Chapter 6
THE MOMENT I woke up, Bubba was sitting on my boobs, glaring at me. I squinted, still tired from the events of the night before.
“What’s up, Bubba?”
“Mrowf!” He definitely had a chip on his shoulder.
The next moment I heard someone calling from the hall outside my bedroom door. “Maudlin! Wake up! You’re being a laze-about and you know I didn’t raise you that way—”
Holy crap. In all the excitement the night before, I had forgotten about Zara. Or maybe, I had just wanted to forget. Bubba jumped off the bed and scampered beneath it as my door opened. Leave it to my mother to enter without knocking. It was par for the course.
I forced myself up against my headboard, not caring that my boobs were in full view. “I didn’t hear you knock.”
She froze, staring at me, then pasted her smile back on. “You really ought to wear something to bed, dear. What if one of your guests stumbled into your room? You wouldn’t want them to catch you like that.”
“Of course not. Though most of my guests have the manners to knock before they open a closed door.” The words came out sharper than I meant them to. Or maybe I was lying to myself and I really wanted to zing her.
Zara paused, her eyes flickering for a moment. “I see. Well, I’ll wait downstairs for you. I thought you could show me Bedlam today. I probably won’t have a chance to see it again. At least, not for a long time. Don’t dawdle.”
Before I could say anything, she had swept out of the room, closing the door softly behind her. Bubba hopped up on the bed again. He let out a soft trill and headbutted me. I absently scratched his ears as I sat there. Something was off. Zara was her usual busybody self, but there was something not quite right. And I couldn’t put my finger on what it was.
“Come on, Bubs. Let me get up and dressed.”
Bubba bounced down toward the bottom of the bed and I slipped out from beneath the covers. I took a quick shower and dressed. Jeans and a halter top would work. The halter had a built-in bra, which helped. I applied my makeup, taking more care than usual, and then slipped on a pair of sandals. As I brushed my hair back into a ponytail, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Zara was hiding something.
Kelson was in the dining room, clearing away my guests’ breakfast. She rolled her eyes as I greeted her, and nodded toward the kitchen.
“I know,” I mouthed. Aloud, I said, “So, when are Delia’s relatives due to check in?”
“By two p.m. today. I’ll make certain their rooms are all spiffied up.”
“Thanks. Breakfast?” Aegis and I had stayed up talking till three, so I doubted that he had time to make any of his other yummy treats, but I was in for a pleasant surprise.
“Aegis made lemon-poppy seed muffins, and he also whipped up a lasagna for dinner tonight. I can just pop it in the oven for an hour. He made two, actually, in case you have any guests over.” She smiled, wiping her hands on her apron as she set the dishes in the sink.
Zara was listening, of course, and didn’t waste a moment in speaking up. “You let your boyfriend—your vampire boyfriend—cook? You know, that wouldn’t have won me any points with your father, expecting him to slave over the stove—”
I tried to count to ten, but I only managed to reach seven before I exploded.
“Mother, Aegis loves mysteries and kittens and he even knows how to knit. He considers baking an art and he loves to cook for me and our guests. So yes, I let him cook because it’s something he takes great pleasure in. And you and I both know that cooking is a skill that’s not in my wheelhouse. I’m talented in other ways, so I contribute to the bed-and-breakfast in the ways I’m best suited. We certainly don’t keep score, and we don’t play gender-role games. Honestly, you’d think you would have evolved with the times.”
Zara let out a sigh. “All right. All right. You and Sandy never did want to settle down. So is she still dating the entire rugby team?”
Again, I let loose.
“You are talking about my best friend. Sandy runs a very successful chain of restaurants. She serves on more charity boards than I can remember. And currently, she’s dating a fashion mogul who loves her dearly. It’s serious. I think they may even end up engaged.”
I rested my hands on the counter, closing my eyes. Every time. The woman got to me every single freaking time we talked. I counted to ten, this time successfully, and evened out my voice. “Now, would you care for some coffee?”
My diatribe seemed to have bounced off like water on a duck’s back. She brightened up and nodded. “Yes, thank you. And I’m truly glad to hear that Cassandra is doing so well. So, where are you taking me today?”
I couldn’t help but wonder if the woman was deaf. Had she completely missed the fact that I had just tore her a new one at least three times already this morning? But then, Zara had always been good at selective hearing. It was one of her many qualities that I found less than charming.
I motioned for Kelson to move. She had been about to pull the espresso.
“I’ll do it,” I muttered. “You go ahead and get started on your work for the day.”
“Thanks,” she said, glancing beyond me to my mother. Then, in a very soft voice, she said, “Good luck.”
“Thanks, I’m going to need it.” I made my latte, a quint-shot. I was going to need plenty of caffeine to jumpstart my morning. “What do you want, Mother? Black coffee? A mocha? Latte?”
“So you can make coffee, even if you can’t—” She stopped in midsentence. “I’ll have a double-shot mocha, thank you.”
I made the mocha, focusing on each step of the task to keep my mind off the day looming ahead of me. Finally, I carried her cup and a plate of Aegis’s lemon-poppy seed muffins over to the table. I retrieved my iced latte and sat down.
We sipped our drinks in silence, and then she tried one of the muffins. “This is really quite tasty. He’s an excellent baker.”
I let out a soft sigh. At least she was conceding something good about him.
“Aegis makes everything from scratch. He doesn’t believe in using a mix unless there’s no choice. I’ll introduce you tonight, if you promise to be nice to him. I won’t have you acting out just because he’s a vampire. That’s not something he had any control over.”
“Yes, I’m aware of how it works, dear.” She paused again as I opened my mouth. I closed it softly and she added, “I’ll be polite, I promise.”
I finished two muffins and a hard boiled egg that was left over from the breakfast buffet, then drained the rest of my latte. “Ready when you are,” I said.
“I’m finished. Thank you for breakfast. It was lovely.”
Feeling surreal—it felt like I was escorting a guest rather than a blood relation—I led Zara out to my SUV, giving her a tour of the yard first.
“We have three acres, though most of it’s still pretty wild. I thought I’d create a ritual grove farther back, and also maybe a pond. I’d like to make a butterfly sanctuary. Bees too, and dragonflies.”
“I think that’s a wonderful idea. So, you and…Aegis? Am I pronouncing his name correctly?”
“Actually, no. It’s Ay-jes. Not Ee-gis.”
“Oh, all right. Did Aegis and you buy this together?” She shaded her eyes, staring at the tangle of woods behind the inn.
“No, I bought it. He works with me. Though he has sunk some of his own money into the renovations, he refuses to take a share of the profits. He said he doesn’t want me to feel the need to consult with him over my plans for the land and the house.”
Zara gave me a quick look, and I sensed some sort of disapproval in her eyes, but she just nodded. As we fastened our seatbelts, I decided we might as well start with a drive around the island. “How about I take you out on Rosewood Road? It encircles the island. It will take us a two or three hours to drive around it, but you’ll get to see all sides.”
“I’d love to see the island, but can we start with the town first? I want to understand your passion for Bedlam, Maudlin.”
That was uncharacteristic. I shrugged. “We can do whatever you like. All right, we’ll go downtown.” Dreading spending the morning shopping with her, I stuffed down my resentment and we headed for the center of town.
BEDLAM WAS A bustling town, even at nine-thirty in the morning. I found a place to park in JD’s garage, which was really just a large parking lot with an awning to keep the sun and rain off the cars, and we crossed the street. We were on Apple Drive, one of the main cross streets in the downtown area, and we wandered among the shops. The bookstore, Nandi’s Books, was a mixture of modern and old fashioned. In addition to a quaint cafe, Nandi also had a large new- and used-book section, and then a computer bank where you could order any e-book online. Nandi was a retired teacher from Neverfall, who was following her other passion in life—books. She had even written a couple textbooks used in the academy.
“Hey, Nandi—is my book in yet?” I had ordered a rare copy of a hard-to-find spellbook from the Black Forest.
The gray-haired witch grinned at me. She was wearing a similar outfit to mine, only the jeans were loose fit, and the top was pink instead of blue. “You’ve asked that for three weeks straight and what do I tell you each time?”
I rolled my eyes. “To have patience and wait.”
“Yes, and you know why?”
“Because it will make me a better witch?” I grinned at her.
“Yes, and it will also make it more fun for me when I can tell you—the book just arrived this morning!” She beamed, pulling a large, wrapped package out from beneath the counter. The book was huge, the size of the top of a small end table, and it was handwritten. That’s one of the things that made copies of this work so rare and expensive—nobody was able to reproduce it with any technology. Like vampires, the pages refused to photograph. And when anybody got it into their head to photocopy it by hand, the machines would break down. Or the copies would come out blank.
“Thank you!” I pulled out my credit card. “How much do I owe you?”
“You put four hundred down, so that’s another four hundred today. Plus tax. Can’t stiff the government.” She added up my receipt and I wrote out the check.
“It’s worth it. Some of those spells are pure gold, I gather.”
“Can you read German, though? They don’t make any translations,” Nandi asked.
Zara interrupted. “She certainly can. Well, at least at a rudimentary level. I made certain she was schooled in Latin, German, and Romanian when she was a child.”
I cringed. How could I tell my mother, who sounded so proud, that I could barely remember a word of the latter two, and my Latin wasn’t in much better shape?
Nandi eyed Zara. “So you’re Maudlin’s mother? Well, I don’t mind telling you she does the village of Bedlam proud. We love having her for our High Priestess. I’ve never seen anybody lead rituals the way she does.”
I wasn’t sure if that was a compliment, but I decided to take it that way. And it certainly seemed to impress my mother.
“You didn’t tell me you’re High Priestess now. Of the Moonrise Coven?” At least she remembered the name of it.
I nodded. “Yes, long story, but I took over in December. Well, thank you, Nandi.”
“Not a problem, child. I appreciate the business.” She waved us out and went back to dusting the shelves as we exited the shop.
We dropped in at the French Pair—a lingerie shop that specialized in bras for women of my build—and then moseyed over to a boutique that sold trinkets and souvenirs. Zara was a fiend for touristy stuff, and she had an entire room devoted to items she had gathered on her trips around the world. I wasn’t sure whether she even knew what she had by now, but it seemed to bring her comfort.
We bought ice cream at Shafer’s Sweets. As we stopped in Turnwheel Park, choosing to sit at one of the picnic tables while watching children play in the playground area, Zara finished her cone and then turned to me.
“I made this trip for other reasons than just to say hello. I know you aren’t thrilled to see me, Maudlin. You think I’m a nosey, meddling woman, and you’re not wrong there. I also know you’re still angry at me for driving away your father. But you don’t know the whole story about my marriage to him.”
She paused. I could sense this was building up to something, so I kept my mouth shut and listened. My stomach twisted and I had the feeling that whatever she was about to tell me, it wasn’t good.
“It smells so fresh here. The trees are different than anything back home. And the land…it’s so vibrant. I see why you love it. Energy feels freer. More alive.” She wiped her hands on a handkerchief and tucked it back in her pocket. “Honestly, when did I get so old?”
It sounded like an honest question, not a rhetorical one.
“You aren’t old, Mother. You really aren’t. You’re what…two hundred years older than me? That’s not old, not in our line.” I wasn’t exactly telling the truth—it was definitely easing past middle-aged for some magical families, but Zara still had a long ways to go before she could be considered elderly.
“Well, that’s true and…it’s not.” Zara stared at the ground for a moment, then brought her gaze up to meet mine. “Maudlin, I’m sick. I have Winter Syndrome.”
Everything hung very still for a moment. I stared at her, searching her face to see if this was another ploy, but she had never looked so serious.
Winter Syndrome was a serious illness among witches. It was also extremely rare and damned near incurable. Once a witch contracted the condition, their ability to work magic fritzed out, backing up the energy in the body. This overloaded the nerves and brain, eventually causing massive system failure. It was called Winter Syndrome because it almost always affected witches who were over five hundred, and it was almost always fatal. There were several treatments, but they only worked about ten percent of the time.
“You…are you sure?” A number of ailments could be misdiagnosed as Winter Syndrome. “You didn’t go to that old geezer you always go to, did you?” Dr. Markus was stuck in the last century and refused to listen to anything that might be contrary his opinion. He had ushered more than one patient into the grave because of his carelessness.
“After I talked to Dr. Markus, I decided I needed another opinion. So I saw two other top-notch doctors. They both agreed. It’s Winter Syndrome, all right.” She pressed her lips together, staring at a nearby tree.
I fumbled for words. As much as Zara and I sparred, I had never wished her ill. Not like this. I started to take her hand but stopped. That wasn’t us. Not yet, at least.
“Have you tried the treatments?”
“One. It almost took but then my body shook it off. There are two others that my doctors are going to try. But they told me to get my affairs in order because the chances are grim. I’m not expecting much. I don’t want to die, but if it’s going to happen, then I want to be prepared.” She shuddered, looking strained.
“When did you find out?”
“About six weeks ago. Wouldn’t you know it, this is the one time Dr. Markus was actually right. As I said, I went for a second opinion, and then a third. Both doctors confirmed it. They tried the first treatment on me two weeks ago. It only took three days for my body to reject it. So I decided that I’d better come see you while I still can. You see, I’ve done…there are…I want to make certain I don’t leave this world with unfinished business. I don’t want to hang around once I’m gone.” She attempted a smile.
I forced myself to return it. “Yeah, tell me about it. I’ve got a ghost stuck in the house and I can’t seem to set her free.” We sat in silence for a few moments before I asked, “So, when do you try the other treatments?”
“That’s another reason I came over to the US. I’m meeting up with an alchemist in Ohio next week. He developed the other treatments. We should know within a couple of days if it works. If not, I’ll fly back home and make arrangements.” She heaved a sigh. “So, Maudlin…Maddy…I’ve come to make peace. If that’s even possible.”
My emotions were racing. On one hand, I wasn’t about to deny her the peace of mind she was seeking, but on the other hand, it just seemed wrong to sweep everything under the bridge and pretend like nothing had happened.
“I need answers.”
“Ask away.” Zara shifted on the bench to face me. “Ask me anything and I’ll give you the best answer I can.”
I decided to start with the unicorn in the room. “Why did you chase off Father? You were so mean to him. Cruel, actually.”
Her smile cracked just a little. “Yes, I was. But Maddy, you don’t know what my life was like before you came along. How could you? I never told you about it.”
“Tell me now, then. Help me understand.”
Zara let out a long sigh. “Before your father, I fell in love with a bard. His name was Dmitri, and he was Italian. He was dashing and mysterious, a real heartbreaker. Your grandmother hated him because she didn’t trust that he’d stick around. So she refused to let us see each other. Well, I managed to circumnavigate her and was dating him on the sly. And then, I got pregnant.”
Uh oh. Knowing my grandmother, I could imagine the hell that went down when she found out. “What happened?”
“Your grandmother was right. Dmitri ran off, leaving me pregnant. Mother forced me to stay with relatives in a different village. When I had the baby, a boy, she gave him to another family. I was sent home and she watched me like a hawk.”
“I have a brother?”
Zara nodded. “My mother married me off to the first suitable match she could find. That’s where your father came in. He was a good man, he never hit me or hurt me. But I didn’t love him, and I resented the fact that I couldn’t keep my child. What’s worse, when I told your father about my son, he said, ‘Well, at least that’s in the past and we don’t have to worry about it.’ He shrugged off my child, calling him water under the bridge. Your father knew how much I was hurting.”
I stared at her, all my illusions crashing to the ground. “How horrible. But…I have a brother? Is he still alive?”
“Yes, you do. He’s your half-brother, but yes, he’s still alive. I tried to keep tabs on him from a distance. I’ve never contacted him. The family who brought him up is a good family. They loved him and I didn’t want to intrude.” Zara hung her head. “I was so angry, at your grandmother and your father. And when you came along, they both made such a big deal about you. I felt like…”
“Like they were betraying my brother.” A hell of a lot began to fall into place. “And loving me would be…a betrayal.”
“Yes. So you see, I never wanted to marry your father. He proved himself to be a steady man who occasionally took risks, but they weren’t smart risks. The day he got hurt by the dogs? He was drunk. I begged him not to go out hunting until he sobered up, but he wouldn’t listen.”
That was news. I never knew about any of this. “So…”
“So the accident wouldn’t have happened if he had been alert. He could have escaped.”
It was my turn to stare at the ground.
“You see, I put up with a lot. I married a man I liked, but didn’t love. I lost the man of my heart. I lost my first child. Both your grandmother and your father pretended my son was never even born. Then, when your father got hurt, it was the last straw. I did drive him away, I admit it. But it wasn’t out of sheer cruelty. I was just fed up with everything. While I loved you, every day, I was reminded that my firstborn was a taboo subject.”
I let out a long breath. All these years I had thought my mother was just a bitch, when in fact she had been nursing a deep, dark wound. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“I was afraid that you’d think I didn’t love you. And I do. I know I’ve nitpicked so many things over the years. I suppose that I felt that by loving you—and showing it—I was denying my son.” She looked up at me, her eyes wet.
It wasn’t a stab in the heart, but it felt that way. My very existence had brought home her other loss. It wasn’t my fault, it wasn’t hers, but it still had hurt both of us.
“All these years and Granny never said a word.”
In fact, I hadn’t seen Granny since around 1900, when I went to visit her. She still sent me letters once every month like clockwork, and she expected an answer. Now, we used email, which was easier. I realized that I was almost overdue on one, actually. She had loved me, taught me my magic, but now I felt as betrayed by her as I imagined my mother felt.
“She never told me I had a brother.”
“No,” Zara said, her voice barely above a whisper. “She never once mentioned him after I came home from my great-aunt’s house. She warned me that the matter was over and done. That’s all he was to her—a ‘situation’ that had been taken care of. You loved her so much, how could I break your illusions? And you loved your father. But now, I’m facing the end. I thought you should know the truth.”
I stared at her. “I’m glad you did. I’m glad you told me.” I paused. “Does Granny know you’ve got Winter Syndrome?”
“No, and don’t you tell her. Not yet. I’m going to wait till I know if the other treatments work.” Zara hung her head. “Your grandmother has always been disappointed in me. She adores you, and always has. But I was a disappointment. I never took to magic like you did. I learned the basics and that was enough for me. When I got pregnant, that capped her opinion of me. Nothing I could ever do would make up for disgracing her like that.”
I glanced around the park. Mothers were playing with their children, and a few people were walking their dogs. The morning was sunny, and everything seemed so normal. But within the space of ten minutes, I suddenly had a brother somewhere, and Zara had turned out to be a heartbroken woman rather than the shallow bitch I had always thought she was.
I said the only thing I could.
“Please, don’t feel like you are betraying my brother by talking to me. You can talk about him. Granny never should have made you give him up.” I finally felt free to take her hand in mine, and I squeezed it, leaning in for a shy kiss on her cheek.
Zara swallowed hard, then nodded. “Thank you. I just wanted you to know.”
“Do you know his name?”
“Yes. It’s Gregory Oakstone. I have his address. I’ll give it to you, but I have to ask you one thing. Promise me you won’t contact him until…”
I froze. “Does that mean, even after all these years, you aren’t going to meet him? Mother, you have to. Especially after what you’ve told me. You owe it to yourself. You owe it to him.”
She smiled, then—one of the first truly genuine smiles I had ever seen from her. “Oh, Maddy, you’re so sure of that, aren’t you? If the treatments work, then I will contact him and you can come with me if you like. But if they don’t…what favor would I be doing by contacting him? Guess what, I’m your mother and after four hundred years I’ve decided to say hello. By the way, I’m dying. That, I feel, would be crueler than letting you tell him about me. Because I know you, my daughter. I know you’ll contact him.”
I wasn’t convinced, but it was her decision to make and right now I didn’t have the energy to argue. “All right. I promise. If the treatments work, we’ll go meet him together. If not, then…I’ll tell him about you.” As the promise came out of my lips, I felt it seal into a witch’s oath. I had bound myself to the words. When a witch made a promise that was entrenched in her heart, there was no way to undo the oath. She was bound to it.
“Very good. Then I can rest easy and enjoy the remainder of my visit with you.” Zara brightened, and it seemed as though a heavy weight had shifted off her shoulders. “Bedlam is a lovely town. I might fancy living here, if I were given the chance.”
“Wait till I show you the shores. It’s so pretty down by the beach.” I paused. “When do you leave for Ohio?”
“I think on Thursday. I have an appointment with him Monday for the treatments, but I should give myself time to prepare. He wants me to fast for three days before and I don’t want to be traveling during that time.” She paused. “Will you be glad to see me go? To Ohio, I mean.”
I shook my head. “Before we talked, I might have said yes. I would have said yes. But now that I know the story, I feel like there’s so much we need to catch up on. Secrets aren’t always a good thing.” I felt suddenly that I had never known my mother. Now, I wanted time to see her in this new light. I wanted to help her find the side of herself she had buried under Granny’s expectations.
“Don’t blame your grandmother. I do, but you shouldn’t. She was brought up differently. She didn’t want me to be labeled a slut. Even though our magical lineage wouldn’t hold me guilty for bearing a child out of wedlock, the villagers—those who didn’t know about us—would have treated me like a harlot. It would have made our ability to hide from the witch hunters even harder, because there would have been talk about me.” She squeezed my hand. “Anyway, even if the treatments don’t work, I’m glad we’ve talked.”
Still holding her hand, I stood and motioned to the car. “Come on. We’ll drive around the island like we were going to. I want to show you everything I can.”
On the way back to the parking lot we talked about the shops and how wonderful it was that Otherkin could be out in public now, rather than hide like we had all had to back when I was young. But all the way back to the car, my mind wouldn’t stop churning with everything I had learned. After all these years, Mother and I had managed to find common ground. Now, it looked like I was going to lose her. And I realized I wasn’t ready for that.