The Secret Language of Stones by M. J. Rose

don’t throw yourself any deeper into this shadow land of voices and spirits. Has it given you anything but grief so far?”
    I shook my head.
    â€œI know people who can help you rid yourself of all connections to that world. Will you let me take you to them?”
    I wanted to say yes, that I’d heard enough dead soldiers and seen too many of their wives and mothers weep. But was I really ready to give up what I was doing? Especially now after I’d been stirred by Jean Luc’s deep velvet voice?
    â€œNo.” I gestured to Grand-mère’s kitchen, to her house. “Just like what you are doing here, entertaining these soldiers, what I’m doing helps those who the soldiers leave behind.”
    â€œAt what price? Here you are, up in the middle of the night, nervous and exhausted, hearing things, your imagination spinning out of control.”
    The diamonds in my great-grandmother’s many rings glittered as she poured out the chocolate into two fine china cups, white with a border of violets and green leaves. “Drink this, it will restore you.”
    Grand-mère liked diamonds she could scratch on the mirror to prove they were real and pearls whose veracity she could check with her teeth. She liked paintings and sculpture and listening to the raucous laughter of the men she entertained. She dwelled in the world of flesh and passion. Of men’s needs and women’s struggles to survive. Magick, second sight, speaking to the dead . . . she was suspicious of all the dark arts. She’d never attended a séance and didn’t believe in anything she couldn’t touch or see, except love. And she’d argue she could see even that. When I first came to Paris, I yearned to be more like her than my mother, and in many ways I did still. But I was beginning to question if that was at all possible.

Chapter 6
    â€œYou’re not eating,” Anna said as she watched me refill my wineglass. “What’s wrong?”
    We’d closed the shop for l’heure déjeuner as usual at twelve thirty and, since it was the first sunny day in two weeks, brought our lunch out into the garden. The velvety ruby and pink pastel roses were open, perfuming the afternoon, and birds sang as if there were no war, as if men were not dying and mothers were not mourning, and as if I weren’t hearing voices.
    In addition to the wine was cold roast chicken leftover from the night before, mustard, cornichons, and a coveted baguette from the bakery. With so many supplies acquisitioned for the front and rations in effect, white flour was a luxury, but Anna had secured a rare loaf.
    â€œNothing serious,” I said in answer to her question, and picked at the chicken.
    â€œFrom the look in your eyes, I doubt that. What’s wrong, little one?”
    I’d been hesitant to tell her. Like my great-grandmother, she’d want me to take action. But whereas Grand-mère wanted me to divorce myself from my potential abilities, Anna wanted me to do the opposite: embrace my heritage and explore the gift my mother had given me.
    â€œYou know it might make you feel better to talk about whatever istroubling you. I believe you need to delve deeper into what you might be capable of, but I won’t push you, Opaline. You have to make up your own mind that you’re ready . . .”
    Maybe she was right. I was exhausted trying to understand on my own. I told Anna about the voice I’d heard on Friday in the workshop, the weeping that woke me up on Saturday night, and the sheaf of ancient silver leaves I’d found in the bell tower.
    â€œI read in my book of gems that Arabs during the time of Mohammed believed opals came to earth on bolts of lightning. Another legend claims that in ancient times, of all gems, the opal was considered the most magical and the multicolored stone bestowed the power of prophecy. What does that say about me?” I asked her.