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Zelda walks the perimeter of the house, checking and strengthening the wards. It is a nightly routine she has fallen into of late. The house is still full to the rafters with the remnants of the coven – youngsters, mainly, camping out on floors and spare beds and sofas. Most are fully recovered, praise Lilith, although a few still suffer the lingering aftereffects of Faustus’ poison. She doesn’t mind it as much as she makes out, this crush of bodies. There is always a practical matter to attend to, or an argument to diffuse, or a chore to be done. The days pass in a blur of busyness that leaves her no time to think, and she prefers it that way.

But she’s come to cherish these few moments of quiet and solitude each evening, walking the perimeter of the property with a cigarette and the call of owls for company. And Salem. The blessed goblin seems to have adopted her as his charge, and although she quite emphatically does not need his protection, she appreciates the gesture.

She skims her fingers over the protective barrier as she completes her circuit. She feels resistance and a trail of blue sparks lights up the darkness. She has made this – she, and Ambrose, and Edward and her father before them. Generations of Spellman magic woven together: applied, reapplied, patched and strengthened. It soothes her. Its heavy resistance reassures her that the imagined dangers than gnaw at the edge of her awareness cannot reach her here. Here, she is in control. Here, she knows who she is. Here, she determines who may come and who may not.

Salem meows, the noise plaintive in the still night. “All right,” she tells him, “Stop fussing, I’m going inside now.” He likes to have his humans all in one place these days, she’s noticed. The better to keep an eye on them.

The clock in the hall strikes a quarter to midnight as she re-enters the house. The hall lights are off and the doors to the chapel and parlour – both now makeshift dormitories – have been pulled closed. The only light comes from the kitchen.

Hilda doesn’t notice Zelda come to the door. She is standing at the kitchen sink, her hands plunged into soapy water. Zelda can see her reflection in the window. The old glass is not smooth and her reflection is distorted: the eyes scrunched and the mouth turned down. Hilda’s presence, like the wards, is another thing that soothes her. She stands, allowing herself to bask in the warmth of it. How she’d missed Hilda in those few terribly long weeks when she was Lady Blackwood.

Hilda reaches to put a casserole dish on the draining board. It slips and falls to the floor, shattering on the tiles.

“Bless it!” yelps Hilda, her voice sharp and unsteady. She bends to pick up the slippery pieces and Zelda realises it was not the window that had distorted Hilda’s face. Her eyes are red and there are tear tracks on her cheeks.

“Hilda?” she crosses the kitchen floor in quick steps. “Hilda, what’s wrong?”

Hilda swipes at her cheeks with the sleeve of her cardigan as Zelda crouches down opposite her. “Nothing,” she says, her voice filled with insincere cheer. “Just a little accident. I’ll have this mess cleared up in no time.” She sweeps the shattered stoneware into a pile. Her hands are shaking.

“Hilda, stop,” Zelda tells her, wincing at the sight of Hilda’s unsteady hands near the sharp edges. When Hilda ignores her Zelda reaches out and wraps her fingers around hers. “Hildie, please stop.”

Hilda’s fingers still beneath hers. She sniffles, and fresh tears pool in the eyes that she keeps steadfastly turned away from Zelda.

“Hilda, what’s the matter. Has somebody hurt you?” She doesn’t look hurt, but then not much of Hilda is visible beneath her lumpy cardigan and shapeless dress, and Zelda knows how much judiciously chosen clothing can hide.

Hilda’s eyes widen at the suggestion. She shakes her head, emphatically. No.

“Are you…are you thinking about Methuselah?” Hilda had seemed so matter of fact when she had explained his appalling behaviour, but perhaps she had held something back – or perhaps only now is the reality of it hitting her.

Hilda sniffs loudly. “No, nothing like that.” Her voice is thick with tears and emotion.

“What then? Perhaps I can help?”

Hilda shakes her head. Her eyes are squeezed tightly closed. Zelda feels panicky. Something is wrong with her little sister and she doesn’t know what it is – Hilda doesn’t want to tell her what it is. “Shall I—shall I call Doctor Dracula?” she offers. Much as it would pain her to ask that jumped up barista for help, she cannot bear to see Hilda unhappy.

This, at last, seems to get Hilda’s attention. She sinks back on her heels, pulling one of her hands from Zelda’s to wipe her eyes. “It’s nothing, really Zelds. It’s silly. It’s just that sometimes this—” she waves her hand around vaguely, encompassing the kitchen, or perhaps the house, “—all just gets a bit too much and I need a bit of a cry, that’s all.”

She squeezes the hand that is still clasped in Zelda’s, and Zelda squeezes back. She’s not sure what else to do. Certainly she feels as though she would like to cry sometimes, but the feeling seldom results in tears. And on the rare occasions that she does actually cry she wants nothing more than to crawl into the quietest, darkest corner she can find and curl up there until it passes. “Is it because of what happened to Ambrose?” she asks, trying to understand. The boy’s like a son to Hilda, and they had come so close to losing him. Hell knows she’s spent enough time laying awake dwelling on her own part in that sorry saga.

Hilda shakes her head. “It’s not one thing, it’s just everything. Sometimes all the emotions just build up and up inside me until I have to let them out.” With this she erupts into a messy sob.

Hilda has always been extraordinarily sensitive to those around her. It goes beyond the ability to read auras or see magical fields: she can sense the emotions of others and, when she applies herself, even hear their thoughts. It’s a gift Zelda is glad not to have received. She finds her own inner life taxing enough, without being subjected to that of others. She should have realised, given the sheer volume of people in the house and the drama they have lived through in the last few months, that it becomes overwhelming for Hilda sometimes.

Zelda releases Hilda’s hand so that she can pass her her handkerchief. “Here, why don’t you sit down while I clean this up?”

Hilda nods and blows her nose noisily, then rises to her feet and shuffles to the kitchen table. Zelda sweeps the broken pottery into an old copy of El Pais and deposits it in the trash. Then she washes the rest of the dishes, because that at least is a problem she knows how to solve. By the time she has finished, Hilda’s sobs have subsided. She is sitting with her chin resting on her hand, watching her.

“How do you feel now?” asks Zelda, coming to sit next to her.

“Better,” says Hilda with a watery smile. She looks tired. And no wonder – quite apart from the huge amount of magical energy she expended healing what remained of the coven after Faustus’ massacre, she has been running herself ragged caring for their house guests. Zelda feels a pang of guilt that she hasn’t noticed sooner. Self-absorption has always been one of her less attractive traits.

“If you…if you need some time to rest you could stay with Doctor Cyclops for a few days. I can take care of things here.”

“Doctor Cerberus,” Hilda corrects her.

“Doctor Cerberus,” Zelda agrees. She’s not sure why she has so much trouble remembering the name, given that it’s so ludicrous.

Hilda shakes her head. “I’d rather be here with you. It helps to be around someone familiar.”

Zelda tries to hide the smile that her traitorous face threatens to adopt. “Well I should hope I’m familiar to you by now,” she says, patting Hilda’s hand. “It’s late. Why don’t you go and get ready for bed? I’ll bring you a cup of tea.” As if to illustrate her point, the clock in the hall strikes midnight. The witching hour.

“I can’t,” says Hilda. “I promised little Dorcas I’d make her strudel for breakfast and I haven’t even started yet.

“This is not a hotel. It will not kill little Dorcas to have toast for breakfast.”

“But Zelds, they’ve been through so much. They deserve to be looked after.”

“And you have looked after them,” Zelda tells her sternly. “You quite literally brought these children back from the brink of death. And since then you have fed them and clothed them and broken up their petty squabbles and held them when they have cried. It is your turn to be looked after now, Hildie. So go upstairs. I’ll bring you a cup of tea shortly.”

Hilda gives her a shy little smile. “Well, I suppose I could leave the strudel for another day and just do bacon and eggs tomorrow. Perhaps I’ll get up early and whip up a batch of—”

“Upstairs, Hilda. Now!”

Hilda’s giggle isn’t the response she expects to that tone of voice, but Hilda’s smiling as she scampers out of the room so she doesn’t mind too much.

She makes a pot of tea and while it brews she secures the house for the night, checking that the downstairs doors and windows are locked. By the time she enters her bedroom, balancing a tea tray on one hand, Hilda is dressed in her night gown. She sits on the edge of her bed, looking almost excited.

They have been sharing a room again these last few weeks. Unbidden, Hilda had slept in her old bed on Zelda’s first night at the mortuary after the sorry disaster of her marriage and she has never been so grateful for anything in her life. Then their house had become a field hospital and Hilda’s bedroom had been given over to the Weird sisters, and so the arrangement had continued. She is privately dreading the day when their lives resume some semblance of normality and Hilda moves back into her own room again.

She distracts herself from this unwelcome thought by depositing a sugar cube into Hilda’s cup and stirring it into the steaming liquid. “Here you are,” she says, handing it to her. “Camomile and lavender made just how you like it.”

Hilda takes a long sip from her cup, then places it on the nightstand. She pats the bed next to her. Zelda sits. Hilda’s mattress is softer than her own and she sinks into it. Hilda shuffles a little closer to her, her shifting weight causing them to tilt into each other. “Thank you for being so nice,” she says, snuggling into Zelda’s side.

She’s hardly done anything, thinks Zelda. She lacks Hilda’s knack for knowing how to comfort. She raises an arm to wrap around Hilda’s shoulder. “What are big sisters for?”

“To torment their younger sisters, mainly,” says Hilda, wrapping her arms around Zelda’s waist and squeezing tight.

“I’m not above tickling you, Hildegard,” she warns.

Hilda giggles again. It’s unnerving to have her threat treated with so little weight. But the press and warmth of Hilda’s body against hers is pleasant. She runs her hand through Hilda’s hair, teasing out the tangles. Hilda sighs contentedly.

“Do you remember how you refused to let anyone cut your hair when you were little?” she asks. “It got so long my arm would ache whenever I brushed it.” Hilda had been such a pretty, patient, little girl – content to let Zelda plait her hair and play dress up with her for hours.

“Hmm,” agrees Hilda, nuzzling her nose into Zelda’s shoulder.

“You had such lovely hair,” she says, remembering the way it had rippled down her pinafored back like woven gold. “Why did you cut it?”

“It wasn’t very practical.” Hilda’s voice is muffled.

“So? Not everything has to be practical, Hildie. It is enough to want something simply because it is beautiful.” Hilda snorts with laugher and it is such a very Hilda noise that she cannot help but laugh too. “What’s funny about that? You deserve to have nice things.”

Hilda doesn’t reply immediately. After a few moments she says “Can I brush your hair?”

“What?” asks Zelda, thrown by the non sequitur.

“You never used to let me, when we were children.”

It’s true. Zelda, always so particular about her appearance, hadn’t wanted her younger sister playing with her carefully arranged ringlets. She shrugs. “If you like.”

Hilda fetches her hairbrush from the dressing table and returns to sit on the bed, nudging Zelda to turn so that her back is to her. She tries not to tense as Hilda places a steadying hand on her shoulder. Slowly, very gently, Hilda eases the brush through her hair. When Zelda doesn’t complain she repeats the motion. And then again, settling into a rhythm of long, slow strokes.

Hilda’s touch is light and soft. Zelda breathes out, trying to expel some of the tension in her body. She reminds herself that there is nothing to brace for with Hilda– no pain to anticipate. Hilda hums under her breath as she works, something slow and soothing that she cannot quite place. It makes her scalp tingle and her eyes droop closed. She’s almost nodded off when Hilda tells her: “Turn around.”

Zelda turns back to face her. Hilda brushes the hair back from her forehead and fluffs the curls around her shoulders. “There,” she announces with satisfaction. “Pretty as a picture.”

Unaccountably, she feels her cheeks flame at the compliment. “You’re tired Hildie, you should get some rest.”

Hilda shakes a head, setting her mouth in a pout that wouldn’t have looked out of place on her five-year-old self. “I can’t sleep.”

“You haven’t tried.”

“Just a little bit longer. We haven’t had any time together by ourselves for weeks.”

She’s touched that Hilda would rather stay up with her than get the sleep she so obviously needs. “Very well then,” she agrees. “What shall we do?”

Hilda smiles and rubs her hands together. “Well, the dress I’ve been making for you still needs fitting.”

“Really?” Hilda’s been pestering her about trying this dress for weeks, despite Zelda having very emphatically informed her that a new wardrobe is the last item at the bottom of a very long list of her priorities right now. “That’s what you want to do?”

Hilda nods, and the expression in her eyes is so hopeful and imploring that she cannot bear to say no.

“Very well,” she says, sighing elaborately to make it clear that she’s only doing this to humour Hilda.

“Excellent!” Hilda claps her hand together. “Pop yourself up on the stand over there, this won’t take a minute.”

Zelda strips down to her slip and stands on the fitting block, shivering in the cool of the night. She positions herself with her back to the mirror. She’s more or less resigned herself to the marks Faustus has left on her body – now faded to silvery white thanks to Hilda’s healing balm – but that doesn’t mean she wants to look at them.

Hilda rustles around in her work box and emerges with an armful of burgundy wool crepe. She spys a flash of gold piping. “Here we are.”

“It’s very bright,” Zelda says doubtfully as Hilda positions the yolk over her shoulders. She’s lined it in silk and the fabric feels delicious against her bare skin.

“Nonsense,” says Hilda, pinning the side seams closed. “Just because it’s not another black dress.”

“There’s nothing wrong with black,” Zelda tells her tartly. “It’s practical.”

“Clothes don’t have to be practical. It’s enough to wear something simply because it is beautiful.”

Zelda opens her mouth to respond and then closes it again as she recognises her own words being parroted back at her. “Clothes can be both,” she comments lamely.

“You’ve lost weight,” Hilda tuts, tugging at the back of the dress – which Zelda now realises is a jacket. “I’m going to have to put extra darts in the back.”

“If I have it’s no thanks to your efforts.” The quantities of food produced in the mortuary over the last few weeks have been frankly obscene.

“I’ll have to see if I can’t think of something to tempt your appetite,” Hilda says, walking around the stand and eyeing the jacket with a critical eye. “That looks lovely. Now, let’s just see to the skirt as well.”

She retrieves more burgundy fabric from the workbox and Zelda wonders how few times she can get away with wearing this outfit without hurting Hilda’s feelings. “Really Hilda, I don’t need any new clothes.”

“Shush now, just step into this for me.” Zelda puts a steadying hand on Hilda’s shoulder while she steps into the pencil skirt. At Hilda’s instruction she holds the full train of the jacket up so that Hilda can tug, pinch and pin the fabric of the skirt. Finally it is fitted to her satisfaction. Hilda steps back, surveying her work. A grin breaks out over her face. “Oh, it’s so pretty. Now, let me just sort out the fastening.”

Once again she roots around in her workbox and emerges with a length of gold taffeta. Zelda flinches as Hilda threads the taffeta through the neck of the jacket. “Is it too tight?” worries Hilda.

Zelda shakes her head. “It’s fine.”

Hilda works quickly, treading the taffeta through what Zelda had assumed were buttonholes. It seems this outfit is one of Hilda’s more fanciful creations. “There,” she announces finally. “All finished. What do you think?”

Zelda turns to look in the mirror. It is not at all what she was expecting. The jacket is exquisitely cut with a long, curved peplum that swoops down over the skirt. It is detailed but not fussy in the way that Hilda’s clothes can be. For all that it is still stuck with pins and inside-out darts she can see how elegant the outfit is. “Hildie, it’s—” she meets Hilda’s anxious gaze in the mirror. “It’s lovely.”

“Not too much?” asks Hilda.

“No. I thought it would be but—no.”

Hilda comes to stand behind her and rests her chin in Zelda’s shoulder, so that they see the reflection from the same angle. “It’s the colour of your magic. I wanted something that would make people see you as I see you.”

Zelda occasionally sees flashes of colour if she touches a witch or warlock – a latent impression from their magical field. Hilda’s is green and yellow – bright, like primroses when she was younger and over time it has matured into a more earthy olive and mustard. Faustus’ has always been black and blood red. Hilda, though, can see the actual field, swirling and curling around its owner. She stares at the suit, taking in the impact of the whole. She looks dignified and elegant and powerful. The colours are almost regal. Tears prick at her eyes and she turns her head away so that Hilda won’t see.

Hilda knows anyway, of course. “What’s the matter?” she asks, pressing a reassuring hand into the small of her back.

The warmth and the softness of it is entirely too much. Zelda steps down off the fitting block and busies herself with trying to remove the jacket without pulling the pins out of place.

“Here,” Hilda says, “let me.” Zelda drops her hands and lets Hilda loosen the taffeta tie. “What’s upset you, love?”

She squeezes her eyes shut so that she doesn’t have to see her concern. “I’m not upset. I just—I think you see a very idealised version of me, sister.”

“Oh Zelds,” breathes Hilda. She pulls her into a hug and Zelda buries her face gratefully in the wool of her cardigan. “I wish you had more faith in yourself.”

Is this what it means to be sisters? she wonders as she grasps handfuls of mustard yellow wool. To have seen the worst – the very worst – of each other and still believe in the best? “And I you,” she murmurs into her shoulder.

Hilda chuckles. “What a pair we are, eh? You’d think we’d know better by now.”

“Perhaps in another century or so,” she suggests, stepping back from the hug. Hilda helps her off with the suit and while she arranges it on the dressmaker’s dummy, Zelda changes into her nightdress. She feels exhausted suddenly, weary with vulnerability. “Is it time for bed yet?”

Hilda smothers a yawn. “I’d say so.”

“Who knows what new teenage drama tomorrow will bring with it,” Zelda observes darkly as Hilda turns off the overhead light.

They lie one their sides, facing each other across the gap between beds. Hilda has her covers pulled up under her chin and Zelda’s chest clenches at how much she resembles the child she once was. “Do you feel better?” she asks.

Hilda nods. “Much.”

“Good.” She reaches up to turn off the bedside lamp. “Sleep well Hildebug.”

The last thing she sees before the room goes dark is Hilda’s sleepy smile. “Sweet dreams Zelds.”

She sleeps better than she has in weeks and wakes late. She can already hear the bangs and chatter of their house guests. The smell of bacon and coffee wafts up from the kitchen. Her new suit hangs on the back of the wardrobe door. Hilda must have finished it before going to make breakfast. Zelda’s amazed that she slept through the sound of the sewing machine. She must have been more tired than she realised.

Inevitably, given the hour, the hot water is long gone. She fills the basin with cold water and carries out rather unsatisfactory ablutions. Thoroughly chilled, she stands before the wardrobe to decide what to wear. She sifts through a rail of black and navy, but her eye keeps being drawn to the burgundy and gold suit hanging on the door. She fingers the sleeve. The fabric is warm and heavy.

She imagines what it would be to wear that suit: to walk into a room and be shown, rather than hidden, by her clothing. She has hidden entirely too much in the last few weeks. Despite declaring herself high priestess she has displayed very little in terms of actual leadership, preferring instead to busy herself with the countless administrative tasks that their situation presents: maintaining a stock of herbs for Hilda’s potion making, tracking down the relatives of the survivors of Faustus’ massacre, burying the dead. Perhaps it is time for her to fully inhabit the position. Perhaps she will only come to feel worthy of the role by doing it.

She slips on the jacket, testing the weight and the tailoring. It fits beautifully.

The students are already seated when she descends the stairs. Hilda is running through the breakfast menu – eggs, bacon, fried bread, baked beans, grilled tomatoes, sausages. It is another veritable feast.

“I thought we were having French toast and strudel today?” pipes up Dorcas. She is wearing a dress made of lace that Zelda had brought back from Paris in the 1930s and very much was not ready to part with.

She sees Hilda’s smile twist into a frown. Do these children not understand the effort that her sister has put, day after day, into this meal and the dozens that have preceded it?

“I beg your pardon?” she demands, sweeping into the room. A dozen pairs of eyes turn to look at her. “This is not a full-service restaurant. This is our home.” The students shift and straighten in their chairs. Most have the grace to look guilty.

Zelda feels powerful in a way she has not felt powerful since she danced to the tune of a music box that first night in Rome. Even without looking at her she can see the smile tugging at the corner of Hilda’s lips. Perhaps today will be the new beginning they all need.