The Sevenfold Spell Read Online Free Page B

of the loom dwindled.
    I did have an unexpected source of new joy. Two sisters moved into Tallow’s End with their godchild. Their names were Andante and Allegro, but the local children christened them Aunty Danty and Aunty Leggy. My mother, thinking that it might help cure my melancholy, arranged for me to watch the child in the afternoons so the women could do errands and make visits.
    The little girl was wonderful balm for my soul. Her name was Rose, and she was a sweet and lovely babe. Whenever she saw me, she held her arms out and bounced up and down in unconditional love. It made my heart ache to be with her, but I would not have traded a moment. If I had given birth to my own little Aurora, they could have been friends. Not a year would have separated them.
    I tried to shake such sad thoughts, but I was desperately lonely. The women at church shunned me, even though I had been chaste since Willard had departed. Hilda Cooper and Charlotte Farmer—Willard’s sister—were my particular nemeses. My nickname found its way back to me—Talia the Tart. Several men tried to take advantage of my reputation by forcing themselves upon me, but I was a strong, healthy girl, and soon proved that I was no easy target.
    But I was friendless and bored, already weary of life. I never dreamed that my mother would be the one to make it interesting again.
    ***
    One day, I arrived home from the market to find my mother sitting in her chair, holding a spindle. Not a hand-spindle, but a spindle from a real spinning wheel. It took me a moment to recognize it, because I was not used to seeing it as a separate part.
    “Mother,” I said. Ever since the affair with Willard, I had called her that. “Where did you get that?”
    She cradled the spindle as if it were a child. “Widow Harla gave it to me. She found some spare parts while she was packing.” The widow’s brewing business had been such a success that she had converted her shop to a tavern.
    “What are you going to do with it?” I asked.
    She looked up at me. “I’m going to build a new spinning wheel,” she said, “and you are going to help me.”
    A dozen questions whirled through my mind. I remembered the constable, the armed guards, the spell-wielding fairy. “But what about the ban?”
    “It’s been two years and more. They’re hardly looking for spinning wheels these days.”
    “How would we hide it?” A spinning wheel has a very particular sound. Its whirring would be audible from the street.
    “We’ll spin in the cellar.”
    “There’s not enough light down there.”
    “I’m a good enough spinster that I don’t need much light,” she said. “And one day you will be, as well.”
    “But we have not the skill to build our own spinning wheel.”
    “I know every part of a spinning wheel. I can picture one if I close my eyes. We will build a spinning wheel, and then we’ll have the only one in the country.”
    As she spoke, I felt an interest quickening within me. Our lives were so dull—the construction of an illegal spinning wheel would certainly enliven it.
    She started by having me go buy a cartwheel, which she intended to craft into a flywheel. I went to our neighbor, the wheel-and wainwright down the street. His name was Master Caleb.
    “A cartwheel, Miss Talia?” Master Caleb asked.
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Just one?” His brown eyes studied me.
    “Yes, sir. Our…our cart lost a wheel.”
    “I see. Could you bring the cart in, so I might match it?”
    I had not thought of this. “It only needs to be about this big.” I held out my hands about two feet apart.
    “But it must be matched to the other wheel, miss.”
    Crestfallen, I looked at him. “Oh, I see.”
    He regarded me for a moment. “However, I do have wheels for special carts. If I’m not mistaken, you must have one of those special carts.”
    I, of course, had no cart at all, but he insisted on showing it to me. He led me to the back room and showed me a wheel.
    It was a flywheel.