Goddess of Spring by P. C. Cast Read Free Book Online

yawned then snorted at her.
    â€œI know it’s late, but I have something I need to finish, and I know the perfect spot.”
    Far from complaining, Edith was the first one to the door of the condo, and Lina had to juggle to balance the wine without spilling it.
    â€œEasy there, big girl!”
    Shifting the ball of dough to her jacket pocket, Lina locked the door behind them. It was early March, and the Oklahoma night was unseasonably warm. The air felt rich and heavy with the promise of spring. Lina let Edith lead her into the heart of the well-kept courtyard. A shadow flitted overhead calling Lina’s attention upward. A full moon sat high in the sky, round and bright and the color of whipped butter. She stared at it. What an odd shade of yellow. It lent the familiar surroundings of her English Tudor-style condo complex an ethereal glow, casting mundane hedges and sidewalk edges into new and slightly sinister roles.
    â€œOh, please. I must be having a Lord of the Rings moment,” Lina admonished herself. “Dolores was right. I’ve taken too many trips to the IMAX to drool over Aragorn.”
    The ritual and the dough-making frenzy had obviously gone to her head if she was imaging sinister shapes around her well-kept condo complex.
    â€œI’ll have to tell Anton all about this,” she mumbled to herself. “Maybe I can finally convince him to share his Xanax with me.”
    Actually, now that she was outside and the spell/recipe book was neatly stacked with the other cookbooks in her living room, she was beginning to feel a little foolish.
    â€œMaybe I should have had more wine before this part of the recipe,” she told Edith, who flicked her ears back at her and huffed, but kept on winding her way along their familiar path. “Or maybe I’m just exhausted and I need to go to bed.”
    They were coming to her favorite part of the complex—the grand marble fountain that sat squarely in the middle of the cobblestone courtyard. Year-round it spouted water in an impressive geyser that cascaded down three delicately curved, bowl-like tiers. Actually, it was the fountain that had convinced Lina to purchase the condo. During the summer Lina found the area around the fountain, with its cool cobblestones and old oak shade trees, even more refreshing than the pool, and a good deal less crowded. In the winter months the fountain, like the pool, was heated, and Lina had enjoyed many an Oklahoma winter afternoon swathed in blankets, feet tucked under her, while she read to the musical sound of falling water.
    â€œThis is it. The perfect special place,” Lina told Edith Anne, who was snuffling around an azalea bush. “Stay there, this won’t take long.”
    She dropped the bulldog’s leash. Obediently, Edith planted her wide bottom on the ground, then seemed to reconsider and, with a doggy sigh, relaxed into a full, stretched-out recline, her half-closed eyes watching Lina with sleepy semi-interest.
    The nearest oak was also the biggest. Lina approached it carefully in the buttermilk moonlight, careful not to trip over the intricate knots of exposed roots that proliferated the area around the base of the tree. Unexpectedly, they seemed ominous, calling to life visions of grasping tentacles and writhing snakes.
    â€œStop being ridiculous,” Lina said in the tone she reserved for generic perfume solicitors. The sound of her voice dispelled the disturbing vision, and the oak shifted back to its familiar, solid self.
    Lina extracted the small lump of dough from her pocket. She looked around the courtyard. No one was stirring; even Edith Anne had stopped watching her and was snoring softly. Lina crouched down and placed the dough ball in the vertex of two especially thick roots that intersected at the base of the tree.
    Lina looked around her again. Certain that except for the snoring bulldog she was alone, she dipped her fingers into the glass of wine and flicked