Born Wicked: The Cahill Witch Chronicles, Book One: The Cahill Witch Chronicles, Book One

by Jessica Spotswood

  “What are you doing here?” I demand gracelessly. And dressed like that? I’m hardly one to stand on ceremony, but he’s wearing a pair of ragged brown corduroy trousers, held up with a pair of suspenders, and a work shirt rolled up to the elbows.

  Finn doffs his slouchy hat. Beneath it, his thick coppery hair stands up every which way. “I’m your new gardener.”

  He must be joking. Only, he is carrying a pail full of weeds.

  “Oh,” I say finally. I don’t know what else is appropriate.Welcomewould be a lie. We don’t need more strangers around the place. After Mother died, I convinced Father that we could get by with only Mrs. O’Hare and John and Lily. Father agreed to leave the housekeeping decisions to me, but he’s insisted on hiring a succession of gardeners. His latest scheme is to build a gazebo up by the pond, overlooking the cemetery.

  Mother loved the gardens. Father’s never said as much, but I think he keeps them up for her sake. He certainly never comes outside himself.

  “Do you knowhowto garden?” I ask, not bothering to hide the doubt in my voice. I can’t think of anyone more poorly suited to the task. The other gardeners have been brawny boys from surrounding farms, not pale, scholarly booksellers’ sons.

  “I’m learning,” Finn says, holding out the book. It’s an encyclopedia of plants.

  That hardly inspires confidence. I’ve been pitching in, weeding plots, planting the spring bulbs. I like it. What’s more, I don’t need a book to tell me how. I watched Mother and John for years. I hope Finn won’t go around pontificating about new irrigation methods and optimal soil conditions. He used to be the most insufferable know-it-all in Sunday school.

  Finn swings the pail by its handle. His forearms are all lean, wiry muscle. “Your father heard I was looking for work and was kind enough to offer me a place here. We’ve been having some difficulties with the shop.”

  It’s just like Father to be softhearted—at least where his books are concerned. I’ve never heard him object to the Brothers’ witch hunts, but he gets quite livid about their censorship.

  I shove my hands into the pockets of my cloak. “Are you—your shop isn’t closing?”

  “Not yet.” Finn squares his shoulders—which have gotten a good deal sturdier since the last time I saw him. Or paid attention, at any rate. How long has it been since I actually looked? He’s gotten awfully handsome; it can’t have happened overnight.

  “Good! That’s good.” Finn looks surprised that I care, but Mother loved the bookshop. She was a great one for reading, like Maura and Tess. Like Father.

  I hesitate, feeling like I ought to say something more.

  “Well, don’t murder my flowers,” I mutter, running a protective hand over a bush of pink tea roses.

  Finn laughs. “I’ll do my best. Good day, Miss Cahill.”

  I scowl. “Good day, Mr. Belastra.”

  My mood does not improve at dinner.

  Mrs. O’Hare’s fish chowder is as awful as I’d anticipated: salty and ill seasoned. She’s an excellent housekeeper but a poor cook. I spread fresh butter on thick slabs of sourdough and ignore the bowl in front of me. Tess holds Father’s bowl in her gaze, and a moment later he’s declaring it a wonder.

  I frown at Tess until Maura kicks me under the table.

  I kick her back harder, and she jumps in her seat. The bread in my mouth turns to peppery ashes. I gag and reach for my glass of water.

  “All right, Cate?” Father asks, looking up from his miraculous chowder.

  “Fine,” I choke. Maura gives an angelic smile. She knows I won’t fight back magically, I never do, but I’m hard-pressed not to lean across the table and slap her.

  “I trust you’ve all heard about the new governess?” Father sits at the head of the mahogany table with Tess and Maura on one side and me on the other. By rights I’m the lady of the house now and ought to sit at the foot, but I still think of it as Mother’s place.

  Tess and Maura nod, and Father continues. “She’ll be arriving on Monday. I’ll stay until Thursday to see her settled, but then I’ll be traveling for several weeks. I may not be back until the Feast of All Saints.”

  Tess drops her spoon with a clatter. “That’s more than a month! What about our Ovid?” They’ve been reading theMetamorphosestogether. It’s banned by the Brothers—too many strange gods and goings-on—but Father has a copy secreted away.

  My heart sinks. After Mother died, after it became obvious that he would have no sons, Father started reading with Tess and teaching her the dead languages he loves. She gobbles up his lessons like a starving kitten, thrilled with any scraps of knowledge or leftover bits of affection he tosses her way.

  Father gazes at an empty space on the wall. “I’m sorry to postpone our lessons.”

  He isn’t, not truly. Maura’s right; all Father cares about anymore is his books and his business. Anger rises through me. Does he even notice how Tess adores him? He isn’t here to see how she mopes around the house after he leaves. It’s left to me to cheer her, to entertain her with magic lessons in the garden and impromptu theatricals. It’s always left to me.

  “Will the governess teach us anything interesting?” Tess asks. “Or only stupid things like drawing and French?”

  Father clears his throat. “Er—I imagine the latter. Your curriculum won’t include anything that hasn’t been approved by the Brotherhood. I know it’s not what you’re used to, but drawing and French—those are useful accomplishments for young ladies, Teresa.”

  Tess sighs and fiddles with her spoon. She’s already fluent in French, Latin, and Greek. Father’s been promising to teach her German next. “Won’t you be lonely?” Maura goes to the sideboard and pours Father a glass of port from the crystal decanter. “Away from home so long?”

  Father coughs. Has he been coughing more lately? He says it’s only the change of seasons, but his face is as tired as his eyes. “I’ll be quite busy. Meetings all day.”

  “But wouldn’t you like company? Someone to take meals with?” Maura gives him a bright, wheedling smile. She looks very much like Mother when she smiles. “You’ve been working too hard. I could come and look after you. I’d love to see New London.”

  Tess and I both swivel in our chairs. Maura has to know he’ll never agree to it. He doesn’t know what to do with us at home, much less in New London.

  “No, no, I’m right as rain. And I wouldn’t have time to look after you properly. New London is no place for a young lady without a chaperone. It’s much better for you to stay here with your sisters.” Father takes a spoonful of soup, oblivious to the way Maura’s face falls. “Now, about this governess. Sister Elena comes very highly recommended by Mrs. Corbett. She was Regina’s governess.”

  And Regina married very well. Father doesn’t say it, but it hangs in the air, heavy as the evening fog. Is that what he wants for us? Regina Corbett is a simpering ninny, and her husband is religious and rich and of good standing. He’s sure to be considered by the Brotherhood the next time they have an opening. There are always twelve members on the town council, ranging in age from ancient Brother Elliott, Brenna’s grandfather, down to Brother Malcolm, twenty and handsome, married just last fall.

  Brother Ishida, the head of the council here, reports to the National Council in New London twice a year. Generally, however, the National Council does not involve itself in small-town affairs. They are more concerned with the looming threat of another war with Indo-China, which has settled the western half of America, or Spain, which has colonized the south. It’s Brother Ishida and the Chatham council that we have to be wary of. If they knew what we were, all their fatherly kindness would vanish in the blink of an eye. Young or old, they are united in their fervor to keep New England safe from witches.

  I wouldn’t marry a member of the Brotherhood for all the money in the Brothers’ coffers.

  “I remember Regina’s governess,” Maura says. She’s tearing her bread into bits instead of eating it. “She’s young. And very pret
ty.”

  I search my memory but can’t come up with a face. We must have seen her at services, passed her occasionally in the street, but she was in town for only three months before Regina married.

  “I met the other new member of the staff,” I announce. “Finn Belastra?”

  “Ah, yes.” Father shakes his head. “I popped into the shop the other day and spoke with his mother. Marianne tells me the Brothers have been scaring half their customers away. Hoping to find something forbidden and shut them down, I expect. It’s a shame when it’s come to this, people afraid of books!”

  Never mind people being afraid ofgirls. I interrupt him before he can get started. “Yes, but does Finn actually know how to garden?”

  “He’s a very bright young man. Would have made a fine scholar,” Father says, which does not actually answer my question. He natters on about how Finn was supposed to go to university before his father died, and what a shame it is, and I’m sure Finn would be thrilled to know his mother’s been blabbing his business all over town.

  I make polite replies as Father segues back into the importance of learning. I think he means to encourage us about the governess, but I’m the only one listening. Maura’s slipped a novel into her lap. Tess is amusing herself by making one of the candles on the wall sconce flicker. I give her a look, and she stops with a guilty smile. I shake my head and push my apple pie away, appetite lost.

  After dinner, we’re free to do as we please. When Father’s away, occasionally we coax Mrs. O’Hare into joining us for games. Often we play at chess or draughts, though Tess is the reigning champion at both and Maura is a horrid loser. Tonight Father drifts back to his study. Maura climbs the stairs to her room with barely a word to anyone. That leaves Tess and me.

  I follow my little sister into the sitting room. She settles at the piano, her fingers gliding gracefully over the keys. She’s the only one of us with enough patience to develop any real skill.

  I kick off my slippers and lie on my back on the tufted cream sofa. Tess’s sonata washes over me. She used to play lively old folk ballads, and Maura would sing and play her mandolin. We’d push the furniture to the walls, and Mrs. O’Hare would come in and dance me around the room. The old songs were banned years ago, along with dancing and theater and anything else that smacks of the old days before the Brothers, when the witches were the ones in power. But the Brothers have become increasingly strict, and dancing isn’t worth the risk.

  Tess’s fingers stutter and stop. “Are you still angry with me?” she asks.

  “No. Yes.” If I don’t discipline her, who will? Father doesn’t know about the magic, and he mustn’t find out. Mother was convinced he wasn’t strong enough to handle it. She cited his weak chest, the cough that seems to leave him a little frailer each year. But it’s more than that, even if she couldn’t bring herself to say it outright. Father grumbles about the Brothers’ censorship and hides books in secret compartments all over the house, but that’s an easy sort of rebellion. I don’t think Mother believed he’d be strong enough to stand against them when it came to something that really mattered. Like us.

  She loved him anyway, but I can’t see how it was much of a marriage, honestly.

  I sit up, hugging my knees to my chest. “You can’t do magic anywhere you like, Tess. You know that. I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you.”

  Tess looks very young in her pink pinafore, her hair in two braids that stretch to her waist. Now that she’s twelve, she’s been bothering me to let her put her hair up and her skirts down. I suppose the governess will advise me to allow it. I can’t keep her from growing up. “I know,” she says. “Me either. If something happened to you, I mean.”

  I glance up at the portraits above the fireplace. There’s one of Father with his parents when he was a boy, a retriever puppy asleep at his feet. Next to it is a painting of the five of us—Father, Mother, Maura, Tess, and me. Tess was still a baby with pale blond hair sprouting like dandelion fuzz all over her head. Mother is looking down at her lovingly, a Madonna cradling the child in her arms. She had lost a baby between Maura and Tess—the first of five buried in the family cemetery.

  “This governess—she’ll be living here, taking meals with us, watching our every step. Even if you think it’s to help someone—Father, or even me or Maura—”

  Tess swivels to face me. “Is this about what happened at services last week?”

  “No, but that’s a perfect example.” As we were leaving the church last Sunday, someone stepped on Maura’s skirt. Her dress ripped—right across the middle of her admittedly tight bodice—exposing her corset cover for everyone to see. It would have been mortifying if Tess hadn’t thought quickly and cast arenovospell.

  “Maura would have been humiliated,” Tess argues.

  “A little public humiliation wouldn’t have killed her. We would have gotten her into the carriage and out of sight, and no one would have remembered it in a few days. If anyone had seen what you did—”

  “They would have thought it never ripped in the first place,” Tess insists. “I was very quick. They would have thought it a trick of their eyes.”

  “Would they?” I’m not so certain. “The Brothers have been leaping on anything that even hints of magic—and they wouldn’t assume it was you— they’d think it was Maura. You meant to help, I know, but it could have ended very badly.”

  Tess fiddles with the lace at her wrist. “I know,” she whispers.

  “Brenna Elliott. Gwen Foucart. Betsy Reed. Marguerite Dolamore.”

  I reel off the names like the multiplication tables Father taught us. They’re the four girls arrested by the Brothers in the last year. Gwen and Betsy were sentenced to labor on the prison ship off the coast of New London. The conditions there are horrid—backbreaking work and very little food. There are rats, I hear, and disease, and girls don’t often survive it. But Marguerite—no one even knows what happened to her. She disappeared before her trial, taken away in the middle of the night.

  “Would you have it be Maura? Or you?” I’m relentless. I have to be.

  “No. No, never.” Tess’s rosy cheeks drain of color. “I won’t do it again.”

  “And you’ll be more careful at home, too? No more magic at the dinner table?”

  “No. Only—I wish we could tell Father the truth. Perhaps he’d stay home more. Look after us better. I’ll never get anywhere with my lessons this way.”

  I stare at the gold flowers on the carpet. There’s so much hope in Tess’s voice. She wants a regular father, someone she can depend upon to protect her.

  But we’re not regular girls. If Father knew how I’d gone into his mind, compelled him, and destroyed Lord knows what other memories in the process, would he ever forgive me?

  I want to believe he would, that he’d come to understand. But he hasn’t given me any reason to think he’d fight for us.

  That only means I have to fight twice as hard. I rest my chin on my knees. “We don’t know what he’d do, Tess. We can’t chance it.”

  Tess’s pale fingers twist in her lap. “I don’t understand why she didn’t trust him,” she says finally. “I wish I did. I wish Mother were here.”

  She turns back to her piano, finding some solace in her sonata. I pick up the post from the tea table. There are a few bills for Father, a letter from his sister, and—to my surprise—a letter with no postmark, in an unfamiliar looping script, addressed to Miss Catherine Cahill. Who would write to me? I’ve fallen behind on correspondence with Father’s side of the family, and Mother has no living relatives.

  Dear Cate:

  You don’t knowme, but your mother and I were once very dear friends. NowAnna is gone, and I, who ought to be there to guide you in her absence, can be of no help besides this: look for your mother’s diary. It will contain the answers you seek. The three of you are in very great danger.

  Affectionately yours,

  Z. R.

  The letter flutters from my fingers to th
e floor. Tess plays on, heedless of my terror. I don’t know Z. R., but she knows us. Does she know our secrets?

  CHAPTER 3

  I HAVE NEVER FOUND IT EASY TO sit still during Sunday school. Some of my earliest memories are of squirming on the hard wooden pews. I suspect the Brothers had them constructed this way on purpose, lest we get too comfortable.

  It’s called Sunday school, but we are required to attend twice weekly: on Sunday before regular services and again on Wednesday evenings. There are two separate classes: one for children under ten, held in the classroom down the hall, to teach them basic prayers and the tenets of the Brotherhood’s beliefs, and one for girls aged eleven to seventeen, to teach us about how wicked we are.

  The air in here is stifling, though the wind blows cool and fresh through the trees outside. The Brothers never open a window. Lord forbid we get distracted, even by something as innocuous as the September breeze tickling over our skin.

  Brother Ishida, the head of the Brotherhood’s council here, teaches our class today. He is not a very tall man, only perhaps my height, but up on the dais he looms over all of us. His face is hard, and his mouth perpetually tilts down, as though he’s used to frowning his way through life.

  “Submission,” he announces. “You must submit to our leadership. The Brotherhood would lead you down the path of righteousness and keep you innocent of the world’s evils. We know youwantto be good girls. We know it is only womanly frailty that leads you astray. We forgive you for it.” His voice is full of fatherly compassion, but his eyes are contemptuous as they rove over us. “We would protect you from your own willfulness and vanity. You must submit to our rule, even as we submit to the Lord. You must put your love and faith in us, even as we put ours in him.”

  Maura and I exchange scornful glances. Love and faith, indeed. Back in Great-Grandmother’s day, the Brotherhood burned girls like us. We are not without our faults, to be sure—but neither are they.