Chapter 26
Danica’s mouth just hung open. “You’re going to run a BB? You do realize that the second B means breakfast, right? Like actual food?”
“Brent suggested I could supply breakfast from the cafe. But actually, thanks to Priya, I think I might just start trying my hand at a little cooking here and there.”
Priya smiled through her tears as Alethea continued on.
“After a lot of soul searching, I think staying here is what’s right for me. I’ve spent so much time and effort doing what I thought I should be doing instead of acknowledging what I really wanted.”
Priya’s eyes remained sad, but she nodded in understanding as Alethea spoke.
“And what I really want is to stay here and give things a chance to see how they go.”
Danica cleared her throat loudly. “And by ‘things’ I’m assuming you mean Brent?” Alethea saw a smile light up Danica’s face, but she quickly regained her composure and put on a more stoic expression. Alethea knew her friend was trying to be sensitive to how this would affect Priya, now that both of them would be living here.
“I can’t believe you’re both abandoning me,” wailed Priya. “I can’t lose both my best friends at once!”
Tears started rolling down Priya’s cheeks and Alethea felt her own eyes water to match. She stood up from the table, walking over to her friend. Danica rose with Alethea and then Priya stood up with her arms outstretched. The three friends stood in a group hug for a long while, tears flowing freely now.
“I’m going to miss you guys so much!” Priya had definitely been sideswiped by Alethea’s news and she was taking it hard. Alethea felt her own heart ache. It wasn’t going to be the same with one of the best friends missing from the group. But she knew in her gut that their friendship would stay just as strong. They had too tight of a bond for it not to.
“Not as much as we’re going to miss you!” Danica’s voice trembled as she spoke. “You can see how sad I am, I’m not even gloating about the fact that I get Alethea, instead of you getting her.” The three friends laughed through their tears.
As sad as she was, Alethea also felt a sense of relief. She had been nervous that her friends were going to think she was foolish for staying behind because of a man. The truth was, she was staying for a lot more than Brent. Of course she wanted to explore where things might go between them, but the reality was she had only known him for barely two months. The chemistry between them was undeniable, and they shared secrets that no one would ever know, but it had actually been the trunk that had changed Alethea’s mind about staying.
When Alethea and Brent had walked into the master suite two nights ago, the antique trunk sitting squarely in the center of the room, Alethea had fallen to her knees in front of it. Her fingers had traced the small calla lily etched into the latch and she lifted the metal effortlessly, the enclosure no longer stuck. It revealed a small key hole underneath it. Alethea scrambled to her feet, dashing back into the hidden room and retrieving the key from where she had laid it down on the secretary, holding the blue tassel in her hand, now certain what this key was for.
She was back in front of the trunk in a flash, the key making a satisfying click as she turned it, the mechanism unlocking. As she carefully opened the lid, she was hit with the strong smell of jasmine and honeysuckle wafting out. Brent’s eyes grew wide.
“That’s so weird, it smells just like you.” Brent’s cheeks gained a little color once he realized what he had just said, and he offered a soft laugh.
Did she smell like honeysuckle and jasmine? She looked at the objects in the trunk and began pulling things out one by one. She had no memory of these objects, yet she knew they were hers. Her hands touched a book bound in purple leather, the suede soft on the underside. It had a matching purple leather cord tying the book shut, with a tassel hanging down. Her grimoire. There was a cast iron cauldron the size of a round loaf of bread and so many books and trinket boxes. Tarot cards, candles, polished rocks. Alethea knew all of these objects belonged to her, but she didn’t actually remember them. She knew they were important, but what were they for?
A noise, like something vibrating, began emanating out of the bottom of the box. Before Alethea realized what was happening, a thin object, about eight inches long, flew out from underneath several silk scarves and launched into the air! It circled around her twice and then dropped into her lap. She picked up the tapered piece of wood that had been polished to a sheen. Yew. It was her wand.
The wand felt so natural in her hand, like picking up a fork to eat. Alethea could feel her power surging inside her now, like an awareness of a separate part of her body she hadn’t known existed. Feeling a deep sense of joy, it dawned on her that an entire new life waited for her here, if she wanted it. She looked at the wand in her hand and smiled. Yes, she did want just that. There was so much for her to learn about her powers and her family, not to mention about herself, and the prospect energized her.
Once again she wondered why her aunt had kept all of this a secret from her. And that was the first question Alethea accosted Aunt Scarlet with when she opened the front door to greet her.
“Why have you been avoiding my phone calls? Why didn’t you tell me I’m a witch?” Alethea was exasperated but whispered the last word out of self-consciousness. Danica and Priya were preoccupied over at the cottage, but Alethea didn’t want to take any chances of someone overhearing her admit she was actually a witch.
“Scarlet! It’s wonderful to see you again!” Brent had to stoop down to give the woman a hug, and he took her suitcase inside. Alethea had invited him over for her aunt’s arrival.
Aunt Scarlet beamed at Brent and went through all the formalities one does when they haven’t seen an acquaintance for a while. As they walked into the parlor, the familiar scent of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee filled the air, along with something else. Roses! There on the tea table was a stunning bouquet of bright pink roses in a cut glass vase next to three cups of coffee. These weren’t the typical mismatched mugs with literary quotes or cat comics on the side that they normally drank from. The coffee had been poured into a delicate set of fine china that had gilded edging and a border of tiny rose buds. A matching sugar and creamer set was off to one side.
Her aunt looked delighted, but Alethea gasped at the spread and looked around for any sign of Dandelion. She rounded on her aunt. “Did Dandelion do this? Is she my familiar?”
A flicker of sadness crossed her aunt’s eyes briefly but then it immediately turned to laughter. “No, no, no, of course not, dear! Whatever gave you that idea? Animals aren’t magical. They’re just much more intelligent than humans.”
“But she’s been making Brent coffee!” As soon as she blurted it out, she was aware of how silly it sounded, but then again she suspected that the rest of the conversations that day would probably sound just as unhinged.
Her aunt threw her head back and laughed uproariously. Alethea made an irritated face while Aunt Scarlet tried to regain her composure but it took a few tries before she could stop giggling. “Forgive me dear, it’s just that that’s about the funniest thing I’ve ever heard! Dandelion making coffee, goddess no! Cats most certainly cannot make coffee.” Her aunt was trying desperately to contain her laughter. “Oh my, the cat! Hee hee, of all things. No, no, it was just the house making it, surely.”
Alethea stared at her aunt wide-eyed. “The house?” She felt faint.
“Of course the house. All in due time, dear. There’s much for us to discuss.”
“Yes, like why no one never told me I was a witch!”
Her aunt’s eyes grew somber, all traces of the laughter now gone. “I can see your memory hasn’t returned.” Brent pulled out Aunt Scarlet’s chair for her as they all took a seat around the tea table.
Settled in and taking a sip of her coffee, her aunt continued. “To answer your question, I couldn’t tell you. Or at least you wouldn’t have been able to understand what I was saying.”
Alethea was more confused than ever. What on earth was her aunt talking about?
Seeing her niece’s puzzled expression, Aunt Scarlet tried switching gears. “Let me start from the beginning. Alethea, we come from a long line of witches that might go back all the way to the beginning of civilization for all we know. A witch’s powers are passed down genetically.
She nodded. “That much Brent told me.”
Aunt Scarlet raised her eyebrows and looked at Brent, impressed, then turned her gaze back to Alethea. “Your parents were highly-skilled witches, both incredibly strong in the craft.”
It was strange to hear her aunt talk about her parents being witches like this, and despite herself it still made her feel a bit uneasy.
“So it was no surprise when you came out magical. Your abilities were incredible for your age, Alethea. I mean really off the charts and we were all so eager to watch you grow up to see what you would do with your incredible talent.”
She paused and a darkness fell over her aunt’s expression, as if she was reliving some great sadness. Brent and Alethea stayed silent, giving her time to collect her thoughts before continuing.
“It was about a week after your parents’ funeral.” Her aunt’s tone was somber but oddly clinical. Brent reached for Alethea’s hand under the table and held on to it as her aunt continued. “I came home and found you happy as a clam, doing your homework in the kitchen. No memory whatsoever of your parents or what had happened. The doctors initially thought you had fallen into a fugue state from the shock of the loss.” Her aunt swallowed hard. “It took me a few days to realize that your powers had disappeared and that you weren’t able to hear or see anything related to witchcraft. If I talked about your powers, you heard me talk about the weather or a funny show, something innocuous like that. If I said we should burn wolfsbane for protection you heard me say I wanted to make toast. It was maddening! And that’s when I knew you had been cursed.” Her aunt actually shivered as she said the word.
“But I don’t understand, why would someone curse me? And who?”
Aunt Scarlet shook her head in despair. “That’s just it, Alethea. You don’t understand. Black magic is expressly forbidden in modern covens. Things like that just aren’t done nowadays. And casting the Forbidden Curse on another witch is absolutely unthinkable!” Her aunt was getting agitated now. “Alethea, we witches have lots and lots of guidelines and tenets that we live by. And most of us try our very hardest to be the best witches we can be. But there is really only one cardinal rule. No witch may ever, under any circumstances, take away another witch’s powers.” Tears had sprung to her eyes now. “Cursing a witch by removing all of the magic from her life is considered a fate worse than death. My dear, I’m so sorry you’ve had to bear this burden. I can’t even possibly imagine what it must have been like. You don’t know how much my heart has ached for you these years.”
“But who would have done this to me?” Alethea was scared now and felt herself start to shake. A forbidden curse? Who would go through such lengths to take away her powers, potentially risking everything from the sounds of it.
“It would’ve had to have been someone very powerful. Even though you were only a teenager at the time, you had long since surpassed even your parents’ powers. And then one day, along with all your memories, poof! They were just suddenly gone. I took you to every doctor of magic that would agree to see you, no one had any answers for a cure. You see, since the curse itself is forbidden, so is the hex breaker spell.”
Alethea thought about Brent’s grandmother’s grimoire. His Nan had put herself in great danger just by having that knowledge alone, never mind writing it down where someone could find it. She and Brent explained about the grimoire and recounted the entire ordeal to her aunt.
Her typically unflappable aunt looked stunned. “I just thank our lucky stars that you were able to perform the Hex Breaker spell properly. I must admit, I’d be afraid to even try!”
Alethea shrugged. “I just followed the instructions. I don’t think it needed to be all that precise anyway.”
“That seems highly unlikely to me. Spells are always precise, even more so for the more powerful ones. Why would you think that?”
“I didn’t even have the last ingredient but it worked anyway.”
Her aunt’s eyes grew wide. “Which ingredient did you omit?”
“I don’t know exactly, that’s why I left it out. It just said to burn all of the herbs together in the fire and then to add ‘the purist one of all’. Well who knows what that is.”
Her aunt’s eyes twinkled with laughter as she glanced between Alethea and Brent. “Oh, something tells me you had all of the ingredients after all.” Her smile widened and she winked at Brent, who shifted his weight in his seat. Why did he look so uncomfortable? Was he blushing?
Alethea wasn’t going to be brushed off so easily. “Aunt Scarlet, what are you talking about? What was the ingredient?”
“All in due time dear, there’s so much we need to discuss. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to powder my nose after that long plane ride.”