Spells A Bayou Magic Novel - Kristen Proby Page 0,68

my bag. “I’ve been carrying it with me. I know I shouldn’t, in case it gets ruined, but I just haven’t been able to put it away.”

I pass her the old paper, and Lucien and I watch as she reads it.

Miss Sophia is our grandchild.

I grasp onto his hand at the sound of his words in my head. This is incredible.

“Well,” she says as she tenderly folds the letter. “Isn’t that lovely?”

“We also have the handfasting cord from then, and are wearing the original wedding bands.”

Her eyes fill with tears. “What a gift.”

“I have Sabrina’s baby shoes at home,” I inform her. “And you’re welcome to see them. But, Miss Sophia, can you tell us about her? When I realized I’d been here before, and that I’d had children in other lifetimes, I didn’t really stop to wonder what’d happened to those children. Until Sabrina.”

“It would make sense,” she says. “You’re living in the house that she was born in. And you’re living in a time not far from the one in which you lived with her. In the grand scheme of things, it’s as if it happened last week.”

“Yes.” I nod and wipe a tear from my cheek. “That’s how it feels.”

“She was a wonderful woman,” Miss Sophia adds. “I was very close to her. She was funny and happy. Much like you, Millie.”

I press my hand to my mouth and let the tears fall.

“She was the most talented witch I’ve ever known, even to this day. She just knew. She always had the answers.”

I smile up at Lucien. “You just said that about your own great-grandmother this morning.”

Miss Sophia’s eyes sharpen. “Which one?”

“Well, it would have been Sabrina’s great-great-grandmother.”

“Esther?” Miss Sophia asks.

“That’s right.”

“Oh, I’d heard stories,” she says with a small laugh. “To talk about people long dead with you is so refreshing. It’s as if they’re still here. Nanna, that’s what I called Sabrina, often spoke of Esther’s grimoire and wondered where it was.”

Lucien and I exchange a look of surprise, and then he reaches into his briefcase and pulls the book out, setting it on the table as he smiles.

“I found it just this morning.”

Miss Sophia gasps in shock and covers her mouth with her hands. “You’re kidding.”

I reach over and open the front cover. “It’s two hundred years old.”

“Oh my goddess,” she whispers, lovingly running her hands over it. “This is my four-times-great-grandmother’s grimoire.”

“I suddenly feel really old,” I say with a laugh.

“You’re not,” she replies. “You’re a thirty-year-old woman. Our DNA won’t match. Nothing links us biologically. It’s all spiritual.”

“It’s fascinating,” Lucien adds. “I can tell you that I don’t think anything like this has happened in any of my other lifetimes.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” she says. “Your Power has grown stronger as time passed. Your link to each other became more powerful. From what I was told, your death was sudden and had nothing to do with Horace, but that evil was escalating, and you feared that he’d get to Millie. You needn’t worry, because he did not.”

“Thank the goddess,” Lucien whispers.

“And now, here you are, back to live out your destiny again. May I keep this book to read through and study?”

“Of course,” Lucien agrees. “It’s why I brought it today. I spent some time with it this morning. There are some fun things in there. Esther was pretty funny.”

“I can’t wait to read it,” she says. “Now, back to Sabrina. She married at twenty years old. A fine, upstanding gentleman from New Orleans named Charles Patterson. They had three children. Their youngest baby died at birth from a defect. That would have been around 1945 or so. I’m the eldest child of her eldest child. My mother’s name was Millicent.”

I shake my head, completely overwhelmed.

“I’m so happy we came here today,” I whisper, and then my eyes snap to Miss Sophia’s. “Do you have photos of her?”

“Of course.” She grins and reaches over to the counter and passes us a photo album full of black and white pictures. “She was beautiful. She had red hair, and deep brown eyes.”

I look to Lucien. We’d talked about this. Everything I remember is true.

Of course, it is.

I brush my finger over Sabrina’s face and wish I’d lived long enough in that lifetime to know my daughter.

“Don’t do that,” Miss Sophia says. “Don’t wish for it to be different. Because if it was, you wouldn’t be here now with your man. If you’d lived longer without him, you most likely wouldn’t have been reborn in