I think the darkest moment of Hazel’s disappearance was seeing her on the flier. I had seen so many just like it, but always with the faces of strangers on them, never such a close friend. The walls of the police station were plastered with missing persons posters, all unfound, all still missing. Nothing felt more hopeless than seeing her in black and white on a sheet of paper, reduced to nothing more than statistics about her approximate height, weight and even her age. None of us knew any of these things with any amount of certainty, which only reminded us how little we knew of a woman that we all claimed to care about. After getting over the initial shock of seeing the posters, I left with Fern. Becky endeavored out on her own and the moonshiners left together in search of our mysterious friend.
Chapter Ten
Jimmy Jack waited for his grumbling father to climb into their truck. He had wanted to replace it or at the very least purchase something that would make it easier for Fang to get in. Years of scoliosis had made the old man slightly hunched and made it difficult for him to do many things, though he refused to admit any fault at all. Their truck was older than Fang himself...he had been given it by his father who had used it for the very same purpose before them. If Fang were less stubborn than he was it would belong to Jimmy Jack alone now, but he was stubborn and would probably die while on a delivery one day. At least Jimmy Jack had managed to convince Fang to let him drive for the most part.
“Mazie wasn’t convinced,” Jimmy Jack said once his father managed to settle into his seat. He started up the car which drowned out Fang’s loud groan. He was not one for deceit and Hazel had put them in a difficult position where they were being made to deceive those closest to them. Especially considering the fact that their friends were so stubborn that they would never let up searching for Hazel. “I don’t want to lie either, but we have to.”
“We don’t have to do a thing,” Fang replied hotly. Jimmy Jack had learned growing up to take Fang’s anger and upset with little more than a grain of salt. It was his default emotion...besides, he was angry at himself for not being more convincing. “We are not subject to the whims of Hazel.” It was the most condemning thing Fang had ever said about the object of his affection, but he couldn’t help being upset with Hazel. She didn’t need to disappear the way she did...she could have told Fern and all the others that she was going on vacation, especially if she didn’t want them looking for her. Vanishing in the middle of the day was the most suspicious way that she could have left.
“No, we don’t have to but we did tell her that we would do what we could to keep them from finding her for the time being,” Jimmy Jack replied. He had been forced to be the level headed of the pair since he was a child. He wondered how his father was ever able to get anything done before they began working together. Jimmy Jack had never met his grandfather but he couldn’t imagine that he was an easy man to work with either. He always wondered if his father had been the level headed one in their partnership. Maybe in the future Jimmy Jack imagined that maybe his son would end up being the level headed one in their partnership, though he didn’t exactly hope for this one as he didn’t want his son to deal with him in the way that he felt he needed to coddle his father for fear of an angry outburst.
“I know what we promised, and I know why we promised it,” Fang replied. “We promised the council as much as we promised her,” he sighed. The pair of them tried to avoid the council as much as possible, Their moonshine wasn’t only contraband in regular society. It was also looked down upon by the witch's council. It wasn’t explicitly illegal, but because they sold their moonshine to ungifted people, they could get into hot water since it was frowned upon to knowingly profit by selling magical items to normal people. Much like in town, the council looked the other way simply because they had been doing it for so long. The moonshine wasn’t exactly magical, as Fang and Jimmy Jack weren’t exactly magical themselves. They were more magic adjacent. Their family had at one time been a powerful family of warlocks and witches, but their bloodline became weak. Jimmy Jack and Fang were left with hardly even a drop of real magic to them. If Jimmy Jack had children it was likely that they would be completely ungifted. What they did have was generations of knowledge and a keen ability to practice the making of spells and potions, with their most famous potion being their moonshine. It was moonshine, but with a little bit of magic mixed in that made the drinker forget their troubles a little more than a classic drink might do. Sometimes they would even throw a little bit of luck into the mixture as well.
“The council will be out of our lives again once the anniversary passes,” Jimmy Jack said for the billionth time. He was trying to assure himself of that fact. Fang had grown up more entrenched in the magic community than his son. In fact, magic made Jimmy Jack almost queasy. The council made him more nervous than even Becky and boy did she make him nervous. The council had only been a part of their lives a handful of times, but Fang had a feeling that this time might be a bit longer than the others. He could feel it in the air that this anniversary was nothing like the others. Fang had not told his son, but he could feel his drop of magic ripple out into a puddle at the very least. The comet was going to arrive soon and with it a new energy, reinvigorating the magic in the entirety of Stillwater. It was not just an echo of the comet this time, it was going to be the real thing. Fang still remembered what it was like fifty years ago to have just felt a slight uptick in his power was something he had held onto his whole life since that moment
“Well, they will never be completely out of our lives, at least not as long as we live here in Stillwater and eat at Hazel’s,” Fang said, reminding his son once more that they were going to be tied to the council as long as they stayed in Stillwater. Fang could tell that his son was less comfortable with magic than he ever was, but he also knew that the thought of leaving Stillwater had never crossed his mind. “The council can be a pain in the ass, but they're worth the trouble. They keep things in balance.”
“That’s what you’ve told me,” Jimmy Jack replied, but he was still unconvinced. He’d likely have to see them in action to believe it, but Fang hoped that there would never come a time that his son would have to see the council of witches in action. It would mean that something terrible had happened to create a drastic imbalance between the magic and unmagical forces in the universe. “You still need to do better. Mazie was not fooled by what you said, and she could clearly tell that we were hiding something.”
“That girl has a gut instinct like nothing I’ve ever seen,” Fang said. “It’s a wonder that she’s not the detective and Fern is. Not that Fern’s bad at her job, she’s a fine detective, but that Mazie always knows what’s going on even if she doesn’t trust herself.”
“Becky seems to trust her,” Jimmy Jack said, a small blush started to color his cheeks at just the mention of her name. Jimmy Jack had unfortunately inherited Fang’s inability to talk to or woo women in any way shape or form. Fang had a lot more game when he was younger, but it seemed that it must have skipped a generation. Jimmy Jack had hardly had a girlfriend and couldn’t even look his crush in the eyes - even though it was clear that she felt the same way about him. The two were hopelessly shy, though they had started to brake down barriers...like they could now talk to each other about more than just the weather or their food orders at the diner. “Mazie told her that she had a feeling that Hazel wasn’t in trouble and even though she still wants to find her, she doesn’t seem as worried for her well being”
“We both know that Hazel is alright, or at the very least she will be. The council didn’t give her quite as much warning as she was expecting,” Fang sighed. Jimmy Jack was driving them home although they had told their friends that they would go door to door. They felt bad they were sending Fern, Mazie and Becky on a witch hunt (for lack of a better term), but it had to be done. Hazel had been there the night that she had gone missing when Fang and Jimmy Jack went to check her house. Her house was dark when they arrived so the last thing they had expected was t
o see her inside.
She and Fang had known each other their entire lives. They grew up in Stillwater together and after a long while they both discovered the truth about the other accidentally and around the same time. It was actually fifty years previously, when they both felt an uptick in their powers. Hazel was drawn to do the right thing, when people went missing she used her powers to try and locate them. Fang had stumbled upon her doing a spell and had immediately known what was going on. They confessed to one another that they both shared the gift, though Fang took a while to admit that he wasn’t exactly gifted per say.
If Fang admitted it to himself, he’d realize that he loved Hazel since then, though he would hardly even admit that he had feelings for her now. They grew apart after a short while of course, but Fang was interested in Hazel the whole time. They never got to know each other very well, but they did share that one dark secret between them. That had been enough to bring them together in some way and it had been enough for Hazel to trust him with this now. She had been secretive about what and why the council had called upon her. Not that he had ever expected a straight answer about that...more than likely Hazel didn’t even know why she had been called. When Jimmy Jack and Fang had come into her house she was all a tizzy. The house was dark because her eyes were still blank, she wouldn’t have been able to see anything even if she had turned on the lights.
The son and father had to help her pack a bag. She didn’t know when she would be back or where she would be going, but she made them swear not to say a word to anyone else. She and Fang were well aware that all their compatriots were witches. Jimmy Jack was still ignorant to this and Fang wasn’t going to be the one to tell him. He wasn’t sure that Jimmy Jack would feel the same about Becky after discovering that she was a witch. It was an odd thing, but he could imagine that Jimmy Jack might be so uncomfortable with magic that he would no longer see Becky in the same light as he did now if he knew. Fang and Hazel had never even spoken it out loud but they both knew what the truth was. Fern and Mazie had been displaying their powers since they were young, Becky was more of a surprise. She had hidden it well up until the last few months after the witch hunter died.
“Still, what do you think we should do about Mazie?” Jimmy Jack asked. He had no suspicions of Fern or Becky, but he was beginning to think that Mazie might have some connection to magic. Her eyes had been a pretty big clue when they'd become colorless and she led them all into the kitchen just after Hazel disappeared, but he had suspected it for a long while. She was always talking to herself or her cat. He liked to imagine that it wasn’t because she was insane.
“We do nothing,” Fang replied. They finally arrived at their humble abode. It was not the house you would expect Fang and Jimmy Jack to have. It was magnificent and placed on the far edge of town. Everything about them screamed rustic, old and more than just a little downtrodden. Their home was another thing entirely. It was the kind of place you’d expect old money to own. A brick masterpiece with large white columns at the front of the building. In truth they were from old money, but not that much of it was left. Really it was only the house that they had at this point. Like their family's powers had declined over the years, so had their family money.
“What do you mean we do nothing?” Jimmy Jack asked. He was frustrated that he was lying to Becky about everything. He didn’t feel good about it at all. He wanted to ask her on a date, but was worried that if he was building a relationship on dishonesty then it would doom the rest of their relationship to failure.
“The more we do the more obvious it will look that we know something...it’s not like either of us are good at keeping secrets,” Fang said with some irony. He was a very good at keeping secrets, even though he had not been good at pretending he was concerned for Hazel earlier. He had been so relieved to know that she was okay, that he found it difficult to pretend he was upset. “She’ll be back soon anyways. The celebration is only a couple days away and once the comet passes she should be back.”
“I don’t know if I’d say that’s true,” Jimmy Jack said thinking about how he and his father had effortlessly lied to everyone around them about their lives. His father hadn’t even told him about Hazel being a witch until they found her at the house. They were all certainly very, very good secret keepers. Jimmy Jack was beginning to expect that everyone in town had their own secrets. He was beginning to realize that even the people closest to him, especially the people closest to him, were keeping secrets.
Chapter Eleven
“Have either of you done a locator spell before?” Fern asked Becky and I. Our individual searches, rounding the town had come to nothing. No one knew a thing about Hazel or had seen her at all since they had last seen her in the diner. I was surprised when Fern was the one to suggest a spell to find her. It was completely unlike her, she hated relying on magic. She only used her visions if she were going to use magic at all, and always only to solve a case. It drove her mad that I used magic to make my life easier - simple chores and fun little spells like that. I hardly ever used my magic for anything serious. Becky didn’t use her magic often, but that was more due to the fact that she had been in hiding for quite some time from a witch hunter. Because of this, we both shook our heads ‘no’.
“Never,” I said. “But, you know that.”
“I’ve heard of them, and know the general process, but I’ve never tried one before,” Becky said with a sigh. She was exhausted and I knew it wasn’t just because of Hazel’s disappearance. She had started trying to look for her birth family now that she was no longer in hiding and on the run. I could tell that the search for Hazel wasn’t the only search that wasn’t going well for Becky right now.
“I don’t know if we are powerful enough,” I said, saying what was on everyone’s minds. Locator spells took a lot of power, they were not easy or simple in any way shape or form. “ I know that we are all feeling the effects of the comet coming but we were not exactly the most experienced witches. I’m not sure that we’ll be able to complete the spell until the comet is passing Stillwater.”
“I agree,” Becky said. “Maybe if we had experience we could do it with out the boost in our powers from the comet but since none of us have done it,” Becky trailed off mid-sentence, but we all knew that she was just as doubtful as I was.
“Maybe we should wait for the comet, it’s only two days from now,” I said feeling like it would be our best bet. I didn’t want to wait longer to find Hazel, but I didn’t see the spell working in any other situation.
“I’m not going to give up without trying it,” Fern said stubbornly. “The Sheriff is making it impossible for me to find Hazel. He’s even opened up his own investigation to one up me and won’t share any of his information with me.” Fern hadn’t mentioned this before. It was no secret that he was blocking her investigation, but she hadn’t told us that he had started his own investigation.
“He’s doing what?” Becky asked, her mouth slightly agape. I was glad that Amber wasn’t around for yet another reason. If she had heard this, we would have never been able to shut her up or stop her from confronting the Sheriff which would have gotten us all nowhere.
“He’s looking for Hazel,” Fern said bitterly. “But, he won’t give me any useful information. He thinks that this case is going to be what decides the campaign results - in his mind whoever finds Hazel wins, so he’s blocking me any chance he gets.”
“What about the deputies?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine that the Sheriff would be able to get them all to keep Fern out of the loop.
“He’s only got a few people on it and only those he basically has in his pocket,” Fern growled. The wrongness of it all made my stomach churn. The use of an innocent person like Hazel as nothing more than a political tool was abhorrent. Regardless of whether or not Hazel was our friend and it was an awful tactic for him to adopt. The entire town of Stillwater knew that he was bad news, but we were also a town that clung to tradition and familiarity. No one liked change, and i
f there was anyone that was more of a fixture of the town than the Sheriff it was Hazel. So, he was probably right and the outcome of the case would decide who would be the next Sheriff.
“At least he’s looking,” Becky said with a sad sigh. Fern gave her a look of disbelief, but I understood where she was coming from. Disregarding all the politics, it did mean that people with resources were looking for our friend. “Don’t look at me like that, I don’t know or think that he is going to find her, but I want everyone looking for her and I mean everyone.”
“I know,” Fern seemed reluctant to not argue Becky on that one, but it was just like Becky to only see the best version of the scenario. “We need to try this spell.” Fern pulled out a single sheet of crisp, white printer paper. It was the exact opposite thing you’d expect a spell to be written on but also the exact thing you would expect Fern to have a spell written on. I had never seen Fern so intent on doing magic before. A dark part of me wondered if she was also caught up in the campaign for Sheriff...maybe she would go to any lengths to find Hazel and not just because we loved her.
“We can try,” I said taking the page in my hands. I read over the spell and felt overwhelmed at even the thought of attempting something so complicated. “It doesn’t look like it will be easy,” I reiterated.
“I never said it would be,” Fern replied.
It took most of the day to muster up the supplies. They were mostly odds and ends, some of them could be found at Amber’s but we had decided that it would be in everyone’s best interest to avoid the store (and her) as much as possible. Magic was notoriously fickle and the list of supplies were specific. Four blue candles, I almost expected it to specify what shade, but it didn’t. An amber pendant on a silver chain. A silver goblet, filled only a quarter of the way with water from a brook. A map and jasmine incense.
A Whole Lotta Witchin Goin On Page 6