Page 23 of Spellbound
Even now my grandma still thought she was a witch, and I knew she performed little “rituals,” and so-called “spells,” that she claimed would bring good luck or money or healing—not for herself, but for her friends. She “read” their tarot cards andeven did so-called love spells. It was all part of why my friends considered her to be eccentric. I had, too, to be honest, but I always thought she was relatively harmless. It was even kind of funny sometimes and my friends got a kick out of it. It was fine, I guess, as long as she didn’t try her so-called spells out on me.
As for her son, however, my late father—I was embarrassed to say he had fancied himself some kind of full-blown witch or wizard or whatever. It wasn’t anything I ever discussed.Likeever. It was way too embarrassing. Then again, he had died when I was in the ninth grade, so the subject of him rarely came up anymore. The whole thing was just too weird. It was too much. It was one thing to have a crazy grandma, who fancied that she had witchy “powers,” like all those girls on TikTok, but quite another to have a father who had suffered from a full-blown psychosis.
To be honest, I was afraid they both had a kind of hereditary madness that ran through that entire side of the family. I actually congratulated myself on not having it—at least not yet. I was vigilant about not indulging in recreational drugs at all—I didn’t even like taking the pain pills I took now and planned to get off them as soon as I could, because I was afraid drugs might be some kind of “gateway.”
I banished any kind of thoughts and behaviors that could land me in a mental institution too. For example, I didn’t read about aliens or believe in alternate universes or crazy right wing conspiracy theories or even ghosts. Not really. I never watched all that stuff on television and turned the channel if it came on. I tried to be a practical, logical person. In other words, I was hyper-vigilant that some incipient craziness or eccentricity didn’t one day just show up inside me out of nowhere. Maybe that was why this irritated and infuriated and frightened me so much. I didn’t need any of this shit. To find out that these people my gran had brought me to stay with had the same delusionsas my family had—it was alarming as hell. Maybe I should have known. Rosalyn was grandma’ssister,after all. And now I’d agreed to be here for months with these people.
“What is it you think I’m doing?” Ben asked, standing too close and reaching for me again.
I shoved him away. “I-I think you should probably leave,” I told him. I couldn’t take the chance. “I-I don’t mean to be rude, but I can’t talk about all this. I don’t want to.”
“I’m afraid you’re not in charge here, Ash. And I’m not leaving until I speak to you in an official capacity.” Ben said. His voice had totally changed, and it was harder now.
A sudden anger flared up inside me. “Official? Oh really? I’m sorry, but what the hell? You have no authority over me. I’m trying not to be rude here, but I don’t have to do anything you say.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.”
“Okay, damn it. This is your family’s cottage, so if you won’t leave, then I will.”
I turned toward the porch, intending to just walk out and stop arguing with him. I had no plans after that, because as soon as I got outside, I remembered that my grandma had the damn car!That’s all right. Then I’d fucking walk out of here if I had to. I’d hitchhike to town.
He followed me out to the porch, as I tried to leave, but I didn’t actually go anywhere, because Ben had no intention of letting me. He made a hand gesture, and my knees sagged, and I fell back into him. He put an arm around my waist and turned me back inside. I looked up at him, feeling that lethargy again, and I hated it, but was helpless against it. We went into the kitchen and over to a kitchen chair. The chair scooted politely out for me to sit in it, with no one touching it.Was I hallucinating again?
I sat down, but when I tried to jump back up again to leave, I felt something hit me. It took my breath away for a few seconds. If I could have moved my mouth, I’d have shouted out my shock and rage, because that’s about the time as I felt something clamp down on my muscles, paralyzing them. I have to admit I panicked a little. Okay, a lot, because had they infected me with their craziness? Had they drugged me at breakfast? I was furious, and I put every scrap of anger and frustration into the look I gave him, because I couldn’t say a word. It was like there was a clamp around my throat too. How was he doing this?
Had Ben hypnotized me in some way to make me think I couldn’t move or even speak? I thought he liked me. And had my grandma allowed them to do this to me? A sharp sense of betrayal hit me hard.
The voice inside my head was loud this time when it came.Face it.You’re alone in this. You always have been.
Chapter Eight
“I put a spell on you, and now you’re mine.”
~Winifred Sanderson,Hocus Pocus
Ben
Asher was glaring at me, his face bright red and full of impotent fury. He looked scared, but at the same time, he looked like he wanted to murder me. Why such a strong reaction? He’d just used magic that morning to save himself at the footbridge, and I strongly suspected he’d used it at that waterfall he fell from and other places when he’d needed it to save himself. Magic was a part of him, and he’d grown up with it in his house all in his life, just like I had. His own father had been a talented practitioner, and his grandma had a touch of craft too. She may not have a lot of power, but still, it was in her bones and in her blood. In other words, he had always known about magic, whether or not he “liked” it, so why was he trying to pretend differently now?
Was it whatever I had sensed inside him when we first met? That dark thing inside him that I’d startled on the road? I thought it was, and it was talking to him now.
His grandma said he didn’t like to talk about it, but there really was no choice. If he didn’t talk to me, then there would be someone else coming along to talk to him, who might not be as willing to give him time to wrap his mind around all this as I was. Besides, he was mine to deal with and no one else.
“We’re going to talk about this whether you like it or not,” I said, using a mild voice, completely unbothered by his little outburst, “so try your best to accept it.”
I knew he wanted to shout at me and fight me or storm away and run out of the house, but not only was he still unable to move, but he’d found out he could no longer speak either. He was trembling with anger. I tried to imagine what he thought might be going on. He was still glaring steadily back at me, not trying to say anything anymore, but this was intense.
I stepped out on the little front porch and took a deep, steadying breath. I wished my father was here to give me some advice. Then out of the ether, or maybe out of somewhere else came a thought, fully formed into my head.
The witch has spelled him not to believe anyone but her. You’ll have to break that spell first. He won’t listen—he can’t listen—until that spell is broken.”
Of course—that would explain so much. It was suddenly clear as to why he’d been ridiculously stubborn about everything. Why he’d made up fantasies in his mind to “explain” things about his father, when he couldn’t admit the truth. Or why he’d just dismiss things out of hand.
I had to break the spell—the curse, that was riding him so hard. And I had to do it right away, because I had a bad feeling about this. It felt like we were running out of time.
The question, of course, was who would have put a curse on him and why. I could narrow it down to the ones who had bound his magic, or someone who was close to him. Someone who had easy access to him. Perhaps someone he trusted. His grandmother? Hard to believe, but my father loved the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle mysteries, and he loved the quote attributed to Sherlock Holmes: "When you’ve eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”
I had to at least keep that in mind.
