“First snakes, now this…” Ellie pressed her lips together and debated her options. She decided she’d obviously had a concussion, no matter what the doctors had said. Now, her concussion had led to a stroke, a massive one.
But Ellie still had her bag of binders—and a not insignificant pile of cash.
Do you get to take your things to the afterworld?
Ellie looked down on a village with a castle jutting up in the middle and considered the weirdness of suddenly appearing castles and hills. She checked her pulse again; the stomping beat of her heart was to be expected. Nothing else here was, though. Medieval villages and castles didn’t just appear.
And Pennsylvania ought not to vanish casually.
As Ellie watched the crowd in the streets swarm around the bustling village, she amended her ongoing observations.Peopledidn’t suddenly appear either. At least, they had never done so in her experience thus far.
Nonetheless, there they were. People were filling this lost-era-looking city, and the city was very obviously not near Ligonier—but Ellie’s heart was beating. There was no rational explanation here, and Ellie was not prone toirrationalexplanations. She stood, watching the people and trying to find a way to make sense of it all.
“What do I do now?” Ellie dropped her bag.
After about an hour of pondering the matter from several angles, Ellie decided this was a coma dream, a figment of Ellie’s imagination.No other explanation made a lick of sense, despite the binders’ familiar weight.
Then, the strangest thing happened. The femme fatale from the library strolled up the hill toward Ellie.Prospero. That was her name. Had she died, too? She looked far too lovely to be dead. Her hair was pinned up, and a top hat perched upon her head. A soft capelet covered her shoulders and upper arms, and she wore a sleek black pantsuit and sharp-heeled boots that were thoroughly the wrong shoes for pacing about a meadow.
Ellie’s pulse was—she checked again—present and strong. Stronger, in fact, as she studied Prospero.
Ellie was, after several pinches, still awake… so, imaginative coma dream was the next best answer.
“Hello, Miss Brandeau,” Prospero said. “Most witches wait until they are brought to Crenshaw. But here you are, all on your own.”
Ellie frowned at her. Beautiful but perhaps a bit mad. “Mostwhat?”
“Witches, Miss Brandeau; you are a witch.” Prospero stepped forward as Ellie swayed on her feet.
Nothing Prospero said felt like a lie, but witches were nothing more than superstition.
Prospero wrapped an arm around Ellie’s middle. “Not that I object to a beautiful woman falling into my arms, but what say we get you to somewhere less meadow, more fainting couch?”
Ellie nodded and let the strange woman lead her away.
“Witch?” Ellie echoed finally.
“Yes, my dear Miss Brandeau. We are witches.” Prospero steered her toward the town at the bottom of the hill. “Welcome to Crenshaw.”
8Ellie
Despite the sheer oddity of the hospital’s disappearance and the town itself, Ellie could only think about the woman in front of her. Logic tried to force its way to the surface, to remind her that nothing here made sense. She could not be a witch because witches weren’t real.
Maybe Prospero isn’t real either.
Abruptly, Ellie pinched her—or tried to do so. Her fingers had little purchase on the rough fabric on Prospero’s side.
Prospero slanted a look at Ellie. “Did you pinch me?”
“Yes,” Ellie said. “I think I’m dreaming. Gorgeous woman, magic, weird town…”
Prospero’s mouth curved into a small smile. “You are not dreaming, Miss Brandeau. You are unsettled, but this will pass. You transported yourself to a new world without aid or direction. That is remarkable! Now, however, your body is adjusting. Sensible witches often sleep through it.”
“I’m sensible!”
Prospero’s expression made quite clear she disagreed. “You kissed a stranger in the library, arrived in a new world with a bag of books, andpinched me. Sensible isn’t the word I would use. Intriguing? Lovely? Unusual?”
“I’m sensible,” Ellie argued.
