Unraveled Homecoming

by J. L. Shelton

  Agnes’ eyes were bright with swirling power when she stopped to lean on her cane. “When an item becomes an important part of you, it appears from time to time during your Walks,” she said as an explanation for Mattie’s observation. “Never rely on its presence though, at least not until you are much more experienced.”

  “I’ve learned that lesson the hard way already,” Mattie grumbled, remembering how the weapon showed up whenever it pleased, despite her need or desire for it.

  “Good,” Agnes said with a gruff tone before putting her hand against a nearby tree.

  Though Mattie had seen her do the same when they had first arrived, an eyebrow still rose as an amber stream appeared to pulsate from Agnes’ palm. It wound its way down the tree and into the ground. From there, it narrowed and snaked into a gleaming path through the forest.

  The older woman’s eyes focused on the glowing stream, as if studying it. Then the woods grew darker when she removed her hand and caused the light to disappear. “Let’s go,” she said as she pointed her cane in the direction to where the magic had run.

  Mattie had to hurry and catch up to the woman after she had immediately stormed off. Her pace was surprisingly fast, the cane matching time with her steps as it hit the ground. In here, her spirit wasn’t hampered by the ailments of old age, making her as spry as a twenty-year-old.

  “Why does your searching become visible?” Mattie asked once she finally caught up with Agnes. “Whenever I do it, I just get a sense of where I need to go.”

  “You saw my magic; good,” she said with only a sidelong glance as they continued along. “For a Soul Walker, that’s an important part of the gift.”

  So that’s where the ability to see various colored strands of power came from! She couldn’t help but wonder, “Why would that be?”

  Agnes shook her head and grumbled, “I don’t have the patience for this. I’m no teacher.”

  “Who else am I going to ask?”

  Mattie’s demanding tone made Agnes growl. “Fine,” she finally said with resignation. “We need to see magic in order to help free minds from intrusive spells without damaging people in the process. The only way we can do that is if we have the ability to differentiate between what should be there and what shouldn’t.”

  Mattie’s brow furrowed. “But with Caligo’s Darkness, I only had to encourage the other person to release themselves.”

  “For that particular spell, it was the right answer. However, some curses can twist and entangle around the spirit so tightly that outside assistance is required. In those cases, we need to sever the tether and unwind the magical mess.”

  “How?”

  Agnes let loose a noise of frustration. “Enough with the pestering questions! Depending on what your mother has done, you might see for yourself what I mean!”

  Biting her tongue, Mattie kept the myriad of other inquiries at bay. Why hadn’t Agnes needed to recite the spell to activate her power? Why was her entry into this place more like someone walking into a room rather than the falling Mattie usually experienced going into another’s mind?

  Mattie was so deep in those thoughts that she almost bumped into Agnes when the woman suddenly halted in the middle of a clearing. There was a smile on her wrinkled face before she merrily said, “We are definitely on the right trail.”

  Glancing around, Mattie didn’t see anything to indicate her statement was correct. “How do you know?”

  The cane was pounded on the ground twice. “Look at the grass beneath your feet, girl!”

  Though confounded, Mattie obeyed. It was a frustrating task at first, because there was nothing overtly apparent to be found. Then she saw a faint line running across the ground behind the two of them, barely visible.

  “The grass is shorter here than back there,” Mattie gasped, amazed that the old woman had noticed the difference at all.

  “Evidence that either some of your memories have been returned or some parts of your powers have been unlocked,” Agnes stated while continuing to move forward.

  Mattie immediately followed and didn’t pepper the woman with all the questions rushing through her head. Agnes would probably tell her to keep quiet anyways. Instead, she tried to pay a little more attention to her surroundings.

  Soon the height of the trees lessened somewhat as the grass resembled the first growth of spring. As Mattie was wondering if all this represented more recent events, Agnes stopped and threw her arm out in a protective manner. The older woman had blocked Mattie’s path just in time! The land ended abruptly in front of them and opened into a bottomless canyon. The ragged chasm created an impassable divide, and a dark mist hung over the opposite side.

  “Well,” said Agnes dryly. “It appears we found the constraint on your powers.”

  Mattie stretched out both of her arms in frustration. “But how do we get to them in order to fix this?”

  Agnes closed her eyes and reached out with a gnarled hand towards the direction of the mist. Mattie wanted to ask what she was doing, but something told her not to interrupt. Instead, she bit her bottom lip, waiting impatiently for the woman to finish.

  Agnes’ shoulders stiffened for a moment, before she growled, “We can’t get across.”

  Mattie’s hands ran down the sides of her face at that announcement. Damn it! Was she going to be stuck like this forever?

  Agnes opened her eyes and leveled them at Mattie. “But there is one who can. Prepare yourself, because only the One knows what she’s like after all this time.”

  The realization about whom Agnes was talking barely registered before the older woman stood tall and struck her cane hard upon the ground! Her voice was strong and loud enough to echo throughout the mindscape when she called, “Annabelle Brewer Hawksthorne! Get your stubborn, Soul-Bending ass over here!”

  A soft breeze soon caught Mattie’s hair, as if it was a response. She waited, but nothing else happened. If she thought Agnes had been upset before, it was nothing compared to the scowl the old woman had on her face now.

  “Damn it, Annabelle! Your daughter needs this shit to end, otherwise her unborn child could die! Do you really want to be responsible for the death of your granddaughter!?”

  The wind began to pick up a little, and the smoky wisps across the way started to swirl and dance. They slowly parted like curtains being opened to allow some sunlight into a room, and a silhouetted shape began to walk through the forming arch. Then Mattie’s heart began to break again when the figure became clearer. Long auburn hair with loose and soft curls fell to the woman’s waist, and her garment was made of billowy silver. Those pale green eyes were filled with regret and tears as she seemed to walk on air across the expanse. Her eerie approach had Mattie backing away a few steps, while Agnes just remained where she stood and glared at the shade.

  Annabelle ignored her, those sad eyes for her daughter alone. Emotions roiled through Mattie as her mind raced with: I miss her, I love her, and I despise her! When her mother’s bare feet touched solid ground at last, the woman’s presence literally caused a weight to fall on her heart.

  “Mattie,” the shade said with a quiet plea as she stood there with arms wide open like she was expecting an embrace.

  A part of her wanted to go to Annabelle, to feel close to her mother again. Yet she also wanted to pummel the woman for the abomination of magic she had performed on her own daughter! The emotions behind these two possible reactions warred within Mattie, and she had no idea as to which one was going to win!

  Chapter 31

  The shade that used to be Annabelle Hawksthorne took a step forward, arms still outstretched. Shaking her head, Mattie backed further away from her mother. Annabelle’s countenance fell, as did her arms to her side. Agnes gave Mattie a sympathetic look, not surprised by her reaction.

  The ghostly doppelganger, however, obviously was. “Mattie, honey—it’s really me.”

  Anger swiftly won the war of emotions Mattie had been feeling. “No!” she snarled, holding her hand up
at the shade. “You do not get to call me ‘honey’ or any such thing ever, ever again!”

  Hurt filled those green eyes as if she had just been stabbed. “Please let me explain.”

  Crossing her arms, Mattie glared at her. “Explain what? How you purposefully crippled my powers? How you took some of my memories away from me? How your meddling nearly killed my daughter!?”

  The shade clasped her hands in front of her. “I am truly sorry that anything happened to her.”

  “Not sorry enough,” grumbled Agnes as she leaned on the cane for support.

  A stern look came over Annabelle’s face when she turned to the older woman. “Agnes, please. This is between Mattie and I.”

  A muttered “For now.” was Agnes’ response.

  “I only have one question—why!?” Mattie growled. “Why in the hell did you feel like you had to do all this to your only child?”

  “For that very reason—you are my only child,” she said in an exasperated tone. “Mattie, you have no idea what was going on at the time. I had to protect you!”

  That last sentence had Mattie wanting to scream! Her whole life had been about people thinking they knew what was best for her. Not a single one had realized the ramifications of their choices on her so-called behalf!

  “Protect me!?” Mattie screamed. “Do you have any idea what I’ve been through!? It’s like falling into a whirling vortex of confusion every damn time something new shakes loose. And whenever I discover that the people I loved most were keeping things from me, another piece of my heart breaks. How in the hell is that kind of suffering supposed to be for my welfare!?”

  “You needed a chance to have as normal a childhood as possible,” she said with a quiet yet firm voice. “That never would have been imaginable without your father’s choices, or mine.”

  Agnes and Mattie shared a derisive snort at that comment. “Even I know that her upbringing was far from typical,” griped the older woman. “There has to be a better excuse than that for breaking every damn rule in the book!”

  “Her life then!” shouted Annabelle, her eyes flashing with rage at Agnes. “Or did you forget my final suspicions regarding the one who had cursed me?”

  Now Mattie’s glare landed on Agnes, who was sadly shaking her head. “But you weren’t sure she was the one who had done the deed, and we had no proof in any case,” she said in a disheartened tone. “You could not remember when or how the spell had been cast.”

  “All the more reason to exert whatever means were at my disposal in order to make sure my daughter wasn’t attacked yet again!”

  There was just something about the way her mother had phrased that declaration which had Mattie raising her palm upwards as a signal for them to halt. “Wait. ‘Yet again’? As in more than once?”

  Annabelle lowered her head and hugged herself. “The Darkness that almost claimed you wasn’t the first time someone tried to steal you from us,” she whispered with a harsh edge in her voice. “The other incident happened on our last journey home from the Von Bos Estate. Evangeline had warned me against ever returning with you by my side, but I hadn’t listened to her that time—for many foolish reasons. Then the attack so shortly after the bond had accidentally been formed only steeled your father’s resolve to keep you away from Garin for as long as possible.”

  While that helped explain why her uncle had made sure she had never run into the man until six months ago, Mattie still shouted her disbelief. “Father never told me anything like this!”

  “He never knew the whole truth!” Annabelle insisted as she raised her head. Those eyes had a cold steel within them. “He thought the group attacking us was nothing more than bandits. I would have believed the same except for the one who told me that they would leave us alive if I gave you to them. That the fate of the world hung in the balance of my compliance and other such nonsense. Idiot didn’t realize that my husband had fully trained me to protect myself! That one found a dagger quickly plunged into his heart for daring to even try taking you from me.”

  “But I was just a baby! Who in the hell would have considered me a threat?”

  “Not a threat, Mattie. They considered you to be a prized asset they could use for their own ends.”

  “That makes no sense to me,” Mattie muttered, beginning to wonder if the shade had gone a little insane from being stuck in her head for so long. Besides the tainted Soul Walking, the unlimited transformations, and a minor skill in blood magic—she had no other power with which she had been born. The rest had come after the Dragon’s Heart had changed her.

  Agnes stared into the mist across the way, her eyes narrowing at something in the distance. She obviously didn’t like what she saw because she growled, “Damn it, Annabelle!” A gnarled finger pointed towards whatever had attracted the old woman’s ire. “No wonder you and grandmother had a falling out all those years ago. Doing that to a child is a violation of the highest order!”

  Annabelle’s vehement, “But there were no more kidnapping attempts!” barely registered while Agnes’ words rattled through Mattie’s brain. Something else was wrong with her, more than they had suspected. And all done by this woman’s overprotective belief that her daughter needed modified for safety’s sake!

  “What did you do to me, mother?” Mattie hissed, her anger starting to hit the boiling point.

  “Either you tell her—or I sure as hell will!” seethed Agnes, pounding the cane against the ground after Annabelle was stricken silent by her daughter’s enraged question.

  The shade took a deep breath and ran a trembling hand down the side of her face. Fear and regret were in those eyes, which did not make Mattie feel a damn bit better. Especially since Annabelle began to furtively glance between the two women like a rabbit caught in a trap.

  When her gaze finally remained on her daughter, she haltingly said, “Mattie, there’s no easy way to tell you this. You’ll probably never forgive me, but your magic was weak because I tangled everything within a power that I had completely shut down when you were two years old. Even as a baby, you had the telltale signs of becoming a Siphon.”

  Agnes gasped while Mattie’s brow furrowed in confusion. “A what?”

  “Someone who doesn’t usually manage to stay alive this long,” grumbled the white-haired one, a reluctant understanding in her expression. “Did our grandmother know?”

  Annabelle nodded. “Eventually.”

  “But why bother with carving out a separated space for yourself in her mind and dampening the rest?”

  “Because I wasn’t going to be around anymore to protect her, and the blocks would only hold while I maintained them. The separation was necessary so my personality didn’t influence her own! And if the villain believed Mattie couldn’t do magic, he or she would leave my daughter alone!”

  “What in the hell is a Siphon!?” Mattie screamed, their back-and-forth getting on her final nerve!

  The two women looked at each other. Agnes’ eyes were flashing a demand—Annabelle’s, a plea. The old seamstress forcefully shook her head and swept an arm towards the younger woman’s direction. The auburn-haired shade let out a frustrated sigh at the unspoken command. Mattie’s eyes only narrowed at their delay.

  “Mattie,” her mother finally said while absent-mindedly wringing her hands. “There is a rare magical talent that shows up in my family every few generations or so, and no one understands how or why it emerges. Though in your case, it might have been because I had gone to Rhea’s cave and pleaded with the universe to grant me a child.”

  When Agnes softly whispered, “Materdora.”, Mattie knew she was never going to get rid of this growl in her voice! “Stupidity on your part aside, mother, what exactly is this special power?”

  “A Siphon can channel and use the magical energy from another to augment their own,” she said with quiet frankness as those nervous hands stilled. “The power and talents of the other person adds to what already exists within, creating a force much greater than either original caste
r.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” Mattie said angrily. “Who has ever heard of such a thing?”

  “We have,” said Agnes flatly. “Stories abound if you know where to look. Ask your great-grandmother someday about her elven family, especially her Uncle Enono.”

  Mattie was seething now. How many secrets and omissions were going to rear up their ugly heads? “Even if all this is true, how in the hell did you figure out that I could possibly be one!?”

  Despite the rage directed at her, Annabelle’s sigh was on the sad side. “The first signs were the numerous times you managed to do little bits of magic as an infant, depending on who was present. I can’t tell you how many times you healed your own cuts and bruises after touching either me or Belladonna.”

  “Which is far too young for the gift of healing to manifest,” grumbled Agnes.

  “I still don’t understand why that made you think it was a good idea for me to be magically hobbled!” screamed Mattie, trying not to imagine how different her life would have been if her mother had left well enough alone!

  “I didn’t even consider it until the day Evangeline’s foresight hit her with a sudden and dramatic shift, the center of which involved both you and Garin. Even with your combined magical strength, children that young should not have been able to complete such a strong bond without some kind of help. Between that accidental connection and the kidnapping attempt, I decided to nip that particular gift of yours in the bud.”

  “But why?”

  Annabelle’s voice cracked as if the memories were too much for her. “Someone knew, Mattie. Somehow, they knew!”

  “Or at least suspected, by the sounds of it,” said Agnes with a nod of her weathered head.

  Was Mattie confused? Yes. Was that emotion pissing her off? You had better believe it!

  “Let me see if I’m hearing this shit correctly,” she snarled. “You shut off one of my powers completely, making it impossible for me to ever become accustomed to it, all because you thought someone wanted to steal me away in order to use me for some nefarious end? Then to further protect me, you also hid both yourself and most of my magical abilities deep within my mind? How in the hell did messing with my psyche make me safe!?”