‘Charleston,’ she groaned, almost more upset about my suggestion than the ritual. ‘You don’t have to try to sugarcoat anything for me, Em. I’m old enough to know how things are. People lie and people leave. The only person I can truly rely on is myself.’
‘You’re definitely wrong about that,’ I said, reaching for her arm. ‘You can rely on me.’
Her eyes skirted the disrupted circle of salt.
‘Starting now,’ I amended. ‘You can rely on me starting now.’
‘Promise there will be no more creepy witch shit in the cemetery?’
I nodded.
There would be no more creepy witch shit in the cemetery. At least not for her.
‘Good.’ She hugged herself tightly and cocked her head towards the gates. ‘Let’s get out of here, I would like to forget everything I saw as soon as possible.’
I reached down for my bag, tucking my hair behind my ears, when something in the pile of ashes caught my eye. Poking a finger in the remains of my failed experiment, I scooped out a small black gem, faceted and sparkling.
‘What is that?’ Lydia asked as she plucked it from my fingers. Her eyes glazed over for a second as she stared into the shifting rainbow at its heart. Then she shrugged and dropped it back into the palm of my hand. ‘Cool crystal. Anyway, sorry your little witchy trick didn’t work, whatever you were trying to do. You wanna get another coffee?’
‘Little witchy trick?’ I repeated slowly.
She slapped her bare midriff and stretched her arms high above her head. ‘Let’s get something to eat. Witchcraft makes me mad hungry. Who knew?’
Her smile was too happy, her posture too relaxed. No one could get over something so terrifying so quickly, I knew I hadn’t.
‘You don’t remember,’ I murmured, the black stone pulsating in my hand.
‘Remember what?’
I tucked the crystal away in the smallest pocket of my jeans, keeping my hand pressed against it for a long moment. ‘Nothing. You’re right, it didn’t work.’
‘Don’t cry about it, Em,’ she said kindly as she slid her arm back through mine. ‘We could try again after we eat, or are we done for the day?’
Under the tree, I saw the white-haired woman standing over the pile of ashes, wearing the same dark expression I’d seen in my vision.
‘We’re done for the day,’ I confirmed as I pulled Lydia away towards the cemetery gates. ‘We’re definitely done.’
Chapter Thirty-One
‘Emily James, you look like you’ve been rode hard and put away wet,’ Catherine declared when I rolled back into Bell House, still emotionally and physically spent from the invocation ritual gone wrong. ‘Whatever is the matter?’
‘What’s a binding spell?’ I asked, not bothering with niceties.
My grandmother straightened the collar of her silk shirt, the planes of her face never changing.
‘Might I ask where you came across that term?’ she replied as she glided into the parlour where a half-drunk cup of hot tea was waiting for her.
‘In a book. In the library.’
‘I will assume you do not mean the Chatham County public library.’ She sat and folded her hands in her lap. ‘Come, sit down, you’re fit to drop.’
My legs were already wobbling underneath me. Sharing the vision with Catherine had been an even split of labour but this time, with Lydia, I felt broken and drained.
‘Binding might sound simple and straightforward,’ my grandmother said, handing me her napkin and confirming what I already knew. I was a mess. ‘I have seen how they love to useit in the movies, it’s a neat little plot device. Convenient. The reality is very different. You can’t put your magic in a box and save it for later like leftover lasagne.’
‘But binding rituals do exist?’ I asked, the honey and lemon scent of her tea wafting towards me and soothing my smoke-ravaged throat. ‘It is something we could do?’
‘It’s somethingIcould do. But I can’t imagine for a second why I would.’
