Page 1 of The Witch’s Daughter

1

Trish

It started with a death.

Not that her death was sudden or anything. My gram could see the future, so she knew what was coming, and that was about as awful as it sounds.

After years of holding it together for her children, then her grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and the influx of wolf-witches born in our region, her big heart finally cracked.

First, she gave away her things. A cauldron here. A teacup there. Her knowledge in bursts and hurried lectures to the group of young wolf-witches she’d gathered at her doorstep when I was a pup.

Then she spoke her final wishes.

I can still hear her making me promise to take care of my sisters. Of course I would. Us Cerberus girls stuck together.

Hadn’t she always told us that?

Gram tried her best to prepare us for a life without her, rushing through my magic training and leaving her legacy in the magic of those around her.

Still, the day she died was a shock to the system. Until that moment, I hadn’t known anyone who crossed death’s door. Ironic, because our history was steeped in death. Cerberus wolf pack was haunted by the ghosts of our ancestors who’d fought against the purist humans—and then each other—long before my sisters and I were born.

It was violent and brutal and not at all like the boring life I’d grown up in, playing in the woods as wolves, and then connecting with other wolf-witches my age under the care of my gram.

I tried to be happy for her. None of us wore black to the funeral as per her request. It was a beautiful, sunshiny day when she left us. The day she’d finally been able to return to the loving arms of her deceased fated mate, if the gods or whoever was running the afterlife allowed it.

But all I could see was the fear on her face when she made Jaxon promise to take care of me too. I was only fourteen at the time, and anxious to run off to find my fated mate like all the other wolves my age were doing. I still can’t believe what a stupid, naive little pup I was.

But it didn’t take long to realize what my gram had done.

She’d bound us all together, putting chains on my feet that kept me grounded in Cerberus pack just like her body would be forever buried here. I stood at her grave, holding my triplet sisters’ hands, as our mom spoke a blessing over the earth. That day, I pretended not to see my dad or Aunt Alpha Kera cry.

And I released Jaxon from his vow.

It was the least I could do for him.

Because the day my gram died was the day everything in my life shattered.

That was the day my magic broke.

*

“Moon water, mica dust, and… almond extract.”

That can’t be right.

I frowned as I reread the page in my gram’s old grimoire, checking the list to make sure I’d pulled the right ingredients off the shelf. Herbal magic could be tricky. It was the easiest to understand, and most anyone could use it, but one wrong leaf and it could all turn into a disaster.

Ask me how I know.

“Are you sure you don’t want my help?” Mom stood in the back of the kitchen, wringing her hands.

Sage Cerberus—witch extraordinaire and owner/chef of the café that fed our whole pack—was definitely the person to ask for help in situations like this. But I was twenty-freaking-four-years-old and didn’t need my mom to save me.

“I’ve got it.” I carefully measured out the almond extract, only spilling a little over the side of the spoon.

Are you sure about that? My wolf, an ever-present force in my mind, closed her eyes so she wouldn’t see the mess I was about to make.

Quiet, I hissed at her.