Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 67614 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 338(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67614 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 338(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
I haven’t been back here in more than five months, not since the day after everything went down. My family and friends were kind enough to pack everything I needed and bring it to me.
I left the rest behind.
When I open the door, the air rushes out and over me.
Through me.
“Well, that was creepy,” I mutter as I walk inside, immediately beginning a protection spell. “Only love and light are welcome here. Only that which serves us in our highest good may stay.”
I continue saying it over and over as I wander through the house.
“I need my sewing basket,” I say to Giles. “It’s over there by the chair in the living room.”
“Got it.” His eyes never stop moving over the space. It’s as if he’s staying alert in case something tries to jump out and get us.
I point out a few more things I want to be sure to take with me, and then we move to the guest room where the loom is.
“Did you just see a shadow move across the hallway?” I ask as I stop in my tracks.
“We won’t speak of it,” he says, his voice low. “Let’s get the fucking loom and get out of here.”
“Okay.” I open the guest room door, but the loom isn’t in the corner where I left it. “It’s been sitting right over there for years, Giles. It was handed down in my family for generations.”
“Maybe you moved it to the attic to make room for something else in here?”
“I hate the attic. It’s cobwebby and dark and just…no.”
“Let’s check anyway.”
“You can check. I’m not climbing that ladder.”
He grins and nudges me with his shoulder. “Okay, I’ll climb.”
With the ladder pulled down from the ceiling, Giles climbs it until his head and shoulders disappear, then he turns on his phone’s flashlight.
“You’re right. There’s not much up here except spiders.”
I scrunch up my nose and shiver. “Ew.”
“I’m coming down.”
He pushes the ladder back into the ceiling and sighs.
“Maybe my mom came to get it,” I say, thinking it over. “I’ll call her.”
But when I pull my phone out of my pocket, the battery is dead.
“How is that possible? It was full when we left.”
“Lots of energy in this house,” he intones softly, his eyes saying we won’t discuss this here.
“Let’s just go back to your place. I’ll buy a new loom, I guess.”
But when we walk past the guest room, there it is, in the corner, exactly where it’s been for a long, long time.
“I’ve got it,” Giles says grimly, walking in to pick it up. “Now, let’s get the fuck out of here.”
“I’m with you.”
Once outside, and after I’ve locked up, I turn to Giles and put my hand on his arm.
“You can’t put that in the car until I cleanse it out here first. I won’t take any bad energy home with us.”
He nods and sets the loom on the ground. I place my sewing basket next to it and then take Giles’s hand.
Witches are stronger in numbers.
“Only love and light may stay. Anything not here for our highest good must go away.”
I cast the spell and raise my hands, putting the force of everything I know and the knowledge of my ancestors into the working. I won’t risk Giles’s safety by bringing something sinister into his home.
Suddenly, little sparks fire into the air around my items. Tiny flames dance, burn blue, and then disappear.
The air pulses around us as the wind picks up, seeming to sweep through the items, cleansing them with my words.
Finally, when I’ve finished the spell, the air swirls up and away, leaving us in the stillness with my things once more.
“Holy shit,” Giles says, staring down at me. “You’re one powerful witch, Breena.”
“I have my moments. Come on. I want to get out of here.”
We load the items into my car and immediately drive away. I don’t even look in the rearview mirror, afraid of what I might see.
“No, you won’t be going back there,” Giles says softly.
“Maybe to cleanse it,” I reply. “But never to live. And I’m not nearly as sad about that as I was when we arrived.”
“You need me.” Those are the first words out of my mom’s mouth when I open the door to her the next morning. I can’t help but rush into her arms and hug her close, so relieved to see her.
“I always need you, Mama.”
“I suspect you’re behind in your work, what with everything going on, and I came to help out.”
“You must have been reading my mind.” I close the door behind her and lead her back to the kitchen. “I’m making Beltane candles for our coven celebration in a couple of weeks, and I need to make some extras to sell on my site.”
“I love making candles,” Mama says as she reaches for the apron I offer her. “You always add the best oils.”