Make Your Move Katherine

The grimoire’s revelation

Oscar

Oscar opens his eyes and groans when the heat from the enclosed room surrounded them. He stares up at the still ceiling fan above him to his right and twists his head to look at the woman on his left, asleep on his arm. He calls out to her, nudging his arm as he does so.

Familiar and most importantly, no alarm bells were going off in his head. He took no great importance in where they were at first, “Kat?” he calls out getting no response but feeling the warmth illuminating from her he relaxes a bit trying to gather his thoughts about what just happened.

“Katherine,” he calls again shaking her vigorously this time. Her body so still that it was alarming- had he not heard her pulse or her rushing blood he would have thought otherwise. She had brought them to her condo. She is in distress he knows and this is her safe place it seems. His wife had not needed a spell to cut through the air. She just had to think it. It must be the change her body was undergoing- the phoenix power. Katherine was more powerful and skilled than anyone anticipated. The bird will never leave her now, he could feel the merge within her. Why has it overtaken its vessel?

The firebird was supposed to become one with his vampire- it was what they had been working on. The only way for him to survive centuries upon centuries was with its power. Now he was fated to live maybe a few hundred years alone.

He is mad.

He waits a full minute, lying back on the floor staring at the fan again before he calls out to her again. Raising his head, he glances over at her face which is faced on the other side of the room. She seemed to be in a trance of some sort for her body was limp- beyond the regular sleep motionless pile of body. As if she was floating somewhat for her body seemed lighter.

All his work down the drain. Why had the bird chosen her? A weakling? He had felt the connection within himself- Katherine sucked in a sharp breath and called out to him. He looked down at her surprised. It was the bird obviously but he caught himself looking at her lips nevertheless.

He could just make out her pearly whites between the slightly parted lips. He feels the stirring beneath his waist and hisses out loud. The incantation was wearing out again. Has it been twelve hours since he last took it?

See, this incantation was tricky- one could not just have the words spoken to them as it could, erm, destroy some functions, Ju had warned. He could only have it recited to him when the ‘adult urges’ took place, which on average is every twelve hours he had come to learn.

He made to move away from her but her fingers came up and gripped his shirt front. “Where are you?” she whimpers.“This is my grandmother’s grimoire,” Ju said as she turned another page of the ancient-looking, musky smelling, ginormous book.

The book of spells even smelled like its appearance- dusty. He had seen it many times before, its huge lock always open. He didn’t know if it was because Ju trusted him and Eric or if it was because she’d lost the actual lock. Oscar knew it was some family heirloom already. Just as he knew it was her grandmother’s and not her mother’s before she mentioned it just now. He and his mage were that close. But he waited patiently for her to go on for he could tell she was just using it as an opening.

Folding his arms, feeling the chilly air waiting impatiently for her to get back to what she wanted to say. Katherine was safely asleep in her room here, back at the castle. He couldn’t believe how easy it had been to convince her while she was unconscious.

When she had called to him, he had kissed her and simply whispered, “Kat, let’s go to bed.” In two seconds, they were back inside her room at the castle. Leaving her after ensuring a maid was with her, he instructed another maid then ran straight to Ju to share the news. But was as if she expected him here, for she swiveled around not surprised when he walked in.

“That page there,” she points to the page she had left open. He walks over to the huge counter and glanced at it. He did not understand most of it.

“I can’t make two cents of it- wait…is it in different languages?” he stated the obvious.

“Ah, yes. So, you see? The witches are very clever, aren’t they?” Ju chuckles dryly and taps her chin with her finger. “Let me read what I know and you translate what you know okay?”

Ju knew Hindi. He translates the Latin and Arabic text and frowns. They did not make sense even when they wrote it down as most of the untranslated words remained in a language, they both did not know. Nor did it seem familiar to them.

It started with, ‘Immortal God, then strange writings then ‘through fog and rain, sunshine-’ the writing then ‘moon meets the sun-’ the strange language filled the rest of the page until the very middle, in Arabic- ‘Our power combined against the demon God,’ with one line in Latin, ‘Our sacrifice, accept our offering-’ then ‘give us the power to rid the earth of this beast…’ and two words of English then to the very end, followed with ‘-rest place forever.’ It was very peculiar as to why this particular page was inscribed in such a way that it was difficult to translate. As if the spell was meant for only a single person to know what they wrote. Oscar and her both frowned at the Chinese symbols. He knew she expected him to know it but he did not. He was fluent, yes but not all he understood and he mostly spoke it not write it.

“Take this sacrifice Immortal God- through any weather, I’m guessing,” Oscar says and Ju agrees, “Something to do with the night? Maybe under a full moon as it states moon meets the sun.” Ju nods again. “Then they did a linking spell of some kind to strengthen them and they want to kill a beast of some sort. They slaughtered an animal or some- may be a human as a sacrifice to appease this said God, for they were savages back then- sorry,” he adds for the ‘they’ he had referred to is her forefathers. The witches.

The mage shrugs and unfolds her arms waiting for him. “This blood and obviously it’s death to the end,” he finishes and he backs away from the counter waiting.

“Huh. You don’t see it?”

“See what?” he queries and steps back to the book and scanned the words again.

“The drawing?”

“What- ah, yes.” He frowns when he took note of the fading grey scrawls on the very bottom of the page. Truthfully, he had thought it was a stain of some sort- books tend to get them.

“Look at the front cover now,” she instructed and he did. “The infinity,” she went on saying staring into thin air before she starts pacing.

Yes, he is familiar with the symbol. It's -on his sword. Oscar frowns. Why is the symbol on his sword adoring the cover of her grimoire?

“It’s an amuletum,” she says and pauses looking at him. “A protection spell was placed on it.”

‘An amulet? On the book? What?’

“I saw it on the queen,” she says and his frown deepens. He never saw Katherine wearing any chain or jewelry that held any ornament and he had been looking at her even when she did not know. It definitely was not in her room either- unless Ju meant in her own condo. He thought for a few seconds- his mind wandered to her place- nope, nothing was there either. Ah- a painting perhaps? She was always painting. Maybe she is unaware of the symbol and drew it somewhere. He had to find it.

“A few days ago, I did an incantation spell and the queen had it on her flesh,” the mage carried on with her pacing and even scratched her scalp.

No, he had seen every inch of Katherine naked. Oh, her words took effect then- a spell which meant it was hidden- on her flesh. He did not even question her as to why she had been doing a spell on his wife.

“That symbol is on her. God will safeguard you from them, it says in Arabic. I think it was placed there by your father’s mage.”

Delun? The missing mage?

“I think he was protecting her long before any of us knew. I was thinking maybe he’s not missing and was with her all along, in hiding. But I could be wrong and maybe he had it done before he went missing but I can be wrong there too,” she mumbled. “What if when the kingdom was attacked years ago, Delun took her and disappeared to keep her from,” she paused looking up at him, “you perhaps. Or the former king.”

Oscar could feel his heartbeats- so still and silent he was, listening to her words. Vital words.

“I think your father might- know what is going on- maybe he has something to do with it…I might be wrong. I don’t know. We have to find the mage.”

“How do you know what it says?” he queried.

“Huh?” she looks up, adjusting her glasses.

“You said it’s in Arabic. You don’t know that language,” Oscar is curious. Was it that she had been learning it?

“I ugh- that is,” she stares into the thin air again. “I have a helper.”

Ah, she has hired help. Eric. He had no idea the man knew the language.

“She’s maybe my ancestor? I don’t know for she does not talk much. A- ugh, a familiar.”