Book of Sindal Print Book Bundle

“My sisters would hate me if we weren’t related,” Celeste complained. “They probably do anyway.” Her words were laced with anger, but her voice was soft. While our therapist considered this with a pitying expression, Celeste turned to us and said, “I’m different from you two. Always have been, always will be, and we all know it.”
Tears sprang to my eyes, and I blinked against the burning. Celeste’s problem wasn’t with me, not really. It wasn’t about our sister Rowan either, but she still responded to Celeste’s comment with a dismissive huff.
“Let’s unpack that a little bit, shall we?” Our counselor stretched back in his chair, emphasizing his long, slim torso and his unfortunate ensemble of a plaid collared shirt and pleated-front khakis. If I were a different woman, capable of dating normal men, I might have been inclined to help him improve his fashion sense and, in the process, find out what kind of muscles were under his clothes. However, I, Phoebe Whelan, daughter of one of the oldest magic-bearing families in the world, would not be dating anyone anytime soon.
I had other things to worry about. My sisters and I had a job to do, a sacred commitment to keep that could fall to no one else. It bound our lives to our land and the book, which meant we’d all spent the last six years frozen in place. To me, it was annoying. To my older sister Rowan, it was unfair. To my baby sister Celeste, it was the reason we were sitting side by side on a couch in this therapist’s office, talking about our family problems in coded language to make them sound anything close to normal. Because as hard as our family’s legacy could be on Rowan and me, it was slowly driving Celeste mad.
“There’s nothing to ‘unpack,’” Rowan said, curling her index and middle fingers into air quotes around the therapist’s favorite buzzword, “if it’s not true. None of these issues have anything to do with whether we like you.”
If Rowan was trying to disguise her absolute frustration at having to come to family therapy, it wasn’t working, a fact I tried—and failed—to convey with a look.
“We love you, Celeste.” I reached to the side to wrap my fingers over hers. She stiffened at the gesture and my heart panged.
As if programmed to sound at the most crucial moment of the session, the soft tone announcing the end of our time with Kevin, as he insisted we call him, went off. He tilted his head and said, “Sadly, our time is up. For homework, I’d like Phoebe and Rowan to each consciously do one thing this week to show Celeste how much they appreciate her contributions to the household, okay?”
A low grunt came from the far end of the couch where Rowan sat, offsetting my enthusiastic nod. Celeste’s expression remained slack, as she stared vacantly at the far end of the room. Her eyes looked watery now, and I gently tugged her to her feet while Rowan stalked to the exit without another word.
“Thank you, Kevin,” I said, smiling apologetically for my hothead sister. “We’ll see you in a couple weeks.”
I kept my arm around my sister’s back as we left the office, and suddenly I was reminded of one of the times my mom had taken us all to the park when we were little. Rowan and I had been playing on the slide when we’d noticed Celeste silently crying while two older girls ridiculed her for talking to rocks like they were real. Rowan was eight and I was seven, but we’d instantly come to her defense. After Rowan had chased the older girls away, I’d wrapped my arms around Celeste and told her that Rowan and I would always be there to take care of her.
Turned out I’d lied. There was no making this okay, and I was starting to become scared. How did we fix my baby sister?
Celeste squinted when we stepped out into daylight, shielding her eyes from the admittedly blinding rays. She hated the sun, despite having the enviable appearance of sunshine itself, with a head full of bright blond curls and a beautiful pink flush that colored her cheeks at the slightest physical exertion.
Keeping the Book of Sindal hidden from the world took a toll on all of us, but not in the physical ways it affected her. Celeste’s abilities were crucial to keeping the book safe, but they sucked the power out of her at every moment of every day, leaving her nerves frayed and fragile.
And we were due to replenish the book’s protections this evening.
Rowan had already lowered her sunglasses into place and was walking at a fast clip toward her brand-new car—last year’s hottest luxury SUV. She didn’t need something so nice, but Rowan had always loved her shiny things, as big and flashy as she could manage. She’d taken extra freelance writing assignments for a year to save enough for that car without having to ask the Council for a supplement to the small stipend they gave us, so I figured there were bigger battles to fight. Celeste hadn’t commented on the car when it came home a few days ago either, but then, Celeste hardly commented on anything anymore.
She was getting worse, and Rowan and I both knew it.