Chapter Fifteen
Honey’s Helpful Hint, from
Honey Frost’s Southern Cookbook for Recipes Gone Wrong:
Make sure to gradually warm up your honey if you’re going to introduce it to something else; otherwise, it will seize and become rigid and uncooperative. A little bourbon doesn’t hurt, either.
In the kitchen, a single lamp glows between me and the Warlock.
The warm light melts over the island counter, like butter in a perfectly hot skillet.
The drink I have in mind requires rich coffee, so I leave some brewing in a French press and prep my other ingredients.
The multitasking is such an automatic response for my hands, I don’t think my brain is ever set on any other mode.
As I work, the Manor is extra silent, even for a forlorn skeleton of a house.
The Warlock’s expression is unreadable—impressively more so than usual—as he leans against the island.
Though the lean looks a few steps shy of collapse.
Now that I’ve got light, I can see how rough he looks.
Hair tousled, shoulders bent, eyes matte.
He’s exhausted. Saving me from those plants took more out of him than I thought.
“Would you like to sit?” I ask. “The coffee’ll take a minute. Don’t worry, you can still flee the room from a seated position.” I try to calm my rambling jitters in his calculating silence, but the man is an intimidating hoverer.
“You’re not sitting.”
“I never sit.”
“I’ve noticed.” His eyes study the ingredients. “Did you invite me only because it’s ill-advised to drink alone?”
“Ha. The Frost women don’t believe that. Never drink without food. That’s our rule.”
“So you are capable of following rules.”
He came for drinks and snark, apparently.
Best get this over with. “I’m sorry,” I blurt.
He raises an eyebrow, as if I’m such an annoying little olive fork jammed into his side, he’ll need me to be more specific. I swallow the bad name I’d like to call him.
“About the poking around. I’m not trying to ignore your privacy, or make the Manor think it needs to go on the attack.”
“The house is not as scary a devil as you think. For now.”
This is more of an apology than I would’ve gotten a couple weeks ago, so I’ll take it.
“Are you and the house one and the same?”
“No. And yes. The house listens to me, responds to my magic. But it decides whom it allows inside, and what it shows us. It likes to play tricks. To a fault. And it does enjoy mimicking my emotions and moods.” He sucks in a breath.
“I haven’t been around other people for a long time.
Or lived with them. Not that this is an excuse. ”
“We’re not as scary as you think,” I say. He doesn’t have a retort for that. “Can I be frank with you, Mr. Knight?”
“We both know you don’t need my permission for that.”
Well then. “You’re not sick, are you.” I don’t make it a question. “You’ve been cursed.”
His lips press together, teeth grinding.
The silence before was nothing compared with the suffocating vacuum enveloping us now.
No no no.
I was hoping Webb was only trying to crawl his way into my mind and lay eggs of doubt. But the Warlock’s face confirms my fear.
How the hell did I miss this? He’s an expert on curse magic, made it his field of study.
I should’ve trusted my instincts all those weeks ago, when I first considered the possibility of a curse.
But I tossed the idea because I was so sure that a Warlock wouldn’t bother getting involved with Witch magic.
The night hits me then, and I slump against the counter. I’m only going to drain myself further trying to keep up with the Warlock’s secrets.
“The curse makes me sick,” he finally says, voice dark and low. “Those were the terms of the Witch who cursed me. Over the next year, my magic would diminish, my body would weaken, and eventually, well, death.”
“On the summer solstice?”
He nods.
“That’s why you don’t want me wandering.” Bad health, bad control. Bad house.
“One reason, yes. I’m no longer capable of managing the Manor’s behavior as I used to, so I can’t guarantee your safety.”
The Witch who cursed me.
“The Widow Witch!” I realize. “She cursed you, didn’t she? Is that why she hasn’t—”
“First, no, I have no idea why she hasn’t stolen someone from the Holler yet this year. That has nothing to do with me. Second, the details change nothing.”
“They change everything. You hired a Farewitch. To cure an illness. Not lift a curse. You need a Hedgewitch, or a—hell, why did you even think I could help in the first place?”
“In my research, I’ve found evidence of Farewitches lifting curses that mimic illnesses, especially if the curse involves physical symptoms. Vague evidence, but it exists.”
“But that depends on the Farewitch and her specific affinity, the recipe, the patient…”
“Yes, perhaps it was an optimistic hypothesis.”
“A long shot, you mean.”
“This past year has been nothing but long shots,” he snaps.
“I may practice the Language of Small Wishes, but I’ve studied curse magic my entire life, well before this.
I should not have had to burden anyone else with it.
Not Ms. Zeen, not Lazlo—” He bites down on the boy’s name.
“And not you. This is my nightmare, one I should have been able to handle. Alone. But I couldn’t.
So illness or curse, you are my last option. I have never lied to you about that.”
“Wish magic, curse magic—none of that’s my specialty. I’m a Farewitch. What exactly do you want me to do here?”
“What you’ve been doing all along. Hunting for a recipe that will help my body fight a physical ailment.”
“And if I don’t succeed, do you have a plan for Lazlo, for after the solstice?” If you die.
Silence.
That answers that.
Webb’s threats from earlier triple in size at this midnight hour, but I refuse to let the current of doubt pool in. “What can you tell me about the Eldercraft?”
Pause. “Why? What makes you ask?”
“At the market today, Oris Webb seemed keen to report you to them. He doesn’t like the idea that a Warlock is the guardian of a kid without magic.
Do the Eldercraft forbid that or something?
” Is there any kind of precedent for that?
I suspect they’d be all over this town if they thought one of their own kind was harming children.
The Warlock’s eyes fall closed, tight. “Why is that man concerned at all? We wouldn’t know if Lazlo has magic. Warlocks don’t manifest their power until their teens, and then they often leave home to train with a mentor anyway.”
A part of me is relieved to hear that. I don’t think I can handle two Warlocks at the same time.
Again, I’m surprised by how little I know about Warlocks.
Witches sometimes leave home to study, if no one in their family can mentor them.
But there’s often at least one other Witch who’s familiar with their magic.
Maybe mentorship is a longer goodbye for Warlocks, since they live so independently from one another and rarely settle in one spot.
An extra dose of gratitude for a Witch’s network of covens and communal magic winds through me. Though, it would help to have someone holding the Widow Witch accountable.
Opening his eyes, the Warlock pushes himself off the island to fully face me. “Don’t take Lazlo to town again, Ms. Frost.”
My arms fold over my chest as I try to muster some intimidation. “Do you know why the turnovers were elderberry and not apple today, sir?”
“Now hardly seems like the time to discuss pastry, Ms. Frost.”
“I’ll rephrase: Did you know folks at the market wouldn’t sell us apples and treated us like crap?”
His frozen irritation melts. “Lazlo didn’t say anything.”
“Because he wants to go back. Rude folks or not, he enjoyed being there, and he doesn’t want you to take away that privilege.
But Webb and his slimy followers are itching to shun magic from the Holler, more than ever lately.
Not just higher magic, but Witches, too.
Webb can’t get the upper hand on the Widow Witch, so he’ll come for you first.”
“I doubt the preacher and his congregation are coming to burn me at the stake. I can handle being disliked. I’m just fine with it, in fact.”
“Right. Only Witches burn, after all.” It comes out before I can stop it, and his mouth clamps tight over any rebuttal. Good. The obstinate man needs to be humbled. “Webb seems ready to do anything necessary to smother magic, even if it means using a kid to get the Eldercraft involved.”
“See, this is exactly why I forbade you to go—”
“My point is that sooner rather than later, someone’s going to need to extend an olive branch, but you’ve spent all your time fighting enemies, you forgot to make friends—”
“I know!”
The shout comes out of nowhere, echoing around us.
The breath leaves his rigid body, and a gloved hand runs over the misery twisting his face. For a moment, I see the vulnerable younger man he used to be, before the walls went up. Have I actually unsettled him?
As his head hangs, he says, “Lazlo’s not supposed to be here, he’s not… but he can’t go back. I know he needs more. More than me.” His next breath is a shudder. “They can’t take him from me. I don’t know what would happen… They simply don’t understand.”
Who? Now he’s not making any sense. Webb? The Eldercraft? But there—there’s that weird flash of guilt again, piercing his hardened stare. I can almost hear the Please.
I’m not really sure what makes me do it.
Lunging forward, I wrap my arms around the man in the most unexpected and awkward hug in Witch-Warlock history.
My head fits just below his chin and he smells good, like an entire herb garden, thyme and the earth and summer and—I jolt backward. Before he can decide whether to hug me back. This is more mortifying than the animal cracker incident by a factor of light-years.
“That was…” He swallows, hard.
Oh God. Please don’t finish that thought. “Sorry. I should have asked you first.” I wonder if he might combust. “But I’m not sorry for taking Lazlo to the market.”
“Right. Well.” He clears his throat. For several seconds. “His time here is not a result of pleasant circumstances, so I appreciate your effort to make it better.”
I hope I have. Clearly, I’m still missing crucial ingredients to the recipe of how Lazlo ended up here. But this is progress. Finally, I have a sense of the man, not just the Warlock.
The coffee ready, I turn back to my recipe.
Every Frost woman has a preferred version of it.
I like to use honey instead of sugar, and mix a heaping tablespoon with coffee to help the liquid gold warm up.
Next, a healthy pour of Woodford into a big mug.
Then the coffee mixture. The last touch: I whip cream with a hand mixer so it’s denser than anything in aerosol form, and pour it across the back of a spoon over the coffee so the cream floats like melted marshmallow.
“Kentucky Coffee.” I pass the Warlock a full mug and pour one of my own.
My first sip sends the chill of the night’s events skittering away. This drink might not be tied to any memory for him, but there’s magic in dopamine stimulation. It’s the nectar that gets me through any all-nighter. And after tonight’s entertainment, the beverage program is needed.
But before I can warn him, the Warlock takes an ambitiously large swig and falls right into a coughing fit.
“Sorry, it’s got—”
Cough—“Bourbon, yes”—sputter—“I’m aware.” Sniff. He thrusts the mug back to me. “Next time, try to cure me first before you kill me.”
He’s got whipped cream on his upper lip, a fascinating dollop of sweetness that’s—not relevant.
“I meant what I said. It does you no good if folks keep thinking the Warlock of Foxe Holler is a monster who preys on innocents and sunshine. I know the town has its bad apples, but most of your neighbors might surprise you with kindness.”
Except Gertha Fudge. But she doesn’t like anyone.
He clenches his gloved hands. “I’m not sure the truth would do me much good.”
His words gnaw at me. He’s been isolated up here so long, at some point, the town embraced convenient reputation and bulldozed over actual fact.
“Do you know what would be good for you?” I grin over my mug, steam curling into my nostrils.
He finally licks the bit of cream from his lip. I try not to stare. Really.
Then those hazel eyes flick back to me, and in them, something has changed. “I have some ideas,” he says, voice low.
I nearly choke on my next sip. My skin flushes with a tingling haze, like the unmoored heat from sitting in front of a fireplace for too long. The bourbon is kicking in.
“You’re flushed,” he rasps.
I hold up the mug in defense. “Coffee, bourbon.”
“Honey.”
“Yes?” I cringe at the eagerness in my own voice. But this is the first time he’s used my name and I’m woefully unprepared for what the sound does to me.
“I mean, there’s honey in the drink. I can taste it.”
“Oh. Right.”
Bourbon has definitely kicked in.
That’s when it dawns on me. The Warlock and I are sharing a drink. At night. This is the closest thing I’ve had to a date in a long, long time.
Not sure if my mom would be thrilled or terrified.
“Having allies,” I say, clearing the embarrassment out of my throat.
“That’s what would be good for you. If I agree to keep digging through your library for a cure to this…
curse, you have to let your neighbors in.
Lazlo needs friends. He needs to know the unkind folks don’t outnumber the kind ones in the Holler. ”
“Fine. How?”
How indeed, especially if he won’t leave the Manor. But folks have been willing to come here. Arna Jean is proof that the right people will bridge the distance. Everyone deserves a friend like that in their corner. No matter how dismal they are at accepting one…
We’ve got less than eight weeks until the solstice, the Holler’s holiest are out for blood, the Warlock is withering under a curse, and now I need to turn a scary bedtime story into a friendly neighbor.
But what people pleaser can say no to a challenge?
After a hearty swig of bourbon and coffee, I slam my mug on the island. “I have an idea.”