Maggie Shayne - Daughter of the Spellcaster

“Bahru came by.”

“Bahru?” Selma blinked her surprise, turning back toward the big oak door she’d just come through. “He was here?”

“Yeah. Showed up in a big Lincoln with one of Ernst’s drivers at the wheel. I tried to get him to stay, but he was in a rush to leave.”

“I wish I’d seen him,” her mother said.

Lena sighed, recalling how much her mother and Bahru had seemed to enjoy bickering over tea recipes. Mom was a top-notch herbal-tea maker. Bahru was no slouch. But that was before…

“He says I’m named in the will, or the baby is, or something. Anyway. The funeral’s tomorrow. He made me promise that I’d be there.”

Selma’s still-auburn eyebrows pressed against each other. “Do you think that’s wise, honey? To travel that far, this late in the pregnancy?”

“It’s only a few hours’ drive. I can handle that.”

“It’s not just the drive I’m worried about. He’ll be there. Can you handle that? ”

She meant Ryan. Of course. “I’m sure I can. I knew this day would come, Mom. I have to face him sooner or later. He has a right to know.”

“You could tell him later. After the baby’s here.”

“Keeping it from him this long was wrong. And you know it. And I know you know it, because you’re the one who raised me never to lie.”

“You didn’t lie to him.”

“And you’re also the one who taught me that omissions of this magnitude are the same things as lies.”

Selma pressed her lips together. “Damn thorough, wasn’t I?” She ran a hand over Lena’s hair. “You sure you can handle him?”

“I’m sure.” So why did she feel compelled to avert her eyes when she said it? Lena wondered.

“Okay, if that’s what you want to do. You want me to go with?”

“Mom, I’m not six.”

Selma smiled and nodded, her spiral curls—even tighter than Lena’s longer, looser waves—bouncing with the motion. “What’s that you have there?” she asked, nodding at the box in Lena’s lap.

“I don’t know. Bahru said Ernst wanted me to have it.” Lena stroked the box. “I got lost in thought and forgot about it.”

“Memories?”

Lena nodded and tried to ignore the hot moisture in her eyes.

“You really loved him a lot. It hurts. I know, honey.”

She wasn’t talking about Ernst, but that didn’t need to be said. They both knew what she meant. Flipping open the tiny latch, Lena lifted the lid as her mother leaned over her from behind.

An old, very tarnished chalice lay inside the box, nestled in a red-velvet-lined mold that fit its shape perfectly. Frowning, she lifted it out, held it up, turning it slowly so she could see the dull stones embedded around the outer rim.

“I think that’s silver,” her mother said. She hustled to the kitchen, and returned with a bottle of tarnish remover and a soft cloth. Then she took the chalice and went to work. Leaning forward in her chair, Lena watched the tarnish being rubbed away, the heavy silver gleaming through. Her mother sat down in the matching rocker on the other side of the fireplace, rubbing and scrubbing and polishing. “It’s real silver, all right. Heavy. It must be worth a small fortune. Where on earth did he get this?”

“A street vendor in Tibet. Bahru said the stand was mostly junk, with this just mixed in with all the rest. He said Ernst took one look at it and knew it was meant for me.”

Her mother sighed. “Never knew a rich guy as decent as that one.” And then she paused and held the chalice up. The firelight made it gleam and wink in what Lena now saw were semiprecious gemstones: amethyst, topaz, citrine, quartz, peridot, three others that she thought might be a ruby, an emerald and a blue sapphire.

“It’s old,” her mother said. “And if these stones are as real as this silver is, and I think they are—I know my rocks—”

“I know you do.” Most of the jewelry her mother wore, she had made herself.

“Lena, this cup could be worth thousands. Maybe tens of thousands.”

“It’s worth a lot more than that,” Lena said very softly.

Her mother frowned at her. “What do you mean?”

“Remember when I was little, Mom? My first attempt at scrying? The vision I had?”

“The one where you saw your handsome prince. The one you later thought looked just like Ryan.”

“Didn’t look like him. Was him.” She reached for the cup, and her mother handed it to her. “And do you remember the cup I saw in that vision? The one I described to you?”

Selma seemed to search her daughter’s eyes. “Lena, you don’t think—wait. Just wait here, I’ll be right back.” She was out of her chair and up the stairs, heading, Lena had no doubt, to their temple room on the second floor, where they kept their altar and all their witch things. Herbs, oils, books. It was their own sacred space. The house’s chapel, so to speak. Lena studied the cup while she was gone, wondering what on earth all this could mean.

Her mother returned, a Book of Shadows in her hand. An old one. Goddess knew they had filled many over the years, Selma more than Lena, of course. She was flipping pages as she walked. “I remember, I had you draw what you’d seen. You were only eight, but—here. Here it is.” She came to a standstill in front of Lena’s rocker, blinking down at the page, and when she looked up again there was no more doubt in her eyes. Just astonishment.

Turning the book toward Lena, Selma showed her what her eight-year-old hands had drawn in crayon. The shape was the same, the color—well, she’d used the crayon marked “silver,” though what resulted was a pale shade of gray. But most interesting were the gemstones, because they were each a different color and a different shape.

And they matched the ones on the cup.

“They’re even in the same order, at least the ones that show,” her mother whispered, staring at her as if she’d never seen her before. “My Goddess, Lena, it wasn’t your imagination. It was a true vision you received that day.”

“Looks like,” Lena said. “The question now is—what the heck does it all mean?”

“I don’t know.” Selma moved closer, hugging her. “I don’t know, baby. But we’ll figure it out.”

That’s what I’m afraid of , Lena thought.

Ryan McNally sat in the front pew, and felt small and insignificant inside the magnificent cathedral. But it was fitting that his father be memorialized here. He’d been bigger than life, too. Until his wife’s death had brought him to his knees.

When his mother died, Ryan thought, the best part of his father had died with her. He’d loved her so much that losing her had all but demolished him. Ryan had been eleven, and even then he’d known he would never let that happen to him.

He was seated near several of his father’s closest friends—old men, all of them—and Bahru, who had added a black sash to his red robes today, and who looked as if he’d been crying. His eyes were red-rimmed and puffy, his cheeks even more hollow than usual.

Seeing the old guru like that almost made Ryan rethink his twenty-year belief that the man was nothing but a con. But only until he reminded himself that Bahru had spent a lot of time around actors, prior to latching on to a broken and grieving widower. He’d probably learned a few tricks of the trade, like tears on demand.

Ryan had to give the eulogy. He’d spent a lot of time on it, yet when the priest nodded at him to come up, he found his knees were locked and he couldn’t quite force himself to move.

Bahru put a hand on his shoulder. “It’s all right,” he said. “I promise you, it’s all right.”

He didn’t like or trust the man, even resented him—and yeah, that was mostly because Bahru had been closer to his father than Ryan had been himself. Not Bahru’s fault, though. “Of course it is.”