by E J Elwin
Then came the part about Father Gabriel. Harriet explained the resurrection spell, how it required a life in exchange for the one being requested, and how I had quickly suggested the perfect candidate. Connor had never been to Father Gabriel’s church but he had heard the rumors about him. He looked shaken by this aspect of the spell, but agreed that Father Gabriel was the best available option for an exchange.
He watched me describe my anger and hatred of the man, and a look of comprehension dawned on his face. I looked back at him, silently acknowledging what he was thinking, but kept on with the story, describing the spell in detail, the wind that had blown through the cemetery, the glowing Blood Crystal, the flash of lightning, then finally the exhuming of his casket.
“And, well, you know the rest,” I concluded, knocking back more whiskey.
“Wow,” Connor said, staring down at his glass. “I just— I don’t even— wow.”
“I know,” I said. I glanced at Harriet, who reached for the whiskey and poured us all another round. There was silence as we all drank. Then a question occurred to me. “So did you… see anything?” I asked Connor. “What was it like… where you were?”
He looked at me and then down at the table. Harriet and I watched him intently.
“I don’t remember,” he said slowly. “The last thing I can remember before tonight is listening to Blondie in the car on the way to Portland. I wish I could remember…”
“But this is incredible,” said Harriet breathlessly. “I’ve read of resurrection spells being successful but I’ve never actually seen it. It’s fantastically rare. This is… truly miraculous.”
I looked at Connor. “I agree,” I said, feeling his warm hand in mine.
We took the whiskey to the living room, the three of us nicely tipsy. Connor gasped in wonder when Harriet pointed two fingers at the fireplace and a roaring fire sprung up. Any fears I might have had about him having a hard time adjusting to the idea of his own death were dispelled as I watched him talk animatedly with Harriet, who looked highly entertained by the questions he had about witches.
She told him that, no, it was not possible for witches to time travel, teleport, or turn people into toads. She explained, like she had to me, that the number of witches in the world had fallen drastically over the years and with them, what she referred to as the “showier” magic. There were still some witches out there with rare, powerful gifts like shapeshifting and electrokinesis, but they were just that— rare, and they kept well hidden. Her own “showy” gift, she said, was telekinesis, something she’d already demonstrated to my and Connor’s mutual amazement in the cemetery.
“Could you use magic to win the lottery?” asked Connor.
“Theoretically, yes,” said Harriet. “But magic done out of greed or simple selfish gain will backfire. It’s one of the basic laws of witchcraft. Survival is one thing. If, say, you are using magic to steal some food because you’re starving to death, that won’t carry quite the same consequences. Anything more than that, stealing even just a smidgen more than you actually need, is guaranteed to bite you in the ass, as they say. It’s all about intention and motivation.”
Connor sipped his whiskey thoughtfully. “Are there guy witches too?” he asked.
“Sorry,” said Harriet with a smile. “Only women. It’s just the way it is.”
I looked at the picture frames on the walls. Most of them were soft watercolor artwork, but there were several black-and-white photos of a beautiful young woman. They were arranged in a sequence that told a story. In one, she was a teenager, riding a bike and laughing at something that must have been hilarious. In another, she was in her twenties, holding a tiny baby with chubby cheeks. In the one next to it, she was older and held a little girl of about eight or nine years old, a little girl who, despite the years between then and now, I recognized as Harriet.
“Is that your mom?” I asked.
“Yes,” said Harriet. “Powerful woman. Her gift was Seeing. She had visions of the future. It came in extremely useful. She died when I was eleven, from cancer, of all things.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“She lived more than most people in the time that she had,” said Harriet with pride. “She never mentioned it but I’m sure she foresaw her own death and lived as purposefully as she could.”
I wondered why magic could bring someone back from the dead but not cure cancer. Once again, as if reading my mind, Harriet answered my question.
“There are spells that might have helped her,” she said, “but they’re risky and difficult, and could have made things worse. Still, I would have tried them back then if I could have.”
I imagined Harriet as a little girl, crying for her mother, poring through spell books trying to find a way to cure her. Tears welled in my eyes.
“None of that,” said Harriet gently. “This is a night of celebration!”
She smiled at Connor, who stood up and went to give her a hug.
We proceeded to get superbly drunk. Connor urged me to dance with him to the music that issued from Harriet’s old record player. As it turned out, she was fanatical about The Beatles, and she played all their best songs, sipping her drink with one hand and telekinetically switching between records with the other.
“They may not have been witches,” she said, as “Let It Be” issued from the record player, “but this is as magical as anything I’ve ever heard.”
In time, the drinks began to weigh on us, and Harriet suggested we rest for the night.
“I just woke up from the longest nap I’ve ever had, but sure,” said Connor. The three of us howled with laughter, and it seemed impossible that only two days ago, I’d been in unendurable misery.
Harriet showed us to the guest room at the very back of the house. The room was cozy and inviting, with a large four-poster bed at one end of the room and a fireplace at the other. She pointed two fingers at the fireplace and a roaring fire instantly erupted inside it.
“That is just so cool,” said Connor admiringly, watching the flames.
“Make yourselves at home and rest up,” she said. She gave each of us a warm hug and then bade us goodnight, closing the door behind her.
Connor and I looked around at the room. There was a small window draped in plaid curtains that opened up onto what I assumed to be the backyard, but it was too dark out to tell. The four-poster bed was also hung with plaid curtains which were pushed aside, welcoming the bed’s next occupant. We walked to the bed and sat there in silence for a moment, hearing only the sounds of the crackling fire and the continuing downpour outside.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Connor asked gently.
“About what?”
“About Father Gabriel,” he said.
“I didn’t want to remember,” I said, looking down at my hands. “I tried to pretend like it never happened. And I guess I didn’t want you to—” I hesitated.
“Didn’t want me to what?” he asked.
“I didn’t want you to see me that way,” I said, my voice breaking. “Weak. Like a victim.”
Tears stung my eyes. Connor looked stricken.
“Arthur, you were a little kid! Being preyed on by an adult at that age doesn’t make you weak. It only makes him disgusting.” He took my hands in both of his. “I’m so sorry that happened to you.”
“Me too,” I said.
“But thanks to you, he’ll never hurt anyone again.” He raised a hand and gently caressed my face. “Thank you for bringing me back.”
“Any time,” I said. I looked into his ocean blue eyes and felt lightheaded with joy that someone as exquisite as him could care about me in the same way that I did for him.
“I love you, Connor.”
“I love you, Arthur.”
We leaned into each other and our lips met. A shiver ran through me.
“I know it’s late,” he whispered, “but I’m not ready to go back to sleep just yet.”
He wrapped his arms around me and kissed me, a
nd I fell into him, losing myself in his warmth, in the feel of his lips, of his hands in mine.
We pulled off our clothes which were still damp from the rain, and I saw him, all of him, for the first time. I knew total bliss as we tangled ourselves in each other, and I bared all to him, my body, my heart, my fears, my weaknesses, my dreams, my soul.
CHAPTER 3
Candle, Cauldron, and Crystal
I woke up with my face pressed against his chest. The wonder that I’d felt watching Harriet perform the resurrection spell persisted with every beat of his heart. I lay there with my arms around him, celebrating every ba-bump! It was then that it hit me, with overwhelming gravity and clarity, that my life had just changed forever.
But it wasn’t all for the better. On one hand, Harriet had come into my life and introduced me to things I had always believed existed only in fantasy novels. She had repaired my shattered heart by bringing back the person I loved most, and he and I were now profoundly bonded.
On the other hand, when I tried to envision our future together, I saw a brick wall. How on Earth were we supposed to explain this to our parents and to the rest of the world? How could we possibly live any sort of a normal life? I had wanted him back so desperately that I hadn’t considered what would happen if the spell actually worked. Now that it had, panic was setting in.
History showed us that the world didn’t respond well to witches. It wouldn’t be just the religious fanatics in town who would be coming to burn us at the stake; other people would be scandalized too. The media would get ahold of it. We would be a national— a worldwide— story. The authorities would get involved. The government would come after us, would want to lock up and experiment on the boy who had risen from the dead, would want to probe and dissect the witch who had made it happen.
The authorities. I had also committed a murder. Many would say he had it coming, but it had still technically been murder. So, prison for me and dissection for Harriet and Connor. I shook my head and tried to stay calm. Connor woke up and looked down at me in his embrace.
“Hey,” he said softly. “Are you okay?”
I leaned in and kissed him. “We’re going to have to figure out what to do.”
There was a knock at the guest room door. “I’m making breakfast if you boys are hungry,” Harriet called through the door.
“Sure, give us just a second,” I called back.
**
The storm had cleared up and hazy sunlight streamed in through the windows. I could see the cemetery over the weeds in Harriet’s front yard, all puddles and mud. We sat at the breakfast table in front of steaming plates of bacon and eggs. Connor wore the suit he’d been buried in since neither of us had a change of clothes. Harriet wore a long lavender dressing gown.
“So how’d you both sleep?” she asked, taking a sip of tea from a porcelain mug.
“Like the dead,” said Connor.
Harriet choked on her tea. “Nice one,” she coughed, and they clinked mugs.
I was blown away by how calm they both were. “Um, guys?”
“You’re worried about how you’re both supposed to go back to living your lives after having killed the town priest and taken part in one of the few successful resurrection spells in recent history,” Harriet rattled off calmly.
I was grateful for that ability of hers, relieved that she understood. “Pretty much.”
“It’ll be simple,” said Harriet. “First, I suggest that Connor stay here for a while, for obvious reasons. Arthur, you’ll go home to your parents with some teenage excuse as to your whereabouts. I’ll concoct a disguise for Connor, and after the interest in Father Gabriel’s disappearance has dissipated, he’ll go out into town and introduce himself as a new person.”
I glanced at Connor, his mouth full of scrambled eggs, then back at Harriet. Her face radiated nothing but calm, and I felt reassured. If she could bring someone back from the dead, she could certainly create a convincing new identity for Connor.
**
After breakfast, Connor and I asked Harriet for permission to browse through the huge selection of books she had stacked around her kitchen, to which she gladly agreed. Most of them were regular books like Jane Eyre, Frankenstein, and The Picture of Dorian Gray, but there were also some with titles like Candle, Cauldron, and Crystal: The Rudiments of Witchcraft; Walking Between Worlds: The Art of Astral Projection; and Witch Trials Throughout History: Why The World Just Won’t Let Us Be.
“This is awesome!” said Connor, flipping through Walking Between Worlds. “It says here witches can travel in spirit to other dimensions, and that there are thousands of them!”
“Some say the number is endless,” said Harriet. “It’s a nifty experience but it’s dangerous and best done with a group of witches.”
I opened Candle, Cauldron, and Crystal to the first chapter and began to read:
Just as the warrior wields the sword and a writer wields the pen, so does the witch wield the candle, the cauldron, and the crystal. Much of a witch’s magic, with the exception of individual gifts channeled through the hands, must be harnessed and focused using these three fundamental instruments to be most effective.
The candle harnesses the power of the flame, a natural force of energy that has provided humans with light and warmth, and protection against predators since our earliest days. The duality of fire, in that it can sustain life as well as destroy it, mirrors that same duality in humans— the light and dark inside us, and the choices we make to act from either side— making it a potent magical symbol.
The cauldron bears the bubbling brews and sage secrets of a witch’s craft. It is a vessel of power, symbolic of the womb, of transformation and rebirth. Cast iron is the best-loved cauldron, and the inevitable rust is a sign of character and good use, often enhancing certain brews and spells.
Crystals are conduits of magical energy, capable of both bringing it in and sending it out. They have a variety of uses and come in a wide range of compositions and colors. The four major categories include the Cloaking, Crossing, Concealment, and Cosmic Crystals. This volume provides an in-depth exploration of the many kinds of crystals and the different ways in which they work together with the candle and the cauldron. Read on to get the most out of your spellcasting…
It was fascinating. I felt like I could sit in Harriet’s kitchen all day reading it. I noticed that the opening pages, which usually contained information about publisher and copyright, contained only the title of the book and the author’s name, Callie Corran.
“If witches live in secrecy,” I said, “how did these books get published?”
“A lot of them are passed off as ordinary, non-magical books,” said Harriet. “A non-witch might see a self-help book or a collection of Greek food recipes, while a witch would look at the same book and see the actual magical secrets it holds. Most witches who want to publish a book can publish it themselves. There are spells that are effectively magical printing presses, which allow the witch to easily and discreetly produce copies of a book. That kind of replication is usually extremely difficult with any other object— it’s impossible with food— but books are different. Knowledge really is power. It yearns to live, to spread, to shine its light on darkness.”
There was definitely new light shining on my darkness, I thought, as I turned to the Cosmic Crystals chapter to read about the Blood Crystal that had helped bring Connor back.
**
“Where the hell have you been?!”
My parents were furious. It was evening and I was back home after skipping school again to be with Harriet and Connor. Aside from my absence in the morning before they went to work, my parents had both received an automated phone call from the school, informing them of my second consecutive truancy. They stood in front of me while I sat on our living room couch, avoiding eye contact.
“Arthur, you’re going to tell us what’s going on and where you’ve been these past two days right now!” my mom shouted in her most authoritative voice.
“I just… I wasn’t feeling well,” I said. “I didn’t want to be around people.”
My dad sighed and looked away from me. He and Connor’s dad were of the same mind. As far as they were concerned, my grief for a boy I loved was not valid grief. Also, real men could withstand the deaths of loved ones without crying like little girls.
“Arthur,” my mom said more gently, “I know this is a hard time for you. But you can’t just go off on your own without telling us. And you can’t be missing any more school. Aren’t your exams coming up? Those are going to be really important for your senior year and for getting into college!”
“I know,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
She sighed and looked up at my dad, who averted his gaze, looking like he would rather be anywhere else. Well dad, that makes two of us.
Later, I lay in my own bed again in the darkness. I could hear my parents having a heated discussion downstairs in the kitchen that I knew was about me. I wanted to be back at Harriet’s house with Connor. I wanted to at least talk to them, but my parents had confiscated my cell phone as soon as they walked through the front door.
I didn’t want to go to school the next day. I didn’t want to go back to school at all. My mom’s talk of exams and college showed me how removed those things now felt, how foreign. They belonged to another life that was now over, that ended when Connor rose from that casket. I began to let go of my fears of not being able to live a normal life. For better or worse, nothing was normal anymore.
**
“They can’t find Father Gabriel.”
I looked up from my cereal. It was morning, and my mom paused in her bustle of making coffee and toast to read a text message she’d just gotten. My dad looked up from his newspaper.
“What do you mean they can’t find him?” he asked.
“He was supposed to open the church early yesterday for the morning AA meeting but he never showed up,” my mom said, looking down at her phone. “Abigail says no one has seen him, he’s not answering his phone, he’s not at home…”