I looked at her, confused, and asked her to tell me more. What did she mean by that? But her finger slowly pulled away, and her head shook slowly. The train began to pull away.
I patted the window with my hand. Tell me Laura—it’s now or never.
She said no more nor made an attempt to. She looked off in the other direction now, one hand over her mouth, sealing off the explanation forever.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I couldn’t get home fast enough, but the journey just from the train station to my town in the country seemed like an eon, especially since I was wondering what the hell Laura had been trying to tell me. I turned it over in my mind so many times I got a headache. But as the terrain out the window became more familiar and I knew I was nearing home, I let it go. I sat forward in my seat in anticipation, looking around at the familiar sites of my land. The huge trees swaying in a summer breeze, the fields of wheat and bustles of hay all lined for the neighbouring farmer’s livestock. Birds flew magnificently overhead, soaring on the wind, letting it carry them to wherever.
I could’ve called ahead and had Duke or Theo pick me up from the station, but I wanted these last few moments to myself to resolve what I had reflected about on the train, and I wanted to surprise everyone, as no one knew I would be returning today. I’d had no idea when I’d left for Shadow Hills when I would be able to return.
I grabbed a cab. As I drew closer to Autumn Moors, my heart was a butterfly, my stomach a pancake flipping in a pan. All I wanted was to see my family. My hands were like birds with an excited flutter for the first time in so long; it was hard to remember the last time I’d felt so giddy. I laughed in spite of myself.
Finally the house came into view. Autumn Moors had never looked more beautiful than it did to me right then. The trees seemed to open up and allow us inside before closing behind us. Sunlight fluttered on the windows of the taxi as it shone down through the trees.
My home. It took my breath away to see her again. The harshly painted symbols Lou had left were gone, and there was no sign a fire had ever destroyed her. Strong wood held her high with a fresh coat of paint, which returned the exterior to its usual splendour. Everything was just as it should be there in the home that housed everything precious to me.
As we pulled to a stop, I hastily exited the taxi, wrestling a small suitcase that Katerina had given me, and gave the driver the fee as he gave me a “this lady must be crazy” look and drove off. I just looked around and said a silent prayer of thanks with closed eyes that I had made it home yet again, after the latest journey.
And latest terror.
I approached the front door of our beautiful home. I paused for another moment. I took a breath.
I had managed to do a full circle yet again and arrive in the only place I ever wanted to be: home. I felt different inside. I knew I was a different woman—a different witch, even—than I had been when I’d left here a year before. I was completely healed now, stronger and more sure of who I was. I would no longer be a victim of anyone in this world—or not of this world. I knew my strengths as a witch, and I knew my weaknesses as a witch, too. I would protect the earth and my family. And if that meant what it had meant to the last Lightning Witch…well, I would have to make that sacrifice, too.
I listened and heard bustling inside, my friends and family running around the house with voices that sounded like singing to my ears, and an occasional bark from Hunter, as I’m sure he was getting fed up with all of the jostling. I could stand the wait no longer.
I slowly opened the front door and slid inside. I was taken aback to see Tracey and Hayden running back and forth from the greenhouse to the kitchen, murmuring ideas to each other as they crossed paths. Books were flying through the air, and Tracey would grab one every now and then for a quick reference as Hayden stopped to crush herbs with a pestle in the mortar in the crook of her elbow. Betty was a raven, chasing those books up to the ceilings as Roomie flew past her, enjoying the game. Hunter lay on the floor in the middle of it all, looking up and around, getting in everyone’s way, but no one minded. I could see through to the backyard window, and Jasper was with Joel in the yard. They were training! Joel had his swords and daggers, and Jasper was throwing fireballs into the swimming pool.
Jasper.
A million days and a million miles could have stood in between us before, demons and wicked witches of old asylums, and even bad health. But now, the time and distance of our days spent apart—the dramas and the dynamics—they all melted away as if nothing of the sort had ever meant anything at all, as if time had not changed us nor altered our perception of it. My eyes stayed on him, his strong arms working their muscles as his hands tensed, cupping each forming fireball. His blond locks were stringy with sweat, hanging down in his eyes and flying back with every throw. The fireballs sizzled out immediately as they met their contrasting element. He stopped and lifted his shirt to wipe off his face, skin glowing as if he was touched by the sun, ready to form another one.
Jasper.
He stopped and turned ever so slowly. His eyes followed the house and finally rested on the window. I smiled, guiding his sight to see me through it. He froze, unsure if he was really seeing me. Then he was gone.
Within seconds the back door had slammed open, painfully banging off the wall. Tracey and Hayden stopped their carousing, and with it, all of the books fell with a frenzy of smacks onto the floor. Betty dropped down with a caw and morphed right back into her old Yorkie self and sniffed the air as she stared at me. Jasper came flying through the house, bumping into Tracey and Hayden as he landed straight in my arms.
This hug was the best hug I had ever had. The hug of all hugs.
His hand went behind my neck and felt the place where my hair now stopped. I knew he missed my long golden mane as much as I did. He smiled at me nonetheless. Sometimes change was good.
He kissed me with an urgent strength, which I had missed so much. We devoured each other in that kiss. Happy tears dampened my cheeks. I was truly home now in his arms. We looked into each other’s eyes and giggled. Our heartstring glowed between us, fully charged from being so close to where one of us ended and the other began.
I bent down and met with the patiently waiting Betty and Hunter, my sweet babes wagging their tails and licking my face. Betty was changing back and forth from hyena to flamingo to canary she was so excited. Hunter just wanted to smell me deeply, as if he were trying to remember all of me again or figure out where the hell I had been. God, I’d missed them so much.
When they’d had enough of me and wanted to run back to their game, I huffed out and stood up and brushed away a grateful tear.
Tracey and Hayden reached for me, and we held each other for some time, swaying slightly, enjoying this moment.
Hayden stepped back and searched me over. “Magnificent recovery.” Her eyes were wide as she took in my healing. “How are Katerina, Laura, and Anna Belle doing?”
I smiled. “They are perfect. I learned so much. I was accepted into a wolf pack, I helped victims of Shadow Hills find peace, and we took care of each other and worked hard. It was”—I let my breath out—“miraculous.”
Hayden nodded and smiled. She knew exactly what I had needed to heal.
Tracey was about to open her mouth and say something when we were all abruptly pushed further into the house. We all fell down like a row of pins from a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound ball.
I couldn’t see with my face smothered in the fabric of Tracey’s dress. It was all legs and arms as we tried to get up. Betty was a monkey now, pulling hands out of the pile of people.
“Damn it, Duke!” Joel complained as he stood and helped up Tracey, brushing off his pants and sliding a hand through his hair.
Oh, the vanity, Joel.
I was met with one of Joel’s infamous sneers.
“Oh, gosh darn, Nicky! I’m so sorry!” I heard the familiar voice of my favourite iron worker. Duke was picking me up with a look of utter apology on his fac
e. I laughed and hugged him tight. “Aw, I just missed ya so much, Nicky.”
“I know, Duke; me too.” He set me down as Theo peeked out from behind the bodily mass of Duke. He stood straight as an arrow with his arms behind his back, one hand slipping up to adjust his glasses from time to time.
“Hi, Nicole. We can give you a progress report if you like, or we can wait—”
I grabbed him by the tie and brought him into my arms. “Theo, you are so awesome, but yes, let’s wait on that.” I kissed his cheek. His complexion burned crimson, and he seemed to slink back behind Duke. Duke shrugged his shoulders.
Next I heard a woman screaming in the front yard.
“Now what?” I held my hands at the ready.
I was met with a flight of butterflies and blue jays, which could only mean Piper was here. Betty joined them as a small hummingbird. I immediately relaxed. We could all only laugh at the joy of her entrance.
She ran through the door and jumped into my arms. I had to step back to catch her. She showered my face with kisses. God, I’d missed my Pipes.
“Oh, Nicole! I’ve got so much to tell you! Oh, and I need to hear your stories, of course! We missed you something awful!” She stopped to take a breath as Reg walked in. I put Piper down and walked up to her. She still felt like a second mother to me.
“How are you doing, darling?” We embraced, and I wanted to hold onto her forever and never let her go.
“I’m good, Reg. Really good.” I put my cheek on her chest as she ran her fingers through my hair. I sniffled a bit. Now I knew this wasn’t a dream.
“Glad you are home, darling.”
I looked around at the people I loved—my friends, my makeshift family. I looked at their beautiful faces and felt such adoration for them, as I could plainly see all of their strength and loyalty to one another. It was so great to be home.
“So when do we eat?” Duke looked to us all, concerned. We all laughed.
“I couldn’t agree more, Duke!” I rubbed my hands together. “I’m starving!”
We all wandered into the backyard. I stopped to smell the earth and the trees, new and growing with all of their might.
Hello there, friends.
The trees spoke very low and told me they loved the new yard and the rebuild.
The fresh air cleansed me, and the familiar surroundings soothed my soul. There was no place like home, and there was absolutely no place like Autumn Moors.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
It felt so good to have everyone around the table again. Duke and Theo were in their own world of some important board game, juices from the meal running down Duke’s chin as he spit his sentences this way and that. Tracey and Joel huddled close at the other end, whispering softly to each other as Tracey’s hand absently stroked the coarse fur behind Strider’s ear. Piper was telling us all about her year so loudly that everyone else could scarcely speak as Reg sat primly and cut her steak into cubes before placing small fragments delicately on her tongue. Hayden had the attention of Hunter and Betty as they performed tricks for bites of Hayden’s meal. Betty swirled around, shapeshifting to all sorts of cute animals, at which Hayden laughed lightly. Hunter more or less just gazed at her ever so deeply with his round blue eyes, which earned the same reward from Hayden.
I basked in their company and stories, and I sat as close to Jasper as I could. I wanted as much time touching him, smelling him, and loving him as I could get.
We feasted on grilled steak, courtesy of Jasper, of course. Frothy, cold beer splashed in deep mugs. An array of succulent root vegetables steamed mightily into the air, and the broken legs of crabs were piled high on the platter, and butter bubbled and simmered in the ramekins that sat atop various lit candles that we all shared. Double-dipping rules did not apply here. The scents of garlic and herbs wafted on the breeze that sailed on toward the stars.
Reg had baked angel food cake clouded with cream and plopped with strawberries. It sat waiting for the main course to be finished so that it too could wind up in our starving bellies.
When the food had been eaten and the dishes cleared and cleaned, we all moseyed back to the table and sat down with a collective thud. Tracey came out carrying a tray with small glasses filled with a silver tonic meant to aid in digestion, while Hayden lit a bowl of herbs that smoked to aid in waking us up.
We slowly came to, energy returning to us and tummies settling. But now there was a nervous chatter from me and my friends as we all kept looking over our shoulders with skittish eyes. Everyone felt the chill in the air, the impending threat all around us so thick you could almost chew it.
“What was in that drink, Trace?” Theo was nervously pacing around in no particular order.
“I may have made it too strong.” Tracy bit her lip.
Oops.
Dinner had been a welcome distraction, and we had all needed it, but now it was time to get down to business. We had to come up with some sort of game plan before Lou walked right up to our doorstep. We had to be prepared for anything at any time.
“Well, then.” Reg cleared her throat. “We must be getting on with it, then. I don’t like the look of that moon tonight.” We all slowly raised our eyes to the heavens. The moon was round and large and as white as an all-seeing eye. It seemed to eavesdrop on us there and stare right down at us. Piper shivered visibly.
“Who has some ideas?” Joel clasped his hands together and sat forward. “Let’s have at it—open the table up for anything.”
Silence.
Everyone looked around at each other, no one truly willing to commit to speaking their minds until someone else broke the silence.
“I think we need to lay it out; say exactly what we are planning here tonight.” Jasper stared deeply at everyone. “We are discussing how to kill a demon. Before we leave this table tonight, we will have a plan on the destruction—the murder—of another creature. Everyone has to be aware of that and not take that lightly.” Jasper wiped his mouth. “If anyone doesn’t think they can handle that, it is totally okay to go. No one here will think any differently of you. It’s okay to be scared; it’s okay to think you won’t have the stomach to follow through with our design. Because I am telling you right now”—he pointed his finger straight down on the table—“this is going to be the most horrible thing we have ever done. We aren’t even sure we will all survive this, so it has to be foolproof, and it has to work so none of us die.” Jasper paused and breathed deep, looking at me with sad eyes. “If anyone doesn’t think they can see this through, get up now and walk away.”
No one budged. The evening breeze swept through our crowd and whistled away with our silent pledge to each other. The heaviness of the world and its horrors weighed down on us, stubborn and unyielding. It became slightly uncomfortable to breathe. A loud scraping noise broke through the silence as Duke and Theo’s chairs pushed back from the table.
“I didn’t realize we would have a choice in the matter, but glad we do,” Theo squeaked. “Come on then, Duke; we have games to play.”
Just as Theo turned to take his leave, Joel stood up and stared him down.
“What? Jasper said we have a choice!”
“Jasper may have said that, but I didn’t,” Joel growled.
“Okay, okay.” Theo slinked back down into his chair, shaking like a leaf.
My heart went out to him. War wasn’t Theo’s forte. Duke put an arm around him.
“Don’t worry, little buddy. I’ll take care of you too.” Duke beamed down at the disappearing Theo as he was shut away in the bulk of Duke. Duke touched Theo’s nose with his finger to punctuate that he meant every word.
“Can’t Jasper just burn him at the stake or something?” Piper pouted.
“That’s a good start, hon. But we will need more than that, I’m afraid,” Tracey commented with a sympathetic tone as she touched Piper, who deflated visibly, on the shoulder.
“He needs to fight us here,” Reg stated, her eyes far off, staring at something i
n the darkness of the newly growing trees that swayed in the breeze and seemed unearthly tonight, as if they would give answers of where Lou could be hiding. “He will find us here and try to take what is his—what he thinks is his. He needs to take what we have and conquer us on this land.” We all knew Reg had the power of insight, so her words meant something.
“Well, isn’t that a good thing?” Joel was animated now. “We can be better prepared here. We can fortify the house and see him coming.”
“If we can see him coming.” Hayden bit her lip.
“We need to train more.” Joel turned to Jasper and eyed him hard. “You need to get this element completely under your control. If that rat bastard has a chance to use it against you or any of us…”
“He thinks he can take it,” I whispered. Everyone stopped and looked at me. “Lou thinks he can take the elements from the witches. Really he is replicating them. He can never have the complete control of the elements unless he has them all. Fire is one of the hardest to find, let alone acquire, but really he is searching for the Lightning.” I stopped when I looked around and noticed everyone staring at me, their faces expressing shock and horror. I had said too much. From the looks of their faces, I knew then what I was afraid of. I could never tell them about my newfound identity as a Lightning Witch. Worse, I could never tell them, my loved ones, my closest in heart in this world, of what the duties of the Lightning Witch meant.
Jasper stared at me, realizing then that I was holding something back. My eyes pleaded with his not to push it.
“Well, he isn’t taking anything more from this family than he already has.” Jasper seethed. He stood up and stormed away, a glowing trail in his wake. I didn’t go after him; I knew when Jasper needed to walk something off.
Joel shook his head in my direction and followed him, dropping Tracey’s hand.
Great.
I felt a sharp twang on my heartstring. I knew how hard this had been for Jasper. It burned my heart deeply that I had had something to do with breaking his. All of me wanted to run after him and hold him, soothe him and protect him from all this evil around us, but as I was about to move, Tracey laid her hand on mine and told me to stay with sympathetic eyes.
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