“Bingo,” Eva said. “Yet another Claire. No wonder Ostara wants to shift the blame elsewhere.”
We sat quietly for a minute or two, listening to the clanking and sizzling sounds emanating from the kitchen, punctuated by snatches of song in Xiomara’s rich, husky voice. Another few customers came in, and Eva jumped up to get their orders, which left me free for a few minutes to process everything Eva had told me. I honestly hadn’t thought at all of Sarah Claire since that night, which was foolish, I supposed, and yet somehow unsurprising. After all, Sarah had been an almost invisible presence that night. If it hadn’t been for Bernadette communicating with her, I wouldn’t have even registered that Sarah was there. She hadn’t appeared in any sort of physical form. She hadn’t made contact with me in any kind of tangible way. She had been merely a theoretical threat—the mysterious spirit that would take over my mother’s body once Bernadette had killed her. But once we’d struck our bargain—my life for my mother’s—all thought of Sarah Claire had evaporated. She had become, at least for the moment, irrelevant. But if she’d been powerful enough to influence Bernadette and, therefore, help orchestrate the events of that night, she was dangerous enough to still be wary of. I felt her land on the heaping pile of anxieties already crowding my brain, and sighed. I ought to have been worried about her all along. I thought about the past few days: how Rhi had distracted me with books and introductory lessons,how my mom had kept us mind-numbingly busy with packing and unpacking, and finally, I recognized it for what it was.
“That night on the beach, it felt like the end of something scary,” I said to Eva as she ushered the customers out and slid back into the seat across from me. “Everyone’s been trying to push me forward so that I wouldn’t look back, but the truth is that it wasn’t the end at all. It was the beginning, wasn’t it?”
I looked up and caught Eva’s eye. She didn’t look away. She didn’t even blink.
“I’m no oracle, but I’m afraid so,” she said. “Hence why I kick my scaredy-cat sister out of the room every time we talk about it. Everyone’s on edge, worried about what will happen next. I know she picks up on it. And she’s even more anxious than your average kid because she hasn’t really found her magic yet.”
“Found her magic?”
“Yeah, you know, her spark, her affinity. I’m sure you’re learning all about it now. Every witch is drawn to some kind of magic—think of it like your own personal talent. Bea hasn’t found hers yet. It makes her even more anxious, knowing that she can’t defend herself the way another witch might be able to.”
I swallowed hard. I knew how she felt. Here I was, simultaneously untrained and yet, by all accounts, very powerful. I felt exposed, undefended, like someone trying to navigate their way through a hostile new place with a blindfold on.
There was a pinging sound, and I snapped back out of my thought spiral. Eva reached into her pocket for her phone, and checked her notifications. “It’s Zale. He wants me to come help him with Litha pageant preparations.”
“Litha?” I asked.
“Midsummer. The summer solstice,” Eva said, and her eyes lit back up with an excited sparkle. “Didn’t you notice the banner? It’s one of Sedgwick Cove’s biggest events of the year!”
“Oh, no, I didn’t, I… sorry, I’ve been a bit preoccupied,” I said.Uprooting my entire life. Recovering from a brush with the deepest evil. Seeing my dead grandmother in the garden.
“Well, don’t worry, you’ll soon know more about it than you’ve ever wanted to,” Eva said with a laugh. “Why don’t you come to the meeting tomorrow night at the playhouse? Zale has bitten off way more than he can chew, and he’s gonna need all the help he can get.”
Suddenly grateful for a distraction, I nodded. “Yeah, okay! What time?”
“Seven.”
“I’ll be there. What are you all planning?”
Eva’s smile broadened into a grin. “You’ll see.”
3
Iwalked back to Lightkeep Cottage, my worries weighing me down like sandbags I had to mentally drag along with me. I’d gone to Xiomara’s Cafe hoping for answers, but I only seemed to come away with more questions.
I found myself longing for my life back in Portland. Not Portland itself, or our familiar neighborhood, or the safety and familiarity of my school and my friends and the theater, although I missed all of that, too. No, it was the simplicity of it all—the mundane predictability of our day-to-day existence. I’d woken each day with a baseline sense of security that had been torn to shreds since my arrival here. I’d taken it all for granted—the safety, the banality of it all. And even for the things I worried about, it wasn’t anything like the worries I carried around with me now. At this point, I’d have felt relieved to fret about a science test or wonder whether a technical rehearsal would go off without too many hitches. It was almost like I’d been missing out on my real life all along, and now that I’d found it, all the troubles that had piled up in my absence were threatening to bury me all at once.
But then Lightkeep Cottage came into view, nestled against the winding seaside road, as natural in its place as the wavingmarsh grass and the cliffs and the rolling crash of the ocean. A deep sense of calm washed over me; and I was comforted by the knowledge that, whatever I might have to face, here I was. Despite it all, I was home for the first time in a long time. Lightkeep Cottage was my port in the storm, however new and frightening that storm may be.
I knew from the moment I opened the door that Rhi was at work in the kitchen. The aromas drifting through the house were enough to make my mouth water, despite the huge lunch I’d just eaten. I followed my nose to find her in her natural state: covered in flour and elbow-deep in ingredients.
“Hey, there! How was everything over at the cafe?” she asked, looking up and smudging more flour across her cheek with the back of her hand.
“Fine,” I said, because neither of us was emotionally prepared for the real answer. “Xiomara sent this.” I handed her a bag that clinked and clanked as she took it.
“Ah, excellent. I’ve been meaning to ask her to restock her Florida Waters,” Rhi said, rummaging her hand through the bottles with a satisfied expression. Then she looked up, her expression almost hurt. “Is that all?”
I grinned. “Nope.” And I handed her a paper bag heaped with take-out containers. “It was Cuban sandwich day.”
Rhi groaned with anticipation as she took the bag. “Even more excellent!”
I didn’t reply, only patting my stomach to indicate I shared her enthusiasm. “What are you working on?” I asked, gesturing to her work surface.
“I was testing out some new cookie stamps I’ve made using sigils. I thought we could all use some calming influence, so I’m planning to fill the cookie jar.”
The word “sigil” tickled the back of my brain, and I tried to remember what I’d read about the word, but my mind came upblank. “Can you… remind me what a sigil is?” I asked, smiling a little sheepishly.
