“Yvette and Yvonne have assured me that Alana’s condition is severe but stable,” Morgan replied, kneading the bridge of her nose between her fingers. “They’ve seen no distressing changes in her.”
“They haven’t seen any good ones either.” My toast lay cold and abandoned as I tried to get through to the older witch. “Come on, Morgan. You’ve always said that you trust my judgement, and my judgement is telling me that what we’re doing isn’t working. Not well enough, anyway. I need to find this girl, and I can’t do that if I’m stuck in Yew Hollow.”
Morgan set down her mug. It left a tired ring of coffee on the mahogany tabletop. “I do trust you, Gwenlyn, but you’re also young. This ward keeps us safe. If we open a rift, we open ourselves up too. The ward doesn’t just keep the curse from progressing. It prevents the culprit from locating us. I can’t risk that. We’ll find another way without the healer.”
“What if there is no other way?” I asked. “What if we waste away under this glorified circus tent because we decided that it was too dangerous to venture outside? I’m not asking anyone to go with me, Morgan. No one else has to risk their health, but I’m not really a Summers, remember? I’ll be safe outside the ward.”
“No,” Morgan growled.
“You’re being stubborn—”
“I said no, Gwenlyn!”
Her voice boomed through the dining room, echoing to the far corners of the house as she magically amplified the sound waves to get her point across. Her aura slammed me against my chair, stunning me into silence. As her power settled, Morgan rested her elbows on the table and dropped her head into her hands, staring straight down into her coffee to avoid my gaze.
“Fine,” I said quietly. “Let me know when your pride cools down and you realize that I’m right about this. I’ll be in my room.”
I left her to stew in the kitchen and climbed the stairs to the second floor. Winnie was waiting for me, lounging on my bed as she watched some famous chef whip up a pot roast.
“Wow,” she said as I collapsed face down into the pillows next to her.
“You heard?”
“Who didn’t?”
I flipped over, giving the pillows a frustrated thwack as I maneuvered them to sit against the headboard. “She’s being ridiculous. Ignoring this won’t make it go away. We can’t manage a curse. It’s like living in purgatory. Eventually, it’s going to escalate and catch up to us, and when it does, we won’t have a damn clue what to do.”
Winnie stretched and rested against the pillows with her arm behind her head. “I think Morgan is doing what she thinks is best for the coven.”
“Oh, so you’re taking her side? Great. So much for support. What kind of twin are you anyway?”
“I didn’t say I agreed with her,” Winnie retorted, swiping her hand through my head and causing my brain to momentarily freeze over. “Actually, I think her anxiety is affecting her judgment. Even the best leaders fall prey to self-doubt sometimes, and when they do, it’s often up to their second-in-command to step up to the plate.”
I wrenched my eyes from the chef’s hypnotic onion dicing to study my sister. “What are you suggesting?”
A line appeared between Winnie’s eyebrows, the same line that appeared on my own face whenever I was deep in thought. “You can open a portal in the ward on your own, right?”
“It wouldn’t be easy,” I answered. “But I could do it. Yes.”
“Far be it from me to encourage you to disobey your coven leader,” Winnie said, shifting into a more active pose as her ideas took over. “But I agree with you. I think the only hope of saving this coven is to find the healer. Morgan may not approve now, but she might change her mind when she sees how much a super-powered witch can flip the advantage.”
I chewed anxiously on my lip, considering the possibility. “She would kill me.”
“Probably,” Winnie agreed nonchalantly, “but then she’d most likely thank you for doing what she couldn’t.”
I groaned and tossed the TV remote across the room out of frustration. It collided with the image of the steaming pot roast, and the batteries toppled out. “I don’t feel comfortable with sneaking out. It would be blatantly betraying Morgan’s trust.”
“You know what they say,” Winnie said with a shrug. “Better to beg for forgiveness than—”
“To ask for permission,” I finished. I already felt queasy at the thought of directly disobeying Morgan’s orders, but something needed to be done. “I’ll go tonight. Will you come with me?”
Winnie answered with a warm smile. “Of course.”
As she returned her attention to the television screen, I subtly studied her from the side. It had been well over a month since she’d first appeared in my bedroom. It was one of the longest hauntings I’d ever experienced. Part of me felt guilty for not doing more to convince her to cross over. Ghosts who lingered on earth for too long eventually found themselves unable to venture into the otherworld at all. I didn’t want to condemn her to such a fate. She had suffered enough in life, and she deserved a peaceful one after death. On the other hand, I cherished the time we spent together. Somehow, between the research and the coven’s feud and the hunt for the healer, Winnie and I managed to laugh, share stories, and connect with one another. She told me about growing up in a small coven in the southwest and I filled her in on all the quaint chaos of Yew Hollow. I grew accustomed to her presence, and in the long run, I realized one selfish fact about myself: I didn’t want Winnie to go.
“Stop staring at me,” she instructed without straying from the television.
“Sorry.”
“It’s all right. What’s on your mind?”
I sighed wistfully. “You.”
Winnie glanced over at me, saw my distressed expression, and stretched out to face me instead of the TV. “What about me?”
“I feel like I’m letting you down,” I mumbled, picking at the pattern of the purple quilt. “I’ve been so focused on the coven that I haven’t spared even a minute to think about getting you to the otherworld.”
Winnie chuckled.
“What’s so funny?” I asked.
“You,” she replied. “And Morgan, by extension. See, you keep going on about how you’re supposed to help me, but I told you already, Gwen. I have no debts to settle or goodbyes to give. You don’t have to help me do anything.”
“There has to be something,” I insisted. “Otherwise, why are you here?”
She tapped my nose with the tip of her finger. “To help you, silly.”
“What?”
Winnie rolled her eyes, as if my bewilderment was endearing. “Here’s the problem with you and Morgan being so alone in your psychic medium education. In your experience, every single ghost you’ve encountered has come to you for assistance. That’s understandable. Most people are inherently selfish, especially in death. But did it ever once occur to you that maybe—just maybe—each ghost that appeared to you taught you a valuable lesson?”
“Every single one of them?” I asked skeptically. “Because I’d really like to know what I learned from the eighty-year-old grandpa that tried to hit on me before I could throw him into the next dimension.”
“All I’m saying is that you should stop worrying about me,” Winnie said, smirking at my anecdote. “It’s no coincidence that I showed up here on the exact same day Yew Hollow experiences its biggest disaster in ten years. You want to help me cross over? Focus on saving the coven. That’s why I’m here—to help my sister.”
Before I could agree or disagree, a rumble of thunder shook the house. I scrambled to my feet and looked out of the window.
“Crap,” I said, squinting up at the gathering black clouds.
“What is it?”
“There’s a big storm rolling in.”
These days, the only weather Yew Hollow got was rain. It pelted the town regardless of news reports or radar readings. I was not naïve. Each bout of rain stank of the same acrid smell as that of the first
. The storms were part of the curse, and every time another one swept through the area, it left the witches weaker and sicker than they had been before.
Morgan’s voice echoed up the staircase and into my bedroom. “Gwenlyn?”
I momentarily forgot about our tiff from earlier. Any moment now, the skies would open up, showering the town with more bad luck. Morgan needed my help. I abandoned the sickening sight at the window and hurried into the hallway.
“On my way.”
12
An hour later, the Summers house was full to bursting with nearly every member of the coven. The storm raged on, the worst one we had witnessed since the initial downpour that had left me with a witch’s mark and the lingering effects of electrocution. Water poured off the roof in buckets, constant thunder made a deafening racket, and lightning flashed so close to the windows that the children were hiding under the dining room table out of fright.
The witches were panicking. Their health deteriorated by the minute. All of the work we did to hold the effects of the curse at bay was meaningless. The house now resembled a makeshift hospital ward in the middle of a war zone rather than actual living space. I had vanished all of the furniture on the first floor and replaced it with a number of twin-sized beds. Each one was occupied. Auras flickered and trembled like dying embers, a sight that ate away at my heart. It seemed impossible that one dark hex could reduce a once-ferocious coven of witches to the quivering helpless collection of women before me.
I did my best to tend to everyone, but even though the curse didn’t affect me, I didn’t have enough energy to go around. I rationed myself off to the best of my abilities. The witches were in pain, and it hurt me to see my family so afflicted. I gave as much as I could—soothing muscles aches, clearing clogged airways, and guiding witches into unconsciousness—until I felt woozy and unsteady on my feet. As I mixed an anti-itch healing salve in the kitchen to combat the nasty red rash on some of the witches, vertigo overtook me. I dropped the bowl of salve and gripped the edge of the counter, trying my best to make sense of the world around me.
Just as I went spiraling toward the floor, someone caught me from behind and lowered me gently to the cool tile. I recognized Morgan’s gentle aura through my haze. She propped my head in her lap, and I closed my eyes until the room stopped spinning.
“You know, wearing yourself out isn’t going to counter this curse,” she murmured, wiping sweat off my forehead with a damp dishtowel.
“They need help.”
“I know.”
She fell silent, rhythmically combing her fingers through my hair. I’d finally trimmed off the burnt ends, which left the style shorter than ever.
“Gwen?”
“Hmm.”
“My pride has cooled down.”
I wearily opened one eye, catching an upside down glimpse of Morgan. All night, I’d only seen her from across the room as we triaged the witches and did our best to treat them. Now that she was so close, I could see how badly the curse was affecting her too. Morgan had died once. She’d been to the otherworld and back, and she had looked better then than she did now. Morgan was a living corpse, the stuff of nightmares, with sunken cheeks, haunted eyes, and pallid skin. No one could fight a curse looking like the living dead.
“We have to go to Windsor Falls,” I said, closing my eyes again to ward off additional images of Morgan’s frightening features.
I felt her nod in agreement. “We need to wait for this storm to pass, and you need to get your energy back up. I want you to go upstairs and sleep. You’re done helping for now. We can hold on through the night. Tomorrow, we’ll figure out a way to open a door in the ward. Laurel?”
“Yes?”
I peeked through my eyelids as Laurel came into the kitchen. She fared slightly better than Morgan, but the curse took its toll on her as well.
“Help Gwen up to her room,” Morgan said. “Make sure she gets to bed.”
With Laurel’s help, Morgan and I stumbled up from the floor. Laurel and I leaned on each other as we made our way through the dining room. At the bottom of the stairs, I turned to look at Morgan, who had already returned to aiding the other witches despite her wearied state.
“Are you sure?” I asked her. “I can stay.”
Morgan shook her head firmly, pointing up the stairs. “Go. I need you at your best.”
So Laurel took me upstairs, lay me down in bed, and tucked the duvet around me. As she left, I noticed Winnie glimmering like a night light in the corner of the room. She was hiding. I knew why. There were people in pain downstairs. If she were alive, she would be able to help them. Instead, her death rendered her useless. At some point, she couldn’t take it anymore. Neither could I.
“Tomorrow,” I muttered to her, my face mashed against the pillows. “Tomorrow, we fix this.”
I slept soundly through the night, and by the time morning broke, my craft had restored itself to full strength. I slid out of bed in last night’s clothes and looked out the window. The storm had wreaked havoc on Yew Hollow. Dead branches, leaves, and debris were scattered throughout the yard. In the distance, a fallen tree rested on the roof of Laurel’s greenhouse. It would need repairs. The water mill had most likely taken damage too. I sighed heavily. The witches were in no state to clean up the town after this storm.
I showered, got dressed, and trod downstairs. Most of the witches were asleep, recovering from yesterday’s fallout. They were united in unconsciousness. No one argued about coven leaders or Yew Hollow’s fate. Even Camryn was quiet, sitting on a cot in the corner of the living room and gazing out at the side yard in contemplation. I tiptoed through the slumbering witches, following leftover wisps of Morgan’s aura to locate her. She was sitting on the back porch with Laurel, rocking in one of the wooden chairs as she sipped a potent-smelling concoction from a coffee mug. Laurel sat on the porch steps, her bare feet resting in the dead grass of the backyard. She looked solemn. Yew Hollow’s lack of greenery was wearing thin on her.
“Morning,” I said, careful not to let the screen door slam and wake the others as I joined them. “How are you feeling?”
“Slightly better,” Morgan replied. She tipped her mug at the empty chair, gesturing for me to sit down. “And you?”
I ignored the chair and propped my ankle up on the railing of the porch to stretch out the back of my leg. “Fully rejuvenated. I think we should get going as soon as possible. I just need your help to get through the ward. Then I’ll be there and back by the end of the day, hopefully with this healer in tow.”
Morgan shook her head. “No way.”
My sneaker thunked to the wood planks of the porch. “Seriously? You changed your mind already?”
“I mean you won’t be going alone,” Morgan said. “Laurel and I are coming with you.”
“Oh.” I looked between them in consternation. “Is that a good idea? You said yourself that the ward might be the only thing preventing this illness from getting worse.”
Laurel trailed her fingers through the dirt at her feet. “Morgan and I are the healthiest out of the coven. If we keep our venture short, we should be fine.”
“Why risk it?” I asked. “Stay here. Save your strength.”
“Gwen, we don’t know anything about this girl,” Morgan pointed out. She wiped a droplet of spilled potion from the side of her mug. “I can’t send you to find her on your own.”
“I won’t be on my own,” I countered. “I’ll have Winnie with me.”
“While Winnie gives excellent direction and advice, she won’t be able to help you should you find yourself in a sticky situation.” Morgan beckoned me over to her, so I finally sat down in the chair opposite her. “We’ll go together. We’re stronger that way.”
I had not been to the edge of the ward since it was constructed, so when we reached the line between Yew Hollow and the rest of Massachusetts, I was alarmed to see that the curse had somewhat bled out beyond the borders of the town. It was nothing in comparison to the gra
y world in which we lived, but the trees that lined the road leading to the interstate showed unnaturally early signs of frostbite. Even so, I relished the color outside of the ward. I forgot how beautiful the world looked in the fall. The red, orange, and yellow hues warmed me from the inside out, and I bounced up and down on the balls of my feet in anticipation. Today’s excursion would be a welcome respite from the monotony of the last month.
It was no easy task to open a trapdoor in the ward. Layers and layers of witchcraft made up the magical force field, and it was so well fortified that it took two hours for me, Morgan, and Laurel to punch a tiny hole in the surface of it. We widened it just enough to scramble through to the other side. I went first, flattening myself out and crawling military style through the narrow opening. It was like navigating a clear glass tunnel. I could feel the ward, but I couldn’t see it, which made moving through it all the more peculiar. Winnie followed behind me, her icy presence biting at my heels, and we waited on the other wide for Morgan and Laurel to worm their way through.
I inhaled through my nose, savoring the scent and feeling of fresh air through my lungs. It was a brisk cool morning, and the chill already permeated the fluffy liner of my green bomber jacket. I cherished it anyway, knowing that the feeling of freedom would vanish when we returned to Yew Hollow later that day.
I lent Morgan and Laurel a hand as they emerged from the ward. They took great gulps of the refreshing autumn morning. As a bit of color flushed their cheeks, I wondered if creating the ward hadn’t been the best decision after all. Morgan and Laurel looked healthier outside the barrier than they had in the past several weeks. Maybe we should’ve followed the locals’ lead and evacuated Yew Hollow instead.
Since there was no way to get a car through the ward, we walked to the highway, lured a friendly man driving a passenger van to the side of the road, and lightly spelled him to pass out. I took over the steering wheel as Laurel and Morgan belted him into the backseat, and just like that, we were on our way to Windsor Falls. We reviewed what little information I had gathered about the super-powered healer and formulated a rough plan as I piloted the van through upstate Massachusetts.
Witch Myth Super Boxset: A Yew Hollow Cozy Mystery Page 40