by Sarra Cannon
“This house has been in your family for a long time?” I asked.
“Almost two centuries,” she said. “The Winter family has always held a prominent position in politics. My ancestors built this house here shortly after Washington D.C. became the nation’s capital.”
“It’s beautiful,” I said, noticing the gold and crystal chandeliers and artwork. It was easily the most luxurious house I’d ever been in.
Zara stopped in front of a set of double doors at the end of the hallway and knocked. The girl that answered looked so much like Zara, I had no doubt this was her sister. She was a fragile porcelain doll on the outside, but I knew that if she was anything like the other women in her family, she was also very smart and very powerful.
“Harper, this is my sister Honora. She is the second in line to take my mother’s place,” Zara said, introducing us. “Honora, this is Harper. She’s the Prima Futura I told you about from Georgia.”
“Zara has told me so much about you, Harper,” she said. Her voice was higher-pitched than Zara’s. “I’ve been so anxious to meet you. I know you both were expecting the Heritage Ritual to begin soon, but mother isn’t home yet. I’m not sure what’s keeping her, but it hopefully won’t be too much longer.”
“Will anyone from Peachville be here?”
“Mrs. Ashworth should be here any minute,” Zara said. “She’s bringing the Heritage Chalice.”
“Chalice?” I asked. “What’s that?”
“The Heritage Chalice is a special cup forged from silver from the shadow world,” Honora said. “Each demon gate has their own chalice with a stone embedded into it that is much like your necklace. The stone comes from the portal and contains a powerful connection to your demon. The Heritage ceremony itself is brief, but you will feel the effects of it for the rest of your life.”
I breathed in slowly, my heart racing. I knew it was wrong, but I was looking forward to having more power. I wanted to be able to defend myself and not get tired, but I knew that I was walking on thin ice.
Jackson once said that power was a dangerous drug.
He was right.
Plugged In
The room in the basement of the Winter’s home was small and silent. No one spoke as they entered. Zara told me the basement room was one of the earliest ritual rooms for witches in the United States and that it was a rare honor to be invited to participate in a ceremony there.
The second I crossed the threshold, I felt a kind of breathless energy take over my body. I had only been to church a handful of times in my life, but this felt similar to that experience. Sacred. Steeped in history and tradition.
The crowd that gathered to witness my Heritage Ritual was small, but familiar. Mrs. Ashworth and Mrs. King had both come through the Hall of Doorways early this morning. Zara, her two sisters, and her mother were all there. As a surprise, Caroline, Meredith, and Eloise Sullivan from Cypress were also there as witnesses.
“You’re like a daughter to me now,” Eloise had said with a bright smile.
It was good to see them again. Caroline gave me a huge hug. She was looking much better, and I was happy to see she was recovering from the attack. It also made me less nervous to have another young Prima Futura in the room. Meredith had gone through her Heritage Ritual just a year before me. “You’re going to love it,” she said. “It’s like being plugged in to a permanent power source.”
Chills ran up my spine as the stone door to the room slid closed. There was no turning back now.
The walls were draped with colorful tapestries that depicted witches casting spells. A pentagram was carved into the wood floor, five white candles set up, one at each point. Priestess Winter lifted her palm and formed a bright blue flame. She held it out in front of her and blew, as if blowing pixie dust into the air. The wicks each caught fire and burned the same bright blue.
“Harper Madison Brighton of Peachville, the spirits call you to the center of the star,” she said, her voice low and mysterious. The candlelight flickered across her face.
I crossed into the pentagram and stood in the very center. A tingle spread up my legs and through my chest, filling my body with awareness. I had to remind myself to breathe. As the ritual began, I felt almost as if I were standing outside of myself. The air was filled with electricity and promise.
Mrs. Ashworth handed the priestess a silver cup. For a moment, my heart skipped a beat. It looked identical to the one the crow witch had used when she tried to kill me. I could still see it in her wrinkled hands, her long, twisted nails clinking against the metal. This cup, however, had a blue stone embedded into the side that exactly matched the stone in my mother’s necklace.
I still didn’t completely understand the significance of the stones. Each demon gate had their own gemstone. Some were rubies. Others had diamonds or topaz or even pearls. Cypress’ gem was an emerald. When I’d asked about the purpose of each stone, I’d been given a vague answer about how finding the right stone for an area had to do with the terrain and the particular magical energy of a town. Something about that explanation didn’t ring true, though, but no one could give me a straight answer when I questioned it.
Like most things in the Order, it seemed to be a guarded secret.
All I knew was that, for whatever reason, Peachville’s chosen stone was a clear blue sapphire.
Priestess Winter held the silver chalice high in the air. The witches around me all began to chant in unison, and the sapphire stone on the side of the cup began to glow. My eyes locked on the stone, unable to look away.
Around my neck, I felt the stone on my necklace also begin to vibrate against my skin.
The priestess turned the chalice around three times in her hand, and when the stone came back around to face me the third time, a bright light shone out from it like a sunbeam. The light sought out the sapphire in my necklace and connected us with a visible thread of light.
A strange energy pulsed through me. I leaned my head back, letting the power flow into my chest and fill me.
“Vis Vires, power of the old ones, enter the body of this young Prima Futura,” the priestess said. “Guide her ways so that she may become worthy of her heritage.”
She held the chalice in her left hand, then reached into the pocket of her robe and pulled out a small vial of blue liquid. The neon glow of the vial made her face light up in the half-darkness.
“Vis Vires, power of the old ones, show her the way. Fill her with the power of those who have come before her.”
She poured the blue potion into the chalice. My heart beat faster and faster as my body began to tremble. I didn’t know what was in the potion, but for some reason, I ached for it. My mouth watered just thinking about it on my tongue. My own need for it scared me.
“Vis Vires, power of the old ones, judge her as worthy,” Priestess Winter said, letting go of the silver cup and letting it float in the air between us. “Harper Madison Brighton, the seventh Prima of the Brighton line of Peachville, embrace your heritage and drink of the cup of your ancestors.”
Without even thinking of what I was doing, my hands reached for the cup, hungry for a taste of its knowledge and power.
The silver was hotter than I expected. So hot, it nearly burned my hands to touch it. The instant my fingers closed around the base of it, part of me wanted to pull away. To drop the cup onto the floor. But a stronger part of me welcomed the pain.
“Drink,” she said.
With trembling hands, I lifted the cup to my mouth. The glowing blue liquid swirled inside, and as my lips touched the silver, the need for it consumed me. I tipped the cup toward my mouth and drank hungrily.
A terrible pain shot through my body. The chalice fell from my hand and landed with a clang against the stone floor. I clutched my stomach, the liquid burning inside me like a wildfire as it spread through my organs. I screamed and fell to the floor, instantly overcome with fever. Sweat formed on my forehead and I struggled to breathe through the heat.
Caroli
ne reached toward me, but her sister grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
Was this normal? I had never felt such heat in my life. I held myself up on my hands and knees for as long as I could, then finally succumbed to the growing fever, collapsing onto the cool stone floor.
A Bright And Burning Fire
A vision of the woman in white flashed before my eyes. She sat on the edge of the fountain at Shadowford, smiling softly. I walked toward her and place my hands in the flowing water, yearning for the cool refreshing feel of it against my skin. Instead, the water was scorching hot.
Suddenly, I was back in the basement room of the Winter’s home. I was aware of my body enough to know that I was on my hands and knees on the stone floor of the ritual room, but I felt half-in, half-out of the moment. Faces kept flashing in my mind.
The woman in white.
A young girl with her hair in braids.
A middle-aged woman with kind brown eyes.
My mother, Claire, running through a field of the most beautiful white roses.
Sweat dripped from my forehead. I opened my eyes and the room seemed to spin in circles. The small group of women in the room continued to chant, but all I could hear clearly was a thrumming in my ears.
Another vision bolted through me.
The woman in white stood in the ritual room at Shadowford. She was surrounded by women in blue and black robes. The sapphire portal in the center of the room opened, it’s bright light almost blinding. A thick black smoke snaked through the portal, then wrapped itself around her body.
As soon as it had come, the vision disappeared.
I gasped for breath and wiped the sweat from my face. My stomach twisted and turned, and a hot fever pulsed inside me.
Images from the lifetimes of every Peachville Prima flowed through me like a river of lava.
Finally, there she was. My mother. Her beautiful blonde hair blowing in the breeze as she ran through a field of white roses. She turned and smiled, her eyes looking straight into me. I ached to talk to her. To know who she was and why she gave me away. I reached for her, but the vision fell through my fingertips.
Just as suddenly as the visions began, they disappeared, leaving a bright and burning fire within the core of my soul.
Aldeen
I had never felt so alive or so awake in my life.
Energy swirled through my veins like an unending tornado. Priestess Winter closed the ceremony and everyone spilled out into the hallway, embracing me with hugs and congratulations.
“See what I mean?” Meredith whispered in my ear. “Amazing, isn’t it?”
I nodded, my cheeks warm and flushed. Amazing wasn’t even a strong enough word to describe how I felt. My entire body buzzed from head to toe. The demon tattoo on my back tingled. I’d gotten so used to having it there, I barely noticed it anymore, but after the ritual, every inch of my skin was hyper-aware.
“I’m very happy for you,” Zara said. She handed me a small white box.
“What’s this?” Growing up the way I did, I hadn’t gotten very many gifts in my life other than toys donated to me by a church or something.
“Open it.” She stood perfectly still, waiting.
I pulled off the white ribbon and carefully opened the top of the box. Inside, nestled in white fluff, was a beautiful crystal butterfly. It was made of clear blue stones just like the Peachville portal stone and was attached to a bobby-pin I could wear in my hair.
“I love it,” I said, fastening the pin in my hair. “Thank you.”
“Come on,” she said, placing her arm in mine. “Mom has a special luncheon prepared for you.”
The small party made its way up the basement stairs and into the elaborately decorated home. The dining room was huge. A long, shiny table made of rich, chocolatey wood sat all ten of us. Priestess Winter insisted that I take a spot at the head of the table. Gifts had been laid out on a side-table, and Mrs. King made a toast to me as the Prima Futura.
For the first time since I’d come to Peachville and realized who I was, I felt loved and appreciated by the members of the Order of Shadows. I wondered if there was some way I could be happy being a part of it. Yes, I understood there was a dark side to the Order. A side I didn’t completely understand or want to be a part of. But with the fresh flow of power coursing through me, I saw a beautiful side to my fate as Prima.
I’d seen the faces of my ancestors. I’d felt their power surge through me. I’d experienced a connection to them during the ritual that I never knew was possible. I suddenly didn’t feel so certain about turning my back on all of that.
When the main meal was over, the waiters brought out a large chocolate cake covered with cream cheese icing. My favorite.
My mouth fell open. “How did you know this was my favorite?”
A waiter placed a large slice in front of me on the table and I ran my finger through the smooth icing.
“Ella Mae told us,” Mrs. King said. “She said you mentioned it once at dinner when you guys were eating cupcakes.”
I couldn’t believe anyone remembered that. It touched my heart.
I felt stuck between Jackson and the Order. There was no way I could have them both.
I pushed the worry from my head and decided to try to enjoy the rest of the afternoon. Someday I would have to make a choice, but not today. Today, I could have cake with my friends in the Order.
I brought a large bite up to my mouth, but before I could even taste the chocolate on my tongue, the doors to the dining room burst open and a woman ran in. Her clothes were ruffled and her eyes were red.
All eyes turned to her. Priestess Winter stood, her chair scraping against the floor.
“What’s happened?” she asked.
“Priestess,” the woman said. She fell to her knees and bowed her head. She was out of breath. “There’s been an attack. It’s horrible. They’re dead. They’re all dead.”
Someone’s forked dropped hard against their plate. I set my bite of cake down, searching the faces of the women at the table. Who was dead?
“Slow down,” Priestess Winter said, walking over to the woman and helping her rise to her feet. “Tell me what happened. Where was this attack?”
“Aldeen, Kansas,” the woman said. “Sometime in the middle of the night.”
A gasp went through the room. Eloise Sullivan cried out, then placed her hand over her mouth. I still didn’t understand what they were talking about, but I could feel the dread that oozed through the room like poison.
Priestess Winter walked to the large bay window and stared out into her garden. “How many dead?” she asked, her voice trembling.
“Everyone,” the woman said. “The Prima was murdered and the demon gate was destroyed by magic. Every witch bound to the Aldeen gate,” she said, crying. “They’re all dead.”
Until We Know
The woman’s words hung heavy in the air. No one spoke or moved. An entire demon gate town was dead? Every witch? I had heard that it was possible, but to have it actually happen was unthinkable. Horrifying.
“What are we going to do?” Eloise said. She directed her question to Priestess Winter who was still staring out the window.
“Was Aldeen under some kind of threat?” Mrs. Ashworth asked. “Who would have done something like this?”
Mrs. King looked to me, obvious worry etched into her features. “We should get Harper and the other girls someplace safe,” she said. “Should we put them in hiding?”
Panic twisted my insides. Hiding? What exactly did that mean?
“We have to keep a level head,” Priestess Winter said. She turned back to us, her eyes glistening. “Until we know who is responsible, we need to take every precaution to make sure all of our Primas are safe.”
“Have any of you experienced any strange threats lately?” Honora asked, looking to the Sullivans.
I shifted uncomfortably. Should I mention the illusion attacks? Or the guy with braided hair? Were they somehow related to this?
“Nothing,” Eloise said. “Harper?”
I cleared my throat and shook my head. “No, not since the crows left Peachville,” I said. “You don’t think…”
“No,” Priestess Winter said. “The crows were severely damaged after their battle in Peachville. They wouldn’t have the strength or power to destroy a portal right now.”
“So who does have that kind of power?” Mrs. Ashworth asked.
Selene, the oldest of the Winter sisters, shared a look with her mother.
“What?” Eloise asked. “Do you know who did this?”
Priestess Winter straightened. “I need to meet with the rest of the High Council before I can say anything for sure,” she said. “I will tell you that it’s in your best interest to keep an eye out for strangers in your towns. Anyone who looks out of place or is dressed in strange clothing or has a foreign accent. Don’t trust anyone right now.”
I stared down at the discarded cake. Mysterious strangers? I thought of the weird guy who’d been watching me through the window of the pizza place last week. I knew the second I saw him that he didn’t belong in Peachville. There was something eerie about him. Different.
“I am sorry to cut our lovely celebration short,” Priestess Winter said. “But I’m sure you understand there is much to be done.”
Together, the rest of us walked to the Hall of Doorways. We silently slipped through the portals back to our hometowns, fear thick in our hearts.
Everything’s Just Peachy
For the next two days, I was confined to my bedroom at Shadowford. Mary Anne and Courtney kept me company, but I wasn’t allowed to go to school or talk to Jackson. I spent a lot of time practicing my new magic. Zara continued with her training sessions, but we were limited since we had to stay indoors.
