Legacy Of Magick (Legacy Of Magick Series, Book 1) (20 page)

As if my thoughts had conjured her up, Holly appeared in my doorway. Ivy showed up a moment later. When I asked them if they could find me some nails and a hammer, Ivy gave me a thumbs up and took off down stairs.

Which is why I found myself a half hour later, decorating my room by committee. The twins sat and sprawled on the big iron bed and offered suggestions on the placement and positioning of the botanical drawings. Holly sat considering the trio of drawings, while Ivy sprawled, her head hanging off the bed while she napped, or possibly meditated, upside down. Like a vampire bat.

Bran stopped in the open doorway. Apparently he was living on the edge, because he had deigned to unbutton his blazer and remove his tie. “Ah, here you are,” he crossed into the room, studying me as was about to hang up my large vintage botanical drawing of a rose, and held out a short stack of books. “These are for you to study. Hopefully these will bring you up to speed on protection magick.”

“Thanks.” I said as I stepped up on the step stool, and asked him to set the books on my dresser.

“If you have any questions, don’t be afraid to ask.” He suggested and then left.

Bran was certainly being nice to me tonight. Then again, he had said while we were eating dinner that he felt guilty he hadn’t known Drake was in his library.

“These are so nice.” Holly commented as she held the thick frames in her lap.

“They were my father’s.” I explained as I went to hang my next botanical illustration, this one of lavender.

From her sprawl on the big bed, Ivy announced I needed to move the nail up an inch before I hammered it in. I took a second look, she was right. I made the adjustment, and realized, as I looked over my shoulder at her to say thanks, that she still had her eyes closed. Creepy.

“Stop showing off Ivy,” Holly poked at her dark haired sister.

“I’m gifted, what can I say?” Ivy replied with a drawn out sigh.

They certainly were. It was hard not to feel disadvantaged. I looked over at the new stack of books, courtesy of Bran, and hoped I would find the time between my grad school classes to give them the attention they deserved. After today, protection magick was a priority.

I went to hang the third image, this one of yarrow, then stood back and studied the results. I had always loved these old botanical drawings. They had hung in my father’s office at home for as long as I could remember. It seemed right that they come with me. As it turned out, the room I now called my own, had once belonged to my father. So it was kind of a full circle that the botanical drawings hung back on these walls now.

Gwen knocked on the doorframe and I invited her into my room. When she saw the art on the walls, she went very still. “I haven’t seen those in a long time.”

“Really?” I folded up the step stool. “Dad always had them in his office at home.”

“Do you know who the artist was?” Gwen asked me.

“Ah... No.” I confessed

“Your great grandmother, Esther.”

Oh. After the big talk downstairs, I looked at them a bit more carefully. I had always figured dad liked them because he was a landscaper. Knowing they had belonged to his grandmother, made them seem even more important. “I’m going to go out on a limb here.” I said. “I’m betting great grandma Esther was a Witch, too?”

“Well, of course.” Gwen answered me patiently. “I want to show you girls something. Give me a minute.” I exchanged looks with the twins as Gwen left. A few moments later my aunt was back with a thick oversized album. She moved over to the bed, and Ivy ditched her vampire bat routine and sat up at attention. The three of us gathered around as she opened the album.

In the album were ten botanical style illustrations of various herbs, trees, and flowers. “These were drawn and then water colored by your great grandmother.” Gwen explained as she reverently went through the images. They were lovely. All of the botanical drawings or paintings were slightly faded, but that only made them more attractive. I also discovered that on the bottom of each painting, there were notes.

The handwriting was neat and feminine and still legible. I leaned closer and saw that the notes were actually the astrological associations and magickal properties of each plant. Then I observed that each painting was signed and dated between the years 1925 and 1926. The watercolors were almost one hundred years old! As a student of museum sciences, my first thought was for conservation.

“Please tell me those album pages are an archival type of acid free paper.” I said.

“Oh my god.” Ivy rolled her eyes. “You sound
exactly
like Bran right now. Do you realize that?”

I ignored her. I double checked the position of the framed drawings on my wall. They would be out of direct sunlight where they hung and that relieved me. I walked over closer and noted that my three seemed to be in a similar condition to the remaining ten illustrations that were in the album. Also, as mine were matted, if there were any witchy notes at the bottom of the picture, it would have been covered up by the matting and oversized frame.

“So I have the rose, lavender and yarrow...” I thought about it. “What other plants did she draw?”

Gwen started at the beginning of the album and listed them off. “We have: day lily, verbena, viola, foxglove, belladonna, rowan, apple tree, elder, holly, and ivy.”

I added them up. “So originally, they were a set of thirteen illustrations of magickal plants. The three that Dad had, and the ten that remained in the album.”

“Thirteen is a magickal number. Do you remember why?” Gwen asked me.

“Because there are thirteen lunar cycles in a year.”

Holly smiled down at the page of the drawn holly plant. “Mom, could we have the holly and ivy illustrations framed for our room?”

“That’d be cool.” Ivy said thoughtfully as she studied the album.

“We certainly could.” Gwen agreed with the girls. “I’ll see about having it done so the drawings are protected and preserved as much as possible.”

Ivy studied the notes at the bottom of the illustration of the plant that shared her name. “Do we have the astrological associations and notes from these pages written down and recorded somewhere?”

“Yes,” Gwen said. “My mother, your Grandma Rose, recorded them. I have her notes in the family’s herbal grimoire.”

“Is that the big green book, in the collection?” Holly asked, referring to the secret stash in Bran’s closet.

Gwen nodded in confirmation and then said. “These paintings are magickal not only for the talent and love Esther imbued in her work, but also because your great grandmother noted that she used an herbal wash of each of the featured plants mixed in with her watercolors.”

Well that was a clever bit of witchery
, I thought, as I looked with a new appreciation at the trio of drawings that now hung above my bed.

Later that night as I tried to unwind in my room, I looked up at the old botanical illustrations that now hung over my head and thought about family. What I knew about my family — and what I didn’t.

Why had my father taken three of those old illustrations with him, when he left Missouri? He’d had them framed, effectively covering up the magickal information, yet they had been in his home office for as long as I could remember. Had he stolen these as well, just as Rebecca had confessed that he and David had stolen the grimoire from old man Drake? Aunt Gwen seemed surprised to see the illustrations again. If she had given them to him— wouldn’t she have said so?

Thinking back to my childhood, I had to wonder how well I even knew my parents. My father had bound my powers, and, apparently, had sticky fingers when it came to magickal items. Not to mention that my mother had always been upset at any talk of psychic ability or the occult. While my father may have given up the Craft, there were little bits and pieces of magick that had been hidden in plain sight in our
new
life. Only I hadn’t been able to see it.

Which brought my musings back to my mother in New Hampshire. Beside an occasional text about my classes at the university, we hadn’t spoken in weeks. Knowing what I knew now, I started to understand why she had been so bent out of shape about me moving here to go to grad school. I wondered if she knew about my father stealing that grimoire. And if she did, would she know where he and his friend had hidden it? I looked over at the clock and figured it would be after eleven east coast time. Would she still be awake? Then I grinned. I could find out if she was awake, easy enough.

I closed my eyes and focused The Sight on my mother. I visualized our house in New Hampshire, and, as I did, a vision washed over me.
I saw her sitting on her back patio, sipping white wine with a few candles flickering on the table beside her. Then she turned, smiled, and laughed with someone.
My perspective on the vision shifted.
Now I saw a man with dark hair, run his hand possessively up my mother’s arm. He tugged her forward and began to unbutton her plum colored cardigan. I saw him brush aside an ornate crucifix necklace, as he moved in to kiss my mother’s throat.

With a pop, the vision was suddenly gone, and I sat straight up in bed, and my stomach lurched. Oh god, how embarrassing! I had not expected to
see
that! Then I realized that in addition to the shock of seeing my mother make out with some guy... that I had never seen my mother drink in my entire life. White wine on the patio, late at night? Also, she absolutely hated candles and had never allowed them to be burned in the house, or even on the patio, when I was growing up.

I had always figured she was paranoid about fire, but maybe that was a hold over from my father’s legacy of magick. Maybe, to her, it was a reminder of
spell candles
. Like all of the spell candles in Aunt Gwen’s shop?

But besides all of that, I sure as hell did not like the idea of some strange man putting the moves on my ultra conservative mother. It simply boggled my mind. I scrambled for my phone, and waited, impatiently, for her to answer.

She answered, slightly out of breath, “Hello?”

“Hi Mom.” I said, refusing to think about why it took so long for her to answer the house phone.

“Autumn! Well this is a surprise.”

She didn’t sound like it was a happy surprise, “Sorry to interrupt your evening. But I need to ask you something.”

“No. There is nothing to interrupt. I was... sitting in the living room and reading a book.” She sounded nervous, and very unlike herself.

With a flash of insight I knew that the man was standing there with her, and listening in on our conversation. That combined with her lying to me, made me a little angry. “Who’s your friend?”

“What? What are you talking about?” She laughed again, and it was high pitched and strained.

“I’m talking about the dark haired man you were having a glass of wine with, out on the back patio. The one who’s standing there with you, right now.”

She was silent for a good four seconds. “You have always had an overactive imagination.”

I managed to keep my tone light at the insult, and I even chuckled. “Mom my imagination isn’t that good. And by the way, tell that guy to keep his hands to himself.”

“Stop that,” she said, clearly angry. She had always hated it if I talked about, or displayed any psychic ability around her. “I don’t know where you come up with these things.”

I really hadn’t called to pick a fight with my mother, but damned if we weren’t heading towards one anyway. “It wasn’t my imagination that saw you drinking wine by candle light a moment ago.” She said nothing, so I continued. “You’re wearing a new necklace. A fancy silver crucifix. You have on that plum colored cardigan I gave you for your birthday last year. The cardigan that he just unbuttoned.” I heard her breathing go ragged. “I didn’t
come up with
that one. Did I Mom?”

“Stop it, Autumn.” She whispered shakily into the phone.

I took a deep breath and tried again. “Listen, I’m sorry. I do
not
want to fight with you. Your private life is truthfully, none of my business. The reason I called, was to ask for your help.”

“Why do you need my help?” She sounded confused.

“Tell me what happened around the time my grandparents died. I need to know what you remember.”

“That’s best buried and forgotten.” She snapped at me.

“Well, it’s time to dig it up.” I shot back. So much for not arguing.

“Your father promised me... No.” She said, her voice stronger. “Not ever again, do you hear me, Autumn Rose Bishop? I won’t talk about that horrible time of my life. Not again and not at all.”

“Mom, this is important. Do you remember anything about Dad and David Quinn taking an antique book called the Blood Moon Grimoire? Do you know where that is?” I pressed on.

“Honestly, what nonsense are you talking about, now?”

“You can drop the act Mom. I know about the legacy of magick. I know that Dad was a Witch.” I heard her start to sob, but I kept going. “I know that Dad tried to bind my powers.” Tears ran down my own face as I pleaded with her. “For once in my life, tell me the truth! Explain to me what happened, and why.”

“Autumn, you have to let this go. For the love of god, promise me. Leave it be.”

I heard a man speaking in the background. Lover boy, no doubt. I tried to calm down, and to get through to her one more time. “Mom, this is important. I really do need your help.”

“That’s enough from you, young lady.” Said an unfamiliar voice.

“Who is this?” I demanded, even though I knew. It was the dark haired man that I saw in my vision.

“Your own mother may be afraid of you, but I am not. I suggest that you go to church. You need to repent for your evil ways, girl.”

I’ve said it before; sarcasm is one of my super powers. Having heard that unbelievable suggestion, from the faceless mother-grabbing bastard, I let my super power off the chain. “That’s big talk from the guy who is getting my mother liquored up, so he can peel her out of her cardigan.”

“In the name of Jesus, I rebuke you!”

Call me psychic, but that was the last thing I expected. “Are you freaking kidding me?” I said to him.
What kind of person actually talks like that?