Page 33 of A Beastly Court

“Thistle thorns,” I muttered, clutching my head and fighting for clarity. “Does ‘the Redbud Curse’ mean anything to you?”

Amber eyes large and bright with worry, Sawyer shook his head. “Could that be what’s going on right now? With Wystan’s attacks and the whole town hunkered down in fear?”

“I don’t know.”

“You alright, dear?” Daphne called from the other side of the garden fence. “I was munching over there by the herbs when the wind shifted and I heard pixies! They didn’t knot your hair or go for your eyes, did they?” She stamped a hoof.

“Quite the opposite,” I called back. “We’re going inside now.”

I paused at the front door, familiar handwriting by the doorbell declaring this house belonged to Misty Fields.

Misty fields… my favorite view. My pulse thrummed as I realized I had written that name on the little tag, though I couldn’t remember doing so.

Grandmother, what did you do to me? I shivered, fear creeping into me. This was a part of my past I hadn’t even known existed, and yet it felt like I was coming home. The creak of the porch steps was familiar and comforting, the pixies were obviously very fond of me, and this old farmhouse… it was like seeing a friend after years apart. Had I lived here before Ossian, before my little room at the Candlelight Inn? Why would Grandmother rob this memory from me?

I glanced down at the tomcat. He sat by my ankle, and at my look, he leaned into my leg. You can do this. The encouragement was as clear to me as if he’d spoken right into my mind.

Sucking in a deep breath, I placed my hand against the worn knob, twisted, and let myself in.

An aura of expectation greeted me. It was like the farmhouse had been waiting for me, and as I crossed the threshold, it sighed in relief.

The interior was as sparse as the exterior, as if the previous occupant Misty Fields—me—hadn’t planned to stay long. The essentials were here, plus maybe a little more to make it homey and less skeletal. There were only a handful of truly personal items within view—a goldfish plant on the kitchen window and, beside it, a glass candy dish filled with all sorts of buttons and marbles and feathers and other mismatched knickknacks. Just like the ones in my hand. Above, crouched in the lefthand corner of the same window, was a white garden spider with seven legs.

While the curious part of me begged me to explore, the part of me that feared discovery urged me to stay on task—to revive the Hawthorne hearth ember. At the end of the hall, through the dining room and the little kitchen, was a fireplace. A hearth. Gray slate lined the floor while smooth stones that looked like they’d been pulled out of a river or excavated from a field built the firebox, a thick wooden mantel crowning it all before it disappeared into the wall and the brick chimney beyond. There was dry wood split and stacked to the side under a south-facing window, and an iron grate in the firebox with four nub-like teeth to keep the logs out of the ashes.

And on that grate was a single piece of red cedar feeding a small yellow flame.

The hearth in the abandoned farmhouse was lit.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The floorboards groaned as I sprinted into the hearth room, nearly losing my balance on the braided rug in the center hallway when it slipped under my boots. Breathless, I dropped to the slate hearth stones, Sawyer skidding to a halt beside me.

“How is it lit?” he gasped. “There’s no one here! And the pixies certainly aren’t strong enough to lift those logs.”

“I have no idea,” I whispered.

My breath stilled as I leaned in to examine this miraculous anomaly, reaching out like I was introducing myself to a frightened woodland creature.

A single ember—the heart of this farmhouse hearth—had burned itself a cradle in the log of red cedar, a lemon-yellow flame flickering from the ashy surface. It flared when my hand neared, flashing a weak green as it evaluated the status of my magical core.

“Heh, I know,” I murmured. “Thanks for confirming. You—”

A blue spark leapt from the flame against my hand, a second spark zapping Sawyer almost immediately after. But unlike me, he didn’t cry out in pain. The maelstrom inside me convulsed, ejecting a slew of memories from behind its dark cloud.

They were fragments, but I remembered making apple butter cinnamon rolls in the kitchen, running through an orchard with Sawyer, feeding the pixies bone broth in a gravy boat, a golden-white wolf patrolling the fence line, a parasite ring made of rainbow tourmaline and blackberry brambles, a grimoire hidden under a mountain of wood ashes and rosemary sprigs in the crawlspace under this very house.

Something pricking my skin cleared my head of the onslaught, and I looked down to discover Sawyer had placed his paw on the back of my hand. Comfort radiated down my arm, pushing the pain away. “You okay?” he asked.

“Yeah.” I sucked in a deep breath. “Just remembering more of what Grandmother had locked away.”

“I remember this place too.” He jerked his white chin up at the mantle. “I used to take naps up there. And study. I took classes at Grimalkin University. I was training to be a familiar.”

I reached out to scratch him behind his ears. “I’ve always wanted a familiar, but Grandmother—”

“I’m not a familiar!” he said, batting my hand away. “And we’re just… friends.”

“Uh-huh.”