His strong hands cupped her face, calloused fingers running through her auburn hair. Dawn would break soon, ending their time together, perhaps forever. The wrongness of the scene ground in Emmaline’s mind like the gears a seizing clock, strange and alien perspectives only half understood. Like tectonic plates, finally slipping to relieve ancient and unimaginable forces, she slid back into her own mind with a crash.  Emotional transference. It was always dangerous to touch the mind of another and that was doubly true with other practitioners. People weren’t as similar on the mental level as science and psychologists might have them believe. She blinked hard trying to clear her mind and focus on what Beth was sending her.
 
Carefully she stepped away from the car, the bruises and contusions on her back and ribs howled for attention. Adrenaline still coursed through her body and she worked to keep her mind walled off from the aches and pains of the body.
 
Rob and Jacob still fought with the monster, making quick, stinging attacks with their improvised weapons. Doubtless the pair were the only reason they hadn’t all been torn to bloody rags. In her attuned eyes she could see green and gold tendrils of magical energy trashing around the spirit like the tentacles of some deep sea horror. That was new; a few minutes ago they had been taut bands, binding the spirit to whatever purposes its summoners had imposed. As she watched she saw the tendrils bend, as though against their own will, towards Mandy. In a rush she grasped the meaning of the images Beth had sent her.
 
Reaching into her pocket she produced a sharpie permanent marker. With the familiar and comforting smell in her nostrils she began to write rapidly on the hood of the car, the only available surface appropriate to the task. With practiced skill she theorized the spell she would need, a series of integrals and mathematical transforms. Try as she could, she was unable to find a solution that was within her optimal parameters. Perhaps if she had time and leisure to rework the Fourier transform… but she had neither time, nor leisure. Licking her dry lips she focused on the numbers, she touched her thumb to a small sharp protrusion on one of her rings. A tiny drop of blood welled up and she took a deep breath. This would be bad.
 
With a quick thrust she smeared the drop of blood over the hood of the car in a diagonal slash, cutting through the hastily created calculations. The numbers spun in her head as the spell raced along its own internal logic. She felt it take hold, the randomly lashing tendrils of energy bent towards Amanda like grass bending in a gale. The girl would still have to master them but it should at least be possible. She felt the backlash almost immediately. All the negative probabilities she had foreclosed coalesced into a single malign energy. The Hex bloomed into being, seeking a place to land and balance the cosmic scales. She hoped they would all survive it.