “When is it ever? Our job is secrets and lies, this isn’t anything new.”

Sweeney leaned back in his seat, flipping his coin across his knuckles and in the back of your mind you were painfully aware of how smoothly it rolled across the breadth of his strong hands. You forced yourself to think of something other than the freckles and the fine orange hairs that traveled from the back of his hand and up his wrist. Christ, you scolded yourself. Get a grip. The muscles of his shoulders flexed involuntarily under the fabric of his blue button-down and everything in his body language screamed anxiety and discomfort, from his constant fidgeting to the tension that arced through him, and you worried that he would snap like a rubber band wound too tightly.

You sighed. “Look, we’ll be at Circe’s in a couple of hours. Maybe we can start to get some answers.”

“Or maybe we’ll just be more confused and a three days’ drive from where we should be.”

You glanced over to snap back at him and your heart froze in your chest.

He blinked. “Y’alright there?”

The grass green eyes were gone. In their place were sightless black pits that wept a black viscous ooze.

“S-Sweeney?”

The black pits narrowed and the figure that had been Mad Sweeney leaned closer. You pressed back against the passenger door, seized in that moment with an absolute certainty that this man, this thing, was going to kill you.

His mouth moved, but no words came out. Instead, a heinous and inhuman keening issued from his lips and burrowed into your skull. You clutched at your head as if you could block it out and curled up against the door, making yourself as small as you could. You were in a speeding car with a demon changeling that had taken your leprechaun and wanted you dead. You were going to die.

The monster in the driver’s seat pulled the car to the shoulder of the highway and shut off the engine. You flattened yourself against the door, your eyes screwed shut as you willed this creature to disappear.

After a few minutes of silence, you cracked an eye open. Not-Sweeney was standing outside the car and watching you closely with those hideous eyes and you could feel your heart climbing up your throat.

You wondered if it really was possible to die of fright.

It opened its mouth, its jaw making a nauseating popping sound before dislocating, and again that horrible keening pierced your skull and it didn’t stop. It came closer to you and you scrabbled for the door handle, desperate for escape.

He came around to your side of the car and opened the door slowly. Someone was screaming and it was only after a moment or two that you realized the sound was coming from your own mouth. Not-Sweeney crouched in front of you, keeping a few feet of space between you.

You were aware that he was speaking, but your terrified mind refused to comprehend it. He reached out to touch you gently and you flinched so violently you nearly bit a hole through your tongue, but he didn’t remove his hand. Instead, his thumb began to rub the skin of your arm and he kept talking to you. After a few minutes of this, the blood roaring in your ears quieted enough that you could hear what he was saying. You kept your eyes glued to the ground, too scared to look into those horrible eyes, but you could hear his words now.

“— and I don’t know what you’re seeing right now, but it’s still me. I promise you, it is still me, and I will never hurt you.”

His voice was so soft and gentle and it instantly made your eyes well. You blinked, letting the tears roll down your cheeks, and looked up at him. That horrible face yawned before you and you cringed away from him, but in the blink of an eye, it was gone. The black pits had returned to their shining green and his jaw was back in one piece and covered with four-day-old ginger scruff.

Your relief at the sight of his face was so immediate and overwhelming that you threw yourself against his chest and buried your face in his shirt, your shoulders heaving with sobs.

His enormous hands rubbed small circles between your shoulder blades and stroked the back of your head.

You fought to breathe through your hiccuping sobs but couldn’t quite get enough air into your lungs. He guided your face up to look at him. His palms were rough with calluses, but they were warm and they were so, so gentle.

Before you could say anything, before you could even try to take a breath, his head dipped towards yours and he was kissing you. He was kissing you and he was holding you so tightly, like he was afraid you would disappear if he let go, with one hand on your face and the other against the small of your back, pulling you as closely as possible.

You clutched at him and he just felt so real under your hands. Clove smoke and liquor filled your nose and his scruff scratched at your lips in a way that made you shiver. This was real, he was real. Not the monster. Never the monster.

He broke away from you, leaving you staring at him wide-eyed and thunderstruck.

The sadness you saw in his eyes punched the air from your lungs.

“You were scared of me,” he said quietly, the despondency in his voice nearly cracking your heart in two. “What did you see?”

“I — what the fuck?”

Sweeney’s face flushed scarlet. He wouldn’t meet your eyes.

“‘M sorry,” he murmured, ducking his head. “Dunno what that was.” He got up and strode back to the other side of the car and climbed behind the wheel, gripping it so tightly his knuckles were bone white.

“Sweeney —“

“Don’t,” he said softly.

You stared at him mutely, your mind reeling. You didn’t even know what you wanted to say.

“Can we just —“

He started the car and whatever you were about to say was drowned out by the roar of the engine. The conversation was over.

If there had been tension in the car before, it was smothering you now. You couldn’t bring yourself to speak, not trusting your voice, and Sweeney hadn’t even looked at you since you had gotten back in the car. The trees outside had long since changed from oaks and beeches to towering palm trees that waved in the breeze as though they were welcoming you.

Unease crept up your throat, settling in the back with the unpleasant oily feeling that comes with nausea. You remembered that Circe had told you how Florida had been formed from the grit and dirt that had sloughed off the Appalachian Mountains and settled in the Gulf. You figured this was at least a partial explanation for all the weird and unsettling things you’d seen there. What else could you expect from somewhere that had been born from the blood and dirt of gods that were older than the Atlantic? Here, all bets were off, but whether or not that was a good thing remained to be seen.

The remainder of the drive passed in what felt like an eternity of that tense and anxious silence when, at last, you arrived at the ferry that would take you from Fort Myers to Key West. From there, you would take a small boat that would take you to Circe’s island, an uncharted islet that held the ancient witch’s home.

On the ferry, Sweeney seemed to come back to himself. He had disappeared the moment you stepped onto the deck and reappeared shortly with snacks and drinks clutched in his hands. He had gotten your favorite snacks from the vending machine along with two hot drinks from the small ferry cafe.

He held your snacks and one of the cups out to you. “Tea,” he grunted. “Help keeps y’from getting sick. Immune system boost or something.”

Whatever remaining anxiety you had from the drive melted away as you took his offerings. “Thank you,” you said, giving him a small smile.

He rubbed the back of his neck and wouldn’t meet your eyes. “Dunno if you can even get sick, but between the driving and the not sleeping I figure it can’t hurt.”

You inhaled the steam, letting it clear through your sinuses, and sighed contentedly. “Thank you,” you said again.

He nodded and sat down on the opposite bench facing you. “D’you have a plan for when we get there?” he asked.

You chewed on your lower lip. “Beyond just sort of showing up?”

Sweeney groaned and ran his hands through his hair. “Of course you don’t. S’pose you show up and she’s not there? Or s’pose she’s not willing to help?”

“I could ask the same of Maine,” you muttered.

He leaned forward and pointed a finger at you. “Sure, except I do have a plan for Portland.” He sat back. “Do you even have anything for her?” he asked. “You’re smart enough to know that she won’t give help for free.”

You patted your backpack. “I’ve got something I’ve been holding onto for her.”

Sweeney looked at you skeptically. “Like an offering something, or is this another. Gungnir situation?”

You glared at him. “It’s an offering, dickhead,” you snapped. The annoyance from earlier was suddenly back in full force. “Stop acting like I’m completely incompetent.”

“You’re the one that wants to drop in on her with no advance warning,” he pointed out. “I just wanted to make sure.”

“Sweeney,” you said, pinching the bridge of your nose and squeezing your eyes shut, “please, just shut up.” As you spoke, a shiver ran up your spine and the tip of your tongue tingled.

He moved to retort angrily, but it seemed that he couldn’t open his mouth. His green eyes bulged and your own widened as he clawed at his throat.

“Th-this isn’t funny,” you stammered.

Sweeney shook his head vigorously. He wasn’t messing with you.

“Fuck.” You tried not to panic. Clearly, this was your fault, but you had no idea how to undo it. Your hands fluttered as you tried to think of how to undo whatever it was that had been cast. “Um…Christ. Fuck, okay, um…speak,” you tried, like he was a dog that could be trained to bark on command. He looked at you in reproach and you winced. “Okay, yeah, sorry. I have no idea how to undo this.”

You tried again and again to no avail, succeeding only in further upsetting yourself. Your hands began to shake and your words stumbled over each other and you couldn’t quite catch your breath and oh god what had you done —

Warm hands covered yours and squeezed gently. He inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly.

You swallowed and took a shaky breath. He nodded and took another and you tried to breathe in tandem with him.

Your heart slowed and he nodded. He paused and thought for a moment and then he grabbed a pen and a notepad from your backpack.

“Hey!” you protested, but he paid you no mind as he scribbled something on the page in front of him and handed the notepad to you. You didn’t recognize the word he had written down.

“I have no idea how to pronounce this or what it means,” you told him.

He rolled his eyes and took the pad from you, once again scribbling something before handing it back to you.

You scanned his chicken-scratch writing. “’Just feel it’? What the hell is that supposed to mean?” you demanded.

He gave you a look that said try.

You stared at the page for a moment, not sure where to begin, and then took a deep breath and carefully sounded out the word. Nothing. “Did…did I say it wrong?” you asked cautiously.

He shrugged, which you took to mean It was good enough.

Eyes closed, you leaned back against the sticky brown vinyl of the seat. You knew this likely had to do with the tingling you’d felt when you accidentally cast whatever the hell this was, so you just had to get that back. Reaching forward, you tried again but still felt nothing. You cracked an eye open to see Sweeney staring at you expectantly. It hadn’t worked. Your shoulders sagged with frustration. “I’m sorry,” you said quietly. “Maybe it’s temporary?” You had been aiming for a light, joking tone, but your voice cracked and you had to press the heels of your trembling hands against your eyes in an effort to stop the dam from breaking. There was a pressure that had been building behind your eyes for several days, all the fear and anxiety and exhaustion piling up and threatening to spill over, but you couldn’t let it. You refused to cry in front of him.

The seat next to you dipped with new weight and you opened your eyes to see that Sweeney had moved to sit next to you. When his eyes met yours, they softened. He wasn’t mad at you, he knew this had been an accident.

Mortifyingly, your eyes began to brim with tears that quickly spilled down your cheeks. You realized that you wanted to hear his voice. You needed to hear him say that you would figure it out because that’s what you always did. You refused to meet his gaze, instead staring straight ahead and willing yourself to stop crying. Then, in a gesture that you had always understood to be unlike him, Sweeney put an arm across your shoulders and gently squeezed you against him.

The dam broke. You slumped against him and turned your face to bury it in his side, tears now flowing freely down your face and soaking into the fabric of his shirt. The feeling that you were overreacting to this comparatively small misstep in the grand scheme of everything else ate at you, but in the smaller scheme of right now, it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Your body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds and your hands were trembling.

Sweeney’s thumb gently brushed back and forth over your arm. The callused skin on the pad of his thumb snagged at the looser fibers in the flannel you wore. His head rested on top of yours and his breathing was slow and even. You did your level best to focus on the rhythm of the rise and fall of his chest and tried to sync your breath with his. The two of you sat like that for several minutes while you worked to stem the tide flowing from your eyes. Sniffling, you sat upright and swiped at your eyes.

“Maybe Circe can fix it.” You didn’t even bother to hide the misery in your voice. You were exhausted and there was an odd smell in the air that you initially attributed to a general Florida-ferry-scent, but upon further inspection, you realized that the odor was wafting from your own self and Sweeney. Never in your life had you longed for a shower and clean clothes more than you did at that moment.

A second wave of tears overcame you and you folded in on yourself, desperately wishing you could disappear and hating how weak you felt in that moment. You couldn’t even fix your own mistakes, between running to Circe to save you and Sweeney being the reason you had stayed alive long enough to get Gungnir to the old man. Sweeney being the reason you hadn’t died after you escaped the Jötnar and Sweeney being the reason, Sweeney being the reason, Sweeney being the reason. Fuck.

Your shoulders hunched forward and you stared at the linoleum floor of the ferry as you chewed at the dead skin of your nail beds. You didn’t understand why Sweeney was still by your side even after you had dragged him across state lines and nearly killed him. He’d said you were his best friend, sure, but everyone had their limits. How many strikes until you found yourself alone?

Sweeney laid a hand on your shoulder and gave what you could only assume was meant to be a reassuring squeeze, but it only threatened another round of crying. Again, you found yourself surprised at how badly you wanted to hear his voice.

The remainder of the ferry ride was filled with suffocating silence, Sweeney unable to speak and you unwilling. There was nothing you could say that wouldn’t feel depressingly hollow, so you buried your nose in your journal and scribbled down everything that had led to the right now in excruciating detail. You didn’t know if Circe would find it helpful, but you figured it couldn’t hurt. At the very least, she might be able to help you figure out where to even begin to learn to control whatever was happening to you.

The moment you stepped off the ferry, you were submerged into the hot Florida air, which clung to you like a second skin. The palms waved at you merrily and you glared up at their dancing fronds. They were where they belonged and you, most assuredly, were not. You couldn’t help but feel like you were being mocked.

There was a small marina beside the ferry terminal and it was there that the two of you headed next. You led the ginger giant down to where the boats bobbed gently in the saltwater and towards the farthest end of the marina. As you walked past yachts that increased in size the farther you went, you could see Sweeney’s eyes darting excitedly from vessel to vessel. He thought you were leading him to what had to be a spectacular super-yacht, you could tell, and your misery lifted long enough for you to make the decision not to tell him otherwise.

Despite the everything about how you were feeling in that moment, you couldn’t help but snicker when a small and rather dingy sailboat came into view and a look of dawning horror came across his face when he realized that you weren’t going to stop at one of the enormous sleek monstrosities that stood sentry on either side of the walkway.

Approaching the vessel, it became clear that it was even shabbier than it had seemed on first glance. The deep blue paint of the hull, which must have been breathtaking when it was new, was flaked and peeling with bare wood visible in places. The glass of the aft porthole of the cabin was spiderwebbed with cracks and appeared to be held together with duct tape and there was splintered wood everywhere. The gold-painted letters across the stern that had once proudly spelled “Aeaea” now read “Ae e “ in script that was just as faded and peeling as the rest of the boat. You didn’t need to look at Sweeney to know how he felt about your ride and he didn’t need to speak for you to know exactly what he was thinking.

“I know,” you told him, “but she’s never sunk before.”

He gave you a look and you knew then that it wasn’t just the boat that was giving him pause. The witch had turned him into a pig the last time they had crossed paths and there was nothing to say she wouldn’t do it again. You couldn’t really blame him for his reticence.

“I won’t let her turn you into a little pig boy again,” you teased. Both of you knew that it was not within your power to stop Circe from doing anything.

Sweeney’s shoulders hunched with reluctance and you gave him a gentle shove in the direction of the boat, mentally preparing yourself for the possibility of having to body-check him over the rail, but you were pleasantly surprised when he climbed aboard with no complaint. Not that he could complain even if he wanted to, but it was nice that he didn’t try to fight you over it.

The two of you sat on the cracked and yellowed vinyl seats that circled the perimeter of the deck. You folded your hands and waited patiently and Sweeney looked at you, clearly confused as to how this was supposed to work.

“Give it a sec,” you told him.

Sure enough, after a moment the boat lurched forward, its engine coughing and spluttering and belching black smoke. Sweeney’s face told you that he did not think that this was a good idea and you could see his reluctance only increase as the little boat trudged down the jetty. As soon as you were out on open water, a thick, unseasonable fog descended around you, obscuring everything from view.

“This is the only way to the island,” you explained. “I mean, it’s the only one I know of, at any rate. I’m sure there are other ways to get there, but this is the easiest and also the least dangerous.”

He gestured for you to continue.

You huffed out a breath. “Okay, I don’t know how well I can actually explain this, but I’ll do my best. Basically, the island is shielded. You know how in The Magicians, how the school in that has wards on it to keep people from finding it?”

He nodded. You had plowed through those books and made him watch the bad TV adaptation with you, he remembered how it worked.

“It’s not the same shielding, obviously, but it’s the same concept. Circe has a shielding spell on the island that keeps it hidden. The only people that can get to it are people who have been there before. The boat has an enchantment on it that will guide it to the island with the right person.”

You could almost hear his voice demanding that you explain to him how you’d gotten to Aeaea before and you knew that if you didn’t tell him now he would only be annoying about it later.

“You know I spent time with Circe, yeah?”

Sweeney nodded. “Wednesday sent me to her after he found me. I didn’t learn anything major or super helpful, but he had her teach me basic protection magic and some other small things here and there. She was the one who helped me get my feet back under me.”

There was more to the story, and he could tell that you were holding something back, but that was a can of worms for another day. You lapsed into silence and leaned back against the seats and gazed out over the water. Even having been to Aeaea before, your breath still hitched when the fog cleared and the small dot of Circe’s island came into view. Memory had dulled the beauty of this place, you could tell even from a distance. The water that lapped at the hull of the boat was a bright, seemingly impossible shade of cerulean that almost hurt to look at in its brilliance. The fish that swam beside you seemed like something from a dream, so beautiful were they with bright orange crests arcing down their backs and sunlight glinting off of their silvery scales.

You leaned over the side and let your fingers trail in the warm water. A sea turtle slid gracefully through the water, close enough that your fingers could skim its shell, and you couldn’t help but gasp. In doing the work that you did, you saw so much ugly without reprieve and it was easy to forget that there was still beauty and wonder in the world. In spite of it all, there was still beauty. Even the little boat looked new, whatever enchantment that had disguised it now lifted, its blue paint glossy and no longer peeling and the wood polished to a mirror shine. The cracked porthole was now in one piece and the vinyl on the seats was now a soft beige and looked brand new.

You closed your eyes and tilted your face skyward, taking a deep inhale of the clean salt air. The rays of the sun warmed your cheeks and seagulls wheeled through the sky at incredible heights and you opened your eyes to watch them. You envied their freedom. They didn’t have to do anything, no one ever asked anything of them. They were free to go where they wanted when they wanted and answered to no one. You’d have liked to be a bird. When you had asked him about it, Sweeney had said that he didn’t remember much of his time as one, but he remembered the freedom and the feeling of soaring through the air, weightless and free.

You looked to the island. Now that you were closer, you were able to see some of the animals that lived among everyone there and among the bustle of the witches on the beach. You’d have liked to be an animal. You’d have liked to be anything other than…whatever it was you were. It was a cruelty, in some ways, that you had been given this life and this form. You looked to Sweeney, curious what was on his mind as you approached the white beaches, and found that his gaze was already burning into you.

The moment your eyes met his shocking green ones, all thoughts of wishing you had been made differently evaporated.

Sweeney looked away from you quickly and scratched the back of his neck. That moment passed in the space of a heartbeat, but you didn’t think you were imagining the flush that was creeping up from under his collar.

Before you could dwell on it for too long, the small vessel glided neatly to its dock. Waiting to greet you were three gorgeous women with jet black hair and clear gray eyes. They smiled at you in unison and you could see rows of needle sharp teeth, stark white against pink mouths. These women had been at the docks when you had last arrived years ago. They’d made your skin crawl then and they made your skin crawl now.

“She’s been expecting you,” they said as one. Their voices made your frontal lobe buzz unpleasantly. Their mouths moved, but their words felt as though they were being beamed directly into your mind. Judging from Sweeney’s grimace, he felt it too.

You cleared your throat and regained your bearings. “She knew I was coming?”

Sweeney moved to stand behind you and once again you were grateful for the solidity of him in the face of the Gray Women.

The Gray Women said nothing more, only turned and began to walk down the dock towards the beach. A look passed between you and the leprechaun before you followed. The sisters (Were they sisters? You’d never been sure.) led you to a cobbled path that ended at an enormous manor. It was an elegant building that you could only imagine was what the home she had grown up in looked like. Its façade of soaring columns and well-polished stones supported snaking vines with fragrant blossoms that were as big as your fist and there were gas light fixtures on either side of the massive oak doors that were banded with iron and sported heavy brass door knockers that had been cast in the heads of lions, their jaws agape in mighty roars.

The tallest of the three women raised one of the lion heads and let it fall against the oak with a boom that echoed through the house.

After a moment, the doors swung open of their own accord and you were hit with a gust of incense-perfumed air and woodsmoke. The women gave you one more eerie smile before vanishing back the way you had come and you stepped inside.

Sweeney moved to follow you, but you turned and placed a hand on his chest. “Maybe you should wait here,” you told him. “You know how she can be.”

He looked as though he very much wanted to protest and shook his head vigorously. He was not going to let you talk to the witch alone.

You patted him on the shoulder. “I’ll be right back,” you promised and walked down the hallway. You could feel Sweeney’s glare boring a hole in the back of your head.

Though it had been a while, you still remembered the layout of Circe’s home. It was approaching late afternoon and you knew she would be taking her tea in front of her hearth in the great-room as she attended to her rituals and the hearth would not be difficult to find.

You dodged the dryads that bustled around the halls, their hands full with rich fabrics, decadent dishes, and wine in jugs made from the most beautiful ceramic you’d ever seen. The walls were hung with vivd tapestries and patterned with intricate mosaics, both holding images that were so lifelike you half expected them to leap out at you. Treasures on pedestals lined the walls and glinted in the warm light of the sun. Carved chests were tucked into corners and soft rugs padded the cold stone floors. You ran your fingers along the cool marble of the windowsills and traced the intricate scrollwork of the wooden shutters. Undeniably, the home of the sorceress was breathtaking, but there was a cold, hard feeling that lurked beneath it all. You supposed centuries of forced exile would do that to a person.

Eventually, you got to where you wanted to be and, as expected, when you rounded the corner she was sat before the fire at her loom, her fingers deftly sending the shuttlecock back and forth with a glimmering thread. Another woman sat adjacent to her with her back to you. You couldn’t see her face but her auburn hair was intricately braided and threaded with silver beads. She waved her hand as if to illustrate a point and you saw silver rings adorning long slender fingers that were covered in inked symbols that were too small for you to make out.

From your backpack, you retrieved the bottle of 1869 Château Lafite that had been packed carefully at the bottom of your bag and set it on the long cypress table. You contemplated knocking on the table to make yourself known, but Circe spoke before you could.

“It’s rude to stare,” she said calmly without looking up from what she was doing. “Either speak or leave.” Her voice was cool and carried through the space so that it sounded like she was right next to you. You had never once heard the witch raise her voice, but she always made herself heard.

You picked up the bottle and made your way to the hearth, your cheeks burning. Like the rest of the house, the grand room was a thing of beauty: the high ceilings boasted intricate frescoes of what you knew to be scenes from The Odyssey. Columns stretched from floor to ceiling, the tops of which curled into delicate scrolls. Two stone lions bracketed the enormous fireplace and you couldn’t shake the feeling that they were watching you as you moved, and more rich tapestries hung on the walls. You could see threads of gold gleaming among the royal purples and bloody crimsons. Despite the oppressive heat of the day, there was a roaring fire blazing merrily before them.

“I apologize Teacher,” you said sheepishly.

She eyed the bottle of wine in your hands.

“Is that the 1869 Château?” she asked. Her eyes shone hungrily with the promise of an offering.

You nodded. “Yes.”

She snatched it from you. “Oh, well done indeed.”

You cleared your throat. “I know I come without invitation, but—“

“Dear one, have you met my friend?” She spoke as though you hadn’t said a word.

“I — no, ma’am.”

Circe indicated the woman beside her, who smiled at you kindly. Her ice blue eyes glinted and her smile actually reached her eyes. “This is Angrboda. She’s a dear friend and a fellow practitioner of the craft.”

At the woman’s name, your blood ran cold. The old man had told you stories about this witch. Mother of Fenrir and Jormungandr. Loki’s wife. A force to be reckoned with above all else, who had died at the hands of the Æsir more than once but now sat five feet from you. And yet, the woman before you didn’t seem as cold and wretched as Wednesday had made her out to be. Those sparkling eyes had crow’s feet and there were smile lines around her small mouth. This was a woman that smiled often, even with the aching sorrow you could see behind the twinkling in her eyes. You liked her immediately.

You gave Angrboda your name and she inclined her head.

“Pleased to meet you.” She was soft-spoken, her voice gentle and delicate, but like her Greek counter, she radiated power and authority.

“Likewise. Teacher, you —“

Circe held up a hand. “I know what you’re here to ask. Where’s that ginger giant of yours?”

You ground your teeth. “I left him in the front hall. I didn’t want to risk offense and, forgive me, but he’s still a little skittish after last time.”

She scoffed and tossed her head. “He ran his mouth, I set him right. The man has nothing to fear as long as he minds his manners. He’ll be brought in shortly, I should think.”

“Thank you,” you mumbled.

At that moment, the doors at the end of the hall banged open and Sweeney strode through, looking for all the world as if he owned the place. A harried dryad trailed after him but Circe waved her away and she made a quick retreat.

“Mad Sweeney!” Circe exclaimed in delight. She stood and spread her arms to hug him. “Lovely to see you,” she said, kissing him on both cheeks. It almost sounded like she meant it, but you didn’t miss the glimmer of disgust in her eyes.

Sweeney raised an eyebrow, but said nothing, and surprise flitted across her face. For a split second the witch was visibly annoyed, but she quickly wiped her face and plastered on a pleasant smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “No biting comment?” she teased. “Am I not worth your words, great king?”

You tensed but Circe waved her hand. “Sit down.”

An invisible force yanked you into one of the high-backed chairs like you were attached to a string.

Circe approached Sweeney, inspecting him like he was one of her cattle.

“Oh, now this is interesting,” she remarked. She prodded his jaw. “You can’t speak at all, can you?”

Sweeney’s face remained impassive. Circe waved Angrboda over. “Boda, come look at this.”

Angrboda rose from her seat and crossed the room with impossible grace. Her pale fingers delicately probed along Sweeney’s jawline and down his neck. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he gulped and you snorted derisively. Not that you could blame him though, Angrboda was otherworldly in her beauty.

“This is wonderful work,” she murmured, forcing Sweeney’s jaw open so Circe could stick her fingers in his mouth and poke around in his cheeks and under his tongue.

Circe removed her fingers and took a step back. “It’s rudimentary and a little crude, but it’s clean and to the point.”

Angrboda hummed. “It does feel unintentional, but it’s better work than some of your novitiates.”

The Greek witch turned to you. “Is this your doing?” You nodded. “I thought it felt familiar,” she said, more to herself than to you, “but if it is, it is stronger than it used to be.” She sniffed the air. “You smell different, too. Much more wild.”

You blinked at her.

“I don’t think they’ve come to be told they stink,” Angrboda said gently.

Circe cleared her throat. “Right. Why have you brought him to me? I know that this alone isn’t what brought you back to my shores.”

You swallowed. “I was hoping you could remove the enchantment. Please.”

She pretended to think hard. “I don’t see why I should. I like him better this way anyway. All of the strong and handsome brooding with none of the insufferable speaking.”

“I need him to help me find answers,” you said.

The witch looked at you in a way that made you feel naked and exposed. “It’s your spell, you should be able to do it yourself.”

Your eyes were glued to the floor and you let the sole of your boot scuff across the textured surface. She knew you well enough to know exactly why you hadn’t undone this, she just wanted to hear you say it.

“I haven’t…been able to,” you said reluctantly.

She scoffed. “You cast it, didn’t you? You can remove it.”

“The casting was unintentional,” you snapped. “I haven’t been able to figure out how to undo it. I don’t even know how it happened in the first place!”

“Did my teachings mean nothing?” Circe demanded. “Did nothing stick in that thick head of yours? I’ve seen you cast. You’re more than capable.”

“Only defenses and wards,” you protested. “It’s never been like this before.”

Angrboda regarded you carefully. “This unintentional magic, is it a recent development?” she asked. You nodded and she turned to Circe. “That could account for the wild smell, but why now?”

Circe scratched her chin and looked at you. “Have you had any particularly traumatic experiences lately?”

“Broad question,” you muttered.

“Let me rephrase. Have you had any experiences recently that go beyond what you would typically encounter?”

You looked to Sweeney, unsure it was safe, but he shrugged and nodded. Might as well, his body said. You reached around to hike up the back of your shirt to show the witches what the Jötnar had done. There were sharp intakes of breath as they took in the ruined flesh of your back, which was already beginning to scar over. Circe’s face hardened but Angrboda’s eyes went wide.

“Nine hells, it was you,” she realized.

Circe’s gaze snapped to Angrboda. “Explain,” she demanded.

Angrboda’s eyes didn’t leave your back. “I heard a rumor about a week back that one of the All-Father’s people had been taken by the Jötnar. They said they had trespassed and stolen something valuable.”

“Is it stealing if they stole it in the first place?” you muttered.

Angrboda ignored you. “I had no idea this is what they were doing.” Her voice was strained as she spoke. “Talk about traumatic. Child, I am so sorry.”

Circe bent to examine your wounds more closely. “I can heal the rest, but I can’t do anything about the scarring,” she said as she ran her fingers lightly over the angry intersecting cuts. “Boda, you said this was a week ago?”

Angrboda nodded and you piped up to confirm, “I broke out around then and found him.” You pointed to Sweeney.

Circe raised an eyebrow. “He was nearby?”

You nodded and she put you under that scrutinizing gaze. “Quite a stroke of luck, isn’t it?”

You shrugged. “I’d be dead if I hadn’t found him, so I’m choosing not to question it. We’ve got more pressing issues.”

Circe straightened. “I see. And I’m sure that you’ve figured out that you’re healing much faster than you should be?”

You nodded again and she turned to Angrboda. The two began conversing rapidly in a language you didn’t understand. When they had apparently reached a conclusion, Circe’s attention came back to you. “We have much to discuss and what remains of the day is passing us by. Let’s get started.”

She swept past you and Sweeney glared at you and coughed into his fist. Circe huffed in annoyance.

“Oh, right. Are you sure you want to undo this?” she asked you. “I really do prefer him this way.”

“Yes, please,” you said. “He’s…he’s my friend,” you finished lamely.

The knowing look on Angrboda’s face only served to add to the awkward anxiety that was railing against your mind.

Circe heaved a beleaguered sigh. “Fine. I’ll show you how so you can fix your own mess next time. You,” Circe pointed at you, “I need you to tell me exactly what happened in the moments that led up to the unintentional casting.”

Wordlessly, you reached into your backpack and handed her your journal. She took it from you with a raised eyebrow and flipped through the pages you had written on the ferry. When she finished she handed your journal back and looked between the two of you.

“You tried in English and Irish?”

You nodded.

“What did it feel like when you spoke the words?”

You didn’t understand and said as much.

“When you spoke the words that cast this and when you tried to undo it, how did it feel?” Circe asked, the way you would ask a small child a question with an obvious answer.

“Like…emotionally or physically?”

“Physically.” Her tone indicated a strained sense of patience.

You shook out your hand, remembering the pins and needles feeling that had danced across your tongue and the chill that had run through you. “It felt weird. Like, my tongue got kind of tingly and it felt like something was slithering up my spine.”

Angrboda nodded. “That’s the magic.”

“What about when you tried to undo it?” Circe asked.

You shook your head. “Nothing.”

She clicked her tongue and walked around you in a slow circle. “You were trying too hard,” she said as she came to a halt in front of you. “When you said it the first time, you did it without thinking. On instinct, no matter how endearingly misguided. The second time, though, you were trying too hard. You have to simply let yourself feel it.” Circe directed the two of you to stand before the fireplace and face each other. When you were arranged to her liking, you were staring into his green eyes. This close, you could see the faint ring of gold that circled his pupil between the black and the bright green and the freckles that were splashed across the bridge of his nose and scattered across his cheeks and his forehead.

You swallowed nervously.

“You also need to believe that this will work and that you can do it,” she said pointedly.

“I get it,” you muttered.

“Watch it,” the witch said sharply. Sweeney’s jaw flexed and you knew him well enough to know he was suppressing a smirk. Circe reached out and cuffed you both upside the head. “I can still send you both back where you came from,” she reminded you. You mumbled a sheepish apology. “The Irish word that he gave you, say that again, but this time chew on it. Feel the shape of the word and how your intentions mold it. Hold those intentions in your mind, look at him and hear his voice as you speak the word aloud.”

You closed your eyes and did as she said before speaking the word, but nothing happened and your shoulders sagged.

“See, it doesn’t work,” you told her, unable to keep the frustration from your voice. “If we keep going it’ll just piss me off.”

“You think if you don’t get it on the first go it won’t ever work? I never took you to be a quitter.” Circe’s voice was mocking and Angrboda glared at her sharply.

“It’s like anything else,” the Norsewoman told you, infinitely more patient than your hostess and teacher. “You need to practice.”

“Do it again,” Circe ordered.

You clenched your jaw and tamped down your growing frustration. Sweeney reached out and guided your eyes closed with the callused tips of his fingers and then took one of your hands in his and pressed the tips of your fingers against his chapped lips.

Your eyes flew open in surprise, but the sight of his face so close to yours was so disorienting that you quickly closed them again. Just feel it. You reached deep within yourself for the feeling from before and poured as much of your will into it as you could. You allowed yourself to feel its meaning beyond the literal translation. What it meant to you in that moment, and in that moment it meant his crude jokes, the obnoxious laughter, and his voice. Loathe though you were to admit it, it meant the feeling of safety that you had somehow come to find in that stupid brogue. You didn’t ever think you would miss it, but now that his voice was gone it was fucking untenable. He needed it back. You needed it back.

“Labhair.”

The word fell from your lips as naturally and as easily as breathing and you felt it. The tingle on your tongue and the chill down your spine, but this time it felt like it was twisting up and around your spinal cord and flooding your brain. The point of contact between your finger and Sweeney’s lips grew uncomfortably warm and you jerked away like you had been shocked, but as quickly as it arrived, the feeling dissipated. Green eyes met yours and your fingers tapped nervously against your thigh. You held your breath and you watched each other carefully. He was silent for what felt like an eternity and tears of frustration and disappointment pricked at the corners of your eyes. You covered your face with your hands.

“Sure you’re not after crying again, are you?”

Your head shot up so quickly you nearly broke your neck. Sweeney had an enormous shit-eating grin that nearly split his face in two plastered firmly in place.

“It worked?” you asked hoarsely.

“Unless I’m being puppeted,” he said easily, “I’d say looks like.”

Your knees jellied with relief. Part of you, a part that you had refused to fully acknowledge, had been afraid that it couldn’t be undone, but you had done it. You hugged him tightly, burying your face in his chest and gripping he fabric of his shirt so tightly that it was a wonder it didn’t tear in your fists.

Sweeney huffed out a laugh as his arms wrapped around you. He pressed a kiss to the crown of your head and you both missed the look that passed between Circe and the Norse witch.

“Jesus Christ,” you breathed. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—“

He palmed your forehead and gave you a playful shove.

“No blood, no foul,” he said simply.

To your exasperation, your eyes began to well once again.

Circe waved her hands. “Enough of that. We’ve fixed one problem, but I know that wasn’t all you came here for. You want to know what’s happening to you.”

You nodded. “This keeps happening. Magic that I can’t explain, incantations that I never learned.” You told her about the Bocánaigh in Missouri and the incantations that pulled themselves from somewhere deep inside you. Circe listened, the crease between her brows growing more defined the longer you spoke.

When you finished, the witch remained silent, though her fingers tapped nervously along her staff. She regarded you carefully as she chewed on the inside of her cheek, seemingly deep in thought.

“I don’t know that I can give you all of the answers you need,” she said at length, “but I think I may be able to offer some assistance. Come.” She swept from the hall with Angrboda in step beside her and led you back outside to the path that had led you up from the beach. You followed it further inland, taking a fork in the packed earth that led you to a sizable pristine white tent. Circe held one of the flap doors aside and gestured for you to step through. Inside, you realized that you were in the island’s infirmary. Lanterns hung from the ceiling, impossibly bright, with thuribles hung between them and from those drifted rivers of smoke that were scented with lavender and frankincense. The stone floor had been polished to a gleam and there was a stream that cut through it, neatly separating the space into two sides. One had a row of beds that were neatly made with creamy linen sheets, while the other held what appeared to be exam tables.

Circe exchanged a few words with her sister witch and kissed her on both cheeks before following you inside as Angrboda went back the way you had come. “She’s going to see if any of her sisters might know anything about this,” Circe told you, answering the unasked question in your eyes. “As for you—“ She grabbed your shoulders and sat you in a plush armchair, whose immense royal blue cushions threatened to swallow you. “You,” she pointed at Sweeney, “outside.”

He snorted. “Like hell.”

“I wasn’t asking,” she said icily.

You looked up at him and tugged gently on the hem of his jacket. “It’s okay,” you said quietly.

He knelt before you and put a massive hand over your knee. “I don’t like it, mo grá,” he murmured. “I don’t trust her.”

You let your forehead rest against his. “We don’t have a choice,” you said softly. “I’m a big kid, I’ll be okay.”

Sweeney sighed and stood. “I’ll be right outside. If anything happens—“

“You’ll come charging in, I’m sure,” Circe said in a tone that conveyed utter boredom.

He shot her a glare and stood and gave you a pat on the shoulder before taking his leave. You watched him disappear through the canvas. You’d been feeling different in his presence since he had stitched you up almost two weeks ago, and it had only gotten worse since he’d kissed you. No longer was he the obnoxious and barely tolerable coworker that you’d put up with out of necessity. After nearly two weeks of his constant presence, you should have wanted to claw his eyes out, but to your mild horror, you realized that the thought of being separated from him now nearly made you nauseous. Two weeks that had felt like a lifetime.

“I truly don’t understand why you keep that troglodyte around,” Circe huffed after he had gone.

“He saved my life,” you murmured as you toyed with a loose thread in the arm of the chair. “More than once.”

She clicked her tongue. “Be that as it may, he’s crass and indelicate and I find him grating. Here, drink.” She had busied herself preparing a tonic, which she presented to you in a steaming willow-pattered mug. You inhaled the vapor and nearly choked on the foul scent of it.

Poison, hissed a voice in the back of your mind. Your head snapped up and your gaze shot to Circe. The chill, ethereal beauty of the sorceress was gone. Her flashing golden eyes had become the same sightless, weeping black pits that you’d seen on Sweeney’s face the day before. It oozed down her cheeks, the skin there now pitted and scarred. The planes of her face seemed to be melting, her skin turning a livid red before settling into a foul necrotic black as it sloughed off of her bones. Her fiery hair hung lank and matted and you were able to make out lice and squirming maggots weaving in between the strands on her scalp.

You knew in your bones that this witch was trying to poison you. She would not let you leave Aeaea alive.

You screamed, a horrible and inhuman sound that tore from your throat.

Sweeney burst into the tent, green eyes wild and searching for you, but you were already up and scrambling away. Like Circe, his face was twisted and terrible. They both sneered at you as they approached you.

They’re going to kill you. The voice was wailing now. You gripped your hair as your heart hammered against your ribs so hard you feared it would burst from your chest. Sweeney made for you, but you dodged his outstretched hand and somersaulted away from them both. You came up on the other side of them white-knuckling the knife that had been in your boot and sobbing with fear.

Sweeney was trying to say something to you, but you screamed in his face, drowning out his voice. He tried again to approach you. You lashed out and kicked him square in the chest and his breath left him with an oof. But even with the wind knocked from his lungs, he still managed to catch the next kick you aimed at him and pull you towards him in the same movement. His other hand shot out and grabbed your wrist, twisting and forcing you to drop the knife to avoid your bones being snapped.

You flailed in his hold, but he was still bigger and stronger than you were. Circe pointed at one of the tables and Sweeney hauled you bodily onto its surface. He pinned your hands to your sides and sat astride your torso, effectively holding the rest of you in place even as you bucked your hips and thrashed beneath him in an effort to unseat his massive frame and free yourself.

Your face was slick with sweat and tears. Your hair was plastered to your forehead and you tasted blood. You must have bitten your tongue, but you didn’t feel it and you didn’t care. You had to escape. Fear forced your throat to constrict, threatening to choke you with it and swallow you whole. Every nerve in your body burned. Sweeney was shouting at you, something you didn’t understand, and Circe was barking orders to the dryad nurses, but you processed none of it. Fear, animalistic and primal, had consumed you and erased all else.

Scream after scream ripped from your throat and tears that weren’t yours dripped onto your cheeks from above. You were going to die here, pinned and cornered like a wounded animal. Eventually your voice gave out and the only sound you could make was a pathetic keening as you writhed in the leprechaun’s grasp.

Then Circe was there, her face hovering inches from yours, and she was wrenching your jaw open and pouring something warm and oily down your throat. You had a moment to register Sweeney’s stricken, tearstained face before you rolled over and voided the contents of your stomach. After that, everything went black.

You woke tucked into the white linen sheets of one of the infirmary beds. The sky outside had darkened to a deep purple and you wondered how long you’d been out.

What the hell had happened? You had been fine one moment and the next you were being choked by overwhelming terror that—

Oh. The Dark Man. He had found you here, somehow, and filled your mind with abject terror. It had been him in the car, turning your leprechaun into something straight from a nightmare.

You desperately wanted to cry, but you were too spent to do even that. Your whole body ached and you felt as though your bones were made of stone. A memory swam before you: Sweeney’s tearstained face, twisted and grotesque and…scared. He had been afraid of you. You squeezed your eyes shut and let your head fall back against the pillows, wanting badly to disappear where no one could ever find you again.

A dryad bustled into the room with fresh linens. When she saw that you were awake, she smiled pleasantly, but her stance was still guarded.

“You’re awake!” she said brightly. “You gave us all quite a fright. How do you feel?” Her voice was soft and musical and carried the clipped vowels that you had come to associate with the tree nymphs.

“Sore,” you said truthfully, “and a little freaked out.”

She moved to stand at your bedside and briskly began checking your pulse, your skin, your throat.

“But none of the terror from before?” she asked as she peeled back one of your eyelids and peered intently into your eye with a penlight. You noticed that her eyes were green, but not the same green that you were used to. Your green eyes were the color of lush, sprawling leas. The eyes of this nymph were the deep green of oak leaves. You could smell the forest on her.

“No ma’am.”

The dryad straightened and scribbled something on her notepad. “Well, physically you seem all right. Circe will be pleased you’re awake.”

“Is my friend okay?” you asked.

“You mean that beefy leprechaun?”

You flushed and nodded.

“He’s fine,” she said dismissively. “Worried himself sick over you and Circe had to bar him from the infirmary just so he would get out of our way.” She shook her head. “He refused to let you out of his sight.”

You chewed on your lip. “Can I see him?”

She shook her head. “Not until Circe has had a chance to speak with you.”

You stared down as your hands, folded together in your lap, and deflated a little. “Oh.” Your voice was small.

Your nurse looked at you pityingly. “We’ve been given instructions not to tell him you’re awake.”

Her gaze was sandpaper against your skin.

“Okay.” Even to your own ears, your voice was hollow. “Could you get her?”

“I’ll let her know you’re awake, but she’s busy on the other side of the island. It may be a little bit.”

You laid back and stared at the canvas ceiling. Your eyes traced the curls of smoke that drifted from the golden thuribles. Couldn’t catch a fucking break. You were beginning to get angry, but it was the sort of anger that had no outlet. Anger that could direct itself at no one and so reflected inwards.

No. That wasn’t right. There was someone. The old man.

Your life had never exactly been easier for him being in it, but the recent string of bullshit you’d had to survive was almost entirely his fault. That one-eyed cunt.

“Okay,” you said again.

She nodded and left the tent, leaving you feeling small and alone.

After what felt like an eternity but likely was no more than an hour or two, Circe appeared.

“Hello child,” she greeted you, calm and unbothered.

You swallowed. “Teacher.”

She sat at the edge of your bed and presented you with a cup of the same malodorous tonic she had tried to give you before.

“It’s not poison,” she said, sensing your trepidation. “It’s not a hallucinogenic, either. It’s only some herbs meant to help you relax.”

Still not entirely convinced, you knocked it back all the same, your eyes watering at the taste. You coughed. “Christ, that’s foul.” But the witch hadn’t lied. As soon as it passed your lips, a soothing warmth spread through your limbs to the ends of your fingers and toes. You could feel your muscles relax as all of the tension and stress you had been carrying melted away, leaving you feeling lighter than you had in ages. You sighed.

“Better?” Circe asked.

You nodded. “How long was I out?”

“Almost two days. Your leprechaun has been insufferable.

You managed a weak smile. “Sounds like him.”

“Mhm.” Circe regarded you carefully. “What happened?” Her voice was soft and it made you want to throw something.

“You don’t need to speak to me like I’m made of spun glass,” you snapped. “I’m not going to fall apart just because someone used the wrong tone.”

“You tried to kill me and your friend because I gave you a tonic that smelled bad,” she said cooly. “I apologize if I attempt to be cautious.”

You said nothing.

“What happened?” she asked again.

You spread your hands in front of you, palms up, helplessly. “Do you really need to ask?”

A shadow crossed her face. “I’d hoped we were wrong,” she said heavily. “He shouldn’t have been able to find you here. I’ll need to reinforce the wards and I’ll see if I can’t add something to your defenses.

A horrible thought occurred to you. “Did I hurt anyone?”

Circe sighed. “Your knife caught that boy in the arm and he needed stitches, but aside from that, no,” came the reply.

You pressed the heels of your palms into your eyes.

She placed a hand on your knee. “It’s all right, child. He’ll heal. As for yourself,” she stood and circled the bed so that she was standing behind you, “there’s some things that need to be figured out.” She took your head between her cool hands, her slender fingers at your temples and just beneath the place where your jaw met your ears. She applied the smallest amount of pressure and you could sense her magic reaching out, trying to connect with yours.

The witch made a noise of frustration. “There’s a wall,” she murmured, more to herself than you. “Someone’s put up powerful wards, but if I prod it just right, I may be able to—“ Her fingers flexed and you could feel her poke at a place in your mind that you hadn’t even known existed. The moment she touched it, you pitched forward and vomited over the side of the bed and all over the polished stone floor.

“Oh dear.” Circe gently patted your back as your body heaved like it was trying to expel your stomach. After a few moments it passed and you looked at her with bloodshot eyes. You had never seen her look so concerned.

Sweeney chose that moment to burst in, looking panicked. His eyes widened when he saw you, but before he could do anything stupid, one of the dryad nurses shoved him back outside.

Circe beckoned the nurse, who approached with a crystalline glass of water that smelled faintly of mint and soothed the burning in your throat and calmed your stomach as you sipped it carefully.

“What the hell was that?” you managed to rasp once the glass was empty.

Circe furrowed her dark brows, her bright golden eyes distant. “A memory spell,” she said slowly, as though she was testing how the idea sounded out loud. “A powerful one.”

You blinked. “Can you undo it?”

She prodded again at the same spot, more gently this time but still enough to make a wave of nausea sweep over you, making you groan.

“I think the only one that can is the one who cast it,” came the reply. “The failsafes on this…I’ve never seen work like this. Someone really didn’t want you to remember whatever it was that they shut away.” She stood to face you and took your face in her hands, her narrow golden gaze examining you intently. “You don’t remember anything from before Wednesday?”

You shook your head. “I was actually hoping you might. Somehow. He sent me here after he found me, I thought maybe…” you trailed off and your shoulders slumped, the weight of your exhaustion returning. “I don’t know. I don’t know what I was thinking.” This was never going to work. If Circe couldn’t give you what you needed, if an ancient sorceress like her didn’t know, what hope did you have?

Circe gave a quick command in Greek and the nurse that had brought you the mint water left, reappearing momentarily with Sweeney in tow. His right forearm was wrapped in crisp white linen, but you could already see he was beginning to bleed through it. Your chest constricted painfully. You had done that to him. He looked at Circe expectantly.

“Well?”

“You might want to try manners sometime,” she said drily. “You’d be amazed at what it can do for you.”

Sweeney made a face and you shot him a warning glance.

Circe pretended not to notice. “What is up in your mind is a barrier of sorts,” she told you. “It’s nothing like anything I’ve ever seen, but parts of the casting feel familiar.” You waited, but she did not elaborate. “There’s someone who may be able to help where I cannot.” Her eyes flicked too Sweeney and then back to you. “Do you know the Morrigan?”

You didn’t need to look at Sweeney to know that he was giving a good run for the world record for “most smug grin.”

“If you say anything, I swear I will let her turn you into a pig and I will leave you here,” you snapped.

Circe raised an eyebrow. “I see you’ve already discussed that option, then,” she observed. “May I ask why you chose my island instead?”

You looked at the floor. “I felt better about someone I knew digging around in my skull.”

Circe hummed. “Well, touching as that is, whatever is going on is much more akin to their particular branch of magic. They will be better equipped to give you what you need.”

Circe saw the two of you down to the docks and watched as you boarded the small boat that had brought you to the island.

“Remember,” she told you, “see the sisters in Maine. Use your magic as little as possible until you get to them, otherwise you’ll as good as tell him where you are.”

You nodded and she patted your cheek. “Sweeney,” she called over your shoulder. “Do try to get them there in one piece.”

He snorted but stayed silent, to your immense relief.

. . .

She watched from the shore as the boat disappeared beyond the horizon and the island’s wards. Her old wolf sat beside her in the sand.

“Why didn’t you tell them?” the wolf asked. Her voice was low and rumbling. Circe imagined she could see the grains of sand dance whenever the wolf spoke.

The witch buried her hand in the thick fur along the scruff of her friend’s neck. “I couldn’t,” she said softly. “It wouldn’t have helped even if I could. They wouldn’t understand.”

“You can’t know—“

“You misunderstand me,” Circe said sharply. “The wards in their mind…any attempt to tell them anything would have been distorted. I physically cannot.”

The wolf’s yellow eyes scrutinized her mistress before turning her gaze back to the water. “What will happen to them?”

Circe shook her head. “Would that I knew. I can only hope they get there in the end. We will need them for what’s to come.”