by Jane Tara
Sadie looked at her children as a wave of shame engulfed her. They saw magic in this man. She’d been so caught up in the superficial things that she’d missed it. Almost.
“I’d love you to stay,” she said. And she meant it.
CLEMENTINE
Christmas Eve
Stupid, stupid, she was so stupid. She’d spent months falling for Samantha’s lies. She’d spent money she didn’t have coming over here. She’d ignored the warnings from people who cared about her: Paige, her parents, Sadie and Amanda. And Debra. God, she’d been so dismissive of Debra, when she’d been right all along.
And now she was all alone for Christmas in a city she already despised.
Clementine sobbed all the way back to the hotel. As soon as she was in her room, she threw herself on the bed. What she’d give to be at home now, with Deb, watching movies and eating one of her seriously delicious cheesecakes.
She blew her nose and scrounged through her bag for her phone. She checked her phone and saw three messages from Deb.
So what’s happening? Have you met Sam?
Then an hour later:
Can you give me an update so I know you’re okay?
Another twenty-seven minutes later.
Just fucking let me know you’re not in a ditch somewhere!
Clementine laughed through her tears. Debra came across as so tough but she was like a mother hen. She messaged her back.
I’m okay. I’m in my hotel room.
Debra’s response pinged back almost immediately.
Thank god. I was getting worried. So are you with Sam?
It was killing Clementine to admit it, but if she couldn’t talk to Debra about it, then who could she talk to?
I messed up, Deb. She was horrible. She lives with someone.
Clementine waited for Debra’s reply. It was bound to be funny. She waited. And waited. Nothing, so she messaged her again.
Deb, did you get my last message?
No answer.
No doubt you’re rolling around the floor laughing. Or getting your “I told you so” speech ready.
There was a knock on the door. Clementine walked over to answer it, glancing at the screen of her phone as she did, willing Debra to answer. She swung the door open and …
“I wasn’t getting my ‘I told you so’ speech ready. I was legging it up from the hotel cafe, where I’ve been sitting for the past three hours.”
“Deb!” And Clementine burst into tears. “What the hell?”
Debra wrapped her arms around Clementine. “I couldn’t let you spend Christmas alone.”
Clementine melted into the embrace. It was exactly where she wanted to be. What had she been thinking? She pulled back and looked at the woman who had been her best friend for over two years.
“Jesus Christ, Deb. How did I miss it?”
Debra gently pushed a locked of hair back from Clementine’s face. “Selective vision, Clem. Sometimes it takes a while to see what’s right in front of us.”
PAIGE
The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.
Eden Phillpotts
Two days before Christmas
Paige stood in front of the quirky-looking cottage and wondered what the hell had come over her. What would possess a woman of her age to take off into the countryside with three witches and her mother’s physiotherapist?
“You okay, Paige?” Arley seemed to read her mind.
“No … I don’t think I am.”
“Nothing like a good shake-up of one’s world to get things in perspective,” said Arley.
Paige didn’t respond.
“Go on in, you guys,” called Calypso as she unloaded some groceries from the car. “It’s not locked.”
“She doesn’t lock her house?”
Nell appeared beside Paige. “No need. The protection spells here are so strong, nothing will enter uninvited.”
If only I’d known that before forking out for an expensive alarm system at the shop, thought Paige.
Paige followed Nell into the house. She had a feeling she’d follow Nell anywhere. While Calypso, Taran and Arley, especially Arley, shook her foundations, Nell made her feel safe. She had a calming quality about her that Paige clung to.
“Come and I’ll show you around, Paige.”
Ash Cottage was a pretty little stone structure tucked away at the edge of a forest near Tintagel in Cornwall. The cottage was a cozy little warren with stone walls and wood floors. While the decor looked like it hadn’t changed for generations, there was no doubting that the house was a home. It had a wonderful light energy that sprang from centuries of laughter bouncing off the walls. Nell led Paige through a lounge room and dining room, a kitchen and a rather antiquated bathroom out the back. Then she took her up the higgledy-piggledy stairs to the two bedrooms.
“Are you and Arley together?” asked Nell.
Paige almost fell over. “Oh, no … nup, noooo. He’s my mother’s physiotherapist.”
“That’s a pity,” Nell said simply. “But convenient for me. Do you mind sharing this room with me?”
Paige stuck her head around the doorway of the second bedroom and into a sunny little room with two single beds covered in patchwork quilts.
“Not at all. I’m happy to share.” Secretly, Paige was relieved she’d be sticking close to Nell.
“Callie and Taran will be in the other bedroom, and Arley can have the lounge.”
Paige put her bag on the bed near the window. She was tempted to crawl under the quilt then and there. She’d had a restless night’s sleep, tossing and turning and regretting her plans to leave London with the others the following morning. She’d spent the entire night trying to come up with a good enough reason to cancel.
“I’m not well. I think I’ve got food poisoning.” And then she remembered that Nell had given her dinner, so she tossed and turned some more.
“I can’t leave the shop.” But that wasn’t true. Sadie was thrilled to be there.
“I don’t believe in fairies and think you’re all as mad as my mother, and it frightens me.” That was the truth, but Paige hated being rude or confrontational.
She turned to Nell, who was watching her from the door. “I’m not feeling myself.”
Nell smiled kindly. “If you’re half Fey but have only just found out, then you’ve spent your entire life not feeling yourself, Paige.”
Paige put her hand on the windowsill to steady herself. “I don’t believe fairies. I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t believe in a big guy in the sky called God.”
“Well, I know for a fact that two out of those three exist.” Nell held out her hand. “And perhaps I’m just not seeing that God. Come on. Let’s go downstairs.”
*
Paige returned to a kitchen filled with laughter. Groceries were spread across the table, and Calypso was giving orders to both Taran and Arley.
“Put that in the fridge, Arley. And Taran, grab me a bottle of something to go with lunch.”
Calypso looked up as Paige entered, and then added to Taran, “Take Paige down to the cellar with you.”
Paige followed Taran down to the cellar, wondering what was so interesting that she needed to see it, and hoped it didn’t involve chains.
Instead she entered an insulated room filled with bottles of homemade wine, herbs and magical brews.
“This is Calypso’s brewery,” said Taran with pride. “That corner is the mead … over there she’s brewing beer. Those racks of wine … all hers. Elderberry, plum, apple and so on.”
“It’s impressive,” Paige said. “What do the wines taste like?”
“The first night I was here, I expected to be poisoned,” Taran laughed. “I remember teasing her about the first bottle tasting like camel’s urine. But it was the best drop I’d had in ages.”
He grabbed a couple of bottles and they headed back upstairs.
“I was just about to make some sandwiches. You h
ungry?” said Calypso.
Paige wasn’t, but she didn’t want a repeat performance of last night, so nodded.
Calypso’s face beamed. She was clearly happy here. “Let’s go digging for food.”
She took off out the back door and the others followed. The back garden was an overgrown Eden of flowers, herb beds, veggie gardens and strange pots. There was a tilting wood paling fence on the boundary, with a gate that led directly into the forest behind.
“There’s no path,” said Paige.
“You’re just not seeing it,” Calypso said as she picked a tomato and some lettuce.
Arley gave a whoop. You’ve got goldthread here.”
“There’s silphion over there too.”
“Oh, yeah, I see it.”
Paige joined them to see what all the excitement was about. Arley pointed at a patch of dirt under a lemon tree.
“That, Paige, is something you won’t see every day.”
Paige stared at the dirt. “I don’t see it now.”
Arley looked at her and then back at the garden. “That little thistle-type vine with the yellow leaves?”
“Can’t see it.”
“Right there. Look closely.”
“I can’t see it, okay?” Paige snapped.
Nell appeared beside her. “She’ll see it when she’s ready.”
“Ready for what?” Paige asked. “I have no idea what you’re all talking about.”
“I grow a lot of magical herbs here,” Calypso explained. “I work by the threefold herbal law. If I find a plant that’s endangered, I take some for my potions, and then replant the rest in three different spots. Because of their magical properties, not everyone can see them.”
Paige looked around at the others in disbelief. “You can all see something there that I can’t?”
Four heads nodded.
“I’m not sure if there’s something wrong with me or with you.” Paige looked at them with a mixture of defiance and fear. “Calypso, Nell, you’ve shared your background with me. As have you, Taran. You’re all … witches.” She stumbled slightly over the final word, but then gathered herself again and turned to Arley. “What’s your excuse?”
“You mean, why can I see those plants?”
“Yes. Are you a witch too?”
“No.” Arley chuckled, as though it was the most absurd thing he’d heard in ages. “I’m not a witch.”
Paige’s shoulders relaxed a little. Of course he wasn’t.
Arley smiled at her. “I’m like you. I’m half Fey.”
*
There was another knock on the door, but Paige ignored it. She had no intention of opening it until she’d worked out how she was going to make her escape. No car, no idea where she was going. Even her shoes weren’t appropriate for long walks.
She heard whispered voices outside the door. Arley and Nell, by the sounds of it. And then they went silent and the door swung open and in walked Calypso.
Paige had a feeling that nothing ever stopped Calypso, let alone a flimsy closed door.
“What are you scared of, Paige?”
Wow, straight to the point.
“I’m not sure. All I know is that I feel unnerved by this whole place.”
“And us.”
Paige nodded. “I know it’s rude, because you’ve been nothing but hospitable.”
“But that might change at any moment and we might devour you or turn you into a toad, right?”
Paige took a step back. “Will you?”
“I haven’t turned anyone into a toad since high school.” Calypso laughed. “I’m joking, Paige. Those spells are so last century.”
Now it was Paige’s turn to laugh.
Calypso sat on the bed opposite Paige. “I am a witch, just like the sixteen generations of Shakespeare women before me. I’m proud of my family history. In all those hundreds of years of history, there was only one Shakespeare woman who deserved to be feared. And that’s not because she was a witch. It’s because she was a bitch.”
“So she was a black witch and you’re a white witch?”
“No such thing. Witches are witches. Just like any other faith, some will abuse it,” Calypso said.
Paige stared at her and knew without a doubt that she was a good person. “So how are you connected to fairies?”
Calypso held her hands out open, as if laying herself bare. “As a witch, I’m closely connected to nature. That’s why I connect with nature spirits. In fact, I was initiated into the ancient healing and herbal arts in their realm when I was thirteen.”
“Bloody hell, I was still playing with dolls at thirteen.” Paige stared at her hands, neatly clasped on her lap. “What are fairies like?”
“What are humans like? All different, but with similar wants and needs.” Calypso thought about it for a moment. “Fey folk work with nature, we work against it.”
“If all this is true, what does being half-fairy make me? Or my daughter?”
“You’d be better off asking Arley that one.”
Paige turned away. She blinked back tears. It was all too confusing. Here was this man she had turned to in her hour of need, and he believed himself to be the very thing she was struggling with.
“I know many people who are part Fey. No studies have been done on it, but from what I’ve observed, the human part of you is dominant. You can have kids. Once you are moved from their world, the Fey world, you age. You will die. You can go your entire life without knowing the Fey part of yourself.” Calypso looked Paige square in the eye. “But I bet there have been signs.”
“I didn’t even like fairies when I was a kid,” Paige snapped.
“That’s probably a sign,” Calypso said cheekily. “Have you ever seen things? Or known that things were going to happen before they did?”
Paige hated where this was headed. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Knock knock.” Arley stuck his head into the room, as one would a tiger cage.
Calypso stood. “I’m going to finish making lunch.”
She left, giving Arley a conspiratorial squeeze on the arm on her way out.
“You okay, Paige?” Arley looked genuinely concerned.
“I am. Nothing like being joke of the week.”
“I’m not laughing at you.”
Paige stood, face to face with Arley, challenging him. “You didn’t find it funny, each time I came to your office, upset about my mother, talking about fairies?”
“No.” He looked deep into her eyes. “I was too busy trying not to …”
“Not to laugh?”
“Not to kiss you.”
And with that he did. Arley drew Paige in, and kissed her, like no one had ever kissed her before. Long, deep, hot and filled with longing.
Paige slipped her arms around his neck and pressed her body to him, responding totally and utterly. For a moment, she forgot everything.
Finally, she pulled back. She searched his eyes. “Don’t mess with me, Arley.”
“I promise I’m not, Paige.”
“This, you, fairies … it’s too much.”
“No, it’s exactly the right amount.”
Paige laughed, surrendering to it all. “Arley, you’re one of a kind.”
“No … there’s you.”
*
A few hours later, dressed in coats and boots, the group left Calypso’s cottage and walked down a small lane and out onto the road. Paige had no idea where they were going, but for once that didn’t matter. She was content just being there. It was a beautiful night. The stars were bright above them. The night air was icy but still. For a while there was no sound, apart from footsteps crunching on gravel, but eventually Taran broke the silence.
“Remember the first night you brought me down here, Cal?” Taran turned to the others to regale them with the story. “I was shit scared, and kept asking about werewolves. Calypso assured me there had been no sightings here for a while.”
“Apart from that—” Nell stopped short wh
en Calypso shot her a look.
Taran’s face fell. “Are you saying there are werewolves here? I told you the English countryside was scary.”
“Don’t listen to him, Paige,” Calypso shot over her shoulder. “He’s a New York witch. Central Park is wild to him.”
Arley stepped closer to Paige and slipped his hand through hers. “I think they’re joking.”
“I don’t care anymore. Send down a UFO while you’re at it. Bring on the zombie apocalypse. Might as well shatter every belief I’ve ever had.”
Arley gave her a sexy smile. “Why not? It’s a good time to start again.
Paige smiled and breathed deeply. She felt refreshed here. But that probably had more to do with Arley’s kisses than the night air. How quickly things can shift. One minute she was frightened and wanting to go, and the next she was walking down to a magical grove at night with three witches and a man who thought he was half-fairy.
She needed to check the label on the wine she’d had at lunch.
They fell behind the others, happy to be in each other’s company.
“I don’t know anything about you, Arley.”
“You know more than most people.”
“You don’t go around telling people you’re half-fairy?” Paige teased.
“I’m not a fan of padded cells, so no.” He gave her hand a squeeze. “I do understand how absurd it sounds.”
“Do you have kids?”
“One of each. Quinn and Ren. Twins. Fifteen now, so trouble with a capital T.”
Judging by the smile on Arley’s face, Paige doubted they were trouble at all. “Do they live with their mother?”
“They float between us. It’s amicable, we live a couple of streets apart, and the kids are fairly independent now, so come and go when they want.” He drew her in closer. “I know you have a daughter, Linda. Jean adores her.”
“Yes, they’re close. We used to be, but our relationship has been strained since I divorced her father. Not sure why. He was hardly father of the year.” Paige stopped walking and turned to Arley. “What does this mean for her? Are your kids quarter Fey?”