by John Osborne
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: Willow is ill
Rowan, this isn’t Willow, it’s Noah. I need your help. Willow’s come down with something. She’s been vomiting and achy and now has a high fever that keeps going up. What should I do? Is there a doctor anywhere near here? I mean one that knows about fairies.
Thanks, Noah
Noah clicked send, and made sure the laptop volume was at full.
Hurry, Rowan.
Two emails arrived during the next hour, neither from Rowan. The sky darkened outside; Noah turned on the lamps to see Willow better. Her flushed skin continued to feel hotter. He went into the poolroom, flipped on the light and dipped his hand into the pool.
Cold. Might as well be colder.
He opened the little sluice gate as far as it would go. The water gushed down the troughs. Satisfied that the water coming in was cooling the pool, he returned to the sofa and knelt. He gently caressed Willow’s flushed face, pulled the blanket off, and dropped it on the floor. She stirred and rolled onto her back but didn’t wake. Noah touched her face again.
“Willow, sweetheart, wake up.” Her dull eyes fluttered open. “We need to cool you down. I want you to get in the pool.” Willow nodded but closed her eyes again. No way would she be able to walk to the pool.
No problem.
Without hesitation, he loosened the belt on her robe and opened it to expose her naked little frame. The bright pink of fever colored her skin. He put his arm beneath her and lifted her to a sitting position. Her wings flopped behind her as he slid the robe off.
“Sweetheart, put your arms around my neck,” he instructed. He slid an arm under her knees. “Okay, hang on tight.” Carefully Noah stood up, her weight feeling like no more than a child’s would. Heat radiated from her body, yet she shivered in his arms. He carried her into the poolroom and knelt by the pool.
“Willow, I’m going to put you in the pool now.”
She woke a little and raised her head. “That sounds nice.”
You won’t think so in a minute.
He leaned over the pool and lowered her in backside first. As soon as she touched the cold water, she woke and gasped.
“Noah!” she howled. Noah released her legs and she dropped into the water to the accompaniment of profanity and much gasping. “Noah, it’s so cold!”
“I know, sweetheart, but we’ve got to cool you down.”
Willow began to cry. She curled up in a ball in the water and shivered. Noah sat by the pool and stroked her hair. “I’m sorry.” He sat and watched her, murmuring encouragement.
“Willow, I need to go in the other room. Will you be okay for a minute?” She nodded without looking up.
Noah grabbed a stack of towels and ran to the sofa, where he made a soft, absorbent pad. Next, he went upstairs to Willow’s bedroom, almost bumped his head on the low ceiling, and searched out a clean sheet, rifling through drawers of underwear and clothes to find one. In under a minute he was back in the poolroom. Willow looked up at him with a mournful expression. Her teeth chattered as she spoke.
“C-can I g-get out n-now?”
Noah knelt and laid a hand on her forehead. She felt cooler.
I may not get you into the pool again.
He cupped her cheek in his hand. “Stay a little longer.”
Willow closed her eyes and bowed her head.
Noah stayed by her side, whispering encouragement another five minutes.
“Okay, let’s get you out. Turn your back to me.”
Willow complied and he put his hands under her arms and lifted her to sitting position on the pool edge. She swung her legs out and he picked her up. She shook uncontrollably. He carried her to the sofa, laid her on the towels and spread the sheet over her wet skin.
“T-Thank you, N-Noah,” she stammered out.
Noah moved to the easy chair. Willow continued to toss and turn.
Several minutes later the laptop beeped as mail arrived.
Damn! Still nothing from Rowan.
She’s looking flushed again.
He paced the room, contemplating what could be wrong, what he should do, what might happen. He had an acquaintance back home who was a Wicca healer, but he didn’t know how to get in touch with her. Healing spells were not familiar to him.
Willow stirred and murmured in her sleep. Noah sat on the edge of the sofa. He used a washcloth to wipe her face. She opened her eyes for a moment.
“Guess next time I’ll watch what I say to people,” she said. “This karma’s a bitch.”
Noah smiled. “I think you have enough good stuff stored up to counter a few insults.” Willow closed her eyes and drifted off again. Noah sat for a time on the sofa and studied her perfect little features and silky skin. His throat tightened and his eyes burned. He rose from the sofa and walked toward the easy chair. Halfway across the room he stopped.
What if that’s it? Not karma, exactly, but what if Chester Jones did this?
Legends spoke of such things and even in his limited experience in Wicca, he had heard stories but had dismissed them. The leap from an amulet on the front door to casting illness spells was a long one.
Of course, fairies’ being real was a stretch a week ago.
Noah didn’t analyze for long. He roused Willow.
“Sweetheart, I need to leave for a few minutes,” he told her. “I have to get some things. Will you be okay? I’ll be back in half an hour.” She nodded her assent and went back to sleep or unconsciousness; he no longer knew which.
Noah grabbed his jacket and the door key and went out. He shut and locked the door and took off at a run to the truck. This was another reason to tell Willow why he liked to turn the truck around when he arrived.
Noah squealed the tires as he pulled up outside The Broom Closet, in time to see the shop owner locking the door to depart. He leaped out of the truck.
“Sir?” he called. “Are you closed?”
The man wore a black tee shirt and jeans, with long hair and beard, and a few piercings but had a pleasant, friendly face.
“Yep, you just missed me,” he said. Noah’s distress must have been apparent. “What you need? I can always reopen.”
“I have a friend who’s ill or hexed, I’m not sure which,” Noah said.
The shopkeeper grunted, opened the door and led Noah in, flipping on the light as he passed the door. The shop was small and untidy, but clean. More magic paraphernalia crammed the shelves than Noah knew existed.
“So what’s wrong with your friend?” the shopkeeper asked as he walked over to a bookcase.
“Vomiting, chills and high fever. Plus aches and she’s delirious.”
“Let’s see,” the shopkeeper said as he perused his books. “Do you have a spell book?”
“A small one, but it doesn’t cover anything like this.”
“Alright, you’ll need this.” He pulled a purple book from the display shelf and flipped through it. “Here we go. ‘Spell to Break Another’s Spell’” he read aloud, and scanned it while Noah peered over his shoulder. “This will do the same as a healing, too, if it’s not a hex. Do you have any equipment?”
“I’ve got all the standard ritual things, athame, incense, candles, and a pentacle.”
“Good. Only other things you need are some ivy and a black candle.”
The man walked behind the counter, reached up to a high shelf and pulled down a cardboard box. From this, he produced a small black taper. “Here’s a candle,” he said. “It’s a two hour one, should work fine. Be sure you let it burn completely and go out on its own. I don’t have any ivy. And acorns, you should get some acorns.”
“I know where to get some,” Noah said. The east side of the Big House foundation was covered in ivy and the woods were littered with acorns.
“Good, you’re all set. The acorns are for protection after you’ve stopped the hex.”
Noah pulled out his wallet and found he
had no cash.
“I don’t have any money. Do you take credit cards?”
The man waved him off. “Not after the computer’s shut off. Just come by some time and pay me. You need to get back to your friend.”
“Thank you. Thank you very much.” Noah extended a hand and gave the man a firm handshake. “Blessed be.”
“Blessed be, and good luck.”
Noah was breathless when he arrived at the cottage, having run through the darkness from the truck to the Big House and then to the cottage. He had ripped ivy from the foundation of the Big House and stuffed it in his pockets with acorns he had gathered near the truck. Willow was asleep. Shadow didn’t move from his guard position but wagged his tail when Noah entered. He stripped off his coat and shoes and put all the supplies on the floor. Willow roused with some difficulty, and then closed her eyes again. She felt hot to his touch.
Time to work some magic.
Noah opened his traveling ritual kit and arranged the contents in a large circle on the floor. He placed colored candles on the outer margin: yellow to the east, red to the south, blue to the west, and green to the north. Two larger candles, one red and one green, sat near the center. An incense burner sat to their east, a small red candle to the south, a tiny bowl of water on the west, and another bowl filled with salt to the north. A pewter pentacle sat to the left of the big candles; to their right a miniature cauldron with a layer of sand in the bottom. In the latter, he placed the black candle.
Noah went to the kitchen, found a large bowl and filled it half full with spring water and set it near the center candles. In this, he placed the ivy sprigs. The pocketful of acorns he placed in a small bowl next to the ivy, after carefully counting out thirteen.
My lucky number, and I hope, hers as well.
Last, Noah opened a parcel wrapped in red felt. Inside was his athame, the ceremonial knife used for directing natural energies. Its edges were dull but the blade was bright above the black handle.
All that remained was to bring Willow into the circle. Noah ran upstairs, rummaged until he found another blanket, and made a pad on the floor. He took a pillow from the easy chair for her head.
Moving Willow was more difficult than before. She was limp and unable to help. He pulled the sheet off, gently lifted her and laid her on the blankets.
Noah proceeded with a circle casting ritual. Kneeling, he first lit the tall center candles: the green to represent the Goddess, the red to signify the God. He lit the incense to correlate with the Spirit of Air and the small red candle to signify the Spirit of Fire. With the athame he blessed the water that stood for the Spirit of Water and the salt that represented the Spirit of Earth, chanting in a low voice.
He stood and walked in a circular path around the room with the athame pointed down as if drawing a circle on the floor, the invisible boundary that would form the barrier between his magic contained within the space and the wild energies outside. He walked the circle three times clockwise, chanting the casting rhyme as he walked.
“Blessed be!” he announced after completing the third circuit. Next, he lit the colored candles, again in clockwise fashion, and spoke the invitation to each spirit to attend his ritual. Last, standing before the tall God and Goddess candles, he asked the Lord and Lady to come as well and lend their power to him. The ghostly presence of the spirits’ energies swirled about him.
Noah now stood in a small “safety zone” as he likened it, where magic wouldn’t harm the worker or the world. One needed to respect the spirit energies.
Shadow watched Noah from his place by the sofa with a perplexed expression, his head tilted to one side in confusion. “It’s okay, boy. We’re going to help our fairy.” Noah patted his leg and Shadow came into the circle. After nuzzling Noah, the dog walked over to Willow, licked her face and lay beside her on the floor.
Noah flipped the purple spell book open to the correct page and looked over the words of the charm. Unlike Hollywood portrayals, magic didn’t involve a few odd words and a swoosh of a wand followed by a flash and a bang. Real magic was softer; often just rhyming phrases chanted or sung in the speaker’s native language, meant to channel thoughts and energies toward a target object or person. Noah owned a wand, but it was to help direct the user’s thoughts toward the object of the magic, not to blow things up.
Noah walked inside the circle’s outer margin, reading the words to the charm out loud. He completed nine clockwise circuits at increasing speed, a common method of summoning energy to power a spell. The most important power came from within: Noah visualized Willow healed and well. After the ninth orbit, he laid down the book and lit the black candle. As the tiny flame flickered and grew, Noah pictured the hot updraft sucking the evil from Willow’s body and sending it back from whence it came. When the candle burned itself out, Willow would be cleansed.
Last, Noah blessed Willow with healing and protective energy. He knelt beside her, took the acorns and laid them on the floor around her, creating a protective fence against evil. The wet ivy from the bowl he used like a scepter to sprinkle spring water all around her.
Nothing seemed to change. Magic took time.
Noah performed the backward disassembly of the sacred space, doing each step in reverse order and direction, snuffing candles, thanking spirits for their aid, and walking three times counterclockwise to open the circle. He picked Willow up, laid her on the sofa, and covered her with the sheet. He sat beside her for a moment and caressed her face. She was still hot and flushed, and didn’t respond to his touch. The small cauldron and its all-important black candle he moved to the table by the easy chair. He gathered the acorns, returned them to the bowl, and packed away the remainder of his ritual supplies.
The laptop beeped as an email arrived, but the message wasn’t from Rowan. Noah settled into the easy chair to wait out the candle.
I feel better. Willow will be okay soon.
He leaned back and closed his eyes, breathing in the lingering smells of the incense and wax. He opened his eyes and checked the clock. Only ten minutes gone since he lit the healing candle.
Noah fidgeted. He walked around the room. He went into the kitchen and put away the bowl he had used. He went into the poolroom and closed the sluice. He built up the fire.
Five more minutes.
Books always helped him pass the time, so he perused Willow’s bookcase. It held many classics, and she had quite a collection of very old books. One printed in 1803 must be a family heirloom. He stood and flipped through it, stopping to read a section here and there. A memoir of life on the frontier in Revolutionary War times, it had been read many times judging by the dog-eared pages.
Willow stirred. Half an hour. The candle was about a quarter burned.
Noah knelt by the sofa. Willow’s forehead was cooler when he touched it, and though her face was still bright pink, her breathing was smoother.
“I love you, Willow Brown,” he whispered. He kissed her cheek, and was glad to see tiny drops of sweat on her upper lip. Her hand was clammy when he lifted it to his lips and kissed it, another good sign. He let it lay in his upturned hand and studied it. Such a tiny thing he’d never seen on a woman. Her powerful arms didn’t fit these perfect hands.
As he caressed the hand like a fine sculpture, his fingers felt an unexpected texture on her wrist.
What’s that?
He turned the hand over and found an inch-long crescent-shaped scar, which stood out on her rosy skin. It didn’t appear to have been caused by a cut, but a severe abrasion. Noah turned her right hand over and found the same disfiguring mark.
What the hell?
He kissed both scars.
I wonder if…
He knelt near Willow’s feet, pulled the sheet up to her thighs and lifted one knee until the foot lay flat on the sofa. She bore another curved scar just above her Achilles tendon. The other ankle had the same mark. He found small white marks encircling both ankles. Another look at her wrists showed the same. He straightened th
e sheet and returned to the chair.
Noah had seen scars like these before. On cattle. His father had a name for them: hobble moons. They were the marks left by the steel hobbles used to prevent cattle from kicking or leaving the milking stand.
No accident did this.
Had Willow been someone’s captive? A fairy Hunter? Could she have been bound with chains? His eyes strayed to her sleeping form, wondering what kind of person could harm such a precious creature. With a sudden jolt, he came back to the present.
Chester Jones is the kind.
Many minutes passed as Noah raged, at Jones, at the nameless, faceless one who scarred this woman, at anyone who dared to look at her with evil in his heart. His hands clenched, his breathing quickened, and his face grew hot.
Willow stirred and then her eyes fluttered open.
Did you feel my anger?
Noah moved to the sofa. She smiled up at him. “Hi, Cowboy.” She dripped sweat. A hand on her forehead revealed she had cooled dramatically. When he touched her cheek, she turned her head and kissed his hand.
I feel…affection.
Thank you, spirits.
Tears tugged at his eyes. “Glad to see you’re back. How are you feeling, sweetie?”
“Better, I think.” She closed her eyes for a few moments. “I’m hot,” she said, and tried to kick off the sheet.
“Slow down, Supergirl.” He drew the sheet high up on her thighs and pulled the top down a little. “Would you like some water?” She nodded, though she was almost back to sleep. Noah went to the kitchen and drew some water. Shadow took the opportunity to greet Willow with some happy face licking.
Noah helped Willow raise her head enough to take a few sips before she dropped back into deep sleep. Sweat ran off her body in little streams that stained the sheet with dark streaks. He wiped her with a cold cloth.