A Murder of Magpies (36 page)

Pulled it inside me.

“Vayda, what the hell?” he cried as a spasm shook every muscle on my skeleton.

Hundreds, thousands of static pops crackled from his body to my hands and condensed
in my core. A fire kit in my gut.

Loaded with energy and shuddering, I staggered toward Jonah, falling to my knees.
He steeled himself against the ground. His breath heaved as he found clean strokes
of heat trapped beneath the earth’s surface. He lifted his face, the black light in
his eyes glittering while his body trembled.

The electricity in my hands nudged my fingertips. One way or another, the energy I’d
accumulated, more than I’d ever before drawn into my cells, had to dispel.

Is this safe?
Jonah asked.

Does it matter?

God, please don’t let us kill ourselves.

“Get down!” I yelled to Dad and Ward and laced my fingers with Jonah’s.

The electrified ball inside me exploded like a star in its millionth year of dying.

One, two, three strikes of lightning streaked out from our clasped hands.

Dad knocked over Ward and their bodies were sheltered by the snow. My breath came
in heated, stuttered gasps, but the awe streaming off Dad and Ward fed the current,
trailing over the ground and absorbed by my knees.

Four, five, six more lightning strikes rocketed from the union of my brother’s hands
with mine.

Jonah’s heat and fire, my cold and ice—they stumbled over each other, obstructing
the path for release before relenting and coming together as a singular blast of silver
light. Branches and icicles plunged from the trees and speared the ground.

Seven, the last bolt of lightning.

The breaker crashed through Rain. He careened through the air and landed in a crumpled
ball. Jonah’s hand slipped from mine, and he slumped forward. My head was so heavy.
Torrents of coolness gushed out of me, unstoppable, a river undammed as I collapsed
in the snow.

***

Fingers untangled the knots from my scalp to the ends of my hair. My ears rang. I
opened my eyes to the dark sky. Craning my head toward the ambulance’s lights wrenched
my neck. I sprawled on my back near the barn. Jonah reclined on a blanket beside me.
Bandages wrapped his palms, and his cheeks flushed with sunburn as he unwound another
knot from my hair.

“What happened to your hands?” I asked.

“Burns, like I held my hand on a hot stove. The paramedics need to bandage your hands,
too.”

Crimson splashed my palms. Similar burns marked the top of my hands, though these
were the same size and shape as Jonah’s fingers.

“You were releasing energy before you took my hands.” His voice was hoarse. “I gave
you a boost and waited for what you could do.”

“
Dati
and Ward?” I asked.

“They’re fine. The paramedics want to take Ward to the hospital for his arm, but he
refused to go until you were awake.
Dati
’s bruised but okay.”

I leaned against my twin as I sat up. A fire truck, two ambulances, and several police
cars parked between the barn and the house. Rain was belted onto a stretcher, unconscious
and wearing an oxygen mask as he was loaded into the hull of an ambulance. A paramedic
smacked the door, signaling the driver to take the patient to the hospital.

“Is he gonna make it?” I asked.

“Not sure. They think he had a hell of a fall and a coronary.” Jonah gave me a one-armed
hug then cringed. “The energy release messed him up. We did that to him.”

I wasn’t sure how to react: corrupted and relieved.

“He would’ve killed us,” I said.

“I don’t like knowing we could end someone’s life doing what we do. We need to be
more careful.”

This, coming from Jonah of all people.

“Sis, I…We…” My brother was lost for words. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

I stood and needed a moment to adapt to the tilt my headache gave the earth. Ward
waited on the steps as a paramedic finished taping his arm. He limped down the stairs
to join me.

“Hey.” He coughed and embraced me. “You’re up.”

“Why are you limping?” I asked.

“My knee got messed up when I hit the ground.” He pointed at the sky. “If you wanted
a light show, why didn’t you come onto the roof with me? The northern lights are beautiful
tonight.”

Sure enough, magenta and chartreuse trailed across the black sky. Breathtaking even
with the lights of the emergency vehicles blinking at the corner of my sight.

Dad edged away from speaking with an officer. He clapped his hand on Ward’s shoulder
and then took my hand. “You okay?”

“I think so.”

“Magpie, maybe it’s time you and Jonah live openly with what you can do. With more
eyes on you, you’ll be more aware of the consequences. Something to think about.”

“Maybe.” My head was like a basin full of warm, sudsy water. Relaxed, drowsy. I wasn’t
ready to think about what tomorrow would bring, let alone beyond.

Ward gestured to the police cruisers. “Do you have to go back to jail?”

Dad shrugged. “I haven’t officially been charged with a crime. That could happen Monday.
Don’t know, don’t care tonight. For now, I’m gonna ride with Jonah to the hospital
’cause he needs those ribs checked out. Afterward, I’m bringing home some Thai food,
taking a shower, and going to bed. Emory Murdock’s a real lively bastard, isn’t he?”

I grinned as he called to my brother who waited by the barn, examining his bandaged
hands. Frowning, Jonah lowered his hands to his sides. He dragged his feet toward
the Chevy, his arm brushing mine as he passed. Nothing. No sparks from our tinder
rubbing together. Just a brother clumsily bumping into his sister.

Ward drew me into another hug. He put his hands on my shoulders and moved to kiss
me but stopped when a spark flared between us, stinging our lips.

“Ouch!” He touched his mouth. “There you go, shocking me again. What am I gonna do
with you?”

My lips hovered over his.

“Get used to me.”

Vayda

Three weeks later

“I always wondered if Lorna’s kin was gonna turn up someday. Guess someday’s come.”

I ran my finger along the top of Mom’s gravestone. Underneath a bower of Spanish moss
and cypress trees, an elderly woman sat on a marker shaped like a bench and stuck
her hand into a bag of birdseed as a flock of pigeons pecked near her shoes. The southern
sun caught her eyes, a glossy, piercing blue, and her drawl was kindly.

“You’re the Murdock girl, ain’t you? You got enough of Lorna’s face, but you ain’t
quite the same.” She scattered some more seed for the pigeons. “Plus, I reckoned you’re
her daughter since it was all over the papers that your daddy has come back to answer
some questions about running off like he did. What charges did they get him on?”

None of your damn business, I wanted to say, but instead murmured, “None yet. He’ll
get in trouble if he leaves the area.”

The woman gave a dove-like coo and snickered at two birds squawking. “Some would say
the man’s already been in prison, all things considered.”

If not prison, at the very least the holding cell at the Hemlock police station where
he stayed between interrogations. Dad wasn’t under arrest, only came down to Hemlock
for a voluntary interview with the police. We shouldn’t have been here more than a
day or two, long enough for Jonah and me to take in what we’d left behind. The days
stretched to too many, and I had no idea how much longer it would be before Dad would
leave Hemlock.

Again, I reached over the short wrought-iron fence surrounding only Mom’s grave and
wiped away a clump of clay from the granite etched with her name. The location at
the back of the Hemlock cemetery deterred vandals—not well. Her marker was dirty with
what appeared to be crusted egg yolk. The rose Dad laid on the stone only two days
ago wilted and lost much of its brilliant red.

Something glinted in the sparse sunlight filtering through the cypresses, and I dug
through the moss to find a silver coin. And then another.

All around Mom’s grave were dozens of coins.

“If people hated my mother so much, why’s all this money by her grave?” I wondered
aloud.

Though my question wasn’t directed at her, the bird woman replied, “’Cause for as
much trouble as your mama was, she helped enough folks, and they’re still hoping she
can do some work on their behalf from the other side.”

I reached into my pocket, found four quarters, and laid them out in a row before her
headstone. A little string-pulling from Heaven would be nice about now.

The woman nodded toward the footpath in the graveyard. “My guess is that boy ain’t
here to pay his respects, not with the way he’s eyeballing you.”

In spite of the sorrow in standing over my mother’s grave, I warmed at the sight of
Ward ambling down the walkway, Bernadette trotting a few paces ahead of him. My body
shuttered back a cry, my arms winding around him. We hadn’t talked in days, not until
yesterday when I woke up and found myself alone in a motel in Georgia. I shouldn’t
have been alone. Jonah was eerily quiet since the night Rain would’ve killed us all,
not sleeping, not reading. Staring off blankly with so many barriers blocking my feelers.
I’d gone to bed while he stayed awake in a dark motel room with only the lights from
the parking lot casting rays through the blackness. He was gone by dawn and so was
the Chevy.

Ward hadn’t hesitated when I asked if he’d drive down from Wisconsin.

“You were supposed to wait for me at the motel,” he reminded me. “But I stopped by
the police station and talked to your dad for a bit. He says you need to go home and
Hemlock isn’t home anymore.”

“It’s not,” I agreed.

“Your dad’ll get released soon. Jonah will show up. Promise.”

Such a bad liar, Ward couldn’t even convince himself. I wanted to believe him. I wanted
to believe the mess of the last two years could be wiped away with a few days of answering
questions for the police, but no matter where we went—Hemlock or Black Orchard—there
were consequences.

“How’d you know where to find me?” I asked.

“Your dad told me where the cemetery is. He figured that’s where you’d be. Are you
ready to go?”

I held up a finger. “One second.”

He watched from the footpath, his hands deep in the pockets of his leather coat protecting
him from the breeze. Bernadette lay on the ground, face between her front legs as
if bowing her head while I stood over my mother’s gravesite. Currents of longing swelled
within my hand, and I pressed my fingertips to her headstone. A crackle, a flare of
cold fire.

Energy wasn’t created or destroyed, only transformed.

***

A few days after coming home from Georgia, I still wasn’t ready to go back to school,
but I was restless. Sister Tremblay had gotten my suspension lifted and grades restored,
but I didn’t care. I spent time in the kitchen, kneading dough for bread. Bernadette
wagged her tail while I stirred an egg yolk to improve her coat’s shine. How Ward
didn’t succumb to that dog’s big eyes was a mystery. Hopefully he’d forgive me for
sneaking her a bit of cheese. The kitchen was one of the few rooms not boxed up for
the move Dad planned. A Victorian renovation in downtown Black Orchard had come up
for sale before we went to Hemlock.

The red light on the answering machine flashed, but I hadn’t checked the messages.
The only numbers that called were from news stations that had gotten wind of Dad’s
story. Some producer wanted to film a special for an investigative report show, put
it on the air in time for Rain’s murder trial right around Halloween. I was all but
sure they’d bring up Mom’s abilities and her tarot business. At least Ward’s family
and Sister Tremblay already vowed they wouldn’t speak to the media.

Strange when you walked past a phone and it rang.

“Vayda, I wanted to check in,” Sister Tremblay’s voice came over the answering machine.
“If there’s anything you need from the food market, let me know.”

Another call from Sister Tremblay, Polly, as I still needed to adapt to calling her.
She’d been checking on me, even helped pack some boxes since Ward and I returned from
Georgia. She kept her distance enough, but Dad was right—she wanted to help. I should’ve
called her back. Maybe I would later. Ward tensed around her. Months of her creeping
around had done nothing to help in the trust department, but perhaps both Ward and
I needed to work on accepting help. If Dad didn’t come back from Georgia soon, I’d
need more than help from Polly and Ward’s family. The police in Hemlock were taking
their time interviewing Dad, but he’d come home again before long. He had to come
home.

Ward stood behind me at the counter, sliding his hands up the front of my body, and
crossed his arms over my chest. I swiveled my head over my shoulder to kiss him, but
he stopped me with his cheek.

“You’ll be okay, Vayda,” he said in my ear. “I swear.”

He coughed hard, and I poured him a glass of water. “What about you? That cough of
yours isn’t getting any better. Did you ever find out what’s causing it?”

With a sip of water, he shook his head. “No idea. Don’t really care either. Whatever
it is, it’s not going away.”

I saw something flicker in his eyes, some doubt.

“
Gadjo
, is something wrong?” I asked.

“I’m fine.”

Now I had my own doubt, fed by the strange way he regarded me. I opened my mouth to
speak, but he laid his finger over my lip. “Shh.”

His fingertip slipped beneath my mouth and raised my chin. I held on to him as he
kissed me. A kiss so deep it took away his breath.

Afterward, I paged through the mail. More than ever, we had mail addressed to the
Silvers. Vayda Silver wasn’t me. Neither was Vayda Murdock.

Stuffed between advertisements and interview requests, I held an envelope from Jonah
addressed in a script I could mimic as well as he could mine. I sought him out. I
wasn’t angry with him for leaving me in Georgia. He’d been so quiet since the night
Rain tried to kill us, and if Jonah needed to work out something, he’d do it on his
own. But, damn it, we’d never gone so long without speaking. He had to be in this
world somewhere, and I couldn’t believe that I wouldn’t be able to find him. My muscles
grew warm, and a heavy, iron door forged from a hammer and fire blocked me.