Mathilda, SuperWitch (Mathilda's Book of Shadows #1)(27)

I made it.

I’m alive.

Breathing.

Baking.

Making kickass vanilla lattes.

Clattering around in my new, fab, fake crocodile stilettos.

Enough!

I went to the studded Dungeon door and banged on it as hard as I could.

Nothing.

With a mighty heave, I pushed it open and yelled down the steps (because, even though I’d had enough, I wasn’t gonna go down there – no way, no how).

“Ash! I want to talk to you!” I shouted.

Nothing.

“Okay then… Sebastian, I want to talk to you,” I yelled, giving an inch.

Nothing.

I waited.

Then I shouted, “Have it your way!”

Then I humphed off to the library and took down Mathilda’s Register and slapped it on the desk.

“I’m fed up!” I told the book. “Eleanora, girl, you gotta give me something. Rory seems safe now but I got a renegade witch, a bunch of men immune to magic, a supernatural expert who can’t tell me what he knows and a bodyguard who’s pissed off at me. How am I to protect my Spellbound?”

Then I opened the book.

It said:

Mathilda, dear, what makes you think Rory is your Spellbound?

What?! I thought.

“What?!” I said.

The letters wiped themselves out.

“Come on! I’m supposed to help someone who’s going to do great things in the future. Rory is bright, sweet, young –”

Eleanora interrupted me.

Yes he is, but, why wouldn’t Josephine be destined to do great things?

Holy Girl Power, Batman!

I wasn’t meant to protect Rory, I was meant to protect Josie.

Whoa.

Whole new spin.

“Thanks Elly, you’re the greatest,” I said to the book.

Don’t expect help in the future and don’t call me Elly.

Eleanora had an attitude.

But then who didn’t?

Yay!

Light dawns!

Speaking of attitude, as I closed the Register in strolled Ash.

Before I could say anything, he said, “Don’t ever do that again.”

I wasn’t stupid enough to ask what “that” meant.

Instead, I apologized, sincerely and sheepishly, going for cute and abashed.

It worked!

The apology threw him for a loop.

I’d hoped (in my deepest thoughts to myself and my journal) we’d kiss and make up but no luck.

He recovered quickly then said, “Mathilda, the Members of that Institute stood by throughout the Burning Times. They watched witches burn and drown and endure torture and they didn’t do anything about it. They watched a lot of innocents burn too and they knew it and they didn’t do anything about that either.”

Wow, that was a lot of words coming out of Ash all at once.

“Aidan wants to –” I stared.

“What your plumber wants doesn’t mean anything. They have a five hundred year history of note taking. The Chosen One is coming into her full powers and there’s a good possibility that all hell is going to break lose. Don’t expect them to be your allies, Mathilda. They’re Switzerland. And in the battle between good and evil, Switzerland is useless. Worse than useless, they’re cowards.”

Wow.

All hell was going to break loose?

Oh shit.

Chapter Five

The Month of March

1 March

Let me tell you, a lot has been happening.

First of all, Mom, Gran and Su are all here!

Right now!

In The Gables.

YAY!

Family reunion!!!

And Viv arrives tomorrow.

They’re here because we’re having a SuperCoven meeting to sniff out the Sinister Evil Bad Villainous Witch a.k.a. Agatha Darling.

* * * * *

This is what happened:

Last Thursday, Auntie Mavis called me into her Magic Room.

In the room with Mavis were Paulina Babcock (Mavis’s Second-in-Command), Octavia Blackwell (if it’s Magical, Tavie knows it, she’s killer at our Wicca Quiz Nights) and Fay O’Hannigan (who Mavis tells me has the strongest magic in our coven, outside of herself and me, ‘cause she’s Irish and the Irish have some wicked magic, that is to say, wicked in a good way.)

So I knew this was a big deal.

Anyhoo.

I sat with them all and they gave me tea (ack!) and Jammie Dodgers (yummy!)

Then they handed me a folder.

In it was a bunch of handwritten notes and photos. The photos were of a woman who looks exactly, I kid you not, like the Wicked Witch of the West (except she’s kinda heavy, has gray hair and, of course, isn’t green).

The file was labeled:

“Agatha Blanche Darling – Witch, High Priestess, Edwards Coven, Worcestershire”.

I knew the Darlings. I had read a lot about the Darlings. Most notably, The Honeycutts and Darlings – The Hatfield and McCoys of the Witch World.

Darlings didn’t like Honeycutts so much.

Honeycutts returned the favor.

It had been a blood feud for years.

Aside: Witches were usually nice ladies, of course, who healed with herbs and could cook and always had a lovely, cozy kitchen but that doesn’t mean we are all like that (read: Darlings) nor that we all have to like each other.