Chapter 1 #3
Talula watched her mother put on the kettle and get out tea and mugs.
She thought of herself as the Sorceress Lite version of her mother.
Side by side, you could see little pieces of Sara in Talula—the wavy hair, the full mouth, the thick eyebrows and lashes, the oval face with a slightly pointed chin.
But Talula’s eyes were a murky hazel instead of deep, stone-sleek brown.
Talula’s wavy brown hair was duller than the silky black locks under Sara’s usual veil.
Talula’s words weren’t accented with the lilt of a thousand languages mastered over millennia.
She was just…Talula. Always falling short of her mother’s example. Just like today.
As the kettle heated up, Talula curled up on the café sofa.
Shame-faced, she described her attempt at witchfire.
Talula had spent years reading every grimoire in her mother’s collection, memorizing spells in languages only a few still spoke.
But when it came to putting theory into practice, Talula hardly got anything right.
“I was so sure Mina was going to hurt—” Talula clamped her jaw down before Dahlia’s name could escape her lips. “The human. But I couldn’t even do witchfire. I failed. Again.”
“You know, I really don’t see the failure here,” Sara said mildly.
“Are you sure?” Talula asked, a little piteously. “It might have been a bloodbath, and all I could do was, I don’t know, become like a tea cozy for vampires.”
“They are very cold-blooded.” Sara chuckled.
Talula groaned.
“Let me put it this way.” Sara handed a steaming mug of tea to Talula with one of her all-knowing smiles. “Why do magical creatures come here?”
“Because someone is trying to kill them, or their communities have cast them out, or someone has spotted them doing impossible, magical things.” Talula ticked off the reasons on her fingers. She’d had the list memorized since kindergarten.
“In other words, because they’re no longer safe.” Sara drew her veil away from her head and shook her hair loose. “They come here by train or bus or plane or the trunk of a car, leaving everything they ever knew behind. Their friends, their family. Even their names. Think of all that loss.”
Talula listened, cuddling her cup close to her chest.
“They don’t know what’s next. They don’t know if they’ll be treated cruelly or if they’ll find a home again. Then, in their lowest moment, someone offers them…cocoa!”
Talula let out a laugh.
“Can you see what a difference kindness makes when you’re walking into uncertainty?” Sara used her knee to jostle her daughter’s. “You helped fulfill this place’s most important, most vital function. Not just safety. Sanctuary.”
Thoughtfully, Talula took a sip of her tea. She nearly burned her tongue. Sara twisted her hand, and a miniature whirlwind whisked away the tea’s heat and steam.
“I know.” Talula watched the little whirlwind unspin itself perfectly. “But it’s hard to…”
Be the powerless daughter of an ancient, all-powerful magical being.
Talula swallowed that thought and instead muttered, “It’s hard to…feel so behind.”
“The magic will come in its time, in its own way for you.” Sara took a sip of her own cooling tea. “But you’ve mastered the biggest sorcery already. Courage, kindness, and an open heart.”
It sounded so wonderful coming from her mother.
Like an important takeaway from a brightly colored children’s movie.
But after Talula’s years of study and practice, kindness and courage felt like consolation prizes for the magically challenged.
Besides, Talula’s immortal mother had all the time in the world to master the secrets of magic.
As her mother’s only daughter (and a half-human one, at that), Talula wasn’t sure that she did.
But how do you explain that to an ageless pseudo-celestial being?
Talula collected her worry in a single breath, then let it go for now. “Thanks, Mom.”
“Of course, my darling.” Sara set her cup on the coffee table so she could pull her daughter in for a hug. “I’m just so proud of you. You have the biggest, most generous heart. It’s why you’ll be a wonderful guardian of the Volta one day. I love you so much.”
Talula closed her eyes, letting herself relax in her mother’s warmth. She might be twenty-four years old, but she still needed her mom sometimes. “I love you too, Mom.”
They sat there for a moment, sipping their tea and listening to the electric buzz of the café’s neon open sign.
Talula took in the café—its brick walls, darkened windows, assorted pagan decor, and, if she looked closely, the faint cerulean miasma of the Volta’s magic, twinkling like tiny blue fireflies in the evening light.
Talula loved every inch of it. She just hoped she could be worthy of it.
Early that next morning, Talula woke up surrounded by moody blue-gray walls. Despite her mother’s pep talk, she couldn’t get the memory of her failed witchfire—and her general magical failures, really—out of her mind.
All sorceresses had a well of power inside them.
With time and practice, a sorceress could access that power and channel it, achieving amazing things using various spells.
Some sorceresses had natural affinities toward certain kinds of enchantment, like prophecy or green magic.
However, some skills—like creating witchfire or making illusions—were foundational abilities that didn’t require chanting or herbs.
But Talula had always struggled with even the most basic magic.
Yesterday’s fumbling attempt with witchfire was just another reminder that she wasn’t quite good enough for the Magical Destiny her mother envisioned for her.
Talula threw on jeans and a T-shirt, determined to shake off her sulky mood.
She eyed her closet thoughtfully. How did Dahlia do it?
How did she add that exact right touch of something extra to her look?
Talula decided her exact right touch of something extra would be lip balm.
It was a fancy, overpriced one she’d bought after too many glasses of wine while online shopping.
The balm gave her lips a rosy, just-licked sheen Talula thought could pass as mildly sexy.
She imagined Dahlia’s grinning reaction: “Look at that juicy pout! Do a twirl or something!”
At the thought, Talula’s heart lifted, and the house noticed. Threads of pink and gold twined through the blue of her bedroom walls.
Talula and Sara lived on the outskirts of town, their quiet neighborhood tucked into the lush forest nearby.
Their mossy-green house stood two stories tall with bay windows, a redbrick chimney, and a wraparound porch wreathed in ivy.
The house was suffused with magic, accumulated from decades of Sara’s sorcery.
The walls changed color based on mood, the weather, or to complement an outfit.
When Talula was little and the Council summoned Sara for magical world-saving business trips, the house would babysit while someone from the Council kept an eye on the Volta.
The house would summon big bowls of mac and cheese and create secret passages full of pocket-sized treasures—a hundred-year-old penny, a bright blue marble, and once, a mermaid scale.
Except for the four years she spent in dingy college dorm rooms, Talula had never lived anywhere else.
Talula pattered down the creaky staircase, ducking beneath miscellaneous amulets of protection hanging from the ceiling.
When she arrived at the kitchen, Talula surveyed the area warily.
From the bottom of her heart, she was grateful to live in a magic house.
But if you asked Talula if she could change one teensy, tiny thing about it—and you’d have to really ask her, or wait until she was online-shopping tipsy—her answer would be the kitchen.
Potions, elixirs, unguents, and tinctures sprawled over every inch of counter space.
Some were harmless. Some cured hiccups. Some, at the lightest touch, turned skin translucent for eight days (and Sara had to write a letter to excuse Talula from the third-grade science fair).
Of course, some of the potions were very helpful.
Talula hadn’t had a zit in years thanks to one salve.
Sara also made a wonderful tincture for period cramps, although its side effects of euphoria, increased appetite, and levitation had resulted in the Cheetos stains on the ceiling.
The only consistently clear area was a square foot of counter to the right of the stove and in front of the microwave. This was the Talula Zone.
Still trying not to dwell on her recent magical mishaps, Talula fixed herself a bowl of yogurt and fruit and sat at the kitchen table.
The house tried to cheer her up, flinging open the French doors that led from the kitchen to the backyard.
Air tinged with wild sage and autumn mist washed over Talula.
She breathed, her shoulders loosening, her mind clearing. She reached—not out, but in.
In certain moments, Talula’s magic felt closer, a shimmering layer of being beneath her skin.
There were times when her mind and heart fell and caught from moment to moment.
Quiet bike rides, rainy days in front of the fire, and years ago, in a restaurant kitchen she’d loved but left behind for her Magical Destiny.
She focused on that feeling, the don’t think, just be-ness, and reached for witchfire—
“Good morning, my heart!” Sara called, sweeping into the room.
Talula jumped in her seat, concentration shattered. She stared down at her hands. They held no witchfire. Only yogurt.
“Good morning.” Talula stuck a spoonful into her mouth.
Sara put a kettle labeled For Tea Only on the stove. “Rosehip and lemon?”
“Please.”
“Darling, how would you feel about a little portal practice today?” The hope in Sara’s voice made Talula feel about three inches tall.