“It’s going to get weirder,” Cleo warned Owen. “We need to call the dogs and Pye in here. I don’t know if they’ll stay through this, but we have to try.”

“She’s coming.” Sonya pressed a hand to her heart. “Oh. I feel like I could jump right out of my skin. Do you feel that? Do you feel her?”

“I do now.” Trey gripped her arm. “Stay close.”

She came out of the dark. Not gliding, no, Sonya realized. Walking slowly, effortfully as the now-full moon hung white over the sea.

Alive, human, weary. And still completely mad.

“We can’t let her jump.” Cleo spoke softly. “Whatever happens, we can’t let her jump.”

The dogs growled almost in unison, but—for now—obeyed the command to stay. When Pye arched her back, hissed, Owen picked her up.

Dobbs looked up at the house where the entity she’d become still raged. Then she stared at the group inside the ring of salt.

“Who stands on what is mine? Who dares? Begone from here or face my wrath.”

Trembling a little, Cleo knelt and began the ritual.

“Your blood.” She poured the stained crystals into the copper pot. “The blood of your creature.” Then added her labradorite ball, Trey’s shirt.

She looked up at Owen.

“Yeah, I got it.”

He passed the cat to Trey, then took out the knife Dobbs had used to kill Astrid.

“This is mine!” Dobbs swept out a hand. Outside the circle, wind swirled. Inside, Owen felt a sting across his cheek.

“Need to do better than that,” he said, and earned a hiss from Cleo. Shrugging, he held his hand over the pot and scored his palm with the knife.

“Blood of the innocent, blood of a Poole.”

“Poole. A Poole. You thought to hang me! I take what is mine. You have no sway over my life, my death. I bring death!”

Lifting her hands, Dobbs curled her fingers. “I bring death to Pooles but first the pain. And in the manor I will remain. Mistress here for all time. Bride after bride their lives I’ll take, and with one twist your neck I break.”

“Tickles some.” Owen wiped his bloody hand on the bandanna in his back pocket.

“I’ll say.” Sonya rubbed at her throat.

Dobbs screamed, by the seawall, inside the house. As she charged the circle, Trey shoved Sonya behind him.

But filled with fury, and more, Sonya pushed back. And held up her hands. Moonlight flooded on the rings.

“I’m mistress here, and so are the seven before me.”

“Mine!” As if mesmerized, Dobbs rounded the circle of salt. “You. You I know. How do I know? In the glass, in the cauldron. In the blood. Give me what’s mine!”

As she started to strike out, Trey grabbed Sonya, prepared to take whatever blow got through. And Jones charged.

Lightning bolted out of the manor, lanced into the ground even as Jones snapped.

As before he tore the black dress.

“Jones!”

At Owen’s shouted order, Jones, all but steaming with reluctance, went back.

And Dobbs struck out with fire.

“Going out weakened the circle, but good boy anyway. Let me have that.” Cleo took the swatch of black cloth, folded it with the first. “One from each of them. One from then, one from now.”

“The fire’s eating at the salt,” Sonya warned.

“Blood you spilled, blood we took, and blood given free.”

The clock struck three.

Dobbs stopped, smiled. “Blood. My blood to seal the curse. There will be no hangman’s noose for Hester Dobbs.”

“Speed it up, Lafayette.”

“I blend them here with water from the sea.”

Before Dobbs could climb onto the seawall, Sonya ran out of the circle.

“Come and get them!” she shouted as Trey cursed and rushed after her.

Behind them, from the manor, thunder roared. With one hand on the seawall, Dobbs turned. Sonya wiggled the fingers of her lifted hands.

“You killed for these. Now I have them.”

“Eight, eight. Seven, eight. Where was the whore’s? Astrid Grandville. She had no ring. But a bride, still a bride.”

“That’s right. She gave it to me.” Sonya tapped Astrid’s ring.

The wind, coming from all directions, might have knocked her down as Dobbs turned from the seawall. But Trey held her upright.

“It better be now,” he called out.

“Damn wind!”

Crouching, Owen cupped his hands, nodded at Cleo. And this time the flame held.

“Gotta improvise a little. This cloth from then, this cloth from now, together burn.”

Owen adjusted his hands as the black cloths caught fire.

“As their flames rise higher, I cast into the bloody sea their fire. And with this token, your curse forever broken. With this spark, we cast out the dark. With your greed and hate, you seal your own fate.”

She tossed the burning cloths into the pot.

“Go, go, we have to help them. If this doesn’t work—”

Shrieks cut through the thunder. Owen lifted Cleo to her feet.

“I think we’ve got it. Nice work, Glinda.”

Flames licked up the black dress. As Dobbs shrieked, as she swatted at them, Trey pulled Sonya back.

“God. My God.”

The wind Dobbs had whipped fed the flames. Her screams tore through the greedy crackle of them as she ran in circles, beating at them still as her hands began to burn. Her hair caught, sparks flying from the fiery ribbons of it as she stumbled, fell.

“I didn’t expect … I didn’t know she’d … burn.”

“She sealed her own fate,” Owen reminded Cleo.

She burned, she burned screaming with a fire that blazed toward the moonlit sky.

Then the screams died, and the wind with it. The manor went quiet so the only sounds came from the roll of the sea and the voice of the fire.

The flames died.

“There’s nothing left.” Her heart still hammering, Sonya stared at the grass where Dobbs had fallen. “Nothing at all.”

“Because she’s gone.” Trey lifted her hand, kissed it. “We ended her then, we ended her now.”

“Go team. High fives all around.” Owen looked down at his wounded palm. “Maybe later on that. And well, Jesus, we’ve got company.”

Trey spun around, ready to defend again.

The seven brides stood together, the manor behind them.

“It’s like your painting, Cleo. It’s just like your painting.” Sonya looked down at the rings on her hands. “They’ve come for these. I need to…”

“Go ahead. We’ll wait.”

As Sonya walked toward them, Clover took a step forward. “Everything’s cool inside. We took care of it. You sure took care of us. And her.”

“Clover.”

“Some of us—most—want to stay if that’s okay with you. I know Charlie’ll want to when we can really talk again.”

“This is your house, all of you, all or anyone who’s stayed and wants to stay, for as long as you want.”

“We knew you’d say that, but we wanted to ask. You should start with Astrid this time, okay?”

With a nod, Sonya walked down to Astrid, held out her hands. “Take yours.”

Astrid slipped it off Sonya’s finger, onto her own. “Thank you. Grief is over, and Collin waits for me in the manor.”

She walked through the open doors.

Sonya held out her hands to Catherine.

“No one waits for me, but this has always been my home.”

“It always will be,” Sonya told her as Catherine put on her ring.

“I had strong, beautiful babies.” Marianne slipped on her ring. “Hugh and I had a strong and beautiful love. We’ll be happy here again.”

Agatha took her ring. “I was to be mistress here, and that was taken from me.”

“You’re welcome here as long as you like.”

With a regal nod, Agatha walked into the manor.

“I can’t have Edward, but I want to stay, at least for a while.” Lisbeth took her ring, admired it, then slipped it on. “I was really happy here.”

“I’m glad.”

Sonya stopped at Clover, and this time took the twined heart ring off, put it on Clover’s finger herself. “My favorite of the seven.”

“Aw. It’s really sweet, isn’t it? So’s my Charlie. I really love you, Sonya. Now I’m going to go kiss Charlie until his eyes roll back!”

She raced to the house, and shouting for Charlie, ran in.

And Johanna smiled. “She helped me through the first terrible fears and grief. And then you.” She took both Sonya’s hands, then looked past her to where the others waited. “All of you.”

She took her ring.

“Because of all of you, I’m the last who’ll know those terrible fears and grief. Thank you.”

She kissed Sonya’s cheek, then walked into the manor.

Trey bolted forward when Sonya swayed.

“Whoa. I’m okay, just … The rings, they really packed a punch. All gone now. Except mine.”

“And you’re chilled again. Let’s go in.”

“Yeah. Who’s for breakfast?”

“Owen.” Cleo laughed, linked her arm through his. “Only you.”

“Actually, I could eat. I’m empty,” Sonya admitted. “Eat, sleep for thirty or forty hours, hope it seems real after that.”

“It’s real,” Trey assured her. “Nothing’s left of her, not even back where she started.”

“I know it, I saw it, I feel it. But before we do anything else?”

“The Gold Room.” Cleo looked at the stairs as they went inside. “I feel the same way.”

“Then let’s go up. We’ve been wanting to get back in there for a while now. Right, Jones? You witch-biting maniac.”

“I think that was meant, too.” Cleo leaned down to give Jones a rub as they started up the stairs.

“Having a piece of her from then to add to what we had from now. We thought—my grand-mère and I—that if we could break the curse and keep her from jumping until we broke it, until the hour passed, she’d just fade away. ”

“She sealed her fate,” Owen repeated. “No regrets.”

“No, no regrets.”

When they reached the third floor, Sonya paused.

“The door’s open. The door to the Gold Room.”

“It’s time to go in.” Taking her hand, Trey walked down the hall.

Then reaching in, turned on the lights.

It was just a room, with walls papered in gold, a bed with an elaborate head- and footboard. Lovely old furnishings covered with dust.

“Needs some serious cleaning,” Cleo observed, batting away a spiderweb. “And clearing out. Then.”

“The Poole Family and Friends Gallery. She’s gone.” Sonya walked through, her steps leaving footprints in the dust. “There isn’t a trace of her left. Despite the shape of this room, I have to say it. This house is clean.”

“And you’re mistress of Poole Manor.”

She threw her arms around Trey, then pointed at Owen. “Kiss Cleo. And you, kiss me. Right here, right now. First thing we do in here? Bring the love and the light.”

“If you insist.”

When their lips met, when Clover added some Huey Lewis and the News with “The Power of Love,” Sonya felt it burst through her.

The love and the light.