“Lindson,” Mae said quietly. “Mrs. Lindson.”
Miss Adaline was a wide woman, with gray hair pulled back tight and up into a bun on her head. She wore a soft shawl the color of wheat over her shoulders, and her modest day dress was deep forest green, seamed to give her figure the best advantage. She was unmarried, and monied by her father’s investments in the wars.
She had been a force in Mae’s life when she was younger. And she had not lost her command in the years that had passed.
Miss Adaline turned. She had the kind of beauty men would turn their heads for, even now at her age. But there was no kindness behind that beauty. Not for Mae.
“You have told outsiders we are witches. You have put our sisterhood in danger.”
Mae waited. She didn’t know what to say. It was true. But she could not change what had happened.
“Before you left the coven, it was suggested we cast you out. We knew you would bring trouble upon us. In these most unsettled times.”
“I meant no harm,” Mae said softly.
“And yet you have caused harm.” Miss Adaline sighed. “It was my voice that raised on your behalf all those years ago. I thought your love of Mr. Lindson would keep you…far from us. And yet you return.”
She made it sound like it was Mae’s fault. Like Mae was some kind of bad penny she could not be rid of.
Mae prickled. “I was not the one who cast the spell to bind me to coven soil. I would not have come of my own volition.”
Miss Adaline took a sip of tea, her brown eyes sharp. “That was sister Virginia’s idea. She always worried you’d be alone and astray in the world. Of course, she thought that of any wild thing.”
Mae stood out of the chair. “I am not a wild thing. You have made it clear I am no longer welcome here. I will leave as soon as my companions are recovered enough to travel. And,” Mae said walking across the room to her elder, “I will break my ties to this coven. But only if the sisters assist me in breaking the curse on Mr. Hunt and his brother, and in healing Rose.”
“We will want something in return.”
Mae literally took half a step back, shocked. “Is that the way of the coven now? Bargaining for your advantage?”
“The war has changed us all, Mae Rowan. Time has changed us all. We adapt, and we survive.”
“What do you want from me?”
“I want you to cast a spell for me.”
Mae shook her head, but just then the front door opened and one of the younger sisters she didn’t know stepped in. “Miss Adaline, the supplies from town have come and there is some mail for you. It looks official.”
Adaline smiled and it seemed that warmth filled up the hard edges of her. “Thank you, Becky. Take it to my room, please. I’ll be there shortly.”
Becky shut the door.
“We will speak later.” Adaline crossed the room to the other door, and left Mae standing with nothing but her doubts and anger.
The sisters had almost killed her trying to bring her home. Yes, she’d agreed to let them bind her blood to the soil of the coven, but she had never agreed that they could torture her as she tried to find her way home.
She could have died. Rose, Captain Cage, Wil, and Cedar, all could have died. She didn’t know if the sisters intentions were to kill others, but they had clearly not cared if they killed her.
The travelers had spent the last week at the coven, resting. The sisters had left them mostly alone, though warm meals were provided.
She, however, was an outsider. Feared.
Mae had spent the last week trying to find forgiveness in her heart. But this place that she had always thought would be home to her was spoiled now. Closed. They did not want her here.
She didn’t want to remain.
A woman’s soft laughter and a man’s low tone echoed from the hallway connecting the gathering hall to the guest rooms.
Rose and Captain Cage had been nearly inseparable.
Mae smiled despite her sour mood. She had to admit their courtship made her happy for both of them, but most especially for Rose.
“Mae,” Rose said, walking into the room. “We hoped we’d find you here.” Rose was moving slowly, as if her feet dragged a great weight behind them. But her color was better, the tin having faded from her face and neck, though there was still a sheen of silver to her skin and hair.
The sisters had very few guesses as to how to help Rose. It wasn’t magic, exactly, that was plaguing her, nor exactly a physical ailment.
Strangeworked devices were well outside the realms of their spell craft.
“Where else would I be?” Mae meant it to be teasing, as she’d found herself here, by the fire at all hours of the day and night. But her words came out with the bitterness of someone sentenced to pace the same cell for the rest of her life.