Page 49 of The Curse of Indy Moore (The Cursed Duology #1)

Mr. Hawthorne went to the fridge, where he retrieved a handful of vegetables.

He went for spices next, leaving them aside while he got to chopping the vegetables on the counter.

Aunt Agnes was fast, but Mr. Hawthorne proved he spent more time in the kitchen than expected.

His slender fingers recognized the work, though there were moments where he rolled his right wrist, the one concealed by a brace.

“Is there something you wish to discuss?” he asked.

“Huh?” I blinked, realizing I was staring.

He finished chopping the vegetables and dropped them into a bowl, where he proceeded to dump different spices that had a sweet aroma. Though he had spoken to me, he wouldn’t face me, continuing to cook with his back to me.

I gestured over my shoulder. “No. I’ll be on my way.”

Humming, Mr. Hawthorne made a shape in the air with his finger. Silver light coalesced into a rune that sparked, then his salad swirled inside the bowl and settled.

He performed magic without a scepter. Back at the beach, too. I hadn’t really thought about it since, but I had never seen an artificer work without their scepter.

Unconsciously, I stepped closer, around the island. “How did you…”

Mr. Hawthorne faced me, holding his breakfast bowl to his chest. Meeting his eyes, even for a brief moment, reminded me of our argument, and I thought better.

“Nevermind.” I pivoted on my heel to leave.

“If you have a question, you may ask me,” he said, followed by the crunch of vegetables. Over my shoulder, he took a slow bite, attention drifting between me and his meal.

The question came without thought of the consequences. “I wouldn’t be getting in the way? ”

He flinched. I wouldn’t deny his reaction felt good.

He shoved a fork full of food in his mouth and swallowed loud enough to hear. Swirling the fork around, his lips pursed into a pout only he could pull off. “I should not have said that. You’ve never been a hindrance, and I apologize for implying otherwise.”

But the sudden darkening of his eyes said enough: he wouldn’t apologize or speak more about Miss Beamy.

The silence goaded me to make the attempt, even when I knew speaking sense to one refusing to listen would lead nowhere.

An argument would ensue, another one, and now more than ever, we had to work together.

“What is it you wanted to ask?” He spoke in my stead, holding open a path of return to our normal.

I accepted that opening. “Earlier, you used magic without a scepter, and at the beach as well. How did you do that?”

“All artificers can do so.” He took another loud crunch.

“Then why use scepters?”

“Because enchantments last as long as a rune does.” With the prongs of the fork stuck to his bottom lip, he muttered, “Once I’m done… would you care for a demonstration?”

I never thought a day would come where I would be like all the folk in Westshire, utterly captivated by the thought of magic.

Francesca never performed magic without a scepter, and I never saw anyone else do it, either.

If he offered, I saw no reason to decline, so I nodded and sat at the island.

While he ate, I twiddled my thumbs, wondering what to say, but we ended up saying nothing.

He finished his meal and set the bowl in the sink before gesturing for me to follow.

Mr. Hawthorne went outside. He never bothered checking if I followed. We walked silently through the trees to an open area. Slate joined us, landing on a nearby tree branch to watch.

Mr. Hawthorne held up a hand and said, “Keep there a moment.”

I did as instructed.

“Without a scepter, any artificer can conduct magic. However…” He pointed a finger ahead of him and rapidly drew a rune.

The silver magic poured from his finger to make the rune visible in the air before a spear of ice burst forth to pierce a tree trunk.

Slate shrieked from his branch and fluttered to the ground to peck at the front.

“That magic lasts as long as the rune is present. Now…” He knelt to run his hand through the grass. He dug in the dirt to retrieve a rock the size of his palm. “This is what I can do with my scepter.”

Reaching into his shirt pocket, he retrieved his scepter equipped with chalk.

He wrote the same rune onto the rock. Standing, he pointed the rock with the rune facing in the same direction.

Slate flew to another branch, watching expectantly.

His magic coalesced into the rune, where a dozen spears of ice appeared and ripped the tree apart.

He pointed the rock at another target to repeat the same process, then stopped.

“Scepters are a tool no different than a fisherman’s pole or a blacksmith’s hammer.

The power comes through us, but the scepter gives us the opportunity to make our enchantments more permanent.

” He tossed the rock up and down while Slate found further amusement in the broken ice shards in the grass.

“That’s why the enchantment on your cottage will remain until that rune is damaged.

If it is never damaged, then the enchantment will never falter. ”

“And that’s why the baron in Westshire had Miss Francesca visit every year to refashion the enchantments,” I said.

“Precisely. He likely has enchantments that can be destroyed by weather and age, so it’s safest to rework them.” Mr. Hawthorne licked his thumb and ran it over the chalk marks. He pointed the rock at another tree and nothing happened, proving that one ruined line ruined it all.

“Would you like to try?” he asked.

“Magic?” I laughed and took a step back. “I’m no artificer.”

“That doesn’t matter.” He nodded for me to come closer .

If Baxter were here, he’d say not to trust him. If this happened a week ago, I wouldn’t trust him. Much had changed.

I approached, letting Mr. Hawthorne settle his chest against my back. His long fingers interlocked with mine, save our pointer fingers.

“Move with me,” he said, his breath hot against my neck. He guided my arm to create a rune, where magic washed over my hand like water. Neither cool or hot, merely a gentle pressure that made my toes curl and heart leap.

The rune flashed silver before forming a glowing orb of golden light that split into ten and spiraled above us in a dance.

Mr. Hawthorne repeated the rune, spinning us little by little, until the golden light overtook the world around us.

We stood at the center, basking in the magic, the warmth building within my chest until I could hardly breathe.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” he whispered, and my breath caught, swearing I felt his lips against my cheek.

“Yes,” I replied, relieved that my sounding so awestruck could be explained by what we did, rather than the fact that I couldn’t stop thinking about how close we were. Mr. Hawthorne practically cradled me against his chest, where I feared I would stay for far too long if I didn’t escape now.

I knew what would ruin the moment, and a part of me didn’t want that. The words caught on my lips that yearned to move ever so slightly to the side, where I may feel Mr. Hawthorne’s skin against them.

Shutting my eyes, I forced myself to say, “Beamy told me that she was originally Luther’s cat, and that he isn’t here anymore.”

The atmosphere shifted instantly. Mr. Hawthorne stiffened prior to releasing me. The loss of his warmth made me shiver.

“I didn’t know you lost anyone,” I said after his prolonged silence.

“Most have.” He sought to escape through the trees. We abandoned the field along with its warm golden light. I already wished to return to it.

“You’ve never talked about him.”

“Why would I?” he muttered .

“Because you need to? Or you want to. I don’t know.” Because I wanted him to be comfortable enough around me to know he could talk about who or what he lost.

“There is nothing to be said. We both know what it is like to feel like something is missing that can never be filled.” Mr. Hawthorne went abruptly still in the middle of the forest.

“Are you alright?” I asked, worried, then frightened when he spun to grab me by the shoulders.

“Filled,” he said, shaking me. “That’s it. Brilliant!”

“Brilliant?” I repeated, then nearly fell over when he released me to run off.

Mr. Hawthorne sped through the woods as if he caught fire.

I ran after him, straight for the house and up the stairs to the office.

He threw open the door just as I stumbled behind him.

Otis and Professor Kumir sat over their books, both utterly exhausted with dark bags under their eyes and empty coffee mugs.

“Packs!” Mr. Hawthorne bellowed. He leapt over the mountains of books, knocking over a dozen, slipping on a page, and face-planting. Professor Kumir and Otis were too tired to laugh, but I did.

He shoved books off the table to replace with more, all the while saying, “Carline seeks out lonely souls each and every time then brings them into her pack. A family to fill what she is missing.”

A memory resurfaced that I voiced. “I hit one of the wolves with my lantern and another…”

Mr. Hawthorne snapped his fingers. “Lingered behind to check on it. Wolves look out for each other like a family would, and Carline cares for her wolves. They may be stolen souls, but she adores them. You pointed that out yourself, professor. We have countless depictions of her wrath when anyone dared to harm her wolves.”

He threw open one book to hand to Professor Kumir. Adjusting her glasses, she read over the passage he pointed at. “Yes, but what are you leading to?”

Mr. Hawthorne slammed his hands on the table and looked at us one by one. “What happens if one of the family turns on her? ”

He pushed the books he found forward. “There are stories of Carline hating betrayal. I bet if we looked at her confirmed victims, most of them would be good, well-rounded individuals that others couldn’t imagine hurting or betraying anyone.

Look at Miss Moore! She is the definition of loyal.

She puts her family above all else. What if that is protection on Carline’s part? ”

His questions spurred hope within me. It made sense for her to go after me.

She saw my loyalty toward my family. While I would hate her for taking them from me, I wouldn’t be myself as one of her wolves.

They would become my family, and I’d share that same loyalty with them and thus toward her.

She would feed off my corrupted feelings while simultaneously gaining what she desired most.

Professor Kumir removed her glasses to tap her bottom lip with the temple tip. “This is all speculation. We require proof.”

“We have read of at least a dozen similar demons, whose curses have been broken by the hands of whom they cursed. Here.” He ripped through another book and dropped it in front of Professor Kumir.

“A fox demon who forced humans to care for his every need, but when one human had the courage to poison the fox, all the curses were lifted, and he fled.”

“He could merely have been weakened by the poison,” Professor Kumir argued.

I knew that was part of her job because he could still be speculating, but it irritated me that she set it aside so lightly.

“That fox demon was never as powerful as Carline, either,” she added.

“There are more,” Otis chimed in to my great relief. He tore through the books to set one in front of Professor Kumir. “A fire demon was doused with water thousands of times until a child it cursed to never sleep poured water on it, and the curse was lifted.”

Professor Kumir tapped her glasses on the desk. “This could be plausible.”

“The Grand Tempest Archives may have better answers now that we have a lead. I could pay them a visit and search for further material to back up our theory,” Mr. Hawthorne suggested .

“I hate to bring it up,” Otis glanced nervously at me, “but we do not have the usual time to consider this theory or any way to test it. If Indy could go against Carline, how could she go about it? Carline is no fire demon to douse in water. We aren’t sure mere poison will work as it did with the fox, either. ”

“He’s right.” My ears flattened against my head. “Am I expected to invite her to a round of fisticuffs?”

The once jubilant atmosphere dulled, and all fell silent, despaired.

Mr. Hawthorne took his bottom lip between his teeth.

Frown lines made deep impressions on his face, and the frustration in his eyes put sweat upon my skin.

He opened and closed his mouth, willing words that didn’t come until he ruffled his hair.

“We have a theory, which is better than what we’ve had. I will go to the archives,” Mr. Hawthorne said between clenched teeth.

“We will.” Professor Kumir grabbed her cane and rose. “The more eyes we have the better. You’ll come, too, girl. We’ve been cooped up in this house for days. It would do us all good to get out of here.”