The Ninth Door

Chapter 17 - Witch

Sienna

Saying goodbye to my family felt different now. Yes, it always came with that bittersweet feeling – knowing that I didn’t have to be fawned on but also helplessly missing them. This time around, I wasn’t sure what to feel.

I’d always feel like the odd one out, not part of the nuclear family made up of Uncle Stefan, Aunt Rachel, Joy, and Silas. I was just a relative, a tragic orphan that they felt responsible for but could do without. No wonder my mother didn’t tell me who my father was. Even my birth certificate didn’t carry any name, and yet somehow, the Kelley surname was accurate. I knew that now.

What the hell were they thinking?

They were siblings.

Knowing that Stefan was my father made everything even more depressing. There he was, leaving the Junction with his legitimate children, leaving behind the child he would never be able to claim because of the possible fallout. It was worse than finding out my father was truly dead. Determination blazed anew in me. I must open all nine doors to see if I could gain my mother back even for a short time – to ask her what the hell happened. Surely there were other men who wanted her, even loved her. It couldn’t just be her brother and her mad rapist.

It all made sense now, why I hadn’t fallen in love with anyone yet. There was never even a spark, a serious crush. I thought it was the tragedy that broke me. Maybe I was born broken.

“I’m glad you’ve found someone who can take care of you,” Uncle Stefan said. I went rigid when he hugged me even though he had enveloped me in his strong arms so many times before. When he kissed the top of my head, I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream that I knew about what I was to him, but I kept my composure.

“Oh, he’s taking care of her alright,” Joy joked, wiggling her eyebrows at me. My cousin/sister didn’t know who I really was to her and she would probably not be joking around anymore if she did.

“You need to get out more, Joy to the world,” Silas said.

“And you got someone taking care of you?” I asked, managing a joke even though my heart was breaking. Broken, I corrected.

“Of course. Aside from mom, I have a girl who takes care of me now, Sienna. Her name is Ingrid. Hope you get to meet her one day.”

“She’s a great cook,” Joy added.

We talked a little more, dawdling by the foyer. It might be my imagination but Uncle Stefan was looking at me more intently that he used to. At least that was what I felt. Emmerich held me so close that we were practically joined at the hip. It sold our story while he comforted me with his touch. I didn’t know that I needed a friend until he came into my life. I was always alone. So alone. But I knew I needed to grow stronger because what we had was temporary. I couldn’t fall into pieces when it was time for him to leave.

Aunt Rachel knew. She knew about her husband and his sister, and the mess that they made that was me. It all made sense. While she made sure I was well taken care of, there was also all the effort she put into making sure I had my own apartment, away from them. Uncle Stefan never lifted a finger to find me a place several towns away. I thought it was a protective streak or just him being his stubborn self, but now I wondered.

Thinking too much about my family resulted in unwanted memories. These were memories that somehow scuttled away with the trauma of my mother’s murder.

**

2007

“Shiela! What a surprise! I thought you would be staying at the Junction this Christmas,” Aunt Rachel said, as she opened the door to her house wider. “Oh look at you, Sienna, all grown!”

“I’m six,” little me replied, fidgeting from one pink ballet shoe to the other.

“We’re staying at the Junction, although everything’s depressing over there lately,” my mom reassured my uncle’s wife. “Since I’m not sure you’ll be coming over, I thought we’d pass by and bring you some gifts.”

Mrs. Winters stood behind us, next to her son Ellis, who carried the presents for my uncle, aunt, and my cousins. I wished I could see them tear the paper, gawk at the gifts, and jump up and down, but I knew I wouldn’t.

“Where are my manners?” Aunt Rachel asked, but I thought her smile was a little too stiff and her grey eyes too cold. “Come inside for some tea before you drive to the Junction.”

“O-kay, but we won’t take long, Rachel.”

“Why are you really going there, Shiela?”

The tone between the two of them was still friendly, but I thought they looked too stiff, like my paper dolls dressed in fifties clothes. Aunt Rachel had her straight dark hair in one long braid. She wore a white blouse over a tweed skirt and ankle boots. She was pretty.

My mother always had that fairy princess look, with flowy dresses and ballet slippers. We dressed alike. These days, though, I’d rather wear jeans and blouses. At work, I dressed more like Aunt Rachel.

“To sell it.”

There was that hard voice that I rarely heard from my mom.

“Why would you sell it?”

In hindsight, I realized that there was a strange kind of glee in Aunt Rachel’s voice and that my mother knew exactly what the other woman felt about her.

“You know why.”

“I don’t. Please tell me why you’re selling your inheritance, Shiela. You know that Stefan won’t be trying to take the Junction away from you. It’s always been yours. Your father passed it on to you.”

“I’m going to die in that house, Rachel. I can feel it. I’ve died there so many times.”

Aunt Rachel scoffed, bitterness emanating from her.

“When you steal something from someone, someone else will steal from you. Karma.”

“Who’s exactly stealing, Rachel?”

**

Present Day

I had two books to read. First, there was Estella’s story and then there was the book we discovered behind the second and third doors – Dux Maleficarum. It was time to embrace my inner witch, or whatever we called it.

“Have you ever had a moment when you made something out of nothing? Magical tricks? Cards? Do you cook?”

“Slow down, Emmerich. I know you’re eager to open the fourth door, but -.”

“It’s not that,” he said, looking like he was afraid he’d offended me.

I smiled. We were sitting on the bed, again with books between us. They were no longer barricades. Instead, they connected us. How he got here might have something to do about witchcraft, and that was what we were going to explore.

“What is it, then?”

“I feel your renewed desire to find your mother.”

How could he know that? Feel that? He must have seen my confusion because he raised his right hand in an appeasing motion.

“You want to know your mother’s side. Was she ever afraid of your uncle? Were they close?”

“They were close,” I said, each word too difficult to say. Why couldn’t I have been born into a normal family? “Too close, some people said.”

The admission was a shock to the system. Could it be that I had always known the answer to the questions that plagued me as a child?

“Then, we need to open the doors. All of them. As soon as possible.”

“After we open them, you’ll leave?” I hated the neediness creeping out of my voice. I had never expected a leopard in the little space I called my home. I hadn’t expected Emmerich in my life.

“I must, Sienna.”

Words died before I let them out. I idly opened the first few pages of Estella’s book. Soon, I was immersed in it. Emmerich read over my shoulder, whispering the words like an incantation or someone putting a child to sleep.

I didn’t realize that the night had fallen deep and the chill from outside had entered the room. We read into the night, interrupted only by silent pauses and small gasps from me. Emmerich’s fingers were in my hair but I couldn’t protest when they felt comforting. I rested my head on his shoulder, sleep almost claiming me. Even though the book was compelling in its darkness, with its vampires and other worlds, my eyes were closing on their own accord.

“Sienna? This other place, do you know about it?”

“Lynx Hall? No. I haven’t been there. They’re home to the Westerleys, a branch of ancestors.”

“Westerley?’

“Yes.”

The two of us fell silent, no doubt wondering whether Eric Wester’s surname was a coincidence or something else entirely.

“Your witchcraft comes from that side of the family,” Emmerich remarked,

“Yes,” I said. The word came out more like a sigh.

Then, all was black.

**

Red hair for witch.

A woman stood in the pyre, as townspeople huddled around her with torches. Fire. A man wearing black robes dipped his torch where the woman’s feet were. Her bare feet were surrounded by twigs and logs. They bled, the red blood spreading. It was so strange how I could see it even from the seemingly great distance.

“Who are you?” the man beside me asked. His eyes were blatantly scared, cheeks grimy, and clothes damp and foul-smelling. His companions, all men, looked in my direction.

“Who are you?” one echoed. The third one did the same. A fourth and a fifth echoed the question.

“Where am I?”

“You’re watching a witch burn. Look at her.”

“She looks like the witch,” one them said suspiciously.

“Of course not. Look at this one. She has blond hair, not red.”

I nodded vigorously, as I watched them come closer. My throat tightened.

“Not a witch, but maybe a w***e. Who else would be walking around in those clothes.”

I looked down to see that I was wearing a tank top over pajamas. They weren’t what you’d call w***e’s clothes, but I guessed in this time and place, they were.

“No need to burn here then, but we can f**k her,” the first man said.

“No! You’re wrong. I’m not a w***e. I’m not.”

It might seem impossible but they seemed to get even closer and closer.

No. No. No.

**

“Sienna,” a gentle voice said my name.

I opened my eyes to see that my head was on his lap. Shame came over me and I tried to get up, but his hand firmly held my arm.

“Shh. You were crying in your sleep.”

“I was dreaming,” I explained. “Did you finish reading Estella’s book.”

“Yes. Lynx Hall has a portal to another world. Maybe I went through one, too.”

“You were in the dungeon, you said.”

“Yes. If the Junction was the place Eric Wester placed under siege, then it meant my home couldn’t be that far from here. Maybe four hours by horseback.”

“That may mean around an hour or so by car,” I said. This time, I sat up without any resistance from Emmerich. He must be as startled, or as consumed by the possibilities.

“What’s the name of the place a little over an hour from here?” he asked.

“That must be approximately the city where Lilith ran off to.”

“The place where she was supposed to build a life with this David person.”

“Yes.”

“We should go there,” Emmerich suggested.

“Of course. Witches and cats are a dangerous combination,” I joked. “We need to find the convergence. Oh, right. It was marriage that made it possible.”

“You are a dangerous combination,” he agreed, his voice low and husky.

I blushed even though I had no idea what he was talking about. It felt like a compliment and I took it as one.

“It’s curious, you know, house cats inbreed but leopards naturally don’t. What am I?”

There was no answer. After all, I was asking a man who was not born as a leopard. I was the cat here, from birth. I had always been.