Not even the shock of seeing a bedraggled Ileana could keep Alex from breathing in the rich scents of the forest. She felt instantly energized, almost overpowered by its lushness. The sandy soil and pine needles gave way to brilliant foliage. Amid many shades of green were pink azaleas, white birches, cherry trees in early spring flower, purple and white lilacs, and golden forsythia. Alex was awed and amazed. Every single fragrance was familiar to her, remembered, a sensual memory long buried, now awakened. Comforting and consoling — this was hers.
What Alex took in, Cam, without meaning to, pushed away. She didn’t stop or even pause to smell the roses — or anything at all. Seeing the one person who could make her feel safe, so changed, admittedly helpless, sent Cam zooming back into the panic zone. There, she babbled nonstop to hear the sound of her own voice, to make sure it was the same upbeat one she used in Marble Bay, where she was now sure she definitely belonged!
“Where are we going? Where are we staying? Is there, like, a hotel or something? Or maybe a Country Inn? I’m so totally up for a hot shower. I mean, there is running water, right?”
Ileana ignored her. Cam added, “Do cell phones work here?” She had a burning need to call home, to connect with her best bud Beth and her other friends who, like Jason, knew nothing about this part of her life.
Telepathically, Alex asked, Did you bring a bathing suit?
Cam scrunched her forehead. What are you talking about?
This isn’t spring break, MTV-girl. Hotels? Cell phones? Your friends? What’s next? Pop idol contests? Aloud, Alex said, “So we’re probably staying with our … with Miranda? How is she?”
“No — and deluded,” Ileana answered, not turning to look at them. “Your mother still trusts Thantos. She’s with him at Crailmore.”
“Crailmore?” Alex repeated. “What’s that? Coventry’s version of a mental institution?” At once, Alex wished she could take back that crack. Their long-lost mother, Miranda, had spent years locked away in a “clinic” in California.
Ileana stopped abruptly and whirled on them. A spark of her old self returned. “How little you know. Crailmore is the DuBaer estate. It’s been in the family for generations.”
“Can we go there? Can we see her?” Cam asked nervously, unsure that she even wanted to.
“You’re not prisoners here, go wherever you want. No doubt you’ll receive an invitation to Crailmore. Thantos knows you’re here.”
“So this Crailmore place,” Alex asked, “is that where our parents lived? Where we were born?”
“We were probably born in a hospital …” Cam started, and then regarded her woodsy surroundings, “or not.”
Ileana sighed wearily. “There’s a quota on questions. You’ve used yours up.”
But a few minutes later, she relented — possibly just to silence Cam, who’d returned to babble-land. “Aron and Miranda got married and built their own home, LunaSoleil.” Loona So Lay, she pronounced it. “Moon and sun. That’s where you were born.”
“So we’ll be bunking there?” Alex asked, thrilled by the idea.
Until Ileana shot it down. “You’ve exceeded the question-quota. Besides, we’re here.”
An abrupt clearing in the wood revealed a stone cottage. Ileana’s house, they instantly understood, underwhelmed. There was nothing regal or pretentious about the modest stone cottage, nothing palatial, extravagant, or exceptional announcing, “A Goddess Lives Here.”
Unless you counted the astonishing herb garden. Here, colorful, fragrant, and lush plants grew high, wide, and bountiful, looking every bit as wondrous as their magical properties.
Staring at it from the gate, Alex was awed. “This rocks. Does everyone on Coventry have these? Gardens to, you know, to help do stuff?”
“Do stuff?” Ileana shook her head. “Right, that’s why we grow herbs. To do stuff.”
Alex felt chastised. Cam came to her rescue. “I can recognize some of them. Lavender … rosemary. Those sprigs are … myrtle. And isn’t this the one …” — she pointed to an aromatic plant with sparse leaves — “… the one Karsh called skullcap? It makes you sleepy, right? And there’s mugwort, for the traveling spell.”
A ray of pleasure pierced Ileana’s cloud of doom. Karsh would be so proud of the twins. She couldn’t wait to tell him —
Her face fell, remembering.
She snapped, “Flora-appreciation hour is up. Take the keys.”
“Aren’t you coming in with us?” Cam was instantly nervous.
Not now. Not tonight. I can’t face this place, Alex caught Ileana thinking.
“Where will you go?” she asked.
“I’ll spend the night at Karsh — that is, Lord Karsh’s cottage. I’ve things to deal with there.”
“Is that where …?” Cam began.
“He is? Where his body is?” Alex finished her sentence.
Ileana flinched but raised her head regally. “Of course not. As befits an Exalted Elder, Lord Karsh lies in state at the Unity Dome, where tomorrow’s ceremony will take place.”
She seemed ready to say more but paused, bit her lip to keep it from trembling, then turned abruptly and left them.
Cam began to hyperventilate as an unwelcome flashback attacked her. Once, when she’d been about five years old, she’d gotten separated from her mom in a big department store. She’d only been lost for a little while, but the overwhelming panic of feeling abandoned had made her stomach lurch. Exactly as it was right now.
Sensing her sister’s alarm, Alex quickly explained, “She’s not abandoning us. Our guardian witch can’t deal, apparently, with her own home. Let’s check into Casa Ileana and find out why.”
Three slate steps led to the front door, which Alex bounded in one exuberant leap.
Cam lagged outside to take stock of her surroundings in case she got lost. Or something. Anyway, she was in no hurry to cross the threshold into Cousin Ileana’s.
Alex let herself in. It took her eyes a minute to adjust. The slice of sun from the open front door was the only light in the dark, damp, and chilled room. Probably from being left empty for several days. She drew the curtains apart.
And stiffened, stunned.
Someone had been there. Someone who’d turned Casa Ileana into Casa Trash-eana. A demolition derby of wanton destruction confronted her. Ileana’s sitting room had been ransacked, furniture viciously ripped apart, keepsakes, laptop, lanterns, photos, vases smashed, strewn across the floor. Even the skylights were broken. That accounted for the dampness and cold.
No wonder she couldn’t face this place, Alex thought.
“Who would do this?” Cam came rushing up behind Alex. “Who hates her this much?”
The answer was a gimme.
Tsuris and Vey, the overgrown dolts who put the “sin” in cousins. They blamed Ileana for their father, Fredo’s, current jailbird status — it meant nothing to them that he was … hel-lo! … guilty! They were out for Ileana’s blood, but apparently settled for wrecking her home.
Anger twisted in Alex’s gut. If only she knew Coventry well enough, she’d rout out the spiteful, murdering slobs and show them what real revenge looked like.
They surveyed the destruction.
“You think?” Cam wavered, reading her sister’s mind.
“Yeah, I do,” Alex said. Ileana’s damaged home was like a reminder of the proud witch’s broken soul. What choice did she and Cam really have? They would roll up their sleeves and make it right, pick up the pieces of Ileana’s … life.
While Alex used her telekinetic power to float Ileana’s keepsakes, knickknacks, and clothing back to their original places, Cam picked her way through the rubble, cleaning up the old-fashioned way. A gold-framed picture drew her eye. Cam stared at it and smiled.
An astonishingly beautiful woman — so much more radiant than the woman they’d met only last week — her hair long and chestnut-colored, her eyes luminous and gray, stared back at her. The woman’s arm was wrapped protectively around the should
ers of an exquisite blond-haired, beaming child. Miranda and Ileana.
Cam called Alex to come look. “She was something else back then, wasn’t she? Miranda.”
“A regular babe.” Tears welled in Alex’s eyes, though she wiped them away hastily. “That’s what Karsh once said.”
“I wish she’d come to meet us. Do you believe she’s really at that Crailmore place?” Cam asked.
“Under the watchful and healing presence of dear Uncle Thantos?” Alex retorted sarcastically.
“Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s find out.” Cam flipped open her cell phone.
Alex snickered, “You’re gonna call her? How? Oh, wait, I can just hear the conversation.” She put on a computer voice. “‘AT&T Direct. City and state, please.’” Alex then mimicked Cam, whining, “‘Don’t you have a listing for Coventry Island? No, there’s no address. They don’t do addresses there. Can’t you just connect me with Crailmore?’ ”
Cam frowned. It irked her when Alex was right. “Well, maybe somewhere in this mess there’s a phone book.” She refused to give in.
Alex crossed her arms. “Yeah, I’m sure everything works exactly like in Marble Bay. Give it up, Camryn. If we want to contact our mother right now, our best bet is telepathy.”
Cam sighed. “Right. And if Mom … Miranda was healthy and had her powers back, she’d have contacted us by now.”
Unless she doesn’t want to see us. Cam’s thought, but Alex reluctantly agreed.
Cam needed to keep moving to keep that thought away. She went back to her search-and-rescue mission using her extraordinary eyesight to find and retrieve anything that might be valuable to Ileana. Underneath an especially dense pile of wreckage, she telescoped in on a painting. The canvas had been viciously slashed; still, you could tell it was a portrait of Karsh. The wise and loving warlock who’d been a grandfather to them: his smile kindly, his eyes twinkling — so alive! For some stupid reason, the portrait suddenly became too heavy for Cam and slipped out of her hands.
Alex picked it up. “It’s not just that he’s gone, is it?” Alex said intuitively. “You’re freaked about the funeral.”
Cam shook her head, denying it.
“Like Jason said, you stink at lying. Give it up, Barnes,” Alex coaxed.
“I’ve never been to a funeral before.” There, she’d said out loud what she’d refused to even silently admit to herself.
A surprising wave of tenderness washed over Alex. She knew just then how far she’d come. Or maybe it was being here on Coventry. But instead of her normal reaction, “Oh, poor, pampered, sheltered you,” she heard herself comforting Cam. “It’ll be all right. We’ll be there together. Just squeeze my hand if you get scared. I’ll protect you.”
Alex broke Cam’s melancholy mood. “Oh, you will? Who’ll protect you? Let’s see, due to death, devastation, and loss of powers, the usual suspects — Karsh, Ileana, and our long-lost mama, Miranda — seem to be unavailable.”
Alex lifted her chin proudly. “I’m tough, I don’t need protection.”
There were noises outside the cottage, footsteps on the cobblestone path, and they both jumped!
Sensing danger, Cam focused her powerful eyes on the door. She’d stun whoever it was, blind the intruder. Alex telekinetically sent a broken chair leg into her extended arm. Holding it high, she so hoped it was Tsuris and Vey, just stupid enough to return to the scene of the grime-crime. This time, the T’Witches were ready.
CHAPTER THREE
A WALK IN THE WOODS
“You look shocked to see me,” the visitor exclaimed, taking in Alex’s defensive posture and Cam’s electrically alert eyes.
Disappointed but relieved, Alex put her weapon down and telegraphed Cam, That’s the second time today someone’s said that to you.
“Really? Someone else surprised you first?” His half-smile, half-smirk threw Cam for a loop.
Shane … Shane Wright? Warlock, mind reader, ultimate fly-guy. Once, they’d despised and distrusted him. He’d come to them as Thantos’s messenger, but during the course of his mission had done a lifesaving 180 and fought against their villainous uncle.
“How’d you know we were here?” Cam stammered, hoping he couldn’t hear her heart thudding. She’d forgotten how magnetic the tanned, tawny boy was.
He grinned and ran his fingers through his wavy hair, grown longer and a lot lighter since she’d last seen him; streaked with blond, it now brushed his shoulders. “Everyone on the island knows who you are and that you’re back.”
We are, Alex agreed silently.
Not for good, Cam thought at the exact same moment.
Shane raised an eyebrow, amused. “Look-alikes don’t think alike.”
The twins frowned at each other. Then Alex turned her wary gaze on Shane. “So what are you, the warlock welcome wagon?” She was no fan of his and didn’t really care if he knew it. Just because he’d refused to kill when Thantos ordered him to, didn’t mean they could trust him.
“Busted,” he conceded good-naturedly. “On what you said, and what you were thinking. I did come to welcome you, and I hope you’ll both come to trust me.”
“Sweet.” Alex let the sarcasm drip. “Only, bad timing of epic proportions. Check it out.” She motioned to the debris-strewn room. “A wreck-o-rama.”
“Courtesy of Morons, Inc.,” Cam added dryly. “Also known as our cousins, Tsuris and Vey.
“Fredo’s sons did this?” Shane seemed to notice the mess for the first time. He frowned and shook his head sympathetically. I can help you clean it up, if you want,” he offered.
“No. We should do this ourselves. Ileana’s our cousin.”
Cam couldn’t hide her disappointment. Alex was dismissing him. He’d been here all of three minutes.
Alex softened. “Look, do your welcome thing for Cam. Let me deal with this.”
“You sure?” Cam and Shane asked at the same time.
Hoping they didn’t lock pinkies or do something equally cheesy, Alex dismissed them. “Go. Just be back soon.”
With mixed emotions, Cam followed Shane outside.
Besides being buff beyond belief, the young warlock, who she’d first met in Marble Bay, was a bridge between her two worlds. Who better to help her bond a little with her … uh … native place? To feel whatever Alex was obviously feeling about Coventry. All she’d felt so far was the urge to leave. Then Shane walked in.
“I really did want to be the first to welcome you,” Shane said as they headed into the woods that surrounded Ileana’s cottage.
Cam tried but could not wipe the smile off her face or settle the flipping thing her stomach, acting independently, had decided to do. There’d been a magnetic attraction between them from the moment they’d met months ago in Marble Bay. She’d never been able to shake the feeling. The way he was staring at her now was so not helping.
An uninvited thought drifted by, and she tried to brush it away. Jason. Sweet, caring, and daring, the hometown boy she’d left behind would do anything for her. Had she ever felt this way around him?
Shane did the half-smile thing at her. Had he heard that thought? When she felt his arm rest lightly across her shoulders, it was, she told herself, a comforting, friendly embrace — nothing more. She didn’t pull away, just savored being with him as they followed a path through the forest.
“Where are we going?” she asked. “Do you live near here?”
He shrugged and looked away. “I used to live about a mile and a half away. My family still does.”
“You moved out?” she guessed.
“I got kicked out.”
“Really?” What could Shane have done to get himself expelled from home?
“Difference of beliefs.” He answered her unspoken question with jarring swiftness. “They brought me up to believe as they do and didn’t like it so much when I began to question their, uh, loyalties.” He tried to sound like it wasn’t a big deal, but Cam suspected otherwise.
“Was it abo
ut Thantos?” she ventured.
“They’re faithful to Lord Thantos. They think I’m not.”
“Is that how things are divided here?” she blurted without thinking. “You’re either with Thantos or against him? Can one person be that influential? I mean, he’s not the president or anything.”
Shane swung around to face her. “You have to understand, Cam. The DuBaer family is royalty here. For better or worse, they’re powerful and influential. So, sure, people have strong feelings about them. But like anywhere else, there’s the usual stuff that divides people: jealousy, greed, even love.”
A strange feeling of uneasiness swept over Cam. “So where do you live now? Other side of the tracks or something?”
Had Shane squirmed or was she imagining it? “I’m bunking with a friend,” he murmured, looking a lot like he wanted to change the subject.
He didn’t have to. The subject changed itself.
There was no breeze, yet Cam shivered suddenly. The hairs on the back of her neck rose. This was not a premonition nor a vision. But her senses became razor-sharp. She felt like prey in the woods. She knew …
They were being watched.
She swiftly checked over her shoulder, but before she could focus through the screen of branches, leaves, and thick bushes, Shane asked, “What’s wrong?”
Cam was embarrassed. It would seem so weird, so … babyish. Someone’s here. Someone’s watching us. “Uh, nothing.” She quickly switched gears. “Tell me about the island.”
The watchers waited in the woods. Waited for Apolla and Artemis, for Camryn and Alexandra. The twins had to be careful. Careful where they wandered and with whom.
Oh, really? And how would you know? Ileana asked herself cynically.
She’d witnessed it, but had been helpless, unable to save Karsh from death. Nor, for the first time, could she help her young charges that awful day in the Salem Woods.
T*Witches: Kindred Spirits Page 2