Chapter Twenty-Eight #2
She looks to the Warlock. “We have a theory. One I’ve been toying with since your Momaw got sick, but Mr. Knight’s knowledge of curse magic has helped me rethink how we’re approaching this. And confirmed some suspicions.”
That doesn’t make me feel any better.
My mom meets my stare head-on, and in her mayor voice, which I’m realizing sounds exactly like Momaw’s voice in my head, she says, “Our magic is killing us.”
Silas blows out a low whistle. I sit up so fast, my head whooshes. “I’m going to need you to elaborate.”
My mom tugs at her unwound hair. “Farewitches turn magic and intention into cures. All for our community. So our profession means we have to know lots of people well, but no one gets to know us. Your Momaw ignored her own illness as long as she could to keep working, stay moving. My entire relationship with her centered on the Apothakery.”
She falls into a coughing fit, but waves off my concerned look and downs some water Silas hands her.
When her voice returns, she continues. “Me? I’ve got the knees and back of an eighty-year-old, no friends my age, and I’ve missed how many milestones with you?
All for what? I’ve never even left the Holler!
And you and me, girl? I’m going to die before we ever get the chance to spend time together as grown women.
Our magic spreads us thin, isolates us. From romantic partners, friends, neighbors.
It’s wearing us down to nothing, slowly but surely. ”
I whirl to the Warlock. “You think loneliness is killing the Frost women.”
He levels his full severe attention at me; he’s never been one to sugarcoat anything.
“Some magic, especially inherited through bloodlines, can cause premature aging, the effects delayed but exponential over time. Like a protein allergy, as it were. Your family’s brutal hours, no rest, burnout.
Isolation. This isn’t a curse, per se. It’s more of a… decay that feeds on stress.”
In other words: Rot. From the inside.
“But… we’re Farewitches,” I say lamely. “It’s what we are.”
Sadness sweeps across my mom’s face. “It’s just what we do, Honey.
Not who we are. I’m not sure when it started, but the Frost Farewitches began keeping their distance from neighbors, friends, any loved ones.
To protect them, maybe. To protect ourselves.
Now we’re barely keeping the line alive with each new generation. ”
I always thought the Widow Witch was the reason Frost women didn’t take husbands, but that only explains romantic partners. Not our scarcity of deep friendships. I have community, customers and neighbors who like me, and I know them—but does anyone really know me?
The protesting folks outside the hospital right now point to no.
“You’ve been on bed rest for months,” I point out. “Why hasn’t that offset the problem?”
“Has she? Been resting, that is?” Silas asks, the question clearly not for me. “When she’s not stressing over being a backseat mayor, she’s worrying over her daughter.”
“Also, the isolation of being hospitalized,” the Warlock adds. “Keeping the town at arm’s length to preserve this secret has hindered recovery, not enabled it.”
Silas nods to me. “Theoretically, if a Farewitch uses her magic less, could the side effects, these symptoms, be managed?”
“If this is caught early enough to change certain behaviors,” my mom says, wrangling a sheepish look.
“I thought giving up my post as Farewitch might save me from the effects. Reverse them, even. But no luck. I think the decades I put into being a Farewitch catapulted me past some point of no return. But it’s not too late for a younger Witch. ”
Of course. My mom, always looking ahead to the last step in the recipe. She didn’t just transition to mayor to help a friend. She was trying to break a cycle, showing me that years later, I might be free to choose to become something other than a Farewitch, too.
“It’s only a working theory,” the Warlock says. “While your family’s… affliction isn’t a by-the-book curse, there is always—”
“—a cost to magic,” I finish, voice soft.
He nods. “Two Frost women could be a coincidence, but I’d—your mother—would like to not have our hypothesis proven correct by a third.”
Me. Rotting away. Slowly but surely. “But,” I start, stop. Start again. “Why does the cost have to be so high?”
“Our power is tied to the land. This land, Foxe Holler. It can only support so much magic. Recent generations of Frosts might have kept the family small, to avoid the Widow Witch, but a small holler means fewer Witches in general.”
“Or one Farewitch,” I say.
He nods. “Witches take on more and more responsibility, but without extra help, especially as younger generations move away to larger cities. So the labor grows but the Witch population doesn’t.
Whether this stress is uniquely devastating for Farewitches, or Frost Farewitches, I’m not sure, but the fact remains: You will literally work yourself to death. ”
There’s no plan B Farewitch in a town this small.
The answer has always been right in front of me. But I’ve never been good at paying attention to negative thinking.
When my mom speaks again, her voice is a feeble thing. “You have a job to do for your community, but you’re also your own person. Your life is your time. There’s balance in there. Somewhere.”
That kind of balance feels impossible.
YOUR TIME IS MINE.
My throat tightens, a flush crawling under my skin.
The rising June sun has got the room feeling like the inside of a toaster.
This is not how this is supposed to go. I’d cure my mom, save Lazlo and the Warlock, and keep the Holler happy and healthy.
I’d be proud, knowing I always give everything I have to folks who depend on me.
I swallow the doubt before I can taste it. I can solve both problems. There’s enough time. There has to be. I’ll work harder. I’ve had twelve hours of sleep; I can do anything. After everyone’s okay—then I can focus on my problem, on what living as a Farewitch means for me. Only then.
But… isn’t that exactly why I’ve been angry at the Warlock? For trying to make more time appear out of nowhere, even if it meant making a messy deal with an ancient Witch?
An ancient Witch. That’s it.
We’ve spent all this time asking the Holler about the legend but never the legend herself.
“We need help,” I blurt. “From a Witch who knows way more than we do about magic, especially lower magics. Someone who’s been tied to the Holler and its history for so long, she might be able to tell us how this…
decay started for the Frosts. If there’s a fix.
Or at least a way to undo the damage that’s been done. ” I glance at my mom.
“The only creature old enough to know anything about generational magic and afflictions this undefined…” The Warlock’s expression flips from exhausted to defiant.
“Absolutely not. This is the Widow Witch. Oris Webb is a zealot but he isn’t wrong about the danger she poses.
She has a depthless well of magic, thrives on recompense, and she will use whatever torments you to feed on your desperation.
Then she will ask the impossible in return. ”
“But she’s still a Witch,” my mom says, catching on to my thinking.
“Coven or no coven, Witches help Witches. Maybe she’ll help me,” I say, never breaking the Warlock’s gaze.
My mom heaves a sigh. “As your mother, I should tell you not to do this, but…”
The Warlock leans forward, his elbows digging into the tops of his knees. “I haven’t spent the past year behind wards avoiding her just to go make a house call.”
“Your archives haven’t helped. We’ve exhausted the network we’ve got.
” I jam a finger into my hospital mattress for emphasis.
Flimsy, underwhelming emphasis. “We’re officially out of options.
Lazlo has two weeks.” You have two weeks, you inane Warlock!
“Besides, it’s not like she can curse you again. ”
“I’m not worried about—this isn’t about me.”
“Then don’t do it for you. Do it for me.”
With a furious puff of air, he turns to my mom. “Are all Frost women this ornery?”
“Afraid we just bake that way in the oven, dear.”
“We’re not confronting the Widow Witch, Ms. Frost. End of discussion.” An edge cuts through his low voice, sharp as my good knives.
“Beginning of discussion. Mom, Silas, give us a second?”
Miraculously, they’re civil and agree. Silas wheels my mom from the room. Then it’s just me and an agitated Warlock.