Nor’s run after work that day took her far into the interior of the island, around Celestial Lake, past the waterfall, and up into the cliffs that edged the island’s western shore. She paused there, wiping the sweat from her face and catching her breath while she admired the view. Nor never grew tired of it. All choppy gray water and gray skies and no one but an occasional breaching humpback whale as far as the eye could see.
Two tiny sparrows hopped along the branch of a nearby pine tree, fluffing up their feathers in the rain and chirping at each other fondly. Animals, Nor had learned, have their own names for each other. Best translated, they were typically things like Winsome, Persnickety, and Sanctimonious. Of these two, one called himself Vigilant, the other Balderdash.
Out in the water, a pod of orcas moved gracefully through the waves. She could just make out the black splotches of their dorsal fins through the drizzling rain. Their thoughts were content and peaceful, and Nor could feel the quiet of the world below the surface wash over her. She closed her eyes, and she was there with them, gliding through those cold waters. Ribbons of sea kelp anchored to the ocean floor brushed against her belly. Tiny fish darted in and out of view. Nor opened her eyes and sighed.
To Rona and her forebears, being able to communicate with nature had meant being able to sway the movement of the tides; to bring rain to parched lands; and to come to the aid of the whales in the sea, the birds in the sky, and the beasts on the land. On her best days, Nor could sometimes predict the weather. It was nothing compared to what her grandmother could do, and Nor had done all she could to keep it that way. She had as much interest in manipulating a passing rainstorm as she did in trying to control the ever-changing color of Savvy’s hair.
She liked the simplicity of this Burden. She liked knowing that rose bushes could fall in love and that leaves sang as they fell, a lilting sigh synchronous with their slow descent to the ground. Most trees could dream as well; all Nor had to do was observe a forest at dusk to know it was true.
The leaves’ autumn song accompanied Nor as she took the long way home, choosing the trail that curved around the lake instead of Meandering Lane. The rain had stopped, and the air felt cold and crisp in her lungs. Her arms pumping at her sides, Nor tried to push out the image of Madge that kept playing in her head. It scared Nor to think of how she’d wilted to the floor as soon as that book was in her grasp, suddenly transforming into the faded, fragile shell that Fern had left behind years ago. What could her mother accomplish with a multitude of fans like Madge at her service? Fans willing and able to do just about anything to keep Fern happy?
When Nor reached the lake, she paused to stretch and was surprised to find she wasn’t alone. A little ways off the beaten path, she saw a boy with dark hair attempting to skip rocks across the water. With each failed attempt, he grew more and more sullen. He was short — probably a good two or three inches shorter than Nor — but compact and sturdy. With a sinking feeling, she recognized him. It was Gage Coldwater.
The Coldwater family mostly kept to themselves, though Nor had always felt a certain animosity directed at her — specifically from Gage, who’d been in her grade at school. Savvy claimed she was paranoid, but Savvy hadn’t witnessed the fit Gage Coldwater had pitched in seventh grade when he and Nor had been paired for a science project. He’d even stormed out of the room — and received a week’s detention for it — when the teacher refused to reassign partners. It had been humiliating, to say the least.
The Coldwaters supposedly lived up here, though exactly where and for how long, Nor had no idea. All she’d ever seen were hemlock trees and snowberry bushes and black-tailed deer skirting around the trail; she’d never seen so much as a single house, let alone several.
Gage wasn’t alone. A girl with the same dark hair sat beside him on the wet ground. She was chewing her lip, lost in serious contemplation. The girl had what looked like tarot cards spread out on a black cloth in front of her. When it came to tarot, Nor was no expert, but she was impressed; if she didn’t know any better, she would have thought the girl actually knew what she was doing.
“You know the ground’s wet, right?” Gage said to the girl. He lodged another rock at the lake. It landed with a lively plop. He scowled.
The girl — Charlie, Nor thought, suddenly remembering Gage’s cousin’s name — looked up at him and rolled her eyes. “No shit,” she said. “Just shut up for a minute. I’m trying to figure something out.”
“Can you imagine what Dauphine would do to you if she found out what you’re doing?” he snorted. Charlie jumped up and punched him hard in the arm. “Come on. You know I would never tell her!” he said, wincing. “That woman already has it out for us.”
“She has it out for you,” Charlie said, sitting down again. “She likes me. She just thinks I keep bad company.” She looked at Gage. “Any idea who that might be?”
“Not a clue.” He picked up another rock and tossed it into the lake. “You could have at least waited for the sun to come out.”
The girl peered at the spread in front of her. “No, I couldn’t,” she said. “I need to do this now and I’m struggling with how to interpret this reading. You know that body they found on Halcyon Island last week?”
“What about it?”
“I don’t know. Something about it just seems . . . strange.”
Gage leaned over her shoulder and pretended to study the cards. “I don’t know if this is helpful, but I’m pretty sure this card means that you’re full of shit.” He laughed. “Come on. It’s an abandoned island in the middle of nowhere! They probably thought, hey, here’s my chance to die in peace. What’s so strange about that? I actually envy that person right now.”
Charlie ignored him. She looked at the book she had open in her lap and then back down at the cards. “That it’s an abandoned island in the middle of nowhere is exactly my point. I have this feeling that —” She stopped midsentence, closed the book with a snap, and swept her hand across the cards to scramble them. She’d spotted Nor, and soon after, so did Gage.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Gage asked, glaring at her. Charlie rushed to gather up her things, then wrapped the black cloth around the deck. As she hurried past Nor, she didn’t notice one of her cards flutter to the wet ground.
Ignoring the sour look Gage was giving her, Nor picked up the card. On it was a picture of two people falling from a tower atop a rocky cliff. There was a lightning bolt in the sky and flames shooting from the tower windows. It gave Nor an unsettled feeling. Charlie took it from her, and the two left without another word. Nor finished her run wondering what it was Charlie Coldwater thought she had seen in those cards.
Nor cut across Red Poppy Road and hopped the fence into the fields where Harper and Kaleema let their alpacas out to pasture. Alpacas hummed when happy, a cheery ascending noise that sounded a bit like a kazoo, and it was a herd of buzzing alpacas that was soon escorting Nor the rest of the way home. The Blackburn home loomed ahead, a dark shadow against a fading sky. It was as imposing as a fortress. Much like her grandmother.
Nor tried to imagine the best way to tell Judd about her mother’s reappearance, about her book. She should probably tell her right away. Just get straight to the point, as Judd was always telling her. As if speaking with a woman known as the Giantess was ever easy.
I’ll find a way to tell Apothia instead, Nor decided. Nor’s grandmother and her partner, Apothia, had been together since before Nor was born. Better to let Apothia figure out how to tell Judd than her. Because what would she say? Her mother was doing the unthinkable and selling spells that hadn’t been cast for generations — spells for success, good luck, beauty, revenge.
Like an ancient relic from the Old World, Rona’s spells and the diary she’d recorded them in were kept only for their sentimental value, as a link between themselves and their matriarch, a reminder of times that once were and never would be again. From what Nor had been told, the last Blackburn daughter capable of casting spells was Rona herself.
The dogs met Nor at the fence. Antiquity flung her giant front paws over the top of the gate and cast a disparaging look at Nor through a thick gray forelock. The little dog poked his nose at her through the lower slats of the fence. Quite the contrast of the larger dog, Bijou, as he called himself, was a happy little thing who always dreamed of sunshine and fireplaces. It made sense. Antiquity had been alive for going on nine generations now, but Bijou could still be considered a puppy and was about as ordinary as they came. Not that Nor would ever suggest such a thing.
Nor coaxed Antiquity down from the gate and followed the two dogs onto a path of river rocks that led to the Tower. In the light of the setting sun, the stones glowed like the embers of a dying bonfire.
The path spanned the length of the few acres of Rona’s original one hundred and eighty that they still held in the Blackburn name and connected the Tower with the little white dance studio that sat at the very edge of the property.
Visiting Apothia in her studio had been a favorite pastime of Nor’s as a small child. She’d browsed through closets filled with traditional silk cheongsams and several tutus, salvaged from Apothia’s days dancing with the San Francisco Ballet. Some afternoons, they had sat together on the porch in wicker chairs too frail to withstand Judd’s size and drank tea from a tea set hand-painted with cherry blossoms too delicate for Judd’s rough grasp. For hours, Nor would ramble on in the way that neglected children do, soaking up all the attention and eating countless tiny chocolates wrapped in brightly colored wrappings until she was so full of both she could burst.
Once inside the Tower, Nor found a kettle sitting in the kitchen’s great copper sink, water spilling over the sides. She turned off the faucet, careful not to look at the blank space on the wall over the sink.
A large assortment of knives — all different sizes for different purposes — had once hung there. Each knife was so sharp you could slice your hand without feeling a thing. The only proof of injury would have been the red blossom blooming fast in your palm. It had been over a year since Apothia had locked up the knives. Though Nor insisted the precaution was no longer necessary, locked up was where they remained.
Apothia was exactly where Nor had thought she’d find her, leaning over a wok on the stove, the heat from the steam creating a rosy glow in her papery cheeks. With her short gray hair styled into a puffy pompadour, it was hard to accept that Apothia Wu was almost seventy years old. She still had the poise of the dancer she had been years ago; Nor almost expected to look down and see a pair of pointe shoes on her feet.
Nor took a peek inside the wok and breathed in the aroma of a bubbling hot pot. Judging by the amount of red and green chilies and Szechuan peppercorns amid the tofu and ginger on the cutting board, it was going to be a spicy one. Nor’s eyes watered just thinking about it.
Apothia swatted Nor away from the stove. “You shouldn’t have gone running in this rainstorm,” Apothia scolded her. “You look pale.”
“You always say that,” Nor murmured. It could be ninety degrees outside and Apothia would still claim that Nor looked pale, as if it were Nor’s fault that she had a complexion that stubbornly remained a light fawn color even in the middle of the summer.
Nor’s great-grandmother Astrid had constructed the Tower around the remains of Rona’s original cedar house, which meant as Nor passed through the kitchen, her feet padded along the same places Rona’s once had. Nor imagined she could still hear her great skirts sweeping the floors as she walked. She wouldn’t have been surprised if, on turning her head, she found herself staring into that eerie violet glass eye.
Judd sat at the dining room table with Antiquity now curled at her colossal feet. She had her back turned to Nor, and for a moment, Nor watched the smoke from her rosewood pipe wind its wispy way up toward the ceiling and then fade away entirely.
Though Judd was a healer, one didn’t ask Judd to cure a broken heart or a bout of winter malaise; her specialty was physical pain. Some pain did not want to be healed; it had to be convinced, compelled, coerced into submission. Some pain gathered on Judd’s hands, clinging to her fingers like sticky threads of spiderweb silk. Some pain was drawn out as shards of ice that shattered when removed. Some pain was made of heavy, dense pebbles that filled Judd’s massive hands; still other pain blistered her palms, with red seeping wounds that Apothia covered with bandages and thick salve. It was a grueling Burden. And though it was true that few people knew how Judd healed, for those she helped, it was simply enough that she did.
Like most everyone who had come into contact with the Giantess, Nor loved and feared her grandmother. She was mountainous and intimidating, but there was a kindness in her scowl, a gentleness in those large hands.
Judd turned, and the chair beneath her groaned. Her long silver hair, loosely plaited, was wrapped around her head like a crown. It was the work of Apothia’s quick fingers; Judd’s were much too large for such deftness and too damaged, mangled by thick scar tissue running from thumb to forefinger, the result of so many healings. Tonight those hands were holding a copy of Fern’s book, The Price Guide to the Occult. Judd tossed the book onto the table with a loud smack as Nor sank into the chair across from her.
“When did you find out?” Nor asked.
“Just today,” Apothia answered for Judd, coming in to set a little cast-iron pot in front of Nor. She furiously rubbed Nor’s wet and unruly hair with a towel until Nor swatted her away.
“Eat something,” Apothia ordered before disappearing back into the kitchen.
Nor took the tiniest bite of tofu and bean sprouts before she pushed the bowl away and picked up the book. She recognized spells in Fern’s book as their family spells — each and every one with a price attached to it. There was the Weather Jinx, the Spell of Misfortune, Fire Scrying, and the Hex of Guilt, known to bring about hallucinations thanks to a helpful handful of those deceitfully pretty belladonna blooms. But there were other enchantments listed in Fern’s guide that Nor didn’t recognize. Something called Void of Reason claimed to grant the power of mind control, and the Revulsion Curse was supposed to suppress your appetite.
Nor closed the book. She’d been counting on the fact that the art of incantations and spell work had disappeared with Rona Blackburn upon her death in 1907. But looking at them here, Nor was suddenly beginning to have her doubts that that was true. Dread filled her stomach. Her mind filled with images she’d rather forget. The charred black of burned skin. Pools of blood. “What’s going to happen if she can actually cast these?” she heard herself ask.
“Nothing good, that’s for damn sure,” Judd replied, peering out at Nor behind a haze of smoke. “She’d have to commit some pretty terrible acts to perform magic that’s got nothing to do with her own Burden. And something just as terrible is bound to happen because of it.”
She was right. For Fern to practice magic outside her naturally bestowed Burden would require a sacrifice, the kind that caused great anguish. The kind of pain that Nor knew her mother would inflict on another without hesitation. It was likely she would find it quite entertaining, amusing even.
Nor nervously ran her fingers along the inside of her arm; even through the fabric, she could feel the thin keloids of scars there. “So what the hell do we do?” she muttered.
“Not too much to do, girlie,” Judd answered. “Not right this second at least.” She stood, shoved her feet into a pair of giant-size boots, and reached for her rain jacket. Antiquity pulled herself slowly from the floor, shaking the stiffness out of her arthritic joints. “Especially since I promised Harper Forgette I’d see what I could do about that cough of hers tonight.”
The Giantess and the wolfhound disappeared into the darkened yard. Nor flipped on the light switch beside the door. Behind her, she could hear the sounds of running water and Apothia humming to herself quietly in the kitchen.
Nor stared out at the trees, now illuminated by the triangle of light pouring from the porch light. Silently, she counted the lines of raised scars that marred her wrists and the crook of her elbows. She counted them until her hair no longer hung wet from the rain, until she no longer felt like she was choking on the pounding heart lodged in her throat.
It took a force of nature to drive pain away. And as Nor finally turned away from the door, she reminded herself that, while she may not have been such a force, her grandmother most definitely was.