Quicker than the bat of an eye, the witch’s reflection faded from the glass, leaving behind only Anne’s bewildered expression.
It wasn’t until she felt fur brush against her ankle that Anne turned away from the mirror.
“Strange,” Anne murmured as she lifted Tabitha from the floor and thought of the odd spark of realization that she’d seen flash across Hester’s face.
The word echoed against the walls and sank into the foundation of the house alongside Anne’s worries, settling into the stone and causing the slightest sense of unease to creep into cinnamonscented hallways.
The walls tried to lean away from it, but eventually, they accepted the sign for what it was: a clear indication that trouble was brewing within the Crescent Moon once more.
By the time the flames in the gas lamps on the street began to flicker against the windows of the shop, the entire house was saturated with the scent of rhododendrons, a fragrance that carried an undernote of caution beneath its soft floral texture.
Though this was certainly not the first time that the Council had gathered at the Crescent Moon in the past year, the strain in Anne’s voice set the house on edge, and now all it could think about was the sense of unease that had slipped into the cracks of its plaster after Hester’s grim face faded from the looking glass.
The teacups dangling from the hooks in the kitchen were tinkling ever so slightly, and the stairs that led to the second floor kept creaking, though no one had stepped foot on them since the morning.
The Quigleys, of course, felt just as rattled as the poor house.
Though Beatrix and Violet didn’t know why Anne was meeting with the other members of the Council in such a hurry, the way they paced around the kitchen looking for something that needed to be tucked in its proper place hinted that they wished their sister could tell them more.
And as Anne waited for them to make their way upstairs with one hand wrapped around the steady ticking of her clock, she found herself wanting the same thing.
Countless times, Anne had lifted her pen when writing to her sisters to share some of the stories that had unfolded in the past year. They were wondrous tales woven with the threads of mystery and magic, but she would always pause just before the ink could touch the page. The ashy flavor of a secret that needed to remain concealed would cut through the taste of her evening tea, and Anne would steer her pen in a safer direction. There was too much at stake to risk the stories taking on a life of their own and spreading outward for all to hear.
So instead of letting some of her secrets slip into the open air, where they wouldn’t feel quite so heavy, Anne had thought of hernew responsibilities and kept her tales tucked away in the safe confines of her own memories.
Of course, Beatrix and Violet said they understood, but that didn’t mean they always remembered to keep their questions to themselves.
“I wonder what it could be,” Violet murmured as she tapped her foot against the floorboards, which caused the house to grow so nervous that the sisters could hear the china cabinet shaking in the kitchen.
“We’d better go upstairs and leave Anne to her work,” Beatrix insisted as she gently wrapped her hand around Violet’s forearm and began to lead her up the staircase.
“I’ll join you as soon as I’m able,” Anne said, pulling her sisters close before letting them go again.
She stood for a few moments longer at the foot of the stairs, waiting until the sound of their footsteps was all but the barest whisper, and then shifted quietly toward the front door, where she slipped onto the street.
Though she shivered against the sharp evening winds that whipped against her skin, Anne knew that she wouldn’t be out long enough to need her coat. After casting a furtive glance from one end of the sidewalk to the other, she reached toward the gas lamp that flickered just above the mailbox and carefully turned the knob to the right. The shadows began to shift then, changing the shape and hue of the front door as the flames started to flutter to a different rhythm.
When Anne moved her hand back to the doorknob, it felt just a bit wider against her palm, and the hinges squeaked in places that they hadn’t before.
By the time she stepped over the threshold, the lingering smell of shortbread and sense of a day’s work well spent that always settled into the front parlor after a long day had shifted into something else entirely.
“It must be dealt with as swiftly as possible,” she heard Nathanial’s stern voice echo from the other side of a circular study filled to its rafters with maps and ledgers.
When the Council members first started meeting at the Crescent Moon, the house hadn’t quite known where to put them at first. Seeing Nathanial’s iron expression among the lace tablecloths and delicate pink peonies had been unsettling, and inviting Hester into the family parlor felt just like hanging a pair of bloomers out one of the front windows. Then there was the problem of Isaac, who had the habit of slipping out of a meeting entirely and wandering up and down the hallways when no one was paying attention.
It didn’t help matters that the texture of the Council’s conversations took on a different hue than the ones echoing through the rest of the house, carrying with them the weight of secrets that caused shadows to pool in corners that should have been sunny.
The solution, it seemed, was adding a room where the Council’s interests could be better contained, and overnight, a circular study had sprouted up for their disposal. Anne wasn’t sure where the house kept the room during the daytime, but she suspected it was somewhere next to the attic since the smell of cedar trunks left for safekeeping sometimes overpowered the scent of sage and salt.
As Anne took her final step over the threshold, she could see Nathanial, Hester, and Isaac sitting in their places around a table that held a map of Chicago. It had taken Anne a few days to notice, but the street lines were always stretching ever so slightly, as if trying to catch up with the evergrowing boundaries of the city.
“The trouble has already . . . ,” Nathanial continued to say, only to close his mouth with a sharp snap when he realized that Anne had entered the room.
“I haven’t kept you waiting too long, I hope,” Anne said as she moved toward her spot at the table and reached for the steaming cup of tea that the house had left for her there.
As she stirred the silver spoon and the rich scent of caramel and vanilla began to infuse the room, Anne felt her heart steady and lifted her gaze to meet the other witches.
She didn’t like what she found etched into the lines of their faces—an unease that grew from worries waiting to be brought to light. It reminded her of how she’d felt during the Council’s very first visit to the Crescent Moon, when fear had caused a fine sheet of frost to settle on the inside of the windows.
