Page 110 of Big Little Spells

Our mother shakes her head. She seems especially brittle, but she won’t crumble. I doubt she knows how. “These are new ones. For this new beginning.”

I take mine. Emerson and I exchange a look, then open our boxes at the same time. She doesn’t gasp. Neither do I. But it feels like there’s some gasping all the same. Because these amulets aren’t like our old ones—bulky and full of Wilde symbols and crests.

These are much more understated. Much more to our taste, in fact. I instantly wonder if my mother knows this and did it on purpose to celebrate us, or if this is supposed to be a dig. That we’re not worthy of the old ones.

But when I turn it over I see that mine is stamped with the symbol of the Diviner. Emerson’s has the Warrior symbol. This time, Elspeth isn’t waiting for the Joywood to give us a designation. And that can only mean that she believes...we are who we say we are.

I swallow at the lump in my throat.

“I think this whole thing is nothing more than a fool’s errand,” our father says, ruining the moment. “A failure is a failure.”

Charming.

But I am a different person tonight. I can’t grieve my beloved aunt, and I certainly won’t let my father get to me. I don’t need him to believe in me to be worthy of becoming a Diviner. I’m already worthy and bonus, I’ve always been a Diviner. I don’t have anything to prove tonight.

I already know who I am.

Maybe that’s why I do something I haven’t done in ten years. I move forward and give my mother a hug. She’s stiff, no surprise, but I feel her hand on my back for a brief second. Emerson hesitates, but then repeats the process, also giving my mother a hug.

“We’ll be in attendance, of course,” my mother says, and her eyes shine, but she does not let the veneer crack. She’s still Elspeth Wilde. As much herself as ever.

“You’re required to be,” I reply, but gently.

She blinks. She doesn’t turn toward my father, and that feels like a quiet little revolution. Then she smiles, and it almost feels real. “You should go. You don’t want to be late. Would you...” She trails off. “Never mind, I’ll pass my condolences along to Zack myself.”

She shows no emotions. The word condolences seems so cold. But there’s something under all that control. A loss even Elspeth Wilde can’t ignore.

Emerson and I walk back through the hallway and the kitchen, studying our amulets as we go.

“These are not what I expected,” my sister says.

“No.” I look back at the hallway. I can’t see my mother and everything is silent. “Maybe she’s not what we expected either. Maybe that’s the lesson.”

At the side door, we pause. We loop our amulets over our neck. Emerson sucks in a deep breath, then pushes it out before we get to the door. “They won’t make it easy, but we’re ready. I know we are.” She squeezes my hand. So sure. So Emerson.

I am neither of those things. I never have been. But as I think, I never will be, it doesn’t come from a dark place. I’m not supposed to be a clone of my sister. I’m supposed to be me. My grandmother always tried to tell me that.

We’re supposed to balance each other, or none of this works.

And we need it to work.

It has to work, or all of this was for nothing—and I’m not prepared to accept that.

I won’t.

29

OUTSIDE, EVERYONE IS QUIET and subdued. Because someone we all know is dead, and it doesn’t make sense. Witches aren’t immortal, but they live a long time. Hundreds of years on average. I try to think through every single thing anyone ever told me about the weird sickness that slowed Zelda down so much, then confined her to her bed. A sickness so odd that neither medical science nor magic nor some of the most powerful Healers in the world could help her.

I think about Zander vowing to get to the bottom of it, and vow that no matter what happens tonight, we will. We will find a way.

The sun is setting and my cousin’s heart is broken. Ellowyn is holding his hand. My heart is broken too, but it makes me weirdly proud of all of us that we can share this grief the way we shared the joy of Emerson and Jacob’s engagement. The ways we can hurt ourselves, each other—and still find ways to forgive, reach out, and love one another.

Without turning cold and bitter like my father.

It almost makes me as sorry for the Joywood as I felt for my mother back there, because whatever power they have, they don’t have this. They don’t have love. They don’t have loyalty. Not like we do.

Jacob starts walking, and we all follow him. I expect Emerson to launch into one of her rallying-the-troops talks as she walks beside him, but she doesn’t.

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