Nanny Lily’s face was cold enough to chill the room. “We do these things, because to not do them would mean the devastation of our world. Your questions tell of a girl who has been raised in far too much luxury to understand peril.”
Aster wanted to laugh. Luxury? Instead of ballrooms and debutante parties, she slaved her days away in Oleander's potion room. She had only two dresses, both of which were faded, stained, and dowdy. Even though Aster had grown and changed in shape over the last few years, particularly in her chest, Dahlia only saw fit to alter the dresses rather than make new. Meanwhile, the market folk wandered about with their rich fabrics and magical riding beasts. Nothing about her life in the borderlands resembled that.
Dahlia had looked sadder, her voice quieter than Lily’s had been. “Perhaps that is my fault. You have not experienced as much pain because I couldn’t allow it. You will face so much as an adult. I wanted you to have a happy childhood. But darkness is coming, dear. I feel the magic in this world waning with every passing day. The prophecy leaves little room for doubt. It’s unfair that it all hinges on you, but none of us asked for this. We’ve all sacrificed for you, and now you must take your turn.”
That was it. The prophecy held sway over them all, and no one was ever to question it. The only Stargazer who might have seen things her way was Aunt Oleander, but the woman’s cruelty made her difficult to approach.
Aster didn't have enough in her to try another sketch. Surely her oppressive aunt would already be in the potion room. She could see Oleander tapping her wooden spoon on her calloused palms as she waited for her peon to show up.
Aster set aside the paper and climbed down from the tree, making her way around the side of their small cottage to the large expansion jutting from the back. It was the biggest room in the house, built by Papa Quercus not long after Aster had been born.
Inside, Oleander was ranting at Aunt Holly, who stooped her shoulders as the taller woman snarled, scarlet patches blooming on her alabaster face. “I don’t care if the dumb bat’s teats are falling off! We don’t take money on delivery! She sends the crowns first and then she gets her cream. You get that?”
“Y-yes, Oly, but I just thought since it was for our dear friend—”
“She isn’t my dear friend. I don’t have any dear friends, and neither do you! None of us does. She’s a wily, conniving parasite trying to get something for nothing. And you’re going to get a pestle shoved up your arse if you don’t get out of here!”
Holly’s whole body quivered as she turned to leave. She caught Aster’s gaze with her watery eyes and sniffled. “Hiya, sweet girl,” she said in her regular quavery whisper. Years of smoking and chewing the addictive weeds had robbed her of her voice, in more ways than one.
When Holly was gone, Oleander’s jade eyes turned on Aster and a familiar pit of dread yawned open in the younger girl's belly.
“There she is. Miss Prettyface, my next favorite idiot in the entire world. Late as usual.” She tossed Aster a bag of blue gentiana flowers to grind into a paste, which would eventually be added to a potion to treat skin fungal ailments. “You think family is exempt from having to show up to work on time, do you?” In a whirl of black cloak, Oleander turned toward the row of cauldrons that lined the back wall, and Aster trudged toward her usual station, tossing the bag of flowers beside the old stone mortar. Her shoulders were already aching just thinking about the task ahead.
“I was at the market getting your chocolate. I don’t see that I’m late, Aunt.”
The witch continued as if Aster hadn’t spoken. “Or maybe it's because you're leaving tomorrow, and you deserve special treatment. Your problem is you think you’re too good for hard work, like the rest of this useless family. But you and I are only ones with straight backs, at least for now. You have no excuse for sloth.”
“Yes, Aunt.” Aster hoped the words had come out bathed with a satisfactory amount of syrup.
“Or I suppose you’d rather be flitting around in bubbles, gifting ruby red slippers to lost little girls, like they do in that silly story they love so much over in that other world.”
“I don't know this story you speak of, Aunt.” She did, of course. Ellemire even had its own satire of the story called the Warlock of Nodd. But it was just bait Aster refused to take.
“Well, I have fifty orders of fungal tonic to fill this morning, and even daft twits such as you should know we have no time to waste.”
Aster said nothing and set about her work. Oleander would only get worse if they ate up even more of her precious time by arguing. Every witch had one special ability, but Oleander had two: making potions and making misery. Aster decided she was only going to focus on the potions. It was her last day in Ellemire and she'd already had one breakdown. Time to make the best of what was left.
“I’m so excited about your party tonight,” Oleander said. She vigorously stirred something that smelled like rotting feces. “Maybe after you’re gone, I’ll hire a girl who can hold more than a single thought in her airy head. Or crush those bloody flowers a little faster. Get a move on.”
Aster focused on her mortar in silence as she imagined grinding her aunt’s face into the purple muck.
-2-
After the day’s potion making, Aster trudged back to the house with purple hands and an aching jaw from gritting her teeth. Nanny Lily was in the kitchen making preparations for tomorrow's feast, or rather, she was directing Dahlia and Holly to perform the duties she no longer could. A mixture of delicious smells, from herbs and celery to baking bread, swirled about the room, and Aster spied an enormous cake being assembled on the counter by the window. She didn't think she'd have the appetite to eat, but her stomach grumbled.
“Can I help with anything?” she asked.
Nanny Lily shooed her away. “Nay, child! Tis enough you went to the market. You have plenty of your own work to do upstairs, I wager.”
Ah yes. Packing and sorting. She would carry but a small bag through the Door. The rest was set to burn on the bonfire. “I suppose I do.”
“No suppose about it, Missy. It must be done.” Nanny Lily's voice was brittle and low, but it carried far in the close quarters.
“I will be up in a bit to help you,” Dahlia called.
“Yes, Mother.” Aster thought of all the stuffed animals still lying on her bed. They had been her only friends in life, and the thought of rendering them to ash put a lump in her throat as she made her way up the narrow stairs to her room.
She had two piles going on her bed: things to take and things to burn. The burn pile was much bigger. She was contemplating a suitable hiding place for them in the woods when a knock sounded at the door, followed by her mother carrying in a stack of folded clothes—the too-tight pants and close-fitting shirts that would be Aster’s wardrobe on the other side. Apparently the homespun shirts and long skirts would not do where she was headed. Dahlia and Nanny Lily had spent months making the clothing on a new enchanted loom that had cost the family a small fortune. Oh how Oleander had gnashed her teeth at that! But after Nanny Lily had offered Aster up for double duty in the potion room to make up for the expense, Oleander relented.
Dahlia’s heavily-lined face oozed with worry and fatigue, and strands of her curly gray hair fell loose from her bun. She placed the items on the bed and then sat down next to them with a huff. “You’re moving slower than me, Aster. Tomorrow night will be here before you know it, and we can’t be late. The magic needed to open the door will be at its lowest point on the New Moon, and your Nanny... Well, she’s getting older and older, isn’t she? We’ll need every bit of help we can get.”
Aster sighed, picking up one of the new shirts. It was black with short sleeves and streaks of silver glitter splashed across the front. It looked like something made for a child half her size. Is this how girls her age actually dressed over there?
“Mother, I would be moving faster if I didn’t have to burn practically everything I owned. I would rather just pack them away
for safekeeping.”
Dahlia rubbed her face. They’d had this argument about the burning several times before, and Aster felt bad about bringing more stress on her mother, but she couldn’t let it go. “Leaving your girlhood on the fire is one of the oldest rituals in all of Ellemire. Not just for our family, but for all people. When you return, ripe with child, this will be a woman’s chamber. These dolls and stuffed animals will be of no use to you.”
“But what about for the baby? Wouldn't it be nice for the child to have something of her mother's life?”
“The baby will get her own things, just as you did, just as I did and so on and so forth.” Dahlia had hesitated before speaking, and Aster could swear her mother was hiding something. But one look at the woman's drained face was enough to dissuade her from pursuing the matter. All things would be revealed in time, wouldn't they?
“I just wish there was one part of this that was easy or painless.”
“A woman’s duties are never easy, witch or not. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t wish you were born with different blood so you wouldn’t have to bear this. But it isn’t all horrible, you know.” She pointed one of her crooked fingers at the pile of stuffed animals and smiled. “You can pick whichever one you want, though I’m pretty sure I know which it’s going to be.”
Sunlight burst through Aster’s gloom and she shot up to her feet. “Really? It's time?”
Dahlia smiled, and in it Aster saw relief. “It is, dear flower. It finally is.”
Aster had been dreaming of this moment since she was a small girl. Her mother would use her special ability with animal spirits to summon Aster's familiar, and she could choose whatever form for it she wanted. It seemed the only part of this business she had some control over.
But Aster didn’t have to decide, for she’d known since she was six. She picked up the gray cat with the blue eyes and the stubby tail that she’d cuddled down to bare thread in some parts. “This one. Larkspur. You’re going to do it now? Right here?”
“As long as you’re sure this is the one. Hand him here.” Dahlia examined him briefly. “He’s worn down to practically nothing. I sure hope this works.”
Aster knew her mother was teasing. Even after childbirth had deformed her, Dahlia’s power with animals remained unmatched. “I have faith in you, Mother.”
Dahlia tipped her a wink and brought Larkspur’s crudely stitched mouth to her own. Cupping her hands around its small head, she took a deep breath and blew into the animal the way one would a horn. A moment later, Larkspur’s legs and body began to puff up and elongate. Real fur, lush and shiny, sprang forth from the patchy velvet, in the same pattern her beloved stuffed companion had—smoky gray with faint white stripes on his flanks. White fur covered his belly, complete with the black spots she’d always loved. He was the largest cat she’d ever seen that wasn’t wild.
When Dahlia pulled her mouth away, an alert and blue-eyed Larkspur, as real and breathing as Aster herself, sat on Dahlia's lap, purring and docile. Its nub of a tail moved in circular motions like a much longer tail would. He jumped down to rub his head against Aster’s legs. “Oh, Mother, he’s perfect! Just like I always imagined it.”
“He’s a hair cross-eyed I think. But he should still see just fine. I’d say with the stubbed tail, it adds character. He’ll never be confused for another cat, that’s for sure.”
Larkspur would be her only real friend in that lonely and mysterious other world. Of course, he was the only friend she had here as well. She picked him up and cuddled him close, breathing in the clean scent of his fur. It was as if he had always been real. “This is the best thing anyone has ever done for me.”
Dahlia’s face was both satisfied and sad. It was an expression she wore often. “He’s a good animal. He will be useful to you.” She got up and walked toward the door. “We’d better head down and help Oleander set the table, before she decides to poison our food.”
“I don’t know why you don’t just put her in her place. You and Nanny Lily. And me.”
Dahlia sighed. “It’s family, Aster. The ties that bind us together are forever, whether they’re strangling us or not.”
Aster didn’t agree. Family or not, it shouldn’t be too hard to cut ties with people who are terrible to you, but she didn’t want to spoil the beautiful moment her mother had created for her.
After situating Larkspur on the bed, they headed down the stairs, Aster holding Dahlia’s hand to stabilize her. Oleander gave them a contemptuous glare as she slapped chocolate frosting on the cake in hasty globs. “It’s about time you got down here. I’ve been slaving in that potion room all day and now I have to frost this cake. All I want to do is eat and stop herding you goats around all day.”
Angry words trembled on Aster’s lips, but she bit them back. For Dahlia. “What can I do, Aunt O?”
“Just put your rear in a chair. It’s what you’re best at. We can’t have our precious Great Mother get her pretty little skirts dirty for her own party.”
Aster stared at her purple hands and bit back her mounting rage. Why did Oleander have to ruin everything that was supposed to be good?
“Oh and keep that flea-bitten beast out of my way.” Oleander pointed a chocolate-coated spoon at Larkspur, who had decided to follow them down after all and was sitting on the bottom step. “Last thing I need is for it to get tangled around my feet while I’m bringing this cake to the table.”
Aster rolled her eyes and watched Dahlia, Nanny Lily, and Holly scurry around their cramped dining room and kitchen, distributing plates and dishes under Oleander’s specific direction while Papa Quercus stirred a giant pot of soup on the stove.
After a mile-long spread consisting of stuffed goose, roasted vegetables, apple soup, sweet and salty breads, and a towering chocolate cake were laid out on the table, the women and Quercus gathered around. Everything smelled delicious, but just as Aster had expected this morning as she was shopping for the ingredients, she didn’t have the stomach to eat any of it. She would fill her plate nonetheless, just to keep the peace.
Nanny Lily took her usual seat at the head of the table, flanked by Quercus and Dahlia. A nimbus of glowing silver hair framed the elder woman’s withered face, and Aster thought she could still see some of her old beauty still lurking around her delicate nose and chin, the elegant line of her jaw. The same as Dahlia’s. The same as Aster’s.
In contrast, the end of the table with Holly and Oleander gave off a cold and joyless energy. Holly sat hunched beside her sister, scraggly salt and pepper locks obscuring her face, shoulders at their typical ear level as if to prepare for Oleander’s next reprimand or slap to the back of the head. She gave Aster a shaky grin, her eyes like frightened animals looking out from dark caves. Never was there a greater sense of two factions in this family. What would they be without the old woman holding them together at the head?
Aster sat in the middle, unsure where she truly belonged. While Lily and Dahlia loved her, they didn’t really see who she was or what she wanted. Meanwhile, she and Oleander shared similarities apart from their looks and their hatred for one another. They both questioned the need for mindless tradition, and she saw a certain freedom in Oleander’s bald hatred of her: there was no need to impress or live up to some brilliant example or half-baked prophecy.
“Ahem.” Lily raised an index finger and touched it to one of the candles, lighting all six them at once. It required only a trickle of magic, but it had delighted Aster from the time she was a little girl. She locked eyes with the old woman and smiled, sharing her thanks for the small gesture. The elder then raised her glass of honey wine to offer a toast or make a speech when Oleander broke in.
“Enough with the stupid parlor tricks. I’m eating.” She grabbed a leg of the goose, tore it off with a twist, and sunk her teeth into the still steaming meat. The last of Aster’s appetite fizzled, for this was surely the beginning of a fight.
Nanny Lily cleared her throat with a deliberate volume
. “Oleander, this is a special occasion and I haven’t signaled the start of the meal. Still your pig’s mouth for once while we address our Aster.”
Oleander’s eyes narrowed above the mutilated goose leg. Her chin was shiny with its juices. “Just who are you calling a pig, you old bat?”
Nanny Lily’s face didn’t change, but the candles on the table flamed brighter, cutting through the room’s shadows. “If you can’t exercise a little respect, you can take your plate out back and dine in the barn with the rest of your friends.”
Oleander pounded her fist on the table. Silverware and crockery jumped and jangled, wine sloshed from glasses. “I paid for this slop, and I’ll eat when and how I blighted well please. Or I can take it all with me and dump it into the feed troughs.”
Dahlia cleared her throat. “Actually, Papa Quercus has been selling his whittlings at the market, which helped pay for the goose as well as the chocolate you stuff down your ugly gob. But if you like, you can take that atrocious green gelatin salad you always make that no one likes. That is, if the pigs would have it.”
Oleander’s nostrils flared like an angry bull’s. The green salad, pungent with the rose water with which she liberally flavored it, was always the sore spot at the dinner table. No one liked it, and they only took helpings to be polite. And to keep Oleander from losing her temper. Now it seemed Dahlia didn't so much care about the silent green salad pact, but maybe it was for the best.
“You always said you liked my salad! It was the only reason I ever made it!”
“I-I like it, Oly,” whispered Holly.
Oleander elbowed her hard in the arm. “Shut up, you nitwit!”
Aster braced herself for the hurricane, which usually involved scathing words and flying food. Many meals in the Stargazer house had been soured in such a way. There was no way to talk Oleander down from her rage once it reached this point, and even if that miracle did occur, Oleander would never forget. It could be a year from now, long after everyone else had forgotten, and she would still have her revenge. Aster glanced at Holly and Quercus to see if they were going to join in, but Holly was rubbing her arm, easily cowed by Oleander’s bullying, and Quercus was like a wax statue, staring at his empty plate.
The Stargazers Page 2