Hallow Graves

by Amanda A. Allen

  Table of Contents

  Hallow Graves

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  ALSO BY AMANDA A. ALLEN

  Author’s Note

  Copyright

  Hallow Graves

  A Rue Hallow Mystery, Book 1

  By Amanda A. Allen

  For Emily

  Emers

  Emerlini

  Lucinda

  Cindy

  Cin

  Feliz Navidad

  Emmyluly

  Bratface

  Sister

  * * *

  Chapter 1

  “Veruca,” the voice made my eye twitch.

  When your mother was Autumn Jones of Sage Island, eye twitches were a fairly normal event. My mother handed me a frothy orange juice and then looked around my room with a frown. I could see her cataloging what I was taking, what I was leaving, and how I was packing. The eye twitch increased in speed and level of spasming.

  I took a sip of the juice and set it on my dresser. There was a lot left to do, and the time to leave for the airport was ticking by far too quickly.

  “Hey,” I said without inflection. I was tired of arguing. I just wanted to finish up and maybe get a hug before I left home.

  “It’s not too late to go to Grace College.” My mother was a large woman with small eyes, a pursed mouth, and a way of looking at—everything—that said she found it wanting. That included her daughters.

  “I have a full ride scholarship to St. Angelus,” I said without intonation. This was a conversation we’d had many times. I'd have hoped it would have been done by now since my flight was purchased, my room reserved, and my choice made.

  “I can afford Grace,” Mother said. It was not an offer. It was a statement that required me to ask for the money to pay for Grace College.

  I didn’t answer. I didn’t want her money. It was full of strings and controls. I wanted to make my own life.

  “I already accepted St. Angelus.” That was when the warm, familiar relaxation hit me. Gods and monsters, my mother was a super-villain. “How many doses of truth serum are in the orange juice?”

  She didn’t answer, she smiled that cold, snake-ish smile. But I didn’t need the answer. With a sip that small and the level of relaxation I was feeling, it was probably a 1/3 truth serum My mother was a witch. So was I. And my sister. And nearly every friend I had. Not that I had many friends. My mother was Autumn Jones, and she was a jackal in the shape of a suburban housewife. But, she was also very good at magic and didn’t have an ounce of ethics in regards to its usage.

  Which was why I was so very familiar with the cool, sweet relaxation of truth serum.

  When people look back on their childhood for the comfort foods—for others, it will be mashed potatoes and gravy or grilled cheese and tomato soup. For me, it will be a warm drink dosed with truth serum and careful conversations that snatch all my secrets away.

  “I believe you would prefer Grace.”

  I opened my mouth and closed it several times. With truth serum in me, I couldn’t give her the lie that I’d prefer. It took me several moments to realize that I was an adult, and I didn’t have to justify what I wanted. That didn’t keep me from gaping like a fish in my bedroom fighting for an answer that I wanted to give.

  I was open-mouthed and stupid when my sister walked into the scene.

  First she snorted. Then she said, “Oh Rue. You know better than drinking Mom’s offerings.”

  “I was distracted, Brawny,” I said, using the nickname she hated.

  We had terrible names. Veruca is horrible. But Branka—pronounced Brawn-kah was worse. She went by Bran and owned it, but Holy Hecate Goddess of Magic and the Moon, it was a terrible name. For sisters, we sure didn’t look alike, I had dark brown hair so deep and thick that it seemed to be almost black. My eyes were a similar deep, dark brown and tilted. My skin was goth pale. I was slender, almost without curves. I looked like a yoga master or a dancer, but I only liked to run. As far and as fast as I could. Bran, on the other hand, was a short, freckled, handful of curling red hair, green eyes, and curves. Everything about her screamed adorable except her personality that was all of jagged edges.

  Bran was as cute as a button, and she hated it. Just thinking about that made me smile my own cold spread of lips and teeth.

  “I believe you would prefer Grace,” Mother said in a way that demanded an answer. She was very, very good at truth seruming her children and then conversing in a way that made the truth serum more effective. If there was a bit of a question behind the statements you made, the truth serum made you want to answer. If people asked outright questions, the need to reply pounded at the self-control of the poor, drugged victim.

  “I don’t want to go to Grace College,” I told my mother, precisely. “I don’t want to go somewhere that is yours. I want to be myself. Not be defined by who my family is.”

  That meant my mother. And Mother’s snake smile chilled. I could see that cold, distant part of her stir, and then she smiled again, and I admitted to myself that I was going to Connecticut to get away from her. I loved her, and I loved my family and my island, and my coven, but I needed to be somewhere where being Autumn Jones’s daughter wasn’t my defining characteristic.

  She wasn’t pleased with my answer, but she said nothing. And then later, she didn’t come with me to the docks when I caught the ferry to the mainland and then had to take a bus to the airport. I was traveling from the San Juan Island’s in Washington State to Connecticut, and my mother couldn’t be distracted from the potion she was brewing when I left. I wanted to be fine with it, but it hurt my feelings. A lot. I knew that I was ignoring her wants and desires for my future, but surely even she could see that it was my life. Apparently not. I shouldn’t be surprised. I had told myself it time and again, but I told myself right now.

  Our family was complicated. My Dad was sweet and affable. He worked hard and adored my sister, myself, and my mother. I didn’t understand why. He was like a puppy dog in a house full of snakes. Branka was tricky, sneaky, underhanded and morally challenged. My mother didn’t even pretend to have morals. She taught us spell work by describing an “arsenal” of spells, and she wasn’t joking around. I could do spells no other witch my age on the island could do. But I couldn't talk to cats like nearly all of them learned when they were pre-pubescent.

  I didn’t know what I was, but I knew I didn’t want to be what she was. I suppose that hurt her, but Hecate’s eyes, what could I do about it? Give in and become the cold, calculated witch that my mother was?

  I shook myself from my reverie and turned to my sister and Dad. So, this was what homesickness felt like. As if snakes and lizards and had taken up residence in your stomach while your heart physically hurt and your eyes burned with the need to cry.

  “Bye,” I told my sister as we faced each other on the docks. Daddy stood to the side, watching us with this sweet heartbroken smile that was too painful to examine.

  Bran scowled at me, staring at a point beyond my shoulder.

  “Shut up,” I said, wishing we could fight. But we couldn’t.

  “You’re going to be a phone call away, witch,” Bran said. I didn’t need to see the tears in her eyes to know she was burning with them. She was my sister. We were witches. So I knew exactly w
hat was going on inside of her head. But she wasn’t a crier. She was more of an enacting destruction-er.

  “Now girls,” Dad said. He hated to hear us fight, even if we were messing around. Or fighting out of reflex so we wouldn't cry. Neither of them had said anything about my leaving so early. They knew why I was going.

  “Bye, sneak,” I said again and turned into Daddy’s arms. He gave me a squeeze so tight, it hurt, and I wanted to beg him not to let me go. But of course, I also didn’t want that. He kissed my cheek and then because he was perfect, he left me to my sister.

  Daddy was affable, jolly, kind. He worked hard for his family and adored us. He was far, far too good for any of us. And because of that and because everyone else who knew all of us wondered why he stayed, they assumed he was stupid. He wasn’t. He knew exactly who he loved and why we were the way we were. And he knew why I was leaving, why I was going to college across the country, and why I was going so early. And despite his utter and complete adoration of my mother, he supported those choices without ever saying one word.

  Branka—my sister—it was different for her and me. Dad chose our life. Bran and I—there weren’t any choices. The madness of our life was simply what we had. But Bran took my farewell in. I watched her grit her teeth as she controlled whatever she was feeling. All hidden away. Mysterious and dramatic at the same time. But when she spoke, it was what I expected.

  “If you come back or regret this, Veruca Jones, I will punch you so hard that you feel it in previous lives.”

  I took that to mean that she loved me. I loved her right back. When your mother was Autumn Jones, only someone who had been spawned by the same snake could understand you. Which was why I was going to miss Bran so hard. I punched her arm and then when she was fully scowling at me, I hugged her so hard it hurt my arms to hold her that tight. When the hug came to its horrible end, I hugged her again. And then left without saying anything else.

  * * *

  Chapter 2

  I’d gone to school early to cut short the manipulation and being potioned. Which meant that the campus was deserted when I arrived. It meant that the loneliness grew into a homesickness so deep and vast that I had taken to running away from it. Literally. At night.

  Which, when you stop and think, was an interesting choice. Here’s the thing, I grew up on a small island where everyone knew everyone else. And, everyone knew there were witches and that I was one. None of the magic users would have hurt me. And none of the non-magic users would have dared to try.

  It was only after I had left my dorm room at 2:00 am that I started to do some math. It went like this. This wasn’t Sage Island. This was a college that catered to witches. I was a witch.

  I believe in monsters. It was 2:00 am and I was running through campus alone. Heartsick and whiney, drowning in my thoughts. While running through the campus, I had let myself become distracted by my feelings, running alone at night, at a college for witches. Also known as monsters. So, that adds up to stupid.

  I believe in monsters. Because I am one. It was why I had left home. It was why I was here. I wanted to go to a school that taught me beautiful magic and gave me some time to figure out witchcraft and ethics. I needed to learn to stop thinking so hard about what was right because I always had to stop and think what my mother would do. What Daddy would say and what Hazel, my coven leader, would expect.

  But when I felt an aggressive spell flying towards me, I dove into the trees without pause and without the need to think. I dove and crouched into the trees, melding my essence into the oaks to hide my aura. It was the only type of magic that I could dare because it was a subtle shifting that would be difficult for the very best of witches to detect, even standing next to me.

  There were the other tells. I tried desperately to control my breathing. The moon was covered by clouds, this part of the campus wasn’t lit at all. I wouldn't have seen the spell if I hadn't had my power in my grasp, but when I looked up, I saw a black flame that had bypassed where I had been and landed in the oaks across the path.

  I could smell ash and magic in the air. I wanted to examine it further, but every sense I had was telling me to get away. I didn't run. Running was too obvious. I scuttled on my elbows and knees, deeper into the trees, passing my aura from ancient oak to ancient oak.

  If it were a normal night, the dark and the loneliness would be a balm to my soul. I was very, very used to the dark, the trees, the moonlight.

  As I slithered away, fury rose in me. I should have been safe running in the woods. This wasn't some war zone even if it was a school for witches. I didn't want to feel afraid. The fear that had replaced the sense of security I had been feeling made me even angrier than whatever that black flamed spell had been.

  I didn't get up as I realized it could not have been aggressive, but I scoffed immediately. I didn't know the purpose of the spell, but I had felt the aura of that spell, and I didn't like it one bit.

  St. Angelus College was founded by witches looking to unite modern education and witchcraft and create powerful and well-educated adults ready to face the world. Or…you know…slaughtering the stupid witches in the woods. Would they bury my body and hide it with a spell or leave my carcass for someone to find?

  I couldn't help as I pressed the back of my head against an oak tree, to think of my sister coming to see my body. I remembered her teeth clenched. I remembered the other promise I had made—that she’d be leaving soon too. I had almost decided to stay behind until she could leave too. But some advice from another coven member and the realization that Bran wouldn't accept my protection had made me go. But I had promised her that eventually it would be the two of us against the world.

  By Hecate, I wasn’t going to die in the woods alone. I was going to survive and adventure with my sister. I was going to, as my sister said, Hermione it up at college and get my witch nerd on. But despite the Hermione in me, I didn’t know what that spell was. I didn’t know who was trying to hurt me or why. But I knew one thing—they weren’t going to win.

  I stood. Stupid? Maybe. But I stepped onto the path, pushing my magic through my body to my hands. I held one, tense at my side, holding a killing spell. The other was high and in front of me—a blocking spell. A good one. I pressed forward on the path, senses delving…trying to trace that last spell. And I found nothing.

  Was whoever it was hiding better than me? Would they get me as I passed them? Were they gone? I didn’t know. But I moved forward carefully until I found my way back to the better-lit portions of the campus. I stood for long minutes watching in the shadows, but I saw nothing. Did I dare to step out?

  I licked my lips, cracked my neck and dropped my shield hand. The spell was still there, and still ready. I didn’t need to hold my hand up for the spell to work. It wasn’t about where my hand was, but about my focus. I considered for a minute, and then I walked out of the oak grove. Stupid? Probably. But I didn’t have it in me to flee back to my dorm room like a scared rabbit.

  Which was when I saw someone in the shadows. I almost threw my spell at him, but he was just standing there. With my magic ready, I could delve him easily, and I did. Of course, I did. I am not an idiot. And someone might have been trying to do something to me back there. He was supernatural, but there was nothing aggressive in him at the moment. At least towards me. He felt as ready as I did. I wondered if he sensed by delving, but if he did, he didn't respond to it.

  I could see nothing about him physically, but there was a flash of…familiarity. And yet, I knew I had never seen him before in my life. But, I suppose as a witch it was a flash of intuition that I would be seeing more of him. I didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

  At the moment, I was grateful to have the intuition that I had a future. I didn’t care so much about that person in the shadows. He was a thought for another day. Not now. Not after the other things my intuition was telling me. Which is that none of this—whatever it was—was over. It was me gritting my teeth this time, but I made
my way, shield never falling until I reached the dorm room.

  *

  There are a lot of witches in the world. My family is from the Sage Island Coven. I didn’t understand why my mother—who did not have a sense of right and wrong—would have selected Sage Island and its coven for her family. But she had. There are the ones from the North Island Coven, who will do anything for a price. That one seemed more of a home for a woman like my mother.

  The Sage Island coven leader, Hazel, was an excellent witch. She was powerful, and she learned wonderful things. She was kind, and her coven was kind. My mother was…powerful. She was an excellent witch. When Hazel trained you, she asked you about your passions and then helped you uncover the path to learning what you desired. My mother created a list of spells and abilities she called your arsenal. And then she insisted you fill your arsenal. There was no denying that insistence.

  The two spells I was using to protect myself were spells from the “arsenal.” I got my desire to be my best self from my Daddy, but Hazel certainly reinforced that desire. I got my skewed sense of right and wrong from my mother. I couldn’t help but wonder, after this night, who was right and who was wrong? And then I realized—there was no way Hazel didn’t know both of these spells. I should have been safe at college. I shouldn’t have needed them yet. Hazel hadn’t left me undefended so much as allowed me to be young.

  I had never been young, though. You aren’t really when your mother is Autumn Jones. It was the very fact that my mother was Autumn Jones that I had chosen St. Angelus. Sheer whim to drive my mother mad. Sort of. I narrowed down my choices to those that offered me scholarships, ruled out my mother’s alma mater, and then found the best witch programs. I’d been left with three choices.

  But something about the oak grove at St. Angelus called to me. So, I’d sent my acceptance, packed everything I loved, and took off.

  And here I was…