Mark of the Witch

by Maggie Shayne

  Tomas sat. The gruff old man was his mentor, his teacher and the closest thing he’d ever had to a father. Yes, he believed in things Tomas had come to consider unbelievable. But even he didn’t doubt the man with as much conviction as he used to. His doubts were still strong enough for him to know this was not the life for him, however. So he sat and tried to assume a humble demeanor. He loved the old priest, despite the fact that he’d always considered him a little bit crazy.

  “Pull your chair around here,” Dom said. “We’re not through with this machine yet.” He was clicking keys as he spoke—slowly. Hunting and pecking with a single forefinger, knuckles swollen from arthritis.

  Tomas nodded and moved his chair closer, turning it so he could see the computer screen again. It showed a lengthy series of astrological terms, symbols for the signs, abbreviations for alignments and conjunctions and oppositions at varying degrees. It stood beside a map of the solar system with lines and arrows and more symbols all over it. It looked like an NFL coach’s playbook. Astrology had never been his strong suit.

  “What am I looking at?”

  “This configuration. Right here.” Dom pointed. “In a week it will be exactly the same as it was in the beginning.”

  “The beginning…” Tomas looked up from the screen, meeting Dom’s aging but sharp cornflower-blue eyes as he finally got the old man’s meaning. “The beginning? The fifteen-hundred-BC beginning?”

  “More precisely, Samhain Eve, fifteen hundred and one BC. The day a high priest of the cult of Marduk imprisoned He Whose Name Must Not Be Spoken in the Underworld. If the demon is going to try to escape into our world again, Tomas, it will be soon. Samhain Eve, in fact. And I’m no longer strong enough to do what needs doing, though it pains me to admit it.”

  Tomas searched Dom’s face. “You’re not well?”

  Dom shrugged. “I feel fine.” He turned his head, gazing across the room at the oversize crucifix on the opposite wall. “But the Lord has spoken to me, told me it has to be you. This is the mission I’ve trained for all my life. Now it falls to my successor before his time. But that’s the way it has to be. So sayeth the Lord.”

  “All things happen for a reason, Father Dom.” But inside Tomas was thinking this couldn’t be happening. Now not, not when he’d finally made the decision to leave the priesthood and sent in the paperwork making the request formal.

  Thank God he hadn’t yet told the old man.

  “Watch and wait for the signs, Tomas. Watch for the witches of Babylon. The Demon’s whores. Each of them bound by oath and by blood to help He Whose Name Must Not Be Spoken to escape. Stop the first of them and you stop them all. You must do this, no matter how difficult, in order to keep the demon from emerging and wreaking havoc on the world of man. It is our calling.”

  It is a fairy tale, Tomas thought. But I’ll humor you a bit longer. “How will I know—”

  “It’s written, ‘the witch’s past sins will rise up to mark her flesh and wake her memory.’ Watch, wait, listen, and take heed when you are called. I’ll help you all I can, Tomas, but the task, for some reason, must be yours.”

  Tomas nodded solemnly. He wasn’t entirely sure Dom was 100 percent wrong about this, after all. The scrolls were real, and the tale was in them. He had seen it. “And if I locate the first witch and stop her from helping the demon—”

  “Then the next will never be activated and our mission is done. Theoretically the Portal won’t open again until the next alignment, another three thousand five hundred years from now. But if you fail…”

  “If I fail to stop the first witch, I have to try again with the second. And if I fail to stop her, then I try again with the third.”

  “And if you fail then…the demon walks among us and the world of man is doomed.” Father Dom gripped Tomas’s wrist in his hand, squeezing so hard it hurt. “Do you believe me, Tomas? Have I shown you enough proof of the existence of demons, of the power of them, of the danger they pose, to make you a believer in the ancient prophecy?”

  Tomas met the old man’s eyes. There was holy fire sparking from their depths. “Yes,” he said at length. “Yes, Father Dom. I believe.” It was a lie, and he felt guilty as hell for telling it, but what else could he do?

  “Hold on to that faith, my son. You are going to need it.”

  No harm in humoring him a bit longer, Tomas thought. He would play along. But he knew there would be no signs. No witches. No marks. Samhain would pass, and Dom would have to concede defeat. And then Tomas could leave knowing he’d done the best he could for the old guy.

  Then his sister called, and all that changed.

  * * *

  The occult shop in Greenwich Village had a minuscule backyard enclosed by a vine-smothered stone wall and bathed in moonlight. Fingers of dark cloud slithered over the face of the moon, only two days past full. A true Halloween moon—perfect ambiance for a Halloween night gathering of witches. There were fountains and statues marking the four directions. Venus in the west, pouring water from a conch. Brigit—the Celtic goddess of the forge and giver of creative fire to poets—in the south, holding a shallow basin where blue flames floated. On the east wall, the beautiful Eostre—Germanic goddess of spring and rebirth—a ring of wildflowers upon her head, incense wafting spirals of fragrant smoke around her. The north boundary was the back of the brick building, and in front of it stood a modern rendition of Gaia. She held a dish of sea salt in her lap.

  I sat in the center of it, and five witches stood around me in a circle. They had already performed all the preliminaries and had gone silent now to listen to Rayne as she led the rite.

  “We come to weave a web of protection around the solitary witch Indira,” she said, her voice deep and compelling.

  I wanted to correct her—former solitary witch. The words rose in my throat, but I bit my tongue to hold them in.

  Rayne wore her long black robes tonight, her vivid red hair loose and moving in the slight breeze, her eyeliner exaggerated, and every limb dripping with sacred jewelry. The other women were dressed much the same way. Everyone jingled when they moved. Even me. I’d dug through my closets and pulled out my old witchy wardrobe. I had chosen white, since this was a spell of protection. A white one-shoulder dress with gold trim that could have been Grecian. But it reminded me, too, of the clothes I wore in that powerful, terrifying dream.

  I’d donned my pentacle again. I told myself it didn’t mean I was returning to the fold or had started believing again. I didn’t believe. There was no magic in the world. I’d proven that to myself. I’d cast and cast and cast my spells, but my soul mate hadn’t appeared. And I’d been so damned sure he would—so certain he was real. All my life I’d felt this unnamed, unknowable longing gaping like a great big giant hole in my gut. A yearning for the man who was supposed to be by my side, whose absence I felt keenly, even though we had never met. It was real, that feeling. Which meant he had to be real, too.

  I ached for him. Sometimes even cried for him. Like a real lover I’d had and lost. That’s how vivid the feeling was.

  Sort of like those damned dreams.

  Hey, that was encouraging. Maybe they were as flimsy and imaginary as he was.

  Anyway, he hadn’t come, so I’d stopped believing. Magic either worked or it didn’t. Black and white. Scientific method. Test the theory, prove it right or wrong. I’d tested it. It hadn’t worked. Ergo, no magic. Period.

  And yet, when I’d pulled out my pretty mini-treasure chest from the back of my closet and opened it, and the smells of sandalwood and dragon’s blood resin had enveloped me like a puff of magic from a genie’s lamp, I’d felt it all coming back to me. Witchcraft might be all bullshit, but it had felt very real from time to time.

  It felt real now.

  Rayne was still talking. Her voice was different during a ritual. Deeper. More powerful. “Together with the powers of Earth, Air, Fire, Water and Spirit, and by the unyielding power of the Goddess Herself, we weave this web so that nothing, b
e it from this world or any other, may harm this woman.” Facing me, she said, “Do you have any requests of the Goddess before we raise the cone of power, Indira Simon?”

  I nodded and, rising to my feet, lifted my eyes and arms skyward. I felt a tingle flowing through me from the tips of my fingers down my arms, into my spine, and another upward from the ground, through my feet, up my legs and into my spine, until the two energies met and exploded. I pulsed with it and reminded myself it was just a trick of the mind.

  “Show me what I need to know,” I said, though I was sure no one was listening. I was playing along because Rayne knew something and I wanted her to tell me what it was. “Show me what these dreams mean, what you want of me. More than anything right now, I need clarity. Wisdom. And information.”

  And while you’re at it, that soul mate I’ve been longing for, forever and a day, would be a really nice bonus. You know, on the off chance you’re real.

  Stupid. You gave up on that, remember?

  “So mote it be,” Lady Rayne said.

  “So mote it be,” the others all repeated in unison.

  “So mote it be,” I whispered softly. I don’t have any idea why there were tears rolling down my cheeks. Maybe my eyes were just reacting to the smoke from the incense that hung in the air. It didn’t dissipate like you’d expect it to do, outside like this. And even though it was the end of October, it was warm within the circle, as if it were physically holding our body heat and the fragrant smoke within it, just like it would supposedly hold the energy we raised until Rayne sent it forth to become the magical goal.

  One woman hit her djembe drum, beginning a slow, steady beat. Another joined in, adding an accent, and then another brought a flourish of her own. A fourth woman shook a rattle in time, and then Rayne began a chant that echoed the heady music.

  “She changes everything She touches. Everything She touches changes.”

  On and on the chant went, and it grew louder, its pace picking up. The witches joined hands, began walking in a circle, spiraling inward until the first of them reached me in the center, then turning to spiral outward again, forming a human snake with no end and no beginning. The drums kept up or led the way, it was impossible to tell which, but everything increased in both volume and tempo until the entire area was vibrating with energy. I felt it in my chest, in the pit of my stomach, all around and within me, until it reached a fever pitch and the chant evolved into a simple, rapid repetition.

  “Touches, changes, touches, changes, touches, changes, toucheschangestoucheschangestoucheschanges…”

  Then, like the crack of a starter’s pistol at the beginning of a race, Lady Rayne pressed her palm flat to my chest and shouted, “Release!”

  And I swear to God, I was knocked backward, right off my feet. A witch standing behind me caught me, though, so I never hit the ground as the energy wave—or whatever it was—rushed over me. I sank to my knees in reaction. As I lifted my head, blinking my eyes open once more to look around me, I was not surprised to see several of the other witches sitting on the ground, where they’d settled as they let the power surge from them. I could almost see the result of the spell—the bubble of light around me. I could certainly feel it.

  I tended to be a skeptic about most things of a so-called paranormal nature. But in witchcraft, I had believed—had really believed—and moments like this were why.

  The mind sure is a powerful thing, isn’t it?

  “It is done,” Rayne said. “Now you’ll be safe, at least. And pretty soon, I bet you’ll receive the information you’ve asked for. Watch for signs, Indy.”

  I nodded. “I was hoping some of that information might be coming from you, Rayne.” I searched her eyes.

  She averted them. “I have a call out. I might have something for you by tomorrow.”

  I guessed I would have to be satisfied with that for tonight.

  Rayne turned to her fellow priestesses. “Ladies, would you kindly wrap things up for me? I’m drained.”

  As Rayne took a seat on the cool ground beside me, the other women took over. One thanked the Goddess for Her presence and aid, then each of them bade a hail and farewell to the energies of the four directions. Finally one woman took up the magic circle, the invisible space Rayne had cast. The magic circle was the witches’ temple. Sacred space. Holy ground. I knew better than to leave before all of that was complete, but I was eager to go once it was finished, hoping to find a smoke on the way home. I was dying for a cigarette.

  Rayne put a hand on my arm and I jumped. “You need to eat something, Indy. Ground yourself. I’ve got coffee and cake inside.”

  “Right. Ground myself.” I’d forgotten the habitual post-ritual snacking. Always seemed to me that the “grounding” thing was just a good excuse for a pile of sugary carbs. “I know it’s rude of me to rush off, but I just feel…compelled to get home.”

  “Then that’s where you should be.”

  “Thanks for understanding. And for all of this…”

  “Text me in the morning, let me know how it goes tonight. I’ll do the same as soon as I have any information for you. Blessed be, Indy.”

  “Blessed be,” I replied automatically.

  I headed for the subway stop on the corner, intending to catch the next train to my Brooklyn neighborhood.

  But there was something happening to me. A tingling, like an itch I couldn’t reach way down deep in my psyche, and a slowly spreading darkness that kept sucking my attention away from the here and now. Like a person running on lack of sleep who almost drifts off, then shakes herself awake, I fought against the somnambulant state trying to overtake me, went down the stairs (into the Underworld), dropped a token (paid the ferryman) and pushed through the turnstile (entered through the first gate). I found a post to lean against on the nearly empty platform and waited for my train to arrive.

  A few other people wandered in, most not paying any attention to me. There was an old man who made brief eye contact and smiled, breaking an unspoken rule, probably because in his day it was rude to do otherwise. There was a cluster of pants-hanging-off-the-ass punks, one of whom had a nice crisp unlit Marlboro Light Menthol in his hand, and a nice-looking couple who were too lost in each other to notice anyone else.

  Off in the distance, I heard the train echoing closer.

  I drifted, pulled myself back, drifted again. I kept almost falling asleep and seeing myself in different clothing. Not quite like in the dream, though. This time I wore a long cloak of black, with a hood pulled up over my hair, bathing my face in shadows.

  Stupid dream. Can’t you at least wait until I get home?

  I jerked myself back to the present. The train was closer. The other people were beginning to edge nearer the tracks. The punks were uncomfortably close to the old man. The lead one was about to light his smoke, lighter in his other hand. But then he paused, pocketing the lighter, smiling at the others, nodding the old man’s way. The intended victim seemed to realize it about the same time I did. And just as the flash of alarm showed up in his kind blue eyes, one of the underwear-showing assholes pulled a knife. I felt myself lunging toward them even as I fell into the blackness of my dream world.

  * * *

  I woke groggy, rolled over in bed and pried one eye open to look at the clock. There was a cigarette, a white filtered Marlboro Light Menthol, lying in front of my little alarm clock, pristine, unsmoked, waiting for me. Had the nicotine fairy visited last night?

  Then my foggy eyes focused on the illuminated red digits. 11:11. I’d slept way late, which was totally unlike me. My brain reminded me that my shift at Pink Petals, the flower shop sixteen blocks from my apartment, started at noon today, and that, more than anything, set a fire under my ass. I bounded out of bed, took a record-speed shower and toweled down in front of the mirror. A handful of mousse and a quick finger comb, and my hair was done. Easy breezy. I was still tugging its natural crimp-curls into shape as I gave my mirror image the once-over, but I stopped moving with one hand
still tangled in my hair. My forearm was sporting a black-and-blue mark the size of a pizza slice.

  Frowning, I lowered my arm and looked down at my body. Small boobs, still hanging where they ought to, no marks on what I’d always considered a rather boyish figure. I was kind of straight—slender, but straight—long waist that was nice and lean, but no flaring out at the hips. No booty in the back. I was small everywhere. Delicate and slight. I turned and looked back over my shoulder, spotting a good-sized slate-colored blob on one shoulder blade and a maroon one on my butt cheek. Legs looked okay in back. I looked down and cringed at the way the second littlest toe on my right foot was all bent out of shape and discolored. Looked broken. Felt it, too.

  I turned back and met my own eyes in the mirror. “What the hell happened last night?” Damn. I was a mess. And that was about the time it hit me that I didn’t remember how I got home. In fact, I didn’t remember anything except standing in the subway, trying to hold on to the here and now, while something else was trying to suck me in. I remembered the punks and the old guy. I remembered one of them with a knife, and another with a mouthwateringly good-looking smoke in his hands. I remember lunging toward them.

  And then…nothing.

  And now there’s a mouthwateringly good-looking smoke on my nightstand. Coincidence? Or not…

  I went back to the bedroom, picked up the cig, looked it over. I wanted to smoke it almost more than I wanted to know how I’d gotten home and into bed last night, but I couldn’t. God only knew what might be in it. Punks like that, you just couldn’t tell—assuming that was where I got it, which was impossible to know.

  I picked it up, drummed up every ounce of will in my entire body, took it to the bathroom, dropped it in the toilet and flushed it away.

  I almost cried.

  I grabbed my towel off the floor, hung it up to dry and rubbed some witch hazel on my bruises. Then I dressed—leggings and a pretty little white camisole with lacy straps, long minty-green sweater over that, with a wide enough neck that it could hang off one shoulder. I added a wide pale brown leather belt that matched my short, kick-ass boots right down to the big gold buckles.