Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Eight

She was still delirious when I carried her into the parlour and laid her down on the chaise longue. All the birds on the walls began to call and cry, the trees swaying in a terrible wind I could not feel. I couldn't feel anything.

Catherine killed my father.

‘Don't move,' I ordered unnecessarily, the words still ricocheting around my mind. ‘I'll get you something for the pain.'

‘What pain?'

Ashley's words were as light as air and when I looked up, the ceiling was covered with threatening grey clouds.

‘Oh, she's going to be so mad at me,' she muttered, flinging one arm above her head and almost hitting herself in the face. ‘I was not supposed to tell you about your dad. I didn't think I could. Very interesting.'

Catherine killed my father. I wanted to crawl under a blanket, pull it over my head and pretend none of this was happening but there could be no hiding now.

‘Why wouldn't you be able to tell me?' I asked, sifting through feelings and searching for facts, something solid I could hold on to. ‘Why did she kill my dad?'

‘Until a new Bell witch rises, I'm linked to Catherine,' Ashley replied, only answering the first question and overenunciating every word. ‘The caretaker thing? It's not a voluntary position. She knows where I am, she hears what I say. She tied my life to the house on my seventeenth birthday. I literally cannot leave.'

‘But you left when you came to collect me?'

She winced, sucking the air in through her teeth. ‘Because she let me and it was still agony. Even though Catherine willed it, every mile I travelled away from Savannah was like another knife in my heart. You can take all the herbs you like but they can't do a damn thing for that kind of pain.'

On the opposite side of the room, the brushstrokes on the wallpaper rearranged themselves and a new picture took shape. The storm dissipated and a narrow country road came into view, a clear blue sky, my dad's car travelling at a sensible speed. I watched the little blue Ford making its familiar journey as the skies darkened and the rain came.

‘She sent the storm,' I said, incredulous.

‘Almost killed her too,' Ashley confirmed. ‘Catherine's magic ain't meant to travel so far but she really wanted you home, her special little witch.'

On the walls, the terrible tableau played on. The windshield wipers wouldn't work, the headlights wouldn't come on, and when he hit the brakes, his car sped up, racing to meet the tree as it fell.

‘At least he didn't suffer,' she breathed. ‘Not like we will.'

The scene faded away and everything was idyllic again, powder blue skies, unmoving birds, willowy trees, but I was forever changed. Nothing could go back to the way it was.

‘No point blaming yourself,' Ashley said. ‘Paul knew she'd be coming sooner or later. If he didn't want her to have you, he should have killed her and don't look at me like that, you know it's the truth.'

‘What kind of person kills their own son?' I sank down to the ground, shivering in the non-existent cold. Magic buzzed over me, no longer a tingle or prickling sensation, but a constant vibration, coating my whole body like a second skin.

‘People will do all kinds of things when they're desperate,' Ashley said with enthusiasm. It sounded like she was enjoying her new freedom, every word bubbling out of her. ‘And she was desperate.'

‘To keep her magic,' I replied. ‘She doesn't care about me or the prophecy. She didn't want to lose her magic.'

‘Two things can be true at the same time. Her magic may be the most important thing but don't underestimate my mother's pride. She really does believe in the prophecy and she wanted her witch back.'

‘I'm not hers, she doesn't own me,' I said, replaying my conversation with Wyn.

We're not our families, we belong to ourselves. And each other.

‘Might want to tell her that,' Ashley clucked. ‘For a real long time she believed he'd bring you back, didn't think Paul would be able to cope on his own with a new baby. She waited as long as she could but as time wore on, her patience ran out. Her regular magic couldn't locate you, she spent half her fortune trying to track you down the human way, private detectives, that kind of thing, but Paul must have spent just as much hiding you. Did you know your mom was rich?'

My head jerked up, not sure I'd heard her right.

‘Oh yeah, Angelica was a very wealthy woman, but money only works for so long. Once Catherine accepted there was only one way to find you, she went all in. You wouldn't believe the darkness she channelled, and that was just to put a pin in a map. Then we went through weeks of how to bring you home. The original plan was to have you abducted and keep you sedated until the Becoming but that wouldn't work because you'd fail the Wilcuma. Had to be your choice to be here. And what better way to accomplish that than to take away all your other choices?'

‘So she conjured the storm, made it look like an accident. She used magic to take a life.'

Ashley flinched with pain as she turned her head to look at me, still shaking by the bay windows.

‘Catherine's blood brought Paul into this world,' she replied, all her enthusiasm gone now. ‘It took her blood to take him out. Almost all of it. I sat at her bedside round the clock for days. Eventually she came around. I didn't even know if the spell had worked until she woke up.'

‘That's a neat way to say she murdered her eldest child.'

Ashley didn't correct me.

‘It took all those weeks between the storm and the day I came to get you for her to get right again,' she said. ‘She's still struggling. All those meetings and appointments? Most of the time she never even leaves the house. She's hiding away in her craft room, doing everything she can to restore her magic.'

I felt sick. I felt hot and cold and shaky and furious. I felt everything and nothing. All this time, she was in the house? Every time I'd wished she was home to help me, she was right here, behind that little blue door? The image of Catherine bleeding out, Ashley sitting beside her while the ground swallowed up her offering, made me nauseous. Across the room, my aunt huffed out a violent sigh, beads of sweat forming on her forehead.

‘There were so many times when I thought she might not make it,' Ashley said. ‘But she pulled through in the end, she always does. If she hadn't, you and I would both be free now. Imagine that.'

‘She didn't need to kill him,' I said, spinning through my emotions like a ball on a roulette wheel, no idea where I would land. ‘If she'd sat him down and explained everything, explained how we would lose all connection to the magic if I wasn't here on my birthday, he might have understood.'

Ashley scoffed with disappointment.

‘When I told you not to be a fool for love, I wasn't only talking about the wolf,' she grunted, the glassiness in her eyes starting to clear. ‘Why don't you get it? I tried to tell you, Paul was surplus to requirements. She only needs you.'

‘And I need her,' I admitted, my teeth grinding with my great reluctance. ‘I can't go through the Becoming in this state. It'll be 1820 all over again. I need her to bind me.'

‘You don't know what really happened in 1820.'

Pain etched itself deeply into Ashley's face as the moss and vines that had wrapped around her legs began to wither and crack. Crawling over to her, I held my hands over the plants and tried to bring them back but it was too late. They were already gone, all their healing power spent.

‘Then tell me what did,' I said as she clenched her teeth against the growing agony.

‘First I need you to do something,' she croaked. ‘Go to Catherine's craft room. Inside, you'll find a sunflower. Bring it out here.'

I didn't argue. I ran out the room and down the hall, Ashley's moans echoing louder once I was gone. Skidding to a halt in front of the sky-blue door, I reached for the handle ready for the burn but today it wasn't even hot. Today it sang, filling me with light as I turned it and entered the room.

The whole space thrummed with energy and as I crossed the threshold, a dozen candles sparked into life. No wonder I couldn't sense Catherine when she was in here, the room was spelled with more charms and curses than I could name. But there was no time to investigate properly, that would have to wait. Instead I scanned the shelves and tables for Ashley's sunflower, forcing myself not to reach for every fascinating thing; journals, spell books, crushed herbs, dozens of different crystals and gems of every possible shape and size. Tucked away in one corner was a narrow bed, a thin mattress studded with herbs, feathers and more crystals. I picked up one of the feathers and held it to the light. Black with red and yellow patches, with rusty stains on the shaft. I dropped it right away. These weren't feathers Catherine had found on the ground.

The sunflower sat on a high shelf above the door, the last place anyone would look, its petals withered and pale from too many days locked away in this dark place. Clambering up onto the nearest desk, I strained to reach it, stretching as far as I dared until my fingertips brushed the terracotta pot. As I made one more push to get a proper hold on it, the sunflower began to bloom and one of the brackets that held up its shelf fell away from the wall. The flower slid down, straight into my arms.

‘Thank you,' I said as I climbed back down to the floor, picked up the bracket and placed it on the desk before backing slowly out of the room. It was the first time I'd gone inside. It wouldn't be the last.

‘You found it,' Ashley said, unable to hide her surprise when I returned. ‘The room let you in.'

‘Did you think it might not?' I asked as I pressed the sad sunflower into her open arms.

‘Honestly, kind of thought it might unalive you. But yay.'

I glared at my aunt as she turned the pot around in her hands, the petals and leaves of the sunflower growing stronger and brighter every second it was with her.

‘Bell House is not a regular house,' she explained as if that wasn't already very obvious. ‘If it let you into Catherine's secret little room, well, that changes things. You are part of the house and it is part of you. When the Bell witches are strong, Bell House is strong, when the line is weakened, things begin to fall apart. Literally. That's why you can't go up to the third floor. I'd bet my bottom dollar it'll be as safe as the day is long if your Becoming goes off without a hitch.'

She paused to give me a look. ‘Which it won't.'

‘What about the sunflower?' I asked, my hand reaching out for the wall without even realizing. She was right. The house was buzzing with energy and urgently calling my name. We were both running out of time.

‘This sunflower is me,' she said lightly. ‘This is what ties me to Catherine.'

Without taking a single second to explain further, she raised the plant above her head and hurled it at the ground. The terracotta pot smashed into a million tiny pieces, damp black earth soiling the pale wool rug, and the sunflower lay limp in the debris.

‘And now that tie is broken.'

‘How do you feel?' I asked as we watched it wither and decay in front of us, shrivelling away until it was just dust.

‘Like I got crushed by a beam and had my bones and organs put back together by magic. Thanks for that, by the way.'

‘You're welcome?'

She picked up a piece of the terracotta pot and smiled, another year of misery rolling away with each heartbeat.

‘We don't have much time,' I said, looking first at the clock and then at the fading light that streamed in through the window. ‘I don't want to hurt anyone. You have to tell me what really happened in 1820.'

‘Every Bell witch is connected, you all draw from those who came before you,' my aunt replied. There was something new in her voice, something I hadn't heard before. It sounded dangerously like hope. ‘After you Become, you'll be able to access all the strength and knowledge of our ancestors, dead and alive, but that's not all. Should you choose, you will be able to drain Catherine of her magic. That's what happened in 1820.'

‘Catherine said that witch was crazy and her sisters had to bind her.'

Ashley grunted out a laugh.

‘Angry woman gets called insane? Wow, what a plot twist. Elizabeth Howell wasn't crazy, she was furious. Witches used to tie the younger generation to their home as a matter of course, to protect them until they came of age, and this girl took offence. Tying isn't the same as binding, it doesn't change a person, just restricts them, like one of those invisible fences they put up to keep dogs in? For me, it means I can't leave the vicinity of Bell House. For others, it might limit their magic, who they can speak to or what they can say. Elizabeth didn't want to be a witch or treated like a dog. She didn't want to live a tethered life. Once her Becoming ceremony was complete, she drained her grandmother and tried to escape but it was too much, she couldn't control all that magic and it overwhelmed her. She killed her grandmother, then set fire to the city and herself. There was no binding, they didn't even get a chance to try it. It's a miracle Emma Catherine, her one so-called friend, survived to continue our line. You and I shouldn't even be here, our family line should have ended that day like the rest of the witch families who died in the fire.'

There was no need to fact check, we had both run out of reasons to lie.

‘I don't know what Catherine's planning but I do know she's not going to let you take her magic away. She is not happy with you at all. There's no telling how far she'll go now.'

‘But she won't hurt me,' I reasoned. ‘She can't risk losing her magic if I die.'

‘If she kills you, the magic is gone, but she can bind you, just like you've been begging her to,' Ashley reminded me. ‘It's not what you think, binding. You can't tuck magic away for a rainy day and walk around living an ordinary life. You are your magic. If Catherine binds your abilities, you'll be living half a life. It'll be agony. Learn the lesson your father didn't. There's only one way to escape her control, you must take control yourself.'

‘I'll run.' I was thinking out loud as I circled the room, formulating a plan. ‘If we leave now, me and Wyn can be in the middle of nowhere before nightfall.'

‘With what money? With what passport? And how are you planning to travel with a phasing wolf? I don't think they allow those in an Uber.'

She flexed her legs, testing the movement before dragging herself into a sitting position. She was getting stronger by the second.

‘Catherine would be on you before you'd even crossed state lines. You didn't even go through the Becoming yet and your magic is already lighting up the sky like a flare gun. Why do you think your wolf is so in love with you? Even if he wasn't fully initiated into his pack, he still had magic in his blood when you met.'

‘Magic might have drawn us together but that's not why he loves me,' I said, urgent and true and sure of my heart. ‘What we have is real.'

‘Don't matter much. We're all three of us going to be dead by dawn,' Ashley said as she carefully lowered her feet to the ground. ‘Scenario one, your boy phases and kills you. Scenario two, his pack finds you, figures out you killed his brother and they kill you. Scenario three, Catherine kills him, kills me, binds you and you wish you were dead, or best-case scenario number four, you drain Catherine, lose control, set the world on fire and we all die.'

She staggered over to the bar cart in the corner of the room. ‘Do you drink? I think we should toast your birthday while we still can.'

The way she laid it out made everything look hopeless. Too many threats, too many ways this could end in nothing but death. That's what happened last time. But I wasn't Elizabeth Howell. As my grandmother so often liked to remind me, I was a Bell.

‘She won't kill me and she won't let anyone else kill me either,' I said again, running through Ashley's scenarios in my head, searching for a light in all the darkness. ‘It's not just the magic that's important to her, it's the whole Bell line. If I'm gone, it's all gone.'

Ashley paused, listening as she poured.

‘Go on.'

‘There is one possibility,' I said as she raised a tumbler filled with whiskey in a toast. ‘Catherine really believes I'm the witch from the prophecy. What if I am?'

‘Oh good,' Ashley cheered. ‘You've chosen option four, everybody dies.'

‘Maybe,' I admitted. ‘But until now, everything has happened to me or around me or because of me. You're right, I need to take control of the situation. She won't kill me and she can't bind me until after the Becoming. All I have to do is fight her and win.'

My aunt yelped out a laugh. ‘That's all? Great! I'll make a reservation at Husk for supper since you've got this in the bag. I heard their oysters are to die for.'

‘The house let me into her craft room,' I went on, ignoring her very obvious sarcasm. ‘You shouldn't be able to tell me any of this but you can because I'm getting stronger. I'm more powerful than she is.'

Ashley stared at me over the rim of her very full glass.

‘You know she hates that word,' she said.

‘You know she's going to kill you,' I replied.

With one hand still on the bottle, she burst out laughing.

‘Emily James, that was pretty good. I'll be sure to think on your heroic speech when my mother comes back here and rips my lungs out of my body.'

Before I could respond, my cell phone buzzed in my back pocket. Lydia's name flashed insistently on the screen and I tapped accept.

‘Lyds?' I said as my aunt topped off her drink. ‘Please tell me you're calling from somewhere far away?'

‘Em, it's Jackson.' The panic in his voice crackled down the line, a bright red energy blaring all the way across town. ‘There's something wrong with Lydia. She's awake and breathing but she's not moving or talking, she's just kind of staring at nothing. And I swear I just saw your grandmother out back and it looked like she was carrying a body? Do you have any idea what is going on?'

‘I'll be right there,' I told him, glancing over to where Ashley was downing another drink. ‘Don't panic, it'll be all right.'

‘I'm going to call an ambulance,' Jackson said.

‘No, don't, that will only make it worse,' I replied, cutting off his protestations. ‘I know it sounds stupid but please just trust me, I'm on my way right now.'

‘You've got ten minutes then I'm calling the ambulance,' he said after a moment's consideration. ‘I hope I don't regret this.'

I ended the call as the patterns of the wallpaper started to shift again, trees pulling back and birds circling overhead, making way for a new addition. Two tall stone columns I'd seen once before, each topped with a sad-looking figure, both with their heads bowed. A tall, red-haired woman passed through them with the body of a teenage boy slung over her shoulder.

‘Well now, ain't that interesting,' Ashley said, still holding the bottle of whiskey as the gates to Bonaventure cemetery swung shut behind them. ‘Looks like the house has chosen a side. At least we know where they are. Unless it's a trap.'

‘It probably is,' I admitted. ‘I still have to go after them.'

She reached over and placed her hand on my shoulder, a warm smile I'd never seen before on her face. ‘Whatever happens, I want you to know you're not alone in this.'

A jolt of gratitude shot through me and I returned her smile.

‘Because she's going to kill us both.'

‘Thanks for the vote of confidence,' I muttered, smile melting away.

‘Any time,' she replied with a thumbs up. ‘Let's do this.'

Things were worse than Jackson realized. By the time we tumbled into the Powells' parlour, Lydia was catatonic. Sitting upright on the sofa, she stared straight ahead, her brown eyes completely blank. I crouched down in front of her, searching for her bold energy but came up with nothing. Her body was with us but Lydia was somewhere else entirely.

‘I can't believe I'm out of the house,' Ashley said, staring around the parlour with wonder. ‘And I can't believe Catherine would do this again.'

She pushed me out the way and took hold of Lydia's hands.

‘You know what this is? She's done it before?' I replied. ‘When?'

Ashley looked back at me like she had terrible news she did not care to deliver.

‘She was awake, her eyes were open, but she simply wasn't there.'

‘My mom.' I exhaled, all the air knocked out of me. ‘This is what she did to my mom.'

‘Who did what?' Jackson demanded to know. ‘What are you talking about?'

‘I think I can help.' Ashley spoke to me as though he wasn't even there. ‘I've been working on a cure, just in case she ever decided I was too much trouble but, thankfully, I haven't been able to test it out. But you need to stop Catherine. If the herbs don't work, taking her out might be the only way to get Lydia back.'

‘Will someone please tell me what is going on?' Jackson yelled, his face bright red and full of fury.

I turned towards him, desperately trying to calm the energy in the room and only halfway succeeding.

‘We're going to help Lydia,' I promised. ‘I know it's confusing and we're asking you to take a lot on trust but I don't have time to explain it all right now.'

‘Emily is a super mega witch and she's maybe going to blow up the whole city tonight but fingers crossed she won't,' Ashley said. ‘My mother, also a witch, is planning to bind Emily's magic to stop her ending the family line but she needs her to go through this whole ceremony thing first so she, Catherine that is, has cursed your sister and kidnapped Wyn the werewolf to get Emily where she wants her. That pretty much brings you up to speed. Any questions?'

‘Emily?' Jackson said my name weakly, turning to me for verification.

‘She covered it pretty well,' I replied, forcing my mouth into the world's least convincing smile.

‘Wyn is the guy you were dating?' he said.

I nodded.

‘He's a werewolf?'

‘Probably.'

‘And you're a witch?'

‘Definitely.'

He sank down on the sofa next to his sister, a similar blank look on his face.

‘Before we lose you too,' I said, squatting down in front of him, ‘is this a terrible time to ask for a ride?'

He wiped a hand over his face. ‘It's not great.'

‘Then you'll never get your sister back.' Ashley dumped out a backpack full of herbs and crystals she'd grabbed on the way out of Bell House, onto the floor. ‘Emily is Lydia's best chance. Help her and you're helping your sister.'

‘I need to get to Catherine,' I agreed, squeezing his hand. ‘It's the only way to put a stop to all of this. I know you must have a million more questions but—'

‘Em, we should be in the car already,' Jackson said decisively, pulling a set of car keys out of his pocket and striding straight to the door. ‘You can explain the rest on the way.'