Gathering Deep by Lisa Maxwell

three-legged stool close to the bed where he lay and rested his palm in the skirts that covered my lap. I already had everything I needed, but still I hesitated.
    â€œNo ,” I thought wildly.
    No more hesitation. No more second thoughts. I knew what needed done, and I would do it. I would keep him safe.
    I took the knife I’d prepared and carefully shaved a bit of his hair from his temple and added it to the lock of my own hair that I’d already cut, binding them together with a few drops of red candle wax. Always red for power.
    Then I took a bit of sewing thread and pierced the clump of wax as I murmured the words that would bind him to me. The man shifted in his sleep as I finished the incantation, but I ignored him. Working more quickly now, I fastened the clump of wax to the small figure I’d carved from one of the great oaks on the neighboring property. I’d selected the largest of the trees for its constancy and power.
    When I was finished, I looked at my handiwork for a moment, sensing the warmth that built in my palm where the charm rested. Magic like this should have been more than enough to bind most, but he wasn’t like most. He had a strength and a power to him that everyone could sense—the others, who made way when he passed by. The slave driver, who’d never raised the whip to mar his back. Even his master, who refused to sell him, no matter the price offered.
    I knew well enough it would take something stronger than a simple binding to hold him safe when he was so determined to die for the sake of living. Not that he’d told me any specifics of what he was planning. But he didn’t have to, because I could smell it in the air, cutting through the smoke from the fires that boiled the cane. Disquiet and recklessness has its own particular perfume—sweet and thick smelling, with a little rot underneath. For weeks now, that scent had been thick in the fields, wafting through the cabins filled with uneasy bodies, and following Augustine everywhere he went.
    Before she’d walked off into the swamps and left me behind, my mother had whispered to me secrets that her mother had taught her. Secrets of blood and life, of power and magic so thick it could smother a person. My whole life I’d hidden away those secrets from the hateful eyes that looked at my skin like it was my fault. From those who saw her in my blood, like I had any choice.
    But I’d use those secrets now. I’d save him.
    Taking the bright blade of the knife, I made the smallest of incisions in his palm. He didn’t so much as stir this time, so I pressed the knife deeper, carving through the skin of his hand, following the strong, steady curve of his lifeline. As the blood welled, dark and shining in the flickering light, my mouth formed words that my tongue had never tasted. Words I hadn’t even realized I knew.
    When his palm was filled with the inky darkness of his own blood, I took the small figure and I placed it in the pooling blood. Dark rivulets ran over the edges of his cupped palm, staining the material of my skirt, but I didn’t waver. Ignoring my ruined dress, I twisted the little carved man until it was coated with Augustine’s lifeblood.
    My mouth kept on chanting those strange words until my throat went hoarse and the blood began to slow. Gently, I bound up the wound and placed his bandaged hand back on the bed. Only then did I allow myself to relax any, satisfied at the work I’d done.
    Only then did I allow myself the pleasure of pressing my lips to his.
    As I pulled back, the sleeping man’s eyelids flew open. But all I could see was the whites of his eyes.
    I jerked away from the carved doll and gasped as I came back to myself. I wasn’t wearing a long, roughly spun skirt but the same shorts I’d had on earlier. We weren’t in a fire-lit room but still in Dr. Aimes’s cluttered office.
    â€œDid you hear anything I just said?”