Chapter Forty-Two
‘This isn’t exactly how I imagined conducting my first Becoming ceremony,’ I told Lydia as we changed hurriedly in the kitchen. My room was still haunted by the violence of the night before, just stepping inside to retrieve what I needed was difficult enough.
‘This should be a celebration, we shouldn’t be hurrying through it like this. There are supposed to be gowns.’
‘Em, do I look like a gown girlie?’ Lydia shucked off her jeans and tank top, trading them for a pair of cargo pants and white long-sleeved shirt.
‘Anyway, I’ve already been to more than my fair share of ceremonies and everyone knows the party afterwards is the best part.
This is good. We burn through the yapping and skip straight to the good part. ’
Cinching a belt around the carpenter jeans I’d borrowed from Jackson, I frowned.
‘I think you might be the first person in history to describe standing trial for murder as “the good bit”.’
‘Love to be a trendsetter.’ She held out her arms and struck a pose. ‘Same with the ensemble. Here we have Lydia Powell modelling the finest in Becoming ritual-slash-Were-combat chic. Long sleeves, long pants for practicality, metallic accents for flair and most importantly, pockets for snacks.’
‘Snacks and spells,’ I corrected. ‘Don’t get them mixed up.’
Over on the kitchen table, Ashley was lining up the concoctions she and Viriginia had been working on all afternoon, all of them wrapped in muslin bags except for one. The pouch in my back pocket, the smallest of them all but it was already dragging me down.
‘Ready?’
Virginia opened the door to the kitchen from the outside, glowing with pride in her long white dress, the traditional Powell family Becoming gown.
The only evidence of their connection to the blessing, something so precious even Edwina couldn’t bring herself to destroy it.
Since Lydia had politely declined the chance to dress up as her great-great-grandmother, Virginia elected to wear it herself, and despite her distress over Jackson’s disappearance and Lydia’s part in the trial, she still found time to whisper to Ashley how pleased she was to know that the thing still fit.
‘I can see the moon,’ she said, hurrying us down the steps and into the garden. ‘We’re ready.’
‘You know your lines?’ Lydia asked me as I picked up the ceremonial dagger I’d already warned her would be making another appearance.
‘Let’s hope so,’ I replied. ‘We don’t have time for a dress rehearsal.’
My own Becoming ceremony was not one of my fondest memories.
I was determined to ensure that wouldn’t be the case for Lydia.
Ashley and Virginia waited on either side of the copper arch at the end of the garden, woven with sweet-scented jasmine and morning glory.
Time and time again, Catherine told me this ritual was supposed to be a beautiful thing. Time to see if that was true.
Lydia waited, shifting from one bare foot to the other as I passed under the arch.
The blessing already alive in both of us.
Magic wasn’t a limited thing to be sliced up and shared.
It was infinite, expanding and deepening as it grew, new possibilities blossoming in both me and Lydia as we took our places.
I searched inside myself for the door, the one that held all the knowledge of my ancestors.
I didn’t try to force it this time, only bowed my head and waited for it to open.
Stop trying and know it is done. See it.
Feel it. Our ancestors didn’t hesitate. They passed through the open door, filling the garden with their presence and my heart with the knowledge.
Lydia couldn’t see them yet but I hoped she felt their presence, wishing even more love, even more hope, onto the latest in a long line of beloved sisters.
‘Lydia Virginia Sarah Powell,’ I said, the words flowing through me. ‘Do you accept the blessing as the blessing accepts you?’
The earth was warm beneath my feet, soothing and grounding.
‘I do,’ Lydia replied, solemn but smiling.
‘As the full moon represents wholeness and completion, we ask those who came before us to complete the Becoming and make our daughter whole,’ I said, dagger in hand.
‘We ask those who came before us to bring her into the blessing. We ask those who came before us to offer her their strength and wisdom and show her the path she must follow.’
I took a step backwards, Lydia’s cue to make her choice. Without doubt or hesitation she walked through the archway and, above us, I saw a shower of meteorites shoot across the sky in celebration.
‘One last thing.’ I held out my hand with an ‘I’m sorry’ smile.
‘Why is there always something gross at the end?’ Lydia said, giving me the stink-eye. ‘We can’t pinky-swear instead?’
‘The sooner we get it over with, the better,’ I assured her. ‘How do you feel?’
She rolled her shoulders like her skin was the wrong size for her body.
‘Like I’m about to combust.’ Lydia immediately held out her palm. ‘Oh wow, I do not care for this part. Hurry up, slice and dice me, baby.’
‘This part does burn a little,’ I agreed. ‘Let’s not make it last longer than we need to.’
Without giving her time to think about what came next, I slashed her palm open with the dagger and did the same thing to myself, reopening the same wound I’d given myself the night before.
‘We ask those who came before us to bring her into the blessing,’ I called, raising my voice as the wind whipped up around us. ‘As whole as the moon, she will Become.’
Clasping Lydia’s hand in mine, I pulled her into me, embracing her not only as my best friend but as my sister. My blood was her blood, her life was my life. We both belonged to something bigger than ourselves now and I understood, in a very singular way, I would never be alone again.
‘I saw them,’ Lydia gasped as her knees buckled, leaning against me as Virginia rushed to our side, her eyes full of happy tears. ‘My ancestors, the other Powell witches, they were all here.’
‘Did you see my mama?’ Virginia asked, her stately dignified voice now that of a little girl. ‘Did you see Juliet?’
‘And Sarah. They’re safe and happy and they all love you so much.’
‘Then that’s all that matters.’ She wiped away Lydia’s tears while she allowed her own to fall. ‘That’s all that matters to me.’
‘And you?’ Ashley asked, pulling me away. ‘Anything?’
‘Everything,’ I breathed, so full of the blessing I thought I might float away. I ached with magic, my skin buzzed like it was on fire. The voices of a hundred sleeping witches called out to me, fading away with the wind but promising to return.
‘Then it’s time.’ Ashley drew in a deep breath and pulled me into a hug. ‘I know you always wanted a sister,’ she whispered in my ear. ‘I wish I’d known how much I needed one. Be safe.’
‘I will be,’ I promised. ‘You have everything you need?’
She nodded. ‘I won’t let you down.’
Somewhere on the other side of the city, wolves howled.
We were expected.
Shoulder to shoulder and stronger than ever, Lydia and I departed Bell House.
‘They might be expecting us but I don’t think they’re ready,’ Lydia said, tossing her head and whipping up a miniature tornado in the palm of her hand. Only minutes since her Becoming and her magic was already sharp and precise.
‘Doesn’t matter if they’re ready, all that matters is that we are. You know the plan, you have everything you need?’
‘Get in, get Jackson, get out,’ she repeated for at least the hundredth time that day. ‘Leave the rest of them to you.’
Without the opal ring, I was able to track Jackson exactly.
Whatever magic Astrid was using to hide Wyn, the Weres didn’t share it.
The pack had convened down by River Street, moving along Factors Walk, where they’d held Jackson in the Cluskey Vaults for most of the day before moving to the park at sundown.
I felt sick at the thought of it. Those vaults had dark histories of their own, not only used to hold the goods that came in from the merchant ships, but enslaved people.
The wolves most likely couldn’t know that, they couldn’t hear the screams and cries that called out to me.
It was a dark and cursed spot in our beautiful, complicated city, and only served to set the scene for the ugly night ahead.
Lydia and I stalked through the fading twilight as the moon moved higher in the sky.
Between us, it was easy to convince people to stay indoors.
There was an ever-present threat of thunder, the suggestion of a nightmarish storm.
Leaving the house did not make sense, I whispered as we passed by home after home; probably best to stay away from the windows too, close the curtains. Maybe turn in extra early.
‘We still don’t know where Astrid is,’ Lydia said as I opened the door to the empty Pirates’ House, all staff and patrons having abandoned ship after the manager became convinced of an unexpected threat of flooding. ‘Or what she’s done with Wyn.’
‘If she’s planning to attack tonight, she knows where I am,’ I replied. ‘No reason why the plan won’t work on her the same as it’ll work on the others.’
‘And you’re sure it’s going to work?’
I gave her a look as we opened the door to the pirates’ tunnels, a maze built for crimping, tricking men into drinking too much and taking their gold then dragging their unconscious bodies down to their ships, long gone from land by the time the men awoke.
These tunnels had literally destroyed lives.
Tonight, I only hoped they could save some.
‘Sure as I can be about anything,’ I said, leading the way.
When the hard-packed ground under our feet shifted to an incline, I patted myself down one last time to check everything was where it needed to be.
A healing poultice blended just for Wyn, another for Jackson, and in one zipped pocket, the silver and moonstone pin I’d used to kill Cole.
Perhaps not the wisest move, bringing the murder weapon to my own trial, but the verdict was in and I’d decided it was better to be armed than not.
There were other crystals, other herbs in my pockets and woven into my braid.
Protective spells mostly: agrimony for shielding, white willow bark for amplifying lunar magic, and angelica, the herb that bore my mother’s name, for protection and courage and more importantly to remind me of the love that brought me into the world when someone else was trying their best to take me out of it.
I wore her locket around my neck, the diamond snowflake pendant from Lydia, even Catherine’s aquamarine ring.
All I’d left behind was the arfvedsonite, the black crystal given to me by my ancestor months ago.
Whatever happened, tonight would be something to remember, not forget.
‘They’re close, I can sense them,’ Lydia whispered, slowing her pace and pressing her hand against the roof of the tunnel. ‘This is wild.’
‘We still don’t know exactly how your magic is going to manifest,’ I replied, just as quiet. ‘Ideally we’d be testing this out at home.’
‘Don’t worry about me, I always do better in exams than essays. What is it they say? Pressure makes diamonds?’
‘We already made diamonds.’ I pointed to my necklace and she reached for its twin around her neck.
The same locket, the same snowflake and, beside them, her mother’s opal ring, humming now with a different kind of magic.
For twenty years, it hid Alex from my family.
Now, infused with hyssop and wormwood and loaded with aconite, it hid my family from the Weres.
‘Can you feel how many of them are up there?’ I asked.
‘No,’ Lydia admitted, scrunching up her face. ‘Jackson is there. Other than him it’s not entirely clear. Three, maybe four others? I must be wrong, there must be more.’
‘There are more.’ I pressed my own palms against the roof, the wooden supports soft and decaying with age but holding together just for us. ‘Something is off.’
‘You think Jackson kicked their asses?’
Her optimism might’ve made me laugh if I wasn’t so afraid. There were at least a dozen more wolves above us but their energy read so weak, I could barely feel it.
‘No way to know exactly what’s going on until we get up there,’ I said, facing the door with determination. ‘Remember, do not let them bite you.’
Her ring wasn’t the only thing dosed with aconite; our clothes were still damp to the touch from the hours they’d spent soaking, and Virginia had stitched so much silver thread into the fabric I could see Lydia sparkling even in the dark, but I didn’t relish the thought of having to heal a mortal injury we didn’t have the time or energy for.
‘That’s a general rule I like to live by,’ she said, testing the two-hundred-year-old door to the riverside. ‘On the count of three?’
‘On the count of three,’ I agreed. ‘One, two—’
‘Three.’
So much for the element of surprise.
The doors flew open and a rough hand grabbed me by the hair.
I gripped the wrist, yelping in pain, yanked out of the tunnel and tossed across the park with too much strength to be human.
I landed beside the Waving Girl statue, striking my head on her metal plinth.
Stars sparked in front of my eyes as Lydia rolled to a stop by my side, coughing in pain, and crying out when a stained desert boot kicked her in the ribs.
Squinting, I tried to focus. All I saw were worn jeans, a soft grey T-shirt, golden tanned skin and wavy, dark ash-coloured hair.
I’d been prepared for everything but this.
‘Wyn?’ I groaned as he dragged me up to my feet.
‘Not quite, witch.’
Cole Evans spat in my face then punched me so hard everything went black.
‘Next time you kill a wolf, you’d better make sure he stays dead.’