I lead Asher down a hallway that branches off from the kitchen, my feet moving with confident familiarity despite my conscious mind drawing a blank. The wood floors creak beneath our steps, my hand trailing along the wallpaper.
We pass several closed doors, but nothing that sits behind them comes to me.
At the end of the hall, we turn left into a narrower corridor that slopes gently downward. Morning light filters through a small, diamond-paned window, casting prismatic patterns across the floor.
“This house is a maze,” Asher mutters.
“Yeah, but somehow, I know where I want to go.”
“Which is?”
“No idea.”
He snorts. “You are a paradoxical woman.”
And then we see it.
At the end of the corridor stands a door unlike any other in the house. While all the other millwork is painted eggshell or stained wood, this door is a deep, vibrant green. It’s the color of forest shadows, and carved into its surface is an intricate tree. Branches spread toward the top of the frame, roots reaching toward the floor. Tiny symbols I can’t quite decipher are etched among the leaves and roots.
Asher leans in close. “Wow, this is some door.”
My heart quickens as we approach, the blood in my veins starting to vibrate. It’s like a tuning fork has been struck and something inside me is humming at the same frequency as the piano and the standing stones.
“Let’s see what’s behind the magnificent tree of life.” Asher tries to twist the ornate brass handle and frowns. “Well, that was anticlimactic.”
“I think I’m supposed to do it.” I don’t know why I’m so certain, but when my fingers touch the cool metal, something electric passes between the door and me.
It feels like one part recognition and one part relief.
The handle turns effortlessly in my grasp, and the door swings inward without a sound.
Asher rolls his eyes. “Rude.”
I chuckle at the genuine offense on my bestie’s face. “Don’t be salty. I have a feeling this door is meant to allow family in but to keep everyone else out.”
We step into a room bathed in golden light from tall windows that face east. The space smells of dried herbs, beeswax, and something else—something old and earthy that makes my skin prickle with goosebumps.
“Holy shit,” Asher breathes beside me. “Hello, Hogwarts, meet Martha Stewart.”
In the center of the room stands a massive harvest table, its pine surface worn smooth by years of use. Deep knife marks, stains of varying colors, and burn marks tell stories of work done here… important work.
Along one wall, bundles of dried herbs hang from the ceiling beams: lavender, rosemary, sage, and dozens I can’t name but somehow recognize by scent.
Shelves line the remaining walls, filled with books, strange instruments, and dozens of mason jars. Some contain driedplants or hold powders or crystals, while others house things I can’t identify.
There are glowing liquids, small bones, and in one particularly large jar, something that might be moving.
“Is that an eye?” Asher points to a jar on the top shelf.
“Don’t touch anything,” I warn, though I’m drawn deeper into the room myself.
My fingers brush the table’s surface, and images flash behind my eyes. I see hands working a mortar and pestle, a jeweled athame chopping roots, the precise measuring of powders on a brass scale that sits in the corner.
I recognize the woman’s hands in my mind’s eye. They are my mother’s hands.
“This was her workroom,” I whisper.
“Whose?”
