The Lost Lovelies

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Kit

IT BEGAN WITH AN ODD LETTER.

Returning to Halifax because of it was a risk. Usually, I thought I was damn near irreplaceable, but, five years ago I’d been crouched a few feet away from my predecessor when a Nazi sniper’s bullet tore through his skull. So perhaps not.

Climbing into a taxi, I brushed my fingers over my new sister-in-law’s letter, reminding myself I’d had to come home.

Mary-Alice hadn’t written me before, nor had I expected her to.

We’d never met. Had she explained precisely what the matter was, things would have been simpler.

Instead, I’d received the fearful, sharp scrawl of a woman I didn’t know.

My brother was deep in hot water, she claimed.

And it could get him—or both of them—killed.

She’d begged me to talk sense into him. By the time her letter found me, she and Ted were unreachable. My telephone calls went unanswered.

I’d like to say I was unselfish. That I immediately rustled up a ship to get back here.

But as worn down as I was by long stretches covering this godforsaken war, I took my duty seriously.

Thanks to Broadcast and Radio Canada, my voice reached into the homes of Canadians across the country.

“This is Kit Daring, speaking from…” had become a near nightly comfort to folks hoping desperately to glean information about their loved ones overseas.

People relied on my reports. They trusted me. Respected me.

It was a heady feeling after years of scorn as I’d covered the rising threat of Fascism in Germany for the Winnipeg Press.

During those bitter times, I’d been written off as a warmongering scapegrace mage, nothing more than an alarmist wishing for relevance.

Until I’d been proven right, and the world had seen the same hell unfolding that I’d rightfully sounded the alarm on from the beginning.

During the few leaves I’d taken since, guilt overwhelmed me. The other men in uniform —magical and otherwise—were risking their lives, dying brutal, muddy deaths for freedom, and I got to go back to London if I wanted? No.

The idea of leaving when hard-won victory had finally begun to toll its bell was anathema.

For anyone other than Ted, I’d have let the letter slip to the back of my mind.

But I owed a debt to my younger brother, the only person I’d ever loved who hadn’t let me down.

Abandoning him with our father when I’d fled to McGill University with a broken heart and big-time plans born half out of spite still plagued me to this day.

I’d owed Ted better then, and I owed him twice as much now.

So here I was, taxi gliding through the dark, cloudy evening, the rainy mist transforming into a deluge as we navigated the empty streets, climbing up from the pier higher into the city.

Wind rocked the vehicle, leaking through the poorly sealed windows.

My already damp and clinging clothing chilled further.

I should have expected nothing less from the tiny city of my disappointments.

Eventually, we rolled to a halt in front of the childhood home Ted had inherited upon our father’s death last winter. When I ran for the hills, he was the son who stayed. Not that I’d have wanted to own the house anyway—it was too full of memories I’d hate to live with.

The skinny two-level with chipped white wood siding had seen better days, though it was clear that effort had been put into maintenance since the last time I’d seen it.

The stairs weren’t sagging anymore, which meant Ted was doing what he could to repair the neglected property.

My father never would’ve gotten around to repairing them.

I thanked the driver and paid him well before retrieving my canvas bag and waterproof typewriter.

Rushing through the downpour for the front door, I only processed the darkened windows when repeated knocking failed to produce results.

“You’ve got to be joking, Ted,” I muttered in frustration, kicking the frame.

I tried pounding harder, then listened intently, but over the wind and pouring rain, I didn’t hear anything inside. No one answered. There was no car out front. Did Ted even own one?

They were a young couple. It wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility for them to be away from home on a Saturday, even on an evening this miserable.

I jiggled the doorknob and magic I didn’t recognize tingled against my palm like static electricity building before a discharge. Not just locked but spelled. It couldn’t have been Ted; his magic was as wonky as mine. Mary-Alice?

Either way, without the key or a counterspell, I wasn’t getting in.

Any attempt to use my own magic was all risk no reward.

When other people described their power, they used phrases like warmth swelling in their chest or pulsing softly through their blood.

Mine felt like a lightning strike, every bone in my body a metal conducting rod if I drew too much. And I always drew too much.

Terrible things happened when I lost control.

As if it was happening here and now, the sharp sound of ice cracking socked me like a punch to the jaw.

A bolt of electric heat zipped down my right arm, and my back arched in pain.

I clenched my fist around my burning palm.

I’d never manage to contain my magic, but I fought hard anyway.

My grasp slipped, a pulse of energy blasting down between my fingers, splintering the new wood of the porch.

Singed and smoking lines snaked along the grain.

“Great, just great.” Tipping my head back, I let the rain pour on my overheated face.

The faint scent of salt water and seaweed swirled around me in stormy gusts that came in off the ocean.

I hadn’t let my magic slip out in over seven years.

One night in this city, and I’d already damaged Ted’s brand-new steps. Was it possible to be more pathetic?

I curled forward and dropped my chin down. My arm throbbed painfully, the scent of burnt flesh mingling with damp earth and charred wood. I was soaking wet and cold and hurt, and I needed a new plan. I needed help.

There was only one remaining course of action. Gut plummeting, I readjusted my belongings with my uninjured hand, then headed for the house left of Ted’s. Light shone bright and warm from the downstairs windows.

Tillie North, our neighbour, had been near as next to a mother for me and Ted after ours was killed.

Our father’s foul moods drove us to her home often enough that she’d routinely set places for us at supper.

When my magic had finally come in broken and unusable, it was Tillie, not him, who’d consoled me. And then Ted in his turn.

She’d distracted me with book after book, let me read the paper she subscribed to, and told me all her stories.

Before she’d met Mr. North and come to Halifax with him, she’d been a reporter out in Alberta.

She still freelanced and had a regular column in the Chronicle Tribune.

It was in no small part due to her contacts that my career was what it had become.

We’d kept up correspondence even after I’d run to Montreal.

Tillie was proud of me in ways I wished my father had had the presence of mind to be.

It wasn’t her fault that the thought of going into her brightly lit and loving home caused a bittersweet ache to bloom in my chest and my throat to swell up. But as I passed the gap separating the houses, I didn’t allow myself so much as a glance at the towering tree between them.

I rapped my knuckles against her door and waited.

When it swung open, a grin split my face.

Tillie’s dark hair, scattered with silver strands, was up in curlers and the ruffled white collar of her nightdress flopped above her mint green housecoat.

The familiar scent of freshly baked bread made my mouth water despite my stinging arm and hand.

As soon as she recognized me, Tillie’s eyebrows flew up. The dimple in her left cheek popped into existence. “Why Kit Lovely, as I live and breathe! What are you doing soaked to your skin on my porch? Come in, come in!” She ushered me past. “Or do I call you Kit Daring these days?”

Embarrassment blazed in my cheeks and the back of my neck. I preferred Daring, but I said, “Either’s fine, Mrs. North.” She gave me a flat look. “Tillie,” I corrected.

“Better. You’ve got a bag and your typewriter. Did you just get in? Are Ted and Mary-Alice out?” she asked rapid-fire. Then her gaze dropped to my injured arm cradled against my chest. “Oh no. What’s wrong? Kit, you didn’t.”

“I didn’t mean to,” I admitted, sounding like the guilty child I’d been the last time I’d come to her with singed skin. “There was strange magic locking the door and…”

“At least it was only one arm this time,” she said, soothing me. “Maybe you’re getting better. I thought you gave up trying to use magic a long time ago.”

“I have. It slipped out.” The last thing I wanted was to hurt Tillie, but I owed her the truth after what my magic had done to her family. I didn’t know how she could stand there calmly talking about it. Or how she’d ever managed to forgive me, for that matter. “It’s stress, that’s all.”

Her keen observation indicated she didn’t believe a word, and why would she? Who’d believe I found Halifax more stressful than war? I hardly did, and it was happening to me. “Come on, let me see.”

Shrugging out of my jacket, I left it dangling from my other shoulder and held out my arm, palm up. Tillie undid my cuff and gently rolled the sleeve up to my elbow before cradling my hand.

“It’s not that bad,” I lied, even though reddened skin and weeping blisters stretched from my fingertip to the edge of my sleeve.

“Sure looks like it hurts,” she countered.

The vanilla scent of her magic swirled around us and tingled in my palm, warm and comforting like a tight hug.

Her brows pinched slightly as she concentrated.

The painful blisters shrank, redness fading until all that remained was a slight itch and faint pink tinge to my skin.

Most mages needed spells or objects to focus with.

Tillie and others like her, who could do it with nothing but focus, were rarest among the already rare.

“There. That’s all I can manage tonight. How does it feel?”

“Good as new.”

She gave me a half-smile for the fib. “All right, shoes off, then let’s get you out of those wet clothes. You’ll catch your death, little Lovely.”

Fondness over a childhood nickname I’d almost forgotten couldn’t quite chase off the goosebumps and chill seeping into my bones, but it went a long way.

“Leave your bag there and I’ll dry the rest of your clothing once I get you sorted out.”

“Thanks, Tillie.”

As soon as I removed my footwear she led me upstairs, asking over her shoulder, “I didn’t give you a chance to answer earlier, but I’m guessing Ted and Mary-Alice are out?”

“It looks that way. The lights were all off and no one answered me.”

“Were they expecting you? I can’t imagine Ted leaving you outside in this weather.”

I fiddled with the hem of my jacket. “Not quite. Have you seen them lately?”

Tillie stepped into the bathroom and turned on the light while I waited in the hall.

“No. Now that I’m thinking of it, I haven’t seen Ted’s car in a few days.

It typically sits out front with the way fuel is hard to come by, but I could have missed them coming and going.

I wouldn’t worry too much. You’re welcome to stay here until they get back.

” She reached into the linen closet and withdrew a towel.

“Now go on into Gus’ room and borrow some of his old clothes, you still look like you’re the same size. ”

Her retreat left me to brave a space I knew as well as my own childhood bedroom.

Swallowing around the pain in my throat, I walked in and studied the framed photograph on the pine bookshelf while I dripped a puddle on the floor.

In the photo, my arm was thrown over Gus’ shoulder, bright matching grins on our faces, and the same dimple his mother had creased his left cheek.

We’d been dressed to the nines for a school dance, and Tillie had just gotten a new camera.

The carefree joy on Gus’ face was like a jab to the gut.

One short year after this photo it had become such a rare expression.

Forcing my gaze away, I focused on peeling off my sodden clothes and ignored how that, too, felt familiar in here.

After quickly toweling myself, I opened the closet and chose soft worn brown trousers, an undershirt, and a threadbare white button down.

It was impossible for them to still smell like Gus, for a faint trace of his magic to cling to the fabric, but as I threaded buttons into their holes, I swore I caught spicy citrus and wood smoke, and my skin hummed with remembered awareness.

Closing my eyes, I almost felt the scrape of stubble against my cheek as Gus leaned in to whisper about some perceived injustice. Heart always in the right place.

This was why I dreaded coming home. Even after seventeen years, the gaping hole in my chest threatened to swallow me hook, line, and sinker. This city, this house, made it so much harder to ignore everything I’d lost.

The hurt sank into my bones, and my irritation at Ted and Mary-Alice rose.

She’d begged me to come home and talk sense into him, and here I was with my heart shredded instead.

Had I been foolish to come running? Sixteen days crossing the dangerous German U-boat infested ocean, all for love of my brother.

Tomorrow, bright and early, I’d find Ted and Mary-Alice at home and resolve this. Before I knew it, I’d be overseas once more with the advancing Canadian troops. Ted and Mary-Alice would be safe and sound.

Unless something awful had happened to them in the twenty-one days since her letter was pressed into my hand.