Page 31 of The Witching Moon Manor (The Spellbound Sisters #2)
A Chess Piece
Emerges when a new strategy is needed.
After the last skirt train shifted over the threshold and the sound of the lock clicking into place echoed through the shop, the Crescent Moon had done its best to primp up the kitchen.
It was eager to watch the Quigleys wrap their tired fingers around warm porcelain cups and savor the taste of freshly baked apple bread once they all returned home and drifted toward the scent of mulled cider brewing in the cauldron.
But the house’s dreams of a quiet winter’s night were dashed to pieces when Anne stumbled through the back door and cast her cloak to the floor with a cry of frustration, followed quickly behind by a bewilderedlooking Beatrix.
It wasn’t long before Anne was snapping the cabinet drawers open and closed, mumbling curses beneath her breath that she realized must have slipped straight up the chimney when a disheveled Violet appeared in the kitchen, her eyes still foggy from sleep.
“What’s happened?” Violet asked, a note of desperation slipping into her tone as Anne prepared a pot of tea with so much aggression that she knew there was little doubt of the copper kettle acquiring another dent or two when all was said and done.
“I’m not going back,” Anne grumbled as she pried the lid from a metal canister and began scooping out a blend of blue cornflowers and black tea, most of which fell across the tops of her boots instead of the strainer, though she was too focused on her own troubles to bother brushing them away.
“That man is impossible to work with. We’re better off trying to find where the ring belongs on our own. ”
“But you’re normally so patient,” Beatrix remarked, keeping her voice soft and low, as one does when convincing an angry cat to crawl out from beneath the bed. “Even with the customers who demand a table when they don’t have a reservation or criticize the daily specials.”
“This is much worse than insulting Peggy’s bonbons, Bee,” Anne scoffed. “Vincent notices too much. It’s like he can sense exactly what I’m thinking, and now he’s discovered something about me. Something that should have remained a secret.”
Violet reached over and took hold of Anne’s elbow then, pulling her attention away from the pot of boiling water and toward questions that she knew needed to be answered.
“What sort of secret?” Violet asked, unable to hide her curiosity.
Anne sighed and tossed the strainer against the counter in surrender before sinking into a chair at the table.
“Do you remember when I told you that there aren’t any clear lines between the past, present, and future for me anymore?” Anne asked, brushing away some of the curls that had broken loose from her bun earlier in the evening.
“Of course,” Beatrix said as she and Violet took their places on the opposite side of the table. “We were talking about our birthday visions, and you said yours must be an echo of what’s come before.”
“Yes,” Anne said with a nod. “But what I didn’t tell you is that the glimpses I get from the past are much more than echoes. I can drift backward now into moments and places that I’ve never encountered before.”
Anne watched as Violet and Beatrix widened their eyes and leaned forward, demanding to hear more, though neither uttered a word.
“It’s why I think the bookshop and the apartment above it are important,” Anne finally explained. “I was searching for an answer to our troubles, and my magic brought me back to the past that unfolded there.”
“This is a very rare power,” Violet said, and Anne knew she was thinking the same thing as her: Seers get hints of the past from time to time, but only so that they can learn something about the future. “I’ve never heard of a witch being able to peer into the past in the way you’ve described.”
“I wanted to test it a little at a time,” Anne explained, lacing her fingers together as if the movement might help keep her magic in check. “But Vincent realized what I can do and wants me to use my power to better connect with the spirits.”
“It could work,” Beatrix murmured with a nod, her brows pinching together in the way they did whenever she was considering a potential plot twist.
“But you don’t want to,” Violet said with a pointed look at Anne’s hands, which were clasped so tightly that they looked shockingly white.
“He thinks that I’ll need an anchor,” Anne said, each word a hiss between her teeth. “And has offered to do it.”
“Of course you’ll need an anchor,” Violet insisted, clearly shocked that her sister had thought otherwise. Anne had proven to be an unusually skillful witch, but her new powers had the potential to run wild without someone to remind her to stay grounded.
“I’m not sure that’s true,” Anne replied. “I’ve never had any trouble keeping myself in check before.”
The house shuddered as it remembered the feeling of the black ribbons that Anne had used to bind her magic slithering across the floor.
“This isn’t the same thing,” Beatrix argued, her words fast and insistent. “The power you’re describing is much more unpredictable, and your magic will be tempted to stretch you further than it’s done before. You could break if you try and do this on your own.”
Anne suddenly noticed that the familiar softness of her sister’s voice had dimmed under the strain of the day, to the point where each of her words seemed like they were about to buckle.
The sound of it instantly changed the texture of the room, the heat of Anne’s anger giving way to alarm as her gaze shot from her clasped hands to Beatrix’s worn expression.
“I’m not the only one who’s at risk of crumbling, it seems,” Anne said as she reached forward and grasped Beatrix’s hand, her gaze flickering to her sister’s face as she noticed for the first time the red trails where tears had frozen to ice against her skin.
“I still haven’t been able to think of a single sentence,” Beatrix whispered, her voice shaking now. “And Mr. Stuart wants the story even earlier than he did before.”
The house wanted to rattle its pots and pans then and push Beatrix toward the nearest wingback chair in the front parlor so that she would finally rest, but Violet acted first.
“You need to stop thinking so much about what you’ll write next,” she insisted. “You’ve grown to view storytelling as something that comes from checking off a neat list of steps instead of remembering what it truly is: magic.”
“How can I sit back and do nothing at a moment like this?” Beatrix asked as she shook her head, unconvinced.
“Resting is the best thing you can do when searching for inspiration,” Violet argued as Anne nodded in agreement. “How can you expect a tale to come to light if you don’t make room for it to grow?”
“Any distractions would be too risky now,” Beatrix insisted. “Not when we don’t have any time to lose.”
Violet’s gaze shifted from Beatrix to Anne then, a plan obviously stitching itself together beneath the startling hue of her eyes.
“What if Anne promises to try again with Vincent,” Violet said, “so long as you agree to let yourself rest, Bee? You can’t keep staring at a blank page in your notebook or you’ll go mad.”
Anne sighed then, understanding what Violet was up to.
They would both need to take a risk, Anne pushing beyond her boundaries to see how far she could go and Beatrix falling back to discover if what she’d lost could be reclaimed.
Neither would step away, so long as it meant leading their sister down the right path.
“Then it’s settled,” Violet said happily as she shifted away from the table and toward the cauldron bubbling in the hearth, where the scent of mulled cider had grown stronger beneath the current of their conversation.
At Violet’s declaration, the strain that had seeped into the floorboards began to ease and notes of cloves and apples saturated the kitchen as the Quigleys sipped from their mugs and thought of the days ahead.
They could still feel something tightening within their own chests, but tucked in the warmth of the kitchen with the curtains drawn against the night, the sisters thought it was merely their own worries tangling together.
The house let its awareness shift beyond the front door, though, and instantly recognized the sensation for what it was: a sign that things were continuing to slip out of place beyond the safe confines of the Crescent Moon.