“You did. You felt it. I didn’t need the storm unleashed on the store to prove it. It wasn’t the first time either, was it? Was yesterday’s thunder because of her? It didn’t feel like yours…”Rhiannon shook her head again, but the pain was making her weak, and she couldn’t muster words to deny anything.
“Just as well.” Ceridwen traced her fingertips over Rhiannon’s lifeline, and it felt as if she had been laid on warm grass, the scent of it comforting and familiar. Ceridwen kept tracing and kept talking. “I sensed it when I hugged her earlier this morning. And believe me, I’ve hugged her plenty of times and there wasn’t anything there before. So you must’ve done something. Why do you always have to do something, Rhiannon? And why her?”
The pain in Rhiannon’s hand, soothed almost completely, suddenly spiked at the words, at the images of her sister hugging the girl, and Ceridwen wrenched her own fingers away as if stung. Rhiannon’s vision darkened, and Ceridwen smirked.
“Wow, sister mine, now this is an entirely unforeseen development.” Ceridwen’s face was too self-satisfied for this train of thought to bring Rhiannon any sort of pleasure.
“You’re delusional. She’s just some townie.”
Rhiannon got to her feet. Her hand throbbed but there was nothing of the earlier danger of fainting or vomiting. Damn Ceridwen for still being very, very good at this thing. Rhiannon refused to give it its name.
“She isn’t ‘some townie,’ Rhiannon. She’s a brilliant woman, and by the looks of it, she is a witch, just like us. You unlocked her power, dear sister. Congratulations, I guess.”
Rhiannon’s palm flared, but the pain did not return. Warmth settled in and spread. The craft answering its sister’s call. Rhiannon gritted her teeth and shook her head, painstakingly tucking in every tendril of power. Her blood was boiling, her hands were shaking, but after a long moment, when she looked into Ceridwen’s eyes, she knew her own were devoid of any remnant of her essence. And her sister… Well, her sister knew her and the craft too well.
The planes of the austere face, so like her own, turned ashen, and Ceridwen’s mouth fell open. It seemed she had forgotten how to speak, her shock so deep. But Ceridwen being Ceridwen had never needed much time to shake off emotions and reach for the flagellation that were words.
“You’re a fool, Rhiannon. I thought you were merely irresponsible. Young and hasty and hotheaded back then when you screamed from the rooftops of leaving the island and everything it came with behind. Now? You’re all that and just damn foolish. Denying your power? Suppressing the craft? How dare you? How dare you treat magic like this? How dare you go through life as if the gift is a curse and not a blessing?”
“It is a curse. And it brings more curses along with it. Or have you forgotten?”
Rhiannon turned around, marching toward the thankfully half-equipped kitchenette and poured herself a glass of water, Ceridwen hot on her heels. It pleased her greatly to see her always oh-so-serene sister disheveled.
“I’ve forgotten nothing. And I’ve forgiven nothing either. You’re the one?—”
Rhiannon downed her water in one long gulp and whirled on Ceridwen.
“Yes, yes, I am the one. The good-for-nothing one. The irresponsible one. The disgrace of the family tree.”
The anger was immediately wiped off her sister’s features, and Rhiannon felt a pang in her chest, her heart already beating double time, opening up to more pain, more memories.
“I always wondered what you remembered from our last conversation, what you thought of all these years—” Ceridwen began, but Rhiannon had no pity left for old hurts.
“Conversation? This is rich, coming from you. You cursed me in every way you knew how and then you slammed the door…” Heartache forgotten and only more insult added to the alreadyopen injury, Rhiannon laughed, the sound brittle and fake to her own ears, yet she reveled in it just the same. “You wondered about me? Well, I haven’t thought about you at all. About any of you. And had it not been for Marg—” She trailed off abruptly, even the beginning of her wife’s name tasting like poison in her mouth.
She expected Ceridwen to latch on to that dangling end of the conversation. Nobody like her older sister to press on the most infected of wounds under the guise of drawing out the puss.
Except when Ceridwen spoke, her voice held no rancor.
“You might not have thought about us, yet you still managed to support?—”
“Don’t. How I soothed my guilty conscience is none of your business. You made it clear you hated me anyway.”
Ceridwen took a step, then two, and touched her hand again, letting go only when she was satisfied that the pain that seared Rhiannon just moments ago was sufficiently pacified. She traced the lifeline one more time for good measure, and Rhiannon closed her eyes.
The smell of flowers, all at once and none in particular she could discern, was familiar and comforting. When Ceridwen touched her cheek and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, Rhiannon almost leaned into the touch, just as familiar and just as comforting.
But when she opened her eyes, she saw her sister’s were calculating, and so she slowly pushed away while tugging her hand free.
“Thank you. You know where the door is.” Rhiannon turned to go. Where? She didn’t know, anywhere really, away from here, away from Ceridwen, and away from that something that no matter how much comfort was applied, still lurked just under her skin. The fact that her sister couldn’t feel it anymore, whenit breathed and pulsed just beneath the surface, was surprising and something to think about.
Damn it to all hell, as if she had nothing else to think about.
“I do know where the door is. And you know where the coffee shop is. It’s been four weeks since you crossed the town line. If you think Seren didn’t feel it, you’ve lost some of those smarts of yours in Los Angeles. And if you don’t care? Well, then you’ve lost your heart.”
Rhiannon wanted to argue, to hurl insults, to drag them back to that last year just before she had fled Crow’s Nest, when all they did was scream and curse each other. But that would solve nothing and that would not make Ceridwen leave sooner. And so Rhiannon didn’t take the bait carefully laid down.
“I’m busy, Ceridwen. Look around. This place has languished for years?—”
