The Vine Witch

by Smith, Luanne G.

  Still, she could use the time to refill her supplies. She was dreadfully low on even the most essential of potion ingredients. Her mind made up, she closed the spell book and picked up a basket. She might not be able to perform complex magic yet, but it was no reason to be unprepared when her strength did return. She banished the notion that it might not ever return out of her mind as she closed the storage room door behind her.

  As she exited the cellar, she met Jean-Paul in the courtyard as he brought the plow horse in from churning the soil between the vine rows. She didn’t need to see his face to know he was angry. His aura blazed to rival the setting sun.

  “What is it?” she asked. “Has something happened?”

  “This,” he said, reaching into a bag he’d slung on the side of the horse. He produced one of her witch bottles caked with mud. “Care to tell me what this is for?”

  Lie or tell the truth? She didn’t expect to be torn over which was the right way to answer. “It’s to protect the roots.” There, not a lie.

  “Oh? And does it contain some sort of slow-release fertilizer I’ve never heard of?” He opened it and gave it a sniff, though he was obviously mocking her now. He tipped the bottle and poured the contents out at her feet. The wine and strands of hair splashed on the cobblestones. “I specifically said I wouldn’t tolerate this sort of nonsense.”

  Nonsense?

  How to tell him that the vines on the crown of the hill had been exposed to a spell encouraging black fungus and wouldn’t survive the summer if those bottles were not kept in the ground? “It’s an old custom,” she said, choosing the lie after he’d splattered her skirt with the remnants of her wasted work. “Joseph Gardin would never face a growing season without first paying homage to the earth, sky, sun, and water. Every grower knows that the hope for a good crop begins with humility. It’s like an offering to the gods of wine. Harmless, but hardly nonsense.”

  His eyes narrowed at the mention of Grand-Père, the look of a man zeroing in on knowledge he wanted for himself. His respect for the old vigneron ran deeper than she’d first thought. And though she didn’t regret the lie—he’d just undone a day’s worth of work, after all—she did regret she couldn’t be candid with him about someone he obviously admired.

  Joseph Gardin, as everyone knew, had been the best vine witch ever to work in the valley.

  She waited for the lingering influence of her wish to strum through his heart until his posture relented.

  “On second thought I suppose it was just a bottle of wine,” he said, backing down. “I can appreciate the symbolism in the gesture. Even a modernist like myself has a soft spot for the old Romantics and their reverence for nature. We’ll toast Monsieur Gardin at dinner tonight to make amends for spoiling the custom.”

  “I’m sure he would appreciate that. Until then I’m off to gather a few supplies for a project I’m working on.” She swung the basket in her hand for emphasis.

  Jean-Paul glanced up at the darkening sky. “Will you be all right walking by yourself?”

  His genuine concern for her safety disarmed her. Odd how he could win her over in the most unpredictable moments. “I’ll be fine,” she said and even managed a smile. “I’ll return before dark.”

  “Maybe I should accompany you.”

  To see the worried expression on his face, as if she were a mere defenseless mortal in a dangerous world, made her almost sorry she’d had to use the wishing string on him. He wasn’t truly bewitched, but he wasn’t capable of seeing her for what she was, either—a witch who experimented with poison in her spare time so she could kill the former lover who’d betrayed her.

  “No, that won’t be necessary,” she said and then saw he’d taken her answer as a rejection. “But perhaps next time?”

  “Of course. Well, I’ll leave a lamp burning for you in the courtyard.” With nothing left to say, he shoved the witch bottle back in the bag and led the horse toward the stable.

  Elena tucked her basket in the crook of her elbow and headed out the gate, wondering why she’d said that last thing. She had no reason to spare his feelings. Did she?

  For someone who didn’t approve of spellcraft, this handsome mortal was very good at the charm business.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Jean-Paul had not lived with a woman for three years, not since his fledgling marriage had been allowed to fall apart under the new secular law. Now he lived with two. Yet when he’d first bought Château Renard and invited Ariella Gardin to continue on at the estate, the arrangement had felt little different than sharing a home with an elderly aunt. They complained about the weather when it rained, gossiped about the neighbors when it didn’t, and on Saturday evenings he endured her gentle teasing about being a bachelor as they ate their supper together in the kitchen with a glass of red wine from the cellar. Sometimes he’d wished he’d had the house to himself, of course, but most days he was happy for the company. With two women now coming and going in the house, there were days he barely knew how to navigate the hallways without feeling like a guest who’d overstayed his welcome.

  From the first night, the Boureanu woman had slipped off to sleep in the cellar workroom—the room Madame had long claimed was a storage room full of useless broken equipment. During the day she came and went inside the main house as if she owned the place, but at night she always retreated to the workroom. Peculiar for a woman to want to sleep in such spartan surroundings on her own, but on reflection everything she did was slightly strange.

  His curiosity had, of course, boiled over. While she and Madame went to finish pruning the old vines Monsieur Gardin had planted, he had tried the door to her room. He’d found it locked, as usual, and for a moment considered breaking the door down. He gave it a hard shove with his shoulder, testing, but the solid oak door might as well have been a tree still rooted in the ground.

  He swore the house hummed with her energy. Even now, as she sat at the dining room table with Madame, a pile of charts and maps spread out under the light of a work lamp, a wave of static electricity skittered along the hairs on his arm. He never quite knew what to make of the phenomenon. Or of her. She completely disarmed him, and yet not in the way a woman normally did. Despite Madame Gardin’s chiding, he had courted a few women from the village. He wasn’t shy around a woman if he was touched by desire. He would charm her with witty compliments, smile and take her to dinner, and more often than not accept an invitation to her bed. But this was something different. Despite the awkward revelation that he found Elena oddly attractive—and not because some woman who baked sweets for a living claimed to know his taste in lovers—he’d fought the impulse to act. He likened it to obeying the same instinct that warned one not to pick up a scorpion by the tail. Her allure held hints of danger, which, if he were honest with himself, was part of the attraction, but the reasonable side of his brain knew better from experience. And for the better part of four months now, he’d resisted the temptation.

  “Is there something you wanted?” Elena asked, looking up at him with her feline eyes. “You’ve been staring for five minutes.”

  “Was I?” Knowing he had, he took a step toward the table. “I was just curious about the calculations. Is that an astrolabe?”

  She paused before responding. “I’m helping Grand-Mère work out the cycles of the moon and planets so we can know the best days for planting and harvesting in the growing season.”

  “You mean like an almanac? Don’t be ridiculous. I can send away for one easily enough.”

  The older woman exchanged a look with the younger one. “Yes, those farmer’s almanacs are handy to consult for some things,” Madame said. “But this one will be a little more detailed. I would have made one for you years ago, but without Elena’s help I could never sort out all the intricacies with my failed . . . um, eyesight.”

  Odd. He’d never heard Madame complain about her eyes before. He leaned in closer to examine their notes. His brows tightened as he read a few of the entries:

  - N
ew vines are best planted when the moon, Jupiter, and Venus are in conjunction at 45 degrees.

  - Mix sheep’s bone and charred beetles into soil two weeks after the last frost on the twenty-second day of April.

  - Pinch back leaves when first lacewings appear on the last day of May.

  Jean-Paul scratched at the static electricity sparking against the back of his neck, wondering why anyone would believe the stars dictated the daily business of humans on earth. He was disappointed to see them cling to their superstitious beliefs, especially two such intelligent, talented women. Country folk were often stubbornly behind the times, he knew, but one day in the near future he was going to drag the vineyard into the new century. Perhaps even invest in a hydraulic-powered winepress. But for now, he sat in his favorite chair and buried his face in Le Temps.

  He’d just begun reading an article about demonstrators in the city decrying the number of public executions when a gust of wind slammed against the house, whistling through the cracks in the doors and shimmying the windows. The women’s heads lifted in alarm when their papers rustled on the table. “A north wind at the south door,” Elena said to the old woman with a note of concern.

  Madame, showing the same worry, got up to peek out the window. The rattle of metal and hissing steam clamoring down the road followed. She craned her neck to get a better view, then backed away in alarm. “It’s Bastien in that confounded contraption of his. And he’s got her with him. What will you do?”

  “It’s too soon,” Elena said in a panic. “I’m not ready.”

  Jean-Paul didn’t miss the unspoken communication that also boomeranged between the women. Then Madame did that strange thing she does when she gets nervous, rubbing her thumb and fingers together as if tasting the air with her touch, while Elena mumbled a few foreign-sounding words and doused the work lamp. A trail of smoke snaked over the table, concentrating in the place where she’d just been sitting. It appeared to make a perfect outline of the shape of her body before dissipating.

  Jean-Paul stood and folded his newspaper. “Du Monde? What would bring him here unannounced?”

  Elena collected her charts and pens and, with arms full, reminded him about their agreement. “I’m not here, remember?” He gave a distracted nod on his way to the door, recalling her outrage when she’d heard Du Monde had once tried to buy the vineyard. He nodded more firmly, and she escaped up the stairs at the back of the house.

  Moments later, a black automobile, its front end sloped like the nose of a goose, chugged into the courtyard. White smoke billowed from the engine as the automobile rattled to a stop in front of the door. Madame “hmphed” from behind the window as Du Monde stepped out, waving his hat at a cloud of angry steam. His passenger smoothed a strand of blonde hair back in place under her fur-trimmed black hat as she waited expectantly for her door to be opened. After a troubled glance at the engine, Du Monde did just that, walking around to the other side of the vehicle to take his wife’s hand. She stepped out of the automobile and shook out her black damask coat with the matching fur trim. Of all the women in the village, she was the only one who might shrug off the rural life at a moment’s notice and slip into a fashionable city salon. As if expecting an audience, she strode up to the house, an obsidian-and-silver walking stick held in her grip like a scepter. Jean-Paul wiped his palms against his trousers and opened the door to greet the couple.

  “Welcome. To what do I owe this unexpected surprise?” he said, meeting the pair in the courtyard.

  Du Monde removed his hat. “You must excuse the intrusion, Monsieur Martel. I’m not sure what happened. One minute the damn thing was running smooth as a kitten, the next it’s fuming like an alley cat trapped in a rubbish bin.”

  Jean-Paul shook his hand when offered. Though not strangers—they had twice been introduced at a meeting of the village wine council—it would not be accurate to say they were friendly or even on a first-name basis. But one thing they shared was an appetite for the roaring age of new technology. Automobiles, to be precise. Not the wind-up steam confound-its of his father’s day. No, these new engines could rev up to sixty-five miles per hour. This very model had won the Grand Prix three years earlier doing precisely that. Bastien, who had been there to witness the race, had relayed the excitement of the final lap over cigars and glasses of port at their last council meeting. Jean-Paul was rightfully envious. In his old life he, too, would have been there to see it.

  With a sigh he greeted Madame du Monde more formally and then took an appreciative walk around the vehicle to get a glimpse of the engine. “They’d just added the electric headlamps when I left the city. Must be a dream to drive.”

  “It never met a rut in the road it couldn’t stay away from,” Gerda du Monde said, peeling her gloves off in anticipation of being invited inside. “Honestly, they’re little improvement over the pleasant Sunday pace of a double-team and carriage, if you ask me.”

  He resisted the urge to argue. “I’m sure it’s just overheated. Please come in and sit while she cools down.”

  “My wife or the car?” Du Monde guffawed at his own joke and then ducked a chastising slap from his wife’s gloves.

  Jean-Paul extended a hand toward the front door and escorted the couple inside to where Madame waited. The old woman stood as if poised for battle, though he hoped there wouldn’t be a confrontation. He rather liked Du Monde, or at least admired all that he’d accomplished.

  “Welcome—do come in,” she said, though her smile appeared forced against the sagging lines in her face.

  Gerda du Monde offered her hand. “The esteemed Madame Gardin. A pleasure to meet again.”

  The women shook hands. As far as he knew this was the first time Gerda du Monde had come to the house, yet something familiar traveled between the women. He saw it in their eyes, their body language. Daring. Defiance. Respect. When their hands parted, Madame rubbed her thumb and fingers together at her side before excusing herself to prepare some refreshments for their guests.

  Jean-Paul led the couple into his sitting room, where the whiff of kerosene smoke lingered in the air. Gerda inspected the space with keen eyes that searched from the coved ceiling to the fringe on the oriental rugs. Her hand trailed over the chair where Elena had been sitting moments before. She drummed her fingers three times before returning to her husband’s side.

  “You keep a lovely home,” she said. “There’s evidence of a woman’s touch. Not a bad thing for a single man.”

  He motioned to the padded leather chairs near the fire. “Most of the furnishings are Madame’s. I didn’t bring much with me when I left the city,” he said, taking a seat on the flowery upholstered sofa.

  “It’s just the two of you in the house?”

  He pinched the seam in his trousers, straightening the fabric as he crossed his legs. “Yes,” he said, avoiding her eye.

  Her stare trapped him in his seat so that he could not move. He feared any twitch might reveal the lie. He didn’t know why he owed Elena such loyalty, but he’d given his word and he meant to keep it. Especially after he’d seen the fear creep over her face when she understood who was coming to the front door. He quickly changed the subject.

  “So what new surprise will Domaine du Monde have for us this season?”

  “We’re aging a fine blended red,” Du Monde said, eager to brag after the compliment. “One of our best. Gerda’s full talent is truly on display with this barrel. It will be our entry at le Concours des Vins, I am almost certain.”

  “Ah, of course. No doubt another grand champion wine. You do the valley proud.”

  Du Monde tilted his head in obvious feigned modesty and squeezed his wife’s hand. “We’ve done well together.” Then, likely realizing he was not in a position to offer a similar compliment, commented where he could. “Er, I noticed as we drove up that you’d dug out half an acre of chardonnay on the north end of the property. Those were new, weren’t they?”

  “Rot.” He gave a small shrug. “Seems to affect
one patch or another each year.”

  “Madame Gardin doesn’t have a cure for it?” Gerda inquired, apparently perplexed.

  “A cure?”

  “For the roots. Any working vine witch ought to have the counterspell. It’s all part of the game, isn’t it?”

  He blinked back at her. “Game, madame?”

  “Oh, come now. Everyone does it. A little jinx here and there to keep the competition on their toes. I myself had to rid three acres of aphids in January, if you can believe it. Perhaps you’ve found a new vine witch to work the property. Someone who can take care of it?”

  Jean-Paul had no immediate response. His good manners fought against his intellect’s desire to put the irrational woman straight on the matter. But he was getting better at holding his tongue. He understood he was the outsider. A man from the city, with city ways and city thoughts he must keep to himself to get along in the country. “I’m afraid we run a simple winery here.”

  Du Monde put a hand on his wife’s arm. “Come now, ma petite. You know Madame is retired now. Monsieur Martel is dedicated to working the vineyard on his own terms. He’s a man of science. He even believes he can measure the precise moment when the sugar in the grape is at its peak.”

  “But of course he can.”

  “Yes, but he tests it by reading the color on a piece of paper.”

  Gerda scrunched her nose at her husband. “Is it a form of scrying? I’ve never heard of it before.”