Witches of East End

by Melissa de la Cruz

  Privately, Joanna had started to wonder if provoking the Council might be a good idea, anyway. Freya’s upcoming nuptials had put her in an optimistic mood. If the fickle goddess of Love was tying the knot on the night of the harvest moon (the Labor Day weekend fell right on their traditional holiday—not that they were allowed to celebrate it anymore, of course), perhaps there was still hope that things would finally change around here.

  But if she was actually going to do this she was going to need the right ammunition. It might be a good idea to have it anyway, after what happened the other night. They would need protection from whatever was out there. Joanna climbed up the attic steps and rooted around the cramped space until she found the false wall where she had hidden their greatest treasures. She had been very careful to make sure the Council did not take everything back then. Ah. There was the black steamer trunk, right where she had left it hidden under a piano sheet so many years ago. She pulled off the dusty sheet, unlocked the lid, and looked inside. The box was empty save for a simple wooden case, and from inside the wooden case Joanna removed three ivory wands, as pristine and beautiful as the day they were made.

  “Mother? What are you doing up there?” she heard Ingrid call from below. “We need to leave for the hospital now, before visiting hours are over.”

  “Coming, dear,” she replied. When she climbed back down she was holding the three wands tightly in her left hand. She handed two of them to Ingrid. “Make sure you give Freya hers when she gets home. But remember to be careful with them. Only use when absolutely necessary.”

  “Are you sure about this, Mother?” Ingrid asked, holding the wands reverently. They were made from dragon bone, from the skeleton of the old gods, older than the universe itself, the very bones that created the earth, the same ones that once supported the bridge. Translucent, white to the eye, they shone with an iridescent light.

  “Not really. But something tells me it’s time we took them out of storage,” Joanna said. She stuck her wand in her coat pocket. “Now, come on, let’s go see if we can wake up Lionel.”

  They arrived at the hospital in the late afternoon, managing to make it right before the patients’ rooms were closed to visitors. “So how long has he been out?” Joanna asked, rolling up her sleeves as they made their way to the correct floor.

  “About a week or so.”

  “And there’s no brain activity at all?”

  “Some, but not enough to guarantee he would ever recover consciousness.”

  Joanna nodded. “Good. This shouldn’t be too hard, then.” If there was still some brain activity it meant Lionel was only barely submerged in the first level of the underlayer, and it would be easy enough to pull him to the surface.

  “That’s what I thought.” They arrived at the right room, but before Ingrid opened the door, she turned to Joanna. “Thanks, Mother.”

  Joanna patted her daughter’s arm. She would never have agreed to it unless Ingrid had asked, and since Ingrid never asked for anything, as her mother she couldn’t refuse. Besides, Emily Foster’s story piqued Joanna’s sense of injustice. Marriages weren’t held together by paperwork, and it angered her to think that a woman could be thrown out of her home simply due to bad luck and horrid in-laws.

  Ingrid pushed open the door to find Emily Foster weeping by Lionel’s bedside. His body was covered by a sheet, and Ingrid exchanged a startled look with her mother before approaching.

  “They pulled the plug while I went home to change my clothes and check on our animals. When I came back the nurse told me his mother signed the consent forms. She knew I wouldn’t agree so they did it behind my back. He’s gone. He’s gone, Ingrid. You’re too late,” Emily sobbed.

  Joanna pulled off the sheet slowly and took the dead man’s wrist in her hand. His skin was gray, and his fingernails were white and bloodless, but there was still a hint of color on his forearms. “The body’s still warm. They did this when . . . just a few minutes ago?” she asked.

  “Just before you arrived,” Emily said.

  “Emily, this is my mother. She’s going to help Lionel.”

  “I remember,” Emily said, blowing her nose. “Hi, Mrs. Beauchamp.”

  “Close the door,” Joanna instructed. “Draw the curtains and take her out of here.”

  Ingrid did as told and guided Emily out of the room. “What’s going to happen? I mean, he’s dead, right?” Emily asked, looking at the two witches fearfully.

  Ingrid and Joanna exchanged another glance. “Not quite. Even without a machine, the heart keeps beating, it’s just undetectable as it’s a very, very low pulse,” Joanna said, hoping the newly bereaved woman would believe her tiny white lie. But it would be too difficult to tell her the truth: that she was going to bring Lionel back from the dead. He had been gone for only a few minutes, not even an hour, which was well within the allotted time.

  When she was alone in the room, Joanna took Lionel’s cold hand in hers. She closed her eyes and stepped into the glom, the twilight world of disembodied souls. In the glom was a path, a trail in the sand. Using her wand to light the way, Joanna saw that Lionel had made it only to the second level; he was climbing the mountain toward the gate, and once he crossed the gate it would be much harder to bring him back. For beyond the Kingdom of the Dead lay Hell’s frontier.

  There was something different about the glom, a sense of malice and despair that she had never felt before. “Lionel! Lionel!” she called. She wanted to get out of there as soon as possible.

  Lionel Horning turned around. He was bald and severe-looking, dressed in his usual attire of paint-splattered clothing. When he saw her he smiled. “Mrs. Beauchamp, what are you doing here?”

  Joanna climbed up next to him so that they were both looking over the view. “Taking you home.”

  “I’m dead, aren’t I?” he asked.

  “Only in human terms. Your heart has stopped beating,” Joanna said.

  “Did I drown? I seem to remember being all wet.”

  “You did.”

  “Emily always said that ocean would get the better of me one day.”

  Joanna analyzed his spirit. There were traces of a silver spiderweb around his soul; she had never seen that before and it worried her. “Would you prefer to stay here?” she asked Lionel.

  He looked around. “Not really. What is this place?”

  “Think of it as the halfway station. See that gate up there? Once you reach it, it’ll be harder to get you to the surface.”

  “How’s Emily?”

  “Not good. She’s about to get thrown out of your house.”

  “My parents!” he groaned. “I know I should have forced her to marry me. She’s stubborn, you know.” He sighed. “I can’t leave her.”

  “Then don’t.”

  He stared at the glimmering path, at the mountain trail that reached toward the silver gate. She knew how hard this decision was. He had been in the underlayer, in the glom, for a week now. He had forgotten about hardship and fear; he was beginning to transition to the spirit world. Perhaps this wasn’t such a great idea. Perhaps she should never have agreed to do this.

  He looked at the faraway gate, shining in the distance. “Right. Let’s go, then.”

  Joanna took his hand and led him back down the way he had come. He started to walk back but suddenly stopped. “I can’t move,” he grunted. “My feet are stuck.”

  “Try harder,” she ordered. She felt the hard tugging on the other side; that would be her sister, Helda, holding on to his spirit.

  “Do not test me, sister!” Joanna called, waving her wand in the air so that it flashed with a hot white light. “Remember you agreed to keep to the Covenant! It is not his time yet!” She kept her hand on Lionel’s arm and pulled. The wind howled, the oceans crashed, lightning flashed. The Kingdom of the Dead did not give up its souls that easily.

  But Joanna’s magic was stronger; this was the power that was rooted in her, older than the earth, older than the Dead, and her ferocious w
ill held on to Lionel and pulled him up and out of the trail. . . . There was a mighty flash. . . .

  Joanna was sitting by Lionel’s bedside, holding his hand in a tight grip. The dead man blinked his eyes. He coughed and looked around. “Where’s Emily?”

  Lionel’s parents were thrilled to have their son back, if a bit sore about losing the house, although they tried not to show it. Joanna and Ingrid bade their good-byes.

  “How can I ever thank you? I don’t know what you did, or how you did it, but thank you.” Emily wept. “What can I give you? . . . anything. Take the house,” she laughed. “Lionel’s putting me on the deed.”

  Joanna embraced her and kissed her on both cheeks. “Take care of each other,” she said. “And keep an eye on him. He might be feeling a bit off for the next day or two. If anything changes with his condition, let us know immediately.”

  Ingrid led them down the hallway. “So, about this whole restriction . . . I’d say bringing a man back to life kind of breaks each and every one of those rules, doesn’t it?” she teased.

  Joanna smiled. The whole adventure had felt fantastic, like the good old days again. She stuck her wand into the bun of her hair. “To hell with it. We might as well admit it. We’re witches. Just let them try to stop us this time.”

  chapter nineteen

  Rhinemaiden

  Matt, hi. Caitlin’s just finishing up processing a few new books; she’ll be out soon,” Ingrid said with what she hoped was a friendly smile.

  The handsome detective nodded and took his usual seat at the bench across from the main desk. Ingrid felt as if she had blinked and when she opened her eyes, Matt and Caitlin were a couple. It happened so fast that she suspected Freya had slipped one of her now famous love potions in the lawman’s coffee. Her sister swore up and down that Matt had not been to the bar in a while; nor had she recently served Caitlin, who was one of those girls who got drunk after one glass of wine and was hardly a North Inn regular.

  Ingrid tried to concentrate on the files in front of her, but knowing Matt was sitting right across from her made it difficult. If he had been something of a regular before, there was no escaping him now. Every afternoon he would appear at the library around five o’clock right on schedule. Sure, today was Thursday and the beginning of a holiday weekend, but still. Didn’t he have something better to do? How did he have so much time to spend lolling about waiting? Weren’t there crimes to solve? It had been more than six months since Bill Thatcher had been found dead on the beach, and the police had no leads. His wife, Maura, was still in a coma, which was too bad as she was the only witness to whatever had happened to them.

  The detective’s constant presence was annoying, but not half as irritating as watching Caitlin get ready for her dates. The girl was in the back room, furiously slapping on blush and lipstick, telling everyone in earshot everything about her new relationship. Even Tabitha and Hudson had been pulled into the drama—Tabitha because she adored romance in all forms, and Hudson because he soaked up drama like a sponge. Ingrid had attempted to escape all the girly commotion only to find the lawman idling by the main desk.

  She tried to pretend he wasn’t there, or that she was immune to his presence, which was difficult, as something about seeing him made her throat tighten and her body freeze so that she could actually see the goose bumps forming on her arm. Ingrid pulled her cardigan firmly together and tried not to shiver. She would not let him affect her this way. Ingrid was concentrating so hard on appearing indifferent that she did not register that someone was standing in front of the main desk until Emily Foster poked her in the shoulder. “Ingrid? Earth to Ingrid?”

  “Emily! Sorry. I was . . .”

  “Daydreaming.” Emily smiled and handed her a few books. “Don’t worry, I’m used to it. Lionel’s always gazing off into the distance.”

  “How’s he doing?” Ingrid asked, glad for the distraction. From the corner of her eye she saw Matt tapping on his BlackBerry.

  “Good. He’s good,” Emily said. “A little more absentminded than usual, but that’s probably because he’s busy working on a new series of paintings. They’re beautiful and haunted-looking, trails that lead nowhere, some kind of mountain with a silver gate. He hasn’t shown in New York in a long time and his gallery is very excited.”

  “Good to hear; please tell him we say hello,” Ingrid said, handing Emily her stack of novels.

  So far, after Lionel’s resurrection there had been nothing from the Council. No messages from the oracle, no indication that they had even noticed or cared. It was a bit unsettling, and Ingrid wondered if they had followed the rules too closely. If the Council didn’t care if the rules were broken, perhaps they should have used their magic a long time ago.

  There were a few more patrons in line stocking up on books for the long weekend, which kept Ingrid busy. See, she wanted to shout to their pompous mayor, people still use the library—it was still relevant to daily life. There wasn’t much hope, however. She had heard that they planned to move the architectural archive to a warehouse with a tiny office, but that was only because the bequest could afford it; as for the library itself, its future was grim.

  At last the line dwindled and it was just Ingrid and Matt again. The silence between them was going to drive her mad, so she decided to take action.

  “Let’s see what’s keeping her,” she told him, as she finished tidying up the main desk. She walked briskly to the back office, where Caitlin was sitting at her desk, pursing her lips and surveying her reflection in her compact mirror.

  “You know Matt is here, don’t you?” Ingrid asked.

  “I know, I’m so late.” Caitlin sighed, snapping the compact shut. “He doesn’t mind, of course, but I hate to make him wait. You know he’s a stickler for time! Always so prompt; he makes me look so bad. I guess it’s just part of his personality. Did you know his father was captain of the force before he retired? And his grandfather, too. Runs in the family—isn’t that sweet?” It was as if the girl had developed a personality overnight. Suddenly she was a chatterbox; you couldn’t shut her up. The staff was well-informed of her dear Matthew’s eating habits (he took most of his meals at the diner by the highway), political views (like Ingrid, he didn’t vote for the current mayor), and ex-girlfriends (not many). Ingrid was finding it increasingly difficult to refrain from hexing her. All it would take was thirteen black candles and a pentagram and that silly girl wouldn’t know why she was breaking out in boils.

  Ingrid would prefer not to know so much about Matt Noble. Especially since the picture Caitlin painted was of a simple, honest, hardworking guy, someone she couldn’t help but respect and admire, if only from afar.

  “Do you think this looks right, Hudson?” Caitlin asked, fretting about her outfit, a white linen dress that showed a hint of her tanned cleavage.

  Hudson arched an eyebrow. “Considering I helped you pick it out, I think it’s fabulous.”

  “You look great,” Tabitha agreed, looking on enviously. She wasn’t showing yet, except for a slight puffiness in her cheeks and the requisite bout of morning sickness. “Where is he taking you, again?”

  “To the outdoor opera, you know, by the beach? I can’t remember which one.”

  “It’s Wagner, the Ring cycle,” Ingrid said icily. She had made plans to see it as well. The North Hampton orchestra performed an abridged instrumental version every year over the Fourth of July holiday, with a fireworks show at the end. Ingrid had been planning to attend with her family, but Freya had canceled on her at the last minute, and Joanna had begged off the yearly tradition, saying she really didn’t feel up to all the Sturm und Drang this summer. Ingrid had decided to skip it, as she didn’t feel like attending the opera alone.

  “Hold on,” Hudson said and tightened the belt around Caitlin’s waist to further exaggerate the dress’s hourglass silhouette. “That’s better.” He nodded approvingly. The traitor was Caitlin’s new best friend, Ingrid lamented. Hudson had the soul of a thirteen-year-o
ld girl. He couldn’t help but swoon at a new love affair. It certainly beat recapping last night’s reality shows.

  Caitlin blushed and giggled, and Ingrid tried not to listen, telling herself that she was not jealous, she was not jealous! If only there was something she could do to stop feeling the way she did. She could help other women with their problems and yet she couldn’t seem to fix her own. Freya would tell her to take one of her love potions and steal him away. But Ingrid didn’t want that. She didn’t want him to like her due to some magic trickery. Not that she liked him, anyway. Right? It was getting harder and harder to fool herself into indifference. She liked Matt Noble, and it wasn’t just because he was now out of reach. Ingrid did not suffer from the affliction of loving men she could not have. To be honest, she had never loved any man, not one in her long life. She preferred her own company. So this infatuation with Matt came at just the wrong time. She thought he liked her, and so it had piqued her interest. She had been wrong about his attraction, but now she could not seem to do anything about her feelings.

  Hudson whispered something in Caitlin’s ear that made the girl blush furiously, making her look even prettier than she already was. “Well, if you really want to know,” she said, and Ingrid could not help but overhear, “tonight’s his lucky night!”

  “Lucky night for what?” Tabitha asked. “Oh! Oh!” she said, as she realized what Hudson and Caitlin were talking about and giggled naughtily.

  “We’ve been seeing each other for two weeks now and I think it’s time,” Caitlin said primly.

  “Is that some sort of rule I’m not aware of?” Hudson asked. “The two-week shag?” He turned to Ingrid and Tabitha expectantly.

  “Not for me,” Tabitha chortled. “Chad was a one-night stand.”

  “Tab, you slut,” Hudson teased. “A one-night stand that lasted fifteen years, huh?”