Once Blessed, Thrice Cursed: A Sister Witches Urban Fantasy #1

by Coralie Moss

The room went silent, but for the rain hitting the windows. I was vaguely aware of the looming presence of three big, somewhat antagonistic male Magicals. Mostly, I felt the connection between me, Beryl, and Alderose, soft threads of sisterhood mingling with clashing strands of our individual temperaments.

  “Maybe this is a good time to shift the focus to the day Rémy met with Moira,” Kostya said. “She brought you up here. Then what?”

  Rémy pointed to the desk in the corner. “We sat over there. She asked me detailed questions about my family, my past relationships, my work history, my death count, and I provided her with answers she deemed satisfactory. When she agreed to accept me as a client, I gave her a few strands of my hair and thirty-three thousand dollars. Cash.” He turned to me and added, “Your mother spoke of her pride in you and your upcoming graduation.”

  His words offered a small comfort. I clutched them to my heart.

  Kostya continued his questioning. “Do you recall anything else about the interview process?”

  “Moira paid meticulous attention to detail. She walked me through this room, had me choose fabrics and other bits and baubles that caught my eye. When we finished, she piled everything over there.” He pivoted on his heel, setting wisps of mist to spinning, and directed our attention to one of the rectangular tables. “She cut samples of my choices and added them to the envelope with my hair. I have no idea what she did with the envelope.”

  Beryl picked up the questioning. “Did my mother give you a receipt? And was there any mention of a delivery date?”

  The mage raised his eyebrows. “You really are as ignorant of her life’s work as you confessed, aren’t you? Moira guaranteed results within one year or she would refund my deposit—minus expenses. She provided a handwritten receipt then prepared tea from her samovar. We chatted about inconsequential things, and I left.”

  “If you hadn’t heard from Moira after the year was up, why didn’t you come back for your refund?”

  “I never said I did not come back,” he answered. “When the year passed and I had not heard from your mother, I returned. Another woman met me downstairs and explained that she was assisting Moira with her contracts and that they needed more time. She neglected to mention your mother was dead.”

  “And what did you do after that?”

  “I waited another year, and I continued to wait. I made Northampton a regular stop on my travels. I monitored the shop when I was in town, and when I saw the lights on in the second-floor windows two days ago, I decided I had waited long enough.”

  “Did you approach the building to see who was here?”

  Rémy shook his head. “I had business to attend to elsewhere, so I had to wait until this evening. Lucky for me you answered the front door, as the portal in the cellar is out of commission.”

  “There’s a portal in the cellar?” Alabastair asked, stepping closer to Rémy.

  “Yes, that’s what I said. I was only given access to it that one time.”

  “I happen to be a Portal Keeper.” The necromancer adjusted the cuffs of his formfitting sweater. “If the sisters are comfortable doing without me for a short while, I shall ascertain the location of the portal and test to see if it is in working order.”

  “First we have to figure out how to get into the cellar. I’ll go with you in case there are more doors that require the use of the ring.” Alderose stopped her pacing and turned her back to the mage. Waving Beryl and I close, she asked, “Are you okay with me leaving?”

  I darted a glance at Kostya. He seemed focused on Rémy. “I’m fine, Rosey. Kostya’s here.”

  “I need to get my charger, then I’ll be right back.” Beryl squeezed my waist and headed toward the door. She disappeared into the stairwell after Alderose and Alabastair.

  The moment the sounds of their voices and footsteps faded, Rémy strode to the door, closed it, and pressed his palm against the wood. Ice spread across the surface, filling in the gap between the door and the frame.

  “What are you doing?” Kostya asked. With a quick turn of his wrist, he’d released his whip. Agitated fingers tapped the grip.

  The water mage ignored Kostya, shrugged his shoulders, and shook out his arms, freeing the chains that adorned his jacket. Staring at me, he said, “I don’t think any of you realize how much is at stake.”

  “We’ll find your beloved,” I said, backing myself into the solid wall of Kostya’s fiery chest. “We just need time.”

  “I have no time to give.” Rémy stepped closer and grabbed the arm Kostya had wrapped around my chest. “For too long, I have bet borrowed time against a future I cannot fathom.”

  With those words, the chains hanging from the back of Rémy’s collar rushed forward and wrapped around Kostya’s neck, head, and legs. The demon sucked in a surprised breath as the chains released a spray of water, immobilizing him in a coating of ice within seconds. I slipped from my friend’s frigid grip, landed hard, and found no purchase on the film of ice coating the floor. Rémy crouched in front of me, grabbed me by the back of my neck, and lifted.

  A loud banging from the other side of the door interrupted him. “Clementine, are you there?” Beryl’s yell barely penetrated the insulating layer of ice. “The door’s frozen closed and—”

  “Beryl, run!”

  “Wrong thing to say, little witch.” Rémy threw his chains toward the workroom door while growling out a command. Enchanted metal penetrated the wood, ice cracked, and my sister’s frightened scream ended in a gurgle.

  “Don’t you dare hurt her,” I hissed. Pain blurred my vision. I fought against the need to close my eyes. The emotions scudding across Rémy’s face were telling a story at odds with his actions.

  “You have no idea the loss I have suffered because of my patience, because the witch your mother left in charge kept issuing false promises and dead ends, and because hope—my hope—is a self…renewing…resource.” He jerked my head back even harder as he enunciated each word, but I refused to cry out. “A resource that I ran out of five minutes after you opened the door.”

  A new set of story threads pushed aside the ones that had been twisting in the air behind Rémy’s head. These threads formed the outline of a seashell.

  I grabbed the lifeline they offered. “Did you lose a little girl?” I asked, referencing the pale, amorphous figure I had seen behind him when I first opened the door to the shop. Rémy circled my neck with his other hand and lifted me until I dangled in front of him. My knees and chest bumped against the icy expanse of his body.

  The mage’s eyes went wild. The emotion-whipped storm cascading over his features turned my joints to slush. “Find. My. Beloved,” he ground out, cracking the layer of frost creeping across his cheeks. “You have forty-eight hours before someone dies.”

  4

  Rémy deposited me at Kostya’s feet and strode to the door. He bashed the side of his fist against its ice-coated surface, sending cracks through the barrier. The door popped open from the weight of Beryl’s body. Rémy made a show of pulling in his chains and sweeping them in a circle, drawing every icy shard and chunk of evidence to him where it evaporated in an ozone-scented puff. Kostya hit the floor behind me. Rémy stepped over Beryl and clomped down the stairs.

  “Clementine,” Kostya choked out. “Are you okay?”

  I spun on my knees and cupped his cheek. “I’m okay. I’m okay. I need to check on Beryl.” My sister hadn’t moved or made a sound. I scrabbled to my feet, ran to the doorway, and rolled Beryl onto her side. Her eyes were open and she was blowing short, rapid breaths out of her mouth.

  “That was…weird, Clemmie.” She took another moment to return her breathing nearer to normal. “I have a whole new appreciation for what it feels like to have ice in your veins.”

  I rubbed her upper arm. “Can you move?”

  “Yeah, I think I can. But I think I better stay still until I’m more thawed out.”

  “I’ll wait with you,” I said, touching the side of my neck where a rin
g of burning cold throbbed. I could still feel the circle of Rémy’s hands.

  Beryl batted the air behind her until she found my leg. “That was the mage’s magic, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes. And I have no idea why he singled me out to deliver the message, but he’s given us a forty-eight hour deadline to find his beloved. Or someone dies. Those were his exact words.”

  My sister looked at me like I’d suddenly sprouted a second head. “How the hell are we going to find someone in forty-eight hours that our mother couldn’t find in a couple of months?”

  “I have no idea.” I extended my hand. Beryl waved me off. Shaking out my arms and legs, I turned to check on Kostya.

  He was on his back, knees bent. Low flames played along the nubbed surface of his horns. The muscles in his arms and upper chest tensed beneath his T-shirt when he threaded his fingers through his hair and shouted his frustration to the two domed skylights centered in the ceiling. “Fuck, that was the most frustrating moment of my life.”

  “I was terrified,” I admitted, touching my fingertips to the tender part of my neck. Kostya followed my hand, staring.

  “What’re you hiding?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” I said. “It just stings a little where Rémy squeezed me.”

  “Let me see, Clemmie.” Kostya rolled up to standing, nudged my fingers aside, then swore. “He marked you. The fucker marked you.”

  “What do you mean, he marked me?”

  “Did you see the liquid silver coils he wore on his first finger?” When I nodded, Kostya continued, “They have multiple uses. Branding. Tracking. Bonding.”

  “Are they moving?” I asked. I wanted to throw up. “Because it feels like it’s alive.”

  “Yeah,” Kostya said, his voice going almost apologetic. “They’re staying in one place, coiling over and over. And there’s nothing I can do about it. The good news is, it’s a spell that doesn’t burrow underneath the skin. The ones that do…” He blew out a low whistle.

  “Let’s not go there,” I said. “Just help me keep an eye on it, okay?”

  Beryl had been watching and listening from the floor. She sighed as she rolled onto her back. “I wish to Goddess Dad wasn’t always disappearing. He’s the one who taught me most of the basic spells I still use. He could probably fix that thing on your neck, Sissy. He could maybe even point us in the right direction.”

  “Well, Dad’s not here and I need to be pointed in some kind of a direction because Rémy freaked me out and if I think about him and those icy fingers and…and this—” I touched my throat again. I couldn’t stop myself. “Us getting to work will distract me. Tell me what to do.”

  Beryl grunted as she rolled to her hands and knees. “Okay, I think I have a plan. According to Rémy, we’re looking for envelopes with hair and bits of fabric and stuff in them. I’ll go through Mom’s desk and Clementine, you start with the table Rémy pointed to. Kostya, you’re tall. Take the shelves. Start at the top, open every roll of fabric, and work your way down.”

  “That’s it?” I asked. An unstoppable wave of hysteria was filling my body. “That’s the entirety of your plan? What about the part where we never have to see that mage again?”

  “Clementine Brodeur.” Beryl stood, brushed off her knees, and straightened the skirt of her dress. “For Pete’s sake, no, that’s not the whole plan. That’s the beginning of the plan. If Mom had left operating instructions, we’d be following those. She didn’t, so we have to start from scratch. Kostya, can you give me a hand here?”

  Beryl planted herself in front of me and held my elbows. Her wavy, chin-length hair was a mess, but her lipstick was miraculously intact. Kostya embraced me from behind. “Can you give her some heat?” she asked. The demon murmured his assent and within seconds I was flooded with warmth. Platonic, brotherly warmth.

  “We’re going to be patient.” Beryl made a show of slowing down her speech. “Patient and thorough. We’re going to go through every bolt of fabric, every drawer and box and envelope until we find a clue. And then we’re going to find more clues, and then we’re going to put them all together and find Rémy Ruisseau’s beloved. Got it?”

  “Got it,” I said, glad for Kostya’s solid presence and for my middle sister’s ability to calm my crazy. Beryl had a knack for quickly evaluating what needed doing, and then assigning tasks. I’d grown up resenting her bossy side, probably because she’d practiced on me incessantly when we were kids, right up until she entered junior high school and turned to bossing her gaggle of friends.

  She and Kostya peeled themselves away from the Clementine sandwich and started on their tasks. I went to the nearest worktable and rested my hands on its surface. I knew of witches and others who could read objects simply by touching them. I wasn’t one of those Magicals—not counting my ability to identify fibers, which I figured was a learned skill, not one I had been born with. I kept my eyes open for meandering threads, ignored the cool presence of the thing on my neck, and concentrated on the table.

  The polished wood was scratched, the edges nicked and dented. I trailed my fingers along the surface as I walked its circumference, counting two wide drawers on each side. Crouching, I scanned the wide shelf underneath. On it were two dozen or so oblong oak file boxes, the kind that might have housed oversized index cards. Each one had a hinged lid and a label tucked into a tarnished brass pull tab and label holder. I recognized my mother’s handwriting, but not the language.

  I turned my attention to the drawers. Inside the first one, scissors and cutters of all sizes and purposes were arrayed on dark brown velveteen. The next drawer held tools for measuring. On the other side of the table, one drawer was filled with delicate-looking needles—the kind used for stitching, embroidering, and other techniques. The last held trays of knitting needles, crochet hooks, and similar tools.

  I had some idea how to use most of what I was looking at, though I was impressed with the sheer quantity of items devoted to every imaginable mode of needlework. Glancing over my shoulder, the armless mannequins garbed in unfinished projects called for closer inspection. I’d make time for that once we had Rémy out of our hair.

  “Did Mom have any assistants?” I asked. How she managed to raise us and run the shop—which we knew about—and create custom garments and make love matches—which she kept secret—was baffling.

  Beryl looked up from the desk. “Not that she ever mentioned to me. I think Dad recruited Alderose to help him with his work, and Mom knew I’d be more of a liability than a help.”

  I pointed to the row of unfinished hats. “What about a milliner? Did she work with someone who made hats, or do you think she did all of this herself?”

  “I have no idea, Sissy. We really need to talk to Dad. Maybe Rosey can convince him to help.”

  I hmmed in agreement and returned my attention to the wooden boxes. Lifting the lid of the first one, I spotted a card filled with tight writing sitting atop a muslin-wrapped bundle. I lifted the bundle and placed it on the table, keeping the card close by. Around me, Kostya grunted with the effort it took to heave a roll of fabric off one of the shelves. Beryl was opening and closing the desk’s drawers and muttering under her breath.

  I followed suit, mouthing a silent prayer that whatever lay inside the bundle in front of me didn’t come equipped with sharp claws or a curse aimed at whomever did the unwrapping.

  Underneath the muslin was a layer of tissue paper. The parcel was secured at its middle with a narrow, sky-blue satin ribbon and finished with a bow. Finis was written in black ink on one of the ends of the ribbon. I tugged it loose, unfolded the crinkly paper, and examined the layers before venturing further. I wanted to put everything back, in order.

  Small squares of fabric were held together with a long hatpin topped by an oval drop of turquoise glass. Underneath was an unsealed envelope. Inside the envelope was a hank of light brown hair tied with another bit of ribbon and a tiny card. The name on the card was also written in my mother’s hand.

&nb
sp; There was more, including a twist of yarn, a vial of beads, a card wound with beading thread, and a special beading needle. All the items were shades of blues and browns. I also spotted a piece of paper, which I promptly unrolled. On it were front- and back-view drawings of a doll wearing a long dress. What caught my eye was the design on the dress’s back of an elaborate and detailed set of wings.

  I replaced everything inside the box as I had found it and lifted another box onto the tabletop. This one appeared to be unfinished. Its contents included an unadorned cloth doll made from the same muslin in which it had been wrapped. I put it back and set about moving the remaining boxes to the top of the table.

  A few of them held more plain muslin dolls and no embellishments, envelopes, or drawings, which I gathered meant they hadn’t been assigned. As I went through each box, I continued to hope that the contents of at least one would call to me, offering up story threads or—preferably—blindingly blatant clues.

  I found them in the tenth box. Inside was another wrapped figure, the first one I’d come across with embroidered facial features. What gave me pause were the tiny horns done in a raised, couching technique, complete with silver threads, to either side of its head.

  I studied the card included in the box. Something familiar about the writing nagged at me. I opened the drawers, found what I was looking for, and held the special mirror up to the words.

  My mother had simply written the client’s name and birthdate backward. This card read, “Laszlo b. 1 Aug.”

  Kostya had a brother named Laszlo.

  “Kostya? I found something,” I said, setting the box to one side of the table. “I think you’re going to want to see this.”

  “I found something too,” Beryl chimed in, waving a tall yet slender book and an expandable, envelope-sized file folder in the air. “A ledger and a paper trail. We might be able to use this to figure out just how many clients were left when Mom was—” Beryl stumbled over the rug as she hurried to share her discovery. “After Mom died. And where she kept the deposits and the final payments. If we can figure out how to read her writing.”