First Pages Friday: THE LAST WILL OF MOIRA LEAHY

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First Pages Fridays offers a taste of an author's work—from books long on the shelves to works-in-progress, because while you can't judge a book by the cover, you can tell plenty from the first pages.

"Therese Walsh's strange, fascinating novel of psychological suspense is suffused with the supernatural. (It's) an imaginative exploration of the bond between twins." The Boston Globe

The Last Will of Moira Leahy

by Theresa Walsh

CHAPTER ONE

Prodigy

I lost my twin to a harsh November nine years ago. Ever since, I've felt the span of that month like no other, as if each of the calendar's thirty perfect little squares split in two on the page. I wished they'd just disappear. Bring on winter. I had bags of rock salt, a shovel and a strong back. I wasn't afraid of ice and snow. November always lingered, though, crackling under the foot of my memory like dead leaves.

It was no wonder then that I gave in to impulse one November evening, left papers piled high on my desk and went to where I'd lost myself in the past with a friend. I thought I might evade memory for a while at the auction house, but I slammed into it anyhow. It was just November's way.

Only this time, November surprised me.

*****

I had to have it.

Just over a foot long, the wavy dagger looked ancient and as though it'd been carved from lava rock. The grooved base was a study in asymmetry, with one end swooping off in a jagged point and the other circling into itself like a tiny, self-protective tail or the crest of a wave. Gemstones filled a ring that bound metal to a cocked wood handle. Intricate engravings covered the silver sheath. If not for a small hole in the blade's center, it would've been flawless.

I leaned in to touch it but was jarred out of my study by a poke to the thigh. The poker, a little girl, almost capsized me, and not from the poking either. I don't believe in ghosts, but if I did I might think I was looking at my sister from years past. My sister, a child. Eyes like the sea. Long, red hair like hers—and mine, before I snuffed out my pyrotechnics with several boxes of Platinum Snow and found a pair of scissors.

My vision grayed a little as I stared at her. She might've been seven or eight—a few years younger than Moira and me when we'd filched a sword like the one I intended to have and lost it in the bay. Well, I'd lost it, pretending to be Alvilda, Pirate Queen.

The girl poked me again.

"Can I help you, little one?" I asked. "Are you lost?"

She didn't answer, just pointed toward the far back of the viewing table. There wasn't much there: a bust of JFK, a pearlized candy jar and an indigo bottle that might've been depression-era glass. Noel would've been able to say for sure.

"Do you want that?" I took a guess and pointed at the candy jar. Maybe there was a secret stash of chocolate in there, who knew? But she shook her head. I looked again and saw a small black box slathered with pink roses, the buds as sweet as frosting. Of course. "The box?" She nodded.

I cradled it before her, and she reached out a hand pudgy with youth. "Careful," I said. I looked for parental figures but saw no one exhibiting missing-child panic—or with the right hair color. The girl didn't take the box, just left it in my hands and opened the lid.

Music swam up at me. The Entertainer. The girl giggled.

"Do you—" My voice turned to rust. "Do you like music?"

"I love dancing to the music." Her voice was sweet, as shy as her smile. She was so much like Moira, but whole, able to run and laugh. I missed my sister's laugh—maybe most of all.

"Do you play any instru—"

"Jillian! There you are!" A woman with dark hair strode toward us, her face a combination of annoyance and relief.

"I was looking at the music, Mommy," the girl said. "See how pretty?"

The mother bent before her daughter. "You scared me. Next time you want to look at something, we'll go together."

The girl nodded, serious, just as the lights flickered.

"Let's find a seat." The woman pulled her daughter behind her as the girl lifted her hand to me. Goodbye. They disappeared in the crowd.

I shook off my melancholy thoughts and turned back to the blade. My fingers itched to touch it, but just as I reached, an auction attendant pulled it off the table, sheathed it and placed it in a cardboard box. "Viewing time's over," she said.

"But—"

"Fallen in love, have you?"

I'd never seen another blade like the one I'd lost to the sea, and the desire for it tugged at me like a line rooted in my mouth. "I have to have it."

The woman added items to her container: the blue bottle, the candy jar, the music box. "You'd better get out your checkbook, then. Old George thinks that sword will go for hundreds."

Fine then. I had a checkbook.

[image error]Therese Walsh's debut novel, The Last Will of Moira Leahy, was published in 2009 by Shaye Areheart books (Random House) and released in paperback in 2010 by Three Rivers Press. She's the co-founder of Writer Unboxed, a blog for writers about the craft and business of genre fiction. Before turning to fiction, she was a researcher and writer for Prevention magazine, and then a freelance writer. She's currently hard at work on her second novel—another story about self-discovery, acceptance and magical journeys—at her home in upstate New York.

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