Page 86 of The Women of Wild Hill
AFTER HIGH SCHOOL, PHOEBE WANTEDSibyl to go to University of Texas and study something practical like hotel management. Someday the ranch would be hers, after all, and she could turn it into a spa. Ed thought this was a terrible idea. He’d already made his position on the matter quite clear. Sibyl needed to get as far away from her mother as possible. It was Lily who suggested the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York.
Once she’d escaped Texas, and Sibyl felt like she’d found the right track, Lily visited her less often. It was as if Lily’s role had been to help Sibyl slip out from under her mother’s thumb.
And yet, when the ravens came, Sibyl immediately wondered if Lily, who’d always loved corvids, could have sent them. Then she arrived on Wild Hill and met the ancestors. Only then had Sibyl made the connection. Her childhood best friend, Lily, was her great-grandmother Lilith.
NOW SHE WAS BACK. WHENEVERSibyl was alone in the cottage, Lilith came to join her. She was Sibyl’s age now, with her black hair pinned to the side with a single barrette and a tweed suit that would have looked dowdy on someone older. But her spirit was just as arch and mischievous as Sibyl remembered. She was excellent company—and never, ever boring.
“I don’t feel like I’m a part of this story yet,” Sibyl confessed as she assembled hors d’oeuvres.
“Why is that?” her great-grandmother asked.
“My mother is... well... amazing. She’s beautiful and gifted. She talks to snakes.”
“To be honest, I doubt snakes have anything terribly interesting to say,” Lilith butted in. “It always seemed like a silly gift.”
“We’ll have to agree to disagree on that,” said Sibyl, who’d long been curious. “The point is, I always thought she was a goddess. Then I met Brigid. She’s so fucking fabulous that death follows her around like a puppy.”
“That seems like a very mixed blessing to me,” Lilith said. “I mean, there’s nothing more satisfying than ridding the world of terrible men. But I’d rather make my own choices. Would you want death picking out your victims for you?”
“Victims?” Sibyl shot back. “Am I supposed to kill people? I don’t even know! What role is there for me in this story? Brigid knows what she’s supposed to do. Mom’s good at everything. She smoked that meat man without lifting a finger. But why amIhere? To cook everyone dinner?”
“Your part hasn’t come yet,” Lilith told her. “You’ll know when it arrives. The Old One won’t be subtle, I promise. She speaks in earthquakes and lightning.”
“Okay, fine. But I can’t imagine how I’m going to make a difference. I thought maybe I’d pick up some new skills being here at Wild Hill. But so far, nothing. The only thing I can do is make amuse-bouche.”
Lilith looked at her with an amused expression. “That’s not the only thing you can do.”
“What else?”
“You can talk to me,” Lilith told her. “In my humble opinion, that is the greatest gift of all.”
Sibyl dismissed the thought with a wave of her spoon. “How do I know you’re not just a figment of my imagination?”
“Why on earth would you think that?” Lilith sounded offended.
“What are you, then? The ghost of my great-grandmother?” Sibyl asked. That would explain the outfit, the hairdo, and the accent.
“In a way,” Lilith told her. “It’s a wee bit more complicated than that.”
Sibyl studied her. “But you look so real. How is it possible?”
“We could discuss theoretical physics, if you like, but I’d rather talk about the other thingsyoucan do,” she said.
“Me? I can do more than cook and talk to ghosts?”
“The night you arrived on Wild Hill, you stepped back in time. But you weren’t just visiting. You were traveling through the bloodline and entering each of your ancestors’ minds. You know things about all of us now.”
Lily was right. Sibyl knew where Ivy kept the baking soda. She knew the family recipe for scones, which Sadie had brought over from Scotland. She remembered that Rose had been particularly fond of currant and cream scones, though she’d never seen her eat one.
It was a strange gift and she wasn’t sure what to do with it. “How does it work?”
Lilith shrugged. “I don’t know. Close your eyes and tell me a secret.”
Sibyl closed her eyes and saw Sadie and Ivy in the living room of the caretaker’s cottage, putting on a show for a girl they both knew was eavesdropping. “Sadie always knew you could talk to ghosts. And she knew you were hiding under the stairs that day we firstmet. She was trying to goad you into accepting the fact that you were a witch.”
“I always knew I was a witch,” Lilith replied. “I just didn’t want to be anyone else’s kind of witch. I wanted to chart my own path.”
“I think Sadie would be proud of you.”
