“All this time,” I whisper. “All this time, you were right here. My Assia.”
Rory disappears briefly, returning with an entire box of tissues, and for the next few hours, I hold my daughter’s hand and listen to Thia explain how far her father had gone to poison his son against me.
He’s dead now, and good riddance. I’ll never forgive him for what he took from me—or forgive his son for letting him do it. That Anson could believe me capable of such a betrayal is the bitterest pill of all. Because I see now that he was never the man I thought him. I lost that man the morning I climbed into the back of an ambulance and watched him disappear. That he has suddenly turned up alive all these years later changes nothing. Anson—my Anson—is dead.
FORTY-SIX
SOLINE
Lovers wound one another for many reasons, but in the end, fear is always at the root of it. It’s a hard thing, perhaps the hardest of all, to trust when we’re afraid—to open ourselves to the risk of forgiveness. But forgiveness is the greatest magick of all. Forgiveness makes all things new.
—Esmée Roussel, the Dress Witch
They’ve gone, and I’m back in my robe after a long, hot shower, alone with this strange new reality. I’m curled up on the sofa, combing through the album of old photos Rory and Camilla left for me. I’ve been through it a dozen times already, but I can’t seem to stop turning the pages, savoring the details of each and every childhood photo, as if I’m trying to engrave their little faces on the blank places in my memory.
Assia—alive. And Rory.
For the second time in a handful of days, someone I loved has come back from the dead. It seems impossible, like the ending of a fairy tale, where the princess receives a kiss and the spell is suddenly broken. The long, dark sleep is over at last. The Roussels have been taught that fairy tales are for other people. But something has set this strange chain of events in motion. It can’t be mere chance that brought Rory and Camilla into my life or me into theirs.
We will have much to talk about in the days ahead, stories I must eventually share—about la magie and the legacy that has always been a part of them. It will be a strange conversation, or perhaps not. From the beginning, I have sensed something special in Rory, and of course Camilla—my Assia—will have inherited the gift too. What they do with it will be up to them, but they will know about the Spell Weavers who came before them—Esmée, Giselle, Lilou, and all the rest.
I think of Maman and her belief that we are irrevocably connected to those we love. That our echoes will always tether us. Across years and miles and even death. Is that what’s happened? A collision of echoes? I suddenly realize it doesn’t matter.
I close my eyes, my limbs deliciously heavy, and let the events of the day wash over me. There is so much to think about, so much lost time to make up for, but I’m content to leave those things for tomorrow. Outside, the rain is still falling, heavier now, and the wind has picked up, buffeting the windows in uneven gusts. One of the shutters sounds as if it has come loose. I can hear it thumping against the house. No . . . not a shutter. The door. Banging on the door.
I bolt up from the sofa, my head muzzy. Rory promised to check on me later, but the phone is still off the hook. Surely she hasn’t come back out in this.
I scurry to the foyer, fumbling with the chain, then the bolt. A sharp gust of wind catches the door as I pull it back, spattering me with a wall of cold rain. I see him then as I push my hair out of my eyes. Anson.
His silhouette fills the doorway, unmistakable despite the years, but I can’t see his face. He’s backlit by the streetlamp, his shoulders hunched against the blowing rain. I stare at him, my breath tight and shallow. For forty years, I’ve imagined this moment, what it would be like to see him just once more, to say the things I wished I had said before we parted. And now that he’s standing on my front steps in the pouring rain, I find I can’t manage a word.
He runs a hand over his face, wiping the rain out of his eyes. “I need to come in. It won’t take long.”
I back away, leaving him to follow me into the foyer. When I hear the door close, I turn quickly, afraid he’s left instead, but he’s still there, standing with his arms stiff at his sides. His jacket and shirt are sopping, his hair slick with rain.
I remember my bare hands suddenly and shove them into my pockets, painfully aware of my robe and bare feet. The seconds tick by as we stand looking at each other, and I find myself wondering what he sees. Forty years is a long time, but it’s an especially long time for a woman. Does he still see the girl he met in the halls of the American Hospital, or have the years made me a stranger? It shouldn’t matter, but it does.