“You’re such a flatterer.” He was referring to the white bandages that wrapped both my arms—the cuts were minor, all flesh wounds.
“I’ve come bearing bad news,” he said, shifting uneasily on his feet.
How much worse could it be after the week I’d had? “Lay it on me.”
“Sylar lied about being sick yesterday.”
“Oh?”
“Turns out he and Dorothy ran off and eloped last night.”
I smiled. “They did?”
“You’re smiling? Why? That’s bad news. Isn’t it?”
“Long story,” I said. “But no, it’s not.”
“Incoming!” Archie called from above.
I glanced up, squinting against the sun. Archie circled overhead, a colorful flash against the summer sky. Pepe clung to Archie’s neck feathers for dear life as they came in for a landing on the porch railing. Pepe slid down Archie’s tail like a slide.
“Are you telling Evan of my bravery?” Archie asked, spreading his wings and taking a bow.
Pepe elbowed him. “Our bravery.”
“Our bravery,” Archie said reluctantly.
They had heard my scream the night before and followed Zoey and me to Patrice’s house. Then they’d gone for help, but strangely, Nick had already been on his way.
“Yes, you’re both very brave,” I said. “Thank you.”
“Has there been any word about what will happen to Zoey now?” Evan asked.
“Not yet,” I said. “Do you think Dorothy knows what happened?”
Evan nodded. The goose egg on his head was all but gone. “Apparently Glinda called her last night and told her.”
“Is Dorothy coming home?”
“Not until after her honeymoon.”
Poor Zoey. Her family life didn’t excuse what she had done—not by a long shot—but it hadn’t helped, either.
I had thought Dorothy warned me away from the Keaton job because she possibly had something to do with Patrice’s disappearance…. But what if it had been because she knew Zoey had something to do with it and had been, in her own way, trying to protect her daughter?
I doubted that there was any way to find out, unless Dorothy was willing to confess all she knew.
And that was never going to happen.
But that wasn’t to say she was going to get off scot-free. As soon as she returned from her elopement she was going to have to face charges of her own—for the assault on Evan. There hadn’t been enough evidence to charge her with the fire, though Glinda all but confirmed her mother had set it.
“What are you reading there?” Archie asked, hopping over.
I ran my hand over the diary. I’d been reading the page on spells, over and over. “Something illuminating, as Starla might say.”
“Care to share?” Evan asked.
I smiled. “A girl has to keep some secrets.”
“Does this have anything to do with why Godfrey was over here so early this morning?” Pepe asked, being inquisitive.
I shrugged. “Maybe.”
The fewer people who knew what I planned, the better.
“Well, I need to get back to the bakery,” Evan said. “Do you need anything?”
“I’m fine,” I said. “Really. Just a little scratched up. In fact, I’m planning to go to Patrice’s house this afternoon to get some more work done.”
I wasn’t telling the whole truth. I had another hunch I wanted to check out. After that, I had a date…with Mimi.
“Alone?” Archie asked.
I raised my eyebrow. “Maybe you can sit outside and be my lookout?”
Archie fell backward onto the porch and covered his chest with his wings. “‘A blow with a word strikes deeper than a blow with a sword.’” He flopped around as if dying.
“Didn’t I tell you he was dramatic?” Evan asked. He waved and trotted off.
Archie was still on the porch floor. “Dramatic? Me?”
I smiled. “Was that a movie quote?”
“Non, it’s from an old English vicar,” Pepe said.
Archie sat up. “Pepe might have known him personally, he’s so old.”
“He’s amusing, is he not?” Pepe asked sarcastically.
They sat with me awhile longer, then went on their way. I picked up the diary again, said the spell Godfrey had taught me, threw the book into the air, and watched it disappear.
I smiled. I had searched deeper within and finally realized what the Elder had been telling me.
I was a Crafter.
A witch.
I had spells at my fingertips. Literally.
But as I thought about the conversation I had to have with Mimi later, I knew that there was so much about my legacy that I still had to learn.
Patrice’s house was eerily quiet.
I walked around, looking at the mess the scuffle the night before had left behind. Glass littered the floor. Blood stains had turned a rusty color. My neat boxes had been overturned.
There was so much work still to be done.
But I wasn’t there to do it.
I was there about that hunch I had. About a wish I’d made—that the police and the ambulance would arrive—that had been granted immediately. And I thought about how Yvonne’s wish to find Patrice’s body, Zoey’s wishes for the pizzelle and Jonathan’s appearance last night might not have been granted by my spells at all.
But by the Anicula.
I recalled how Elodie had said the Anicula only had to be in close proximity of the person making the wish for the wish to be granted, and looked around.
I cleared the spot on the floor where I’d sat last night, and realized it happened to be almost identical to the spot Yvonne had stood when she made her wish to find Patrice’s body all those days ago. I looked around, a foot in all directions.
I was knocking on the wall, looking for a hollow spot, when the front door opened. I was more than a little surprised to see Jonathan walk in.
He looked worse than usual. I didn’t know how much of that had to do with his disease—or if it was a result of the trouble Zoey was in.
I tried to pretend I sat on a glass-littered floor all the time. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see you,” he said, clearing a spot and sitting next to me. “I had a feeling you’d come back here.”
“Why?”
“Because your wish for the police and an ambulance to appear was granted last night.” He bent his knees and rested his elbows atop them. “Because I figured by now you’d suspect that the Anicula is here.”
I hadn’t been scared when he came in, but now I was getting a little nervous. Had Zoey acted alone in killing Patrice?
“Do you know about my past with the Anicula?” he asked.
“Some. What Elodie told me. That you used Patrice to get rid of the rats.”
“What else did she say?”
I saw no reason to lie. “That you were a womanizer and cheated on her mother. That you and Patrice had a huge argument that Zoey overheard, and the Elder had to do a memory cleanse on Zoey and you lost your powers as a result….”
He smiled a humorless smile. “There she is wrong. I didn’t lose my powers because of what Zoey overheard.”
“No?”
“I lost my powers because Patrice wished for me to lose them. She was angry about the breakup. Very angry.”
I drew in a breath. “She wished your powers away?”
“Not only that, but she wished that whatever I cooked from that point on would taste terrible and make people sick. I mentioned she was angry, right?”
A woman scorned. “Yet you still cook? Why?”
Sighing, he said, “Sometimes I forget. I jump into the kitchen fray and help out when there’s a crush. My customers pay the price.”
“You had no recourse? Through the Elder?”
“None. The wishes of the Anicula are binding. So when Patrice threatened to wish that Zoey and I would break up, I knew I had to do something. I couldn’t
let that happen. I love Zoey. It’s such an incredible feeling to be in love. Even if it was wished upon me without my consent, I couldn’t lose it.”
“You know about that?” I asked softly.
“Patrice told me what Elodie had done. She hoped it would somehow change my mind. It didn’t. That’s when she threatened to wish Zoey and I would divorce.”
“What did you do?”
He grinned. “I stole the Anicula.”
“But…but…if you have the Anicula, why not wish you can cook again? Why not wish yourself well?”
“I made a decision the day I stole it to never use it. It’s dangerous. Evil, even. Life needs to be led the way it was meant to be.”
“Like the way you and Zoey fell in love?”
With a quirk of his eyebrow, he said, “Touché. But I stand by my decision. The kind of power the Anicula holds—it’s all-consuming. Devastating.” He took a deep breath. “It breaks my heart that Zoey has been looking for it all this time. I blame myself for what’s happened. For what she did to Patrice.”
Ah, so she had acted alone.
“For the break-ins. For what happened to you.”
“The argument I heard at the Dumpster the other day—you suspected Zoey, didn’t you?” It explained the police comment.
“I begged her to stop looking for the Anicula, that if she stopped the police would never figure out it was her. I never dreamed how far she’d taken her obsession. I hadn’t realized what she had done to Patrice.” He held my gaze. “I wanted to let you know that I’m turning myself in to the police this afternoon.”
“Turning yourself in?” I didn’t understand.
“For the murder of Patrice. I’ll sign a full confession. Admit to the break-ins. Everything. I obviously can’t lie about what happened last night, but I hope the judge will be lenient on Zoey for what happened.”
“But you didn’t do any of those things…. Why take the blame?”
“I’m dying, Darcy,” he said simply. “And Zoey has her whole life ahead of her. She deserves to live it.”
I wasn’t sure I agreed with that. We sat in silence for a moment before I said, “Why are you telling me all this, Jonathan? Why track me down here today?”
“The Anicula can’t fall into the wrong hands. It needs to go to someone who appreciates its power and can protect it. You, Darcy.”
“Me? What makes you think you can trust me with it?”
“I’ve been watching you,” he said. “I see the way you are with your sister. With your aunt. With Mimi Sawyer. The Elder verified that you’re the right person to trust. You will figure out what to do with it.”
I was honored and at the same time horrified. What was I going to do with the Anicula? Could I cast a spell on it like I had Melina’s diary?
“When I stole the Anicula,” Jonathan said solemnly, “I hid it in the one place she’d never think to look. Under her nose.” He reached into a smashed shadowbox on the floor next to me and pulled out Elodie’s baby rattle. He shook it and it made a clunky thunking noise. He passed the rattle to me. “Good luck to you, Darcy.”
He rose and made his way out the front door.
I watched him go, then worked the rattle apart. Inside was a small teardrop opal.
The Anicula is shaped as a small teardrop. Because, my father said, it had brought so much pain to those who abused it.
I wrapped my hand around the stone and thought of Patrice and how she’d taken revenge on Jonathan, of Elodie and how her good deed of wanting to protect her mother from Jonathan’s womanizing and help her friend at the same time had gone horribly wrong by indirectly causing Patrice’s death. Of Zoey, who would do anything for love, and of Jonathan, who finally learned that love meant making the ultimate sacrifice. And of Roger, who would have given his life to save his enemy’s daughter—because she was, in a way, his daughter too. And even of Andreus and his strange wisdom. His words floated back to me.
You must remember that things, that people, are not always as they appear.
As I stood up, the stone warm in my hand, I knew what I had to do with it.
I just didn’t know how.
Chapter Thirty-five
“What gave me away?” Mimi asked, her big, dark eyes troubled.
I clapped my hands twice (the trick Godfrey taught me), and the diary appeared in my palms. “Watch,” I said. I dropped the book on the table and it automatically fell open to the spell page. The page that had the instructions for a recantation spell.
Mimi sighed.
“Plus, Cherise mentioned how a recantation spell had to be cast within an hour of her spell. There were very few people who knew when she was going to be here.”
Mimi scrunched her nose.
“But I didn’t really know for certain until yesterday, when you were so distraught and went storming off over the green with the dog. You were upset that Ve was well. But what I want to know is why you did it. Why did you cast those recantation spells that kept Ve ill?”
In a small voice, she said, “I didn’t want her to marry Sylar.”
“Why?”
“Do you ever watch them when they’re together?” she asked. “Really watch them?”
“I…I think so.”
“They laugh. They smile. But they don’t really look at each other. They don’t look at each other the way…”
“What?” I prodded.
“The way you and my dad look at each other. They don’t look at each other like they’re in love,” she went on quickly. “And I don’t think anyone should get married if they’re not in love.”
I let out a slow breath, not quite knowing where to start. I decided to bypass the whole part about me and Nick and said, “But that’s not for you to decide.”
She slumped on the swing. “So I heard.”
“Ah. So that’s what the Elder was talking about.” I recalled what she had said to Mimi in the meadow.
You cannot always control what is going on around you. Nor should you, even if you believe you’re doing the right thing.
I added, “She knew what you were up to.”
Mimi threw her hands in the air. “How does she know? I still don’t understand.”
I put my arm around her and drew her close. “Maybe it’s not for us to understand, but for us to just accept.”
“I don’t have to like it.”
I laughed. “No. You don’t.”
“Are you going to tell my dad?” she asked.
“Nope,” I said. “You are.”
She looked aghast. “Why would I do that?”
“Remember that whole responsibility thing the Elder was talking about? Taking responsibility for your actions is part of that.”
Her lower lip jutted. “I think I’m going to go watch Survivor with Ve and Archie.” She stomped off, and I smiled. Sometimes she reminded me a lot of a teenaged Harper.
Missy lifted her head, and I patted it. “Want to go for a walk?”
She jumped up and wagged her tail.
I grabbed her leash from the mudroom and set off around the village green. The Roving Stones tents still flapped, but for some reason it didn’t feel so ominous anymore. I circled around and waved to Mrs. P and Vince inside Lotions and Potions.
Tourists laughed and window-shopped.
A tiny orange kitten sat in the window of Spellbound Books. I peeked in and saw Marcus moving another large bookcase while Harper supervised. What would happen with them, I wasn’t sure, but I hoped it would work out.
As I neared the Charmory, I was surprised to see the lights on, and even more so when I saw Elodie in the window, taking down the crystals that hung there.
When she saw me, she waved me inside. Missy bounded ahead as we went in, and I blinked at the store’s transformation. Gone was the magical, colorful wonderland, replaced now with cardboard boxes that reminded me a lot of Patrice’s house.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
Elodie set a crystal into tissue paper and ca
refully rolled it. “Andreus Woodshall made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”
“What kind of offer?”
“He wants Connor and me to join the Roving Stones. We accepted. It’s time for a change.”
“Wow,” I said as Missy sniffed around.
“It’s a good time,” she said. “Roger’s out of the hospital and doing well. Thankfully, the gunshot missed all vital organs. Things here have been settled,” she said quietly. “I trust you to take care of my mom’s place and to have that yard sale. It’s time to start living my life. Our lives. Mine and Connor’s. We’ve been in limbo for so long. It’s time to move on.”
“When will you leave?”
“After my mother’s funeral next week we’ll meet the Roving Stones in Portland, Maine.” She wrapped another crystal. “I think Andreus asked us to join only because he thinks I have the Anicula, but that’s okay. I’m going to embrace the opportunity. Connor and I always wanted to travel.”
“What you said yesterday about not wanting the Anicula if I found it…is that still true?” I just wanted to be sure.
She nodded. “I’m not going to even ask if you did find it. I don’t want to know. If you did, do with it what you will. Just be careful.”
The tear-shaped stone was burning a hole in my pocket. “Will there be a wedding soon?” I asked.
“I hope so, Darcy. But I’m not sure. The curse…” She pressed her lips together, and I could tell she was trying not to cry.
“I’m not sure you are cursed,” I said softly.
“Why do you say that? Look at all the things that have happened. That’s not just bad luck.”
Okay, maybe she was a little cursed, but she hadn’t been responsible for her mother’s death, and she needed to know that to truly move on. “Jonathan’s powers as a Foodcrafter weren’t taken away by the Elder.”
Her hands stilled. “What are you talking about?”
“Your mother wished them away. And also wished that whatever food he made would make people ill.”
Confusion played across her face. “Who told you that?”
“Jonathan. Apparently, it was in retaliation for the breakup.”
She sighed. “Which was my fault.”
I couldn’t argue with that, but it was likely Jonathan’s relationship with her mother wouldn’t have lasted anyway. “But don’t you see? She misused the Anicula, too.”
A Witch Before Dying: A Wishcraft Mystery Page 25