Chapter 8
I refuse to alter events or emotions. That was not what my magick should be used for. Mistress Briggs railed at me, at once asking for an exception, then railing against me when I declined. She vowed to make me sorry. To make me rue the decision to deny her, but I could not help her.
“You will regret this day,” she screamed.
While I already regretted things in my short life, didnst we all? Not doing something that went against my principles wasn’t one of them.
“Make me a love potion,” she begged.
That is not ethical. “Love must grow on its own.”
She left in anger. Such desperation would not make love grow.
Unlike the love Caleb and I shared, which had blossomed unexpectedly, Mistress Briggs will not find her true love with that attitude.
Present Day
Morning came early.
Sunlight filtered through her curtains, waking her before the alarm was set to go off. Mercy groaned.
Last night had been lovely, but in the cool autumn morning light, she knew pursuing anything with him wasn’t optimal. If his sister bought the Briggs house, he would be coming here regularly. A fling with him didn’t work as a palate cleanser if he was going to be around regularly.
She threw open the windows and inhaled the crisp fall air. Movement in her garden caught her eye. The black kitten from yesterday wandered through the herbs.
She set her crystals on the windowsill in the sunlight.
She chose an ochre skirt for joy and clarity, and a blue sweater with starbursts of gold for wisdom and trust to set her intention for the day.
Little sparkles lit up her face in the mirror. She wanted to believe they were just reflections of the sunlight, but she knew better.
She might have decided that seeing him again was a bad idea, but her subconscious was creating sparkles like a halo around her.
She drew the Moon card from her Herbcrafter’s deck, with Datura, a toxic plant, prominently featured.
The message, face the Unknown, turn toward mystery with curiosity and courage, meant intentionality and possibility.
She tied the cards together with a snap, deciding to take away the message of toxicity instead, even if refusing the wisdom of the cards was considered taboo.
Starting something with a stranger in town was not the answer to cultivating her own self-acceptance. Wasn’t that why she was in therapy?
When she was twelve and did her first finding spell to find her father’s lost keys, she believed he would be happy. She’d discovered the keys in an odd kitchen drawer.
When she told him the finding spell had worked, she’d waited for praise.
Instead, he had freaked out.
He’d railed against the town, the magical inhabitants, and Mercy, calling her abnormal. He forbade her from using magic and moved them away.
She’d come into her magic later in life, practicing in secret as a teenager, and alone as an adult when she’d moved back to Driftwood Pointe. But she still had issues, trying to praise herself rather than seek validation from others. This was not the time to start something with Zane.
At peace with her decision, she unlocked the door to the shop.
A few hours after tending to the store, unboxing and shelving new stock, she could finally get back to Mercy’s diary.
Mercy went into the Reading Room. She had wanted to close the private room and add to the public section of the bookstore.
She wasn’t getting wealthy running a bookstore, especially one where half the store wasn’t accessible.
But one of her aunt’s provisions for selling her the bookstore was the agreement that she keep the reading room open for those who needed it.
The town was full of magical beings who, for the most part, kept to themselves. The town had not forgotten the tragic events of the late 1600s and the hysteria that pitted neighbor against neighbor.
Many people had abandoned their magic for a more “normal” life.
She had suppressed her magic for years.
The Reading Room, warded against anyone without access to magic, held her most prized possessions—the De Secretis Mulierium, The Trotula, and the Malleus Maleficarum and local magical books—and was cooled to an even sixty degrees with forty percent humidity to keep the books well preserved.
If a normal person tried the door, it wouldn’t open.
A large wooden table sat in the center with small banker’s lights and surrounded by low-backed chairs with padded leather seats. Mercy flitted around before choosing one of the chairs.
Midge had returned, so she could read the diary uninterrupted.
Mercy had been in love with a local boy. Funny, there hadn’t been any lore around this romance. Although it didn’t really have any bearing on the present, it was an interesting new fact about her ancestress.
The door to the Reading Room burst open.
Zane rushed in. “I need your help.” His hair was mussed and his shirt tail half untucked. That wasn’t what had her stunned.
How had he gotten into the Reading Room? That was impossible.
She fell back a step. His presence hit the air like a pressure change. “How did you get in here?”
“Lady out front told me you were in here.” He waved away her question impatiently. “I need to get back in the house. Now.”
“You shouldn’t be in here.” He wasn’t understanding, or maybe she wasn’t. But Zane Bridges should not have been able to access this room, unless…
He paced the small room, one hand on his waist, the other running through his hair. “I’m truly sorry to bother you, but I need to get back into that house.”
“It’s a house emergency?” She thought she was funny, as she tried to lighten his anxiety. But his eyes were wild, and his face was full of misery.
“My sister is having contractions.”
“That’s exciting?”
“Too early. They are going to hospitalize her.”
“Maybe you should wait until she’s stable to go to the house.” Mercy totally wasn’t getting it. Babies were more important than a house.
“I’ll explain when we’re there.”
She shrugged. Clearly, she didn’t understand what was happening, but she wanted to ease his stress.
“Okay. Let me tell Midge where I’m going.”
Back to old Briggs house.
Hopefully, for the last time. She would get this over with, wave a melancholy goodbye to Zane Bridges, and then never step foot in that house again.
Zane’s heart thumped hard, fear a giant obstruction in his throat. Abby had called in a panic. She was on her way to the hospital. She begged him to find the hex bag before her babies were born.
“What’s so important?” Mercy asked as he bounced on his toes impatiently while she unlocked the door to the house.
“It’s hard to explain.” The lump in his throat got bigger.
He didn’t want to admit that he hadn’t been truthful. He dreaded explaining that his family had perpetrated violence on her ancestress.
The black kitten jumped out at them, meowing with a screech.
Mercy yelped. “Where are you hiding?”
The kitten wound his way between Mercy’s ankles, purring loudly. Mercy squatted down to check for a collar. “No identification.”
Zane barely glanced at the animal. He had to find that damn hex bag.
The kitten climbed up Mercy’s skirt and perched on her thigh.
“You are hecka cute.” The kitten rubbed his head against her hand. “What should we call you?”
“Heka,” Zane said absently.
“What?” Her startled amber gaze shot to him.
“Egyptian god of magic and medicine.” Zane hoped the magic cat could give him some guidance. “A little help here, Heka.”
“Heka.” Mercy tested out the name, and the cat purred even more loudly.
Zane stood in the common area of the old home. He didn’t have time to be charmed by a stray cat.
Where did he start?
“What are you doing?”
He didn’t want to tell her. Once he did, she would hate him, and he couldn’t bear that.
His heart thundered, and he couldn’t seem to catch his breath. “I don’t know.”
Mercy put her hand on his forearm. “Take a deep breath. Inhale slowly.”
Zane complied. Her touch calmed him as he listened to her soothing hypnotic voice.
“Hold it for four seconds.”
He counted to four silently.
“Now let it out slowly for at least four seconds.”
She held onto him tightly through another four rounds of breathing. “Better?”
“Yeah.” Zane rubbed a palm over his face. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” She smiled softly. “What next?”
He was going to start with the fireplace.
He knelt in front of the fireplace and searched for any mortar that was different in color. Most was a pale grey. But he found a brick surrounded by a lighter cream mortar, which likely meant it had been repaired. He pulled the screwdriver out of his pocket and began digging at the mortar.
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to find something.”
“You’re… defacing the house.”
The house had warmed around them. So strange, but he felt like the house was trying to tell him something.
“I’ll pay for the damage.”
“Money doesn’t solve everything.”
Zane’s stomach twisted at the disgust in her voice.
“It isn’t about money.” He pulled the first brick out and reached into the open cavity. “It’s about my sister’s mental health.”
“So you decided to tear apart a house.” She tried to stop him, grabbing his arm. “Stop.”
He refused to hurt her, physically anyway, so he stopped.
“How does ripping apart a house—that you don’t own—help your sister’s mental health?”
His heart stumbled. “How much do you know about your ancestress?”
“Which one?” She looked completely confused.
“Mercy Finch. Your ancestress who was hanged in 1693.” He began to pace. “My family thinks she put a hex on us.”
“Your family…” she trailed off, looking at him like he’d completely lost his mind.
“I know it’s weird.” He didn’t even believe it. “We have lore passed down from generation to generation, saying we’ve been cursed. And my sister wants to break the curse before her babies are born.”
“Why would a woman from 17th century Massachusetts curse your family?”
This was where she would leave in disgust.
“We moved away from Driftwood Pointe and changed our name after the witch trials. My family are descendants of—”