When he was young, Vincent had wandered through Lower Manhattan to places where left-handed magic could be found. He’d tried most of it, sympathetic magic in which wax figures were used along with blood magic in order to get what he wanted, which mostly was his freedom. He’d made his way downtown on dark streets at a time when he didn’t truly know who he was, only that he wasn’t the person his parents expected him to be. Whatever rules their mother laid down, he balked at; he went the other way, into the darkness, staying out all night at his favorite bar, called the Jester, drinking himself into a stupor, performing silly magic tricks, lighting fires with a snap of his fingers, turning off the lights with a puff of breath, hoping to impress people. Franny had been there with the cure for drunkenness, a mixture of cayenne, caffeine, St.-John’s-wort, and tomato juice, which she dispensed along with a tirade on his irresponsible acts. If Franny hadn’t pulled him back, anything might have happened. Back then, only she had known the truth about his sexuality; she knew without him saying a word, before he admitted it to himself. Young people were easily lost, they took chances, certainly he had, and he had compassion for those who fumbled around on the left side.
“She’s just a girl,” he said of Kylie. “She doesn’t know what she’s doing.”
“You make your choices and you pay for them unless someone with a clear head stops you,” Franny said grimly.
“She thinks she can end the curse and save that fellow of hers,” Vincent said. “She’s got the book, so maybe she will. Our generation certainly didn’t manage to remedy anything.”
It was only now, in this far-off place, that Franny remembered something Jet had said on the seventh night, after she’d come home from the library. The wind had picked up and the leaves had shuddered. It was their last night together, the time to say anything and everything.
If anyone can do it, it’s you, Jet had told her. You’ve always been stronger.
At the time, Franny had thought Jet meant she was strong enough to survive her sister’s death. Franny had responded, No, I’m not, for she had no idea how she would live without her sister. Jet had embraced Franny and said, Everything worthwhile is dangerous, then she’d gone inside, leaving Franny in tears. It was only now that she understood what her sister meant. Franny had been the one meant to end the curse all along.
* * *
Ian took the path to the front door, then hacked through the vines. If you didn’t know there was a house standing here, you’d think there was nothing but an overgrown wood. The stink of left-handed magic hung in the air, bitter, yet somehow enticing. “You were supposed to wait for me,” he told Sally.
She blinked looking up at him and found herself thinking the most curious thing. Hadn’t she done that all of her life?
“You’re supposed to be helping us,” Gillian chimed in. “Where were you?”
“At the library. Doing research that concerns your family.” Ian handed Sally the information.
Franny came over to see what he’d discovered. “A few sentences,” she said, shaking her head. So little had been written about Hannah Owens it was as if she had never existed.
“Most didn’t even get that,” Ian responded. “If a woman doesn’t write her own history, there are very few who will.”
Sally leaned toward her sister. “What did he just say?”
“He’s talking about himself,” Gillian said. “His life’s work.”
“No. He’s talking about us.”
Since there was only one copy of My Life as a Witch in the library, Ian had photocopied the text. “You might want to take a look. Cora Wilkie lived here in the fifties and sixties when my mum was growing up. She’s still got a load of cousins in town. She lived out at the far point that’s more water than land.”