The figures formed a circle around the fire, keeping me and my parents in the center. One of the witches was older than the rest, her gray hair cropped short, wrinkles gouging her cheeks like claw marks. It felt as though she should’ve been dressed in something dramatic, like a gossamer gown or a dark cloak. But all she wore were jeans and a button-up shirt.
I’ve been spending too much time with Laurie, I thought distantly.
“Are you sure?” the witch asked by way of greeting. Her voice was deeper than I’d expected it to be, almost throaty. It was a voice made for incantations.
The coven was silent and still as they waited for an answer. Waves crashed, far off shore, the roar of the sea reduced to white noise from where we stood. After a few seconds, my father—my strong, stern, courageous father—only nodded. As if he didn’t trust himself to speak. Mom visibly tightened her grip on me, turning her face to rest it against my hair. I watched her inhale, long and deep, as if tonight was the last time she’d ever hold me. Ever smell my scent.
That was when I finally understood.
This was the binding. The night my parents had tied my power down with ropes and chains of magic. Mom was acting like this because the daughter she’d known would be forever changed.
Dread sprouted in my chest like bloated, poisonous flowers, and suddenly I didn’t know if I wanted to see this. The thought made me take a small, hesitant step backward.
But I didn’t look away.
“Place her within the circle, please,” the gray-haired witch instructed.
Wasn’t I already in the circle? No, I realized a moment later—there was a symbol drawn into the sand. It was similar to an amulet I’d seen the Tongue put into his bowl on multiple occasions. Lowering my small-boned body as if it was made of crystal, Mom set me down on top of the symbol and pressed a kiss to my forehead. She backed away slowly, acting as if every step caused her physical pain.
Don’t do this, I wanted to say. Some remnant of the child on the ground that still lingered inside me now.
But Mom couldn’t hear me, and she’d made her choice a long time ago.
With a brisk sound, I refocused on the scene playing out. Next to my prone form was a basket, and from what little knowledge I’d gleaned of witches these past months, I knew it held her supplies. The ingredients needed to complete this spell.
Once my parents had moved back, the old witch knelt beside me. She rummaged through the basket, and when her hand emerged, it held a spool of red thread. She began to braid my hair, stopping every few seconds to add a piece of that thread to the separated strands. Her movements were gentle and slow. Unhurried.
Once she was finished with the braid, I watched the witch reach for her basket again and pull out a pair of silver scissors. Mom’s body seemed to tense even further. The witch kept her focus on me, her expression calm. Handling my head carefully but firmly, she cut off the entire braid, leaving the rest of my hair short and ragged. My eyelids fluttered. It was the only indication that I was alive. Some part of me must’ve been aware, though. Seeing what was happening. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to retain this memory.
The flames hissed and spit. Against the backdrop of the black sky and even blacker water, there was something stark and otherworldly about them. Still kneeling beside me, the witch held my braid over the fire. It was still smoking when she put it in a bowl, along with a handful of what appeared to be roots. Or maybe it was withered ivy.
Then she closed her eyes and began to chant.
The effect of those words was gradual. For a few seconds, nothing changed. My younger self didn’t move, the fire snapped in the wind, and my parents looked on silently. The witch kept going, raising her voice. Not to speak over the wind, I thought, seeing the fierce concentration on her face. The true power of the incantation came from the witch herself. The strength of her conviction. It was why the Doors within the faerie courts couldn’t be used by any random person that stumbled upon them.
The child laying there suddenly arched her back, rising off the sand with a violent lurch. It was unnerving, watching myself writhe and scream from a pain I didn’t remember. Didn’t feel now.
My magic was reacting to hers. Trying to fight back.
Dad’s grip on Mom looked too tight, as though he were holding her back. Her mouth was a thin line, her eyes dark with guilt. I didn’t blame them. I wasn’t angry about this choice they had made. I’d been a danger to them, to Damon, to everyone around me.
The proof was in this very memory. Watching the beach flicker with things that had lived inside seven-year-old Fortuna’s head, winking in and out of existence like an old television trying to find a signal. Not just the dreams and memories that had frightened me, but the ones that held meaning, too.
Seeing this, I was suddenly grateful to my parents. They’d made an impossible decision and protected our family the best way they knew how.
And whatever that other witch had wanted from me, the binding only further protected me from it.
“Fortuna?”
The sound of Oliver’s voice made me blink, and I saw the memory had come to an end—my parents were gone, along with younger Fortuna and all the witches. Only the fire remained.
I wondered how many times Oliver had said my name. Feeling hollow, as if someone had scraped out my thoughts and feelings with a dull spoon, I turned to look at him. He looked back patiently. I knew, somehow, that Oliver had been watching me instead of the memory.
What can I do? I imagined him saying. His mouth didn’t form the words, but he didn’t need to. I gave Oliver a weary smile. “Let’s set up the tent. Maybe, if we get enough sleep tonight, you can see about those ol’ lightsabers.”
Oliver visibly repressed a sigh. “They’re just not working, damn it. Something about the inner mechanisms. I’m not exactly an engineer or a scientist.”
His brief tirade made me smile again, and this one was more genuine. Oliver and I left the beach behind and found ourselves in a hillside cornfield. We fell into an easy silence. Every once in a while, Oliver would offer his hand, helping me up a tricky bit of slope or rock. I didn’t need it, but I grasped his fingers each time, reveling in the warmth of his skin.
“I think I’m done,” I said eventually, the wind threatening to snatch away my words. I paused and amended, “For a while, at least.”
Oliver lent me his strength again as we picked our way over a narrow, trickling creek. “Done with what?”
“Looking for memories. Digging into the past. It hurts too much,” I whispered. My tone made Oliver stop walking, his eyes bright with hesitation. His expression slowed my footsteps, and then I stopped, too. “Ollie? What is it?”
He shouldered his backpack in a nervous gesture. “There’s—”
Oliver’s voice cut short and the starry field vanished. I woke up in the loft, in my own bed, curled on my side. Hello was stretched out over my rib cage, purring like a motor. She must’ve been what woke me, I thought, petting her with a frown. I wondered what Oliver had been about to say. Guess it would have to wait until next time.
My gaze alighted upon my hand, which rested palm-up on the mattress. I was holding something, its weight so insubstantial that I probably wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t been facing it when I opened my eyes. When realization struck, the breath caught in my throat.