by Coralie Moss
Magic Reclaimed
A Calliope Jones novel
Coralie Moss
Copyright © 2019 by Coralie Moss
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, objects, and incidents herein are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual living things, events, locales, or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Published internationally by Pink Moon Books, British Columbia, Canada.
ISBN 978-1-7752646-9-9
Created with Vellum
The entire MAGIC series owes its inception to Meghan Ciana Doidge, her husband, Michael, and an afternoon conversation over iced tea and Meghan’s magical gingersnap cookies.
Getting ‘Magic Reclaimed’ written and into the world could only have happened because a group of women held my boat steady at a time in my life when the waves were coming over the gunwales.
I dedicate this book to:
Yaffa Seraph, Tia Barber, Taralynn Moore, Taylor Fox, R.R. Taylor, Michelle McCraw, Meka James, Maureen Marshall, Marit Tinguely, Luna Joya, Lily Michaels, Lauren Accardo, LA Burroughs, Jessica Calla, Jeni Chappelle, Felicia Grossman, Evie Drae and E.C. Farrell.
Thank you.
Contents
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
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Coralie Moss
Magic Redeemed (book #3)
Chapter 1
“I know what you are, Calliope.”
Officer Jack Kaukonen of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police planted himself at the end of my roughed-up gravel driveway, hands on his hips and chalky half-circles under his eyes. His unexpected presence at one o’clock in the morning was no social call.
“Jack,” I said, trying to keep my body language from broadcasting the maelstrom tugging me in multiple directions, “what are you talking about?” I shifted my weight to one leg and crossed my arms under my breasts, hoping a flash of cleavage would draw his attention away from the collection of Magicals keeping tabs from the kitchen window.
“I know you’re a witch.” He tapped the side of his nose. “An earth witch. Wolves have an acute sense of smell.”
Oh. A fraction of the internal storm quieted at his admission.
“Certain spells leave an olfactory residue, and my nose tells me there was a sorcerer here tonight.” He lifted his chin in the direction of the clumps of sod and the cluster of overturned tables and chairs littering my yard. “A powerful sorcerer. In addition…” He inhaled again, flared his nostrils, and squinted. “There were at least two otter shifters, three witches, a wolf, and a couple others I don’t recognize off the bat but let me get my nose to the ground and I will.”
“I had no idea, Jack.”
“No idea your party guests were Magicals?” he asked, shifting slightly on his boot-clad feet. His black work pants strained at the seams.
I chided myself for staring at his thighs. Eyes up, Calliope.
“No idea you were on the magical spectrum,” I answered. Generally, I could sense when I was in the presence of other Magicals, even prior to my recent initiation ceremonies. Jack had never popped up on my radar, which might have been another downside of the magic-muting tattoo I’d only recently gotten rid of.
When he glared at me and ran fingers through his close-cropped hair, I held his gaze. Now that he’d shared his secret, I waited to see if his animal side would show. “I’ve known you were a witch for a while, Calliope. Just never had a good opening line on the tip of my tongue.”
Yeah, Jack was a shifter all right. The wolf peeked out, amber facets shining in his eyes, and headed toward hopeful before making a U-turn back to Officer Jack.
Once I grasped that piece of the puzzle, the control he held over himself made a lot more sense. So did the zing zipping between us the first time he’d showed up at the house. I twined my fingers through the cords looped around my neck to remind myself what was at stake.
“I’m getting concerned,” he said. “This is the second time in two weeks I’ve been called out here because of a disturbance.”
“And the last time you were here, I told you—”
“You were lying, but I couldn’t to say anything in front of Lewis. My partner’s human.”
The last time Jack—and Lewis—had parked their RCMP-issued vehicle at the end of my driveway, a druid had just hauled my ex-husband and his twin brother out of the woods behind my house. The men had not come out quietly.
Rifling through my options, I decided I could present Jack with a partial truth. “I’ve been having some trouble with Doug. That night, he and his brother Roger thought it would be fun to harass me in my own backyard.”
“You could have called me for help.”
“A friend helped me strengthen the protective wards around the property. I figured the boys and I were okay.” I shrugged, tried to keep my expression nonchalant, and left out the bit about the friend being a druid with a wolfy side.
A woman’s voice called, “Calli!” from my house.
Jack’s gaze traced a line from my face to the deck fronting my A-frame. I swiveled on my heels and confirmed the voice was Rowan’s. She was a local OB/GYN doctor and witch. She was also one of my newest Magical friends.
“Everything’s okay,” I yelled, waving. “I’ll be right there.” The night air had dropped a good ten degrees since red-and-blue revolving lights had announced Jack’s arrival. I rubbed my upper arms and shivered. “Jack, I can handle the stuff with Doug. I promise.”
He gave my shoulder a brief squeeze. If my response trigger wasn’t so skittish, I might have leaned into the masculine solidity of his chest, let him wrap his arms around me, and confessed every bit of worry. But my life was complicated enough without muddying a fairly straightforward relationship.
“I believe you,” he said. “But if another complaint comes in, I’m going to have to take statements. From you and from everyone else on the property, whether they’re Magical or human.” The wolf reappeared in Jack’s eyes, this time clinical and assessing. “Be careful, Calliope. Something’s coming, and it doesn’t smell right.”
A prickly silence grew between us. Jack wanted to push, and I wasn’t going to give him any more information. I was going to gather information. Using one big toe, I nudged aside a few nuggets of gravel and briefly closed my eyes. Jack’s energy glimmered like molten minerals in the crack that opened up between my toe and where he stood.
Gotcha.
He glanced toward my house once more then turned toward his car. “You might want to do a complete overhaul of those wards,” he said, raising his voice as he walked away. “I didn’t feel a damn thing when I got out of my car.”
His parting shot stung. I stayed put, the bottoms of my feet whimpering about the gra
vel, until the retreating sound of the police car was swallowed in the night. The glimmering strand connected to him snuffed out.
Fuck.
And ouch. I took a couple steps to the side until I stood on more forgiving ground, shoved my hands into the back pockets of my jeans, and for one protracted moment, let the waves of overwhelm I’d been holding at bay crash around me. I started to shake.
Jack was right. And wrong. The something he felt coming was already here, and the druid the RCMP officer had sensed—Tanner Marechal—was responsible for its presence.
I called the something the Apple Witch. In their shared pasts, Tanner and the Apple Witch had been lovers. And for weeks this summer, maybe longer, she had pursued him and in the process of doing so, latched onto me. And now, the druid was out there, beyond the matte black trees and sky, maybe beyond this island—way beyond—looking for her.
Recounting all that in my head while waiting for my joints to regroup enough I could walk tall and face the expectant houseful made it hard to take a full breath.
Tanner had to find the Apple Witch. Two of my party guests were in her safekeeping, at my behest, and I knew in my gut she was unpredictable. Asking her for help had been a decision made in a moment of adrenaline-fueled desperation.
I hoped I wouldn’t regret that decision. Because those special guests, Abigail and Clifford Pearmain, owned the orchard where two hidden folk had been murdered. I shivered and rubbed my upper arms.
Before Tanner left to pursue the Apple Witch, he’d entrusted the ever-present pouch he wore to me. Revisiting the moment he snugged the cords over my head, my heartbeat sent the pouch bouncing against my sternum. I could see the squarish leather adornment through the thin cotton of my T-shirt, even with my back to the porch light.
I wasn’t one-hundred percent comfortable with the idea of guarding an object of mystical origin and magical potential. But as Tanner made me the promise he would find the Apple Witch, and Clifford and Abigail, he deemed the pouch important enough to leave in my care.
Or maybe it was the other way around. Maybe the pouch had to stay out of the Apple Witch’s sight.
Fuck. The past really could come back to haunt you. And slice up your lawn and steal your friends.
“Calliope! Are you coming?” My grandfather’s voice boomed across the yard.
My grandfather. I snorted. Searched the sky for Orion’s Belt and traced the collection of stars comprising my favorite constellation. My grandfather’s appearance on my roof at the end of last night’s chaos should have been the shock of my adult life. Instead, having a winged man swoop down the long roofline, land on the grass, and call me granddaughter was par for the course. My life had taken on a decidedly wild and unpredictable rhythm, and his arrival was just another beat.
Enough me time. I made my way toward the homey light and up the porch stairs, to the man framed in the doorway.
“Trouble?” he asked, holding the screen door open.
“No. And yes,” I answered. “Turns out my high school buddy, Jack, is a wolf.”
Christoph, my paternal grandfather and bird-man—no last name yet—nodded. “The Kaukonens are a good family, Calliope. I wouldn’t rush into sharing all of your secrets with him, but I don’t think you have to hold back.”
This relative, who up until two or so hours ago had been MIA my entire life to the extent I had no idea he even existed, had the rundown on my friend’s reputation. If I got as angry about that right now as I felt, what little energy I had left would go there and not where it was truly needed—toward the people waiting for me in the house.
“Thanks. I’ll take your opinion under advisement,” I said, unable to fend off the sarcasm. That’s what exhaustion and a surfeit of surprises did to me.
“You’re angry. And that’s understandable. We have all the time in the world to talk now.” His hand landed on my upper back for a brief moment before I shrugged it off. We were way too new to one another for that kind of earned intimacy.
He pulled the door tight and engaged the lock.
A quick scan of my kitchen and living room showed two other druids who’d recently entered my life, Wes and Kaz. They were head to head at the dining table with their knives and scraps of wood spread before them. I didn’t see my sons, their cousin Sallie, or Harper’s girlfriend Leilani. Rowan was out of sight too.
“The doctor made a pot of tea,” said Christoph, his voice raspy, “and took Harper, Thatcher, and the girls upstairs.”
I turned, wanting to get a good look at the birdman standing in the nexus of my house. He didn’t look grandfather-ish, except for the flowing white hair speckled with flecks of steel gray cascading down his back. He was a few inches taller than me and, up close, finer boned than I first thought. Bird-boned. And he didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands.
“I need to check on the kids,” I said, distracted by him fidgeting with the pockets of his fitted vest. “Maybe you could see if there’s anything Wes and Kaz need. Last I knew, they were going to reinforce the protective wards around the house.”
Christoph exhaled, and when he did, his shoulders lowered. He let his arms hang at his sides. His hand fisted, and his knuckles paled.
“I have something for you.” He extended his arm, his fingers curled around an offering. “Calliope,” he began.
I pulled my gaze off what he was holding and stumbled into the wall behind me. “Your eyes…”
His eyes, onyx circled with a corona of yellow, had no pupils.
“I am a gyrfalcon, granddaughter. And I have a gift for you. Please,” he continued, unfurling his fingers and blinking. “Take them. And wear them.”
Two rings, carved from pieces of a star-filled arctic sky, made a figure-eight in the middle of his palm. They were too big around for any of my fingers.
“What are these?” I asked, knowing full well they had to be more than simple jewelry.
“You wear them on your thumbs.” He lifted one and gestured. “They belonged to your father.”
My father. My father had worn these rings. I had never been offered anything of his. I extended my arms, gave Christoph my thumbs, and gasped when the bands tightened onto the middle joint. He cradled my hands in his and cleared his throat. “I found them on the shore, in the pockets of his folded pants, the day Benôit disappeared.”
Chapter 2
Benoît. My father had a name. Miniscule flecks of ore twinkled throughout the matte black metal of the rings. My father had worn these same rings, and the metal responded to my touch. Now was not the time to open the door labelled Dad, but I couldn’t catch the tear before it landed on one thumb. Little Calliope had stopped longing for her father ages ago, and Big Calliope was about to collapse.
“Your father, like me, was born with the gift of flight, Calliope, but he was less attracted to reaching the clouds than he was to bodies of water, especially the sea.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, wiping my nose with the back of my wrist. The magical metal called to me. I couldn’t bear to take my gaze off its changing surface, and its tensile strength buttressed my shaky knees.
“Do you remember anything from when you and your mother lived with her parents in Maine?”
“I have bits of memories,” I admitted, glancing at Christoph. His head was bowed, staring at the rings’ alchemical reaction to my skin. “I’m underwater in the most vivid ones.”
“Do you remember your mother being in the water with you?”
“Yes. And we were happy.”
“And what about your father?”
I shook my head. There were no photographs of my father amongst my mother’s things, at least not that I had knowingly come across. I rotated my hands so the palms faced down and almost did a face plant against my grandfather’s chest. “The only other thing in the water with us had flippers.”
Christoph took that as an invitation to make a physical connection and squeeze my fingers. The rings on his thumbs pressed against mine. “Calliope, that
’s your father.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, unable to stop the image of my mother, happy, swimming, and next to her, flippers. Little Calliope had known the flippers weren’t rubber accessories attached to human legs. Big Calliope was slow to catch on.
He released my hands, reached behind either side of his hips, and brought his lower feathers forward enough he could perch himself on my kitchen’s lone stool. “Benoît had the ability to grow wings and fly. Like me. It’s a rare trait, but for those endowed with such a gift, the need to fly usually dominates. My son preferred the sea to the sky, and his wings were useless in the water.” He bounced the toe of his sandal against the side of the island. “He loved you and your mother. He also loved other women, including a selkie. Genevieve understood this about him.”
“Selkie?”
“Seal Folk, Calliope. Magical beings that wear their mammal skins in the water and shed them to walk as humans on land.” He crossed his arms and tucked his fingers under his armpits. “Benoît had an affair with a selkie and would borrow her skin.”
The dim bulb in my head flared as I made the connection.
“Were my parents even married?” I asked. Curiosity gave me enough of a mental boost to see what else this conversation might reveal.
“Yes,” Christoph assured me, “they were married in Maine. I was at the ceremony, along with your mother’s parents, the grandparents you said you remembered from the cottage. There’s more,” he continued, “much more. Would you like to hear about your parents now or later?”