“Well, yeah, I guess so.” I snorted, thinking how ridiculous that sounded.
“Rocco decided that Vern really didn’t deserve to profit off his nefarious activities, and so he went into business trying to put Vern out of business. They’re rivals, and I’m pretty sure Vern would love to take Rocco out, but Rocco has a lot of backing. So Vern tends to leave him alone, taking the hits that Rocco sends his way as a price he has to pay.”
“In other words, Raffiolo doesn’t foresee being able to take Rocco down any time soon, so he puts up with the interference,” Delia said.
“Well, the things you learn,” I said.
“Yeah, I don’t think I really want to be involved in that scuffle,” Aegis said. “It’s hard enough dealing with the Arcānus Nocturni. Who, thankfully, have been very quiet since Maddy’s interaction with Essie back in March.”
I nodded. The Arcānus Nocturni were frightening enough without diving into the dark side of shifter politics. I had inadvertently stumbled on the bad side of a secret vampire organization whose members could walk in the sunlight. It was hidden in obscurity, and if the general public became aware of what was going on, there would be wholesale panic and vampire slayage. While I was one of the most famous vampire hunters around, I didn’t want that kind of carnage on my head. Not with so many of the vamps trying to blend into society and follow some semblance of the good-neighbor rule.
“There I agree with you. So this Rocco, he’s sending out protection for tonight?”
“Right, so you and Aegis can go on home. We’ll talk in the morning, after Joel Purdy has a chance to track down any more clues about the arsonist.” Sandy hung her head, the sadness palpable. She had lost one dream today, and another had been threatened. And that was on top of the fact that her own life was in danger.
I gave her a hug before we left, careful to avoid her broken arm. “We’ll figure this out, Sandy. You know we will.”
“I know,” she said, but she sounded anything but convinced.
On that note, Aegis and I took off for home, both of us feeling totally useless in the situation.
Chapter 6
THE MOMENT I woke up, Bubba was sitting on my boobs, glaring at me. I squinted, still tired from the events of the night before.
“What’s up, Bubba?”
“Mrowf!” He definitely had a chip on his shoulder.
The next moment I heard someone calling from the hall outside my bedroom door. “Maudlin! Wake up! You’re being a laze-about and you know I didn’t raise you that way—”
Holy crap. In all the excitement the night before, I had forgotten about Zara. Or maybe, I had just wanted to forget. Bubba jumped off the bed and scampered beneath it as my door opened. Leave it to my mother to enter without knocking. It was par for the course.
I forced myself up against my headboard, not caring that my boobs were in full view. “I didn’t hear you knock.”
She froze, staring at me, then pasted her smile back on. “You really ought to wear something to bed, dear. What if one of your guests stumbled into your room? You wouldn’t want them to catch you like that.”
“Of course not. Though most of my guests have the manners to knock before they open a closed door.” The words came out sharper than I meant them to. Or maybe I was lying to myself and I really wanted to zing her.
Zara paused, her eyes flickering for a moment. “I see. Well, I’ll wait downstairs for you. I thought you could show me Bedlam today. I probably won’t have a chance to see it again. At least, not for a long time. Don’t dawdle.”
Before I could say anything, she had swept out of the room, closing the door softly behind her. Bubba hopped up on the bed again. He let out a soft trill and headbutted me. I absently scratched his ears as I sat there. Something was off. Zara was her usual busybody self, but there was something not quite right. And I couldn’t put my finger on what it was.
“Come on, Bubs. Let me get up and dressed.”
Bubba bounced down toward the bottom of the bed and I slipped out from beneath the covers. I took a quick shower and dressed. Jeans and a halter top would work. The halter had a built-in bra, which helped. I applied my makeup, taking more care than usual, and then slipped on a pair of sandals. As I brushed my hair back into a ponytail, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Zara was hiding something.
Kelson was in the dining room, clearing away my guests’ breakfast. She rolled her eyes as I greeted her, and nodded toward the kitchen.
“I know,” I mouthed. Aloud, I said, “So, when are Delia’s relatives due to check in?”
“By two p.m. today. I’ll make certain their rooms are all spiffied up.”
“Thanks. Breakfast?” Aegis and I had stayed up talking till three, so I doubted that he had time to make any of his other yummy treats, but I was in for a pleasant surprise.
“Aegis made lemon-poppy seed muffins, and he also whipped up a lasagna for dinner tonight. I can just pop it in the oven for an hour. He made two, actually, in case you have any guests over.” She smiled, wiping her hands on her apron as she set the dishes in the sink.
Zara was listening, of course, and didn’t waste a moment in speaking up. “You let your boyfriend—your vampire boyfriend—cook? You know, that wouldn’t have won me any points with your father, expecting him to slave over the stove—”
I tried to count to ten, but I only managed to reach seven before I exploded.
“Mother, Aegis loves mysteries and kittens and he even knows how to knit. He considers baking an art and he loves to cook for me and our guests. So yes, I let him cook because it’s something he takes great pleasure in. And you and I both know that cooking is a skill that’s not in my wheelhouse. I’m talented in other ways, so I contribute to the bed-and-breakfast in the ways I’m best suited. We certainly don’t keep score, and we don’t play gender-role games. Honestly, you’d think you would have evolved with the times.”
Zara let out a sigh. “All right. All right. You and Sandy never did want to settle down. So is she still dating the entire rugby team?”
Again, I let loose.
“You are talking about my best friend. Sandy runs a very successful chain of restaurants. She serves on more charity boards than I can remember. And currently, she’s dating a fashion mogul who loves her dearly. It’s serious. I think they may even end up engaged.”
I rested my hands on the counter, closing my eyes. Every time. The woman got to me every single freaking time we talked. I counted to ten, this time successfully, and evened out my voice. “Now, would you care for some coffee?”
My diatribe seemed to have bounced off like water on a duck’s back. She brightened up and nodded. “Yes, thank you. And I’m truly glad to hear that Cassandra is doing so well. So, where are you taking me today?”
I couldn’t help but wonder if the woman was deaf. Had she completely missed the fact that I had just tore her a new one at least three times already this morning? But then, Zara had always been good at selective hearing. It was one of her many qualities that I found less than charming.
I motioned for Kelson to move. She had been about to pull the espresso.
“I’ll do it,” I muttered. “You go ahead and get started on your work for the day.”
“Thanks,” she said, glancing beyond me to my mother. Then, in a very soft voice, she said, “Good luck.”
“Thanks, I’m going to need it.” I made my latte, a quint-shot. I was going to need plenty of caffeine to jumpstart my morning. “What do you want, Mother? Black coffee? A mocha? Latte?”
“So you can make coffee, even if you can’t—” She stopped in midsentence. “I’ll have a double-shot mocha, thank you.”
I made the mocha, focusing on each step of the task to keep my mind off the day looming ahead of me. Finally, I carried her cup and a plate of Aegis’s lemon-poppy seed muffins over to the table. I retrieved my iced latte and sat down.
We sipped our drinks in silence, and then she tr
ied one of the muffins. “This is really quite tasty. He’s an excellent baker.”
I let out a soft sigh. At least she was conceding something good about him.
“Aegis makes everything from scratch. He doesn’t believe in using a mix unless there’s no choice. I’ll introduce you tonight, if you promise to be nice to him. I won’t have you acting out just because he’s a vampire. That’s not something he had any control over.”
“Yes, I’m aware of how it works, dear.” She paused again as I opened my mouth. I closed it softly and she added, “I’ll be polite, I promise.”
I finished two muffins and a hard boiled egg that was left over from the breakfast buffet, then drained the rest of my latte. “Ready when you are,” I said.
“I’m finished. Thank you for breakfast. It was lovely.”
Feeling surreal—it felt like I was escorting a guest rather than a blood relation—I led Zara out to my SUV, giving her a tour of the yard first.
“We have three acres, though most of it’s still pretty wild. I thought I’d create a ritual grove farther back, and also maybe a pond. I’d like to make a butterfly sanctuary. Bees too, and dragonflies.”
“I think that’s a wonderful idea. So, you and…Aegis? Am I pronouncing his name correctly?”
“Actually, no. It’s Ay-jes. Not Ee-gis.”
“Oh, all right. Did Aegis and you buy this together?” She shaded her eyes, staring at the tangle of woods behind the inn.
“No, I bought it. He works with me. Though he has sunk some of his own money into the renovations, he refuses to take a share of the profits. He said he doesn’t want me to feel the need to consult with him over my plans for the land and the house.”
Zara gave me a quick look, and I sensed some sort of disapproval in her eyes, but she just nodded. As we fastened our seatbelts, I decided we might as well start with a drive around the island. “How about I take you out on Rosewood Road? It encircles the island. It will take us a two or three hours to drive around it, but you’ll get to see all sides.”
“I’d love to see the island, but can we start with the town first? I want to understand your passion for Bedlam, Maudlin.”
That was uncharacteristic. I shrugged. “We can do whatever you like. All right, we’ll go downtown.” Dreading spending the morning shopping with her, I stuffed down my resentment and we headed for the center of town.
BEDLAM WAS A bustling town, even at nine-thirty in the morning. I found a place to park in JD’s garage, which was really just a large parking lot with an awning to keep the sun and rain off the cars, and we crossed the street. We were on Apple Drive, one of the main cross streets in the downtown area, and we wandered among the shops. The bookstore, Nandi’s Books, was a mixture of modern and old fashioned. In addition to a quaint cafe, Nandi also had a large new- and used-book section, and then a computer bank where you could order any e-book online. Nandi was a retired teacher from Neverfall, who was following her other passion in life—books. She had even written a couple textbooks used in the academy.
“Hey, Nandi—is my book in yet?” I had ordered a rare copy of a hard-to-find spellbook from the Black Forest.
The gray-haired witch grinned at me. She was wearing a similar outfit to mine, only the jeans were loose fit, and the top was pink instead of blue. “You’ve asked that for three weeks straight and what do I tell you each time?”
I rolled my eyes. “To have patience and wait.”
“Yes, and you know why?”
“Because it will make me a better witch?” I grinned at her.
“Yes, and it will also make it more fun for me when I can tell you—the book just arrived this morning!” She beamed, pulling a large, wrapped package out from beneath the counter. The book was huge, the size of the top of a small end table, and it was handwritten. That’s one of the things that made copies of this work so rare and expensive—nobody was able to reproduce it with any technology. Like vampires, the pages refused to photograph. And when anybody got it into their head to photocopy it by hand, the machines would break down. Or the copies would come out blank.
“Thank you!” I pulled out my credit card. “How much do I owe you?”
“You put four hundred down, so that’s another four hundred today. Plus tax. Can’t stiff the government.” She added up my receipt and I wrote out the check.
“It’s worth it. Some of those spells are pure gold, I gather.”
“Can you read German, though? They don’t make any translations,” Nandi asked.
Zara interrupted. “She certainly can. Well, at least at a rudimentary level. I made certain she was schooled in Latin, German, and Romanian when she was a child.”
I cringed. How could I tell my mother, who sounded so proud, that I could barely remember a word of the latter two, and my Latin wasn’t in much better shape?
Nandi eyed Zara. “So you’re Maudlin’s mother? Well, I don’t mind telling you she does the village of Bedlam proud. We love having her for our High Priestess. I’ve never seen anybody lead rituals the way she does.”
I wasn’t sure if that was a compliment, but I decided to take it that way. And it certainly seemed to impress my mother.
“You didn’t tell me you’re High Priestess now. Of the Moonrise Coven?” At least she remembered the name of it.
I nodded. “Yes, long story, but I took over in December. Well, thank you, Nandi.”
“Not a problem, child. I appreciate the business.” She waved us out and went back to dusting the shelves as we exited the shop.
We dropped in at the French Pair—a lingerie shop that specialized in bras for women of my build—and then moseyed over to a boutique that sold trinkets and souvenirs. Zara was a fiend for touristy stuff, and she had an entire room devoted to items she had gathered on her trips around the world. I wasn’t sure whether she even knew what she had by now, but it seemed to bring her comfort.
We bought ice cream at Shafer’s Sweets. As we stopped in Turnwheel Park, choosing to sit at one of the picnic tables while watching children play in the playground area, Zara finished her cone and then turned to me.
“I made this trip for other reasons than just to say hello. I know you aren’t thrilled to see me, Maudlin. You think I’m a nosey, meddling woman, and you’re not wrong there. I also know you’re still angry at me for driving away your father. But you don’t know the whole story about my marriage to him.”
She paused. I could sense this was building up to something, so I kept my mouth shut and listened. My stomach twisted and I had the feeling that whatever she was about to tell me, it wasn’t good.
“It smells so fresh here. The trees are different than anything back home. And the land…it’s so vibrant. I see why you love it. Energy feels freer. More alive.” She wiped her hands on a handkerchief and tucked it back in her pocket. “Honestly, when did I get so old?”
It sounded like an honest question, not a rhetorical one.
“You aren’t old, Mother. You really aren’t. You’re what…two hundred years older than me? That’s not old, not in our line.” I wasn’t exactly telling the truth—it was definitely easing past middle-aged for some magical families, but Zara still had a long ways to go before she could be considered elderly.
“Well, that’s true and…it’s not.” Zara stared at the ground for a moment, then brought her gaze up to meet mine. “Maudlin, I’m sick. I have Winter Syndrome.”
Everything hung very still for a moment. I stared at her, searching her face to see if this was another ploy, but she had never looked so serious.
Winter Syndrome was a serious illness among witches. It was also extremely rare and damned near incurable. Once a witch contracted the condition, their ability to work magic fritzed out, backing up the energy in the body. This overloaded the nerves and brain, eventually causing massive system failure. It was called Winter Syndrome because it almost always affected witches who were over five hundred, and it was almost always fatal. Th
ere were several treatments, but they only worked about ten percent of the time.
“You…are you sure?” A number of ailments could be misdiagnosed as Winter Syndrome. “You didn’t go to that old geezer you always go to, did you?” Dr. Markus was stuck in the last century and refused to listen to anything that might be contrary his opinion. He had ushered more than one patient into the grave because of his carelessness.
“After I talked to Dr. Markus, I decided I needed another opinion. So I saw two other top-notch doctors. They both agreed. It’s Winter Syndrome, all right.” She pressed her lips together, staring at a nearby tree.
I fumbled for words. As much as Zara and I sparred, I had never wished her ill. Not like this. I started to take her hand but stopped. That wasn’t us. Not yet, at least.
“Have you tried the treatments?”
“One. It almost took but then my body shook it off. There are two others that my doctors are going to try. But they told me to get my affairs in order because the chances are grim. I’m not expecting much. I don’t want to die, but if it’s going to happen, then I want to be prepared.” She shuddered, looking strained.
“When did you find out?”
“About six weeks ago. Wouldn’t you know it, this is the one time Dr. Markus was actually right. As I said, I went for a second opinion, and then a third. Both doctors confirmed it. They tried the first treatment on me two weeks ago. It only took three days for my body to reject it. So I decided that I’d better come see you while I still can. You see, I’ve done…there are…I want to make certain I don’t leave this world with unfinished business. I don’t want to hang around once I’m gone.” She attempted a smile.
I forced myself to return it. “Yeah, tell me about it. I’ve got a ghost stuck in the house and I can’t seem to set her free.” We sat in silence for a few moments before I asked, “So, when do you try the other treatments?”
“That’s another reason I came over to the US. I’m meeting up with an alchemist in Ohio next week. He developed the other treatments. We should know within a couple of days if it works. If not, I’ll fly back home and make arrangements.” She heaved a sigh. “So, Maudlin…Maddy…I’ve come to make peace. If that’s even possible.”