Spellbound

by Trana Mae Simmons

  Sybilla either couldn’t--or didn’t want to, Wendi couldn’t decide which. Sybilla avoided Wendi’s gaze, looking down at the floor without answering. The glare Wendi then turned on Thalia was returned with a vacant, unreadable look.

  Instantly, Wendi realized the blank look on Thalia’s face covered up her intentions. Darn her, while Sybilla distracted her, Thalia was working a spell in her mind! Thalia reached out to take Sybilla’s arm, and Wendi stepped forward.

  “Don’t you dare!” she cried.

  But the two witches disappeared in a poof of smoke.

  Hurt beyond measure at Sybilla’s defection, Wendi stared at the spot Sybilla and Thalia had stood. The kitchen was quiet, not even a trace of smoke lingering in the air. The clock on the wall ticked and tocked, and the metal coffeepot on the stove crackled as it cooled.

  Ever so slowly, Wendi sank into a chair at the table. Now she was totally alone. Who knew when--or if-- Sybilla and Thalia would return. Toenails clicked on the wooden floor as Alphie came out of the corner and trotted over to her, laying his head on her knee.

  “I can’t believe it,” she murmured to the dog, stroking his head. “Thalia Thibedeau is the most powerful witch I’ve ever seen. Yet I never had any inkling at all of her magical abilities.”

  Alphie whined in sympathy, but didn’t answer. The puppy peeked up over the woodbox beside the stove, trotted out into view and sat down to scratch a flea. The little elbow on his back leg beat a tatoo on the floor, and the now-bedraggled red ribbon on his neck danced with his movements.

  “I’ll give you a bath today, darling,” Wendi told him.

  Then she sniffed back a sob and buried her face on Alphie’s neck. But she didn’t allow herself to cry. She was a Chastain, and she and her mother had borne plenty of sorrow in their lives. Her mother had always had the strength to get through adversity, giving Wendi the best life she could after they were kicked out of the mansion where they lived.

  Wendi had had plenty of time to formulate the type of woman she was to become under Sabine Chastain’s tutelage before her mother’s death. She’d lived with her mother twelve years. One thing Sabine had taught Wendi to value above anything else was her witchcraft and resulting magic. It made her different, and at times unacceptable. But it made her special, Sabine had said. It was as much a part of her as her femaleness--to be valued for that very reason.

  The Goddess was more powerful than the God in their beliefs, and only death could keep a witch from using her magic. Death had indeed stopped Sabine’s magic, but Wendi was alive.

  She’d been more gloriously alive than ever in her life last night. Nick’s arms had held her tenderly yet firmly, with her exulting in her femaleness against his maleness.

  Those memories made this morning’s letdown even more difficult to bear.

  But she’d get through it somehow. Some way.

  Chapter 16

  Shortly before noon, Lucian appeared in the courtyard, heading for the kitchen house. Wendi stopped the rocking chair, realizing she’d been sitting there trying to work out a plan but failing to climb out of her misery ever since her aunt and Thalia Thibedeau had disappeared.

  Lucian walked up the steps and paused to speak. “Is my mother in the kitchen?”

  “No, Lucian. I haven’t seen her this morning.”

  “Why don’t I smell anything cooking?”

  Wendi jumped from the chair. “Oh, no. I didn’t think of that. My aunt and Thalia . . . uh . . . they had to go back to New Orleans. I guess I better see what I can throw together for the noon meal.”

  Lucian stared through the screen door, then straightened his shoulders. “I miss Monsieur Jacques, too, but it’s time my mother got back to work,” he said in a strangely adult voice. “I’m going up to tell her that.”

  “Lucian--”

  But he was already gone. Oddly enough, if Wendi hadn’t known he was human, she’d have thought he moved as quickly as a warlock at times. She’d seen them move in that graceful way, which anyone with magical powers of their own could discern as an ability they repressed in front of humans.

  She shook her head. Her misery must be overworking her imagination. After realizing Thalia Thibedeau was a witch, she envisioned everyone around her with magical powers, even a child who was probably Nick’s younger cousin. A child probably the result of a liaison between Cecile and Jacques--the strange form of the magnolia leaves she’d seen before notwithstanding.

  Except for Nick. She had no doubt at all that he was completely human. All his sensuality and masculinity were total maleness, not magical.

  She looked around in the kitchen, opening drawers and cupboards, peering into the spring-fed cooling room off the rear of the structure. By the time Lucian came down from talking to his mother, a forlorn look on his face, she had slices of ham frying in a skillet and potatoes boiling in a pot. While Lucian sat dejectedly at the table, she opened jars of canned green beans and corn, mixing them together for succotash and adding some seasonings.

  “I assume your mother has decided she’s not up to cooking again yet, Lucian,” she said as she set the succotash on the stove, wiping her face in the heat from the fire.

  He nodded, and she continued, “Grief takes time. It’s different with different people. We have to let each person work it out on his or her own.”

  “Monsieur Nick says that hard work is the best way to overcome grief,” he responded. “But Mama just lies there in bed. She talks to me when I come up, and she gets up sometimes and sits in the rocking chair by the window. But she stares out at the graveyard and rocks. I may be only a boy still, Mademoiselle Wendi--”

  “Please,” Wendi interrupted. “Just call me Wendi. For one thing, I’m not a mademoiselle.”

  “You’re married?” he asked in a confused voice. “But

  where--”

  “No, I’m not married. Not now. But we were talking about your mother.” As a woman who had experienced grief of her own, Wendi knew she should have paid more attention to helping Cecile overcome hers. But she’d assumed her aunt and Thalia were handling it.

  “Will you go talk to her, Ma--Wendi?” he pleaded. “I’m worried about her.”

  “I will. Right after we eat, I promise. Now, how about you going out to the pump in the garden and filling the water pans for Alphie and the puppy? I noticed they were almost empty when I passed them. Come back in about fifteen minutes, and the food should be ready.”

  Lucian pushed his chair back and headed for the door as Wendi hurried to the stove, rescuing the ham at just the right instant to turn it. One side was crispy brown, and the grease spattered gaily as she turned it to cook the other side. The potatoes were boiling, and the succotash beginning to steam. She took some red, ripe tomatoes off the windowsill and carried them over to the table to slice. Luckily, she’d seen some pies in the cooling room for dessert.

  * * * *

  Nick met Lucian in the courtyard, and the boy told him that Thalia and Sybilla were gone, and that Wendi was cooking. Hot, tired and dusty, he stormed up the steps to the kitchen house. He didn’t mind Sybilla’s absence at all, but when he got his hands on Thalia Thibedeau, he’d fire her, despite her being the best damn cook in any state!

  And he’d have a talk with his stable master right after lunch and chew his ass out for allowing the two women the use of a buggy without first asking Nick’s permission. Stopping with his hand near the door, he shook his head. No, it wasn’t possible. Surely Sybilla hadn’t used her witchcraft to transport the two of them back to New Orleans as a punishment for Nick’s attitude the previous night at the thwarted ceremony. Miz Thibedeau would probably have a heart attack if that happened.

  Changing his mind, he headed for the stables. Not more than five minutes later, he walked back to the kitchen house, confused, after being assured by his stable master that no one had used any of the carriages or buggies that morning. Indeed, no horses were missing. He’d find out from Wendi what the hell was going on.

 
He made the mistake of glancing in the window before he plowed through the door. Wendi stood at the table, cheeks flushed from the heat, strawberry hair curling wildly and enticingly around her brow and cheeks. She’d piled her hair on top of her head, but curls and tresses tumbled around almost as though alive, bouncing with her movements as she arranged a plate of bright red tomato slices. His palms tingled as he recalled that her hair felt even more silky than it looked.

  A drop of sweat fell from her nose, and she flicked her tongue out to catch it, wrinkling her face at the salty taste. She wore a capped-sleeve dress with a low neckline, cooler for her but one that made her even more sexy in the heat and humidity. It clung damply to her breasts, and a rivulet of sweat trickled down between them, making him yearn to follow it with his tongue.

  Men sweat, ladies perspire. Damn, that was his father’s voice. He well recalled that chastising, teasing manner Dominic used to teach his sons the better points of manners toward Southern womanhood. The reminder of his father cooled his libido more effectively than if Wendi had grown a wart on her nose.

  He pushed on through the door and into the kitchen. When Wendi glanced up and saw him, a brief smile of welcome flickered on her face before she evidently remembered how they’d parted this morning. Or perhaps she caught the thunderous look he could feel on his face.

  Maybe she was even inside his mind again. That thought fired his anger higher.

  “I want to know why the hell your aunt took my cook out of here,” he demanded. “When I get hold of either one of them again, I’ll--”

  “My aunt?” Wendi cried.

  The plate of tomatoes hit him in the face, then slid over his chest, leaving behind juice and seeds, which oozed down his chin. The china plate broke on the floor, drawing his amazed stare to the blotches on his white shirt. They almost looked like blood stains.

  His eyes then settled on Wendi. She stood at the table, hands gripping the edge, a warning glare on her face and a sharp knife dangerously close to one hand.

  “You can flip yourself around and take that ill attitude of yours right on out of here,” she snarled, “and don’t come back until you can be polite. I’ve been sweltering in this heat, cooking to fill your darned stomach, and by the Goddess, I won’t be treated like some pre-war slave!”

  “You tossed those tomatoes at me,” he said in a surprised voice.

  “Understand this,” she warned. “I threw them myself. I didn’t need magic. I’m sick and tired of your changeling personality. One minute you’re growling at me like a dragon disturbed in its lair, and the next you’re stroking me and trying to kiss me! Then, when I give in and you get your satisfaction, you sneak off to work and turn back into the dragon!”

  “All I wanted to know was where my cook was!”

  “No.” Wendi leaned on the table, thrusting her chin out at him, her blue eyes shooting warning sparks. “You wanted me to tell you that my aunt had used her witchcraft to steal your cook away. To get back at you for the way you acted last night when we tried to perform a ceremony.”

  “Stay the hell out of my mind,” he said, quickly realizing his comment had confirmed her words.

  “I don’t need inside your mind to follow my thoughts to a rational conclusion. Just because I’m a witch doesn’t mean I need witchcraft to think with. I have a perfectly fine brain all my own! And your actions and comments are very easily read!”

  “Well, we’ll see how my actions are read when I go into New Orleans and find Miz Thibedeau--rescue her from your aunt’s clutches.” He started for the door, but at Wendi’s gale of laughter, he stopped in his tracks and turned to face her again. “You think it’s funny that I’m going to turn your aunt over to the authorities?”

  “My aunt didn’t take Thalia out of here,” Wendi denied. “Thalia took my aunt with her.”

  “Oh, sure,” Nick snarled. “If that were true, that would mean that Miz Thibedeau is a--”

  His face tightened in reaction as the blood drained from it. Shaking his head, he stumbled unsteadily to the table, easing himself into the chair opposite Wendi.

  “That would mean Thalia Thibedeau is a witch,” he said in disbelief. “That she’s been living with me for over five years without me knowing that.”

  Wendi shrugged. Instead of answering him, she rose to her feet and walked over to the windowsill, where she picked up two more tomatoes. After washing them in a bowl of water in the dry sink, she pointed her finger at the broken plate. It flew back together, then swooped over to the sink, into the pan of water. Retrieving a clean plate, Wendi came back to the table. While Nick sat silent, she cored the tomatoes and started slicing them onto the plate.

  Something itched on his face, and Nick reached up a hand to scratch it, his movement drawing Wendi’s gaze. A tiny smile--more of a smirk--curved her lips, and he drew his hand back to find a tomato seed on the end of his finger. Surging to his feet, he went to the dry sink and grabbed a dishtowel, dunking it in the water bowl and cleaning his face. He didn’t bother with his shirt. It was probably only good for the ragbag now.

  He caught Wendi staring at him when he turned around, but she quickly shuttered her eyes and reached for the second tomato.

  “I notice you’re not limping as badly this morning as when I first met you,” she murmured. “Are you still using the liniment and tea?”

  “The massages work better,” he said without thinking.

  Her eyes flew to his thigh as though to examine the wound through his trousers, and he groaned in discomfort, mixed with disbelief that he’d allowed her to sidetrack his thoughts. It took him several more seconds to gain control over the instant response her gaze caused in the part of his body adjacent to the wound. Well, not control, but at least enough composure to walk back to the table and sit down again.

  Wendi concentrated on the tomato.

  “Look,” he said at last. “Maybe I owe you an apology for storming in here like a . . . a dragon,” he admitted. “But you owe me an explanation about your comments.”

  “Why?” she asked, quirking an eyebrow and cutting off the last slice of tomato. “I didn’t have a damned thing to do with Thalia Thibedeau moving in with you without your realizing she was a witch. In fact, I didn’t even know it myself until she took Aunt Sybilla’s arm this morning and the both of them disappeared in a poof of smoke. Right over there by the stove.” She pointed the knife blade at the spot she meant, then said, “Furthermore, I didn’t have a damned thing to do with the scandal ten years ago.” She dropped the knife and rose to her feet, leaning toward him across the plate of tomatoes. “I was a child, twelve years old. I didn’t choose my mother’s lover, although knowing why it happened like it did, I didn’t fault her. Or judge her.”

  “What do you mean--”

  But Wendi leaned even closer to him, ignoring his attempt at interruption. “I lived through the results of that mess, too, however. Steeped in your self pity, you seem to conveniently forget there were other people involved in that mess--hurt by it, and their reputations damaged. You seem to think you were the only one effected--or at least, the one effected the most severely. I stayed here and suffered, yet made a life for myself. A life where I helped others, instead of living in pitiful recluse. You ran off and didn’t even try to bring the truth to light.”

  Rounding the table, she stomped to the door, and Nick swiveled in his chair to follow her.

  “Serve your own meal!” Wendi yelled over her shoulder. “And don’t forget to clean up when you’re done!”

  “Get your ass back here--”

  The plate of tomatoes flew up from the table and hit him in the side of the head, cutting off his angry shout. Nick had no doubts this time magic had done it. The plate hit the floor and broke, and his eyes widened in disbelief as he got to his feet. His movement sent more tomatoes slithering messily down his cheek and chin.

  How dare she?

  He took one step after Wendi, and his foot landed on a slippery piece of the china littering the
floor. His boot slid out from under him, and he barely managed to land in the chair instead of on the floor amidst that mess. His wound throbbed and pain filled his vision with blackness strewn with pinpoint stars of agony.

  Dropping his head into his hands, he gritted his teeth. Something tickled his nose, but when he swiped it, he didn’t encounter a tomato seed. Opening his eyes, he saw a cup of tea on the table, steam swirling upward, carrying the scent of the willow bark he’d become used to. Wendi’s magic again.

  Grimacing in both pain and the knowledge that he’d acted like an ass and deserved every bit of agony, he picked up the teacup.

  Chapter 17

  Wendi paced her room. She could go after them, she supposed. But it wouldn’t do any good. From what she’d both seen and sensed when Thalia Thibedeau disappeared from the kitchen with Sybilla, even hers and her aunt’s magic combined wouldn’t touch Thalia’s. And her aunt had made it clear who she had aligned herself with!

  No, her best bet was to try to find a private time to perform the seance.

  Or she could find Nick and wring his neck. Force him to listen to her.

  Sure. And pigs could fly without a magical spell on them.

  She climbed the step stool beside the high-mattress, four-poster bed and flung herself onto the comforter. She couldn’t decide which hurt the most--the fact her aunt had obviously been working with Thalia Thibedeau all these years, or the fact that Nick had made torrid, devastating love to her and it didn’t appear to have effected him. Hadn’t made him care for her as a woman rather than only a bed partner. Hadn’t made him love her, in spite of her being Sabine Chastain’s daughter.

  Their witchcraft doctrine acknowledged the superiority of women to men--the control they had over them. But she was fully aware the culture Nick grew up in fostered the opposite presumption. In Nick’s culture, women were inferior both in their brain power and their physical abilities. Women were to be handled delicately and restricted to things within their capabilities.