Meanwhile, Roane stood back watching it gouge me to death, not concerned in the least.
It circled my high ceiling with its prize—my hair—before swooping in for a landing and parking its ass on my dresser.
And here it came. The moment I’d been dreading. I eased closer. “I know what you’re thinking.”
It cawed again.
“Listen, I just—”
Ca-caw!
“If you’ll just let me explain.”
It glared at me with the glare of a thousand needles. I never knew a bird could be so expressive. Or contemptuous. Or—
It pecked my hand.
“Ouch.” I raised my hands and patted the air. “Okay—”
Caw.
“I just—”
Caw.
“If you’ll—”
Ca-caw.
“Stop it.”
Caw! Caw! Caw! It flapped its wings to add a visual component to the soundtrack of its bellyaching.
I folded my arms across my chest. “Now you’re just being obstinate.”
It glared again, its stormy gray eyes burning a hole into me as though I were an ant under a magnifying glass.
In the sunlight, I could see smoke wafting off its singed feathers, which were oddly curly. “On the bright side, you’re literally smoking hot.”
It lowered its beak, its eyes half-mast, as it continued to regard me with a special seething kind of hatred.
“At least you’re alive, though, right?”
It didn’t move.
“Annette, you’re going to have to forgive me eventually.”
Nothing. Nada. Zip.
“You can talk, you know. I mean . . . I think you can talk.” I looked at Roane, suddenly worried.
He stood there grinning and shrugged. No help whatsoever.
I chewed on my lower lip. “You can talk, right?”
“Of course, I can talk.” She had no lips. It was like watching a ventriloquist. She flapped her wings, her high-pitched voice a bit like nails on a chalkboard. “But I sound ridiculous!”
She wasn’t wrong. I hid a snicker in fear of losing an eye. Or the rest of my hair. “This is amazing.” I eased closer. “Can I pet you?”
“I dare you to try.”
“Your afterfeathers are curly! Just like your hair!” They were a lighter color, too. Much like the color her hair had been, a soft chestnut. Against the raven black, she made a beautiful crow. Not that I was about to tell her that. I put a hand over my heart, dying from all the cuteness. Which was better than dying by beak.
“I will peck you to death in your sleep.”
“I don’t think I’d sleep through something like that.”
“Change me back, or else.”
I straightened. “What?”
“Change me back.”
“What do you mean?” My gaze shot to Roane then returned to her. “I can’t change you back. You’re supposed to shift back to human form on your own. You know, like a bona fide shapeshifter. Roane can do it.”
She blinked at me, her beady eyes narrowing in for the kill. “Just how am I supposed to do that?”
“Well, I—I’m not sure exactly.” It wasn’t like the spell had come with directions.
Her wings flapped again, and I suddenly understood the meaning of the word unflappable. Annette being the antitheses. “Why would you do this to me?”
“Because you were about to be crushed by a building. I needed to shift you so you could get out of your bindings into something small so you could fit through tight spaces like the missing floorboard above you and fast so you could go airborne and fly away before the building crushed you.”
She blinked again, unimpressed, her lower lids sliding up to meet her upper ones. It was fascinating.
“And crows are really smart,” I continued.
“Smart?”
I nodded.
“My brain is the size of a pea, and I’m very attracted to shiny things.”
“See? Nothing has changed. Wait,” I said. She was missing the most important part of this entire conversation. “You’re alive.” I jumped into Roane’s arms and kissed him. “She’s alive.”
He stared down at me. Pulled me closer. Brushed a thumb across my lower lip.
Just as his head descended, Annette squawked again. “Crows before bros, buddy! Out.”
I stood back and smoothed my sweater down. “Maybe I should go see Ruthie.”
Sixteen
I think I seized the wrong day.
-True Fact
“But I keep screwing up,” I said to Ruthie. Roane and I found her hanging with my dads and Minerva in the kitchen, which was a big step up from the basement. “Now I don’t know how to change her back.”
“Hmm,” she hmmed, handing me a cup of tea even though I needed a shot of something stronger. Like coffee. Or tequila. Or electroshock therapy.
When Ruthie turned her back to dish out some of Papi’s beef stroganoff, Roane switched my tea for coffee. That’s when I knew. Really knew.
He completed me.
I gazed up at him as he raked an ink-covered hand through his hair and winked, which somehow caused my nether regions to flood with warmth.
“I just keep almost getting people killed,” I continued, turning back to Ruthie. Annette had refused to come downstairs, she was so embarrassed. And Roane . . . the memory of him taking my injuries into his own body clenched my stomach. “I keep hurting people.”
Ruthie handed me a plate. My dads sat on barstools while we took over the table. Minerva ate like she hadn’t eaten in weeks—Papi’s beef stroganoff did that to the best of us—but she kept rapt attention.
“How did you know what that spell would do?” I asked Ruthie.
“Which one?” Which one? She knew full well which one.
“The one you drew after the witch hunter knocked me into oblivion. The one where I transferred my injuries and pain to someone else. How would you know something like that?”
She took a delicate bite and swallowed before answering. “Defiance, that’s hardly important.”
The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as they’d recently started doing when people tried to hide something from me. “It is, actually.”
She pursed her lips. She didn’t want to tell me, but I figured she knew me well enough by now to realize I wasn’t going to drop it. After filling her lungs, she said, “Because you used it once when you were a child.”
“That doesn’t sound good.”
“You broke your arm on the monkey bars at the playground.”
“Weren’t you watching me?” I teased.
“You were in so much pain.” Her smile was sad. “You didn’t do it on purpose.”
I stilled.
“Your magics took over. Self-preservation, I suppose. You grabbed another child’s arm and drew that spell.”
“Oh, no.”
“I didn’t know what it meant until after he screamed. His arm had splintered. And you’d given him all of your pain.”
“I—I broke his arm?”
“Yes. With that spell, anything that happens to you is transferred to whoever you touch, and you are healed. But you stopped yourself with Roane.”
“Why would I do that?”
“Because you didn’t want to kill him. You knew how much he could—”
“No, why would I do that to a child?”
“Defiance, you were only three. You had no idea what that spell would do.”
“Clearly, I did.”
“All right, then you had no idea what the ramifications would be.”
I scrubbed my face. “I can’t do this anymore. Up to this point, I’ve lived the most boring, mundane life imaginable. The most exciting thing I’ve ever done was open a restaurant, and then I had that stolen out from under me. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Ruthie”—I clued her in—“but sometimes I’m about as sharp as a marble.”
“Cariña,” Dad admonished.
“It�
�s true. I’m unlucky and jinxed and accident-prone to a ridiculous degree. And someone was delusional enough to entrust me with all of this power? Me? The same girl who once flashed a hottie in a Porsche because all the cool kids were doing it, only my hottie turned out to be an undercover cop?” I flattened my palms against the table and leaned closer. “I was arrested, Ruthie. That’s the kind of girl I am. Other girls could flash guys. I could not.”
Roane cleared his throat and hid a grin behind his fist.
“And that pertains to the conversation because?” Ruthie asked.
“Because I’m cursed!”
“Ah.”
“I don’t have the talent for this gig. Everything I do is wrong. It always has been. Everything I touch spoils.”
“Defiance.” Her tone stayed even. Placating. “Did you ever think that maybe all those things happened to you because you were an insanely powerful witch whose powers were suppressed?”
“How is that even relevant?”
She laughed. “You’re a charmling.”
“And?”
“Have you ever touched a toaster only to have it catch on fire?”
Dad nodded, and Papi held up two fingers. Dad lifted the third for him.
“That’s my point exactly! Everything I touch breaks. Or catches on fire. Or explodes. Well, that only happened once.”
“Sweetheart, just because your powers were suppressed, didn’t mean they weren’t there. It’s not like with a regular witch. Even one from a long line like mine.”
“So, all of my bad luck was just really my powers trying to break free?”
“Something like that.”
“Then explain . . . wait.” Some of what happened while I’d been writhing in pain on this very kitchen table came back to me. Astonishment rocketed through my body. “You tried to take it.”
“Take what, sweetheart?” She took another bite.
“The pain. The injuries from that asshole on the balcony. That’s what you and Roane were arguing about.”
She put her cup down. “He cheated. He got to you first.” She offered him an insincere glare. “I didn’t want him to have to go through that.”
“And you felt like you should?”
“Defiance, all of this is my fault. If I’d found another way, if I’d let you keep your powers, or knowledge of your powers, or trained you your whole life, none of this would be happening.”
“So, you have to martyr yourself as punishment?” Her self-banishment suddenly made sense. “Is that why you locked yourself in the basement? Why you stopped seeing the chief?”
“No.” She shook her head. A pink hue rose in her cheeks. She was never the kind to air her dirty laundry, but if ever there were a time to display a dirty thong or two, it was now. “I can assure you, sweetheart. That has nothing to do with any of this.”
“Then why? He’s devastated, Ruthie.”
She winced and set her jaw. “Talking about my issues is not getting us any closer to solving yours.”
“I have issues?”
“You’ve overtaken my copies of Good Housekeeping. But none of your issues are your fault.”
Annette flew into the kitchen like a tiny hurricane and landed on the counter next to my dads. “You are getting completely off subject,” she said in her strange voice. “We need to get back to the real issue at hand.”
My dad’s jaw fell open, as did Minerva’s. Papi dropped his fork.
“We will,” I said, “but I just want to know what’s going on with my grandmother.”
“I would like to know that too.” The chief stood in the hall, looking into the kitchen.
“I’m a bird.” Annette ruffled her feathers. “My problem should take precedence.” She lifted a wing to scratch under it with her pointy beak as Minerva slowly raised her phone.
The chief gawked at Annette and swayed, and I worried he would pass out. It was one thing to have a talking bird. It was quite another to have one that could provide intelligent conversation.
“Chief.” I jumped up to help him.
Roane joined me, and we led the chief to a chair at the table next to Minerva.
He pointed at the bird. “Is that . . . did she?”
“Yes. Remember when I told you there was more to the story?” I gestured to Annette with a furtive nod.
“Vogel abducted me,” she squawked. “And I’m certain my glasses are at the bottom of a pile of rubble.” Then she turned a murderous glare on me. “Not that they would fit on my beak anyway.”
My dads were still staring.
“Ruthie?” I circled back to my earlier point. “Why have you suddenly become a hermit?”
She brushed an invisible crumb off her dress. “I can’t do magic.”
“What?” I asked, stunned.
“I can no longer practice. My magic is gone.”
That wasn’t possible. “Ruthie, most witches don’t have inherent magic. They are simply sensitive to the unseen. Maybe you just need to start practicing again. It could come back to you.”
“Why? So I can make a love potion that does absolutely nothing?”
“Of course, not. Wait, does that mean there are love potions that do absolutely something?”
I couldn’t help a glance at my intended target. He folded his arms over his chest.
“Oooo.” Annette’s awe was more caw, but the sentiment was there. She was just as interested as I was.
“You don’t understand,” Ruthie said. “I haven’t figured out how to live without my magic. I’m having a hard time adjusting. I’ll get over it, it’ll just take a while.”
And here I was complaining about having so much power when Ruthie had none. “Gigi, I had no idea what you were going through.”
“My dear, you have had more than your share of things to worry about. My paltry problems are—”
“Paltry?” I scooted closer to her. “You think this is paltry?”
“I do. I didn’t want to burden you with it.”
“You’ve really lost your powers?”
“I have. I’ve done everything. Scoured ancient texts. Consulted witches older and far wiser than myself.”
“I doubt that.” That came out wrong. “I meant the wiser part.”
“I tried every spell in the book. Literally.” She speared me with a hapless gaze. “Do you know how hard it is to find eye of newt?”
“You went old school. I’m impressed.”
“I did. I even asked the great mother for favor. My powers are simply gone.”
“They can’t just vanish. I’m sure they’re around here somewhere. Have you checked your pockets? Looked in your bra? Tried the crisper drawer in the fridge?” I listed off all the places I’d ever lost my keys. “Or what about the oven—”
“I don’t think it works like that, sweetheart.”
“Did you check in the sofa? I’ve lost things in sofas.”
“We aren’t talking about your virginity, cariña,” Dad said.
I gasped. “How did you know that?”
Ruthie shook her head. “I’m fairly certain my powers are not in the sofa.” When I opened my mouth, she said, “Or under my bed.”
I deflated.
The thing was, once I knew the problem, once she had the desire to tell me like those people who’d pounded down the door, I knew exactly where to find her lost object. She was right. It was not under the sofa.
The chief tapped me on the shoulder. “Did you know there’s a talking bird in your house?”
I grinned and leaned closer to my grandmother. “When you died, your power, your energy, didn’t go anywhere.”
A vertical line formed between her brows. “I don’t understand.”
“Now, there’s a twist for you,” I teased. “They’re still right where you left them.”
She shook her head before her curiosity got the better of her. She looked at me, her expression full of a careful hope. “Defiance?”
I nodded.
“You mean they’re�
�”
“They are. I can feel them.” A soft energy hummed nearby. I just couldn’t quite pinpoint the location.
She covered her mouth with a hand. After a moment, she stood and walked to the butler’s pantry.
“You died in the butler’s pantry?” I asked.
“The butler did it!” Annette shouted, stealing my thunder.
We looked at each other and giggled. Well, I did. Her laugh was more like the cackle of an evil crone. We could work on that.
“I rarely come in here,” Ruthie said. “This is where I keep a few old appliances and my canning supplies. I hadn’t canned in years, but I decided to can some apricots a friend brought over.” She stepped to the middle of the room, and a soft glow floated up and over her.
The energy was so strong, a mundane might think the spot was haunted. From where I stood, it felt like Ruthie’s powers had been hanging out, doing their hair and nails, just waiting for her to return.
She whirled around to me. “How did you know?”
“I think things are revealed to me when the person is ready to know.”
The chief, who’d finally found and collected his faculties, walked up to her. “You put me through six months of hell because you lost your magic?”
“When you put it like that . . .”
He glared.
She explained. “I didn’t want you to be stuck with me. I was giving you an out.”
“An out? Ruthie Goode, why in the world would you think I’d want or need an out?”
“Houston, I’m dead.” She crossed her arms.
He crossed his arms right back and loomed over her. “So?”
“I can’t leave this house. We’ll never have a life. We’ll never get to go anywhere.”
“When did we go anywhere anyway?” He stepped closer. “I just want to be with you, woman. Why is that so hard for you to understand?”
I had a theory. “Your sudden and inexplicable inability to leave the house?”
She caved. “Contrived.”
“What?” he asked, flabbergasted.
“I can’t go out into the world if I’m supposed to be dead. How would I explain my existence?”
I rolled my eyes and looked at Annette, who rolled her head in solidarity. I turned back to Ruthie. “Ye of little soap opera trivia. You’re . . . Rachael. Ruthie’s twin sister, mysteriously just arrived in Salem, lurking around to steal a piece of her fortune. But instead, you fall in love with her adopted brother, only to find out he’s really her son, which makes your love child—”
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