Violet surveyed the parlor and realized that Celeste was correct. All their customers appeared to be deep in conversation, lost in the stories that they were telling one another rather than searching out a Quigley sister to string one together about their own future.
“I could use a cup of tea,” Violet sighed, thinking of how it would feel to grasp the hot porcelain between her hands, which were still chilled from dreams that threatened to slip into daytime.
She led Celeste toward an open table nearest the window, where they could watch the sidewalks slowly disappear beneath snowflakes and evening shadows.
At first, Violet was uneasy about the silence that unfolded between them after they settled in their seats and ordered a pot of tea, wondering what meaning undercut Celeste’s quiet gestures as she rested her chin atop her clasped hands and gazed out the window.
But then, as one second slipped easily into the next, Violet realized that her companion was merely the type of person who didn’t feel the need to fill every quiet moment with chatter. Each word was formed only when she thought it necessary. And though Violet was normally one for speaking so quickly that the sentences she strung together practically flew from her tongue, there was something about Celeste’s steady silence that managed to calm the erratic tempo of her pulse.
“How does it feel to return home?” Celeste finally asked after Franny set a piping hot pot of tea on the table and poured them both a cup.
When Violet lifted it to her lips, she smelled mugwort and anise, the same herbs that Clara Quigley had blended whenever she hoped to clear her mind to make space for a vision of the future. It was a tea favored by witches of their sort who practiced divination, and Violet couldn’t help but wonder if Celeste ever felt a pang of regret when she took a sip of the blend and remembered what she’d lost.
“Like I’m finally able to breathe again,” Violet answered before she could remember to say something that didn’t ring so loudly with the truth.
“Does it?” Celeste asked.
Violet was surprised to realize that she wanted to tell Celeste about what had brought her back to the Crescent Moon. Though she hadn’t yet found the words to share her troubles with herown sisters, there was something about the witch sitting across from her that made her inclined to say more. Perhaps it was the knowledge that their conversation would well and truly end when Celeste slipped out the door, taking Violet’s secrets along with her instead of letting them brew within the house, where they would grow stronger than they already had.
“I thought that after I completed my Task, everything would be so clear,” Violet said as she stared away from Celeste and out the window. “But something’s happened, and I haven’t been able to get my feet back under me. Being here makes me feel steadier somehow.”
She expected Celeste to ask the obvious question, to lean forward and inquire about what, exactly, had pushed Violet so far off course that she’d landed right where she started.
But she didn’t.
Instead, Celeste merely sat back in her chair and stared straight into Violet’s eyes, as if she was trying to decipher something there. Eventually, though, she broke her gaze and looked out the window as she stirred her tea, the silver spoon clinking delicately against the sides of the cup.
“It sounds to me like you’ve lost something but don’t know how to go about the task of recovering it,” Celeste finally said.
“Yes,” Violet agreed with a nod. “That’s exactly right.”
“I know what it’s like to be in such a position,” Celeste murmured, something like the shadow of sorrow flashing across those eyes that once peered into the future but could now only see the present.
Violet remembered what Celeste had looked like that first night she’d wandered into the Crescent Moon, her cheeks so sunken that it seemed as if her missing magic had left a vast hollow at the very center of her being.
“How did you bear it?” Violet asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “Knowing that you’d never get it back again?”
Celeste remained silent for a moment, her eyes drifting away from Violet and toward the table that rested in front of the hearth where she’d first sat with Katherine and Mr. Crowley.
“I discovered something else that I’d thought had been lost,” Celeste finally replied. “The spark within myself that made life worth living in the first place.”
For a moment, Violet let the taste of mugwort overwhelm her senses as she tried to think of what, exactly, she would need to find to reclaim the fire that had blazed within her, shooting her forward without a single worry of when the flame would burn out. But it was difficult to think of something potent enough to fill the strange emptiness that had made a home in her heart.
Violet set her cup back in its saucer and reached toward the pot to pour Celeste another helping, but before her fingers grasped the handle, she caught a movement out of the corner of her eye.
Glancing upward, she saw a flash of auburn hair and realized that Anne was waving at her from the threshold of the door that led to the back hallway, trying to get her attention without disturbing their remaining customers.
“Excuse me, Celeste,” Violet apologized with a note of genuine regret as she placed her cloth napkin on the table. “It seems that Anne needs me.”
“Of course,” Celeste said, her gaze already returning to the street beyond the window, which was so coated in snow that it was difficult to tell where the fog on the glass ended and the world outside began.
“Is everything all right?” Violet asked Anne once she slipped into the hallway and closed the door behind her. She caught the distinct aroma of peppermint as she said the words, and that, along with the glint of excitement in her sister’s eyes, was enough to tell her that something important had happened.
“I need to visit Mr. Crowley’s home,” Anne announced. “As soon as possible.”
Violet’s brows pinched together in concern.
“I’m not sure you’ll find the warmest welcome in that house,” she sighed.
