Page 20 of A Spell for Midwinter’s Heart

“This spell. You don’t agree with my mom that it’s…against the Rede or something?”

The snort that came from Zaide was deafening. “Do I think preventing a corporate leech from lying through her teeth is against the Rede?”

“Well, when you put it that way, I feel silly even for asking.”

“As you should. Now, go do it.”

The early-morning locker room was still blessedly empty. Her backup plan had been to cast the spell in a nearby supply closet, but it was better this way.

Claiming a locker, she swiftly disrobed before assembling her improvised altar, laying out a printed handkerchief on which to arrange a clear crystal, her athame, a white candle, and finally the poppet.

The heather gray doll was soft and squishy, having no features except two tiny blue button eyes.

She slid the ring of Hayleigh’s hair around its mouth, binding lies inside.

Her eyes fixed on the poppet, and a tremor passed through her. Her grandmother had cast A Spell for the Whole Truth on her. Did that mean she’d had a Rowan poppet? How had she bound it?

She shook her head and the thoughts free with it. That line of questioning would do nothing but tangle her up, and she needed to focus on the task at hand.

A solid lump in her jeans pocket reminded her she still had the hairbrush, and she tossed it to the altar for good measure. The spell didn’t call for it, but personal effects never hurt a spell’s chances of success.

She struck a match with a flare of sulfur and cupped her hand around the candle to be sure it lit. Finally, she held the athame up in her palms and stared at the poppet as she spoke the words:

Deliver the truth, suffer no lie,

No matter how deeply I might pry.

By the power of three by three,

As I do will it, so mote it be.

There was no immediate effect, but of course there wouldn’t be. She couldn’t be certain it had worked until she asked a question Hayleigh didn’t want to answer. Until then, she would simply have to trust. She shut the locker door to hide the evidence of spellcasting and hurried out to the spa area.

Four rippling blue pools heated at intervals of five degrees Fahrenheit dominated the open stonework room, while both steam and dry saunas lined the walls.

Mudwort wafted up from a cistern at the entrance, brown and earthy.

She dipped a heavy white bowl into the murky water and dumped it over her face, where it rushed down her skin in pale brown rivulets.

Hayleigh reclined, soaking in a pool. Just as Rowan entered, one of Zaide’s aunts, Mi Young, emerged from the body scrub area to call their names.

The Goshen Group representative opened her eyes, noting Rowan immediately.

A hard line formed between her eyes before her expression relaxed into a satisfied smirk.

“Oh, it’s you,” Hayleigh said. “How are you, Ronan?”

“It’s Rowan.”

“My mistake.” The reply was airy, with no hint of apology. She emerged from the pool in a dripping trail, and Rowan followed into the treatment area.

They stretched out on the waterproof vinyl of the treatment beds. Mi Young had been briefed on a deeply edited version of the plan, and the older woman gave Rowan a secretive smile before slipping on her scrubbing gloves and going at it. Another woman leaned over Hayleigh to get started.

The experience of having the outer layer of skin forcefully removed from her body was a new one, and it took a great deal of effort to stay focused on the task at hand.

“Are you heading home for Christmas?” she asked, her body shimmying with Mi Young’s deft scrubs.

“Are you talking to me?” asked Hayleigh, surprised and a little offended.

“Yes?”

No doubt Hayleigh would have ignored the question if the spell had not been involved, but it was, and so the other woman turned her face toward Rowan and, not bothering to open her eyes, mumbled, “Heading out today. But I’ll be back next week.”

“More meetings related to the festival?”

The mumbling continued. “No, we’ve got that pretty well settled.”

“Meetings related to why you were looking at the downtown buildings?”

“Yes, and the resort.”

“The ski resort?”

“No, the new one.”

Rowan stalled at that. “What new resort?”

“The one we’re going to build.”

That was new. She hadn’t expected that. “Where?”

“Outside of town. Between here and the ski area.”

Between town and the ski area was all wild, untamed old growth. It must have been the land Mr. McCreery stewarded.

“So you’re trying to buy the timber land?”

“Yes. It’s part of the package.”

Rowan cursed softly. She hated that she’d been right.

“The other day,” she said, “were you looking to buy the building the Magick Cabinet is in?”

“Yes,” Hayleigh mumbled. “We have a long line of corporate partners salivating for downtown commercial space.”

“Why? What’s got them so interested?”

Hayleigh let out a yawn. The treatment was putting her to sleep. Rowan was almost out of time.

“They all want to get in on Christmastown.”

“Christmastown? What’s Christmastown?”

“The future,” mumbled the other woman, rapidly fading into sleep. “An all-up experience where you can celebrate the reason for the season and buy everything you need to go under the tree.”

“Does that include the local vendors at the market?”

Hayleigh laughed at that. “Only if they can pay what bigger vendors are willing and able.”

That was a no, then—there was no way they could afford to compete with massive corporations that used their size and influence to extract cheap materials and even cheaper labor.

Rowan inhaled. “There’s no place for the Magick Cabinet in Christmastown, is there?”

A tinkle of a laugh. “By next year, it’ll be a Starbucks.”

It was all she could do to keep herself breathing as she staggered into the changing room, visions of “Christmastown” dancing in her head, and plunged into the shower.

The revelations had been even worse than she had imagined. Not just replacing the festival but pushing out local businesses from downtown? Cutting down the old growth to build a resort?

What could Operation Holly and Ivy possibly do that would compete with that?

Mi Young had slathered her with a moisturizer that clung sticky on her skin, its cloying flowery scent burning her nostrils.

As the flow of hot water hit, she did her best to clean it off, hoping her anxiety would go with it, even though she had been too long in its company to imagine this would be that simple.

But it was far from her only coping tool. This knowledge, she reminded herself, was what she’d come looking for: difficult to hear, but necessary in figuring out what to do next.

These things had not yet come to pass. In this moment, everything the Goshen Group threatened was still safe.

And she would do her damnedest to keep it that way.

When she emerged from the shower, the first thing she saw was Hayleigh, wrapped up in a terry-cloth robe, shifting through the contents of Rowan’s now-open locker. She held a pearl white iPhone up with poinsettia red nails, poised to document the locker’s contents.

“What a freak,” muttered Hayleigh, her free hand moving toward Grandmother Madeleine’s pendant.

Anxiety crystallized into fury as Rowan stepped forward and raised a pointed finger, shouting, “Don’t touch that!”

The locker slammed shut on one of Hayleigh’s hands and her phone went spinning from the other, torn free as if by a furious gust of wind. Yelping in pain, she stumbled back, clutching her reddening digits, and whirled.

“What the hell!”

The Goshen Group rep’s face clouded in confusion. She’d clearly been expecting Rowan to be standing right behind her. Instead, her mouth dropped as she took in the many feet of empty space between them, her gaze coming to land on Rowan’s outstretched finger, which still pointed in command.

“Did you…” Hayleigh glanced back at the locker, eyes wide. “Did you cast some kind of spell on me?”

“I…” Rowan’s cheeks flushed, betraying any pretense that she might have lied her way out of it.

“That’s what that was in there, wasn’t it?

” said Hayleigh with a gasp. “That was my brush. My hair! You…you sicko!” She scrambled across the tile floor to where the phone had landed, keeping a wary eye on Rowan.

“I knew it. Gavin said your family’s witchcraft was just a ‘harmless self-actualization practice.’ But I could tell there was something wrong with you.

” Her eyes widened. “You cast a spell on Gavin too, didn’t you?

” With a cruel laugh, she added, “That explains it.”

“Explains what?” asked Rowan, finally spitting out some words. Every other time she’d attempted to form a retort, she’d ended up tangled in the mixed truth and lies of Hayleigh’s accusations.

“How you kept stealing his attention.” Hayleigh crossed her arms across her front with a flip of her hair. “Well, it seems your magic’s not that strong anyway.”

Uneasiness flitted through Rowan’s chest. “What do you mean?”

The other woman stared her down from beneath long, curling lashes.

“Gavin and I went out last night, and we’re going out again today.

” Hayleigh relished dropping each revelation as she stalked closer.

“And when I see him, I am going to tell him exactly what you did to me…In fact.” Tap, tap went a bright red nail against her phone. “I’m going to show him.”

No. No. No.

Already-racing thoughts intensified. Her field of vision constricted, so that the closer Hayleigh got, the more the woman overtook it.

“And what you did to him…”

The other woman was inches away then, close enough to smell the sickly sweet moisturizer and spearmint toothpaste. A sharp nail dug into Rowan’s chest as Hayleigh finished delivering her threat.

“And then he’ll realize exactly what you are.”

A primal instinct tore its way free from where she’d worked so hard to keep it down, so that she could play nice, be accepted, and keep her head low, which had let bullies like Hayleigh run rampant around her. Taking what they wanted, doing what they wanted.

No. No longer, not when she had the power to do something about it. The room blazed with lines of magic, power that called to her, and she drew it to her center in a single pull.

The best defense is a good offense. The pendant in her palm burned red hot as the spell came both from within her and from without.

Words to a spell bullied their way to the surface— A Spell to Forget —and she pictured herself scrubbing the last few minutes of Hayleigh’s mind, removing all evidence of spellcasting and of what she had done.

Keeping Rowan’s secrets, and Elk Ridge, safe.

She stared straight into Hayleigh’s eyes, wiped her hand through the space between them, and in a voice she hardly recognized as her own, said,

“Forget.”