I looked deeply into his blue eyes, trying to see the old Oliver, the one who Grace had unintentionally excised on our table. His confidence, maybe even callousness, had all but evaporated. I sensed that the Oliver I’d known was gone, and although part of me would miss him, I suspected that my uncle might become a better man now that he’d been freed of the secret he had been carrying all these years. “Will Jilo let you stay now that Ginny’s gone?”
“Fuck Jilo,” Oliver stated flatly. “And fuck any deals she made with Ginny. I’m not denying I’m guilty, but after last night, I think I’ve sure as hell served my sentence.” He grabbed the ax and punctuated his statement with a quick whack at a large chunk of the table.
“You seem to have this under control,” I said. “I guess I’ll leave you to it.”
“All right then,” he said, but as I started to leave, he called out after me. “Gingersnap, that wood you have in your pocket…” he said, and I felt the blood rush hot to my cheeks, as hot as the fire popping in the barrel. “No,” he said. “It’s okay; I’d say I owe you at least that much after last night. Just take it up to your room for now, and I’ll be up later to show you how to use it right. Don’t try anything till I’ve shown you, okay?”
“Yes,” I responded, my eyes dropping guiltily to the ground. I couldn’t bring myself to look him in the eye. I turned on my heel and fled through the kitchen door. I heard Oliver chuckling as he tossed another bit of wood into the can. His laughter sounded truly happy.
TWENTY-TWO
By lunchtime, Iris and Connor had returned, having purchased a new kitchen table and chairs that would be delivered in the afternoon. The air was thick with awkwardness. Iris walked in with her head hanging low, her arms pulled tightly against her sides as if she were afraid of bumping into things. Connor was still angry, smarting from having been hogtied and gagged by his own wife, even though she’d been under Grace’s control at the time. Ellen had found him naked in a closet, a sock duct taped in his mouth.
Connor opened a cabinet and grabbed a glass, then slammed the cabinet shut. The remaining glasses rattled against each other. He yanked open the refrigerator and poured himself a sweet tea. He tried to slam the refrigerator door too, but the insulation strip muffled his tirade. He made no attempt to hide the fact that he blamed Iris for the whole situation, glaring at her between each gulp of his tea. Iris clearly blamed herself too; she stayed quiet and braced herself against the counter by the sink, staring blankly out the window. I went over and wrapped my arm around her shoulders, but she pulled away.
“I knew the risk I was taking when I laid hands on Ginny. Especially after you…” Iris stopped short.
“After I what?”
She and Connor looked at each other. “Are you gonna answer her, or do you want me to?” her husband asked, slamming his glass onto the counter. Tea splashed everywhere, and Iris reached for a towel and began dabbing at it without even looking up at us.
I had almost stopped waiting for a response when she turned to me and said, “Your reaction when you found Ginny was rather intense. Your distress destabilized the energies I needed for my reading, and I knew it. I also knew that in all probability you wouldn’t be strong enough to help ground me, to help keep anything from getting into this world.” She paused. “Into me. Connor tried to stop me from doing it, but I wouldn’t listen.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t know. I just reacted.”
“Don’t blame yourself, sweet girl. None of this is your fault. I’m responsible for everything that happened here yesterday.” I tried to pull her into my arms, but she wouldn’t allow it. “I don’t deserve your comfort,” she said, shrugging off my embrace.
“You sure as hell don’t,” Connor replied. He grabbed the newspaper off the counter and stomped out of the room, hitting the kitchen door hard enough that it swung back and forth three or four times before settling itself closed.
“Well God save us all from getting what we deserve,” I said, loudly enough for him to hear me. I hugged my aunt anyway. Her body felt different to me today, as if a certain frailness had crept into her bones.
“Amen,” Emmet said, stepping in through the door to the backyard, which was still open.
“Bless you, baby,” Iris said to me and then fled from the room, her face lined with tears.
“She’ll be fine,” Emmet said. “She made a mistake, a huge mistake, but nothing we were not able to rectify. Your family is careless, impulsive when using their powers. They are weak and emotional.”
“Yeah, well thank you for your input,” I said. Whatever my family was, we had been through enough, and the last thing we needed was the criticism of someone who had once been a pile of dust.
“We don’t mean to anger you,” Emmet said. “The fault does not lie with your family. The fault lies with us. An anchor should cultivate the witches around them. Help the weaker powers to grow and learn to function responsibly. Instead of offering guidance and light, Ginny created an atmosphere of darkness. She kept your family weak and you ignorant. In so doing, she failed you all, and we failed you by not seeing that earlier. We are here to rectify these wrongs.”
“What about Grace?” I asked.
“The spirit will not be able to return,” he said. “She can either move on to the next realm or she can remain in the shadows of Savannah as an angry spirit. The choice is hers. But she will not be able to break through and make another attack on Oliver or anyone else in your family.” Emmet closed his eyes and broke into a discordant inner discourse—I’d never get used to that as long as I lived. After a few unnerving moments he looked at me. “We have spoken to Oliver,” he said and held his large hand out to me. “Show us the remnant of wood that you claimed.” I obeyed him without even giving it a single thought, reaching into the pocket of my cutoff sweatpants and handing him the scrap of wood. He hadn’t compelled me to do it, I simply did.
“Glamour and persuasion,” he said as he turned the piece in his hand. The splinter’s sharp edges rounded as he touched them, leaving the piece perfectly smooth. “Those are Oliver’s strong suits, and for a brief while they will be yours too.”
Oliver appeared in the open doorway, as if he had been called by name. He took the piece from Emmet’s hand, and held it silently for a few moments before placing it in my palm. It was warm, and it gave off a tingling sensation. As I watched, three symbols etched themselves onto its face.
“Gebo shows that I have given this to you freely,” Oliver explained, “for stealing power comes with a consequence that I could not bear to see you pay. Uruz, here,” he said, pointing at the second symbol, “has the double meaning that it is my power that I am giving, and that it is within my rights to do so. The last one is Dagaz, and it limits the time the power is available to you to one day. And with that, a share of my powers are yours. Your buddy Emmet here will explain the rest,” he said. “Don’t do most of the things I’ve done with them,” he added and went back outside.
The tingling moved from my hand through my arm and then dispersed in a blink throughout the rest of my body. My knees went weak, and I started to tumble forward, but Emmet caught me in his arms before I could even blink. I righted myself and stepped away from him. I had never felt so powerful or so lost. I had dreamed all my life about having a day, just a single day, to know what it felt like to be Maisie. To have the world at my fingertips. And here I was stumbling around in the kitchen without a clue what to do with the power now that I had it.