Page 7 of Calling Quarters

My eyes snapped to her, and she clamped her lips shut, clearly realizing she'd said too much. “The Movement?”

The memory from that day was faded and distant, but I recalled hearing him mention something about a movement to Ash.

The door closed behind Rayner, and it was like my lungs could fill with air again. After years of constantly dreaming of the man who had turned my life upside-down, being so near to him sucked all the breath out of me.

Blaire swatted her hand between us in an attempt to downplay her statement. “It's nothing. More of an idea than anything with substance. I'm not even sure you could call it that. It's kind of just a rumor, really…” she rambled.

“Blaire,” I cut in, leveling her with a desperate look. Her liquid green eyes fell to the table. “Please… you can tell me. I need to know.”

“I really don't know much about it. No one bothers including us in any of it. We're kind of the outcasts, you know? Being the town's midwives, they blame us a little.”

When she noticed my confused expression, she shook her head and paused, glancing around to make sure no one was listening. “We can't talk about it here,” she finally whispered.

I couldn't argue with that. I really didn't want anyone knowing that I was digging into Rayner's business, or that I might suspect him of taking part in my parents’ or Aunt Ash's deaths. It was probably best if we had this conversation in private.

The thought occurred to me that Blaire might end up feeding me lies. Distrust seemed to spread through this town like a cancer, and I'll admit it had infected me a tiny bit. But once again, my gut told me Blaire was an ally. She was terribly naive about most things and didn't take social cues very well, but I realized I really liked spending time with her. The more she spoke, the more genuine she felt, and it was nice to know there was at least one person who I could somewhat believe in.

Chapter 5

Storie

“Ishouldn’t even be talking about this to someone outside of the coven,” Blaire groaned, shoving a throw pillow into her face to hide.

“My parents were a part of Watchtower, weren’t they? Doesn’t that make me an honorary member?”

Blaire’s eyes appeared above the pillow and glared. “No.”

“Come on, Blaire. This is important. I’m asking as a new friend.”

She sighed, and I knew I had her then. Blaire was desperately deprived of friendship. I’m not sure why, but people in this town seemed to walk in the other direction whenever she came near. Sure, she was quirky, but everyone had their tribe who accepted them no matter what. Everyone except her. She mentioned something about being left out because her family were the town’s midwives, but that didn’t make any sense.

Either way, she needed companionship and I needed answers. I liked being around her and we were basically fast friends at this point. It’s not like I was being too dishonest.

“Every coven has a hierarchy, right?” she looked to me for confirmation, and I just shrugged cluelessly.

“Sure.”

“Well, Watchtower has kind of a unique system. Most covens have to call the four elements into their sacred space for protection and guidance. They address each direction and element and invite them in. It's a ceremony of calling the quarters. Watchtower is unique in that we're such an ancient coven, we've been given our own set of Quarters by the gods. It's a role that's been passed down through those four families for generations. Do you follow?”

I nodded.

“Okay, the story goes that in order to keep a balance, the universe creates an opposite for each Quarter—a counterpart,” she held her hands together into a circle and then separated them in two halves. “Counters are born exactly twelve hours after the Quarter on a new moon and are rumored to be the only people that can take the Quarter’s powers away from him. Quarters are trained from the moment they can walk to hunt and kill their Counters, so they can keep their powers and continue to serve the coven.”

She took a deep breath and smiled sheepishly. “See, it sounds insane.”

She was right. None of that seemed realistic. It was like she was repeating a fairytale she'd heard before being tucked into bed every night. As if she knew the story and hadn't believed in it. But an isolated town full of witches and magic once sounded like a fairytale to me too, yet here I was.

I had so many questions. “How do they know who the Counter is?” was the one I landed on first.

Blaire shrugged her shoulders. “They used to track who was born within the twelve-hour period of a Quarter and kill the babe before it could grow up and become a threat.”

I looked at her with my lip curled in pure disgust. “They killed babies just for being born at the wrong time?”

“Yeah,” she stated and nodded quickly, stuffing popcorn into her mouth, muffling her words, “until parents began hiding their children's births from the coven. The Quarters are savages. No one really goes near them if they can help it.”

She swallowed a large chunk of her popcorn and went on. “The women in my family have always been the town's midwives, so they're usually the one's relied upon to keep track of births. But women were afraid to admit they were in labor at the same time as a Quarter mother. They'd birth their children without assistance and hide them until the new moon was over. A lot of times, the mothers would die before then due to lack of medical attention.”

“That's horrible,” I whisper, my thoughts lingering on my own mother.

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