A Body Borrowed [Montclair Grimoire #1]

It was bright in the kitchen. The mid-morning sun streamed through the windows, casting everything in a golden haze. The scent of dried lavender, high-end espresso, and the faint, metallic tang of an approaching summer storm filled the room.

I stood at the counter, adjusting a candle next to a piece of obsidian on my altar. “Xai!” I called, my voice carrying through the old Victorian. “Come on, we’re gonna be late!”

A moment later, Xai came bouncing down the old service stairs into the kitchen. “A star is never late!” he declared. “The show begins once they’ve arrived.”

“Tell that to our customers that expect us to open at six,” I said, but I couldn’t hide my smile as I grabbed my keys off the counter.

Xai moved around the kitchen, looking at his phone in one hand as he moved a rose quartz tower with the other. “Rae said Old Man Pickett’s cat went missing. He hasn’t seen it in two days.”

I felt a weight settle over me as he spoke, watching him reach in the cabinet for a honey bun. “Geiger runs off all the time,” I said. “He’ll be back.” Even as I said the words, I didn’t believe them.

Xai opened the honey bun, taking a bite out of it as we moved towards the front door. “He’s probably trying to escape the smell of cigarettes and chewing tobacco.”

I didn’t say anything as I opened the door. I held it while Xai stepped out onto the porch. The wind blew, filling the air with the sound of different wind chimes my gran had collected over her eighty-three years of life. I locked the door and joined Xai at the car parked in the drive way.

Just as I started the engine and shifted into reverse, a thud startled me. I jumped in the seat, looking at the windshield where a sparrow had just hit. The bird slid down the glass, leaving a faint smear before disappearing from view.

For a second, I just sat there, hands locked around the steering wheel, heart thudding harder than it should’ve.

“Damn,” Xai muttered, leaning forward to look. “That thing came out of nowhere.”

I swallowed, forcing my fingers to loosen. “Yeah.”

But it hadn’t felt like nowhere.

It had felt… deliberate.

I put the car back in park and opened the door before I could think too hard about it. The air outside was heavier than it had been a moment ago, thick with that storm-slick pressure that made everything feel closer than it was.

“Harm, you don’t have to-“ Xai started.

“I know.”

The gravel crunched under my shoes as I moved around to the front of the car. The sparrow lay just in front of the bumper, small and still, its wings bent at an angle that didn’t look right. For a moment, I thought it was already dead.

Then it twitched.

I froze.

It’s head jerked sharply to the side — not weak, not fading. Quick. Wrong.

A chill crept up the back of my neck.

“Hey,” Xai called from the car, his voice lighter than the look on his face. “We’re seriously gonna be late.”

“Hold on.” I crouched slowly, careful, like the bird might startle.

Its eyes were open. Not glassy. Not fading. Watching. A thin, wet sound slipped from its beak — not quite a chirp, not quite anything natural — and its body gave another sharp, unnatural twitch.

Something in my chest tightened.

This wasn’t injury. This was-

The wind shifted, hard enough to rattle the chimes on the porch behind me. And just like that, the bird went still. Completely still. No breath. No movement. Nothing.

I stayed there a second longer than I should’ve. Then I stood up. “We should go,” I said.

Xai studied me. “Yeah. No argument here.”

I got back in the car, but as I pulled out of the driveway, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d missed something. Or worse — that something had just noticed me.