Distorted Affliction

Chapter Seven

The candlelight flickered, casting long shadows across the room as I focused my energy on the small bowl between my fingers. Inside it, sat the mixture I had concocted for the spell I had been working on, something to aid in the fertility journey that I had been struggling with for months. I willed the spirits to accept the offering inside, a variety of herbs mixed with my blood and the intentions I had been focusing on for days. I could feel the power in the air, though I could sense the reluctance of the spirits to grant me the thing I asked for.

"This is my offering to you," I repeated the words for what felt like the hundredth time in a low whisper, tainted with the frustration that was forming deep inside of my chest. "Quaeso exaudi orationem meam. Offero tibi sanguinem meum pro sanguine, benedic me in utero fecundo."

I could feel their energies flowing through me as I repeated my offer, again and again. I felt a desperation deep inside of me, knowing that this journey would be a complete failure without their help. I was beyond saving with medical help, and I knew the spirits were capable of doing the things science just wasn't capable of.

But I could sense that they didn't feel that this was a substantial sacrifice, that I was asking too much and offering too little. They wanted more from me, but I didn't have more to give. At least I believed that, but I could feel them pressuring me for more, hungry for the one thing that would be worth the thing I asked for. My bloodline held a power far greater than any that walked the earth, that was knowledge amongst the witches, both living and not. They wanted me to offer up that power as penance for what I was asking of them.

"Accipe virtutem meam oblationem, ut benedicas mihi facultate adhuc sanguinem meum. Please accept my magic, grant me what I ask." I repeated my words again and again, until I could feel them respond to my offering. They were pleased, willing to take my magic in return for the thing I wanted most in the world.

It seemed such a small price to pay, to be able to raise a child of my own in return for forfeiting my powers to the spirits. Something in the air shifted, the breath suddenly leaving my body all at once, and darkness fell upon the room as the spirits departed, taking the fire with them as they went. But nothing felt different, I could still feel the magic inside of me, and I sighed deeply, unsure of what had happened--

The sound of the car door shutting slammed me back into reality, and my eyes opened suddenly, assessing where the danger was coming from. Sunlight peeked through the early morning clouds outside, and I sat up in the passenger seat, searching for familiarity where there seemed to be none. Sin had stepped out of the car and disappeared almost instantly, and I rubbed my eyes, opening the passenger door slowly.

I didn't make a move to get out, though I did stretch my legs beyond the frame to touch the asphalt of the parking lot outside. I felt sluggish, exhausted, mildly confused, and irrationally irritated. Where the hell had he taken me, and where was he planning on going from here?

I couldn't help the feeling of frustration that consumed me, because I felt like I had reached a dead end before I was ever given the opportunity to discover the truth. If Lucas was gone, hiding someplace as I presumed he would be, then where did we go from there? What was the plan, to wander aimlessly until we either stumbled across him, or the danger that Lucas had implied was hot on our heels?

Part of me wanted to run, to take off in a full sprint away from Sin and everything that was weighing on me, as if that would somehow ease the tension inside of my chest. My mind seemed to be unraveling, my memories somehow split between what I remembered as the truth, and something else entirely. I didn't recall the night I had offered my magic to the spirits, but I had somehow unlocked the memory without trying, as if the web of distorted truths were unwinding slowly.