Page 28 of Destiny of the Witch

‘With a certain amount of swagger, too, I should say,’ Benjamin drawled.

Bastion pushed me gently into a seat and went to put the kettle on. He moved soundlessly around the kitchen; the deadliest assassin in the world was bustling around my kitchen making tea. Sometimes life was weird.

We sat in silence, each lost in our own thoughts. I sipped my hot brew out of a cup that saidIf it was legal to marry food, I’d still choose you over pizza.It made me smile. It was definitely a Bastion mug because mine were all decidedly bitchier. For himself, Bastion had picked one that saidSome drink from the fountain of knowledge; you only gargled.

I let my eyes gaze into the middle distance. I was looking towards a painting above the TV, one of Mum’s more chaotic pictures, a black-and-white image of a dark staircase spiralling downwards. Numbers and letters interspersed the steps.

Her words suddenly echoed in my head: ‘It’s in the painting’.Not inthispainting, butthepainting. She hadn’t been talking about the painting in her hallway but this one. I was sure of it.

I set my mug down and pushed myself up. Holy heck. Grabbing a pen and paper, I stood in front of the picture and wrote down the sequence of numbers and letters as they went down the staircase, then I ran into my office and booted up my computer. Bastion followed me silently.

I double-clicked on the CD. When the box popped up asking for a password, I put in the series of letters andnumbers. Rather than the instant denial we’d been having, the ‘working’ icon appeared. My heart was racing.

Abruptly the icon disappeared and in its place was a folder full of documents.

My hands shook and I clicked to open the first file. It was entitledFor Amber.

Chapter 21

Mum’s image filled the screen. She looked young and vibrant, her hair a lustrous red with not a hint of grey. I was looking at the mum of my childhood some thirty years ago.

She scrambled back from the video camera and sat on a chair. ‘Hi, Amber,’ she said and her eyes softened. ‘I’m sorry to leave you this video. I hope it’s not necessary, but if you’re watching this...’ She took a deep breath. ‘I don’t know where to start,’ she muttered to herself. She looked into the camera again. ‘It’s so hard to squint into the future and see you, Am. You’re so young and conscientious, so hardworking. I’m putting a lot on your shoulders and I am desperately sorry for it.’

She blew out a breath. ‘There was a prophecy. As you know, prophecies are normally read at birth but when we took you to the seers when you were a babe, they said that there were too manypaths in front of you. You needed to come back when you were older, when some choices had already been made.

‘I was planning to take you again when you hit puberty, but instead we bumped into Melva at the Spice Shoppe and she recited a prophecy there and then. I’ll recite it as best as I can recall.’

She closed her eyes and intoned:

‘Through the veils of time, a mother’s plight

Her mind is the cost to set things right.

She weaves the threads of fate so tight

Her sacrifice made in love’s pure light.

A griffin’s wings on the loyal guide,

A familiar bond, forever tied.

Protecting as the fates decide

In shadows cast as realms collide.

The Witch, the Crone, her destiny clear,

Black witches tremble when she’s near.

With heart and rune, she’ll persevere,

In a hunt for justice, she’ll have no peer.

But lurking deep within the night,

The Coven’s head, her father’s might.

A reckoning waits in close sight,

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