Clearing my throat, I said, “Show me what I seek.”
Tess’s grimoire flipped open and turned a few pages to the remembrance spell she had gotten from Joe Leatherneck.
“How does this one work?” I asked. It wasn’t a familiar spell and in fact I’d not let Tess use it while studying the tattoos I’d wanted her to burn in her flesh.
“Easy peasy. Just read the spell aloud and then read it a second time. The first time means that everything for the next minute or so will become unforgettable to you. The second time will let you memorize the spell with no effort. Then you speak it once, just before studying the tattoos you want to relearn.”
I pursed my lips. That was no way to do magic. It was too easy. Magic needed to be learned, to be mastered. Short cuts were not the way to learn.
I sighed again. It wasn’t as if I had much choice in the matter. I needed my tats back.
I set the book on the floor in front of me. “Okay, let’s mesh.”
I held out my hands and they each took one.
Tess and I meshed in seconds as we shared thoughts, auras, and emotions. For Cris to join in took a couple of minutes, but eventually she was there with us. Our breath and even our heartbeats synced. I felt their warmth, the emotions they each shared for me and I echoed them.
“Excellent,” I said. “First step, activate the circle.
As one, we applied power to the circle and a dome of energy snapped into place above us. Now safe from interference, we could get to work.
I read the remembrance spell once and fell a tingle as its power activated. I read it again and there was another snap of power. I realized that the spell had done more than let me remember it. It had made this moment in my life unforgettable. I would always be able to recall this moment in time, sitting here, meshed with the two women in my life. A hundred years from now, the memory would be as fresh as now. I would always recall the gaze of these two on my face, the slight movement of their hair in the ceiling fan’s breeze. The pressure of their knees against mine, the gentle rise and fall of their breasts as they breathed together and their feelings for me. This was a moment to treasure.
We released hands simultaneously as they realized my next step as soon as I did. They each raised a hand to help pull first my jacket and then my shirt from my shoulders. I rolled those items into a small pillow and picked up my grimoire while Tess returned hers to her jacket. They slid back to give me room and I stretched out prone between them.
Setting my grimoire in front of my face, I said, “Show me what I seek.”
The book flipped open to the enhanced senses tattoo I’d first burned before I turned twenty.
I recited the remembrance spell and felt the snap of power that announced its completion. Then I concentrated on the image in front of me. In less than a minute, I could almost feel the pattern being burned into my memory.
“This is too easy,” I said.
I felt the amusement sweep through both girls at my statement.
“Okay, now comes the fun part,” I said through gritted teeth.
Focusing on a spot on my lower back that I could see through both Tess and Cris’s eyes, I steeled myself. I gathered my power and pictured the tattoo being burned into my flesh again. Then I unleashed that energy.
Blinding, crippling pain shot through me and I knew it had been equally felt by both Tess and Cris. I held my focus for as long as I dared and then relaxed. The pain lessened in intensity. Sweat had beaded up on my forehead and run down into my eyes. My entire body was flush with heat and sweat.
I felt Tess activate her senses tat and suddenly I could see and feel at much higher levels.
“Gees, turn off that tattoo,” I said.
“Sorry, I didn’t think it would affect pain,” Tess said. “Rafe, did you mean for that to happen?”
“What happened?” But then I remembered what she’d seen in my back.
The last time and every earlier time I had burned a tattoo, I drew it like a line through my flesh, following the pattern through its twist and turns just as if I were casting the spell without a tattoo. This time I’d burned the entire tat at once. From what I’d seen, the lines were thinner and smaller in diameter than the original one, but it was intact. Now to see if it functioned.
My thinking about it was loud enough for both Cris and Tess to understand and realize that it hadn’t been my intention to burn the tat at once.
“I think the difference is that remembrance spell. I’ve always pictured a tattoo in the same way you would cast the spell if you didn’t have one. You start at the beginning of the spell’s pattern and weave it into your flesh just as if you were casting it. With the remembrance spell holding the pattern completely in my memory, without thinking about it, I just burned the entire thing at once.”
“Are they always that painful?” Cris asked.
I shook my head. “No, I want to thank you two for sharing that with me. I can’t imagine how bad it would have been if I’d done it without your assistance with the pain.”
“I should have thought to tell you, but I guess I’d forgot how it was the one time you weren’t around to stop me from using that spell to memorize another spell,” Tess said.
“When you burned that temblor spell. Is that what it was like?”
I
