Chapter 8
DESPERATE SPELL. UNEXPECTED WISDOM
The house was quiet when Cassie got home.
She stood in the kitchen, still sticky with pie residue and shame, and stared at the grimoire sitting on the counter.
It had migrated there again—or maybe she’d left it there, she couldn’t remember anymore.
The house liked to move things around when it was agitated, and right now the walls were cycling through shades of gray like a mood ring having a breakdown.
Luna sat on top of the grimoire, tail wrapped neatly around her paws, watching Cassie with the particular judgment reserved for creatures who’d never made a mistake in their lives.
“Don’t,” Cassie said.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were thinking it.”
“I was thinking that you smell like apple pie and regret.” Luna’s whiskers twitched. “Also that you should shower before you do anything else stupid.”
Cassie showered. She stood under water hot enough to scald and tried not to think about the look on Liam’s face when she’d pushed him. The sadness. The resignation. The way he’d walked away like he’d finally given up on something he’d been holding onto too tightly.
I can’t make you trust me, Cassie. You have to choose to believe it.
She pressed her forehead against the tile and let the water run over her.
He’d chosen to stay. For days. Knowing he could leave. And she’d repaid that choice by literally shoving him away with magic she couldn’t control.
By the time she emerged, pruned and no less miserable, she’d made a decision.
“Absolutely not.”
Margaret stood in Cassie’s kitchen with her arms crossed and an expression that suggested she was reconsidering every life choice that had led her to mentoring this particular disaster of a witch.
“It’s the only way to know for sure,” Cassie said, flipping through the grimoire with desperate energy. “If I break the binding completely—not just loosen it, but break it—then there’s no question. No magic forcing him to stay. No connection pulling at either of us. Just… free will.”
“He’s already exercising free will. He told you—”
“But how do I know?” Cassie’s voice cracked. “How do I know it’s not residual magic? How do I know the binding isn’t still influencing him in ways neither of us can feel? If I break it completely, then whatever he chooses after—that’s real. That’s him.”
Margaret pinched the bridge of her nose. “Child. You’re not doing this to give him freedom. You’re doing this so you can stop being afraid.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Because you’re not ready. Breaking a binding spell requires precision, focus, and emotional clarity. You have none of those things right now.” She gestured at the walls, which had shifted to an anxious yellow-green. “Look at your house. Look at you. You’re a mess.”
“Thanks for the pep talk.”
“I’m not here to coddle you. I’m here to keep you from making things worse.” Margaret moved toward the door, then paused. “The binding is already thin as gossamer. It’ll dissolve on its own within a week, maybe less. You don’t need to force it.”
“I can’t wait a week.”
“You can. You’re choosing not to.” She sighed. “I can’t stop you, Cassie. You’re a grown woman with enough power to make very large mistakes. But I’m asking you—as someone who’s made those mistakes before—don’t do this tonight. Sleep. Let things settle. Talk to him in the morning.”
“And if he’s gone by morning?”
Margaret’s expression softened. “Then you’ll have your answer, won’t you? Without risking your magic or your safety.”
She left. The house groaned softly behind her, like it agreed with Margaret but was too polite to say so.
Cassie looked at the grimoire. At the pages filled with her great-aunt’s careful handwriting. At the spell she’d found for “Severing Bonds and Breaking Ties,” which required midnight, a silver blade, and the willingness to let go of something precious.
She had all three.
Luna jumped onto the counter. “You’re going to do it anyway, aren’t you?”
“I have to know.”
“You already know. You’re just scared of the answer.”
“When did you become a therapist?”
“I’ve always been a therapist. You just couldn’t hear me judging your life choices until recently.” Luna stretched, claws catching on the grimoire’s leather cover. “For what it’s worth, I think you’re making a mistake. But I also think you need to make it. Sometimes the only way out is through.”
“That’s almost supportive.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
At 11:47 p.m., Cassie sat cross-legged in the middle of her living room with the grimoire open before her, thirteen candles arranged in a circle, and the silver spoon from her great-aunt’s package clutched in her hand.
The spell was complicated. Layers of words in languages she didn’t fully understand, gestures that felt awkward in her untrained hands, visualization exercises that required her to picture the binding as a thread and herself as scissors.
She’d read it seven times. Practiced the pronunciation until her tongue stopped tripping. Memorized the gestures until they felt almost natural.
It wasn’t enough. She knew it wasn’t enough. Margaret was right—she wasn’t ready, wasn’t focused, wasn’t emotionally clear.
But she was desperate, and desperation had its own kind of power.
“Okay,” she whispered to the empty room. “Let’s do something stupid.”
She began.
The words felt strange in her mouth—old and heavy, like stones worn smooth by centuries of use. The magic rose slowly at first, a gentle warmth in her chest, then built as she continued through the incantation. The candle flames stretched taller. The air pressure shifted.
She pictured the binding—that invisible thread connecting her to Liam, the magical tether that had held him to her property and then to her. She pictured scissors. Sharp. Silver. Final.
Sever, she thought. Let go. Set him free.
The magic surged—
And the grimoire burst open to a page she’d never seen.
Not burst like an explosion. More like it insisted. The pages flipped of their own accord, riffling past spells and recipes and hand-drawn diagrams until they stopped on a section near the back that Cassie could have sworn was blank the last time she’d looked.
There was a letter.
Folded, aged, tucked into a pocket in the binding that hadn’t existed before. The paper was yellowed but the ink was still dark, and the handwriting was achingly familiar—the same looping script that filled the rest of the grimoire.
The candles guttered. The magic she’d been building dissipated like smoke in a breeze. Whatever spell she’d been attempting had been interrupted, redirected, replaced by something else entirely.
With shaking hands, Cassie unfolded the letter.
My darling girl,
If you’re reading this, you’ve made a mess. Good. Magic isn’t for the tidy.
I spelled this letter to appear when you needed it most—which, knowing our family, probably means you’re sitting in a circle of candles at midnight trying to break something that doesn’t need breaking.
We Morgans have always been better at destruction than patience. It’s both our gift and our curse.
I don’t know exactly what you’ve gotten yourself into. That’s the trouble with prophetic correspondence—all very vague and mystical, no practical details. But I know our bloodline, and I know our patterns, so let me take a guess:
You’ve fallen for someone. Or you’re about to. Or you’re actively running from the possibility because feeling things is terrifying and you’d rather set yourself on fire than be vulnerable.
Am I close?
Cassie laughed despite herself—a wet, broken sound. She was crying, she realized. Had been since the letter appeared.
The spell that brought him to you—and I’m assuming it’s a him, though correct me if I’m wrong from beyond the grave—wasn’t random.
The summoning spell I wrote doesn’t pluck just anyone out of the ether.
It finds someone who can help. Someone whose skills match your need.
Someone who, on some cosmic level, fits.
But here’s the part most witches get wrong: the spell brings them to you. It doesn’t make them stay.
The binding isn’t a cage, dear. It’s a question. The magic asks: “Will you remain?” And every day they don’t fight it, every day they choose proximity over escape, they’re answering.
You’re probably thinking: but they CAN’T escape, the binding holds them. And yes, at first. But the binding loosens as you learn control. It fades as you grow. By now—however long it’s been—I’d wager there’s barely a thread left. Whatever’s keeping them close isn’t magic anymore.
It’s choice.
Cassie’s hands were trembling so badly she almost couldn’t read the next part.
I never told anyone this while I was alive, but I had a binding once. His name was Thomas. Gruff, practical, entirely too handsome for his own good. He appeared in my garden one morning because I’d been trying to spell my roses and accidentally summoned a groundskeeper.
We had three months together. Three months of bickering and laughter and the kind of connection I’d never felt before. The binding loosened quickly—I was always a fast learner—but he stayed anyway. Said he liked my chaos. Said I was worth the inconvenience.
And I pushed him away.
I was so certain he’d leave eventually—so certain that no one could actually choose me, with all my mess and magic and too-much-ness—that I made the choice for him. Broke the binding before it could dissolve naturally. Told him he was free and watched him walk away.
He would have stayed, Cassie. I know that now. I’ve had sixty years to know it. Sixty years of wondering what might have been if I’d been brave enough to let someone love me.
Don’t be like me.
Don’t spend your life alone because you’re afraid to let someone see you fully. Don’t push away the good things because you’ve decided you don’t deserve them. Don’t break bindings that are already breaking just so you can control the ending.
Let it dissolve on its own. Let him choose. Let yourself be chosen.
And if he stays—and I think he will, if he’s anything like my Thomas—try to believe it’s real. Even when it’s terrifying. Especially when it’s terrifying.
You are not too much, my darling. You are exactly enough. You always have been.
With all my love across the veil, Aunt Elspeth
P.S. - The cat is going to have opinions about all of this. She usually does. Try to listen—familiars see more than they let on.
P.P.S. - I left you my silver spoon for a reason. It’s not just for spells. Sometimes a woman needs to eat ice cream directly from the container at 2 a.m. while crying over her choices. The spoon doesn’t judge.
Cassie sat in her circle of guttered candles, clutching a letter from a dead woman, and sobbed.
Not pretty crying. Not delicate tears rolling down her cheeks. Full-body, snot-everywhere, can’t-breathe sobbing that shook her whole frame and made Luna hop onto her lap and press her small warm body against Cassie’s chest.
“She was lonely,” Luna said quietly. “Sixty years. I wasn’t there for most of it, but I saw the end. She didn’t want that for you.”
“I’ve been so stupid.”
“Yes.”
“I pushed him away. Over and over. Because I was scared.”
“Yes.”
“And now—” She looked at the letter again, at the words that could have been written about her own life. “—now I’m doing exactly what she did. Breaking things before they can break me.”
“The spell didn’t complete,” Luna pointed out. “The letter interrupted it. The binding is still there.”
Hope flickered. Tiny and fragile, but real.
“So he’s still—”
“Still connected. Still here.” Luna’s golden eyes met hers. “The question is: what are you going to do about it?”
Cassie wiped her face with her sleeve—gross, but she was beyond caring—and stood on shaky legs. The house was dark, quiet. It was after midnight now.
“I’m going to talk to him,” she said. “Really talk. Not push, not deflect, not set anything on fire. Just… tell him the truth.”
“Which is?”
“That I’m terrified. That I don’t know how to believe someone would choose me. But that I want to try.” She folded the letter carefully, pressed it against her heart. “Elspeth was brave enough to leave me this. The least I can do is be brave enough to use it.”
She walked down the hallway toward the guest room. Luna padded silently behind her.
The door was closed. No light underneath. He was probably asleep—it was past midnight, and he’d had a terrible day because of her.
She knocked anyway. Soft. Apologetic.
No answer.
“Liam?” She knocked again. “I know it’s late. I know I don’t deserve to ask you for anything. But I need to talk to you. Please.”
Nothing.
She tried the handle. The door swung open.
The room was empty.
Not empty like he was somewhere else in the house. Empty like he’d left. The bed was made with military precision. His few belongings—the clothes he’d accumulated, the toolkit he’d assembled, the worn paperback he’d been reading—were gone.
On the pillow was a note.
Cassie—
The binding broke. I felt it snap about an hour ago. Whatever you were trying to do, it worked.
I’m staying at the motel on Route 9. I think we both need some space to figure out what’s real without magic involved.
I’m not leaving town. Not yet. But I can’t stay in your house and pretend everything is fine when you keep waiting for me to disappear.
If you want to find me, you know where I’ll be.
—Liam
Cassie read the note three times. Then she sat on his empty bed and cried some more, because apparently she had an infinite supply of tears tonight.
The binding was broken. He’d felt it snap. Which meant her spell had worked after all, despite the interruption.
And he’d left.
“He’s at the motel,” Luna said, jumping onto the bed beside her. “That’s not leaving. That’s… waiting.”
“Waiting for what?”
“For you to decide if you’re going to keep running. Or if you’re finally going to chase something instead.”
Cassie looked at the note. At the address he’d left. At the words that weren’t goodbye, just… space.
I’m not leaving town. Not yet.
He was giving her time. Giving her a choice. Doing exactly what Aunt Elspeth had said—staying, even when he didn’t have to. Even when she’d given him every reason to go.
The question was: what was she going to do about it?
She folded the note, put it next to the letter from her aunt, and didn’t sleep at all.