I looked at the spine again. There was the title, in gold letter in the greenish black cloth. It hadn’t been there a second ago. I was shaking a bit now, and he put his hand on my shoulder to steady me.

“It must have been spelled with some kind of glamour or concealment spell,” he said. “That’s all. You’re not going crazy. Let’s have a look at it and find out why it was being hidden. This is a private family library, so it’s kind of strange for a Rowanwand to hide a book from a relative.”

We took it over to the reading table and switched on the light. Charlie began to page through the book. In the first moment we could see it was definitely not a German textbook on something and metals. It was handwritten, in English. It looked like a Book of Shadows, with dates at the tops of the pages. Charlie’s eyes grew wider with every page.

“This is Máirin’s book,” he said, looking up, his eyes full of awe. “Oona’s daughter. No one’s seen this book in years. How the hell…”

Máirin’s book. That was what I had found. The story of the family witch, down here, in the secret Curtis family library. This was where my mother had experienced a frightening telekinetic episode. There was too much magick, too many feelings tied into this house. I chose this moment to become completely overwhelmed. Even though I tried to will them back, I felt tears well up behind my eyes. Charlie looked up in alarm and saw my eyes glistening.

“What is it?” he said, setting his hand back on my shoulder.

“All these weird feelings,” I answered, rubbing my eyes. “All of these strange things I don’t understand.”

As much as I knew he was dying to look in that book, he slid it aside and turned all his attention to me.

“It must be really hard to have to deal with so much magick at once,” he said. “Just try to relax. I’m right here. Nothing that’s happened is too out of the ordinary.”

“Everything is out of my ordinary,” I moaned.

Instead of reading, we sat there for a while, talking. I found myself telling him about the dark wave and how frightened I had been. I told him about Hilary and all the things that had led up to my running away—all of the really personal things that I’d left out of my first explanation. I finally explained that I had a problem with telekinesis and that that what I was trying to find out more about.

“The newest thing,” I explained, feeling my defenses collapse under the calming weight of his hand on my shoulder, “is that I can feel other witches around me. I can sense their feelings. I can sense my mother here, even though she’s gone. I like the feeling of connection, but it also scares me. Everything comes so fast now. I’m never expecting any of it.”

Then he leaned in, and his look took on a new level of seriousness.

“Can you feel my senses right now?” he said.

My body seemed to freeze in time. My heart stopped. I didn’t breathe, didn’t move. Everything was anticipation. I could feel him. He was going to… what?

He came in close, took my face in one of his soft hands, and kissed me.

I’d never been kissed before, and I’d been kind of worried that I wouldn’t know what to do when and if it ever happened. Luckily I didn’t freak out or accidentally bit him or anything. I pressed to his mouth and responded naturally. He slipped his hands behind my neck and pulled me closer. Warmth…so much warmth. A universe of warmth. As he pulled away, he looked at me in happy surprise.

“I…” He seemed to catch himself speaking bit didn’t know what to say. “I’ve been wanting to do that since I saw you yesterday.”

Could I speak? Did my mouth still work? Was my voice going to come out all funny? Only one way to find out.

“Me too,” I said. “I mean, not kissing myself. You know. You.”

Smooth, Soto. Smooth.

Fleeting concern zapped through my brain. What about Brigid? What did this mean? Those feelings were numbed when I felt the sensation again. He wanted to pull me into him, and I wanted him to wrap his arms around me. But the flow cooled quickly, like we’d blown a fuse, and all the power went down. We must have become aware of it at the same moment. We sat very still and listened.

Someone was upstairs.

13. Attack

September 24, 1952

Goddess, goddess, where have I been? I'm only just now getting the strenght to get out of bed and resume my daily activities.

We opened the lith dearc two nights ago. Claire Findgoll and I, down on the shore below the house. It is a terrible yet fascinating thing, this small hole that rips through the fabric of the universe and seems to go on eternally. I maintained the dearc while Clair comducted the spell to try and draw Oona from the house into the opening. I am glad that Claire stood away from it, as it possesses a devastating force. It actually drains you of life energy. I feel as though I've been poisoned.

We haven't had any visitations since we performed the spell, but only time will tell if we've been successful.

Oh, I must go to sleep again. There is nothing left in me. No energy at all.

— Aoibheann

"Hello?" called a female voice. "Mom?"

"It's Brigid," Charlie whispered, all color draining from his face. "She's home early.”

"Should I… hide down here while you go up?" I offered. Good one, Alisa. The sitcom situation always works so well in real life.

"No," he answered, shaking his head. "She knows we're here."

Brigid, I had figured, wasn't a powerful witch—but she was still a witch. Feeling another's presence in the house seemed like something she would very well be able to do. We head her walking through the kitchen and then opening the basement door.

"Okay," Charlie admitted, "this is kind of bad."

"What do we do?" I asked.

He squeezed my hand quickly, as a kind of apology for what was probably going to happen next. "I have no idea," he said.

"Hello?" Brigid called again. She approached the door to the library, which was still open behind us. "Aunt Evelyn?" Brigid said. She came down the steps and looked at the two of us, first in confusion and then with a growing flurry of emotion.

"Charlie? Alisa?" she said, her voice wavering. "What are you two doing here?"

"Researching," Charlie said simply.

"Researching?" she said. "You came in here when we weren't here… both of you?"

Whether through magick or regular female intuition (which might also be magick, I don't know), Brigid seemed to know at once that there was a problem. She sat down on the bottom step, blocking our way out. Did kissing a witch leave a mark on your mouth? Did my lips glow? Could she see some kind of imprint?

"Alisa needed help." Chalrie said. "She's trying to find out about her ancestors, and Evelyn was definitely wasn't going to give her a hand. Sorry. We had to come in when Evelyn wasn't here."

"You could have told me," she said. "I would have helped you."

Oh. If we didn't feel bad before…

"So," she said, staring hard at me, "did you find anything?"

"A book," I said immediately realizing how stupid that answer was. I went to a library and found… a book. Not for the first time in my life, I wished the floor would open under me and swallow me whole.

After a few moments of silence it finally dawned on my that I should leave them alone. I didn't want to leave Charlie to the wolves or anything, but had no place here. They needed to talk. And I had a feeling Charlie was going to come clean about what had just occurred.

"I should probably go," I said, "before Evelyn gets home, like you said. She'd be furious to find me here."

"That might be a good idea." Charlie nodded. We probably realized at the same moment that he had driven me here.