Page 61 of Calling Quarters

Almost as if she were waiting to be mentioned, the woman from the photos Hazel showed me materialized on the other side of my father. She wore a kind smile and her purple eyes gazed at me as if I were the most riveting thing she'd ever seen.

“Storie,” she breathed. Pale, feminine hands covered her mouth as her eyes misted with emotion.

I felt a tugging in my belly button and my vision flickered between the Graves cabin and the spirit world. Remy was still deeply concentrating on keeping me tethered on this plane, but the others appeared to be struggling to hold their corners. A drop of blood had run from Enzo's nose and over his lips. Rhyse's complexion was faded and gray.

The connection was severing, and time was running out. They wouldn't be able to keep me here much longer.

When the flickering stopped, I pushed away my emotions about seeing my mother for the first time and focused on the reason I was there.

“I don't have a lot of time,” I rushed out.

My father stepped forward. “We had to cover your birth up somehow. Tabitha Granger had managed to take care of the others without incident. We should have known Rayner wouldn't let you slip through his fingers.”

“I still don't understand what that means. Lunet said you passed five days later.” I looked to my mother, then back at my father. “Why did you lie about her dying in childbirth?”

“Because no one was supposed to know you were born twelve hours after Remington Wildes. We kept you a secret until it was safe.”

“But it wasn't safe…”

“No, it wasn't,” my mother agreed soberly. “Rayner knew the truth and he wanted to use you as a pawn to weaken the Wildes boy. We didn't know how far out of his mind he'd already become by then.”

“So, what exactly happened?”

“He came after you in the same way we feared the Quarters would. They were fighting on opposite sides for the same result: to weaken the future generation of Quarters. Rayner didn't expect me to fight for you as hard as I did. By the time he'd eliminated me as an obstacle, Tabitha found us and stopped him. She wasn't able to save me, though. That has haunted her for years.”

Tabitha was weaved deeper into my past than I ever knew, and she kept it a secret from me all this time, pace feeding information as she saw fit. The monster in my chest was roaring to life again, irritated at the deeply rooted lies and deception. Each time I thought I was on the path to finding answers, I learned that I was being led astray by people who didn't think I was capable of handling it.

Who were they to decide?

“So, Rayner murdered all three of you?”

I felt sick thinking of all the times his beady eyes glared at me, knowing exactly what he'd done. Proud of his duplicity and the lives he took for a cause that was just as malicious as the forces he was supposedly fighting against.

All those Movement members were supporting a monstrous murderer. They were feeding him power when he deserved to rot here in the spirit world, where he'd unapologetically sent his own friends.

“Storie, we know how much this hurts, but you have to know that we're at peace. Our purpose was to protect your life until you found your Quarter, and we've done that,” Aunt Ash assured, looking to my parents for confirmation. They both voiced their agreements, and she went on.

“It's imperative that you don't dwell on your resentment over what he did to us. Don't let it lower your vibrations and bring you down to his level. You're so much more powerful than he is. Use that power to save your coven and town. They need you right now. We'll be here waiting for you when it's time.”

“They aren't my coven,” I corrected waspishly.

“Of course, they are. You're a Counter.”

My vision fluttered to the cabin again. Enzo was slumped face down onto the table beside me in a pool of blood leaking from his nose. Rhyse was swaying in his chair, his eyes stuck at half-mast, and Lux was collapsed onto the floor. Remy's panicked expression tethered me to the cabin before the tugging sensation in my belly button stopped and I knew it was over. They were gone again.

And once again, I didn't even get to say goodbye.

Chapter 34

Remy

Storie's sleeping body was draped across my lap on the couch as Rhyse, Lux, and Enzo lounged on the floor around us. They were too fatigued to make it up the ladder to the loft where our cots were set up. It's been hours since the seance and the three of them were finally regaining their energy.

Energy that they focused strictly on berating me for wasting our one true shot at communicating with our ancestors. I didn't care, though. I'd do it a thousand times over if it meant making the sleeping woman in my lap happy. They'd never understand that.

We would find another way.

I should have known better than to push them when they were already so low. I just assumed it would be easiest on the night when access to the underworld was most available. It seemed as if the moment any of us exerted our power in any way, the looming cloud of black magic that hung over the town syphoned it and used it to grow even stronger. Whoever cast that spell knew exactly what they were doing.

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