Over and over again until the words reached a crescendo, and then it all… popped.
Gasping, she opened her eyes and stared into the center of the circle as a wind gust blew around them, suddenly there when there had been nowind at all. All the candles went out at the same time, leaving them all seated in silence as the coiled smoke wafted up where there had once been light.
Elissa let out a little whimper. She dropped Sybil’s hands and then frantically tugged at her nightgown. She ripped at the fabric, tearing it right down the neck and revealing the darkened fissure that all the witches shared. But now there was more to the shadows in that crater between her ribs. They were moving like eels, stretching out into the darkness, and then, suddenly, Jessamine could feel it.
Magic.
It billowed through them, not like Sybil’s magic of sharpness and softness. This was like silk. Like long tendrils of silk floating in the air, stretching upward. They all looked up as the stars seemed to fall among them, tiny pinpricks of light that peeled out of the very night sky and rained down like snow.
Jessamine held her breath as the beauty of the night sky itself captured her heart. She couldn’t believe what they were seeing. Surely magic couldn’t peel the very stars away from their home, and yet, she was seeing it happen.
Tears dripped down Elissa’s cheeks as she reached her hands up and caught one of the stars in her hands. The light glowed through her fingers.
“What is this?” Elissa asked.
“Some call them cosmic witches,” Sybil replied with a bright grin on her face. “You’ll be able to read the future in the stars, if you wish. I knew some cosmic witches whose power was directly tied to the sky, however. The full moon will make you the most powerful, but you will feel bursts of power at other times as well. The new moon is when you should set intentions, the waxing moon for manifestation. Oh, I wish we were still in the old coven’s home. There are books there that would help guide you better than I can.”
But Elissa was barely listening. Instead, she was staring at the star in her hands in shock. More stars landed on her hair and shoulders, leaving her glittering in the moonlight.
“A cosmic witch,” she whispered.
Jessamine slowly stood, making sure to get Sybil’s quick nod of permission before entering the circle. And then she crouched in front of Elissa, grasping her hands in her own. “You are everything you ever hoped to be.”
Elissa’s eyes flicked up to her own. They were wide and full of shock, but there was something like belief there now as well. “Is this what it means to be in a coven?”
Jessamine tilted her head in question.
“To feel so… full.”
Again, that hollow inside of her twisted. She didn’t know if that’s what it felt like. She’d only felt full like that when her mother was alive, and, she supposed, a bit when she realized how powerful the Deathless One would make her.
Sybil rushed forward at that, grabbing on to Elissa’s hands and drawing her toward the house. “Come, bring your stars with you. I want to see what you can do with them.”
They left Jessamine alone in the garden, still sitting in an empty circle with no more magic swirling around her. That hollow wanted to split, fracture, and ache even more. But now she was alone here, and again she wondered if she just wasn’t doing enough.
“Nightmare?” The dark tones interrupted her thoughts.
“I should have known you would be here,” she whispered.
He crouched beside her, his fingers finding the dirt and letting it trail through those long digits. “Do you regret it?”
She looked over into those dark eyes, so like her own, and she knew the question he was asking. She just didn’t know how to answer. Not yet, at least.
“What would I become if I truly joined your coven?”
He sucked in a deep breath before rasping, “Endless.”
“In power or in spirit?”
“Both. Neither. No one knows. No gravesinger has ever joined the coven. The rumor has always been that to do so is to join with me. Suchcloseness to a god has never been accomplished. I do not know if you would even survive it.” He held his dirt-streaked hand out for her to take. “Come with me, nightmare. Such questions are not for late nights.”
She took his hand, but that hollow feeling seemed to expand and grow into an ache that was hard to ignore.
He’d never understand witches. Elric stood outside the shop that was much more traditional than Elissa’s birdcage. A classic square building with pretty white shutters and warm wooden walls, it was exactly what he’d expected the shop to look like. Even right down to the white fencing that was truly remarkable to look at. Completely white, enchanted to look like it was dusted with pearls. Beautiful, and not at all the kind of place from which his ladies should be stealing clothing.
Who was he to tell them what to do, though? Tonight Elric was just the muscle outside the door, with his eyes on the crowd that passed by. Apparently, he would not be helpful in this endeavor, likely because he was too much of a distraction himself. At least, that was what they told him.
He had a feeling both Jessamine and Sybil thought he would get overly bored with the whole deception and just start taking things. If someone tried to stop him, he was always happy to kill them. A human life was simply less valuable to him than the clothing that would get them one step closer to their goal.
