Black Moon (The Moonlight Trilogy) (7 page)

Deep inhale, slow exhale. She focused her mind. No way she was falling off the board again.
Let’s just get this over with, please!
Pressing her teeth together, she reached out with her magic. Everything was in place, except for two people.
I think. Is it two or just one?

Another deep breath.
Two, definitely two people moved.
A shift in the energy around her and a rush of heat coming at her from left and right forced her to react and she summoned the water to rise up on both sides. A loud hiss next to each of her ears and the feel of steam on her face followed.

Then the cheers of her coven-mates.

She released the water.
Did I do it?

“Well done!” Rowan yelled. “You stopped Darby and Cal’s fireballs. Fire was one of the easier types of magic to detect. One test completed. Now number two.”

Willa smiled, but didn’t let herself bask in the triumph for too long. She wondered briefly what would have happened if she hadn’t stopped the fire. Would Rowan have let her be burned? Simon could easily heal her, but, still, would her Luminary let her feel the fire? Or would Darby and Cal have pushed the balls away from her? She hoped the latter but was quickly learning that witches didn’t go easy when it came to training.

She pulled back her focus, ready for the second test. Inhale, exhale. A tremor in the energy, this time from below her. In her mind, she saw the water churning, rising.
Is that what’s really happening?

She lowered to her haunches and gripped the board with one hand, while extending the other. She pushed a rush of air downward and heard it plow through the rising water. Water sprayed up into her face and she nearly lost her balance, but she had stopped the churning wall of water from rising to the board.

A second round of cheers.

“Test two complete!” Rowan called.

Willa, shaking, managed to get back to her feet, now twice as wet. Cold and shivering, she tried to steady herself and the board, which wobbled beneath her.
One more. Just one more then it’s over.

“Here we go, Willa. Remember, stay on your board no matter what and you’re done,” Rowan called.

She nodded. “Ready.”

Calm and focused, Willa felt outward with the magic. The air grew too still, too thick. There was a flash in her mind; and she flinched, rocking the board.
What was that?!
She shifted her feet to steady things. In her mind, she saw Charlotte fall into the pool, thrash to the surface and call for help. Willa flinched again, nearly sprang from the board.

The splashing and calls echoed in her head, but was she hearing them with her ears? It was impossible to tell the difference.
Willa, please help me!
Willa bit her bottom lip.
Why isn’t anyone else helping her?
Charlotte went under and then scrambled back to the surface, coughing and calling out to Willa.
Everyone else left. You’ve got to help me! I can’t swim.
Under she went and this time didn’t come back up.

Willa crouched, ready to dive. It was so real in her mind, but yet everything around her felt calm, quiet. Her senses didn’t match her thoughts. The conflicting information tore at her ability to decide.

Charlotte had not come back up. Bubbles broke the surface of the pool, and then the water stilled. Willa wanted to cry out in frustration, but then a thought broke through.
It’s not real! It’s only in your mind!
If it was only in her mind . . . she chanted a quick spell to block her mind from others, “Powerful Earth, accept this mind-lock. A magical door, make it solid as rock.”

The image disappeared. Willa ripped the blindfold from her face and scanned the water. Still as glass. Charlotte stood on the edge of the pool, smiling up at her. “Sorry!” she called out.

“Did you break into my mind?” Willa asked, breathless.

“Yeah . . . I totally did. When you reach out with your mind, it makes you vulnerable,” Char explained. “Great job sensing the difference between the vision and reality.” She gave two thumbs up.

“So I can get down now?” Willa asked weakly to the amusement of the group.

“Yes!” Wynter called out. “Come on down.”

Willa was right. This sucks!

Simon now stood out on the diving board, the fiberglass flexing severely under his weight. It was hard just to stay on the thing. He took a couple steps back. The height didn’t scare him, even with the blindfold, but being knocked from the board was not something he really wanted to experience.
Poor Willa.

“Simon, you ready?” Rowan called.

“Sure,” Simon called back.

“Here we go.”

Simon opened his mind and immediately felt the presence of all his coven-mates, plus several people in other parts of the facility. Not only could he tell exactly where they were, but what they were feeling. He realized with a tug of regret that no one would be able to sneak up on him or surprise him with magic.
This is supposed to be hard! Why is nothing hard?

Rain and Corbin stepped forward, summoning up a huge wave and sent it rolling toward him. He lifted his hands instinctively to send a burst of air in defense. The air plowed into the water, dissipating the wave. Test one done.

“Nice work,” Rowan called. “Here comes number two.”

Simon frowned, the wet blindfold moving against his forehead. Rowan had pulled him aside before the challenge. “You need to be extra careful tonight. What we are doing will open your mind and expose your powers to stress. Can you keep everything under control?”

Simon had stiffened at the implied meaning under the question. “So you want to know if I will hurt anyone?”

Rowan frowned, touched his beard. “No. But you refuse to talk to me about what’s going on, so I do get a little nervous. We are moving into more serious magic here. I want to keep you and everyone safe.”

Simon exhaled. He couldn’t berate his Luminary for his own shortcomings. “I’ll be very careful; I promise.”

Now Cal broke off from the group and moved up to the spectator benches. Simon saw it clearly in his head.
What should I do?
He knew Cal was about to throw a stream of fire his way, and he knew he could stop it easily.
Maybe I shouldn’t?
The idea shocked him. Fake a failure? The shock gave way to intrigue. If he faked a failure, everyone would stop looking at him like some kind of freak. This challenge was supposed to be hard; he was supposed to fail at least once. So why not give them what they wanted?

Cal’s fire came on, and Simon pretended to flinch, duck out of its way, and loose his footing. He crashed into the cold water. He swam to the side where Willa waited. Lifting himself out, dripping, he met the smiles and words of encouragement from his friends. Exactly what he’d been hoping for. No narrowed eyes; no fear.

Darby whooped out a laugh. “Well, who knew? Even the mighty fall.” The rest of the Covenant laughed. Simon smiled, a little high on the success of his fake failure. Then he turned back to Willa, who was not laughing or smiling. She lowered her chin and looked at him as if trying to solve a problem.

“You okay?” he asked, stepping closer.

She hurried to clear the look from her face. “Yeah, yeah. You?”

“Yes, but you were right. That fall is awful.”

“Yeah, it is.”

Rowan stepped between them, blocking Willa. “Okay, okay. Let’s keep going. Back up, Simon. We start over.”

Simon moved forward, his biker boots squashing loudly as he walked. At the ladder he looked around and caught Willa’s eyes.
She knows. I can’t fool her.
All happiness he’d felt a moment ago evaporated, replaced by a dull ache behind his heart.

He climbed the ladder to finish his challenge, which he knew would be as easy as it’d been to fall off the board.

Chapter 7

Waxing Crescent

June 1936

T
he Tuscan hillside was bathed in sumptuous sunlight. The light embraced the vineyard, highlighting the tops of the vines in their comforting straight lines, pooling in the deep recesses of the curving hills. The sky, a blinding blue, rose up from the earth to set the background for life in its quiet rhythm. The scent of sun-baked grapes and thousand-year-old dirt swam on the breeze.

No matter how many times Camille sat here, the scene still took her breath away. The remnants of her humble lunch—bread topped with arugula, tomato, and olive oil—sat next to her in a small wicker basket. She’d carried it up the hill an hour earlier; and now she sat in quiet contemplation, preparing for what she would do next.

She glanced at the empty grass beside her. Usually, Ronald, her husband and partner in magic, would sit there; but he’d been gone for over a year now—an unexpected heart attack in the night, Camille waking to his cold body beside her. His heart had finally given out under the weight of their grief. She couldn’t get used to his absence and to the throbbing emptiness that followed her around. She lived with grief every day, but it never got easier and never got lighter as people often told her it would. Instead it grew, like an untreated tumor, metastasizing through her whole soul. And she knew one day it would stop her heart, too.

Alone.

One small thing brought her an ounce of fleeting joy these days. Although bittersweet, at least it still made her smile.

From her small basket, Camille took a wooden bowl, some herbs, and a thermos of water. She poured the water into the bowl and then dropped in a fresh sprig of dill, a small chunk of mica, the petals of several fragrant flowers, and, lastly, one round aspen leaf.

As the water absorbed the energy of the offerings, she looked out over the picturesque scene. Then, to focus her mind and power, she closed her eyes and listened to all the tiny sounds of nature. A flock of birds passed overhead, their calls faint and illusive on the air. Leaves quivered on trees, small creatures scurried over and under the ground, and grapes grew on their vines.

Finally, with her mind clear and her heart turned to the Earth, she called to the magic, now her rare, seldom-seen friend. The heat was subtle at first, like a warm passing breeze, but then it flared, rushing into her body like a flood. She gasped at the suddenness of it, her head rocking backwards. Part of her called out in joy to have the magic back, but another part of her cringed as memories of all the sadness it had caused filled her head and heart. Camille fought with both parts, trying to calm her emotions enough to perform the spell.

With effort, she quieted the excitement and dammed the memories.

Deep breaths.

Without opening her eyes she held her hands over the bowl and sent a wave of magic into the water and its contents to charge them. Then she sang her spell, a soft and lilting chant,
“Power of the Earth, please accept my humble gift. This day, take my power of Air, carry it sure and swift. Let me see the one I left behind, a sweet, revealing vision, clear in my mind.”

First came a snap in her head, like a camera shutter flicking, and then she opened her eyes. Clear and bright on the surface of the water, the vision took shape. A small girl—five years old, dressed in a striped sundress of pink, green, and orange—flew through the air, back and forth, on a backyard swing. She smiled a glorious smile, her long bronze hair twirling out behind her.

Lilly!

Amelia Plate’s sweet baby—no longer a baby, but a bright, beautiful little girl. Camille smiled, inhaling the scent of lilacs from a tall hedge near the swing set.

After a few more minutes, the girl jumped off the swing and skipped over to a large garden. She walked along the edge, singing to herself. At the head of the garden stood a small stone birdbath, a simple open basin with blue and green marbles in the bottom. The girl stopped beside it and looked around.

Hesitantly she dipped her fingers in the warm water, flicking them, throwing little splashes across the surface. She looked up again, moved her eyes back and forth as if to make sure she was alone. Her eyes returned to the rippling water, and then she submerged both her hands up to the wrists and closed her eyes.

Camille leaned forward, her heart skipping.

After a few quiet moments, the girl opened her eyes again. She lifted her arms up; and the water came too, a clear liquid bubble encasing her small hands. A wide grin spread her lips. She clapped her hands together; and the water burst apart, separating into a million tiny diamond droplets. Stirring her hands in front of her, she guided the droplets to dance and swirl around her.

Camille gasped and put a hand over her heart.
Just like her mother.

The midday sunlight cast colorful rainbow prisms through the drops. Surrounded by sparkles and colors, Lilly giggled, a fairy princess in a sparkling wonderland, weaving the drops into elaborate patterns.

“Chloe!”

The water fell from the air with a sad
swoosh
as Lilly—Chloe to her adoptive parents—lost control. Her clothes and red-brown hair wet with the water, she looked across the yard at her mother’s hand covering her mouth and her eyes wide with shock. Her mother was a thin woman, with a kind oval face and short black hair. She marched across the yard to her adopted daughter, knelt down in front of the girl, who stared back with fearful, guilty green eyes.

“What did we talk about, Chloe?” the woman asked quietly.

“I know. I’m sorry,” Chloe answered sheepishly, fiddling with the hem of her dress.

“You have to promise not to do these things. It’s bad, and it scares Mommy. Okay?” The woman placed a tender hand on her daughter’s head.

“Okay. I promise.”

The woman stood, offered a tiny smile. “Okay. Run inside, and get ready for lunch.”

Chloe jumped up and ran away, eager to please.

The mother waited until the child went into the house, out of sight, and then she turned to look at the birdbath. She bit her bottom lip, shook her head, and looked suddenly worried, even desperate. She bent down, placed her hands on the lip of the basin. She stood blinking forcefully for a long moment, and then with a grunt she pushed the bath over, the basin breaking off from the stand to roll into the fence with a disappointed thud. The blue and green marbles bounced over the grass and disappeared among the blades.

The vision ended, and the water cleared.

Camille inhaled and exhaled deeply. She looked down at her folded hands. The part of her that still loved the magic wanted to cry, to go retrieve the girl, to teach her what her talent meant and where it came from, and to tell the child her real name and show her pictures of her real parents. The other part of her, the one that hated the magic, that blamed it for Solace’s death, sat back in pleased triumph.

The old witch inclined her head and watched the sun climb higher in the Tuscan sky.