Page 15 of The Bone Witch
“Theresa, what in the name of the equinox is going on in here?” my aunt demands as she rounds the corner, her lips pursed and her brows dipped with irritation. Her angry gaze lands on me, and she freezes mid-step. “How did you get in here?” she demands, her voice pinched and a little higher pitched. Her dreary gray-blue eyes widen with shock and a tinge of fear, and satisfaction warms me.
“You should really start locking your front door. Wealth doesn’t make you impervious to crime,” I tell her, just as a slight woman in a crisp blue dress and apron comes rushing into the foyer. She takes one look at the mess, then at me, crosses herself and then promptly leaves. I’m not sure if she’s making a break for it or just going to fetch a broom and a mop.
“You are not welcome here, leave,” my aunt growls, steeling her spine, but the panic in her gaze gives her away.
“Oh come on, Aunt Magda, aren’t you going to congratulate me?” I taunt, stepping closer to her. Glass crunches under my sneakers as I close the distance between us, and her whole body tenses.
“Mother, what is going on? I told you I need to study, but how am I supposed to do that if the maids can’t keep from destroying the house while they’re cleaning it?” a whiny shrill voice demands, and right on cue, my cousin Gwen rounds the corner.
Unlike her mother, she doesn’t seem to notice that she has an audience. Her petulant stare is fixed only on Magda, as though she’s solely responsible and needs to be taken to task. It isn’t until my aunt trains her anxious gaze on her daughter, that Gwen takes a moment to assess the scene. Bright blue eyes turn and take me in, but instead of fear, rage flashes in Gwen’s doe eyes.
“How dare you show your face here,” she seethes, stepping in my direction, her hands balling into fists at her sides. I’m uncertain if she’s about to throw a temper tantrum or a fist.
Rogan moves protectively closer to me, and both Magda and Gwen seem to notice him for the first time. Gwen stops, as though his presence has glamoured her and she’s forgotten what she was just about to do. Her mouth drops a little with surprise, but she recovers quickly and delicately presses her lips together in an annoyingly enticing way.
I want to look over at Rogan to see if he’s captivated and trapped by her obvious attraction, but I internally slap myself for caring. Gwenisbeautiful. She’s all long red hair, legs for days, and the D cups that her mom bought her for graduation. But she’s a vapid, selfish, little twit, and if that gets Rogan the Ridiculous all hot and bothered, then more power to him, why should I care?
“Who are you?” Gwen asks, her voice breathy and missing all the acerbic bite that was just there for me.
I roll my eyes.
“Rogan Kendrick, and you are?” he asks, his tone dripping with manners he’s never bothered to use on me.
Outrage hammers through me, and I turn an offended look on him. “Are you serious?” I demand. “I get magic whammied, and she gets Southern charm?”
Gwen and Magda both refocus on me ,and it’s like that mirror wipe challenge I’ve seen on some clock app: wipe, moony eyes and flirty smiles; wipe, vicious bitches with dagger-filled stares.
“Excuse the trailer trash, she’s practically feral,” Gwen tells Rogan with a sneer that morphs into an inviting smile when her eyes move from me to him.
“All these years, and trailer trash is still the best that you can come up with?” I taunt, unaffected.
“Listen here, you little mongrel,” my Aunt Magda snaps, stepping even with her daughter. “Either you leave now or I’ll call the authorities.”
I gasp, forcing my eyes wide with fear, and throw a hand over my mouth. Rogan stiffens with concern just behind me. “Oh no, not the authorities,” I plead overdramatically, bringing the back of my hand to my forehead and wobbling like I’m about to swoon.Nailed that Scarlett O’Hara impression.“And which authorities would that be, Magda, the Lessers or the Order? Pretty sure when either finds out that you’ve burgled a dead woman’s house before her bones even had enough time to grow cold, and then stole things that don’t belong to you, they won’t be too fussed with me,” I point out as I straighten up.
“Things that don’t belong to us? Theyonlybelong to us. Gwen is the rightful heir, and every scrap of our magical lineage belongs to her,” she snarls at me, outrage flaring in her nostrils and her dim blue eyes.
Gwen adds a haughty nod and crosses her arms over her chest. “Rogan Kendrick, now why does that name sound familiar?” she queries flirtatiously, snapping seamlessly out of her irritation with me and right into her interest for him. If I weren’t so pissed off, I’d be impressed with her ability to multitask.
“Oh shit, my bad,” I announce, popping myself in the forehead in a universalduhgesture. “Gwen is the rightful heir? I had no idea. Guess you won’t mind showing me the bones then,” I deadpan, dropping all the theatrics and leveling my aunt with a baleful stare.
She stammers, her gaze bouncing around the room as her brain struggles to form another delusional argument that we both know has no merit.
“We don’t have the bones yet, but it won’t be long,” Gwen sneers, and with that obvious threat, I’m done fucking around.
I step closer to her, my patience for this situation tapped. Options pop up in my mind, as though I’ve just opened a closet full of magic and now I need to decide what to wear. I’m reminded of how I felt when I sealed the bones to me and more abilities than I could comprehend wove themselves into my very essence. It’s as though, in response to my anger, some of those abilities are asking to be called on now.
Let’s see what we’re working with then.
The ground below my feet begins to quake. It’s slight at first, but with each steady step I take, the movement grows. The glass on the floor plinks and scrapes as it’s jostled, and both Magda and Gwen shriek and reach out for each other as they try to steady themselves, their terrified gazes landing on me as I close the distance between us.
It may look like I’m controlling the elements, a power that an Osteomancer shouldn’t have, but what Gwen and Magda don’t know is that this house has been built on top of the graves of some of our ancestors who used to live here ages ago. Their bones have long since disintegrated, but their essence and power still remain in the very soil.Thatis what I have domain over, but these assholes don’t need to know that. Let them think that I’m some meta witch, maybe then they’ll think twice about fucking with things they shouldn’t in the future.
“Stop!” Magda screams as pictures fall from the walls and a crack moves up the grand marble stairs to the right. “Please stop!” she begs.
“Where ismybook?” I snarl, my tone not to be trifled with.
“We don’t have it!” she squeals, but she can’t seriously think that I’ll believe that.
