She put on trousers and a jumper that had once belonged to Theodora’s mother. She drank black tea at the kitchen table beside Archie and, all the while, she waited again for the cold of the Ancient Spirit’s magic to return. It never did. Whatever Opal had been doing, it was over.
Afternoon came, and still Theodora would not leave the grave.
Dot made the witch a cup of black coffee and on her way out of the cottage, she paused in the makeshift library. She placed the mug on the shelf as she read the titles. There was an encyclopaedia of many volumes, several novels, works of philosophy and botany and technology. Stephen, it seemed, was like Theodora in his myriad interests.
But Dot found at last, stuffed in the corner of the bottom shelf, a leather-bound tome. She reached for it. Its paper was mushroom-coloured and she recognised it at once as the fatal grimoire of magic that Theodora had used to summon Cate.
Dot opened it and flicked through. There was old blood on the pages. Spells for memory loss, the Nine Herbs Charm, Sympathetic magic, the hierarchy of spirits – Dot paused.
She recalled now her conversations with Belchamber and the book she had borrowed from Theodora’s office.The Spirits of the Bygone,what had it said?
A spirit’s elder could overpower them in magic.
Her heart began to race.
Perhaps, they did not need hundreds of spirits to break Theodora’s contract. Perhaps they only neededone.
Then, Dot recalled a conversation from her very first day in the tea shop.
‘Nearly twenty centuries I have lived, and never have I met a creature so terribly precious . . .’
Dot just about shrieked. She took up the mug of coffee and rushed through the house, slipping as she climbed into Stephen’s gumboots. She opened the door. Dot found the witch outside in the mud.
‘Theodora?’
‘I asked you not to call me that.’
Dot painfully set the mug down on the grass beside the witch.
‘I brought this and I have something to tell you. Thistlethwaite! She’s two thousand years old. She can help us! We don’t need hundreds of different spirits, we just need her.’
‘Go inside,’ said Theodora. ‘You need rest.’
‘And you don’t?’
‘Stop, Dot.’
Dot startled at this. ‘You didn’t call me Dorothy.’
‘Dot is what you wanted to be called. That’s your name, isn’t it?’
‘Theodora—’
‘My name isTessa,’ said the witch, and Dot realised now how different she looked, crouched against the wet ground of her childhood. Her hair was limp. She wore a frumpy beige jumper and had removed the golden daggers from her ears. ‘I wanted too much, Dot, and look what’s happened. I deserve what’s coming for me.’
Theodora stood and wiped her eyes. Dot reached for her, but the witch walked briskly into the willows, leaving Dot staring after her, the mug of coffee still in the grass. Dot picked it up and brushed off the mud.
As she returned to the porch, Lio called out to her.
Dot felt that familiar tug at her stomach. She was so tired and so sore, but in spite of all her complex feelings, she still liked the sound of him saying her name.
In his hands, Lio held a sprig of lavender. His clothes were also borrowed, old and ill-fitting. With those dark, melancholy eyes, he looked at her a moment too long.
‘Dot,’ said Lio, ‘I was terrible to you.’
‘No,’ said Dot, realising how differently he watched her now. ‘You don’t need to—’
‘I do.’ Lio took the mug from her and set it against the windowsill, and then took up her afflicted hand in his. His grip was firm, yet cold. ‘I am so sorry. I was chasing after a boyhood fantasy of a woman who did not exist. You were there the entire time. You were good to me. There was nothing wrong with you. You were simply yourself.’
