Secret Of The Rose (Legacy Of Magick Series, Book 2) (26 page)

“There’s a rose embossed in the seal.” I showed it to Ivy, my eyes swelling with tears.

“Oh my Goddess,” Ivy breathed. “Is that what I think it is?”

I tugged the string aside and broke the wax seal. When I did, a little blast of energy fluttered the hair back from my face. I stopped and looked at Ivy. Silently, she nodded at me to open it up the rest of the way. I gently tugged a corner off the bundle and saw parchment pages covered in beautiful writing and illustrations. “This
is
another section of the Blood Moon Grimoire,” I said.

Ivy bit her lip. “It’s not very big... maybe not even a half inch thick,” Ivy ran her fingers over the part of the pages we’d discovered.

“The first part of the Blood Moon Grimoire wasn’t that big either. But these pages do look to be in better condition than the first set.” I said.

“They’re beautiful,” Ivy said with wonder.

“You know... those first pages were also tied up in red yarn.” I turned the package over in my hands.

“I bet they were... since red string binds evil,” Ivy said, still stroking the pages.

“Ah, okay. Maybe we
shouldn’t
be touching this,” I said recalling what Thomas Drake had told me about the pages being dangerous. I didn’t want to take any chances with my cousin, so I pulled it out of her reach. As soon as I did, Ivy shuddered.

“Whoa. I feel a little dizzy,” Ivy said brushing at her hair. “Does it bother you to touch the pages?”

“No, actually, I don’t feel a thing. No visions this time either.” To be safe, I tugged the brown paper wrapping back into place and gently set the pages aside on the area rug.

Ivy picked up the botanical drawing our great-grandmother had done. “So part of the grimoire was hidden behind that rose illustration all this time?” She flipped over the large print, and I saw, for the first time, all of the magickal information that had been concealed behind the matting.

“Which means that my father
did
take a part of the grimoire with him when he left William’s Ford,” I realized.
Maybe he wasn’t such a coward after all...

Ivy rubbed her hand down my arm. “It was ingenious, really. He found a way to hide the pages in plain sight.”

“Dad had those hanging in his office at home for as long as I can remember.” I blew out a breath, and my bangs fluttered. “After he died, I inherited the botanical illustrations, so I brought them with me.”

Ivy grinned. “So part of the grimoire has literally been
under the rose
for over twenty years! Until you and I found them!”

I had to laugh. “You know, I do feel a little Nancy Drew right now…”

Ivy pumped a fist in the air. “Go us!” She hopped to her feet and tried the door. It opened easily. “
Mom!
” she shouted at the top of her lungs. “Come see what we found!”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

I had to admit, it did feel a little anti-climatic finding the second set of grimoire pages like that. As we gathered around the dining room table that afternoon, Ivy regaled Duncan and the family with the details of communicating with our grandmother’s ghost and finding the pages. I sat back and let her tell the tale—Ivy was the center of attention for the moment, and she was loving it. Holly sat off in the corner of the room, sulking.

The two remaining prints had been checked, but they held nothing other than the glass, the illustrations, and the matting. Aunt Faye and Gwen had laid a large piece of white silk down on the table and placed the newest set of grimoire pages and the paper they’d been wrapped in on top of those. Silk, Aunt Faye explained to me, muffled psychic vibrations. Bran had the antique pages spread out on the dining room table, and Duncan was carefully photographing them with Ivy’s digital camera.

I thought about the red wax seal. “Gwen do you think that your mother was the one to seal up the pages? There is a rose stamped in the wax.”

“I would imagine so. She used to have a rose stamp and sealing wax,” Gwen said.

“Rose always loved the flower she was named after,” Aunt Faye said.

“Yeah, I noticed that,” Ivy grinned at her mother and Aunt Faye. “I’m never gonna react to the smell of roses the same way again.”

“I’ve experienced that when I was with Autumn. But I wish I could have seen or spoken to her again.” Gwen said tucking her arm around Ivy’s shoulders.

“She was in the rose garden last night,” I said, watching the family all whip their heads to stare at me. “I forgot to tell everyone.” I shrugged. “Things have been a little chaotic.”

“Go on,” Gwen said.

“Anyway,” I continued. “I didn’t notice her until everything was over— that’s when I saw her. It was right after Bran showed up and fussed at us all.”

“I do
not
fuss,” Bran said.

“Yes you do,” Ivy and I said in unison.

Gwen tried to maintain a serious expression. “What was she doing? I’m fascinated by her presence last night and now this morning. Especially considering what happened.”

“She was sitting on the little concrete bench in the rose garden,” I told Gwen. “She appeared more ghostly than I’d ever seen her before.”

“Meaning?” Aunt Faye took her gaze off the pages she’d been studying and raised her eyebrows at me.

“Meaning, she seemed like she was all lit up— almost transparent,” I explained. “She smiled at me, and then gave me the thumbs up.”

Gwen threw back her head and laughed. “That sounds like my mother.”

Aunt Faye knocked on the table to get our attention. “Has your grandmother’s ghost ever given you information about the grimoire before today?”

“She has,” I said. “But I’ve had a hard time figuring out what Ro was telling me. I’ve kept notes about it in a journal and mostly in an app on my phone.”

Bran stopped rearranging the pages. “That’s clever.”

“Why do you refer to your grandmother as
Ro
?” Aunt Faye asked.

“Because the first time I saw her, I thought she was a real person, and she introduced herself to me as Ro.”

Gwen picked up the old brown packing paper. “I am still trying to wrap my mind around the idea of Arthur hiding the pages under the botanical drawing.”

“Rose helped him conceal the pages before she died,” Aunt Faye announced.

“Really, do you think so?” I asked her. For once, I hoped someone would tell me that my father had done
something
noble.

“I don’t think. I
know
.” Aunt Faye said. “When I first touched the wrappings, I had a vision of the past. Rose meant to keep the pages in the manor, but when she died, Arthur took them with him.”

“Seems like he took a lot of things,” Ivy said, then cringed. “I’m sorry,” she said to me.

“It’s okay.” I waved away any apologies. “We know he did, that’s how I ended up with the scrying mirror that belonged to our grandmother.” I stared at those pages, and said what I was thinking. “Those grimoire pages were hidden in plain sight under one of a trio of prints in our house in New Hampshire for over twenty years. My mother would have sold off these antique botanical prints if not for my father leaving them to me in his will. When I brought them along with me, I’d thought they were simply a cool old set of botanical drawings. I never knew my great-grandmother was the artist— until Gwen told me this fall.”

Duncan set the camera aside and put an arm around my shoulders. “Have you considered that maybe your father intuitively
knew
what tools you would need in the future? You’re a Seer— and he made sure you had the scrying mirror. He entrusted the pages to you for safe keeping.”

“I admit that I’d hoped that we’d find a letter from him behind the other prints...” I leaned into Duncan. “I don’t know, it’s probably dumb. But I hoped there would be something to explain what happened.”

“It’s not dumb,” Duncan said.

“I want to see if these pages react to your touch the way the first set does.” Bran pulled off the cotton gloves he’d been using.

“What, right now?” I asked.

“Yes,” Bran said, pulling me over to stand next to him.

“Don’t yank me around,” I glared at Bran.

“Then don’t act like a child,” Bran said pleasantly.

I tugged my arm away from him. “You want another punch in the nose,
bro
?”

“Children,” Gwen warned us.

“The pages didn’t change when Ivy and I were upstairs.” I stalled. The whole family was staring at me, and I felt really uncomfortable.

“How would you know?” Ivy said. “They were mostly wrapped up. We wouldn’t have been able to see any changes.”

“Well, if I do this... no making-the-pages-come-to-life shaming!” I scowled at Bran.

Bran rolled his eyes at me and set his phone to record a video. “Stop stalling.”

“Ooh good idea!” Ivy said and got her phone out to record also.

Duncan nudged me closer to the table. “Go ahead, I want to see what happens.”

I shot a glance at Gwen and Great Aunt Faye. One was curious and hopeful, while the other kept their expression regal and bland. Two guesses as to which Witch was which. Holly walked closer to the table, her arms folded over her chest, but she remained silent.

“Okay, here it goes,” I said, laying my hands on the outside edges of the two closest pages that featured illustrations. With no wrapping paper to get in the way this time, I felt as before when I’d had direct contact with the first section of pages— a warmth that started in my hands. Energy traveled up my arms in a little rush, and the pages started to look brighter. Slowly, the illustrations began to shift and change. While the family gasped watching the transformation of the illustrations on the parchment pages, I felt my arms start to tremble.

“You okay?” Duncan asked, laying his hand on my shoulder.

Everything changed. The pages lit up with a bright golden light. One by one, I could see the edges of the pages on the table start to flutter.

“Duncan,” Gwen said, “put your hands on top of hers and touch the pages too.”

Duncan reached around me with his chest up against my back. He laid his hands over mine, and his fingertips touched the pages. I felt him jump in surprise.

“Are you alright?” Gwen asked with a frown.

“Yeah,” Duncan said slowly. “It’s like a magnetic type of energy. There is a pull and a rush of warmth. I wonder—”

Before he could finish his sentence, the pages began to flow together, one on top of the other they shuffled like a big deck of cards. They slithered around and stacked themselves neatly. The pages pushed against the two that Duncan and I had our hands on. Without a word, we lifted our hands as one, and the pages slid and arranged themselves into one neat stack.

“Holy shit,” I managed.

Duncan stepped back from me, reached over and pulled on the cotton gloves Bran had discarded. “I want to see something.” He carefully ruffled through the pages. “It’s almost as if they put themselves back in an order they preferred.” Gently, he set the stack of grimoire pages back on the silk.

“Can I try and touch the pages?” Ivy asked.

“By the edges only,” Bran and I said together.

Ivy made a face at us. “History nerds.”

“I’m serious, Ivy,” I said. I watched as she took a deep breath and set her fingertips on the edges of the pages. Nothing otherworldly happened except that Ivy swayed a little.

Duncan reached out to steady her as she snatched her hands back. “You okay?” he asked.

“Whoa,” Ivy put a hand to her head. “Head rush.”

Holly, who’d been silent until now, reached towards the pages with a tentative hand. “Let me see...” Her fingertips barely grazed the pages. They slid neatly away from her and closer to where Ivy, Duncan and I stood. Holly squeaked jumping back.

I narrowed my eyes at Ivy.

“I did
not
do that!” Ivy scowled at me.

Gwen patted her arm. “I know you didn’t, honey. I would have felt the energy surge if you had.”

“If I didn’t know better,” I gave a half-laugh, “I’d think the pages were alive or something.”

“And they don’t like me,” Holly pouted.

“That’s a good thing,” Bran said to her.

Duncan picked up the pages, placing them in the tissue, and then the archival box Bran had ready. “I’ll ask my mother about the reactions the pages cause and how they
behave
, I suppose, when I see her tonight. We are going to dinner, and I can bring her up to speed on the newest discovery.”

“That’s good,” Gwen said. “Now we need to store these somewhere safe. Bran, I’d like you to load the images up on a new flash drive, and I will see that it is stored in a separate location.”

“Like a safe deposit box,” Aunt Faye suggested.

“That’s where we stored the first flash drive,” Gwen said with a smile.

***    

Within a week, the family seemed to settle back into whatever passed for normal. The Halloween— Samhain— decorations came down, and the mantle in the family room had been shifted to creamy colored pumpkins and a golden brown floral display for Thanksgiving.

Fall break was over, I was back in class, and knee deep in my studies at the Museum. I was assigned a rotation working in the archives, and it gave me access to many older books and journals in the museum’s collection. Whenever I had the chance, I carefully went through the books, and while I didn’t find any information about the town’s
magickal
history, I did learn more about the families who had immigrated here along with the Bishops.

Marie Rousseau held an open house for the official grand opening of her tattoo parlor, and Duncan and I had fun attending that. The shop had a gift section in the front half, and the tattoo area was in the back. The ceiling of the shop had been painted a dark purple with little golden stars. Twisty branches hovered from the ceiling on clear fishing line, and Spanish moss dripped down from the branches along with Mardi Gras beads.

Beautiful decorated bottles of bath salts, potions and waters were arranged on shelves, and I even saw little voodoo dolls tucked here and there. The whole shop had a clever New Orleans vibe, and I knew that Marie would do well with her business. Ivy spent a good hour at the open house going thru the album that held photos of Marie’s tattoo designs. While Cypress and Holly carried on a quiet conversation, Ivy had tried to talk me into getting a large black crescent moon tattooed on my right shoulder with the same Celtic knot design like Gwen and my father’s. I told her I would wait until she turned eighteen next month, and we’d do it together.