Chapter 8
8
“YOU’RE BEAT.” Rebekah makes this pronouncement when she and Jacob tag in at the ferry, Jacob to ride with Zander and Rebekah to buddy me back to Wilde House.
The necklace around my neck heats, pulses. Protections do that kind of thing, but I find myself glancing back at the ferry. Zander is standing at the door of the pilothouse, watching me. He lifts his hand in a brief wave, then turns back to his job, piloting the ferry across the wide river.
I blow out a breath. Safety buddies. Coparents. Adults.
It’s been a big twenty-four hours for Zander and me.
If I’m going to be an adult, I might as well let that bleed into all aspects of my life and deal with my best friend while we walk back to Wilde House.
“I can’t be sorry I didn’t tell you,” I say as we reach the bricks and start down Main Street. “I didn’t tell anyone . Not even my mother. Because you were right this morning, I was afraid. Not of reactions, not of...anything to do with any of you. But because if I told anyone, I’d have to deal with it. Face it. I wasn’t ready, and there was nothing I could do to change it. But I am sorry that keeping a secret hurt your feelings.”
Rebekah studies me for a long minute. “It’s not that. Well, it’s some of that.” She sighs, and throws her hands up for a moment. Frustration, maybe. Drama, maybe. Both. I watch the way her tattoos and rings catch the light, and her piercings too, even though I know they’re all glamours these days. “I was here for the breakup aftermath. I was here, and we were going to get out. You and me, together. Then...everything happened. You didn’t leave.”
“I couldn’t leave Emerson.”
I can’t read the look she gives me then. “I did.”
“ You had to. I did not. I couldn’t.” It seems like so long ago and also like yesterday. “Going with you would have put you at more risk, just as much as leaving Emerson would have made her too easy a target. We all did what we had to do.”
“I understand,” she says. Then her mouth curves. “Are you saying you...had to do Zander?”
I hate absolutes, but it certainly felt like it sometimes. It still does. I can’t lie about that, so I shrug. “The point is that I did what I had to to survive, and I didn’t particularly like all of those things. So I kept them to myself.”
She nods at that and we keep walking, finding the same comfortable pace we learned as little kids. At the end of the day, we understand each other. Always have. And will again, even if things feel weird in the moment.
Even if regrets swirl around us like a dust storm just now, threatening to choke us both. If she hadn’t left. If I had. If things had been different, but they weren’t.
I am too connected to the past—events, past lives, spirits, whole worlds gone and forgotten—to wallow in regret. I might not have a lot of hope for the future, but I know the past can’t do anything but sit there. It’s not dangerous.
Not unless you give it the power to eat you whole.
“We can’t go back,” I say matter-of-factly. “You know that as well as I do. You can hate me forever if you want, Rebekah. If you need to.”
She rolls her eyes at me. “Who could stay mad at such a beacon of warmth and sweetness?”
“Bite me.”
She laughs, and I think...maybe we’re okay. Sometimes it’s not about how badly you mess up, it’s about facing it when it hurts the people you love. That’s a lesson I don’t want to look too deeply at right now.
So I focus on the way we walk together, like our bodies are extensions of each other’s. It feels like coming home. It feels like a relief so great it’s almost painful, and I find myself smiling a little as we move.
Though I’d deny it if anyone saw.
Wilde House comes into view. We both study it, and I don’t know what she’s thinking, but I know that I, personally, never expected to view the pretty, stuffy old house as a kind of coven dorm.
Maybe she’s thinking something similar, because she sighs. “Change is hard.”
“Who are you telling? You don’t have to worry about keeping a baby alive in five months.”
Rebekah laughs. “You must be kidding. That baby is going to be raised by the biggest committee around. Your mom and Mina. Emerson, Jacob, Nicholas, me. Georgie. The entire Rivers clan. You’ll be lucky to have five minutes alone with your sweet little potential demon.”
It is an oddly comforting thought for someone who prefers, needs alone time. All the places my child will be welcomed, loved, cared for...that’s big. These hormones will be the death of me, because I am not going to cry.
I hug her instead.
She hugs me back, hard. “I can’t believe you’re going to have a baby ,” she says into my shoulder.
“You and me both,” I reply, and we both laugh.
Though maybe it’s a little snuffly too. I suspect we’d both die before admitting it.
The front door opens, and we don’t let go of each other, just turn our heads to look. It’s Frost.
He stares at us, the disapproval radiating off him. Which makes me grin, because I think that’s the ancient witch’s version of discomfort. “You want a hug too, big guy?” Rebekah teases him.
He gives her one of his rare smiles, then goes back to dark and foreboding when he looks at me again. That’s Frost for you. “We’ve found your ghosts to summon,” he intones.
My smile dies. Summoning. Great. That always ends well. “Hope you’re ready to get in there and fix what I break.”
Frost looks at me for too long. It’s all much too ancient portent and uncomfortably blue. “My advice would be not to break anything you can’t fix yourself, half witch.”
Weirdly enough, it doesn’t bother me when he calls me that. What bothers me is that he clearly thinks that’s a pep talk, when the idea of not breaking anything is almost as stressful as knowing I probably will. The bull in the Summoning china shop, that’s me.
We walk inside. Georgie and Emerson are hip to hip over a long table they set up in the living room, piled high with old books and elaborate-looking family trees on scrolls held down in the corners to keep the parchment from rolling up.
“You’re never going to guess what we found!” Emerson says as we walk in, excitement radiating off her. That usually means she thinks she’s found a solution. “Back in 1844, a man named Zachariah Rivers and a woman named Elizabeth Good got married right here in St. Cyprian.”
I have never once heard about the Rivers and Good families comingling, and truth be told, don’t want to. That’s a little too close for comfort, thank you.
Georgie jumps in, just as excited. “He died under mysterious circumstances. She was accused of his murder but never convicted.”
“You want me to summon a murderer to be our sponsor?” Because of course she killed him. Why wouldn’t she have? It was probably toxic. Wrong. Maybe even cursed.
It’s part of the historical record that the Good temper has always been something to be reckoned with.
“She was never convicted,” Emerson says again, as if that’s the same thing as being resoundingly proved innocent. “In those days, for a woman not to get convicted of something by the endless parade of patriarchal men in charge of literally everything, I’d say she must have really been innocent.”
In my bones, I doubt it. “Do you really think the Joywood will jump on board with your conclusions there, Em?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Frost says, standing over by the fireplace with his arms crossed. “The rules are the rules. There’s no morality clause on the sponsors. The Joywood don’t have a say in this. That’s why it’s a town hall.”
“Who were the Joywood’s sponsors?”
Everyone’s quiet for a moment. Georgie looks pensive, but Frost scowls. “I can’t remember. And I should.”
He has not taken his inability to access his own memory gaps well.
“It should be in the records,” Georgie is saying, a note of acidity in her tone. “We know how that goes with the Joywood and all their oh-so-helpful edits of the records. Everywhere.” She makes a frustrated noise, because that’s been another thing we’ve learned this summer. We suspected the Joywood were altering things as they went, in complete and total violation of all witch laws. Now we know they have. Partly because of what Frost can remember, partly because of how good Georgie is at finding things they don’t want found. “I’ll do some more deep-diving in Frost’s library.”
It contains ancient texts, banned books, and many other things the Joywood have tried to hide or destroy, but you have to know what you’re looking for and then actually find it for any of that to matter.
The library has its own mind , Frost told us after Litha, when Georgie and Emerson had demanded a tour. Best of luck bending it to yours.
“Once we can get everyone together, we’ll do a full Summoning for our sponsors,” Emerson tells me in her officious way that, all things considered, feels like pure comfort today. Like everything is as it should be, with Emerson telling us what to do and arranging things so the actual doing involves pizza from Redbrick and her cute little planners that she hands out like candy and updates for everyone when they accidentally leave them behind. It feels like home, and that feels good. “We’ve got less than two weeks to get this sorted out.”
Though I’d rather keep what happened with Maeve to myself, I’ve learned enough since March that I tell everyone about running into her earlier today and what Zander and I figured out thanks to that.
“The Joywood know I’m pregnant. They care that I’m pregnant,” I say baldly. For some inconceivable reason , I add privately.
I don’t mention Maeve taking a swipe at me, because it isn’t relevant.
So maybe I haven’t learned jack shit.
Everyone takes this in. Maeve Mather and her panda bag pigeon, taking time to drip condescension at me when we haven’t heard anything from the Joywood in months—but were attacked by something malignant only last night.
“Pregnant witches are powerful,” Georgie says thoughtfully while Emerson frowns. Very deeply.
I think back to what my mother said. A pregnant witch is fearsome . Not fear ful .
I look uneasily at the past laid out on old parchment and leather-bound books that Emerson and Georgie are sure will give us what we need. What if it doesn’t? What if I can’t reach these two people? Even if I do, nothing is guaranteed. No one can predict how ghosts or spirits will respond.
Then I’ll have to do it again for the town hall meeting. In front of not just the Joywood, but all St. Cyprian witch citizens who want a say in the ascension—and as we haven’t had one of these meetings in my lifetime, I imagine that will be all of them.
Rebekah puts her arm around me. “We’ve got this,” she says quietly.
Like she’s certain. Like she’s seen the outcome, the way Diviners do, and she knows .
What I focus on is the we .
Because I’m pretty sure that I, personally, don’t got this at all.
The next few days are all about planning for the Summoning. We’re running out of time, but the timing also has to be perfect. That’s Spellwork 101.
For me. For all our various schedules. For the ghosts and spirits we hope to bring into the fold.
The last time I summoned, it worked, sort of, but it also caused me a lot of pain. Hurting is part of the price, but I’m hoping to avoid that. I’d like to do this without hurting myself, or the baby, or anyone else. Something I don’t voice, because I don’t want any of the rousing you can do it speeches that would cause.
Finally, the night in question comes, the moon and the planets in the ideal positions for communication with the other side.
We gather as a coven out back, where Georgie’s crystals clink in the cottonwood trees, the river sings its songs as it rolls past, and I notice the evening is cool enough that I can almost feel fall and Samhain coming in. That’s how it goes in Missouri. Summer lies on us, hard, until suddenly one night you shiver and remember that the world really is turning after all.
Georgie and Frost are the ones arranging things according to her research and his memories and experiences. They first create a kind of barrier, so that anyone happening by will think there’s no one out here. Just a pretty night in this space between summer and true fall, Lillian Wilde’s overgrown gardens, and the little hill that one of the Wilde ancestors once walked down to drown himself one fine morning. No one knows why.
That’s the story witches will think of when they pass. Humans will see the lengthening shadows and wonder what lurks there. They’ll all keep walking.
Georgie tells the rest of us how to arrange ourselves in the circle she and Frost have prepared. They’ve already told us what we’ll say tonight, so we could spend a day or two learning the specific chants and incantations.
“We’ve built in a lot of protections,” Rebekah says, standing next to me and rubbing my back. It doesn’t ease the tension in my shoulders, but it helps to hear.
They should have found someone else, but I can’t say that. You can’t bring an unknown into your possibly treasonous bid for ascension. I get why I have to be the Summoner in this coven—they trust me.
But I wish they’d chosen someone else for this tonight.
Because though they trust me , no one here trusts my magic , and they shouldn’t.
“We’re not going to form our usual circle,” Georgie says when the moon rises high above us and casts a silvery light down on the rivers. We all know it’s time. “Ellowyn will stand in the center. We need the future at her front and the protector at her back.”
Frost is looking over everything with his usual intensity. “The familiars will form a second ring of protection.”
I remind myself that in this little space we’ve created, the Joywood can’t reach us. No one can see us or hear us.
I hope.
I stand in the center as I usually do for Summonings. My friends arrange themselves around me. Rebekah faces me. Zander is at my back. The other four form a diamond around us.
Protection.
We are a coven now, so while there is always an order to these things, they have more meaning now. We follow the ancient ways that have governed covens across the centuries. I hold opal and calcite in my hands. The family tree that links Zachariah Rivers to Elizabeth Good is displayed on a little easel in the circle with the daguerreotypes Georgie unearthed of them.
A Summoning is a connection to the past, so we start with the future.
Rebekah lights her candle first, saying the words that are only hers. She is followed by the Healer, the Guardian, and the Warrior. Distinctions made up of the present.
Only then come the Praeceptor, the Historian, and then me.
The center of it all tonight, if there’s to be a Summoning.
With the curtain drawn back to let in the other side, the candles lit and our protective animals around us, I begin.
I close my eyes and rest the backs of my hands on my knees. I tilt my head back, opening up to the moon above and the spirit world around me. I know that when I truly connect, my friends won’t understand what I say.
I can’t explain it. It’s just magic.
I open up to it. “Mother moon. Sister Sky. Open me.”
I feel it. The way that Summoner inside of me unfurls itself. It’s like my chest being opened, but it doesn’t hurt. And I know when I’m no longer closed up tight. When I am ready to receive.
Vulnerable , something whispers. I ignore it. I remember my mother’s words. A pregnant witch isn’t fragile... She is powerful. Fearsome. Not fearful.
I hold on to that. “By will divine, by the stars above, spirits, I ask for your welcome.”
The wind picks up around me, and I can feel the light of the moon, the stars, the way they wash over me, rush into me. Welcome me.
I can feel the magic spiral inside of me, then flow out. Just like it’s supposed to, thank Hecate.
I hold on to it and reach—
Into the past, into the ether, into the spirit world.
Now for the complicated part . “We call on you, blood of my blood, Elizabeth Good,” I call out so my coven can hear, so they can push their magic into the night.
Then, because Zander is the Rivers descendant, he says the next part. “We call on you, blood of my blood, Zachariah Rivers.”
It’s working. I can feel them take shape even before they’re visible, and I’m not even struggling.
I lean into the magic in me and then there they are, standing before me. Two people in period dress, a man and a woman. They look alive and animated now instead of stern, remote daguerreotypes.
I try to stick to the script instead of letting myself get too awed by how easy this all was. Or terrified that it’s too easy and there’s another shoe about to drop.
On me, if history is any guide.
I stick to the words that Georgie and Frost made me learn, so I wouldn’t have to cast around into potential dangers now. I can feel both of them looking at me. I can feel them both in the magic we make, reminding me. Encouraging me. Guiding me.
“Elizabeth Good. Zachariah Rivers.” I say both their names and incline my head in greeting. “We thank you for answering this call tonight. We are your descendants, and we need your help.”
Rebekah conjures up the explanation I put together of what’s happened, of what we need. Why it’s up to them. We made it a movie that plays in the night air, clearly fascinating our two ancestors. They peer at it, blinking now and then.
But they don’t look at each other or acknowledge each other, even though they’re both here. I know they can see each other because I’ve brought them here and they’re linked. I can feel it.
Still they ignore each other.
It feels deeply, uncomfortably familiar to me.
“You want us to be sponsors for an ascension,” Zachariah says, and I don’t miss, even in his ghostly form, how much his eyes look like Zander’s eyes. Rivers genetics imprinted on their bones, I guess.
Elizabeth has my mother’s violet eyes, but her hair is brown. She’s shorter, rounder. It’s hard to see any of myself in her. I assume all my dad’s human stuff took over to make me, because of course it did.
“Yes, Zachariah,” Elizabeth replies. Her voice is acidic. “That is word for word what they have shown us.”
It’s the first glimpse I get of me in her, and I am charmed.
Zachariah gives the impression of sighing heavily without actually doing it, another genetic trait that has apparently been handed down through the ages. “ I will support you, blood of my blood. Our light in the dark.”
The I is pointed, and Elizabeth shoots him a narrow glare before she replies too. “I will always stand up for what is right. I will support you, blood of my blood. Our imperative hope.”
Imperative. Zelda used that word too.
“We will ask for you to stand before us in six days’ time, ancestors,” I say to them, getting back to the script. “You will come before the gathering and offer your sponsorship, if you so wish to honor us.”
They both incline their heads. A ghostly promise.
So easy. So simple.
I begin the chant to release the spirits back to whence they came.
We’ll see them again in six days’ time.
They’ll sponsor us.
We’ll start the actual, mysterious ascension process that no one can stop once it starts. Not even a certain evil ruling coven. So say Frost’s books.
I might be a little giddy. Take that, Joywood.
I’m pulling away from the Summoning confident, happy, even excited. I’m ready to let our ancestors go, pull in my magic, break the circle.
Then something...fractures. It’s not painful like that time on Ostara back in March. It’s something else. Like holding a little too tightly to spun glass so it shatters. There’s nothing dark about it—but there’s that shattering all the same.
Yet my coven keeps chanting like they don’t feel it.
The Summoning ends. The circle is broken, the familiars called in. My friends are talking excitedly all around me, but I only hear the murmurs of it, like I’ve got cotton in my ears. I shake my head and try to find my grip in the here and now.
That’s when Zander comes into my vision. “Ellowyn?” he says, and he’s frowning. Not at me, for a change. He’s focused on something behind me.
I look over my shoulder and see that he’s looking directly at the ghostly image of Zachariah Rivers. Like he can see him. When it’s over and Zachariah shouldn’t be here any longer, and neither should the starchy-looking woman who stands off to the right of him, as if she refuses to stand directly beside him, which is relatable but—
“Why are they still here?” Zander asks.
“Who?” Rebekah asks, stepping right through the mist that makes up Elizabeth Good. Clearly she doesn’t see the two ghosts we’re left with.
They should have disappeared when I released them.
But they didn’t.
Meaning that the Summoning did not go according to plan after all.
Shit.