Rosemary Thorne's Arc

Chapter 22 of 24

Rosemary walked home from the bakery with the signed ledger folded in her satchel. The paper felt heavier than the bread she had not bought. She had balanced the promises she could name. She had not counted the ones the garden had to keep. At the cottage she spread the ledger on the table and walked out to the rows. The morning was thin and grey. She counted beans first. Then onions. Then the pear tree by the fence. She wrote each yield in the margin. The apples she halved on paper for Mabel and struck through for the carter. The honey she halved again. When she added the totals she stopped and added them a second time. The garden came up short. Not by much. By a basket of onions and a jar of honey and the pears she had already promised twice in her head. She sat on the step. The cats came and pressed against her skirt. She thought about which promise to break and could not choose one. Break Mabel and the gazebo went. Break the carter and the cider went and his man's wages with it. Break the gnome and she did not want to know what broke next. She went inside and took down the green spellbook from the shelf. The cover was cracked leather over green and gold, a star wheel stamped in the center. It had belonged to the witch. She had kept it for the reversal and the wards and had not opened it since. She turned the pages slowly. She was not looking for a spell. She was looking for a page she could tear. Damien came in behind her. He watched her hand on the book. "What are you doing?" "Mabel pays well for secrets," Rosemary said. "This book is full of them." "That book killed a woman." "It also saved you." She closed it and held it against her chest. "One page. The recipe for a tonic. Nothing that names anyone. Nothing that calls anything." He was quiet a long moment. Then he nodded once. She walked back to the village before the bakery closed. Mabel was pulling loaves. Rosemary set the ledger down and, beside it, a single folded page in old ink. "Against the onions and the honey," she said. "A recipe. It's real. Test it on yourself first." Mabel wiped flour on her apron and read. Her eyes moved twice. She folded the page small and pushed it into her bodice. "Onions cleared," she said. "Honey cleared. Don't bring me another." "I won't." Mabel took the pencil from behind her ear and crossed both lines in the ledger. She signed the margin. Rosemary signed under her. She walked home with the book lighter by one page and the ledger balanced. On the step she stopped. She had paid the debt. She had opened a door she had meant to keep shut.