Leather and Sage (Willow Moss and Kindling Book 1) Read online

The petals are gray, gray like Mother’s eyes had been with the spirit at her mind. The leaves are red as the life that spilled from her throat. It peeks out from where the knife sliced through.

  “This the flower to protect us?” Horror peels Beatrice’s lips back.

  “No,” the Matron snaps. “This is the flower to destroy us.”

  “What you mean?” I snarl at her. “What you mean this flower gon’ destroy us? You said it would save all the witches! You said Mother’s sacrifice would bring us protection from the spirits.” Venom coats my voice as I spit out the words.

  The Matron’s face remains placid. She looks down at me like I’m a child in need of discipline. I ain’t a child. My gaze snaps to the rest of the Blackwoods. They all glare at the flower sticking out Mother’s throat with furled lips and crinkled noses. I want to gouge they eyes out so they cain’t look at her like she a disappointment.

  I turn on the Matron, her beady gaze and flat cheeks fuel to my anger. “This be on you. Whatever you’ve created, whatever it gon’ do to destroy us, you is to blame. Not my mother, not our clan, but you. Now go, and never come back.”

  Beatrice grabs my forearm, eyes cowed wide. “Miriam,” she snarls at me, “what you doing? You cain’t send them ’way. We still need them!”

  I yank free from her. Need them for what? What they done but trample over us and control the way we live? They’ll not step foot in the Orchard ’gain, so long as I breathe. I lift my chin to Beatrice and turn to the Blackwoods, my gaze a curse on theirs.

  “Matron, Leader of the Coven, Matriarch of the Blackwoods, you are fors—”

  “Miriam!” Beatrice shrieks. She rushes forward like she’s gon’ put her palm over my mouth, but I push her ’way. “My mother was Matriarch of the Orchard, and now she’s dead, that title belongs to me. The Ancestor’s already gave they assent,” I hurl at her.

  Beatrice whimpers but don’t say nothing more. When I turn ’round, the Matron glowers at me, her hands clasped in front of her like she might smack me with them.

  “Think on what you’re about to do, Miriam Hallivard of the Orchard Clan. Though you’re not Matriarch yet, should you assume the title this vow will be taken as an oath. Do you want to isolate your witches from us? Will they ever forgive you, assuming they survive the spirits?”

  I think on the other families, all of them no doubt awake in they beds and terrified of the Matron and the fate of my mother. We’ll be better off on our own. I straighten and roll my shoulders.

  “Matron, Leader of the Coven, Matriarch of the Blackwoods, you are forsaken from the witches of the Orchard Clan, from this breath ’til my dying breath and the dying breath of my first-born granddaughter.”

  Knife still in hand, I slice it ’cross my palm, a new line next to the one used for the poultice. The blood drips onto the ground they’ve been banished from. The oath is sealed. In three generations time, they may return, unless my granddaughter decides ’gainst a Reunion of Kin. There’s a thud as Beatrice falls to her knees. The Matron don’t move, her teeth working behind closed lips.

  “Burn the flower, lest it spread,” she says to me, voice dipped in ash, then they leave.

  They silhouettes vanish ’tween the shadows of the forest that surround us. Only the rustle of they cloaks make a sound in the dead, dark night. I turn to Mother and the flower that peeks out from her throat as the candles lit ’round her head start to fizzle out.

  “It’s done,” I say to Beatrice.

  She snarls up at me. “So it is. We’re no longer protected.”

  “We were never protected. That much was made clear tonight with this creation gone wrong. And what’s it done? We got a flower that turns even the Matron pale in fear.”

  Beatrice stands slow, her knees popping as she rises up and looks at the bloom, all gray and red. “Poison, you think? Or perhaps the spirits be drawn to it, the way bees are to pollen.”

  There’s a beat at my temple like a dog scratching at a closed door. What’s it matter now? Our only hope is that the gift will whisper warnings of the bloom, give us sight of what it will bring or tingle our senses when we need fear. The flower’s been created and the Matron didn’t pour the poultice onto Mother. No. She poured it into the land. Our Orchard. I doubt burning one body will stop its spread.

  Even still, it’s best to destroy this one. I grab a fallen branch, thick with dead leaves, and dip it in the fire ’neath the cauldron. It lights, and I hold the limb out to Mother. My arm falters as I hesitate, but the bloom leers at me, a curse, and I bite down on my cheek as I lower the flame.

  The blaze dances in Beatrice’s dark gaze. In the shadows here, it’s more graphite than willow moss and kindling. “You ain’t never gon’ be accepted as Matriarch after this. The Orchard will not stand for it.”

  I don’t respond, and she leaves with nothing more to say. No, I won’t, but it takes the blood of my kin to reunite with the Blackwoods. They’ll not have a choice, even if they hate me.

  In front of me, the flames crackle, and I imagine I can see Mother’s soul drifting up as she burns. I kiss my fingers and hold them out to her, the way she would kiss her fingers and hold them to my temple before she’d send me off to sleep.

  “Be well in the Beyond, Mother. I’ll see you ’gain.”

  The words are eaten up by the crackle of the flames, but I know she hears them. She hears them the same way we see things not there and catch things not said and feel things without presence.

  We are the Orchard Clan, rooted deep. Whatever this flower be, we’ll stand ’gainst it.

  1

  Gray Like Thunder, Red as the Setting Sun

  Ellie Hallivard

  Mama always says we’ll go crazy, that we need to live in the now, but I like to think ’bout the future. Guess it’s ’cause I’ll be Matriarch one day: leader of the Orchard Clan, our clan. Cain’t think ’bout the me in now when I’ve got to worry ’bout the everyone during soon and soon enough and years to come.

  As Lillian grabs a ladybug off the kitchen table and squeezes it ’tween her fingers, nose scrunched up, then pouts when Kylie hits the bug ’way, I wonder ’bout the we and the here. And the making it through this one lesson. Just this one. Ancestors, guide me.

  “How much you got left to read,” Lillian whines, that eight-year-old trill on the verge of bellows and tears.

  The pages of Grannies grimoire ruffle as I count in haste. A subtle catch-and-drag makes them hiss for every one that I pull forward, an entire history told on this bound parchment in the blood of the Matriarchs before me. It’s technically Mama’s now, but I still call it Grannie’s. She had it longest, before she passed it on. It’ll be mine, too, one day. Mama keeps a full pot of the self-formed ink, tinged in red, on the desk in the corner of the common area. For now, I sit my sisters in the kitchen, Kylie just a few years shy of myself at her fifteen, and read.

  I shuffle the pages, and the scratchy parchment shifts back to the place I’ve held open. “Got a few pages, so cross your legs and tuck in. This important.”

  Lillian puffs her pinkened lips, hair all red and angry ’bout her face. I think she might start in at her wailing, but Kylie flicks a mint leaf down for her. She squeals, then pops it in her mouth to chew, content for now.

  “Get on, then,” Kylie huffs.

  I cain’t help but purse my lips at them both, then take the bit of time I got left of they attention. “This Grannie’s writing, so you listen up. She still talking ’bout the Bloodbud and her mama. It say here, ‘Per the Ancestors, Miriam Hallivard foretold that the curse to return every hundred years, seeking the blood of her kin to fulfill the prophecy of the Forespoken. Those of her brood are to turn and run at the sight of any flower with petals gray like thunder and leaves red like the setting sun. Always run. If the Hallivard blood make contact with the curse, the Forsaken shall be born, and the Coven shall begin the descent to destruction—’”

  “What that,” Lillian interrupts, eyes bright as she gnaws at the herb
in her mouth. It’s like she’s chewing cud, just the way them cows do.

  Kylie glares at our younger sister, arms crossed. “Don’t make them noises, they rude. And it means to break apart so it cain’t be fixed.”

  Lillian waves Kylie’s words off, and they eyes of willow moss and kindling bore into one ’nother. We all got them eyes. Those ones of hickory and umber and amber, of grays and greens, like they made from the barks of trees or taken from the shadowed copse of the woods. Kylie’s honey wheat hair glints in the sunlight that streams through the kitchen window, a contrast to Lillian’s flames. “Not destruction. That other one. The de-deesent one.”

  A bead of sweat drips down my neck, and I brush it off. Ain’t no use, though, as ’nother slides right after it. I huff, then pull my own hair from off my shoulder and tuck it ’way. It’s more like Kylie’s hue, though it’s gotten a twinge darker as I grown. “Means to move down. To fall.”

  “So,” Lillian starts, a tilt to her head, “the Coven gon’ fall, and then it gon’ break ‘part?”

  “Yea,” I say, just as Kylie grumbles. “What it matter?”

  I snap the book up and return it to the shelf Mama keeps it on. We’re done for the day. I’m sick and tired of wrangling the two of them, and the grind of Lillian’s teeth on that mint gonna drive me madder than the spirits, those ones that burrow they way into the minds of witches and turn they eyes gray like wilted weeds. Like ash. “It matter ’cause the Coven made up of all our sister clans. The Springwells and Hammerbrews and Everglades and—”

  “And them Blackwoods,” Kylie grouses.

  Why they talking over me today like this? No one taught them to be rude; I know that for sure. Kylie’s shoulders set at the glower I flash her way. “Yea, and the Blackwoods. They the head of the Coven, Kylie. You cain’t pretend they don’t exist.”

  When my sister leans forward and sucks on her teeth, her hair lit in gold as the sun hits it right on, I know I ’bout to be in a rage. Even Lillian sits taller, her legs bouncing in anticipation. Kylie’s stubborn eyes of willow moss and kindling flash an aching ire.

  “They sure as spirits pretend the Orchard don’t exist, so why cain’t I do the same thing ’bout them, hm? Done and cursed our family then left us to rot. I’ll be,” Kylie chokes back a word, eyes a quick flash to Lillian then back, “burned ’fore I acknowledge they poisonous clan. We ain’t even really a part of the Coven no more after Great Grannie Miriam exiled us.”

  A scoff sounds, and I whip my head ’round to the threshold that separates the kitchen from the common room. Mama stands there, leaning ’gainst the pine molding, her auburn hair piled and pinned atop her head, face flushed. The gift bubbles up from my sternum to greet her magic, then settles back down, curled up like a cat dozing in the sunshine.

  She must’ve been out helping Papa. I tilt my chin up at Kylie, a smirk on my lips. Suits her right to be speaking nonsense when Mama shows up. Even Lillian’s stills a hair, and our youngest sister don’t never stop her twitchy movements.

  “The Blackwoods Clan,” Mama starts as she raises a brow at Lillian, whose jaws slow they work on the mint, “is the Coven’s head, and from it comes our Matron. Only the Matron can perform the Reunion of Kin to allow us back into the Coven so we might rejoin our sisters. It would be unwise to pretend they don’t exist.” Her hand lights my shoulder, and she settles into the chair beside me. It groans, and she frowns, then huffs and squeezes me. “Could you have your William take a look at this? Your Papa will make it worse in trying to fix it, and William always mends the furniture to better than it was when it was new.”

  Kylie shoots me a grin that’s all teeth, her cheeks balled up to rosy points. Lillian don’t seem to pick up on the tease, but she does notice the flush that rises to my cheeks and takes the chance to speak through her mint. “Yea, Sissy. William ain’t been ’round this week, and he always gots some sweets for me from that lady in town. When he gon’ come back by?”

  I duck my chin and ignore Lillian, then turn to Mama. “Yes’m, I’ll ask if he can come by to get that creak out. I got a cider for him, anyhow.”

  This time, it’s Kylie who snorts, but she don’t say more when I curl my lips up at her. She bites her cheek then glances ’way, eyes still bright. She knows I’ve been slipping a Poultice of Strength and Prosperity into William’s ciders. We ain’t supposed to—the townsfolk don’t know ’bout the Orchard Clan and us witches, and it’s best to keep our practices to ourselves.

  Mama chuckles, then strokes my hair back from my neck and forehead. There’s a tug, the band pulled from the end of my braid, and she hums a little as she sets to work redoing the plait. My eyes flutter close at the gentle caress. “Your sister here will be the Matriarch of the Orchard Clan one day. It’s a good thing she understands how important the Blackwoods are. A necessary evil, as the humans would say.”

  I bite my tongue on the question I’m keen to ask. If they so special, why didn’t she invoke the Reunion of Kin and bind us back to the Coven? But I keep my mouth shut and let her work on. She’s got to have a reason.

  Mama’s hands keep at they work on my hair. “Now, it appears you’ve given up on lessons. Kylie, Lillian, recite the sister clans, then go on to the bedroom and fit the sheets. They’re folded on the chair.”

  Both my sisters grumble and speak together. Well, mostly together. Lillian gulps down the mint and keeps a sharp eye on Kylie’s lips, a near echo to the middle child. They name them all: Blackwoods, Everglades, Springwell, Hammerbrew, Mangroves, Orchard, Pineshift, Saplings, Marshheld, Braesland, and Vineside.

  Mama grins a soft pleasure, then the duo retreats. Smug heat curls in my gut at being kept behind. It hangs there like dew drops on rose petals, light and crisp. Silence stretches between us, her hands at my hair, and the cadence sends my eyes to close after a few minutes. Mama works quick, and she tugs the end when she’s done, just like she did when I was a child. “You read Grannie’s passage today.”

  The braid gets set over my shoulder. I pick it up and eye the blond strands. “Yes’m. ‘Bout the Bloodbud curse. Been a bit since I seen that in the grimoire.”

  When Mama don’t respond, I turn to her. There’s a darkness in her gaze, one brought on by troublesome thoughts. Worry creeps its way through the self-satisfied glow in my belly. I think I see a hint of gray within the willow moss and kindling there, but it’s gone quick. My stomach churns all the same. She’s had three daughters, the gift stretched thin—an easy target for a powerful spirit to possess. That’s why we’ve been taking precautions.

  Every two weeks we gather for the Poultice of Protection from the Beyond. It’s complicated, and Mama hates asking me to do it, but I wouldn’t stop even if she begged. Sometimes, I don’t tell her I’m making a new batch, my chest tight at the guilt etched on her face. I’ll simply set a flask of the potion on her nightstand.

  “Mama, you need more medicine?”

  The question brings her from her stupor, and she gives a rough shake of her head. “What? No, Ellie, I’ve got plenty left.”

  I’m not convinced, my hand at my wrist where the silvery line works its way ’cross from the dozens of cuts I’ve placed over the same spot. It’s my job as a first-born daughter. The poultice requires my blood.

  Mama’s hand covers my own and pulls it ’way from the pinched flesh I pick at. She frowns, then rubs her own thumb over the raised wound. Her right arm bears the same mark from where she’d made the poultice for Grannie, a scar I’ve seen many times. And it worked. Grannie passed from age, a peaceful descent into the Beyond to join our Ancestors. Nothing like them Requiems so many of us witches face, a ritual only the Blackwoods can perform. I purse my lips, and my gut churns. What if Mama do get sick?

  “Go on and ask, Eleanor.” Her brows raise at the red indents of my lip.

  The gift swirls, uprooted by the churning in my gut. Shouldn’t question her—Mama’s always done what’s best for the Orchard—but my mouth opens anyways. “Why didn’t you do it?
When you was the same age as Great Grannie Miriam and you was meant to call for the Reunion of Kin?”

  She sighs, then her fingers tighten on my arm. A glaze passes her sight, followed by a glimmer of gray, then the willow moss and kindling sharpens ’gain. “The Blackwoods be the head of the Coven, but it don’t mean we need to be part of the body. I like to think of us as the soul. One can exist without the other, but they shouldn’t be too far apart. If we rejoined, well, I fear our soul would be lost.” She pierces me with a hard focus. “But, there will come a day when a Reunion of Kin is necessary, and a Hallivard will be the one to bring the Orchard back into the fold.”

  My nose furrows. That don’t make no sense. She makes it sound like we a dead clan, left to flit ’round with nothing solid to hold us together. But I don’t get the chance to question her. Mama pats my scarred arm, then folds my hand between hers. It’s a gesture she did when I was young, one to let me know she was ’bout to tell me something important. My shoulders tense, and I try to catch her eye, but she’s lost in her own thoughts, gaze fixed over my shoulder. A dash of pink darts out to wet her lips. “Ellie, you need to watch your sisters. Keep Kylie on house duties, and don’t leave Lillian alone.” Her hand grips my wrist, and the skin blooms whiter where her fingers wrap clean ’round.

  Babysitting duty? I want to rebuke her, tell her I’m too old at eighteen, more useful down in the Orchard taking care of the trees in bloom and nurturing those that have yet to bear fruit. My time is best spent with the people I’ll be charged with, the ones I’ll need to keep safe when she passes the title of Matriarch to me. She could ask one of the younger neighbors to watch them, or let Kylie take care of Lillian herself. She’s old enough.

  But, the hold Mama has me in makes the rebuttals catch. I wait. It takes her a moment to continue. “The hundred years has passed. I saw them today, those Bloodbuds, poking out of the wounds of a dead townsman that wandered into our woods. He was by the myrtles, right where our Ancestors met the Blackwoods for the Requiem that started all of this.”