Page 48 of Uncharmed

‘Oh, I have to disagree with you there,’ Hal said, an arcane smile tugging at that same dimple that Annie had only just noticed for the first time.

‘It’s true. Sugar, spice and all things nice. That’s all there is to know,’ she said indignantly, finally turning around to face him now that she felt the need to defend herself.

Hal gave her his gravelly ‘hmmm’ in return, but it sounded a fraction more dubious than usual. ‘Granted, most of my magic and intuition is tuned into the nature of animals and beasts, but there’s something about you, Annie Wildwood. I can’t put my finger on it yet, but . . .’ He waggled a finger, studying her face. His eyes raked over her, a little bolder. ‘. . . I will. I’ll figure it out. Something about you is . . .’ He shrugged off the rest of his thought.

Annie cursed the quiet flutter that her heart stupidly gave. She knew exactly what he was referring to; the alluring effects of Splendidus Infernum ensured that there was always an appealing air around her. The magnetism that caught everyone’s attention and shoved her into the best possible light to perform. The compliment slid straight off her, feeling hollow. Starting tomorrow, he would feel very differently.

‘And I don’t mean that just because you’re beautiful,’ Hal said unexpectedly. An uncharacteristic blush formed at the tops of his cheeks the moment he said it. He squeezed his eyes shut, exposing his embarrassment. ‘Obviously, you are. You know that. I don’t need to tell you. But you are. Not that it matters. Anyway.’

She burst out laughing, feeling a not-entirely-unpleasant awkwardness bloom between them. She shook her head. ‘Thank you? I think.’

‘Back to the kid. I thought we should probably talk about it. Especially because . . . Well, before she got upset last night, I heard her talking back to them.’

Annie stiffened. Her smile popped like a balloon.

‘I know you’ll have the same first thoughts as me about that, given that we both know the inner workings of Selcouth well enough,’ Hal said, lowering his voice and taking a step closer to speak under his breath. He joined her in leaning on the short stable door that was half swung open, both of them folding their arms on the top of the wood and staring ahead into the stable, watching as Mage returned to his hay bundle now that apples were off the menu. ‘A kid talking to spirits, holding her own accidental seance, potent necromancy at the ripe age of fifteen . . . Not a recipe that’s going to go over too well with the elders.’

Annie glanced wordlessly across at him, her heart pounding. Did he know something?

‘A teenage girl sensing an otherworldly presence is not something to write home about,’ Hal continued, as though he were contemplating his own thoughts as they tumbled out. ‘But if they’re communicating back with her? Using her as a mouth piece or channelling through her? Something’s going on here. Pardon the pun, but . . . well, that spells trouble.’

Annie’s breath hitched as she tried to formulate what to say next, how to quell Hal’s suspicions as quickly as possible. But she couldn’t rally her imagination quick enough to fix it. She felt like a moth flying dangerously close to a flame, frantically flapping her wings to stay afloat without touching the fire.

The spell was already failing – maybe her decision to end its hold had already affected its potency. Instead of an appeasing answer to fix things, Annie only found herself firing up, irked and defensive at the suspicion in his voice. None of this was a reflection on Maeve; she owed it to the girl to make that abundantly clear.

‘Maeve is not trouble,’ she said firmly. The one, singular fierce flare of anger felt unfamiliar in its heat.

Hal faltered at her thunderous expression. ‘I’m not saying she is. She’s a good kid.’

‘Then what are you saying? What do you suggest? Why do I feel as though you’re about to come bounding in with some kind of grand plan?’

He looked a little startled. ‘I didn’t mean it that way, I didn’t mean that she’s trouble. I meant that it spells trouble, for us. Here. If we don’t figure out how to protect her properly.’

Annie blinked. ‘We’re an us?’

Hal’s cheeks flushed again and he shrugged, embarrassed. ‘Not an us, but . . . I don’t know. I just thought I’d ask whether you wanted somebody to talk to about it. From my perspective, it’s looking like a lot of pressure and responsibility on your shoulders to make this right, all by yourself. Sometimes it’s easier to fix things as an “us”.’

Annie seemed to have frozen in body and mind. A tumble of tangled thoughts flooded her head, so unfamiliar that she wasn’t sure how to translate them. But somewhere in the mess she could recognize that, most of all, she felt relief. There it was. An offer of support. A comfort so curious, but so entirely enveloping in its gentleness and sincerity, that she thought her knees might buckle. Instead, she squeezed the top of the stable door tightly, feeling her nails sink into the damp wood. She forced her gaze up to the tops of the trees and took a breath as her eyes and nose burned.

‘I’m not much of a talker,’ Hal said gruffly, apparently realizing that it was down to him to fill the silence a little further. ‘As you might have noticed by now. But I am a listener. Think that’s why the animals took a shining to me ever since I was a boy. So . . . Not saying that you need to, of course. But if you want to.’ He turned his head to face her and his hand hovered as though he were debating putting it over hers. Instead, he gave his signature, conclusive tap to the top of the fence. ‘You can talk to me. I’d like to support you. Whatever’s going on here, it’s a lot, but we’ll fix it together.’

Annie couldn’t find any words that wouldn’t open undammable floodgates. Instead she settled for a silent nod and hoped with all her heart that Hal would understand what she meant by that. Life without the fading spell to promptly blunt the spikier feelings, to soften the landing of big thoughts, was already proving tough to navigate and it hadn’t even left her system yet.

‘Anyway, Mage needs a brushing and I know he’s eyeing up your braiding skills for that handsome tail of his. Can’t say mine are up to scratch. How about it? He might even let you add a few flowers if there’s apples to be paid.’

Hal dug into his satchel and pulled out a grooming brush, then offered it out to Annie. Their fingertips grazed with the slightest touch.

‘Thank you,’ she whispered under her breath. Firstly to him for the brush, and secondly to whichever supernatural forces had been at play in ensuring those friendship fancies had been quite such a potent recipe.

Chapter Nineteen

A BAD DAY

Annie awoke the next morning with a startle that made her whole body twitch. She flung out an arm with a violent jerk and bashed the bedside lamp from table to floor. Half asleep, she snuffled a mini snore and bolted upright. She licked her lips, finding them dry and a little chapped. Lip balm, immediately. She smacked them together, noticing a slightly stale feeling in her mouth that tasted worse for wear. Water, too. She could hear faint conversation and laughter downstairs between Maeve and Hal and the jangle of pots and pans being moved around the kitchen. Had she really slept in? That almost never happened. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time that it had. Annie was always the first awake, the one who made sure that everybody else’s day started perfectly. Something wasn’t right. Her brow crumpled and she gave a small hiccough of a burp when she stretched. Her hand shot to her mouth, mortified by the noise, and that was when she noticed.

The polish on her pinky finger was chipped. Genuinely, really chipped. A shard of the hot-pink paint completely missing in a jagged streak across her nail. Annie gasped.

Her hand moved to the top of her head and she touched her hair tenderly all over. She could feel that it wasn’t where it was supposed to be. It was . . . messy? And unkempt? Her neat French braid had unravelled, flyaways sticking up every which way. And there was . . . frizz. A lot of it. Her nose wrinkled and she faltered before taking an uncertain sniff of her pyjamas. An actual, genuine, human-like scent emanated from her raised arm. It certainly wasn’t vanilla or sugar or coconut.