Calling Quarters (Beacon Grove Book 1) Read online

  Copyright © 2021 Jen Stevens

  All rights reserved

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Cover Design: Emily Wittig Designs

  Editing: Nice Girl Naughty Edits

  For my beautiful little muse,

  who I never got the chance to hold in my arms

  but has tattooed themselves on my heart forever

  There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

  —Maya Angelou

  Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Calling quarters

  Glossary

  Also by Jen Stevens

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Epilogue

  About Jen

  Calling quarters

  Calling the quarters is a ritual used by magical practitioners at the start of magical or spiritual work. It involves calling on the four elements and their corresponding cardinal direction of the compass to bring these energies into the magical circle to protect and strengthen the practitioner.

  For the purpose of this novel, the following correspondences are made:

  North = Earth

  East = Air

  South = Fire

  West = Water

  Glossary

  WATCHTOWER COVEN

  Location: Beacon Grove

  High Priest: Silas Forbes

  High Priestess: Ophelia Forbes

  Elections held: every 3 years

  Quarter Families

  North - Earth

  Current: Lorenzo (Enzo) Easton

  Elder: Andrew Easton

  East - Air

  Current: Lux Alden

  Elder: Drake Alden

  South - Fire

  Current: Rhyse Forbes

  Elder: Silas Forbes

  West - Water

  Current: Remington (Remy) Winters

  Elder: Rowan Winters

  Granger Family

  Tabitha Granger: Hotel Owner

  Callista Granger: Herbalist, Midwife

  Blaire Graner: Hotel Employee

  Graves Family

  Mason Graves: Deceased

  Asher Graves: Deceased

  Bonnie (Rigby) Graves: Deceased

  Storie Graves

  Also by Jen Stevens

  Ugly Truths: Grimville Reapers Book One

  Untold Truths: Grimville Reapers Book Two

  Advice from a Sunflower

  Prologue

  Deep in the heart of the pacific northwest, nestled into dense forest and tall, reaching mountains, lies a town most have never heard of. It doesn't follow the same set of rules as anywhere else. It only infiltrates the minds of those who have been blessed with the knowledge of it once a year, when they're invited in. One by one, their cars trail in through the singular winding road, unaware of the important role they play for this sacred time.

  This town is packed with ancient magic and a powerful coven of witches. But it was built on a strong foundation of secrets and lies. Its inhabitants are fiercely protective over one another, though distrust spreads among them like wildfire. They don't take kindly to nosey outsiders, and they keep their skeletons hidden deep.

  I was never meant to return. My own family gave their lives to ensure that was the case. They kept this place from me for nearly my entire life, raising me to believe I was just as painfully average as every other child I went to public school with in the city. But they weren't here anymore to discourage my instinctual need to dig into the past, and I owed it to them to find answers about their mysterious deaths.

  To get back to my roots.

  This town goes by the name of Beacon Grove, and it's the home I never knew existed—the family I desperately craved.

  Chapter 1

  Storie

  Four years ago

  I could hear Aunt Ash arguing with someone downstairs. The soft rumble of a man's voice vibrated through my bedroom floor. Their hushed, aggressive whispers were clearly in disagreement over something. I opened the door and tiptoed to the top of the stairs, listening.

  “It's time, Asher,” the man said, his tone icy and detached.

  “But she's still in high school. She's not ready for this. She has a life here… one that shouldn't be disrupted. You haven't even let me warn her,” Aunt Ash replied in a desperate plea. I imagined the crease between her brows had deepened the way it always did when she was concerned.

  With careful, calculated steps, I navigated down the stairs quietly, avoiding all the spots that groaned or squeaked. I'm not sure it would have mattered. They appeared to be too engrossed in their argument to notice anything else.

  “Don't make this harder on yourself. You knew the terms when you took this on. You shouldn't have grown so attached. Haven't you learned that yet?”

  “She's my family, Rayner. The last of it that I have left. You were once considered her family as well. Why do we have to uphold this silly agreement, anyway? She's unwanted there. They'll only come after her if she returns.”

  “Because this is the way. They need her. You know The Movement won't allow anything to go too far. You have no right to question how things are done, especially when you've hardly done your part.” He turned his back to her then, black eyes scanning the mantle that was filled with pictures of me and Aunt Ash along with protective crystals littered in between with disinterest.

  Until they landed on me.

  His brow slightly twitched before he straightened his features again. Back to the mask of indifference. He continued to stare, though.

  He was oddly dressed. Black dress shirt, black slacks, shiny black shoes, all covered by a black floor-length trench coat. It made no sense in the middle of June.

  “Storie,” Aunt Ash breathed my name out in a panic. “I didn't realize you were home.” She quickly strode across the room to place herself between me and the strange visitor. “Rayner is an old friend of your father's. He was actually just leaving.”

  He still hadn't released me from his intense stare but took the hint and placed the black fedora he'd been holding back onto his head. With a silent warning nod toward Aunt Ash, he walked himself out and slammed the door behind him.

  “He was odd,” I finally said, breaking the tense silence. “What did he want?”

  Clearly, it had something to do with me.

  “We wer
e just discussing some unfinished family business.” She made her way back into the kitchen, a strained smile stretching across her features. “How did your finals go?”

  I stood back as she gathered random ingredients from the pantry, stacking them into her arms as if she were in too much of a rush to make multiple trips. Once she was satisfied and her arms were full, she dumped the pile onto the counter and pulled out a large pot from the cabinet.

  “I think they went pretty well. Not that it matters, though.”

  I'd already been accepted into State, despite some pushback from Aunt Ash for applying. She didn't want me to go away for college, but there was no way I was staying here. So long as I didn't bomb this final semester, I was basically done bothering with high school the moment I received that acceptance letter. I think I did well enough to fly under the radar and get by.

  That's typically how I handled most of my high school career, anyway.

  Aunt Ash was too distracted to respond. She'd grabbed her tattered grimoire from the shelf across the room while I spoke and was hunched over the counter, manically flipping through the handwritten pages in search of something. I hated when she was like this. It had been a while since she needed the book for a rite or spell. She'd memorized all the ones she used regularly.

  I've never believed in the witchy voodoo she practiced, but it brought her comfort, so I didn't say anything against it. At least, until she tried to push it onto me. That had resulted in some nasty fights between us through my formative years. For some reason, she thought it was important that I knew this useless stuff. I just always had better things to do.

  “Just the basics,” she had argued, practically forcing me away from my schoolwork to practice with her. I spent countless nights copying basic spells into my own leather-bound notebook by hand while cursing her under my breath.

  “Keep pouring negative energy into it and you'll get nothing but negative energy back,” she always warned, disappointment lacing her soft tone.

  Eventually, I gave in to her and memorized a few of the spells. To this day, it's been a waste of time.

  But something was bothering her, and it clearly had to do with the man who just left. I shifted to look over her shoulder at the page she finally landed on. It appeared to be a heavy protection spell. One we'd never used before that required a lot more ingredients than what she kept in the pantry.

  “What did that guy say to you?”

  She was mumbling something under her breath. Something that clearly wasn't English. “Hm? What guy?”

  I reached out to grab her hands in mine, forcing her to look at me. “Aunt Ash, talk to me. What is going on?”

  The panicked look that her eyes held when I first came down the stairs still hadn't left. She was keeping something from me, and I had no idea why. We told each other everything. It's always been that way.

  I watched the conflict dance in her eyes as she warred with herself over what to say. How much to reveal. Eventually, she gave up. Her shoulders fell as her head hung between them; eyes cast down to the floor.

  “I've failed them.”

  “Failed who? You're not making any sense.”

  “Your parents.” She pulled her hands out of my embrace and turned back to face the pot on the stove, then threw a handful of rosemary in. “It doesn't matter. They were going to come either way. Resistance was futile. I told your father that.”

  It was clear she wasn't going to explain any further when she began chopping up sunflower stalks while mumbling in that horrible foreign language again.

  This was why I needed to get out of here. My presence was only a burden on Aunt Ash, and it had been for two years now. The day I turned sixteen, we'd gotten into a car crash. Nothing serious, just a few bumps and bruises. But Aunt Ash began acting weird after it happened—more protective of me and our home. Like she thought the crash was intentional.

  That was also when she started pushing her practices on me and fighting the idea of college. I'd just figured it was because of the close call. Like, maybe she didn't want to lose the last bit of family she had left. But now, it seems like there was more to it than that.

  I left her alone, dragging my feet up the stairs.

  Chapter 2

  Storie

  Present

  The two-lane road curved around mountains and in between large, ancient-looking trees. It was terrifying and exhilarating to weave around the natural landscape. Any exhaustion that I'd built up from the previous day of driving was slowly wiped away with each sharp turn.

  I felt like I belonged there, in the trees. It was a foreign feeling to me—one I'd never had growing up in the big city with Aunt Ash.

  Just as the road narrowed and I was sure it was about to come to an end, dumping me into the woods with no cell phone service or way out, the smooth pavement transitioned into gravel that was only wide enough for one vehicle. I checked my GPS for the thousandth time, hoping it would give me any idea as to where I'd ended up, but it continued circling, attempting to calculate a route and failing miserably.

  The sky had darkened overhead, and the trees provided a green canopy that made me feel even more claustrophobic. The only option was to turn back and find a different path around this hauntingly beautiful forest, though turning around was going to be next to impossible. With my mind made up, I slowed to a stop and shifted into reverse.

  I hadn't noticed the headlights when they neared me or the flashing red light until it was right beside me. I was halfway through my attempt to turn around when the officer appeared at my window, unbothered by the constant rocking of my car as I tried to shimmy myself in a circle.

  He knocked on my window three times, then stepped back and placed his hand on his weapon.

  “Ma'am, are you lost?” His low, authoritative voice rumbled once I rolled my window down halfway, still not completely convinced he was real. I hadn't seen a soul around here for hours before he seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.

  “Y-yes, actually. I was trying to find my way into Beacon Grove, but I think I may have taken a wrong turn somewhere. This road doesn't lead anywhere, does it?”

  That was a dumb question. Clearly, it led to wherever he'd just come from.

  His face shifted at the mention of Beacon Grove. Gray eyes narrowed in on me, then bounced around the car in search of something. I took the chance to survey his appearance, sizing him up in case he gave me any issues.

  He was tall and lanky, his arms a little too long for his body. His hair was peppered with gray strands that matched his eyes perfectly and only made the onyx color of the rest of his hair pop even more. His name tag read, “Abbot.”

  “What's your name, Miss?” the man asked skeptically, finally returning his gaze back to me.

  I debated not telling him. Why would he need my name, anyway? If he were a real officer, he'd have asked for my license and registration and gotten that information himself. We stared each other down for a long, heavy moment before eventually, I caved. He was the only living soul I'd seen for nearly 24 hours and there was nothing he could do to me by simply knowing my name.

  “Storie Graves.”

  Recognition flashed across his features. He took me in once more, this time more unapologetically. “It can't be…” he whispered in disbelief.

  Somehow, this strange man had heard my name before. He knew me, though I was certain we'd never met. His stony eyes softened then, the crow’s feet loosening just a tad. Something shifted within him. He dropped his hand from his gun and took a step closer.

  “I'm just going to keep trying to turn around. I think I can find another way. Sorry to bother you, officer.”

  “No!” he shouted, startling me. When he saw me jump, he lifted his hands, palms out. “I'm sorry. I just mean, this is the only road you can take to get to Beacon Grove. You won't find another way around.”

  “Oh, okay, thank you.” I pressed the button to roll the window back up and he reached his hands out again, placing his fingers on the edge o
f the glass. It completely ceased movement at his touch, as if he were strong enough to stop it from going up any farther, though he didn't appear to be using any effort.

  His voice dropped. “Who sent you here, Storie?” he demanded.

  “What? No one sent me…”

  I needed to get out of here. This man was clearly unhinged, and he was coming more undone as each minute passed.

  His head shook. “I don't understand. You weren't supposed to come back. Unless… oh no, Asher... Is she okay?” he rambled, holding one hand on the window glass as he raked his fingers through thinning, black hair. His eyes looked tortured.

  “How did you know Aunt Ash?” I asked before thinking. I shouldn't have been entertaining this mania. It was getting weirder by the minute.

  Who was this random man and how did he know so much about me?

  As far as I knew, Aunt Ash didn't have any remaining friends or family, especially from Beacon Grove. In fact, she'd spent so long drilling into my head that it was just her and me that I completely skipped over holding any sort of memorial service for her. There was no one to call and notify of her odd, tragic passing and no one left to guide me through the harrowing process of getting back onto my feet after losing a loved one.

  A voice on his radio interrupted his response, snapping him back to reality. He quickly pulled himself together and stood up straighter, glancing into the woods.

  “Beacon Grove is that way, Ma'am,” he pointed his finger down the road, past his vehicle. He then dropped his voice back down to a whisper. “If you're smart, you'll turn around now and forget this place ever existed.”

  “I can't do that,” I found myself explaining.