Page 86 of Spell Ya Later

Clementine

I’m not going to lie, Clementine the healer is just as strange as Laura implied. But considering that I was able to heal as quickly as I did,I have no problem moving aside to let her do what she must.

Beaded bracelets trail up her arms all the way to her elbows, jangling as she waves her hands over Noah’s still form. Her glasses are too big for her face and so cloudy I’m unable to see her eyes behind them. She’s chanting something as herbs and candles burn on the bedside table.

Laura sits in a plushy armchair in the corner of the same bedroom I was in a month ago. Grandma observes from the doorway. Neither speak, they just watch as Clementine tries her best to wake up my soulmate.

Clementine lets loose a heavy breath and turns to me. I still can’t see her eyes. “He will wake.”

With that, she stands and walks toward the door. Away from Noah. Who is still very much unconscious.

“Um.” I stand as well. “When?”

A grimy, toothy grin breaks on her face, and I have the sudden urge to brush my teeth. “When he is ready. Soon.”

“Thank you, Clementine,” Grandma says sharply, cutting a glare in my direction.

Yes, thank you, oh vague one.

Laura snorts as Grandma walks Clementine out of the room, and presumably the cottage. We came back here instead of Mom’s house. I guess I’m thankful for that. How do I tell the potentially sentient house that she’s gone? Can someone else have that job?

“Told you she was weird,” Laura says, curling in on herself.

I scootch my chair closer to Noah’s side. “You were definitely right about that.”

“Why is there a bunch of garnet in here?” Laura nods toward the bedside table. Along with an assortment of herbs and candles, little polished garnet crystals sit.

“They’re supposed to be helpful in healing. This one here is unakite, which also helps with healing the body, and some quartz to amplify both.”

“Guess there’s a lot more to this witchy stuff than I initially thought.”

I nod. “More than I ever imagined. I don’t even know a small fraction.”

“You know more than I do,” she says. “And you did it all without me.”

This conversation has been overdue for a while. More than a while, if I’m honest. I can’t let it go sideways like last time. I can’t lose her after losing Mom.

Shit.

“And that was selfish of me,” I reply, meeting her gaze.

She sucks in a breath, the finger twisting her hair slowing to a stop.

“It’s hard for me to truly explain, Laura, but something in me snapped. I couldn’t see past my own needs, and what I needed was to get out of that house. I was so stuck, rudderless, and Ineeded to figure out what the fuck I was doing with my life. It didn’t need to be without you, it shouldn’t have been without you.”

She lets loose a heavy breath. “It wasn’t just you. You did what you needed to do, and Mom...I couldn’t leave her, too. She broke when you left, and I didn’t know what she’d do if I went with you. I didn’t know what it would come to if she knew I was exploring magic with you.”

“I didn’t realize things were that bad.” The guilt is a wave. Disappointment, anger, all broiling in a big pot of guilt. How could I not know? How could Mom put all that on Laura, on me? How could she be such a hypocrite—banning magic for Laura and I and then turning around to hunt daemons? How can I still be angry with her after she saved Noah’s life?

She shrugs. “Why would you? You were off starting a new life, why look back at what you’d left behind?”

I struggle for a response. There’s a wall between us that never existed before I left, and I hope it doesn’t last forever. I hope I get my sister back, but I can tell by the hurt in her eyes that it won’t be today. Probably not tomorrow either. Or the next day.

“I understand more than you probably think I do. But that doesn’t mean it’s okay,” she says, eyes hard.

“For what it’s worth, I am sorry for how everything has happened. I would do things differently if I could.”

She stands with a shallow nod, heading for the door.