The Witches Three Cozy Mysteries 4-6

Chapter 23

Chapter 23

I remember when I was a kid, year after year struggling to stay awake until midnight. I was in double digits before I could stay awake long enough to see the ball drop in Times Square. A bit older still before I was awake for midnight in my own time zone. What can I say? I'm an early to bed, early to rise type of girl.

This was the most exhausting New Year’s ever.

It was nearly two in the morning before the police let everyone leave the house. I understood it. While it was clear that Charlotte wasn't right in the head, it was perhaps less so that she had killed two people that night. The police had wanted to be sure.

But even after Sophie, Brianna and I had dragged ourselves home, first to the school and then through time to the school in the present, 2019 now, the night was far from over for us.

We went straight up to the library, and I told them both everything that had happened while I was in the yard. How someone had told Charlotte about the key and given her the necklace to hide her from us. How Juno had offered me power again, and I had refused it. How I had felt it there for the taking and fought harder to refuse it again.

How I had felt watched.

Sophie grilled me over and over again to see if I could match the number of watchers to the number of spies Otto had seen following him around, but I just couldn't do it. The harder I tried, the more confused it all became.

"This is not good," Brianna said over and over. "Magic that alters perceptions. Not good."

"Evanora was altering the perceptions of the men around her," I reminded her.

"But this is worse," Brianna said. "They were scrambling your perceptions."

"And that's bad because I'm a witch? I don't know. I don't feel like I'm any more perceptive than the next person."

"No, Amanda," Sophie said. "Listen to Brianna."

"They weren't just messing with what you were seeing or hearing. You weren't even in your body at the time you were aware of them, right?"

"Yeah," I said, starting to get it.

"They scrambled perceptions few witches have, and they did it while you were there, in the realm that is your particular domain. The web space thingy," Brianna said.

"That's not good," Sophie said.

I had to agree. It felt very not good at all.

"But you encountered Juno first," Brianna said, and she looked if anything even more worried than before.

"But that was nothing," I said. "She offered to help me, but she didn't press. She went right back into the time bridge, and that was it."

"That's suspicious," Sophie said. "Why would she do that? Why bother to show up at all? She didn't offer to help you the last time you were in danger, and you might have said yes that time."

I bit my lip. I definitely would've said yes that time.

"She's connected with these watching witches somehow," Brianna said.

"But she was gone before they arrived," I said. "They never interacted at all."

"And that's just what's suspicious," Sophie said.

I looked around the library, at the wardrobe that still stood next to the table for the newspapers, at the table strewn with Brianna's books and notes, and the smaller desk I used for my own stabs at research.

"We're not making enough progress, are we?" I said. "And my stupid wand is still being stupid."

"We'll fix it," Brianna said. "We'll figure this out."

"But in the meantime," Sophie said, catching my hand to give it a squeeze. "We should stay here. In 2018. Or I guess 2019 now."

"It's too risky for us in 1928 now," Brianna said.

"I agree," I said. "Why are you both looking at me like you're expecting an argument?"

"Obviously because of Edward," Sophie said.

"Believe me, Edward is just another reason not to go back to 1928,” I said. "I need to leave him alone so he can move on."

"Poor Edward," Brianna said.

"It's how it has to be," I said.

We sat in silence for a moment. Exhaustion was making my limbs so heavy I just wanted to drift away to sleep there in the chair. I didn't have the strength to make it to my bed.

But there was one more thing to say. "I do have to go back one more time," I said.

"What?" Sophie asked, blinking back awake.

"No," Brianna said.

"Yes," I said. "I have to talk to Coco. We can't just disappear on her. We can't ghost her. I have to say good-bye."

"Perhaps we can send her a letter-" Brianna began.

"No, Amanda is right," Sophie said. "But not right now."

"No, in the morning," I said.

"Too soon," Brianna said. "I need time to craft some spells. I can make a sort of cloaking spell that will keep the witches from noticing you."

"Of course, you can," I said with a weary smile.

It was nearly a week later when Brianna finally felt satisfied with what she had created. It was a literal cloak with spells worked into the fabric and stitching.

"It won't hold up to direct inspection," Brianna said. "If you think a witch sees you, run."

"I will," I promised.

"Also, I want you to cross time using Cynthia's amulet," she said. "Miss Zenobia put powerful protections on that."

"I will," I said.

"And Sophie and I are going to stand one on each end of the bridge and make sure that Juno doesn't interfere," she said.

"My goodness," I said. "Is this all necessary?"

Brianna gave me a very dark look. "We know how powerful they are with perception magic," she said. "Imagine what they can do if they decide to attack you."

I didn't know what to say to that. I just swallowed hard, my throat gone suddenly dry.

Brianna stayed in 2019. She had doubled the number of magical devices she had installed in the backyard and was consulting them in a never-ending rotation. I took Sophie's hand, and the two of us stepped back into the past.

"Be quick," Sophie said, already beginning her dance.

"I will," I said, and jogged to the front yard and then next door to ring the bell.

Tompkins recognized me at once and brought me into the parlor. He didn’t argue when I insisted on not taking off my cloak. A maid had just brought in a tray of tea when Coco emerged from a little door in the corner of the room.

"I'm surprised your father hasn't boarded those up," I said.

"I would never let him," she said. But her voice, her very posture, was devoid of most of its usual exuberance. She sat in the chair beside mine and poured out the tea.

"How are you doing?" I asked.

"Well enough," she said, putting two cubes of sugar into her tea and stirring it with a spoon. "Better than my mother." She held out the sugar bowl to me, but I shook my head. Everything about her, from the proper way she was crossing her ankles and holding her teacup to the softness of her voice, was completely unlike the Coco I knew and loved. I hoped it was just an effect of the grief that would fade with time.

But I was afraid it wasn't. Maybe that girl was gone now.

"You left very suddenly that night," Coco said between sips of tea.

"Yes, I'm sorry. Your mother was still very upset, and I was afraid seeing me might make it harder for her. That's why we didn't stop to say good-bye."

"You're probably right about that," she said. "She heard some of the things that Charlotte was saying in the library. About Edward and you. Blaming you."

"Do you blame me?" I asked.

Coco looked down at her tea. "No. I've thought about it a lot. I know you and Edward were friends. But the day you met Edward, he was already pining for my sister. I don't believe Charlotte was right about his feelings. And I certainly don't believe you pushed your way into anything."

"Thank you," I said. "I was hoping you felt that way."

"Yes," Coco said, still looking down at her tea. "I've been thinking about Charlotte too. All of the times since we were little, little kids when she would do something that bothered me. Sometimes even scared me. And how I never really thought it meant anything. And what might have happened if I had taken her more seriously and said something to someone."

"Coco, this is absolutely not your fault," I said. "Her own family didn't notice anything was wrong. And you two were never exactly friends."

"Maybe she could have used a friend, though," she said.

"Coco," I said, but then stopped. How could I explain what I had seen?

Coco looked up at me expectantly, but I couldn't find the words. She shifted in her chair. "I know Charlotte wasn't wrong about everything," she said.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I know you three can do things normal people can't do," she said. "Maybe you don't call yourselves witches, but you're definitely something."

"How do you know this?"

"Brianna and Sophie weren't very careful about what they were saying when they were trying to use that key to find Charlotte," Coco said. "I was with them, but I think they kept forgetting I was there. And Otto knows too, doesn't he?"

"He does," I said.

"I thought so." She looked down at her hands, fingers twisting together. “I don’t actually remember what happened up on that balcony. I mean, I don’t remember it any differently. I don’t know for sure if it was a stranger who came up the steps or if it was Charlotte who knocked me down and threw Ivy over the rail.”

“You sounded very sure when you told the police,” I said.

“Brianna and Sophie said what they were doing would lead us to the killer. At first I thought they were crazy. They couldn’t agree which way to go and I couldn’t even see what they were seeing. But then all at once they were both dead sure, and they ran straight to where Charlotte was. And the look in Charlotte’s eyes…” She stopped fidgeting and set her hands neatly on her lap. “I know she’s the one. And you three solved the case using, I guess, magic.”

"Did you want to ask me any questions about it?"

Coco took a deep breath. "No. I think it's probably better if I don't."

"That might be true," I said. "But there is one thing I have to tell you."

"All right."

"It's difficult to explain, so I'll just tell you that I can look at a person and see things about them. How they connect with the rest of the world mainly, but also other things. When I looked at Charlotte, she had a darkness in her. All through her. There was very little of her left that wasn't darkness. She must have been like that for quite some time, perhaps since birth. I promise you, there was nothing you could have done to save her."

"I see," Coco said. She picked up her tea again. "She's in an asylum now. Her mother can't really afford it, but Thomas' father insisted on paying for her care. I think he hopes if she gets well again, that it will help him understand why all this happened. But I don't think it will, will it? I don't think she can get well."

"I hope she can," I said. "But I don't know if she will."

Coco sighed raggedly.

"Have you been back to school yet?" I asked.

"No, it's still winter break," she said. "But my friends have been stopping by."

"That's good," I said. "You're going to need your friends."

"Yes," she said. "Edward has stopped by as well. I think that's awkward for my parents. My mother won't come down when he is here. My father always tries to speak with him, but he never knows quite what to say. But everyday Edward has been here. We just sit together, and I suppose we're both thinking of Ivy, but somehow that's a comfort."

I picked up my cup and drained the last of my tea. I longed to ask at what hour he usually called, but at the same time, I really didn't want to know. I couldn’t do anything with that knowledge anyway. I needed to get back to my own time.

"You have to go now, don't you?" Coco asked, too perceptive by half.

"I'm afraid I do," I said, standing up and straightening out the folds of the cloak.

"And you won't be coming back," she guessed.

"I would like to," I said. "I would love to come back and see you again, and I hope if I did that I would find you healthy and happy. But I'm not sure if that will ever be possible." I gave her a little smile. "As much as I'm a witch, I'm not a very good witch. And it's become dangerous for me to be here."

"You're not going to say good-bye to Edward?" she asked, genuinely distressed.

"I'm afraid not," I said. "Perhaps you can say good-bye for me?"

"No, I won’t,“ she said stubbornly. "You're just going to have to get better at being a witch so you can come back and do it yourself. Only then, it won't be good-bye at all."

"Thank you, Coco," I said. "I'll always feel stronger knowing you're in my corner."

She got up from her chair to hug me tight then disappeared back through her little door before Tompkins came to show me out.

I interrupted Sophie's dance and the two of us cross the time bridge back to our own January.

"Did you see him?" Brianna asked.

I shook my head then took a wavering breath until the urge to cry passed.

"And how was Coco?" Sophie asked.

"Coco is as to be expected," I said. "But she did make me promise to learn how to be a better witch. So I suppose I should get started on that."

"Back to the library, then?" Brianna asked with a smile.

"Back to the library."

Sophie and Brianna ran up to the steps to the back door, but I turned to look one more time at the time bridge. It wasn't safe now, but I knew someday I would be crossing it again. My life was as much in 1928 as it was in 2019.

And I was, after all, a time witch. That was my calling. It couldn’t be ignored.