“For what?” Sadie laughed.
“Everything. For making the hard decisions. Facing your greatest fear to sacrifice for your brother. The life you’ve built here. I know I had nothing to do with it. But I’ve got some damn fine kids. I know I don’t deserve it. Deserve all of this. But everything is going to work out. Just you wait and see.”
And Sadie knew, in that moment, that being afraid didn’t make someone weak or a coward. Doing something in spite of heartbreak and fear, that’s where courage came in.
Do it afraid, she told herself. Your brother’s life depends on it.
Orange-Infused Honey
This is sure to bring joy back into the lives of those who eat it. Don’t have too much, though, because when your life is full of blessings, you tend to forget gratitude. And that right there is the key to keeping a happy life.
Ingredients
honey (preferably raw)
oranges, sliced thinly
mason jar
Directions
1.?Stack the orange slices and place them in the mason jar. Pour the honey over until nearly full. Put the lid on tight, and slowly tilt to make sure the honey coats everything.
2.?Let sit in the pantry for 5 days (the longer you let it sit, the stronger the flavor).
3.?Strain—be patient, this may take a while.
??19??
THIS WAS IT. THE moment her brother would finally be free. The balance would be paid.
No more magic, a small voice whispered in her head. Are you sure you want this to work?
Shut up, she told the voice, and it snickered, but the echo faded.
As her foot pushed harder on the pedal, her thoughts were wild things, chasing futilely after each other until her head spun. She could still feel Jake’s kiss on her lips. The way his fingers curled into her hair, her skin. The maddening way his body suspended hers against the wall. And before she knew it, they skidded into the Old Bailer parking lot, and their mother’s beat-up old red Corolla that Seth had driven was already there. A faint red glow surrounded the old building, reflecting off the chain link fence that still circled it.
The air had turned wickedly cold, biting into their bones as though it knew what they were trying to do and wanted to thwart them. After all, magic was about balance, and the earth was owed its dues.
Sadie took a container of salt from the trunk and started scouring the grounds, looking for the right spot. The silence compared to the noise of the festival was jarring. Only the whistle of wind through trees and the stars, clear and bright looking down on them. The scent of pine and brick and damp earth smelled like lost secrets and dark promises.
“Here!” Sadie called to the rest. She was forty paces from the main building, in a field of grass. Around her she’d poured a ten-foot circle of salt. The wind picked up, and Sadie pulled her jacket tighter against her, trying not to be sick, ignoring the clamminess that had broken out on her forehead and the back of her neck.
“You sure there’s not some blood sacrifice we can do instead?” Seth asked his sister, stepping into the circle with her.
“I’m sure,” she answered. “Hand me that bowl,” she said, gesturing to the items next to her bag on the ground.
“From a few twigs of sacred oak,” she explained, dipping her finger in the ash of the wood she’d burned earlier and drawing a Y shape on her and Seth’s forearms. “The Elhaz rune, for the divine might of the universe. We’ll need all the strength we can get. This is where Julian is buried,” she added.
“And I’m the one who helped bury him,” said a voice behind them. And there was Aunt Anne with Kay, followed by Tava holding Sage’s hand, and then Florence and Uncle Brian coming close behind.
“You came,” Sadie breathed, as they each took a position outside the salt circle.
“Of course we came. And I brought this.” Anne pulled a rope out of her purse and had everyone grab onto it, directing them around the salt until they formed their own circle. “We’re in this together,” she said. “All the extra power you can get.”
This is it, this is it, Sadie kept saying to herself over and over. Her skin was jumpy, but there was a sureness in her bones. This was right. The whole family together. Putting a stop to something that should never have happened in the first place.
She took Seth’s hands in hers.
“Are you ready?” she whispered.
“Are you?”
“Over a cliff,” she said.
“Over a cliff.” He squeezed her hands.
She closed her eyes.
The earth below my feet, she thought, bringing her mind to focus. The molecules of air I’m breathing. She drew in a deep, steadying breath. Focus on the purpose. The wind picked up, whistling a sad tune as the full moon shone its cold light.
“I’m going to use you as the conduit,” she breathed out. “My magic will flow through you and into the totem. It’s going to get worse before it gets better.”
He nodded mutely.
“At the exact moment my magic goes through you and into the totem, I’m going to use the last vestiges to destroy the brush. And the totem will be channeled into the earth where Julian is buried.”
“Won’t it drain you?” Seth demanded. For the first time in as long as she could remember, he sounded scared.
“We’ll be linked. You’ll have double the magic, but we’ll be united as one. All of our magic—together. And when my magic separates and leaves you, the curse won’t know the difference between magic and life. The debt will be fulfilled.”
“That didn’t really answer my question,” Seth said in a shaky voice.
“I’ll be fine.”
The shadows looming from Old Bailer seemed to turn corporeal and loom over them. The towering birches that surrounded the property shimmered silver in the moonlight and rattled their leaves in the ever-growing wind. She closed her eyes again. Smelled the fresh paint from Old Bailer; the grass beneath her feet; and there, Seth. She breathed him in. The comfort of him. Her brother. Her twin. Around them, Florence, Kay, Tava, Anne, and Brian all nodded to each other. A dozen feet back, Sage stood encircled in Raquel’s arms.
The well deep inside of Sadie had been building for what seemed like her whole life. And she tapped into it. Drawing it out. Directing it down the bond between her and Seth. And then she heard the voices.
They were coming from Seth. It was a cacophony. A symphony. She opened her eyes and his face was a mask of pain. The magic was pushing him through his own personal hell. His face was twisted in agony, eyes shut tight, and even in the dark, she could see his skin had turned a ghoulish white.
The breeze picked up and corralled into a wind so strong it whipped Sadie’s hair against her face, stinging her cheeks. And then she felt the darkness seeping from Seth into her. She pushed back. He was the conduit. He had to hold all the magic, or it wouldn’t work.
But the voices kept coming and they were hers now. The horrors, her own. The living, waking hell sitting on her chest, suffocating. The void called to her. The blackness. The demons of despair and depression.
“Sadie,” she heard her mother shout her name, but it was an echo in the mist, eaten up by the endless abyss.
Kay was praying, tears streaming silently down her cheeks.
The air grew savage, and shadowy talons sliced at their ankles, trying to break through the circle they formed. The siblings closed rank, drawing closer to the twins, and then they heard the voices too. Felt the wretched weight of misery that Seth had been plagued by.
Was this what he had been dealing with? No wonder he’d left.
She couldn’t fight it. She had never been strong like he was. The pit beckoned, and she longed to crawl into it.
“Sadie,” Seth screamed her name, and her eyes, half glazed, turned to her twin. Her brother. Her best friend. This wasn’t for her. It was for him. Family was strength.
“We’re here,” Anne shouted.