Witch Myth Super Boxset: A Yew Hollow Cozy Mystery Page 32

  I woke with a start in the middle of the night, staring up into the dark at the angled ceiling and wondering what had rustled me out of unconsciousness. A face swam into view. My face. I looked at myself. She looked back. I covered my eyes with a pillow.

  “No,” I said. “No, no, no.”

  I looked again. She was still there. A ghost. Of myself.

  “Oh my God,” I moaned. “Am I dead?”

  2

  There was a reason for my childhood insanity, and this was it. Every witch was born with a specific ability through which she channeled her craft. Aunt Alberta had a knack for potions. Malia was psychometric, which meant she could read the history of objects just by touching them. Laurel communed with nature. Karma made voodoo dolls. Morgan spoke to the dead, as did I. Of all the abilities available to witches, this one was the worst. First of all, it was rare. Morgan and I were the only two psychic mediums in the United States. Second, it was exhausting. I’d met ghosts who died in all sorts of ways, from common old age to suicide to murder. Ghosts wanted one thing and one thing only—to pass over—and they didn’t have any moral qualms about haunting you until they figured out how to do it.

  “I’m not even thirty!” I protested, staring up at my own face. “I can’t be dead!”

  “You’re not dead,” the ghost said. “I’m dead.”

  My head pounded. Between my oncoming hangover and the literal out-of-body experience, I was completely bewildered. “But you’re me.”

  “Decidedly not,” she replied. “It would appear we’re twins.”

  I had to be dreaming. I didn’t have a twin. I was practically born into the foster system. I didn’t know anything about my family. My mother and father’s identities were a mystery to me. To be honest, I didn’t care who they were or what happened to them. They had left me in the lurch. I was kicked out into an unfriendly world of temporary mortal guardians, none of whom had the capacity to fill me in on the details of my preternatural powers. When I was a kid, I told anyone who would listen that dead people followed me wherever I went. No one believed me. I was labeled an attention seeker early on. I ran away from foster homes, frequently practiced truancy, and spent more time in a social worker’s office that I cared to remember. All the while, I tried to convince myself that ghosts weren’t real, but it was difficult to ignore the dead when they followed you around like lost puppies. As a medium, it was my duty to help them cross over to the next life, but I never knew that until I arrived in Yew Hollow. As far as family went, I didn’t owe my absentee parents anything. A sister, on the other hand, was another matter entirely.

  She stuck out a hand for me to shake. Ghosts weren’t corporeal enough to physically interact with the living, but old habits died hard. “I’m Winnie. Winnifred, actually, but everyone calls me Winnie.”

  I stared at her hand. It was vaguely translucent. If I concentrated hard enough, I could see the writing desk on the opposite side of the room through her body. That was good. It meant she wasn’t supposed to be here for very long. The more solid a ghost appeared, the less likely they were to move on. I felt relieved. I didn’t have the headspace to process a long lost twin sister, let alone one that was already dead.

  I waved her off. “I’m not touching you. Ghosts are freezing, and I run cold.”

  Her face—my face—fell at my reaction. No matter how many ghosts made contact with me, my level of tact in receiving them remained supremely low.

  “Sorry.” I rubbed my eyes and looked up at her. “Could you float down? My neck hurts.”

  Winnie alighted on the bedspread. Though we were theoretically identical, I noticed immediate differences between us. Winnie kept her hair long and wavy, whereas mine was cut short to my chin. She was thin and graceful while I moved with all the subtlety of a tank. She was also much more relaxed in death than I knew I would ever be. If I ended up trapped between worlds, I would be pissed.

  “Who are you again?” I asked.

  “Winnie Bennett. And you?”

  “Gwenlyn,” I answered. “Gwenlyn Bennett.”

  She lit up, as though having the same last name confirmed our connection more than sharing the same face. “I didn’t know about you.”

  “Me either.” I had no idea what to say. I didn’t know how to feel either. I took stock of my thoughts. Subdued shock hit me first. I did have family. Someone else had been walking around with my face for twenty-six years, and I had no idea. I shared a womb with a person meant to be my built-in best friend, only for the world to force us in different directions. We were identical strangers, robbed of the chance to get to know each other. I had a sister who was already dead. That alone was more tragic than our lifetime apart.

  Winnie cleared her throat. “So you’re not a hugger, I presume. Should I get some party poppers to celebrate our unexpected reunion?”

  “I hate confetti.”

  “Okay. How about that cake downstairs?”

  I folded my pillow in half and stuck it behind my shoulders so that I could sit comfortably against the headboard. “You can’t touch anything. You’re dead, which by the way, I commend you for handling extremely well.”

  “I saw it coming,” she replied. “Metastatic melanoma.”

  “You had cancer?”

  “Yup. I was diagnosed four years ago. At some point, you come to terms with the fact that it’s all ending soon. It was easier to let go than suffer in pain.”

  “So you were ready to die?” I asked. “You accepted it?”

  “I did.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Why not?” She reclined across the foot of my bed, her essence dipping through the covers and chilling my feet. I drew them in toward my chest. “There’s no point in being bitter about it. It’s just life, and then it’s death. I wasn’t afraid.”

  “No, not like it doesn’t metaphysically make sense,” I tried to explain. The concept of getting trapped between worlds was wishy-washy at best. “I meant that you shouldn’t be here. People stay behind because something is preventing them from crossing over, like they didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to their dog, or in worse cases, they have to avenge their own murder.”

  Winnie lifted a skeptical eyebrow. “That happens?”

  “More than you know,” I grumbled, recalling past events. “My point is: if you weren’t afraid to die and you don’t have unfinished business on earth, then there’s no reason for you to be stuck in between. There has to be something you haven’t thought of.”

  She pursed her lips, thinking hard. “Nope. I made peace with the hand I was dealt, hugged my parents, kissed my boyfriend, and nuzzled my cat. I’m all squared away.”

  When she mentioned her parents, a chill rocked my spine that had nothing to do with her ghostly presence. “Your parents?”

  “Yeah, they were heartbroken but—are you okay?” She interrupted herself when she caught sight of my lips twisted into a scowl. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. It’s just… you had parents.”

  “You didn’t?”

  I overflowed with animosity at Winnie’s naiveté. She’d grown up with a family and assumed that I had too, but not everyone was so fortunate. I answered diplomatically, trying to keep my voice level. “No, I was a foster kid.”

  As someone who was well-practiced at keeping my darker emotions bottled up, it was an experience to see Winnie’s dimples mirror my own as her expression turned to concern. “We were babies though. Most adopting couples want a baby.”

  “Well, no one wanted me.” I gathered the duvet out from under her and swung it over my shoulders like a quilted cape. “Makes sense though, doesn’t it? Mortals might not be able to see auras, but they can feel them. Why would someone adopt a baby that felt like death?”

  Winnie finally looked away from me. There was a patchy hole in the fitted sheet. She fiddled with the threads, plucking them out of place. “I’m sorry.”

  The apology sounded so sincere that I automatically felt like a j
erk for bringing it up. “It’s not your fault. Anyway, aren’t you a witch too? How did your adoptive parents deal with that?”

  She looked unsure, as though she knew the answer might upset or annoy me. “I got lucky. My adoptive mom is a witch too. She saw my aura and knew that so many things could go wrong if I grew up with a mortal family.”

  I swallowed another mouthful of jealousy. I knew about those things firsthand. “Are you a medium too?”

  “No, I’m an anodyne.”

  “A what?”

  She chuckled lightly. “That’s what my mom calls me. It means that I can relieve stress or pain. My ability functions like meditation. I soothe people’s minds, feelings, illnesses, so on and so forth.”

  “Let me guess,” I said sardonically. “You went to med school.”

  Winnie stuck out her tongue. “Are you kidding? I’m a daydreamer. I barely graduated from high school. No, I teach yoga.”

  I laughed, covering my mouth so that my amusement would not wake up Morgan or her sisters. “Oh, man, you’re a yogi? Can you align my chakras for me? Are you into energy crystals?”

  “Excuse me, but witchcraft literally works off a woman’s personal energy, so you of all people should understand that there is legitimacy in using yoga to increase awareness and flow,” Winnie chided. “It’s so effective that even mortals can feel it when they practice.”

  “I never thought about it that way,” I admitted.

  “You should try it sometime,” she suggested. “It might help with that tension in your back.”

  I rolled my arms so that my shoulder blades relaxed. “How did you know that?”

  “Part of the package.”

  “You really did get lucky,” I muttered. Winnie’s soothing presence was faint but palpable. It was the leftover remnants of her aura. The fact that I could feel it was remarkable. She was a powerful witch when she was alive, totally in tune with her ability. Comparably, I had a bad habit of running from mine. “So no regrets? We kind of need a place to start if we’re going to get you to the next life.”

  “Just one,” she replied.

  “Good! What is it?”

  “That I never knew you.”

  In the morning, I padded down the stairs in flannel pajama pants and borrowed bunny slippers, massaging my temples. My hangover could’ve been worse, but the bright sunlight of the first floor made me wince all the same. Morgan sat at the head of the table, her feet perched next to a half-eaten stack of pancakes. She sipped coffee from a handmade mug across which the artist had jokingly painted “World’s Best Coven Leader,” reading today’s issue of Yew Hollow’s local paper. She glanced up as I slouched though the doorway, and her eyes widened with apprehension.

  “Uh, Gwenlyn?”

  “Huh?”

  “There’s a dead girl following you,” she informed me. “Normally, this wouldn’t be cause for alarm, but said dead girl has your face. I have questions, comments, and concerns.”

  I’d almost forgotten about Winnie, chalking the whole incident up to a booze-induced dream. She stood in the foyer, gazing around the house to take it all in. The sunlight poked pin-sized holes in her appearance, shining through her as though she was made of poorly woven fabric. I wondered where she grew up. I guessed it wasn’t a place like Yew Hollow. The Summers coven was one of a kind, and the interior of the house highlighted our eccentricities.

  “That’s Winnie,” I told Morgan. “She’s my dead twin. Winnie, this is Morgan. She’s our coven leader.”

  Winnie waved cheerily. “Hi there!”

  Morgan caught me by the arm as I passed by, squinting at Winnie’s shimmering figure. “Should I be concerned?”

  “I haven’t decided yet,” I replied.

  “Ah.” Morgan raised her mug to Winnie. “In that case, it’s nice to meet you, Winnie.”

  Winnie beamed. “Thank you. I hope you don’t mind if I stay for a while. Gwenlyn and I are bonding.”

  “What’s mine is yours, darling.”

  As Winnie floated off to explore the rest of the house, Morgan stared after her. “Wow. It’s weird to see your face smile like that.”

  I sat down, picked up Morgan’s fork, and started in on her leftover pancakes. “I know, right? I forgot I had dimples. She’s going to completely wreck my reputation as a snarky jerk.”

  “I think your hair this morning has already dismantled any hope you harbored of being viewed as intimidating, my love.”

  I stretched out of the chair to glimpse my reflection in the mirror of the china cabinet. Half of my hair was flattened to the side of my head. The other half stuck up like a ruffled peacock’s plumage. I groaned, forcing it down with my fingers, but the attempt was fruitless.

  “Come here,” Morgan said, beckoning me toward her. She combed through my erratic hair, and I felt the fizzle of witchcraft against my scalp. When I checked again, my hair was perfectly presentable.

  “Thanks.”

  “Mm-hmm. In all seriousness, are you okay?” Morgan’s eyes crinkled as she studied me for signs of distress. If that look came from anyone else, I would scold them for pitying me. With Morgan, I knew it came from a place of love and concern.

  “I think so,” I said, returning to the pancakes. They were perfect post-hangover breakfast. “I don’t know. It’s weird, you know? I had no idea she existed. Plus she’s dead, which is kind of a downer.”

  “That and she shouldn’t be here.”

  “We already discussed that.” I swirled my breakfast through a puddle of maple syrup. “She doesn’t know why she hasn’t moved on.”

  “No, not that,” Morgan said. “You know the rules. Ghosts are physically restricted from visiting places that they’ve never been before. I don’t recall your sister ever stopping in for a cup of tea, so how is it that she’s in Yew Hollow at all?”

  “Maybe it’s different with twins,” I suggested. “Even mortal twins claim they share an inexplicable telepathic bond.”

  “Maybe,” Morgan mused. “It’s the only reason I can think of.”

  “I need to get my mind off it,” I said, wiping syrup off my fingers. “What’s on the schedule for today?”

  A legal pad appeared in front of Morgan with a faint pop! and she flipped to the second page of her to-do list. “Let’s see. Malia and Laurel are meeting with the community volunteers to work out a new date for the Fall Festival. Karma is due at the police station in ten minutes to talk to Chief Torres about some of the safety concerns we had. I doubt she’ll make it—neither one of you can hold your liquor—so I’ll probably go instead. Do you want to tag along? It’s a slow day. I don’t have much for you to do other than help clean up the mess in the town square.”

  I deliberated. A slow day in Yew Hollow was exactly what I needed to recuperate from last night’s festivities. “I’ll go to the square.”

  “All right, but the kids are going too,” Morgan said.

  “Teaching them the value of hard work?”

  “You bet. That okay with you?”

  “You know I love the kids.”

  Morgan looked up from the legal pad in time to catch Winnie passing through the hallway on her way to the back porch. She patted my hand. “You can’t ignore your sister forever, Gwen. She wants something from you, no matter what she says, and the longer she stays, the harder it gets.”

  Winnie’s figure refracted sunlight on the antique wallpaper like water did in a swimming pool. I sighed heavily. “I know. Believe me, I know.”

  3

  Morgan was right. Ignoring Winnie wasn’t an option. It wouldn’t help her move on to the next life or banish my lingering jealousy of the difference in our upbringings. Everything had turned out all right, and it was petty of me to be envious of a dead girl, especially one that had thoroughly suffered for the past four years.

  We strolled along the sidewalk, heading into town. Yesterday’s storm was gone. The blue sky stretched on for miles as the breeze coaxed brown leaves from the trees. The coven children bounc
ed alongside us, hopping over puddles of rainwater and singing gleeful songs absent of musical prowess. I counted heads. All seven children were my responsibility for the day. Keeping track of them wasn’t usually the problem. The bigger challenge was ensuring that they didn’t use any witchcraft in front of the locals.

  One of the kids tripped, sprawling in front of Winnie. She gasped, kneeling down to help the little witch to her feet, but Winnie’s hands passed right through her. The girl, Sandra, shuddered, popped upright like a jack-in-the-box, and sped off to rejoin her friends.

  “They can’t see you,” I reminded Winnie when I spotted her dejected expression. “She didn’t mean anything by it. When a ghost touches you, it’s like being doused in ice water.”

  She gazed longingly after the kids. “I don’t mind spending time here, but I can’t say I’m a fan of the supposed perks of ghostdom.”

  “I know it’s tough,” I agreed. “Neither here, nor there. The worst part is being disconnected from the world. You can see it, but you can’t touch it.”

  “Why does it sound like you know from firsthand experience?”

  I shuffled through a pile of damp leaves, kicking them up to expose their colorful undersides. “I don’t. I’ve met hundreds of ghosts though. They all tell me the same things.”

  “How long does it usually take to pass over?”

  “It depends,” I answered. “Sometimes it’s short and sweet. I once met a single mother who died in a car crash, and all she wanted was to check on her kid to make sure he was okay. It only took two hours to track him down, and she disappeared right after.”

  “That’s so sad.”

  Up ahead, Amelia and Sandra fenced with fallen tree branches resembling sabers. I sent a surreptitious jet of magic to race between them. The makeshift weapons morphed into rubber snakes. The girls groaned then promptly resumed their battle by whacking each other with the new toys.