Witching There's Another Way: A Cozy Mystery (The Witchy Women of Coven Grove Book 4) by Constance Barker Read Free Book Online Page A

More than you can imagine.”
    Of course she did. Bailey regretted having said anything, but wasn’t quite ready to apologize yet. Instead, she just hugged her mother tightly.
    “So,” Bailey asked, when they parted, “what are we doing?”
    Frances held up something. Bailey had to squint to see it.
    It was a strand of hair.
    “I know just the thing,” she said, and smiled.
     

 
     
    Chapter 6
    There was a great deal of argument to be had before Frances finally agreed to retrieve the scrying mirror from the attic above the bakery. Taking Aiden and Avery into the sanctuary of the coven was out of the question, according to both Frances and Chloe—and even if they had been so inclined, Aria hadn’t yet returned from helping Dala home and all three of them would have to be in agreement for that to come to pass.
    Given the vast differences between witch’s magic and wizard’s magic, Bailey didn’t see the reason for keeping them out of the attic in the first place—a wizard could no more utilize a witch’s spells than a witch could utilize a wizard’s formulae. They were different approaches to magic, drawn from different sources. Still, Aiden and Avery both voiced their acceptance of the mandate; as though they had a choice in the matter.
    When Frances did return, she carried with her a small chest. “Draw the blinds,” she said, jerking her chin at the windows.
    The three younger magic users in the room tended that task while Chloe and Frances set up a table for the scrying process.
    The scrying mirror itself was polished silver, rather than glass. It was a dish, and into it was poured clear water from a stoppered clay vessel. The water didn’t slosh or splash like water should have—instead, when it entered the dish, it seemed almost to cling to the metal like oil.
    Chloe took the strand of hair from Frances, and placed it in a small metal dish. It began to smoke over a coal inside, and with precise, practiced ease she quickly pinched five powders and crushed herbs and sprinkled them over the coal as well. Thick white smoke began to plume up, and as it did Frances raised a hand and made a circling motion with it. Though there was no wind in the room, the smoke began to shape itself into a rough, spinning disc.
    Chloe touched the edge of the scrying mirror on one side, and Frances on the other. Bailey watched attentively, trying to parse out the process. Fire for a message. The hair and the herbs and powders for the content of the message which probably involved symbols and essences for seeking. One of the powders she recognized as crushed acorns, symbols of offspring perhaps, further directing the content of the message.
    At Frances’ behest, the smoke disc drifted down like a roiling cloud to the surface of the water in the dish, and when it did, Frances and Chloe began to chant. It was Etruscan, but there were words in it Bailey didn’t know yet. Something about opening eyes, eagles, and flight.
    As the chant rose and fell, the smoke began to disperse—not into the air, but down, into the water, making it cloudy at first, until, after several long minutes, it began to clear again.
    Bailey leaned over to look into the reflections inside.
    Except, now, they weren’t reflections.
    The images were watery, although the water in the dish was perfectly still. It showed, at first, a house—possibly Dala’s house. Frances barely tilted the dish one way and the other while muttering to it, and eventually the image began to shrink, as though the perspective inside the dish were zooming out and up into the sky. It drifted one way and another, seemingly at random.
    “It’s following the girl’s recent movements,” Chloe explained quietly.
    Bailey nodded, and Aiden peered with interest at the water. He was looking more and more concerned as the image cast about, but didn’t ask any questions or say anything just yet. Still, Bailey knew the look by now. There was something on his mind, some opinion beginning