Table Of ContentTable of Contents
Other books by Lea Nolan
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Acknowledgments
Conjure
About the Author
Everlast
O L N
THER BOOKS BY EA OLAN
C
ONJURE
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is
coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 by Lea Nolan. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit
in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
Entangled Publishing, LLC
2614 South Timberline Road
Suite 109
Fort Collins, CO 80525
Visit our website at www.entangledpublishing.com.
Edited by Liz Pelletier, Robin Haseltine, and Guillian Helm
Cover design by Heather Howland
Print ISBN 978-1-62266-022-3
Ebook ISBN 978-1-62266-023-0
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition October 2013
The author acknowledges the copyrighted or trademarked status and trademark owners of the following
wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction: Mercedes Benz, iPhone, Ziploc, Beaufort Gazette, Tumblr,
Boy Scout, Q-tip, Yoda, Oscar, Barbie, Jolly Rancher, Google, Energizer Bunny, Cointreau, Hoover, Day-
Glo, the Hulk.
For Riley Finn. May you always be courageous, fair, and noble.
Chapter One
A
stiff, hot wind blows across the Beaufort River, carrying the scent of parched
sea grass, mucky earth, and belly-up redfish through the car window. Low tide in
the South Carolina Lowcountry can be a smelly proposition, especially in the
summer when temperatures soar past sweltering. Stinky or not, these salt
marshes with their maze of dense green reeds, and downy white egrets are some
of the most beautiful places on earth. Definitely paint-worthy.
But before I can grab my canvas and oils, we’ve got to get Miss Delia home
from the hospital in one piece, which shouldn’t be a problem with Cooper
Beaumont at the wheel. Fixing his eyes on the road ahead, he guides his father’s
beige station wagon across the Lady’s Island bridge heading toward St. Helena
Island, my summer home-away-from-home. I on the other hand, prefer to stare
at him.
Shooting me a quick sideways glance, he smiles. “What are you looking at?”
he asks, just loud enough to hear over the engine’s purr.
Caught gawking, my cheeks flush. “You.” Because with his square jaw,
golden-brown hair, and eyes that appear blue or green to match his clothes, he’s
just about the most gorgeous guy I’ve ever seen. And by some miracle, after
secretly loving him for more than an entire year, he’s officially my boyfriend.
It’s our very own happily ever after.
Providing we find a way to break the curse that threatens to steal his soul.
Cooper lets his right hand slip from the wheel and inches it across the front
seat to clutch mine. Our fingers entwine and he gives me a squeeze. A warm
tingle shoots up my arm. Even after a few weeks of being a couple, the
excitement of his touch hasn’t grown old.
Miss Delia clears her throat. “Best keep both hands on the wheel, boy. I don’t
want to end up back in Beaufort Memorial. The food’s awful.”
Though it couldn’t possibly be worse than what landed her there in the first
place—being attacked by a pack of gigantic, seething, demon dogs with serrated
fangs.
Glancing in the rearview mirror, Cooper flashes his devastatingly handsome
grin, the one that makes my heart thump a little bit harder. “Don’t worry, Miss
Delia, I won’t let anything happen to you.” Still, he heeds her advice and returns
his hand to the steering wheel.
Squelching my disappointment at his withdrawal, I twist around to face her in
the backseat. The sight still makes me wince. Though most of her stitches have
been removed, bright pink scars mar her oniony, brown skin. A few larger
abrasions still require bandages, but thankfully most are on her body, hidden
behind clothes. Images of the savage attack flash across my mind, making me
shudder, but I shake them off because Miss Delia miraculously survived.
“We took care of everything while you were away. I tended the garden and
the guys cleaned up the mess from Hurricane Amelia.” I work to make my voice
sound bright.
Miss Delia smiles. Even her milky-white eye looks a bit clearer. “Thank you,
Emma. You’re very kind. I knew I picked you for the right reason.”
My chest swells. She did pick me. Even though I’m only fourteen, she made
me her apprentice. She’s the best, most powerful Gullah hoodoo root worker on
St. Helena and probably the whole Lowcountry. Though if I’m being honest, she
only agreed to pass her mantle to me because I begged. Earlier this summer, my
twin brother, and giant pain-in-the-rear, Jack contracted The Creep, an ancient
curse that dissolved his flesh, exposed his chalky bones, and made him reek like
pond scum. The memory alone churns my stomach. Thanks to Miss Delia, I
learned enough hoodoo magic to destroy The Creep and cure Jack, but not
enough to protect her from the monsters that nearly ate her for dinner. Which is
why she was in the hospital for so long and why the station wagon’s rear
compartment is crammed with her brand-new wheelchair. The hellhounds
weren’t content to just slice open her flesh. Their massive paws pounced, bruised
her spinal chord, and left her unable to walk.
Cooper hangs a left at the dingy-gray tract house at the corner. The tires
crunch as he starts down the unmarked dirt road that leads to Miss Delia’s house.
Pocked with holes and overgrown vegetation, it’s a serious hazard but we’ve
traveled it so often this summer he could probably do it blindfolded. “I hope you
don’t mind, Miss Delia, but Jack and I made a few changes to your house,” he
says.
Her snowy-white brow quirks. “What kind of changes?”
“Just a couple accommodations to make it easier to get around. I know you
practiced driving that chair in the hospital, but it’ll be different in your own
house.”
She crosses her arms over her teal housedress. “Pshaw.” She shakes her head,
her lips turned down in disgust. “In all my ninety-seven years, I’ve never needed
an accommodation.”
“It’s not a big deal.” I play down the additions, knowing how deep her pride
runs and how difficult it must be to accept her new disability. “They just added a
ramp to the porch.” And widened the front door, rearranged some of her
furniture, and hung a few guide rails, but she’ll discover all that when she gets
there. “Maybe we can come up with some spells to help speed your healing.”
Though according to her doctors, that’s nearly impossible.
She narrows her lids. “Way ahead of you, child.”
Rounding the bend, we approach her glistening bottle tree, an enormous live
oak that drips with Spanish moss and dwarfs her ramshackle house. On a normal
day it’s impressive, but today, with the golden, mid-afternoon sun streaming
through its thousand multicolored bottles, it’s dazzling and almost seems to
radiate its own light.
A sleek, silver Mercedes Benz is parked just beyond the tree, in front of Miss
Delia’s lush garden.
Miss Delia strains forward in her seat. “What do we have here? Your brother
hasn’t tried to drive again has he?”
I laugh, remembering Jack’s last attempt behind the wheel. We all survived,
but it’s not something I’d recommend him doing any time soon. “No, he’s
helping our dad with the last of the storm cleanup at High Point Bluff.” If it
weren’t for my father, the plantation’s caretaker and sole employee, the place
would fall apart.
Cooper pulls up next to the Mercedes and cuts the engine. Scanning the car,
he whistles. “Sweet ride.”
The garden’s perfume floods the open car windows. I inhale the fragrant scent
of hundreds of flowers and herbs, some rare, some mere weeds that have been
cultivated for centuries by Miss Delia and her ancestors. These plants are the
secret ingredients of hoodoo magic. But without her experience and knowledge,
it’s just an overgrown patch of dirt.
Three designer suitcases covered with gold initials perch on Miss Delia’s
porch, just steps away from the open front door.
“Were you expecting someone?” I ask.
Just then, a woman in a crisp sea-green linen pantsuit sweeps out of the house
and floats across the porch. Her medium-brown skin is flawless and wrinkle-
free, making her look somewhere in her midthirties, but something about the
regal way she carries herself tells me she’s probably a lot older than that. She
grasps the railing, her lips curled at the sides, managing a smile that doesn’t
move past her cheeks.
“Well I’ll be.” Miss Delia doesn’t appear the least bit excited.
A moment later a girl who looks at a couple years older than me follows,
flinging the screen door wide and letting it slam behind her. Tall and lithe, she
stalks toward the suitcases on the opposite side of the porch, crosses her arms,
