My Three Cousins

Chapter Thirty-Six

We waited two more days for Joan to be ready and on the third day she finally came downstairs looking for food.  She looked worse than I had ever seen her.  Her eyes were swollen and bloodshot with dark circles not just under them but rimming the entire eye.  Her cheeks were sunken in, and she looked pale.  She wore the same clothes she had on the day of the attack and judging by the smell she hadn't washed them.  

Despite her appearance Mom decided that coming downstairs was enough to suggest that she was ready.  After Joan ate the breakfast Mom had made, she got up to go back to her room, but Mom stopped her.  "Joan, we need to talk."

"I don't want to talk to you," she said coldly.

"It's about your sisters."  Mom seemed taken aback at this reaction and proceeded with a gentler tone to her voice.

"I really don't want to talk to you about them." Joan said moving toward the stairs as she spoke.

"I think we can get them back," Mom said with all facades of gentleness dropped.

Joan paused with one foot poised on the bottom stair and I saw her body tense up.  "We?"  She asked in a voice filled with anger, not bothering to turn and look at Mom as she spoke to her.

"Yes," Mom said, slowly. 

At this Joan turned revealing eyes filled with tears and a face red with fury.  "When did you join our side?  Was it before or after you packed up your kids and abandoned us, letting my sisters get killed?"  Joan's voice was angry in a controlled way.  She wasn't yelling but I could hear the rage behind it as she spoke.

"Joan, you know I didn't mean for your sisters to get killed," Mom's face still displayed shock but her voice was filled with guilt.

"Actually, I don't know that.  It seems like that was exactly what you wanted then before they're even cold you came in here and took over our house."  Joan said angrily.

"Joan," my mom's tone harsh and would have made me pause but Joan just stepped closer to look her in the eye.  After the events of the last few days there was nothing left for Joan to fear.

"Joan," I said softer, and Joan turned to look at me, "I know you're mad at her.  I'm mad at her too." I said this without looking at my mom because I didn't want to see her reaction to my anger, "but I didn't leave you all so trust me.  She knows a lot more about magic than we thought, and she has a plan to save Ruth and Helen.  Set aside your anger and try it.  For them."

I saw in Joan's eyes that she did trust me but there was still hesitation.  She took a step back from Mom and looked at me, "what do we need to do?"

"Go back in time," Mom answered then she let out a sigh, "well at least Addison does."

"Me?"  I asked incredulously. 

Mom glanced at the ceiling as if she was worried about Fitz and Vivian overhearing but then she looked at Joan and resigned herself to the fact that it was a risk she was going to have to take.  "When people with magic die their magic dies with them, but magic is a bit like energy in that it can't be created or destroyed so it rips the fabric of our world.  If we use that thin spot, we can open a portal to the past more easily than usual.  Joan should have enough power to do this even without her sisters."

Joan was still angry but seemed to be paying more attention, "so we just go back to the fight and save them?" 

"No, it won't work.  Your powers still wouldn't be enough, and we'd risk losing all three of you.  Addison goes back farther.  Our family has been losing magic every generation, not because our magic is running out but because we're losing the fight to protect it.  If Addison goes back and warns people about the attacks, then she can restore our magic generation by generation." 

The color drained from my face as she said this, I wasn't entirely sure about a plan that relied so heavily on me.  "How am I supposed to do that?"

"Really it's the safest and easiest job, from the afterlife Maggie has a better perspective on our family line than we do.  We'll call her and she can guide Joan to send you back to just the right places.  You don't have to join them in fighting you just have to warn them.  If you stop the magic from being lost even once, you give them more power in the present." 

I wished now Mom had told me about the plan days ago so I'd have more time to prepare but I knew it was too late to say that, so I just nodded, "and how do I get back?" 

"If Joan and Maggie are specific enough with the instructions when they send you then you should come and go from times when you pass the danger point no matter if you protect the power there or if they still lose it.  That means you will move from generation to generation until you reach the last time magic was lost."   She gave me a meaningful look to suggest I shouldn't mention that I knew Aunt Maggie was the last person to lose magic, "After that if you concentrate and the spell is cast correctly, you'll be pulled to right before the moment you're trying to change." 

"Will Ruth and Helen be alive?" Joan asked eagerly.

"It will be the moment before the first one of them died.  That will become the present and only the four of you will remember things changed." 

"Why?" I asked my head still spinning as I struggled to understand what we were planning to do.

"Joan will remember because she cast the spell, Ruth and Helen will remember because they'll remember the were dead at the time of its casting, and you'll remember because your memory will be protected by being in the past."  Mom seemed certain about this plan, and I wished I felt as confident in it as she did.

"You won't remember?"

"No and for my sake I hope you don't tell me about it in the future," she answered, and I could see then how much the guilt was weighing on her.

"I'm supposed to believe that in a matter of days you went from not wanting to let Addison fight alongside us to being willing to send her to the past alone?"  Joan eyed Mom skeptically.

"I was wrong before," Mom said, "I should have protected you all.  I can't let Helen and Ruth die because of my stupidity.  I would go myself, but I think Addison will be safer in the past than you or I will be in the present.  "Once we start the spell there is a chance that the generations whose powers were taken will feel some type of alert and attack.  I need to stay here and protect you because if you die while casting the spell this will all be for nothing." 

"What if Addison didn't go alone?"  A voice behind us said and we turned to see Fitz standing on the stairs.

I was shocked to see that my brother had been listening the entire time.  Mom walked away from us and toward Fitz, "No Fitz," she smiled sadly at him, and I could see the part of her that wanted to keep one of us small and safe, "I need you hear to take care of Vivian.  There is no time to take her to Hal and Joan and I will be occupied the entire time Addison is gone." 

"But," Fitz started and then he gave up.  I hated to see how quickly my brother quit but these last few weeks he had gotten used to being left out of things.

"Anyway, Addison isn't going alone."

"Who is going with me?"  I asked, feeling as though we had run out of options.

"Lennox."  Mom admitted, "I asked them, and they agreed to go."

My breath caught in my chest, and I was shocked.  Mom's desire to have tea with them now made sense.  "You can't drag them into all this."

"They've already been dragged into all this when they hit that monster with their car." Mom answered.

"You're putting them in danger," I said, getting upset as I didn't want to be responsible for any more deaths.

"I think I've already proven I'd put anyone in danger to protect you." 

I didn't know what to say back to that and I hated my mom for saying it at all.  "When will they get here?"  Joan asked, clearly eager to get her sisters back now that she had heard the plan.

"They're on their way now." Mom answered.