Antebellum Awakening (The Network Series #2)(35)

Sincerely Yours,

The Unknown Author

The next page began:

Mildred was a young girl, only she didn’t know it.

I read a few paragraphs, skimming through the beginning of the High Priestess’s life. Unable to focus on the story, I skipped ahead, searching through the words. I would read about the High Priestess later. For now, I was on the hunt for something, although I didn’t know what.

Several minutes of perusal later, my eyes snagged a word.

Mabel.

Startled, I straightened, my interest rekindled. The original Mabel started popping up quite often. When Evelyn became High Priestess, Mabel gave the school to her granddaughter Miss Mabel and took a job as Evelyn’s personal assistant.

“Mabel, you old devil,” I whispered. I dog-eared the pages she appeared in as I continued to read. The more often Mabel’s name appeared, the darker the picture seemed to grow. She must have had an awful personality.

Her countenance hides the ice beneath.

Sharp eyes in a pretty face.

Selfish soul beneath all that beauty.

Miss Mabel’s blonde hair and ruby lips flashed through my mind. Selfish soul, indeed. The dreaded grandmother had rubbed off on her protégé. I shook away the terrible feeling, hoping to keep the dragon in my chest at bay.

The sun crept higher in the sky, forcing me indoors. I sprawled out on a comfortable divan, hidden by shadows. If Leda could see me so enthralled by a book, she’d die with happiness. I slipped through the pages, uncovering scattered snippets of information as I went.

As time went on it became clear to all that there was more to Mabel than a smooth voice, but whether Evelyn realized it or not was another matter entirely.

Rumors swirled that Mabel had kicked her daughter, Angelina, out of her house when she came home pregnant. No one could confirm it, and Mabel never spoke of it. When anyone tried to ask, she placed a hex on the witch who broached the subject. It rarely came up twice.

Mabel fled the final fight, leaving Evelyn to battle Mildred alone.

The execution of Mabel was particularly sad, as there was no one there to attend her or keep her company in her final hours. No one showed remorse at her passing. Any attempt to contact her daughter or granddaughter was futile. They both rejected the messages.

By the end of the book, I had little doubt that Mabel had been a horrid, evil, conniving woman: characteristics she shared with her granddaughter. Perhaps a potent evil ran through Miss Mabel’s blood. But what of Miss Mabel’s mother, Angelina?

Even a book this detailed couldn’t give me all the information I wanted, and I couldn’t ask the High Priestess without inciting suspicion. I drew in a deep breath and slammed the book shut. Before I moved forward with my plan to destroy the binding in the West, I needed to visit someone. Someone who knew Miss Mabel better than anyone else.

Miss Celia.





Miss Celia

Merrick called to me from across the Forgotten Gardens the next day.

“This is going to be your new best friend,” he said. “Bring it with you every day.”

I lifted my gaze just in time to see a long piece of wood hurtling toward me through the air, and caught it just before it kissed my face. The smooth wood snagged one of the healing blisters on my palm, causing a smarting pain. I bit back a grimace and glared at him instead.

“Good catch,” he said with a surprised smile that almost offended me.

“A wooden sword?” I asked, studying it. It was thick and heavy, whittled from a light yellow wood. Its shape resembled a sword, but it was too thick to be real. The sword with which Papa had taught me a few things with as a young girl was nowhere near as hefty.

“We’ll use it to practice. You have to earn a real sword. This one is weighted and heavy. Learning it heavy makes it easier to use the actual sword.”

Earn a real sword? I wanted to ask. With what, bruises?

Merrick held his own wooden sword in his right fist. His white shirt stretched tight over his broad shoulders, and he had pulled sandy hair pulled away from his tan face. I hadn’t really paid attention to it before, but Camille was right. Merrick was handsome in a rugged, intense kind of way.

“Why do I have to earn a real sword?”

“So I know you won’t cut your own leg off,” he said in his usual dry tone. “Let’s review the footwork we’ve been going over the past week. Show me a forward attack, and then a lunge.”

The sun shone around us in the early morning light, echoing off the ivy screens of the walled garden. We had almost total privacy out here on the edge of the gardens, close to Letum Wood. Only the birds fluttered around, keeping us company. The sweet hold of spring had slowly started to fade into the hot days of summer. Although the mornings and evenings still smelled like honeysuckle and carried a cool breeze, the days were getting warmer, and this morning was no exception.

We reviewed the footwork, although the heavy weight in my hand often distracted me. Merrick introduced a new footwork pattern for me to practice the rest of the day, and then we started into swordplay.

“You’re going to need to be fast,” he said, grabbing a stick from the ground, “and accurate. Having a sword to defend yourself won’t mean anything if you can’t hit your target.”

He tossed the stick straight up, swung his own wooden sword, and cut the stick into two equal parts with very little effort. After the experience chopping wood at Sanna’s, I knew this would not be easy.