Of Love and Duty

The Witch's Choice

London, Mid-May 199*

"You're not going anywhere! You never know what could happen!"

Izzy tightened her lips and leant into her chair, glaring at Mother.

"I don't see why I shouldn't," she said at last, placing her chin in her hand and her elbow on the table, stirring the yoghurt. "Amina will be there too—"

"One more reason for you to come to Melarie Cottage with me," Mother snapped at her. "And watch your manners, Isolde!"

Until a decade ago, Isolde would have obeyed and sat ramrod straight, her elbow tucked at her sides as a proper little lady. That had stopped the day she realised how awful Kathleen Tricano was with Isolde's brother Maxi.

Well, half-brother, if one wanted to be punctilious—same father, different mothers, and only three months of difference. There was a rumour among her paternal relatives and his colleagues that Papa hoped Maxi's mother would interrupt his wedding to Kathleen. Surely, things would have been different for Isolde if that had happened. She would be the "out of wedlock" child, free from the duty to ensure their blood-line's future.

It could still have been so, if only Mother shallowed her pride and allowed Maxi's adoption. It wasn't something too hard to do. Isolde was ready to swallow her pride, last Saturday at the dance club.

She swallowed a spoonful of yoghurt, instead, pinching her mouth at something hard and strange tasting. Isolde coughed, spitting the thing into a paper napkin.

It looked like the piece of a crushed pill, staining with a darker pink the strawberry yoghurt and the paper napkin.

"What's this?" she asked to no one in particular. She looked up at her mother—why did her red lipstick and blush look brighter against her ivory skin. "Mother?"

"It's-it's just vitamins," Mother scoffed, trying to take the napkin.

"Why are you slipping vitamins into my breakfast?" Isolde asked, pulling away. "It's not that I wouldn't take them."

"You-you always make a fuss with pills!" Mother said, her voice a little shriller. "Now, give it to me: I'll crush it better so you can take it—"

Papa's laugh interrupted her, without glancing up from his newspaper.

"It's vitamins, Kitty Kat! There's nothing wrong if Izzy skip it once or twice!"

"She can't—" Mother pressed a manicured hand on her mouth.

"She can't?" Papa said, at last looking up from his newspaper. "Why is that?"

A faint smell of metal and ozone, mingled with anised giant fennel and Queen Anne's lace, wafted in the kitchen. Isolde breathed Papa's Magic, prying for sincerity. Mother, the target, puffed her chest out and tightened her lips until they were a thin red line, refusing to comply with the Magic.

"Kathleen, answer me."

Kathleen. Not Kat or Kitty Kat—not even Micia or Micetta, the pet names Papa used whenever he wanted to coax Mother.

Whatever Papa's suspected, it was worse than vitamins.

"Izzy, get yourself something from the bakery," Papa said, his usually jolly voice was scorching like a July noon, as he folded his newspaper.

Isolde glanced from him to Mother, then stood up to kiss Papa's cheek like every morning.

"And go to Maxi's after school," Papa said, glaring at his wife.

* * *

As soon as he had turned sixteen, Maxi had moved into Papa's old bachelor apartment. It was a little mew house in a paved street, at a walking distance from Izzy's, yet far enough for Mother to avoid meeting Maxi.