by Tess Lake
Sophira glanced across at the couch she’d obviously been sleeping on for quite some time. Had she been staying in this house since she’d arrived in Harlot Bay? She’d been relying on Kira to bring her food and clothes for quite some time.
The moment trembled like a soap bubble. I was too exhausted to say anything, which actually was probably a good thing. Eventually, Sophira nodded her agreement.
We gathered up her things, including Luce’s blue cardigan and some other clothes that I recognized as Molly’s. I took those and stuffed them in a separate bag. I had enough on my plate without confirming that Kira had actually stolen these. I’d wash them and then put them back in my cousins’ closets like they were never gone in the first place.
When we arrived at the mansion, Aunt Cass was sitting on the front porch waiting for us. She came over to the car and gave both Kira and Sophira an appraising look. Sophira couldn’t stop looking at Aunt Cass’s pink streak and the silver nose piercing.
“You three come with me. We’re going to boil some water,” Aunt Cass said.
We left everything in the car and followed Aunt Cass up around the back of the mansion and into the forest. This whole area has had generations of Torrents build things and then abandon them. We always need to be careful because there are a lot of empty wells around the place and some full ones as well.
I walked along beside Aunt Cass, Kira and Sophira whispering behind us. I heard Sophira ask if Aunt Cass was cool and Kira answer that she was.
I know Aunt Cass was pretending she wasn’t listening, but I saw the tiniest curve of a smile on the edge of her mouth.
Soon we reached a giant well that was full to the top. It had waterlilies growing across the top of it, and I knew a family of frogs lived nearby.
Aunt Cass waved a hand at the pond and then made a lifting motion. The magic around us pulled, and suddenly all the frogs in the pond came to the surface and hopped away.
“Wow,” Sophira said.
“Can you teach me that?” Kira asked.
“Of course I can teach you that. You only have to ask,” Aunt Cass said and then winked at her.
Despite my very tired state, I felt a little touch of jealousy.
“Why didn’t you ever offer to teach me that spell?” I asked, a tiny bit more petulant than I really intended.
Aunt Cass turned to look at me.
“All you need is the desire to be taught. That’s how it has always worked.”
In a better mood (with more sleep) I might have just brushed it off, but it stung more than it should have. I guess she was right. Our mothers and Aunt Cass were happy to teach us magic, but it was only if we asked. For an instant, I saw the view of myself through my mother and aunts’ eyes, much the same way as I saw Kira. They loved me and wanted to help me but often didn’t know what was going on inside my mind.
If I’d really wanted to learn more, they would have taught me, but the fact was… I hadn’t wanted to learn. I really hadn’t wanted to be a witch at all given my out-of-control Slip magic was ruining my life.
“Okay,” I said, looking down at the ground.
Aunt Cass whacked me on the shoulder.
“Learn how to do this,” she said.
Aunt Cass gave a quick demonstration of a spell used to heat up water. Even I hadn’t learned this one. After a few practice tries, the three of us were ready to go.
I cast the spell and a tiny swirl of steam rose up from the well.
“Good job, Kira next,” Aunt Cass said.
Kira cast the spell and did even better than me. Steam rose from the well. Then it was Sophira’s turn.
“I haven’t done any magic on purpose for a long time,” she explained to Aunt Cass.
“Well, we’re Torrent witches and we do magic all the time, so let’s go,” Aunt Cass said and pointed at the well. Sophira took a breath and cast the spell. I could feel the magic swirling around us.
Normally for a spell like this, there would be a little tug as the witch accessed some of it. In Sophira’s case it was a mighty heave as years of pent-up magic was released into the well. Within a few seconds the well water was boiling.
We all had to step back to get away from the radiating heat.
“Keep going!” Aunt Cass yelled out.
The well was bubbling furiously, the steam billowing up into the air. Another minute more and the magic jerked again as the entire well boiled dry.
As soon as the well was empty, Sophira put her arms down and relaxed, sitting down on the grass very quickly.
“Oh my Goddess,” she sighed and then lay on her back.
Aunt Cass came to stand over the top of her.
“You need to use your magic or it will break out at random times,” she told her.
Sophira looked sleepily up at Aunt Cass.
“Thank you,” she whispered. Then she was asleep right there on the grass in the warm sun.
Chapter 23
Two days and two nights passed by, the world feeling broken, but then slowly starting to move in its old rhythm. Aunt Cass explained to the moms that Sophira would be staying with us for a while. She told Kira her Slip Witch training was almost complete and soon she’d be able to get back to her family. Aunt Cass then arranged with Hattie for both of the girls to stay there.
It had taken a day for Sophira to finally agree to call her father, who came rushing up to the mansion.
There was a very tearful reunion out the front of the Torrent Mansion, and then Aunt Cass took him aside to talk. She told me later that night that his wife had been a witch who had died many years ago. Sophira and her father had stayed in town until four years ago, when he’d taken a job two states away. Growing into a teenager, Sophira hadn’t used her magic since her mother died and it had started to lash out during inopportune moments. She’d been blamed for setting a fire in a chemistry lab at her school, and since then, anytime something went wrong she got the blame for it. Eventually she’d run away, coming back to Harlot Bay, where the swirling magical confluence helped calm her. Unfortunately it hadn’t been enough, and when she was stressed, she started fires. She hadn’t known she was starting the large fires, and Kira didn’t know either.
Aunt Cass took me, Kira and Sophira down to her map which showed all of the fires across Harlot Bay. Sophira had started the fire in the stone cottage, destroying Aunt Cass’s fireworks, and had started one of the other three fires that had occurred much earlier in the month. She had not caused any of the other fires. That was an intense relief for us and her but still left open the question of who precisely was responsible for Lenora Gray’s death and all the other fires.
There was still a lot of unfinished business. Sophira’s father was going to spend a few days in town, and then he’d return home to begin packing up their house so he could move back to Harlot Bay. In the meantime, Sophira and Kira would stay with us before eventually moving back with Hattie.
Jack was still at the empty vacation home across from the mansion, watching and waiting for someone to come out. I’d visited him every day, now adding food delivery to my list of jobs, but the only thing he reported happening was that Sylvester Coldwell had come and gone again and no one else had left the premises.
Sheriff Hardy came to the mansion and told us Detective Moreland was still in town but his investigation was no longer focused on us. What that meant, he wouldn’t say.
The big romantic news was Sheriff Hardy openly kissing Aunt Ro in front of us, and despite how bad all of us felt, we hit him with some good-natured teasing. We hadn’t gotten quite to the bottom of it yet, but the story as we understood it was Aunt Ro and the sheriff weren’t together the night that we’d invited him to the family dinner (as a buffer, I might add). However, that was the night they’d started to get to know each other better, and then they’d started dating in secret. When we’d followed Aunt Ro to her so-called yoga class, she was in fact visiting Sheriff Hardy! He was the mystery man in the car Luce and Molly had seen a few days ago.
/> Aunt Freya and my mom were just as shocked as anybody that somehow this had been going on under their noses and were huffing and puffing about it, but then Aunt Ro made some pointed comments about one of the bank managers in town to Mom and one of the local farmers to Aunt Freya. Both of them had shut down that conversation with lightning speed before we could get any more information out of them.
As soon as we were all feeling better, we were definitely going to be digging into these new romantic developments.
So that was how two days went by. Two days since the bakery was destroyed, two days since the world cracked in half. Aunt Cass’s improved beacons had finally worked – Sophira had accidentally set some junk mail alight shortly before I’d found her by following Kira.
The world was calm, but not for long.
Chapter 24
“Suuuure, you’re going to a movie. Uh-huh, I know your game, I used to play it,” I teased Kira as I drove her and Sophira to the movies.
“We are legit going to the movies. I promise. Cross my heart,” Kira said, laughing.
“Does the cinema still have that back door that opens into the alleyway?”
“Of course it does!” Kira said.
“But we’re not using it. Promise,” Sophira added.
“Rookie mistakes all around. Too much promising and the mark gets suspicious,” I said, waving my finger at Sophira in the mirror.
We turned a corner and then a sudden surge of magic hit the car. It was so strong it was lucky I didn’t drive us into a building. All I could see for a moment was flame, roaring, filling my vision. I blinked and then there was a solid line of fire, stretching out from the three of us, down the road and around the corner. I managed to pull over, all of us gasping for a solid minute before we could calm ourselves.
There was another wave and the hot coal in my belly reappeared. Fishhooks in every muscle began pulling at me, urging me to get closer to whatever was at the end of that line.
“That’s the one who keeps burning things,” Sophira said through gritted teeth.
“It hurts Harlow,” Kira groaned, her hands over her stomach.
“We have to follow it,” Sophira said.
I could barely think. The pain in my stomach was agony, and the pull in my muscles was like I hadn’t drunk water for a week and now there was an inviting cool stream in front of me.
I started the car, and we drove somewhat mindlessly through the holiday traffic, following the throbbing line of fire up the hill. The closer we got, the better we felt.
I followed the line of fire up a long white gravel drive and leapt out of the car, Kira and Sophira close behind me.
Some distant part of me whispered that Jack would be watching from the house across the road, but I couldn’t stop myself.
It was Sophira who kicked the door open, and then we all rushed inside. The mansion was old money. Polished wood floors, multiple stories, much like the Torrent Mansion but obviously it had never gone to ruin. Everywhere you looked there was more wealth. Expensive paintings on the walls, thick rugs, vases that had been broken and repaired with gold. But there were no flowers in those vases and the paintings were covered with a thin layer of dust. The place looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in a long time.
There was a clear trail of footprints where Sylvester Coldwell had come and gone.
“Be careful,” I told the girls as we followed the line. It went around the corner into a large open ballroom. There was an open fireplace on the far side, a roaring fire burning within.
The red line stopped there. It was stifling hot.
The room was mostly empty. A few pieces of furniture were scattered about the place. In a semicircle on the floor near the fireplace were photographs. It looked like someone had been wadding them up and throwing them into the fire. One had clearly charred before falling back out on the floor.
The three of us stood in front of the fire, staring at it for a moment before the pull receded, leaving us with our reason and thought and realizing we’d just rushed into a mansion following a magic line of fire.
“Let’s get out of here,” I urged.
It was too late. The doors we’d entered through were slammed shut by a man who must have been hiding behind them. He bolted them before turning around to face us.
It was Dominic Gresso. He wasn’t dressed in his standard real estate garb but rather a stained black-and-white T-shirt and a pair of blue shorts that had clearly seen better days.
“What are you doing, Dominic?” I called out, looking around. There was only one other exit from this room and it had furniture piled in front of it.
He took a step towards us and I saw instantly that I’d been mistaken. This wasn’t Dominic. A twin?
“No, no, no, you’re wrong wrong wrong, do you like like like my fire?” the man said in a high-pitched singsong voice.
I stepped forward and pushed the girls behind me. The man didn’t appear to have any weapons, and while I was scared, I was also a Slip Witch backed up by two other witches. If that guy came near us, he would get to see some fire very up close and personal. “What’s your name?” I called out to him.
“Hendrick. Hendrick and Dominic. Dominic and Hendrick. Yes yes yes,” he replied. He walked over to a side table to grab something. When he turned back to us, he had a long heavy fire poker made of black iron in his hand.
“Open the door. We want to leave,” I told him.
“You have to see the fire fire fire,” Hendrick said, lazily swinging the fire poker from one hand to the other.
“He’s crazy,” Kira whispered behind me.
“Don’t worry, we’ll get out of here,” I told them. Hendrick was still moving closer, walking across the room, sometimes stepping through the glowing line of fire that only the three of us could see.
He was still between us and the door, and despite him being overweight like Dominic, I didn’t want to risk running past him.
I was sweating, the stifling heat of the ballroom making my clothes stick to me.
“If I hit him with a fireball, I might pass out, so you’ll have to drag me out with you,” I whispered to the girls.
“Fireball fireball fireball,” Hendrick repeated.
“Get away from us,” I called out.
Our silent prayers for intervention were answered. Someone bashed on the door and called out.
My hope that it was Jack vanished when I heard the voice. Hendrick clapped his hands and ran back over to the door to unbolt it. In came his brother Dominic. Hendrick then bolted the door behind him. As soon as Dominic saw us, a look of panic crossed his face.
“What have you done?” he asked his brother, grabbing him by the arms.
“I want them to see the fire!” Hendrick said.
“Let us out of here, Dominic,” I called out, my voice echoing across the large room. Dominic walked across to us, telling his brother to stay at the door. When he was halfway across the room, I yelled at him to stay there. He stopped in the middle of the room.
“You have to promise me you won’t tell anyone,” he pleaded.
“Tell anyone what? We just want to get out of here,” I yelled back. Dominic turned around and called out to Hendrick to unlock the door, but he just laughed and started swinging the fire poker around in front of him.
“Hendrick, open the door or you’ll never get to see a fire again,” Dominic yelled.
“Fire, fire, fire,” Hendrick repeated.
The red line in the middle of the floor had stayed in place through all this. But now it shook, a shimmer running through it before it split into three lines. One crept to encircle Dominic, surrounding him like an aura. The other surrounded his brother. The third line streaked across the floor to hit Sophira.
It had spiraled up her body and plunged into her heart.
The magic heaved and the scent of honey filled the room.
“I know you,” Sophira said, her voice cold. She pointed a finger at Dominic. “You’re the one who bought our house
after it burnt down!”
“I don’t know, I don’t remember,” Dominic said. He turned around again to his brother.
“Open the door! Hendrick, it’s too hot in here! They’re going to leave now.”
“And you’re the one who started the fire!” Sophira yelled, pointing her finger at Hendrick.
A puzzle piece twisted into place. Fires, dates and names lined up.
“What’s your last name?” I said to Sophira.
“I’m Sophira Laroche. Barnes is my dad’s name. I started using it after my mom died in the fire he started!”
Abigail Laroche was on the list of fire victims. Sophira’s mother and a witch. She’d died in the fire and was survived by her husband and daughter.
Witches are matriarchal. We don’t take our husband’s last name, but in this case Sophira had used her father’s name after she had moved away from Harlot Bay.
In the moment it all came together I realized what was going to happen next, but I was powerless to stop it. There were scattered photos all over the floor, pictures of houses that Hendrick had burnt down or had planned to. I saw the bakery and me standing behind the counter.
My eyes tracked to a house painted blue with a white picket fence.
The sweet scent intensified and the photo burst into flames. Three more quickly followed before I could take another breath.
“No, it’s not true,” Dominic pleaded.
“You killed my mother and then you bought the ashes of our home!” Sophira said, pointing her finger at Dominic. Her voice sounded like that of an angry god from the sky about to strike down with all of the vengeance in the world. The temperature in the room spiked, making it almost too hot to breathe.
Dominic clearly didn’t realize the danger he was in. For some reason he knelt and put his hands to the wooden floor before standing up again. Hendrick walked over to him with the fire poker in his hand.
“What did you do?” Dominic roared.