After the Summerland (The Witches of Spring Hill Book 1) (20 page)

“Mostly, Aunt Selene,”
Brianna answers honestly.

“So if she didn’t
explain to you about the Summerland, what did you think was the purpose of all
this? Of life?” Chloe asks Cian.

“I guess I never really
thought about what the purpose is, instead I was just focusing on how to do the
things I’ve learned without considering why I am doing it,” Cian answers
honestly.

Xavier sits quietly
listening to the conversation going on around him, taking in everything being
said. Hearing that everything he does in this lifetime will affect his next
reincarnation, he can’t help but reflect on some of the things his aunt has
made him do. Fortunately, it has not gotten to the point where he has hurt
anyone; but the lies he has told, the way he casts spells to manipulate minds… that can’t be good.

“But how can you live a
fulfilled life without purpose? How will you grow and learn in this incarnation
if you don’t even know that there is a deeper meaning behind your being here?”
Rowan asks. She’s surprised that their aunt Selene hadn’t told them the most
important part of their existence, the part that resonated with her the
deepest.

Brianna says,
defensively, “How can we live a fulfilled life when we are just trying to
survive living with our aunt?”

Everyone is quiet as
they think about the implications of what Brianna said. Finally Kaiden says,
“That’s why we want to get to know you guys. We want to help.”

“And we want to protect
ourselves from whatever your aunt is planning,” Chloe adds, surprising them all
with what she implies in that statement.

Before giving them a
chance to reply, she moves on quickly telling them about the clearing, which is
what makes their land so sacred, the books and grimoires left for them and all the
history it explains, and what little they know about their own abilities. She
explains that so far she is the only one of the three of them to start showing
her abilities. Before she can continue, Kaiden interrupts and explains that
actually he has started to as well. He doesn’t go into detail so Chloe refrains
from explaining what she has discovered about herself since spending time with
Cian. When she finally finishes, she looks around at everyone and waits for
someone to reply.

Xavier surprises
everyone when he is the first to speak. He explains that up until recently, he
has just been doing whatever his Aunt Selene has been telling him to do. She teaches
him how to cast spells and oftentimes, he doesn’t understand why she wants him
do something. Though lately he is finding clarity, which has made him question
his actions more. He has decided it has something to do with this town, and more
specifically this land.

Brianna, surprised and encouraged
by Xavier’s honesty all night, explains that she, too, has just been following
her Aunt Selene’s orders, but the one thing her aunt didn’t teach her, which is
her own, is her intuition about other people. She explains how her abilities
are getting stronger and besides understanding someone’s intentions, she can
now hear people’s thoughts, just like her Aunt Selene, apparently.

“Ahem,” Kaiden says,
clearing his throat, “Have you heard any of my thoughts?” he asks nervously.

Brianna smiles shyly at
Kaiden and instead of telling him that there must be some spell protecting
them, which is the truth, she teasingly says, “Yes. Yes, I have, and I
definitely want to hear more.”

Kaiden blushes and
looking directly at Brianna sends one clear thought directly to her that she
can’t miss: ‘I can’t stop thinking about you.’ She blushes in return and lowers
her eyes from the intensity in his.

Cian says teasing,
“Okay, you two… Really? Inappropriate. Pull yourselves together.”

Brianna replies, “Oh
please, Cian. I know you’re not talking. No one said anything when you and
Chloe made eyes at each other for like ten minutes. Acting like no one else was
even in the room. Whatever.”

Xavier looks over at
Rowan and shaking his head says, “They are obnoxious.” She can’t help but
laugh, and he leans back in his chair and raises his eyebrows, “Whoa, did
we
just have a moment?” She laughs
again, feeling good as she lets go of her obstinance.

“Okay, okay,”
Cian
says, moving on. “My abilities are also getting
stronger. I have always been able to see a little into the future, but since
we’ve been here, I am able to see further than I ever have before and I can pick
up emotions as well as actual events. I can sense whether something will be
good or bad and can make decisions based on the feeling I get.”

Chloe gasps, “That’s
one of my abilities, too, but I only get my visions after I sleep.”

“That’s how mine
started, too, Chloe. You’ll see that eventually it will get so you can simply
close your eyes and a vision will come to you on command,” Cian explains.

To Chloe, that
statement makes all the risk of having them at the house worth it. We are being
honest and we are learning from each other, the way I saw it was going to be,
she thinks to herself.

Noticing that Rowan
hasn’t said anything about her abilities and the way she is just looking around
at them, Xavier asks, “What about you, Rowan? What are your abilities?”

She leans back in her
chair and crosses her arms over her chest. “I don’t know, I mean, nothing has
happened, yet,” she replies, unable to hide the disappointment from her voice.

“Mine took a while,
too,” Brianna says. “Both Xavier and Cian started right away and gradually
built up their abilities, but mine came in all at once and have only been
getting stronger since I’ve been here. The same will probably happen to you.”

Rowan nods, relieved
that Brianna went through something similar. She was surprised to hear that
Kaiden’s abilities are manifesting too, leaving her as the only one of the six
of them who is not showing any signs of special abilities.

“Thanks,” she says to
Brianna, grateful to her for putting her mind at ease. “I’m relieved that it’s
not totally weird that I haven’t shown anything yet.”

Brianna smiles in
return, “No worries. I know how you feel. I hated that they were all gifted and
I wasn’t. It’ll happen for you, though.” Looking at Kaiden she asks, “So,
what’s your ability, Kaiden?”

Looking uncomfortable,
he says, “Um, well, I can’t see into the future or anything like that, but I
just learned I can do this…” and pointing toward the hearth he waves his
hand and suddenly the smoldering log becomes a roaring fire.

“Whoa!” Xavier and Cian
say at the same time.

“Fire is your element,”
Brianna says, in awe of his gift.

“Kaiden! When did you
discover that?” Chloe asks, shocked.

“When I lit the candles
and fire tonight,” Kaiden replies. “I was just as shocked as all of you!”

“Ok, so now that we’ve
told each other everything about ourselves, what about your Aunt?” Chloe asks.

“I don’t even want to
talk about her,” Brianna says. “I feel like just talking about her will wake
her up.”

“I agree,” Xavier says.
“Let’s just say that her abilities are very strong. She’s mastered all of the
elements, she has several psychic abilities, and she has a hard-on for your
land.”

“What do you mean,
Xavier?” Liam asks, catching the last part of what he said.

“Mister Alexander, sir,
excuse me, sir.” Xavier says, not wanting to be caught speaking like that in
front of him.

“It’s Liam, Xavier, and
it’s fine. Why is your aunt so interested in our land?” Liam asks.

“Honestly, we don’t
know,” Cian answers. “We just know that she moved us here because she wanted to
buy this house. She was going to offer you money until she found out you were
the chief of police, and then, for some reason, she wanted us to get to know
you better so that we could come between you.”

Liam thinks about that
for a moment, wondering what would make someone want to break up a family.
Interrupting his thoughts, Brianna says, “Things are getting weird with her.
She’s even more moody and more aggressive than usual.”

Xavier adds, “She’s
becoming more dangerous. We were all shocked when Chloe told us what she did to
them in the car. And, even though I knew beforehand she was going to Peter’s
house, I swear I didn’t know she was going to do what she did. She implied that
she had an appointment with him, but nothing about this makes sense. I don’t
know why she would cast a spell on him and I don’t even want to think about what
she was planning to do to you guys the other night in the car. I’ve actually
wondered what stopped her from going further since she is obviously out of
control.”

“It might have been the
protection spell,” Chloe says. “The night after we discovered we were witches,
we cast a spell out at the clearing and that night as she seemed about to run
us off the road, I held my necklace and repeated the spell. Then just as
suddenly as she approached, she backed off.”

“That has to be it,”
Xavier says. “You need to keep it up, all of you. When she wants something, she
won’t stop until she gets it.”

The room goes quiet as
everyone absorbs what has been said, but the fire popping brings everyone back
to the moment. Liam says, “I better get you back to town before it gets much
later.”

Looking at the clock on
the wall, they quickly say their goodbyes, suddenly aware of the risk they took
tonight to be here. Cian promises Chloe he’ll text her as soon as he gets home
and tells her not to worry. The mood is much more somber departing than it was
when they were arriving.

As Xavier, Cian, and
Brianna walk out the door, Chloe remembers the rosemary. “Wait!” she calls and
runs out the door after them with the flashlight. In the garden, she picks four
sprigs of rosemary and runs back to the jeep. She hands one to each of them,
“For protection,” she says, before she runs back into the house.

Most of the drive back
to town is quiet, with each of them in their own thoughts until Liam breaks the
silence by thanking them for telling him about their aunt. He promises that if
they have any trouble with her, he will do whatever is needed to help them. Liam
reluctantly drops them back off at the school. He hates leaving them to walk the
three blocks home alone this late at night, so doing his civic duty, he parks a
block from their house and watches for them to come down the street.

Their house looks dark,
which hopefully means Selene won’t realize they were out. He is relieved when he
finally sees them walking down the street. He waits a few moments longer just
to make sure they get in the house, but he loses sight of them when they walk
around to the back and go through the wooden gate.

No longer able to see them,
he drives home thinking about the note left at Gramps’ house and what he
learned from Xavier tonight about Selene’s wanting the house and land. He puts
the two together and for a moment, he wonders if, for some reason, Selene thinks
the land belongs to her. How can that be? Liam thinks to himself and starts
working through other possible scenarios in his mind.

On the walk home, Xavier
concocted a story just in case Selene was awake. They agreed to say that they
went to a party at Tyler White’s house, but since they didn’t have a clue where
he lived, they hoped she wouldn’t be awake so they wouldn’t have to answer
any questions. Brianna tells Xavier to think of his mind
as a steel trap and reminds him that as soon as they get in the house she’ll
give him the amulet he needs to keep Selene from reading his mind.

The house is dark and
quiet from the outside and they soundlessly make their way onto the back deck.
Just as Xavier is about to pull the sliding glass door open, he notices the red
light blinking on the alarm pad in the kitchen.

“Damn!” he whispers, “The alarm is set. We’re screwed.”

“What are we going to do?” Brianna whispers back.

“I don’t know. Did anyone happen to leave their window unlocked?” Xavier asks.

Both Brianna and Cian shake their heads.

“I just want to be back in that warm kitchen,” Brianna says. “It’s so cold out here.”

“Well, going back is not an option,” Xavier says.

They nearly climb out
of their skin when, out of the darkness, Selene steps and
asks
,
“Where would you like to go back to, dear Brianna?” Without waiting for an answer,
she asks, “Where the hell have you three been?”

Xavier says, “Jeez,
Aunt Selene, you scared us half to death!”

“I’ll only ask one more
time… Where. Have. You. Been?”

“We went to a party.
This kid from school, Tyler, was having a party and we thought it would be a
good way to get some information,” Xavier responds.

“So why didn’t you tell
me about the party earlier?” Selene asks.

“Can we go in and talk
about this, Aunt Selene? I’m freezing,” Brianna says.

The slap came so fast and
hard that no one was able to react until it was too late. Brianna fell back
against the railing, hitting her head on the brick wall.

“What the hell, Aunt
Selene?” Cian asks as he reaches out to help his sister up. “Why are you
freaking out?”

“Why am I ‘freaking’ out? Why
am I freaking out
!?!
” Selene asks. “You’re kidding,
right? I wake up to find the three of you gone. No note, no text, no call —
nothing. Then when I ask where you were, I get lies.”

“We’re not lying, Aunt
Selene. We went to a party. That’s all. I got a text about it at 7:30 and you
were already asleep. We didn’t want to wake you and we didn’t think it would be
a big deal,” Xavier says.

“I might be more
inclined to believe you if you didn’t smell like rosemary. Why do you have
rosemary on you?” Selene asks.

“Obviously not for
protection from you,” Brianna responds sarcastically, holding the back of her
head.

“Don’t push me, little
girl. Don’t push me,” Selene threatens.