“Aunt Noémi kept this house, and this land, intact, against one of the greatest odds imaginable.” He looked at me quickly. “Mom, I’ve been doing some research and I wanted to tell you this when I knew more but tonight seems like as good a time as any.”
He cleared his throat. “Like my mom, Noémi was a witch. She was also separated from her animal familiar during a stupid experiment that went very, very wrong. And that familiar, a bear, stuck around. I never told you, Mom, but I felt her bear’s presence, too. That’s how I knew which animal trails to follow, and how I learned to communicate with raccoons and squirrels. Bear taught me all of that.”
He wiped at the tears streaming down his face. “I miss Bear. Here’s to Noémi and Bear and the spirits that watch over us.”
“So mote it be,” said Shamaha and Rowan in unison. Christoph rose and opened his arms—and his magnificent wings—and took Thatcher into his embrace.
“So mote it be.” The rest of our motley crew lifted their glasses to the house, and to Thatcher, and drank.
Chapter 3
“Am I really too young for a beer, Mom, because that was hard.” Thatch refilled his plate with salad and garlic bread and sat next to me. His face was flushed.
“I kept a few bottles of Aunt Noémi’s homemade fruit wines,” I said, “and I cannot think of a more appropriate occasion to open one.” Getting the bottle would entail entering the cellar area, which I hadn’t done since I collected the soil samples in August. Those teaspoons of dirt revealed pieces of the history between the Doug’s family, and mine.
Conversation picked up again. I savored the delicious food, while keeping my eye on Sallie. Having Malvyn Brodeur, the Enforcer, at dinner would be hard for her. I harbored hope that we could all continue to get along as Meribah, her sister Adelaide, and Sallie’s parents Josiah and Garnet, faced sentencing.
I carried my plate to the kitchen, rinsed and stacked it in the dishwasher. In the back of one of the cupboards, perhaps with my assorted porcelain tea cups, was a set of cordial glasses Aunt Noémi had used at holiday dinners. Her son, Clyde, hadn’t wanted them when he and his sister sold me this house.
One knee on the counter, I hoisted myself up.
“Calli, let me help you.” Rowan put her plate in the sink and tapped the side of my thigh. “Hand whatever it is down to me.”
“Hey,” I said. “I’m looking for matching wine glasses so we can toast Noémi in style and I think I stashed them—” I tried another cupboard door, “here!”
I pulled the cardboard box forward and handed it off to Rowan. “Can you tell me how many glasses are in the box?” I asked. I tried not to knock over the stack of saucers as my fingertips swept the back of the shelf. Brushing the delicate stems of the old glasses. I curled a finger around one and brought it forward, “Gotcha.”
“Eight,” said Rowan, “plus whatever you’ve got there.”
“How many of us are there?”
“Twelve-ish?” Ro squished her face. “Yeah, twelve.”
Side by side, we washed and dried the glasses. “Want to accompany me to the dark and gloomy cellar?” I asked.
“Sure.”
We carried the tray of glasses and a corkscrew outdoors and left it on an empty chair. Rowan followed me to the cellar. The entrance door was underneath the overhang created by the back porch. One of the new Jones Family Expansion projects was to turn the old catch-all storage spot into an overflow sleeping area. A new, poured concrete floor coupled with the freshly painted bright red door went a long way toward scrubbing away old memories.
“Ready?” Rowan grasped the latch. I nodded.
The smell of old stone, old wood, and old, old dirt always hit me first; the mustiness never seemed to change, whether it was the long, dry days of summer or the months of damp stretching from November through March.
“Over here.” I pointed to a small room, partitioned by an added stone wall and salvaged door and frame. The entire door unit sagged inward. Decades ago, someone had slapped concrete in between the rocks used to make the wall, and the rough surfaces were coated with grime and cobwebs.
I pulled the old door toward me, careful to press a hand against the frame so the whole thing wouldn’t shift and topple over.
Gravel coated the floor and crunched underfoot. Rows of wood shelves held dusty wine bottles lying on their side, and damp boxes full of empty canning jars. More boxes held shrivelled flower bulbs. Rowan shined her flashlight over the hand painted labels.
“I wonder if Belle should have a look at these,” she said. “You never what some of these twisted roots and knobby things might grow into.”
“Ro, that’s just asking for trouble,” I joked. Belle bubbled over with a sunny disposition that could fool you into thinking she was superficial. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Plant Witch had an encyclopedic knowledge of everything with roots, stems and flowers. Her herbal tincture helped my reproductive system produce a menstrual cycle at a critical time, and now I was on her ‘Menstrual Maintenance’ regimen until I had completed my five years of Witch training.
“Look, Calli. Read these labels. Someone in your family had a working knowledge of magical plants.”
“Shine that light over here.” I crouched next to Rowan and read along with her. “Attraction. Camouflage. Blood Borne. Vines, Defensive.” My aunt—or my mother, or a more distant relation—had grown plants to be used for specific purposes. I gave a low whistle and said, “I’m calling Belle tomorrow.” My curiosity was piqued, and curiosity gave purchase over fear.
“Let’s get that bottle of wine and get out of here. I’m starting to get the teeniest bit creeped out.”
Outside, I used the garden hose to wash a thick layer of grime
