by M. L. Briers
“Oh, I have so much more experience than you. Don’t you think I know how to protect myself?” Gran waved an absent hand in the air in front of my face and almost caught my nose.
“So, you admitted it then. You were going to hex him.”
“Perish the thought.” Gran offered me one of her steely glares, and I knew that the conversation was all but over.
It wasn’t just Gran’s backside that I was protective of, but Jack’s as well. Not that I wanted anything to do with his taut backside … oh, never mind.
“Fine. But I’m taking this graveyard dirt with me when I leave.”
“Isn’t it lucky for you that I’m going senile and don’t remember where the graveyards are on the island?” Gran announced with glee. I seethed. She wouldn’t — the look in her eyes said she would. “Now, all of those things that you gathered under the sight of the moon last night — let’s get those things infused. We are on a strict schedule, you know? The full moon isn’t going to wait for you to get your backside into gear.”
“Fine. But this hex thing ends here.”
“I don’t know what you mean, dear.” And she was back to denial again. Proof positive if ever I needed it. When Gran called me dear, something was definitely up. “Now, make sure you have everything you need before you start.”
“Red cloth, red rose petals, basil, cardamom seeds, cinnamon sticks, a red garnet, cheesecloth, brandy, and a jar. Check.”
“You won’t need the brandy, the cheesecloth, or the jar tonight.”
“So, can I drink the brandy?” I shot Gran a broad smile, and she shot me a death glare. I guess the brandy was off the menu.
“You have to take this seriously…”
“I know.”
“This is people’s lives we’re talking about…” Gran berated me again.
“I know.”
“And not just any old life — their love life.”
“Yes, Gran, I know.”
Of course, I knew, and Gran knew that I knew, but, of course, she wanted to get her own back for being busted — and called on it — because even when you busted Gran doing something wrong, you were not supposed to call her on it.
“Well, good. Just as long as you’re aware.”
“I’m very aware,” I muttered as I rolled my eyes to the ceiling and counted, not to ten, because I never got that far when Gran was around, she never let me.
“Because this isn’t a joke…”
“I know. I know. I know.”
“Just so long as you know.”
I groaned, and I’m sure she smirked. Payback was a witch, a witch with the moniker of Gran.
“Are we done talking? I have a spell to start, and I wouldn’t want to get any negative energy in the mix,” I berated her.
“That would be bad…”
“Wouldn’t it? Like, Roger the sheep and Mrs. Doony bad, no?”
I had to get my digs in where I could. I wouldn’t be a productive member of this family without them. Gran huffed.
“That was not me,” she grumbled.
“Good to know,” I muttered back.
“Now, if you’re done flapping your lips and casting aspersions in my direction…”
“Not quite, but I can hold my tongue…”
“Then we can begin the second stage of the spell.” Gran chose to ignore my last remark. Progress.
“I’m ready when you are.”
“Good. Clear your mind of any negative energy; then you want to put the herbs, spices, and petals on the red cloth with the garnet, sending thoughts of love as you recite these words; with these sacred offerings from the Earth, I bring love into life. Then fold the cloth and place them by the window under the moonlight.”
And so began my new venture into the world of matchmaking. If this spell worked, then I would be a fully fledged matchmaker.
Then there was my other side job — keeping my eye on Gran. I was a busy woman.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
~
“And where were you last night?” I asked Moira as I started to stack the cakes in the display case with my trusty tongs.
“Last night?” Moira looked suspiciously vacant, which was different to her normal vacant look.
“When I was making the potion…”
“Was that last night?” Now, she just looked downright gleefully innocent of all wrongdoing, which meant she wasn’t.
“You know it was. We only have a week until the full moon, and it needs time to brew…”
“Like a good cup of tea…”
“Like a good spell…”
“Well, you know, I don’t hold with forcing someone to love you – first rule of witch club, if it harms none.”
She gave me a sideways look of superiority, and I had the urge to change my mind about the lady razors. Oh, if only I were that mean.
“I know that…”
“And yet, you hold with this love potion thing,”
“I’m not wedded to the idea…”
“Ha! You tried to make a funny – that’s … sweet.”
“Not on purpose.” I bit back.
“So, did you fudge the spell?”
“I don’t know yet – it’s not finished…”
“Bet you don’t. At least, not deliberately to save some poor sucker from married hell in his zombie state of infatuation and lust.”
“You’re cheery today – did the cat take a poopy in your shoe again?”
I couldn’t help but rub it in, kind of like when she put her foot in her shoe and smeared poop all over her toes. That’s a happy memory for me.
“I’m sure you had something to do with that.” She hissed like a coiled rattlesnake about to strike.
“You think I pooped in your shoe?”
“I think you coaxed the cat to do it. He loves me…”
“Ah, the fickle finger of love.” I grinned. “Face it; he’s just not that into you.” I deflected, and I had to deflect because it was true — I did coax our cat to poop in her shoe, and I can tell you that it wasn’t an easy task to achieve.
“Well, I won’t be calling on your matchmaking services for love from anyone – go sell your voodoo somewhere else.”
“Voodoo? Bite your tongue…” She did, and with a yelp that brought people’s attention our way.
“Ouch,” she bit out.
“Stop making a show of yourself in front of the customers.”
That was when Jack strolled in, as brazen as you like. As if we hadn’t had words the day before. I could feel the air crackling with magic.
“Maybe I can do something to take the customers minds of me,” Moira leaned in towards me and whispered. I turned to meet her wicked gaze; the mischief was more than evident in the smile on her face.
“Don’t you dare,” I hissed back.
“Oh, I dare.” she grinned.
“No.” I berated her.
“Yes.” She hissed out in a whisper back, and before I could say, or do, anything else, she snapped her fingers, and as I turned to look back at Jack and see what dastardly deed she’d performed — a chair shot out from beneath one of the empty tables, and smacked into his shin.
I heard the grunt of pain that came from Jack, saw that pain registered on his face, and as his eyes widened in surprise — he pitched forward, and almost tripped over his own feet.
My heart was in my mouth. It wasn’t that I cared what happened to Jack — anymore — it was more the fact that I didn’t want him to make a mess on the bistro floor.
I’d already gathered my magic within me to block anything that Moira was about to do; I’d just been too slow to do it. Now, I thrust out an energy wave right at Jack, and like a soft, fluffy cloud of nothingness, it managed to hold him up long enough for him to find his feet again.
I heard Jack clear his throat, saw his head snap up, and just before his eyes met mine, I turned to look at my sister. “That was uncalled for,” I hissed a whisper at her.
Moira bit down on her lower lip with h
er teeth and smiled. But, it was the look in her eyes that said it all — she’d won that round.
Moira tossed up a shoulder, turned on her heels, and started back toward the kitchen as if she were floating on cloud nine. I shot a quick look at Jack, who was looking around him with embarrassment and turned back to zap my sister in her tracks.
She hesitated in her stride, but she knew better than to turn back towards me. I was ready for her.
“Maggie,” Jack said as if he hadn’t just almost taken a header onto my floor. “I’m glad I found you…”
“Me too.” For one long moment he had a strange, hopeful, look on his face, and I hated to do it — but, I had to. “Because I didn’t know I was lost.”
“Yes, well,” Jack frowned. I guess it wasn’t the greeting that he was hoping for. Served him right for being — him. “I wanted to say — about yesterday…”
“Jack, do we really have to go over, and over, and over things every time we see each other?”
I didn’t want any more talk about witches. Don’t get me wrong; I loved being a witch, something different, something special – me. But, there were times when I sympathized with Eileen, and I could well understand why she yearned to be normal.
“No.” Jack shrugged.
“Good.”
“So.”
“So?” I took a breath and waited for his next question. He looked like he had something to say like the words were dancing on the tip of his tongue, and battering his teeth to get out in the world.
“Could you point me in the direction of a witch?” Jack asked.
Jack seemed to have a habit of making my heart either try to escape my ribs or jump into my throat — this was one of those times. I think I choked on it a little.
“Why ask me?” I almost forgot myself and hissed at him like I would at my sister. Hissing, I was told by Gran, was unbecoming a woman, but sometimes you just had to do what felt right.
“Your grandmother.”
“Gran?” My eyebrows were doing the Moira thing again and reaching for my hairline.
“Yes.”
“Well, okay, we’ve established that — go on.” I hardly dared to ask. If Gran got wind of him speaking her moniker and the word witch in the same sentence, she was sure to hex the man.
“I’m told she’s a…” He stopped, he grimaced, he winced — he had the look of a constipated Highland Coo, a guilty one at that, and then he sighed. “Witch.” He mumbled.
“Witch.”
I knew it was coming and so I’d prepared my best chuckle. It sounded a little bit like a cackle to me, but I hoped he didn’t know the difference.
“What can I say?” He shrugged again.
“Oh, I don’t know — where is the psychiatrist’s practice?” I offered back.
Yes, it was a blatant lie, but we’d all been lying for years to everybody that we knew about being witches. The guilt faded after the first hundred times, or so, except — with Jack — strange.
There it was; guilt, niggling at the back of my mind. I mentally jumped up and down on it like a madwoman.
“I’m just telling you what people say,” Jack shrugged again, and I was starting to wonder if he had a muscle spasm. I, of course, had a herb potion that would deal rather nicely with that, if I had been a witch, which of course, I wasn’t.
“Crazy people.”
“Maybe.”
“You believe in witches now?” I chuckled. “And magic?” I chuckled again for good measure.
“I believe that some believe in magic, witches,” Jack offered back.
“Oh, that’s right — crazy people,” I sneered back at him.
“Everybody needs someone to…”
“Love,” Moira shouted from the kitchen, and I could have killed her.
Jack was imitating a goldfish, his mouth was opening and closing, but nothing was coming out. She’d got him again.
“Good song. Big Ears.” I shouted back over my shoulder.
Hopefully, that would give Jack enough time to sort himself out. At least, it stopped him from making the goldfish impression.
“Believe in,” Jack said.
I have to admit that my brain had farted. I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. Yes, Moira had got me to as well.
“Huh?”
“Everybody needs someone to believe in,” Jack rushed out, probably, in case Moira opened her big mouth again.
“Isn’t that some-thing to believe in?” I offered back.
“That too.”
“Well, that’s nice. But around here we believe in hard work, bad weather…”
“And fairies.”
“And someone has been reading the tourist brochures over breakfast again,” I said, deflecting once more.
Of course, the people on the island believed in fairies — faeries were real. I couldn’t really see how I could use that as an argument; I knew witches were real, and yet, I was arguing against them.
It sucks to be me.
“Then could you point me in the direction of a witch?” Jack sighed.
I think he knew that he wasn’t going to get what he was looking for from me in the Gran department. The further I kept those two away from each other the better off Jack would be.
“Books? Best that I can do,” I lied again, and it really was getting annoying to have that niggling feeling of guilt in the back of my mind every time I lied to Jack.
Why was he any different to every other person? I had no idea.
“Books?” Jack sighed. His big, broad, muscled chest rose and fell — not that I was looking.
“Books,” I echoed.
“That’s — actually, that’s helpful,” Jack said as he thought about it.
“It is?” I was as surprised as the next person.
“Yes. Thank you,” Jack said.
Then he turned on his heels and walked away from me. I couldn’t say that I didn’t drop my gaze to his nice, taut backside because that would be a lie — and apparently, where Jack was concerned, lies bothered me.
I just couldn’t catch a break.
I was definitely surprised when Moira’s voice whispered in my ear. I hadn’t heard the she-demon come out of the kitchen.
“I think someone likes someone,” Moira said.
“Who?” I snapped back.
Was that guilt I felt raise its ugly head once more?
“Don’t worry, I’ll never tell.” Moira lied. She was part of the gossip mill, and we all know how well that worked.
CHAPTER TWELVE
~
There he was, all six foot odd of pure beefcake detective, and he was standing on the edge of the Point cautiously looking down to the jagged rocks below. The wind was whistling, and the waves were crashing against those unforgiving rocks, and then he was falling, falling like a bird in flight with his arms stretched out at his sides and his back arched.
I almost screamed, almost, but not quite … because it wasn’t real, and I knew it wasn’t real, and yet the sweat covered my body, and my heart raced.
“It happened again, didn’t it?” Moira’s voice was soft but demanding.
The only times that my sister was ever really nice to me was when I was sick, when I was in real trouble, or when I’d had one of my – things – and I’d just had one of my things. Gran called it the sight. I called it a curse.
I nodded, not yet trusting my voice enough to speak.
I stepped back from the kitchen counter and took a moment while my heart slowed, the sound of my blood rushing in my ears eased, and I wiped my sweaty palms on my apron. The flour still stuck to my hands, and I hated that feeling, almost as much as I hated my vision of what was to come.
“Wanna talk about it?” She asked, and I shook my head. “Someone, we know?” She wondered out loud.
“Not kin,” I assured her as I hurried to undo the apron and get it off of me. My clothes already felt tight, constricting as I tried to draw in a normal breath, and I didn’t need another layer on my
body.
“Go home – you’ve made the mixtures for the final batch. I’ve got this.” Moira offered me a sympathetic look, and I hated that almost as much as I hated this new vision.
Sometimes being a witch wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
“I just need…” I didn’t really know what I needed, except to see Jack walk in through the door.
Jack, I needed to know that he wasn’t at the Point or going there anytime soon. I needed to warn him … but how? I wasn’t a witch to Jack, and even if I came clean and told him the truth of it – he would never believe in me.
In me? Strange that I thought that. I meant to say; believe me.
“Guess what?” Isla’s voice boomed out into the kitchen like she had a megaphone and I jumped in place, curse words a-many spewing from my lips as my cousin pulled up short and eyed me like I was a rabid dog. “You don’t look so good.” She stated the obvious and I shot her a death glare.
“She just had one of her things,” Moira offered the last word on a hissed whisper.
“Things?” Isla drew a blank, and I groaned inwardly as Moira tapped her index finger against her temple. “Oh. Oh! What about?” Isla gasped, and her nose twitched at the thought of the juicy gossip that she couldn’t tell to anyone but our kin.
“She doesn’t feel like discussing it,” Moira said.
There was a look on disappointment on Isla’s face that made me want to hit her with the sack of flour, but, instead, I decided that it probably was a good time to head home.
“So, talk about something else,” Moira urged our cousin on, and Isla didn’t wait for that invitation to be carved into stone.
“I just saw Jack on the way to his car…”
“Car?” My ears pricked up and my heart raced. If Jack was leaving Portree, then he could very well have been going to the scene of the crime-not-crime. That would be bad. “Where’s he going?”
“I was getting to that…” Isla lifted her hand and thought about it for a moment.
“Don’t think – talk – you don’t normally put your brain into gear before your lips start flapping, so spit it out!” Isla looked shocked by my outburst, and when I snapped a look at Moira, she didn’t look much better. “What? Talk!”