The Isadora Interviews (8 page)

“I did,” the old woman said. “I’m not a hag by any means, but neither do I enjoy caring for long hair. This is an invitation to join Miss Mabel’s School for Girls.” The scroll in her hands lifted into the air and hovered just within reach of Priscilla’s fingers. “You passed my interview.”

“Your interview?”

“Yes.”

Miss Mabel’s.

The name alone sent her body into nervous flutters, like birds flying underneath her skin. That meant the old woman was Isadora, the famous and powerful Watcher. She had just been sassy to one of the most powerful witches in the Central Network. Priscilla stared at the scroll with a feeling of disbelief. Isadora’s thin lips lifted into a smile, as if she had read Priscilla’s mind.

“Your transformation skills are very strong, as your mother said in the application she made on your behalf. They lived up to my expectation and then some. You’d do well with transformation as a career. I’m also giving you a chance at the school because you did exactly what I asked you. Too many girls do more than they are asked in a bid to impress me. We could use more students who do as they are told.”

“Yes,” Priscilla muttered. “Who wants to work with students who are willing to do more than their superiors ask of them?”

“Priscilla!” Mother said with a sharp tone, her nostrils flaring. Priscilla clutched the scroll in a tight fist. It was all so embarrassing. She’d read this wrong from the beginning. Isadora simply smiled.

“In a world of unexperienced magical teenagers, no one.”

“I thought you interviewed people,” Priscilla said, meeting Isadora’s eyes although she didn’t want to. She felt betrayed and angry.

“I do.”

“But you didn’t ask me any questions.”

“The best part of an interview rarely does,” Isadora said. “Let me caution you on pride. You have a great deal of it, and that’s far too much. You’ll not last long in a school like Miss Mabel’s if you indulge in it overmuch. Also be aware that your insecurities run your mind. You can’t let that continue forever, or it may turn you into someone you don’t want to be.”

Isadora’s eyes flickered to Mother and back again. Priscilla’s back tightened, receiving the silent message.

“Merry part, Priscilla,” she said, then turned and faced her mother. “Jeannette.”

Without another word, Isadora smiled, then walked to the door and let herself out. Priscilla and her mother stood there for several seconds, stunned. Then Priscilla ran to the window and looked out, but no signs of Isadora remained.

“Well, that was quite a surprise,” Mother said in a breathless voice. “I can’t wait to tell the ladies at tea later today! What do you think? They’ll just die from jealousy, I think. You’ll need to change that dress of course. It’s not proper. What were you thinking? Oh, and I think we should try and curb the attitude in future exchanges, hmm?”

The windowpane in front of Priscilla fogged up beneath her breath.

You’d do well with transformation as a career.

“Yes, Mother,” Priscilla said, wondering if she’d just inadvertently been handed her freedom.

Michelle

T
he soup foamed and frothed.

Perfect,
thought Michelle, pulling in a deep breath. It smelled like salty broth, sweet carrots, and the lightest hint of basil.
The scent is just right. Maybe a pinch more salt. I’m glad I found those dried herbs.

“You have to keep stirring, Mace,” she said. “Or else the chicken will burn to the bottom. See?”

The six-year-old standing beside her rose to his tiptoes and peered over the brim of the pot. The scent of winter and bay leaves drifted through the house. A few chopped carrots swirled in the aftermath of the moving spoon, stirred from the dregs at the bottom.

“I see. Can I ask you a question, Meesh?”

“Sure.”

“Why do I have to sing the soup song?”

“Because it helps the soup cook better. Just like the bread song makes bread fluffy, and the pie song makes pie sweeter. It’s part of the magic.”

Mace thought for a second, his eyebrows pulling together.

“Papa doesn’t like it when you use magic to cook,” he said. “He says food tastes fine on its own.”

Michelle handed him the spoon and ruffled his thick brown hair.

“Yes, well, Papa eats the food anyway, doesn’t he? Here, you take over. I’m going to go get some more firewood. You don’t have to sing if you don’t want to.”

Mace took the spoon and started to sing a song about dragons under his breath. It wasn’t the soup song, but he seemed pleased with it. Michelle chuckled softly, swung a knitted shawl over her shoulders, and plunged into the winter snowscape outside. The fading light meant that each minute the world grew colder. Against a freeze this piercing, her homemade shawl was no more protection than a coat of butterfly wings.

The wind slid past in an arctic blast, whipping the lazy snowflakes into whirls about her waist. Blankets of snow piled up against the trees at the far end of the yard. Letum Wood looked especially dark and menacing against the snow.

Shivering, Michelle stepped onto the packed trail that forked in three different directions. One to the barn, one to the well, and one to the lean-to where the firewood waited.

The cold bit the end of her nose. She lifted a hand to cover it and promptly lost her balance on a patch of ice, falling into the nearest snowbank with a poof. She muttered under her breath in frustration, pushed off the fluffy pile, and continued on.

The lean-to door creaked when she pulled it open. Rust covered the nails, tearing them away bit by bit in the constant exposure.
I feel like that sometimes,
Michelle thought.
Useful, but stuck.
She shook her unfaithful thoughts away. The shanty might get boring in the winter at times, and the scenery never changed, but at least she had a warm bed. Many of the farmers and foresters out here didn’t have even that, not in this forsaken, quiet part of Letum Wood on the southern edge of the Network. The village a couple miles away didn’t even have a name it was so small.

Her billowing breath obscured the view of the firewood as she stood there, trying to figure out the best place to start. They needed a big log to bank for the night and smaller pieces to keep it warm. Moving quickly, Michelle grabbed as many logs as could fit in her arms, which was a substantial number for a girl, and turned to go. Like her father, she was built strong and thick, able to carry as much as her older brother Blain.

By the time she made it back into the log house, Mace was stirring the pot with a gusto that had slopped soup over the sides and dribbled it close to the fire. With every wave of soup he made a crashing sound.

“Mace!” she scolded. “You’re wasting food.”

Although the door had slammed against the wall when she entered, Mace jumped at the sound of her voice anyway, too absorbed in his song to have heard her approach. A blush crept across his cheeks.

“Sorry, Meesh.”

The sweet tone of Mace calling her by the old family nickname stopped her annoyance. She could never stay frustrated with him for long.

“Just be careful,” she said and dropped the logs by the fire. They continued working in silence as Michelle pulled a loaf of bread from the old stove and grabbed a pat of butter to smear it with. The edges of the crust had turned a dusky brown, and the middle sank in.

“I can never get it right,” she muttered in frustration.

Mace took a break from stirring to stoke the fire. The back door flew open, admitting a troop of four burly, towering men.

“You’re early!” Mace cried, jumping off the stool. “Why are you back so soon?”

Ted, the oldest, spoke first.

“Too cold to cut. The ice is forming around the tree trunks. We can barely even stand without falling.”

Taking the hint, Michelle grabbed a few logs from the stack, built up the fire, and then pushed the chairs from the table around the flames. With everyone home, the cabin filled with life and bodies and a surprising quiet. Michelle continued her duties without a word. As the men began to thaw out, their talk increased, but never rose above an easy, steady hum. That’s what Michelle liked about home. It was quiet, even when it was loud.

By the time her brothers had taken off their thick coats and hung them on the pegs by the back door, Mace had peered into the pot and looked back to Michelle.

“Is it ready?”

“I think so.”

Mace gave it another stir and announced, “It’s ready.” Then shot Michelle another look to make sure he was right. She nodded once. “It’s ready!” he repeated, this time with his usual dramatic gusto, and flung himself off the stool again, headed towards his older brothers, who began tossing him around.

The four men stood up, shuffling around the table already set with bowls and spoons. They were a troop of giants—at least, that’s what the other foresters called them, even though the foresters that lived and worked in the wintry bowels of southern Letum Wood were historically a brawny people. Michelle lifted the heavy pot, hefting it over to the table, and setting it in the middle. Her father nodded his approval.

“Smells good.”

Her brothers mumbled a response. Mace brought over the imperfect loaf of bread, set it next to the dish of butter, and settled beside Ted. Once Michelle sat down, dinner began.

“Did you get enough firewood?” Michelle asked, halfway through the silent meal. Her father nodded once.

“Found a new hunting place,” Rian, the third oldest, just above Michelle, said. “We’re going to try it out tomorrow.”

“There wasn’t anything in the traps,” James reported, flicking a glance towards his sister, in answer to the question on the tip of her tongue. “I’ll get you some meat after we look at the new place.”

Another silence followed. The slices of bread disappeared one at a time. Michelle helped herself to a second bowl of stew and was halfway through her first bite when Papa cleared his throat and spoke up.

“Got a letter today.”

When the quiet grew awkward, Michelle looked up from her bowl and realized that Papa had addressed his comment to her. She lifted her eyebrows in question, but Papa wasn’t looking at her anymore. Instead, he was scraping his wooden bowl. His black whiskers moved up and down when he spoke again.

“It’s from your teacher. Seems she thinks you should go to a Network school instead of the school in town.”

Michelle felt as if a stunning spell had smacked her dead in the face, rendering her body useless. Her breath stalled in her chest like a dying wind. She didn’t know what to say.

“A-a Network school?” she finally managed.

“It’s called Miss Mabel’s. I’ve heard of it before. Your mama mentioned it a few times when you were a little girl.”

The mention of her mother seemed to bring another blow. Her brothers gazed down into their bowls. Papa only mentioned her when it couldn’t be avoided.

“What would I learn?”

“You could learn magic better than any of us have.” He sat back in his chair and motioned to her brothers with a wave of his hand. “We get along without knowing as much because we do physical labor. Don’t need magic to swing an ax.”

“Some do,” Blain muttered bitterly into a piece of bread. Many foresters held contempt for the witches in the wealthy northern cities of the Network. The lazy attitude of the northern witches was a usual complaint at the family dinner table. Michelle tensed, waiting for Papa’s usual tirade on the over-dependence most witches placed on magic. He said it made them weak and pathetic. This was part of the reason that everyone in her family was built tall and strong, like a group of oxen.

“You want me to learn more magic?” she asked, gaping. Ted and Mace both looked up now, equally surprised. “You don’t believe in magic.”

“I believe in magic,” he said, bristling. “I don’t believe in using it to be slothful. You could learn it as a trade and not be lazy about it.”

“But Papa, I don’t want—”

“Besides, you’re a real good cook, and you like doing it.” His tone made it clear she didn’t have a choice. Michelle felt her heart shrivel a little inside. He couldn’t make her do this. Surely, he wouldn’t.

Wouldn’t he?
her heart whispered. Yes, he would. Once Papa got an idea in his head, he followed it through.

“You could learn some kind of cooking specialty, I’m sure. Maybe work for the High Priestess.”

Michelle put her hands in her lap, overwhelmed. It was true. She did love to cook. It was the only place she didn’t feel awkward, clumsy, or too big for the space given. The spices, the herbs, combining them together in just the right quantities was all second-nature. Mama had taught her all the cooking songs to use before she died, songs that had been in her family for generations. The music was the magic of cooking, creating different emphases on flavors and textures. Cooking made sense to Michelle. It brought her comfort. And there was always someone to cook for, always a sense of being needed.

But to work for the High Priestess? That wasn’t what she wanted to do. At least, not really. It would be fun to see a castle, to learn more about cooking the perfect loaf of bread. She didn’t want to leave her brothers or her home to do that, though. Besides, they didn’t need her at Chatham Castle. Her family needed her here. So why was Papa doing this?