by E L Wilder
She looked back to the road, but it was empty.
The figure had fled.
A few moments later she heard shouting, a familiar voice yelling in panic, and she saw her mother running, scarfs trailing in the wind and jewelry jangling and bouncing as she ran up the South Way, one hand outstretched and shouting Hazel’s name.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The way the light filtered through the trees made the Postern look like it was suspended under water. Hazel flexed her toes and her fingers, feeling the moss, cool and damp, between each digit. She stared through the oily veil stretched inside the archway, trying to catch glimpses of the other side.
She had come here for two days now and done just this—sitting and staring and waiting. But nobody had come. No Clancy. No magical beings to offer her tutelage. And no Alex.
Three things she desperately needed at that moment.
After the attack, Hazel, Tyler, and Charlie had been rushed to the ER in the back of an ambulance. She and Tyler had sat on the side benches, but Charlie had ridden on a stretcher, still fading in and out of consciousness as the paramedics attended to her. Hazel and Tyler received stitches, but Charlie had been banged up pretty badly—a head laceration, broken ribs, a broken clavicle, and contusions. Now both Charlie and Tyler were convalescing at their respective parents’ houses.
Alex had disappeared. Like a true warlock, he had vanished, leaving behind only dead trees at the site of the attack. They’d found Ronnie puttering around the dairy barn, trolling for magical interlopers and complaining about joint pain, though otherwise unscathed. When questioned about his encounter with Alex at the sheep barn that morning, Ronnie had said they’d argued about a backlog of pay and Alex had left in a huff. And that had been that. When they’d told him that the sheep barn had collapsed, he’d said only, “Great. One more thing to fix around here.”
Everyone had written Alex off as a loss at that point. He was long gone by then, they’d concluded. Hazel refused to let it go so easily, and she could think of no better stakeout spot than the Postern. A foreigner with a hard-to-place accent. A warlock with a secret agenda. Of course he had probably come this way. So she waited.
“I thought I’d find you here.”
Hazel startled, but she settled back down when she saw it was only her mother, entering the clearing like a sylph, her peasant skirt flowing around her like a veil of fog.
“Sorry,” her mother said. “I didn’t mean to sneak up on you like that.” Hazel believed her. Her mother had always been one with nature, moving through it like she had been born there, like she belonged there just as much as every tree, bird, and critter that called it home. That was the eternal hippie in her mother—the flower child that had never grown up.
“It’s not safe coming here,” said Hazel.
“Really? I’ve never found it dangerous.” Her mother smiled and shrugged off her backpack. “Though you should really wear long pants out here. The ticks are a real problem.”
“So I’ve heard. You should follow your own advice.”
“The ticks don’t like me. They know better.” She gathered her skirt above her knees, settling on the moss next to Hazel, and stretching out her legs. “Not that I could ever convince you to dress appropriately. Every morning you’d get up, put on your fanciest dress, and then go play in the woods. You were always my weird one. You were my Indiana Jones in a floral dress.” Her mother chuckled. “What are we waiting for?”
“Him.”
“Perfect,” said her mother. “I know all about waiting for hims. Even though it was forbidden, I used to come here as a young woman, too. And wait and wait and wait . . .”
Her mother never talked about Hazel and Juniper’s father. He had never been in the picture. Hazel wanted to ask questions, but she sensed now was the time to be silent and listen.
“I was born without the mark,” her mother began. “I was painfully aware of that from a very young age, and I spent a lot of time as a young girl hoping—convincing myself—that it was just a fluke. That I would be the first unmarked Bennett woman to get the Knack. A lot of good that did. I was so desperate to defy my fate that I stole Gammy’s book. The book.”
Hazel sat up and turned to her mother, eyes wide. “You what?!”
“It was the summer I was living on the South Bluff in a little shack playing coven with a bunch of other Knackless sods. And I trusted somebody I shouldn’t have. Maybe several somebodies. I paid the price with the Book of Bennett.”
“What did Gammy say?”
“Nothing. She was quiet. I’d never known your grandmother to stop talking—ever—but, for that one, she didn’t talk to me for a year.”
“A year?!”
“Considering what I’d done, it was a lenient punishment.” Her mother stopped and sat up, reaching for her backpack and carefully opening it. “Which is why I never told her about this.”
Her mother pulled out a book. It was smallish, leather-bound, with a rawhide cord tied around it. She gripped it tightly and gazed upon it, her lips pursed. When she looked up, her eyes were rimmed with tears. “She would have killed me.”
“What is this?”
“The Book of Amy. This was the final act of my teenage rebellion. A spellbook all my own. Most of it’s garbage, or at least the parts I wrote myself. But the parts I copied . . .”
“Copied from what?”
“Straight from the Book of Bennett. My finest act of plagiarism. I knew your Gammy would discover the theft at some point, and I’d have to return the book. So I copied the pages that caught my fancy.”
“And you didn’t tell Gammy about this?”
“No!” she said, laughing. “I was afraid if I told her about making copies, she would stop talking to me forever.” She shook her head. “I wouldn’t have been able to bear that, more than I couldn’t bear being quaint. It was wrong to steal the book. And it was worse to copy things from it. And it would have been worst of all not to let you have it. I was going to give it to you when you came into your Knack, but then you left. When you returned, when I saw what you could do—it scared me. There’s something inside you that’s powerful, Hazel. That your Gammy, that my Gammy, never had. I kept the book from you because I thought I would be protecting you. But that was wrong. This is your birthright. Or what’s left of it.”
She handed the book to Hazel.
Hazel felt reverent just holding it.
“Open it,” her mother whispered.
Hazel complied, gently untying the rawhide and flipping to the first page. The book was more than just spells. It was partly plagiarism, but also partly her mother’s journal, her own musings on magic and her own attempts at spellcasting. There were sketches of animals and creatures, some of them clearly not of this world.
“Are these real spells?” she asked.
“Before you get too excited, you should know it’s hardly a definitive copy. Its contents reflect the sensibilities of a naïve young woman. And probably the spelling habits of one too . . . be careful with it.”
Hazel tried to hand the book back. “I can’t,” she said. “I tried to cut Charlie out of the investigation because it was getting dangerous, but then I let her back in. And Tyler. I almost got them killed. You were right before to say this was dangerous. I’m not ready.”
“No,” said her mother, pushing the book back toward Hazel. “You saved them with your abilities.”
“By accident!” Hazel scoffed. Hazel had seen Yota afterward, the crushed tin can that had once been Tyler’s prized pickup. Its front end was crumpled, the bed nearly pulverized by whatever spell Alex had cast. All she had managed to do was to turn a windshield into a projectile. “I have no idea what I’m doing. It could have just as easily not worked.”
“But it did.”
“And I broke Gammy’s hairpin!” she exclaimed. “I’m not sure I can cast without it. I’ve made a mess of everything. Of helping Juniper. Of living my life. I had what everyone dreams of having . . . and
I blew it all up.”
“Helena Rose and Hazel Bennett are not the same girl,” her mother said.
Wasn’t that the truth.
“Everything was so much easier before Helena Rose.”
“Of course it was easier,” said her mother. “You were a child.”
“But I used to see every roadblock as a challenge. Every no was just a yes in need of finessing. I was fearless.”
“So what?” asked her mother. “You’re not as reckless as you used to be. That’s not called losing yourself, Hazel. That’s called growing up. We can always learn lessons from our younger selves, sure. But is it possible that you’re just wiser than you used to be? What you take as cowardice could just be caution and what you take as indecision could just be wisdom.”
“I just feel powerless,” she said. “I wish I had a better plan. Any plan.”
“When have you ever needed a plan? You ran away from home at the age of eighteen and somehow parlayed that into international stardom.”
“At some point I lost my confidence.” Or had forgotten how to be the headstrong girl she used to be. Perhaps that was the inevitable result of living a celebrity lifestyle, of having every aspect of her life micromanaged and scheduled—people that did her shopping, that managed her finances, that lined up work opportunities, told her where to go, where to stand, what to say.
Her mother put an arm around her and pulled her close. “I used to want to be a killer feminist, a daughter of nature, a disciple of the moon. A witch—that one I wanted so badly—but I’m just not any of those things. What I am is a mother of a goddess. Use that book well, my Hazel. You have the knack for it.” She planted a kiss on Hazel’s forehead, picked herself up, smoothed her skirt, and disappeared into the forest silently.
Hazel marveled at the book in her hands. She started skimming its contents, finding spells with titles like “For to cast out the darkness with light” and “For the making of a broom into a vehicle of personal conveyance.” Others sounded less antiquated, spells with terse titles like “Cleanse” and “Camouflage.”
Clancy had said she was unprepared to go through the Postern. Her mother had just handed her the loophole in her Catch-22.
She needed to gather some supplies and find Clancy. They had a killer to catch.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
It was almost evening before she bounded up the front steps of the caretaker’s cottage and knocked on the front door. A few minutes later the door swung open and Ronnie appeared, grumbling. “Yeah?” he barked.
“Good evening, Ronnie,” she said, injecting enough sweetness into her voice to soften his demeanor but not so much that she made him sick. It was a delicate balancing act with him. It was common knowledge that Ronnie rarely left his cottage after dinner, so dragging him to the Carriage House was going to require a labor worthy of Hercules.
“What do ya want? Every time you show up, there’s more trouble.”
“I need to get into the Carriage House,” she said.
“Need?”
“I’m more than happy to let myself in if you just want to loan me the key,” she said, pleading more than a little.
He grumbled. “Like I said, the keys are mine.” He disappeared inside for a moment. She was just thinking he might not be coming back when he reappeared, fastening his tool belt. He led the way, silent save for the keys rattling against his tool belt and the rising chirp of crickets in the bushes. He kept his head bowed, oblivious to the sun dipping behind the Adirondacks, soaking the lake water red.
Had Ronnie and Clancy ever met? The idea that they would get along seemed a touch absurd. Though she’d have to worry about that if and when she found Clancy because it was clear that Ronnie was sticking by her side.
Ronnie unlocked and opened the Carriage House door, but rather than retreating like last time, he escorted her inside.
“Really, Ronnie,” she said. “I appreciate the concern, but I’m fine from here.”
He just snorted, like he needed a tissue, and stared at her.
“Right,” she said. “Or we could stick together. These old buildings can get a bit creepy.”
As she stepped into the darkened interior, she was grateful to have somebody by her side, even if it was just a grumpy old man. If nothing else, his presence made Gammy seem that much closer.
“You don’t happen to have a flashlight, do you?” she asked.
He pawed at his tool belt but came up empty, much to his dismay.
“Nope,” he said, sighing. “I seem to have misplaced it.”
Shoot. She was hoping to keep a low profile, but then part of her was excited to take one of these new spells for a walk. She had practiced this one at the house while gathering supplies.
She made a flourish, squeezing her hand into a fist, and then snapped her fingers. A small ball of light appeared, hovering above her fingertips. She plucked it from the air and examined it. The light was dim at best and it flickered and sputtered as she rolled it around her palm like a marble. She needed a new focus. Again she pined for Gammy’s broken hairpin.
She looked to Ronnie to gauge his reaction, but he was as unimpressed as ever.
“Helena used to do that,” he said. “And then some.”
“You’re looking at my best trick, Ronnie. I’m no Gammy.”
He nodded slowly, and for a moment she saw something in his eyes that was part relief, part amusement. But he said nothing, and just waved her on into the barn.
She moved slowly, silently—it always seemed wrong to yell in dark, vast places. She hoped that Clancy would have already heard and might come to investigate. But from what she knew of him so far, he was just as likely to do the opposite and hide if only to spite her. She made her way toward the grand carriage, where she had first seen Clancy. Perhaps that was his wing, the place where he took those epic naps he had mentioned.
They were passing a string of doors in search of Clancy when she saw a dim light sluicing out from underneath one of them. She stopped, and Ronnie nearly ran into her.
“What are ya doin’?” he grumbled.
She pointed to the door. He stiffened, his hand going to the hammer on his belt.
This was the door that she and Tyler had found before, the one that had been stuck shut. Could this be where Clancy had set up his abode? She almost shouted out to him, but something stopped her. This whole situation seemed off. Why would Clancy need a light in the first place? Perhaps Alex hadn’t gone very far at all. She tried the door but again found it jammed.
“Don’t break it now,” growled Ronnie.
He moved forward and tried the door himself, only to be met with the same resistance. He grumbled unintelligibly.
“Wait here,” she said to him.
“Where are ya goin’?” he asked, suspicious as usual.
“I’ll get in another way,” she replied. “Here.” She handed him the ball of light and quickly conjured up another. She hurried off before he could protest. She went back outside, exited the courtyard, and made her way around the outside of the barn, where the Tanglewood grew right up to the walls. She picked her way through the underbrush until she came to the back of the barn, where a long string of arched windows was set, each dark, except for a single one that glowed a sickly yellow.
She doused her light as a cautionary measure, squeezing it and then blowing into the funnel of her fist. When she uncurled her fingers, the light was gone. She chuckled that it had actually worked.
She snuck to the window and peeked inside. The room was filled with ancient horse tack and harnesses, bits and bridles, saddles and stirrups, all hanging on hooks and laid across racks. Much of the room, in particular the source of the yellow light, was not visible through the narrow window.
She crouched there and waited in silence, listening for anything but hearing only the sounds of the night creatures, the crickets and peepers, the distant bone-chilling hoot of an owl. But nothing from inside.
When she was satisfied that the coast
was clear, she reached up to the window. Somebody had wedged a stick under the sash, and she was able to slide her fingers in and open it. She hoisted herself into the window and pulled herself into a crouching position. Clancy would be proud.
She scanned the room and found it empty. Satisfied, she hopped to the floor. She could see why the door had been stuck. Somebody had wedged a saddle rack up against it. She crossed the room and dragged the rack back far enough to get the door open. Ronnie waited on the other side, the ball of light pinched between his fingers and looking thoroughly unimpressed.
“What took ya?”
“Technical difficulties.”
“Mmmhmm.”
He handed the light to her.
“Did ya find what ya were lookin’ for?” he asked.
She turned back to the room. The source of the light was coming from the far corner, just behind some crates and a stack of folded horse blankets. When she rounded the other side, she encountered a lantern lit not by a flame but instead a small orb of light, much like the one she carried, but brighter.
A few horse blankets had been worked into a temporary bed, right next to some canvas bags and a few cardboard boxes, a stack of paperback novels, and a pile of rumpled clothing. A makeshift larder sat nearby, consisting of a few bags of food and jugs of water.
“Somebody has just been here.”
“Always the brightest of the Bennett bulbs.”
She needed both her hands for this, so she held the ball of light just above the bag, then let go of it. It hung in place, bobbing gently like a lily pad floating in water. She smiled, quite pleased with herself, and set to work rifling through the bags.
She hoped she might turn up a wallet or some kind of identification—but she might as well have hoped for a signed affidavit admitting guilt in Eric Moore’s death. Instead, she found a small metal case engraved with a delicate rose pattern and the initials HRB.
