The attic grew cold. Shadows pooled in the corner like spilled ink. Then two yellow eyes opened in the dark.
“You read from the Magnum,” whispered a voice like rusted bells. “So you must pay.”
Clara rushed downstairs, already forgetting why she’d gone to the attic. She knew only that a book was open on the floor, and a child was crying—her child—though she could not recall his name.
She turned to the index: “To summon the Familiar Who Knows the Herbs of the Invisible Garden.” The ritual required a silver coin, a black rooster’s feather, and a drop of blood from the left hand. She followed each step in the flickering gaslight.
But Clara needed more than prayers. Her son lay feverish, and the doctors had given up.
