Page 41 of Muddled Magic

Dad cast me a worried look, and guilt coursed through me. What had I done to make her scream like that? To make her eyes…

I stifled my own sob as a quarrel broke out among the coven women.

All the aunts, and even my weakened mother, had squared off against Grandmother, the men splitting their attention between the women and the shifters they had momentarily forgotten. No one touched the grimoire, still abandoned in the leaves.

“…hadn’t been the deal…”

“…that thing in the hall…”

“…you promised…”

“What else did it take?”

Otter looked sicker than when he’d mistaken yellow stainer mushrooms for field mushrooms, tears tracking down his cheeks. “I’m sorry, Meadow,” he blubbered. “I didn’t remember— I never would’ve suggested you—”

“Enough!” Grandmother trumpeted, the power in her voice knocking her daughters and nieces back at step. “We don’t have time for this.”

I felt something soft brush against my ankle—Sawyer, cowering there. Cursing myself for not checking on him sooner, I scooped him into my arms, and the tabby tomcat burrowed against my chest, hiding his face in the crook of my elbow. His singed fur felt brittle under my stroking fingers, like grass that hadn’t seen rain for an entire summer, and I sent a healing tendril of magic into him. The little cat began to purr, wiggling even closer. Arthur returned to my side, arm brushing against me but not wholly touching. Another fight was clearly imminent, and we would both want room to maneuver.

The coven tensed, waiting for Grandmother to explain, but her jaw was clamped shut. I knew that look. It was the same expression, passed down through the generations of Hawthorne women, of someone not wanting to come clean. The inner debate whether or not to reveal a damning secret, or a lie.

Dread and suspicion vined around my heart at the same time, and while the old Meadow would’ve given Grandmother the benefit of the doubt—she was our faultless matriarch, after all—I stepped forward and said in a soft voice that held no illusions, “It wasn’t a rival coven who cursed the grimoire, was it?”

Misery flashed in Grandmother’s ivy-green eyes, but only for a moment. Grit returned. “I told you, child. You didn’t know what you saw. Know what it meant.”

My whole body trembled, my voice deadly soft but perfectly clear. “Are you telling me I stole that grimoire, ran away from all I knew, and suffered every day under the fear of discovery, of being hunted down like an animal, of that parasite deciding it would feed off me next, for no reason?”

The Hawthorne matriarch straightened her spine. “You didn’t see the whole picture. You assumed—”

“I know what I saw! I’ll never be able to unsee it—it’s burned into my brain,” I shouted. “There’s no confusion, no muddled memories. That parasite fed off our family. I saw you offer Stoat to that demon. No one unless they were under a curse would’ve dared use a baby to lure a demon off its hunt!”

“Stoat is alive,” Grandmother cried, exasperated. “He was never in any real danger!”

“Tell that to Buck and Olearia,” Aunt Eranthis muttered. She ducked her head when Grandmother sent her a withering glower.

I could accept Stoat was alive—it was just miraculous enough to be true—but I still fought against what I’d seen the grimoire do to Aunt Hyacinth and Otter. Of what Grandmother had allowed it to do.

“Why did you do it?” Tears burned hot as molten glass as they dripped down my cheeks. My own grandmother, my mentor, the very woman I’d modeled my own life after. “You cursed us. Them, your own family! Why?”

“To protect you!” The reins on her own emotions snapped, and Grandmother stifled a sob. “Always to protect you, Meadow. To hide you.”

I shook my head, tears slinging to the ground, not understanding.

Then Mom’s lecture about the tomato hornworms all those months ago resurfaced in my mind. There might be other forces at work in a situation, so we don’t want to jump to conclusions, especially if something seems strange and repellant at first glance. We must think things through and look at all the facts, right?

Thistle thorns, had I really just assumed I knew the truth of what I’d seen and had put myself, and my family, through all this heartache and turmoil for nothing? Oh my Green Mother, I think I’m going to be sick.

“We took the vow voluntarily,” Mom said quietly. “We all did. Even your brother, Marten.”

I whirled to my brother; the muscle in his jaw feathered before he said quietly, “You always were an insufferable goody-two-shoes, Meadow, but you’re my sister.”

“Though some of us weren’t told the whole story,” Otter growled, darting a hurt look at our grandmother.

“You were,” she replied firmly, “you just don’t remember. We learned early on that the feedings were too traumatic—”

“Because they’re against the natural order of things?” Aunt Hyacinth interrupted pissily. “What an obvious conclusion!”

“—so a second spell was added to compel you to do your duty and a third to make you forget,” Grandmother snapped. “For your own sanity. We couldn’t risk anyone backing out on the vow, for obvious reasons, and attaching it to the grimoire ensured we would protect it with our lives.”

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