Page 51 of The Witch's Spell
My daughter stops dancing. She’s looking down at the ground now, brow furrowed in concentration.
“Da,” she says.
“Yes, princess?” I push to my feet and find that I’m barefoot as well. A memory tugs at me, trying to get me to remember something, but I push it away.
“What’s that?” She points down, toward her feet.
I take a few steps toward her, trying to see what the tall grass and flowers are disguising.
But by the time I get close enough to see, it’s already too late.
Because there, in the middle of the meadow on a warm summer day, is a frozen pond. And my daughter is standing atop it, watching as cracks thin as spiderwebs grow beneath her bare feet.
I try to lunge for her, but I’m stuck in the mud, my ankles being sucked into the earth.
Again, a memory tries to surface. I feel like I’ve been here before, but I can’t recall why. It doesn’t matter.
All that matters is the look on her face when she meets my eyes.
And her face is Lucy’s face now, when we were children. So it’s Lucy’s face I see as the ice cracks open and she falls.
But this time I pull free of the mud at the last moment, and I catch her. Splayed on the ice, with the summer wind tousling my hair, I scream, “Don’t let go!”
Far below Lucy’s feet, the water is dark and writhing. It crashes like waves upon the rocky coast, hungering for her.
“I won’t let you have her!” I yell into the chaos below.
“Da! Help me!” She’s no longer Lucy. She’s my daughter again.
As she looks down at the water below, the crown of grass slips from her head, and I track its spiraling motion as it falls down, down, until a wave lunges up to swallow it whole.
“I won’t let go,” I tell her. But even as the words leave my mouth, I feel her slipping from my grip, as if her skin is slick with honey. I tighten my hold, gritting my teeth.
“Row?” Lucy blinks up at me. “Are you going to let me fall?”
I open my mouth to tell her no, that I’ll never, ever let her fall. That I will hold her for as long as I draw breath.
But it matters not. Despite my crushing grip, my hand shaking with the force I’m exerting, my little sister slips right through my fingers. And she’s silent as she falls, red hair curling through the air, until the sea swallows her whole.
I awaken with a gasp, my body lurching upright in bed. My body is drenched in sweat, hair sticking to my face. And as I lift a shaking hand to touch my cheek, my fingers moisten with tears.
It was just a dream, I tell myself. But still, the tears don’t cease.
“Rowan?” Aurora sits up beside me, her gentle hand finding my trembling shoulder in the dark. “Was it another bad dream?”
I want to apologize for waking her, but tears clog my throat, and I don’t trust myself to speak. All I can do is nod.
“My love,” she whispers, moving closer, until her chest is pressed against me and her hand rises to touch my tear-streaked face. “Speak to me. What’s the matter?”
Last time this happened, I was able to brush it off, pretend like it was just a normal bad dream. But Aurora is fullyawake now, and she’s scooting around to better see my face in the low light coming from the still-burning hearth.
“You’re upset. Tell me what happened.” Her thumb brushes the tears from my cheek, but they don’t stop coming.
“It... It was our daughter,” I finally choke out.
Aurora’s thumb stills.
“And it was Lucy. And I...” I grit my teeth. Anger and guilt and shame flare to life inside me, twisting my stomach and heart into painful knots. “And I lost them both, failed them both.”
