Witch Fire (34 page)

Authors: Laura Powell

BOOK: Witch Fire

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‘It wasn’t his fault. We can’t be responsible for our parents’ actions.’

Tears sparked in Glory’s eyes. Nothing was making sense.

Edie made as if to put out her hand, then thought better of it. ‘You’re right,’ she said slowly, carefully.
‘
The Inquisition treated me, and others like me, with ruthlessness and contempt. But even though I owed them no loyalty, I knew Endor was the bigger threat, just as it is today. I did my duty. And then I found I liked the responsibility, I relished the challenge. So when I had the chance to do bigger, better things – take bigger risks – I took it.’

‘
No
. You couldn’t have chosen. You was
forced
.’

‘At first, perhaps. Later, I got free of the Inquisition, free of Endor. I swore to myself that I would never be at anyone’s beck and call again. But there was no going back.’

‘Why not? What – what about your old life? What about me and Dad?’

‘My life before . . . I tried to make it work. I really did. I resented the covens’ expectations – all the intrigue about my mother’s legacy – and Patrick was the only person who understood. He was so kind and gentle; so easily contented. I thought he could make me like that too, but –’

‘I get it. We weren’t enough.’ Glory didn’t try to keep the bitterness from her voice. Auntie Angel had been right, after all.
The kind that always leaves, never looks back
.

‘
I
wasn’t enough. I didn’t know how to be a wife, let alone a mother. Your gran had a talent for lots of things; parenthood wasn’t one of them. I never knew my dad. His identity changed from one of Cora’s stories to the next. And they were always great stories, full of craziness and colour, and unhappy endings. Like my mother herself.

‘I told myself I’d come back for you, when you were older. It was the only way I could live with myself, at first. But the childhood I had – assignations, midnight flits, border crossings . . . I didn’t want that for you. I didn’t want to pass on that kind of damage. I thought it would be easier for you, for everyone, if I disappeared. You could start over without me.’

‘Quite some vanishing act. Not so much as a hexing Christmas card in twelve hexing years.’ The words scorched her throat. ‘Growing up in Cooper Street weren’t exactly a picnic, you know. It broke Dad’s heart when you went. Angeline . . . she’s half-mad. She hates everyone, including me now. Drunks and loonies and mobsters – that’s the family you left me to.’

‘It was still better,’ said Edie, ‘than anything I could give.’ She bowed her head.

Glory drew a shaky breath. ‘I kept having this dream . . . of the Burning Court . . . sometimes it was me on the stake, sometimes it was you. For years, I thought the Inquisition might’ve got you. And then, yesterday – with Rose – watching her, watching me –’ She swallowed painfully. ‘Well. I guess you did save me, in the end.’

Edie made a small tentative movement. Then she placed her hand, very carefully, on Glory’s. Her head was still bowed. ‘I’m sorry I’m not what you were looking for. But you have grown into everything I could have hoped.’

Glory had to take a couple of moments to control herself. Blindly, she fixed her gaze on the blur of green on the other side of the ravine. Her eyes and throat throbbed and stung. She knotted her hand with her mother’s, so tightly they both shook. One more step across an impossible distance.

Glory was the first to move her hand free. Her mother’s face was wet with tears, which she wiped away neatly and resolutely, though they kept falling.

Finally, Glory asked, ‘You like it here? You’re happy?’

‘I’ve made a life for myself,’ Edie replied, after a pause. ‘And now – well. Senator Vargas has asked for my help. An intermediary got in touch this morning.’

‘Back in the presidential race already! That were quick.’

‘Cordoba needs a strong leader, a man of integrity, if Endor is to be kept out.’ Edie’s cool efficiency had already started to return. This time, though, Glory could see the effort it took.
‘
The fact Vargas has reached out to me is a good sign. He knows he needs to unite the country.’

‘So he wants La Bruja Blanca’s endorsement.’

‘He wants my advice. To restore order, he’ll need to establish an Inquisition of some kind. And if he could be persuaded to appoint witches to senior roles within it, we could perhaps create a new kind of security agency.’

‘An Inquisition led by
witches
?’

‘It’s just an idea.’ She shrugged. ‘I haven’t agreed to anything yet. I’m not sure I can. After so long in the wilderness, of being an outsider, I don’t really know how to come in. To stop . . . resisting.’

‘I find it hard too.’

‘You’re very young,’ Edie said quietly.
‘
Too young to turn your back on the everyday world, or cut yourself off from its people. My mistakes shouldn’t be yours.’

At that, Glory lifted her chin. Her face was calm, her smile fearless. ‘Don’t worry. They won’t.’

Epilogue

The two runners on the roof were barely visible in the evening light. The sky was low and grey, except for a burst of gold at the horizon. In the street below, a child gaped and pointed. ‘Look!’ he said to his mother. ‘Sky-witches!’

The woman frowned and pulled the child along hurriedly. Soon the sky-leapers were out of sight, the fluorescent Ws on the back of their uniforms ducking and weaving through the dusk. Autumn had brought a chill in the air and their breath plumed like smoke. So far from the ground, they were conscious only of their own sharp gasps, the thump of their feet on slate, brick and stone.

It had been an even race, but now the boy was drawing ahead. In one smooth bound, he flew across the gap between the dome of a library and a neighbouring bank. When the girl landed after him, he caught her in his arms.

They were both pink-cheeked, panting. Lucas pushed the hood back over Glory’s head. Her hooped earrings were tangled in her hair. Her eyes flashed. He tugged the neck of her T-shirt, touched the dark kiss-mark under her collarbone.

‘Witch,’ he said, smiling.

Smiling, she slid her hands up his back, to the secret spot under his shoulder blade. ‘Witch,’ she said.

The rooftops were a different country. Hand in hand, they walked to the edge of a parapet and surveyed their kingdom.

Lucas sighed. ‘I don’t want to come down.’

‘We mustn’t be late,’ said Glory. ‘It’s the first time Dad’s had a birthday party since he were a kid. And I can’t leave all the preparations to Peggy.’

Lucas knew she had received a letter from Edie yesterday. The letters weren’t frequent, and they didn’t say much, but they still came. Patrick had had his own letter, a long one, soon after they returned to London.

‘How’s he doing?’

‘Good. Yeah. Makes me think I maybe underestimated him all this time. He don’t need protecting, not the way I thought.’

‘You make a good minder, all the same.’ He squeezed her hand.

‘Reckon we both do. “Starling & Stearne: No Witchcrime Too Large.” Remember?’

‘I’d say “Stearne & Starling” has a better ring to it.’

She laughed. ‘You wish. Come on, then – I’ll race you.’

They ran on. Over walls, down slopes, across chasms. Sometimes one was ahead, sometimes the other, leaping effortlessly through the dark.

Acknowledgements

A writer’s equivalent of a witches’ coven is her editorial team. And so I would like to thank my agent, Sarah Molloy, my editor, Emma Matthewson, and Emma Bradshaw, Isabel Ford and Diana Hickman at Bloomsbury.

www.laurapowellauthor.com

Also by Laura Powell

Burn Mark

Bloomsbury Publishing, London, New Delhi, New York and Sydney

First published in Great Britain in April 2013 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

This electronic edition published in April 2013 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

50 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3DP

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