Charmed

After her wife’s death, the storyteller Bun Soyer moves to Monterey with his young daughter Jessica, far from grieving relatives. In this beautiful town, Bun hopes, nothing will distract him from his work—and Jessica from school. At first, everything goes according to plan. But the meeting with a new neighbor—charming Anastasia Donovan—changes everything in an instant.

Magic exists. Who could doubt it when there’s a rainbow and meadow flowers, the music of the wind, the silence of the stars? Magic has touched everyone it has reached. It’s the simplest and most wondrous part of our lives. For some people, so much is given: they are chosen to carry a legacy through endless centuries. Their ancestors were the wizard Merlin, the witch Ninian, the fairy princess Rhiannon, the German Wegeverte, and Arabian jinn. Their blood has absorbed the power of Celtic Finn, the ambitious fairy Morgana, and others whose names are only whispered in secret—in the dark. When the world was very young, and magic was as ordinary and familiar as a passing drizzle, fairies danced in deep forests and sometimes—out of mischievousness, and sometimes out of love—came close to ordinary mortals. And they still do. She has an ancient lineage. She has an ancient—she has an ancient… Even as a child, she understood and learned that such a gift comes at a price. The loving parents who raised her had no way to lower the cost or pay it themselves; they could only care for and guide her, watching the girl grow into a woman. They could only stand nearby and hope while she went through sorrows and joys along her fated path. With a far greater and finer sensitivity than others required by the gift, she valued peace and quiet. As a woman, she preferred a quiet life and often stayed alone—not suffering from loneliness. As a witch, she carried her gift while never forgetting the responsibility tied to it. Perhaps, like everyone since the beginning of time, she dreamed and ached for true, lasting love. Because she knew better than anyone that no force, no magical spell, no witchcraft could surpass an open, caring heart.