After the Summerland (The Witches of Spring Hill Book 1) (24 page)

They decided to wait
until dinner to tell Liam, Grandpa Marcus, and GG Peter what happened in the
clearing. Besides Liam being more understanding with a full stomach, she cast a
purification spell over the food to remove negative energy from everyone who
consumes the meal.

Chloe can’t predict how Liam will react since he is already
on edge about Selene, but she guesses he’ll put them on lock down. That’s fine
with her since next week is the last week of school, finals are over, grades
are in and nothing exciting ever happens that last week. She wouldn’t mind
missing the last week of her junior year, but the following week is their 17
^th
birthday. She can’t help but hope that whatever is going to happen will be over
before then so she can spend her birthday with Cian.

Chloe can tell the
spell she cast is working because everyone is relaxed, talking, laughing, and
enjoying dinner together. Making small talk, Xavier says, “I saw your cat
outside.”

“We don’t have a cat,”
Rowan replies, confused.

Peter shakes his head
and between bites, asks, “Was it a black cat with a white tail?” When Xavier nods, Peter says
nonchalantly, “Yeah, that cat has lived here longer than any of us.”

“What do you mean?”
Brianna asks. “That’s impossible. I think the longest living cat in the world is,
like, 38 years old and sorry, Mr. Alexander, but you are way older than that.”

Peter looks up at
Brianna, smiling at the blunt honesty of teenagers and says, “Well, I’ve seen
that cat a lot over the last 50 years or so; and I know, for sure, it’s the
same damn cat hanging around.”

“Maybe the cat comes
from the same litter — you know, like another generation of the same looking
cat?” Cian adds.

“I don’t think so,” Liam says. “I’ve never
seen any other cats on the property, but I did see the same exact cat you’re
describing the day I found you three,” Liam tells Chloe, Kaiden, and Rowan.

“I read in one of my
books that cats are a witch’s familiar, so maybe the cat is a spirit guide and
is protecting us,” Chloe says.

“Can’t help but wonder
what that old cat’s protecting us from right now,” Marcus says, eyeing the
Silvans as he finishes his last bite of dinner.

With that everyone gets
quiet and finishes their dinner. Once the table is cleared and the dishes done,
everyone sits back around the table with pie and coffee.

“We need to tell you
what happened at the clearing today, Dad,” Chloe starts, but before she can say
anything further Xavier says, “We finally realized why our aunt is so obsessed
with your property.”

Peter looks up at
Xavier in shock. They can’t have figured it out, he thinks. His scalp tingles
in fear and he feels sweat form at his brow. This is not how I wanted this to
happen, he thinks. As Peter is preparing his defense, Xavier says, “The land is
so powerful here that it not only made our abilities stronger, but it also took
down our guards that we use to protect ourselves from black magic.”

Peter sighs audibly in
relief and when everyone looks at him questioningly, he says, “I’m just
relieved we finally know.”

Liam looks at his
grandfather curiously, but rather than respond to Peter’s strange reaction, he
says, “What does that mean to her?”

Cian explains that his
aunt learned and practiced black magic back in Massachusetts. A witch can
practice black magic anywhere, but if the land he or she practices on has the
ability to drop the witch’s guards, like this land does, she is exposed to
darker energies. This makes her power stronger, her reach further, and allows
her to manipulate the elements so completely that she becomes simply
unstoppable. She could take over the whole town making everyone within it her
minion to do her bidding. She could kill people in cold blood, without ever
leaving the property.

Cian continues, “Our
aunt is power hungry. For as long as we have known her, she has wanted to be
stronger and more powerful. Somehow she must have learned about this property
and knows exactly what it will do for her abilities. The only thing that I’m
not sure of is how she would have learned about this prop--”

Peter impatiently interrupts
Cian and asks, “What happened out at the clearing?”

Chloe, somewhat
surprised at her GG’s rudeness, explains that when they were all together in the
clearing, Cian immediately went into a vision. When Brianna and Xavier joined
together so they could read his vision, an electricity pulsed through the
clearing and lightning streaked across the sky. She adds that she has never
felt energy like that before and could sense something ominous so she quickly
cast a protective shield around them in the circle. Once the shield was in
place, Cian came out of his vision and Brianna explained what she saw.

“What did you see, Brianna?” Liam asks her gently.

“I saw my Aunt Selene,”
Brianna says, shivering. “Her aura was dark, and there was so much pain and
suffering. She was cloaked in death, which she is planning to unleash on us —
all of us,” she says, looking around at everyone sitting at the table.

Peter, Marcus, and Liam
look around the table and realize that instead of having to protect three kids,
they now have six to protect. Liam finally says, “Dad, Granddad, I think you
should plan on staying up here for a while. Tomorrow go back to town, check out
Selene’s house for anything suspicious — just a drive by, and then get the things
you need to stay here for a while. Let’s hunker down. We have to be prepared
for anything, at any time.”

To Xavier, Cian, and
Brianna, Liam says, “I’m not sure what to do with you three. Obviously we can’t
keep you here under our protection when Selene gets back to town, but I do want
you to stay until Sunday morning in case she has something planned this
weekend. It’s just too convenient that she is “out of town.” I think that story
stinks of lies. Cian, in your vision, could you see when something was going to
happen?”

Cian shakes his head,
“I didn’t see anything that would tell me when, but I can tell you that I don’t
feel her energy nearby.”

Xavier explains to Liam,
“Our connection with her has been severed, either by distance or by a spell.”

To Cian he says, “We
can’t assume she hasn’t cast a spell on us… she could have used magic to
either make her energy disappear, or she is blocking us from seeing her.”

“So she may or may not
be nearby… is that what you’re telling me?” Liam asks, and by the looks on
their faces, he knows the answer. “Well, if Selene
is
still in town, let’s hope she was far enough away not to see the
lightning over the clearing.”

Selene is feeling very
lucky since she came upon the silly cat that keeps darting in and out of view. It
disappears for some time and then comes back, as if it is beckoning her to
follow him. It is a strange looking cat, all black except for a long, bushy
white tail. Each time it comes into view, she changes her course and follows
the direction the cat has gone.

It has gotten so dark
that she has to keep her flashlight pointed toward the ground to watch her
steps, looking up only when she hears the telltale rustling of leaves indicating
that the cat is nearby. When she points her flashlight toward the sound she
sees the flicking of the white tail, like a beacon in the dark night. After a
couple of hours of following the cat, she thinks she has to be getting close.

Adrenaline
and excitement course through her veins as she continues following, until the cat
disappears and reappears close by. When she turns to follow him, she sees it is
leading her back down the hill! Suddenly, she realizes that she has been
following some random cat for the past four hours; and now has no
effin
idea where she is on this damn hill. Damn cat! She
screeches, causing an owl to take flight overhead.

She pulls out her phone
to look at the GPS, only to discover that she is in a dead zone and her 4G
won’t work. No! NO! Not now, she thinks. Frustrated and exhausted from walking
through the woods all this time, she finds a rock, sits down, and takes a sip
of water from her bottle. She points her flashlight in all directions around
her; as far as she can see, there are only trees and rocks. Nothing else as far
as the eye can see — not even the damn cat.

Running through the options in her head
and not coming up with another plan, she sets up her pup tent for the night and
decides to start her search again in the morning. Just as she settles in under
her tent she hears thunder rumble overhead and watches as the first drops of
rain fall
.

After dinner, Liam,
Peter, and Marcus disappear to talk about what they’ve learned, leaving the kids to
themselves.

“Your dad is pretty
cool about all this,” Cian says to Chloe.

“Yeah, I mean, I think
it’s cool he’s letting us stay here this weekend and all, but I’m also
impressed that he is trying to protect us, too,” Brianna adds.

“Well, he has his
reasons for wanting you to stay this weekend,” Rowan says, still not over the
fact that her abilities aren’t manifesting.

“Oh? What do you mean
by that?” Xavier asks, thinking to himself that things are too good to be true
with Liam’s offer of protection.

“Well, it’s really
our
reasons for wanting to spend more
time with you,” Chloe says, surprising Xavier. “I learned that witches who
practice or even just spend time together become stronger. Abilities manifest,
spells become stronger, and overall the witch becomes more powerful. A witch practicing
with a group will always be more powerful than a witch acting alone. So, the
more time I spend with Cian, the more my abilities are manifesting and getting
stronger.”

“And, since spending
time with you, Brianna, you know one of mine manifested,” Kaiden says. He
focuses his attention on the candles on the counter, reminding them of his
ability when he lights them with his eyes. The candles flare once, then burn
brightly, filling the air with the sweet scent of honey.

“So, um, Kaiden’s
abilities are manifesting, mine are getting stronger and…”

“Everyone is hoping
that being around you guys will make my abilities manifest, okay?” Rowan adds
snottily.

Brianna reaches out to
Rowan and pats her on the arm. “It’s okay, Rowan. Yours will manifest soon. Don’t
worry,” she adds with a smile.

Cian sits quietly for a
moment and says, “Well, it all makes sense now.”

“What makes sense?”
Brianna asks.

“Why Aunt Selene pushed
us so hard to practice witchcraft, to develop our abilities, and everything…” Xavier
answers.

“All that stuff about
teaching us to use our gifts, it would enhance our lives, we would have a
happier life here, blah, blah… it was all bullshit. She wanted us to hone
our own abilities so that we would make her a stronger witch. She has been using
and manipulating all of us since the very beginning.” Cian says, with full
understanding dawning on him. “Brianna, she recognized your psychic ability and
knew eventually you would be able to read minds; she probably suspected I would
see into the future, and Xavier?” he looks at his brother questioningly.

“She wanted me for
clarity. She was going to use me as a go-between between her and the Dark God
and Goddess. She has been teaching me dark magic for the past year and now, I
see why,” Xavier says, finally admitting the truth to his siblings. “She has been
preparing me for what to do when we got here, on this land, without telling me
her real plans.” He suddenly realizes how close he actually was to becoming her
pawn.

“Well, at least she was going to keep you
around. She was probably going to absorb our powers and kill us after she got
what she wanted,” Brianna says.

“In the end, I would
have preferred to die with you rather than be her sorcerer,” Xavier says
honestly. “She would have had me do awful things to people.”

Xavier gets up abruptly
and walks out the side door.

“Xavier, wait!” Brianna
calls. Before she can even get up, Rowan is out of her seat and runs out the
door after him. Once outside, she looks around for a moment and finally sees
Xavier lying on the ground near the garden. “Xavier!” she calls out, worried
that something terrible has happened to him.

“It’s okay, Rowan,”
Xavier replies, touched by the concern he hears in her voice. Without sitting
up or looking at her, he waves his arm over his head for her to find him and
says, “I’m over here.”

“Are you okay?” she
asks, as she settles herself down next to him.

Xavier looks at her for
a moment and then
back
up toward the sky. He finds his
constellations, which have been his constant for many years. He waits until she
sits down next to him and says, “When we first learned my mom was sick, I knew
she would die. I didn’t know I was a witch, but I knew she was going to die. No
one could tell us what was wrong with her. They ran test after test, and everything
came back negative. For a while, they called it a viral infection; but even
that didn’t stick when her blood work came back clean.

“We were twelve when our
dad told us our mom was going to die within the week,” he chuckles
sardonically. “At the time, I didn’t even question how he knew, especially when
doctors couldn’t even tell us what was wrong with her, let alone pinpoint the
day she was going to die. Of course, I now know that he was a witch and probably
saw that it was going to happen.

“Brianna and Cian
started crying, and you want to know what I did? I started listing the constellations
in my head. You see, when I was little, my mom read me a book called
Our Stars
.
It was all about the stars and constellations, and I loved it so much that I asked
her to read it to me every night for a whole year. And she did, every single
night, without fail.