The Book of Spells (29 page)

“Why must Miss Almay keep such a close eye on everyone?” Theresa asked Eliza as they sat on the wrought-iron bench alongside the Crenshaw garden on Wednesday afternoon following classes. “Does she think we’re all going to wander off and meet our doom in the woods?”

“No,” Eliza replied, watching as Miss Almay paced the flower beds planted alongside the house’s foundation. “She knows something is wrong. She can tell.”

“How could she not know?” Helen asked. The maid knelt in the garden a few feet in front of the two girls, pulling out weeds—all the better to hide the fact that the three of them were conversing. “Look at them.”

Eliza scanned the area. It was free period, and several of the younger girls had started up a game of jump rope on the lawn. Their laughter and shrieks of joy were in stark contrast to the attitude of the girls from the coven. Alice sat under cover of a wide-brimmed felt
hat, reading her Bible diligently, as she had been doing ever since she’d learned that Catherine was dead—again. Jane reposed on a bench opposite Eliza’s and Theresa’s, staring listlessly into space as she toyed with her hair. Lavender, Bia, and Viola sat together on a picnic blanket not talking to one another. Marilyn and Genevieve were ostensibly watching Petit Peu play with a stick, but they hardly seemed to notice him at all. Clarissa was squirreled away in the library, ignoring the existence of everyone else.

“Well, we’re still in mourning,” Theresa said. “Of course we’d be listless.”

“It’s not just listlessness,” Eliza said. “It’s guilt.”

Theresa’s head snapped around, and Helen stopped weeding abruptly but didn’t turn.

“What do you mean? Why would they feel guilty?” Theresa asked.

Eliza’s mouth was dry. “Because we had the chance to save Catherine, and we failed,” she said, one single tear spilling down her cheek. “We promised them we could bring her back. We set them up for failure. They believe . . . they believe Catherine is still dead because of them. Because of us. Don’t
you
feel that way, Theresa?”

Theresa took a breath. “No,” she said. “We tried, Eliza. Most people wouldn’t have even done that.”

“Well, even if you don’t feel it, they—we—do,” Eliza said, crossing her arms over her chest as she watched Alice slowly turn the page in her Bible. “That sort of pain doesn’t just go away.”

For a long moment, none of them spoke. All three of them just
watched the others—watched them ignoring one another, watched them not living their lives.

“All right, then. We have to find a way to help them move on,” Theresa said finally. “We have to help them put this whole mess behind them and start over.”

“But how?” Eliza asked.

Helen stood up, dusted her hands off, and turned to them. “I know we said we were done with magic, but perhaps we need to cast one last spell.”

Eliza stood in the center of the temple with Theresa and Helen, the other eight members of the coven gathered in a circle around them. It was Saturday afternoon, and Miss Almay had gone off campus for a visit with her sister in Norfolk. If the girls were going to put Helen’s plan in motion, now was the time.

“What are we doing here?” Clarissa snipped, hugging herself against the chill. “No one wants to be here, you know.”

“Clarissa is right. You don’t intend for us to be casting spells again, do you?” Marilyn asked, holding Genevieve’s hand.

Bia and Viola stood huddled near the door, while the others eyed Eliza, Theresa, and Helen with suspicion. Eliza ignored their questions. She looked into Theresa’s brown eyes and held her breath.

“Ready?” Helen asked. She pressed a single grape leaf into each of their palms.

“Ready,” Theresa and Eliza replied.

The three girls clasped hands, their leaves pressing together, and recited the incantation.

“Sleep, sisters, sleep, and dream your fondest dream. Take no note of what we do. Things are not what they seem.”

This time, there was no dizziness whatsoever. A warm wind swirled up and out from the tight circle, lifting Eliza’s hair straight up from her head. When it died down, she glanced at Helen and Theresa for courage, then turned around.

All eight girls had fallen fast asleep where they stood. Lavender was even snoring. Alice swayed slightly on her feet but didn’t tip over.

“Let’s get to work,” Theresa said determinedly. She walked over to Jane and touched her fingertips to Jane’s forehead. “When you wake, you will be free of this pain,” she said. And Jane’s head nodded forward, her chin ducking toward her neck.

Eliza stepped up to Clarissa and placed her fingers against the sleeping girl’s forehead. “When you wake, you will be free of this pain.” Clarissa’s head nodded forward.

Standing in front of Alice next, as Helen and Theresa worked on the other girls, Eliza took a deep breath. She hoped that when Alice awoke, she would be back to her formerly vibrant, bright-eyed self. She hoped that she would be free of this fear of retribution, this overwhelming guilt that had consumed her. She reached out, touched Alice’s forehead, and closed her eyes, channeling all her energy into her friend.

“When you wake, you will be free of this pain.”

Alice’s head nodded, her red curls grazing her cheeks. Eliza smiled slightly, hoping she had done right by her friend.

“All right. We’re done,” Theresa said, her long, azure blue skirt swishing about her ankles as she turned. “Let’s get them upstairs.”

Helen placed her hands gently on Genevieve’s shoulders and turned her toward the stairs. Then she took Marilyn by the hand and walked her toward Genevieve. Marilyn went along, being led like a sleepwalking child. Helen lifted Marilyn’s right hand and placed it on Genevieve’s right shoulder. Catching on, Eliza set about helping form the chain. Lavender’s hand met Marilyn’s shoulder. Then Clarissa, then Alice, then Viola, then Bia, then Jane.

“I’ll take the front, and you girls take the rear,” Helen said. Then she walked to the front of the line, placed Genevieve’s hand on her own shoulder, and began to walk. Each of the sleeping girls stepped forward as her arm was tugged by the girl in front of her. The chain loped up the winding staircase in silence, never missing a step. Eliza and Theresa stayed behind on the floor of the temple for a moment, looking at each other in awe.

“That Helen really knows her magic,” Theresa said.

“Thank goodness,” Eliza replied. She took a deep breath and let it out, feeling relieved. If this spell worked, at least her friends would be released from their misery. That was something.

At the end of the chain, Jane started up the first step. Eliza looked around the temple and felt a pang of regret and nostalgia. What they had done here in this room had been exciting. It had opened up so many possibilities. But now, those possibilities were gone forever.

But this is a good thing,
she reminded herself.
Then, you looked forward to only happiness and innocent mischief, but look what misery you wrought. Those books are better left hidden.

“We’d better follow,” Theresa said, nodding toward the stairs.

Together they took one last look around their hallowed space. The pedestal and chairs still stood where they’d left them, looking so lonely and bare without the candles and the draping and the books. With one last sigh, Eliza reached for Theresa’s hand. The two girls turned as one and climbed the stairs. At the top, Theresa closed the door behind them, and Eliza turned the key with one final, resounding click.

“Never again,” Theresa said, looking Eliza in the eye.

Eliza slipped the key into the pocket of her dress, where it came to a rest, cold and heavy at her side.

“Never again.”

CAN’T GET ENOUGH OF THE BILLINGS GIRLS?

TURN THE PAGE FOR A SNEAK PEEK OF

THE NEXT PRIVATE NOVEL, COMING FEBRUARY
2011

I knocked on Noelle’s door in Pemberly Hall Friday morning, my eyes puffy and at half-mast—I hadn’t slept at all since we’d discovered the Book of Spells in the basement of the Billings Chapel. It took Noelle a moment to answer, and when she did, she grabbed my arm and pulled me inside.

“Wait. Reed just got here,” she said into her iPhone. “I’m putting you on speaker.”

Noelle placed the flat cell phone atop her dresser and stepped back. She wore a gray wool skirt that came halfway down her calves, paired with heeled black boots and a black ballet-neck sweater. Her dark brown hair was pulled back from her face on the sides, and her makeup was impeccably done, complete with fully lined eyes and lavender eye shadow.

Apparently
she
had slept. I pulled my navy cotton cardigan tighter around my wrinkled long-sleeved T-shirt and stifled a yawn.

“Girls?” Noelle’s grandmother’s voice came through the speaker loud and clear. Well,
our
grandmother’s voice, I corrected myself with a jolt. I had learned just a couple of days ago that Noelle and I were half sisters. “Girls, are you there?”

“We’re right here, Grandmother,” Noelle said, placing her hands on her hips.

“Reed?”

Noelle knocked me with her elbow.

“I’m here,” I croaked.

“Good. Noelle is a bit . . . out of sorts this morning,” Mrs. Lange said, sounding displeased. “Perhaps you can help me calm her down.”

“Calm me down?” Noelle blurted. “Like that’s gonna happen. You sent us out into the snow in the middle of the night to find the quote-unquote
key to our future
and what do we find? A book about witchcraft.” She went over to her bed and yanked the thick tome out from under a tangle of bed sheets and silk pajamas, holding it up as if her grandmother could see it. “Is that what you’re trying to tell us Gram? Really? That you think we’re witches? I’m sorry, but you’re either senile or really,
really
bored.”

I took the book from Noelle with two hands. Even though I agreed that last night had felt like a pointless practical joke, the book was still real. It had once belonged to Elizabeth Williams, one of the original Billings Girls, and was therefore a precious relic to me.

“Seriously, Grandmother, have you ever thought about taking up mah-jongg?” Noelle continued without pause. “I hear it really helps keep your faculties in order.”

“Noelle,” I scolded under my breath.

She widened her eyes at me. “
What
?”

Through the speakers, I heard Mrs. Lange take in a deep, patient breath. “Girls today are so skeptical and jaded. But you two—you have no idea the power you could wield.”

Noelle rolled her eyes.

“So . . . ?” I said slowly, hugging the book to my chest. “Are you saying that
you’ve
actually done witchcraft?”

“No,” she admitted. Noelle threw up her hands and turned away. She’d been away from school for almost two weeks and her Louis Vuitton rolling case was still open on the floor. She picked it up and turned it over, dumping the entire contents out on her gold and burgundy throw rug. “No one at Billings has practiced in a long time,” Mrs. Lange continued. “But the two of you . . . girls, you have no idea how powerful you could be, now that you’re together.”

I felt an odd chill go through me and I looked over at Noelle. She sorted through a pile of balled-up sweaters, crumpled socks, and tangles of necklaces, her fingers shaking slightly.

“The two of you have a unique opportunity here,” Mrs. Lange continued, oblivious to Noelle’s silent tantrum. “You might be able to fix certain things, set to right the unpleasant . . . situation that has arisen at Easton.”

Noelle stood up straight, her arms falling down at her sides, one hand clutching an Hermès scarf and the other the gold chain strap on a Gucci purse. We looked at one another and I knew we were thinking the same thing: The woman
was
senile. But then, I saw a flash of
movement behind Noelle, a blur of color against the stark white snow outside. Stepping over the pile of clothes at my feet, I carefully walked to the frost-laced window and peered out. There, across the quad at the desiccated site of the former Billings House—our former home—was group of people in long wool coats. I recognized the perfect posture of Headmaster Hathaway and the jet black curls of Demetria Rosewell, one of the more powerful Billings alums. They walked carefully around the jagged stone outline that was the footprint of the demolished building, along with a pair of men who pointed and jotted notes on clipboards, and bent their heads together in the bright sunshine.

I felt a familiar hollowing-out sensation in my gut. “What’s that about?” I whispered to Noelle.

“I don’t know,” Noelle replied, coming up behind me.

Chilling words coming from her, since normally she knew everything. Although lately, my know-it-all friend had dropped the ball more than once. The idea of her not always being in charge was going to take some getting used to. I turned and looked at the phone.

“Mrs. Lange?”

“Yes, Reed.”

“Do you mean . . .” I kept one eye on the group out the window, their feet sinking into the snow. “Do you mean that we might be able to bring Billings back?”

For the first time that morning, Noelle looked intrigued.

“Now you’re thinking, Reed.”