Chapter 7

7

CAROLINA

“ L ina! We have a problem!” The panic in Camila’s voice rings clear, and I almost drop a tray of scones in response. I steel myself and place them on the counter before we end up in a bigger mess. Camila makes it three steps into the shop before abruptly turning and flipping the open sign to closed .

Silas hops onto the counter, and we share a concerned look. “Bad time with Detective McStuffins?” he asks.

Camila shakes her head, but instead of telling us what happened, she holds out her hand for me to take. Typically, I’d roll my eyes at her dramatics, but the look on her face tells me it might be warranted.

Brow furrowed, I take Cami’s hand and let her memories of earlier flow into my mind. It’s second nature to me at this point. A muscle that barely has to flex to activate.

This is my power.

Recalling the past and seeing the future.

It’s out of my control in my dreams, and the need for physical touch to do it is nonexistent. Whether it’s my power reaching out and searching for people’s memories or futures or the memories are reaching out to me isn’t clear .

Before I’d gained control over it in the waking hours, I would brush my hand against someone’s, and I’d see their whole life splayed across my vision whether I intended to or not.

The first time it happened, I was pulled out of school for a week until I could get a handle on it. Sometimes my magic went rogue and overruled me if it felt something was off, but for the most part it allowed my friends and family privacy from its desire to see their futures.

On the outside, my eyes glaze over and my body stiffens, seeing memories instead of what’s right in front of me. The power prickles in my hand in a way that I find comforting. Camila says she can’t feel it when I do it, but the change in demeanor tips her off.

Internally, it’s like scrubbing through a movie. I can go forward and see life as it’s currently set, but people’s ever-changing decisions make it possible things will change. It’s harder to see a witch’s future, and Camila and I have both agreed that it would be bad to look too far into ours anyway.

Lowering the shield I have up on my ability, I mentally flip the pages of Camila’s memories working backwards from the present moment to find her arrival at the police station.

I see Sebastian Blackwell and Detective O’Reilly at their desks through Camila’s eyes. I roll my eyes at Bas, just as she had. Then I see the necklace—the cause of Camila’s panic.

“ Fuck . How did they get that?” I ask, dropping her hand like it burned me.

She’s already walking to the door of the magic room. “I don’t know. I didn’t even know it was missing.”

Silas and I follow behind her, and Luna startles from her perch in the corner of the room at the abrupt entry.

“What’s happened now?” she asks, slithering along the floor towards me.

“Camila killed someone,” Silas says, hopping onto the table.

“Silas!” I swat at him, and he lets out a hiss in response.

“One day, they’re going to let me eat you, furball,” Luna says as she coils herself around one of the trees we magicked in a decade ago.

“Vivian Monroe had Camila’s necklace in her house, which is even more ammunition against us,” I explain, taking a seat on the couch as Camila paces along the room.

Declan finding that necklace doesn’t prove anything, but how did Vivian get it? Camila keeps it in her jewelry box on her dresser. She hasn’t been able to wear it since our grandparents died. The only way someone could get to it is if they broke into her room, but surely we would know if someone got past our protection wards. If someone could get past them without being detected, we had a much bigger problem on our hands.

“You’re sure it’s yours,” I ask.

Camila nods. “I checked upstairs before I came to the shop. It’s gone. I tried summoning it back to me as soon I left the station, but I couldn’t. It was like something was blocking my magic from getting it back.”

The weight of that confirmation hangs heavy in the air. Someone was in our apartment. Someone who knew how to get past our charms or was strong enough to deactivate them without alerting us. Someone who could block our magic.

“We need to get that necklace back,” Luna says. “Caro could try using her power to see who took it.”

Camila pauses wearing a hole in our floorboards to look at me. “You can’t read inanimate objects…can you?”

The more a witch trains their powers, the stronger they become. Luna and I had been working on using my powers to view object histories—where they came from, who created them, and things like that. It would be helpful for dating some of our family heirlooms (and avoiding any cursed ones) if we knew more about them.

I lift a shoulder. “I’ve been trying it out in passing. I’ve been able to do it with some of our family objects, but there are flashes here and there. Never the future, though.”

Ever since our grandparents died, Camila and I haven’t been as close, and we certainly don’t talk about our magic anymore. At first, it was because it all reminded us of them and how alone we truly were. Then, it became normal. We worked alongside each other in the shop and lived in the same place, but we had different lives.

Camila nods and leans against a table we use for potion making, drumming her fingers on the edge. “Then it seems like a good time to tell you I’ve been working on the astral projection spell.” My brows raise in surprise.

Astral projection allows a witch’s spirit to be in one place while their body remains in another. It was our mother’s power, and she had written a spell that would simulate the power to a lesser extent. We hadn’t tested the distance or how long the spell would last…or at least I hadn’t, but perhaps Camila had.

“Okay, so…what are you suggesting? I astral project into the police station and see if I can read the necklace? We don’t even know if I can use my power while in astral form.”

I try not to let it show how hurt I am that she’d been practicing our mother’s power without me knowing. It wasn’t important right now.

Camila shrugs. “Isn’t it worth a shot? If we get a chance to find out who’s involved in these disappearances and trying to pin it on us, don’t you think we should at least try?”

She has a point . Luna’s voice filters through my thoughts.

I glance over at my familiar, but she’s looking at Silas. I wonder if he told her that Cami was working on the spell. I wonder if she feels just as betrayed.

I swallow the knot in my throat. “Okay.”

“Tonight, then?” Camila asks.

“Tonight.”

“Alright, I think this should work,” Camila says, placing the last crystal in position on the ground.

I’m standing at the center of a chalk-drawn five-pointed star, each point adorned with an amethyst crystal. I think this should work didn’t exactly sit well with me, but we also didn’t have many other options.

“Did we have to do this in an alley?” Silas asks, sniffing beside a dumpster and instantly recoiling at the smell.

“Well, you and Camila weren’t sure about the distance, so we had to get as close as possible. Stop complaining. We didn’t ask you to come.”

Silas doesn’t respond, but he settles on the ground and watches us with his wide eyes that seem to glow in the dark.

“Ready?”

I nod, unfolding the spell Camila transcribed for me and taking a breath.

Separation of body and mind,

Different places at the same time,

By will and word, I now ascend,

To realms unseen, where spirits blend.

My form at rest, my soul shall roam,

Returning whole when I call it home.

Camila and I used to cast harmless spells when we were in high school after we’d graduated our basic witch training—spells to make us relax before a test in school or clean our apartment when we were too lazy, even one to grant us a little bit of luck on rare occasions—but we’ve never used magic for something like this .

My heart twinges as I wish my abuela and mom were here. They would know what to do, and they wouldn’t be trying to break into a police station for something that might not work.

“Carolina?” Camila’s voice brings me back to the matter at hand.

“Sorry, right.” Here goes nothing.

As I speak the incantation into the night, I focus on Camila’s necklace in my mind’s eye to guide my magic.

I want my spirit to go where it’s hidden. I want to find it. I want to retrieve it from where it’s being kept. It belongs to us, and we want it back.

In a blink, I can no longer see Silas and Camila, and the world feels like it’s zooming past me. In another blink, I’m in a dark room with metal shelves lined with boxes.

The room feels stuffy, and I’m sure I’d be sneezing right now if astral forms could have allergies. The door’s frosted window is the only light source and shines only on the first few rows of shelves. It’s practically pitch black from my position in the back corner of the room. In order to see the boxes back here, I’d have to summon a witch’s light, but I don’t want to risk that quite yet. Not unless I absolutely have to.

My body feels strange in this form. I feel solid but weightless, like I’m almost floating. At least some of this plan worked.

I hear voices in the hallway outside and hasten my search. The row in front of me is easier to see, but there’s no order to the madness, and I’m half convinced that it’s to prevent people like me from having enough time to steal whatever they’re looking for.

Refocusing on Camila’s necklace, I let my intuition guide me to its location instead of wasting time trying to decipher the careless chicken scratch on the boxes. My eyes zero in on the box sitting on the shelves nearest the door. Before I can walk over to it, the door handle jiggles from someone putting their key in the lock.

I drop to the floor where I am, still between the shelves where it’s the darkest. I should go back to my body, but I’ve come this far, so I stay firmly planted in my position.

I seal my lips when the lights flick on, and I catch a glimpse of Declan. We didn’t think he’d still be at the station at 11 p.m., but apparently, we were very mistaken. Any hopes I had that he wouldn’t be going for Vivian’s box are dashed when he stops in front of it and pulls it out of its spot.

On his way out the door, box in hand, he pauses and turns in my direction. I’m confident he can’t see me, but the longer he stares, the less sure I feel.

I don’t wait to see if he walks over because I’m already back in the alley.

“Mission failed,” I say, stretching out my limbs. “Declan’s got the box. We’ll have to try again another time.”

“What’s Declan doing here so late?” Camila asks.

I shrug. “His job?”

Camila and Silas both roll their eyes at me, and we clean up the crystals. A thought in the back of my mind presses into me. Was it a coincidence that Declan came in, or did he know somehow ?

It’s a crazy thought. I must have lost my mind in the transition back to my body. Of course he couldn’t know...right?