Dark Winter: Trilogy

by Hennessy, John

  The pentacle glowed, but hardly burned bright when she touched it. The wand was no more than a chipboard level piece of wood. The only things that would be scared of this wand would be wood lice.

  Toril had been so depressed that she hadn’t even asked where her mother got the new wand. But she hoped it hadn’t been some shop where the things were mass-produced. Even if the wand was made sacred by her old Wiccan coven, she doubted it would be any more effective than her last wand.

  Curie was right about one thing. She didn’t believe, not truly anyway, and that’s why she failed.

  After nearly a month of being able to concentrate on anything, Toril decided that action was more important than wallowing in self-pity. She felt that her hero, Holmes, would ‘heartily concur.’ Launching herself off her bed, she pulled open her bedroom door and was down the staircase in two jumps. The sound had her mother running into the hall.

  “Toril, what are you playing at?”

  “Mum, it’s this wand that’s the play thing, just like the previous one was. Do you want to get me killed, is that it?”

  “What ever do you mean? Silly child.”

  Toril’s chocolate button pupils burned. “This wand is as useful as a chocolate teapot. I want a real wand. A proper one, Mum. You know what I’m talking about.”

  Tori-Suzanne Withers wanted to take back the insult as soon as it was out. Her daughter was anything but a silly child. Still, she wanted to evade Toril’s question. Request. Demand. When it came to Toril, they were all pretty much the same thing.

  The problem was not giving Toril a real wand, it was the sort of wand she wanted.

  “Mum? Are you listening to me?”

  Toril was still bristling from the silly child comment. Making Toril six years old again was how her parents retained control. Regarding herself first and foremost as a witch was how Toril retained control of who she really was.

  “I need the wand made from the tree in Gorswood Forest.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Excuse you? Come on, Mum, with your contacts in the Circle, I know you can do this for me. For all of us.”

  Tori-Suzanne didn’t want to refuse Toril, but this was a request too far. Still, it has taken many months for Toril to recover psychologically from events that remained all too strong in the memory.

  The tree she was on about had survived the fires that raged through the western part of Gorswood Forest. Many trees were burned to the ground and all that remained were ash, and bits of tree root.

  Except for that tree. The tree by Rosewinter, which was still standing. Some say the tree was cursed, and others said that smart people stayed well away from it. Yet it was considered by some in dark covens that a wand crafted from the wood of this tree could defeat anyone or any thing.

  It was this power that Toril wanted. Not for the sake of power itself, but she knew that to defeat Dana at the second time of asking would require some different thinking. Playing at being a white witch just didn’t cut it anymore.

  “Toril.” It was only one word, but it was said in such a way that meant so many things. Tori-Suzanne wanted to say I love you Toril, you’re my only daughter and I cannot let you get mixed up in some dark craft.

  Toril, of course, took it that her mother was stonewalling.

  “If you won’t help me, you know I’ll just have to go and get one myself. You know I will.”

  Tori-Suzanne knew many things. She knew that Dana Cullen was dead. All the parents and grandparents knew it. She knew that her daughter, terrified of cemeteries and graveyards, had fought against the demonic, ghostly entity of Dana, and had been beaten easily.

  The only reason Toril hadn’t died that day, was because of the ointment rubbed into her brittle body as a baby. The oil of the dillfern, a weed found only in Gorswood Forest. Just as quick as she had appeared in the delivery room, the nurse Winnie vanished. Nonetheless, Tori-Suzanne had no doubt her daughter would be dead, if not for Winnie’s intervention that day. But Winnie had meant to be there. It was in the prophecy. Tori-Suzanne wanted to have the ability to forget things like that. “If only I had the memory of a goldfish,” she would say many times to herself.

  Toril was famous in coven circles because of her birth, and because of that battle with Dana. Two parts of her prophecy had been fulfilled. The third was to come, and it was clear Tori-Suzanne had failed to protect her daughter from it. Maybe it was impossible to protect her. Unless she did as she asked.

  “I’ll help you, on one condition, young lady.”

  The anger in Toril’s face softened somewhat. “Name your price.”

  “That you won’t go after Dana, and that you won’t try and get Troy back from wherever he went.”

  “Is that all?” Toril was upset at the mention of Troy’s name, but held back from crying all the same.

  “No. Two more things. You don’t go anywhere near the Circle.”

  “Noted. You said two more things?”

  There was no way for Tori-Suzanne to be anything other than direct about this.

  “Jacinta. You leave her be. I’m not even joking about that. This wand will be for protection only. You are not to mess with any dark craft. You use it for anything other than self-defence, you’ll be destroyed, and I can’t have that, Toril.”

  “What if self-defence isn’t enough, Mum? What then?”

  “It will have to do! There are those out there that mean to do us harm. To stop them, we risk awakening something in ourselves, something dark, something evil. The same evil within ourselves. Stay on the good side of things, Toril. Promise me.”

  “I won’t use it for anything other than self-defence, Mum. My word. Promise. ”

  “Your word has always been good enough for me, Toril.”

  Toril hugged her mother tightly. She then went back to her bedroom and flopped down onto her bed, and picked up her phone.

  “Hey, Toril, been waiting on you to call me for ages. So how did it go?”

  “Phase one is complete, Beth.”

  ***

  Phase One was all about getting a new wand, the kind of wand that, at best, could help Toril defeat Dana, or at least keep Dana and Diabhal’s minions from doing any more harm. All of Toril’s common sense, logic, and level headedness went out of the window once Jacinta died.

  Yes. In dark craft, the sort of which Dana immersed herself in, there was a way to bring someone back from the dead. As much as she wanted to, she had made a promise to her mother, who had long retired from witchcraft or had anything to do with the Circle.

  However, her mother had also made a promise to Toril, but this was one that was to go unfulfilled. Toril knew that her mother would issue her with a wand, but not the one that she really needed. The kind of wand that Dana herself owned. Beth followed up her call with a visit to Toril’s bedroom.

  “You’re really going after Dana? After all that happened?”

  “I have to, Beth. I just have to.”

  Beth looked at Toril with pleading don’t do this eyes.

  “I’ll sew your eyes shut just like I did your mouth. Stop it, Beth.”

  Toril regretted her words as soon as she spoke.

  “I’ll have help, Beth. I won’t do this alone.”

  Beth bit her lip, then spoke slowly.

  “Who is going to help you? You operate on your own, remember?”

  “I have friends in the Circle-”

  “You don’t have any friends now!” cried Beth. “Why didn’t you transport elsewhere? You could have, but the big head in you just couldn’t leave it alone. Taking on Dana, I mean, are you for real? You can name your next wand What Ever Was I Thinking?”

  Toril bristled, and not for the first time that day. Jacinta wouldn’t have spoken to her like that. But Jacinta’s voice had been silenced forever more. Beth just wasn’t the same kind of confidante.

  “Alright Beth, that’s enough,” said Toril. “You’re right of course. I could have run, but I believed my own hype. Mum’s old coven still
has the Toril Withers Day of Light, did you know that? You imagine being told how special you are, from the day you are born? Mum was one of the greatest witches ever. Was. I’d have just liked to have been like her, even for a little while. I didn’t want fame.”

  “It can play hideous tricks on the brain,” said Beth.

  “Yeah, it can.”

  Toril flopped down onto her bed, and bent her legs over her head.

  “A Wiccan trick?” asked Beth.

  “No, just lots of yoga.”

  “Still pretty cool.” Beth passed by Toril’s dresser, and stopped when she saw a picture of Jacinta, who was smiling.

  “I never saw a picture of Jacinta smiling before. Where did you get this? How old is she?”

  “About ten or eleven. I guess she smiled a lot before all that happened.”

  Beth sat down on the bed, the covers of which were covered in Wiccan symbols.

  “A gift from the Circle,” said Toril. “They keep their gifts simple these days.”

  “So, on the phone you said phase one was complete. I take it there is no way I can talk you out of this?”

  “None whatsoever.”

  “Even if it means you could die?”

  Toril, even in her darkest days, loved her life. But since Jacinta died, and Troy was gone, sacrificing himself into the void, she had lost much of what had once made her happy. Vengeance consumed her every waking moment.

  “I just don’t care anymore. You’re right Beth, I don’t have friends in the Circle. I’ve never even been there, and wouldn’t know where to go to find it in the first place. I am relying on Mum and her contacts to get me that wand. The wand. But I don’t believe I will ever see such a thing, not unless it is meant to be. I really don’t think I’ll die, but I can’t live with myself knowing Jacinta died a senseless death.”

  “What Jay did was…unorthodox, okay?” said Beth. “She did it for us, because she thought it was the best thing to do. I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but the girl in that photo, and the one I knew, were not the same. I believe she is happy now she’s at rest.”

  Toril mulled Beth’s words over. Just when she started to make some sense, Beth continued.

  “It wasn’t Dana who threw the axe.”

  Toril flung herself off the bed into a standing position. “I know that! And you know what? I realise I can’t live with it, Beth. No matter how it happened, Jay is not here now. Maybe you don’t know, but she was happy with me. We smiled lots of times. She was my best friend, Beth, and she’s gone. You look at one photo of her, and you think you’ve gotten her all figured out? Gotten me all figured out? Maybe you don’t know right now, what I’m talking about, but you will when it’s over. I promise that you will, when it’s over.”

  “Toril, I’m not attacking you,” pleaded Beth, “but going after Dana, trying to find that house again, would mean your death. You asked me one time to be a support, be a friend, okay? Now that’s what I am being! Troy….Jacinta, not in a million years would they want you to do this.”

  No. They wouldn’t want Toril to go after Dana and the minions of Diabhal. Toril was smart and clever, and had considerable Wiccan powers. Had. She knew all the quotes, such as He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword. Toril had often wondered what death was like, and it preoccupied her more than she would care to admit.

  When she met Jacinta, that all changed, or at least, was put on the backburner for a while. Jacinta made Toril smile, and frequently she found herself laughing out loud. There was no-one like Jacinta, and she missed her terribly. It wasn’t Beth’s fault that she wasn’t Jacinta. Wanting to cry, but not feeling comfortable enough with Beth to let her see that side of herself, Toril decided that anger was the way to go.

  “Go, Beth. Just. Go.”

  Beth felt she hadn’t said or done anything to warrant this. She desperately wanted to help Toril, but felt too that Toril was being rather selfish, and should not act like she was the only one who cared about Jacinta. Beth’s Irish temper flared up.

  “What did you say to me?”

  “Just go,” said Toril. The air hung thick with a chill. “I can see why Romilly got so frustrated with you. Just go!”

  Toril grabbed Beth by her arm and pulled her out of her room, frog-marching her down the stairs. She ignored Beth’s What the hell’s wrong with you? and pushed her out of the doorway.

  “I know what I’m doing!” screamed Toril.

  “I’d punch you, that’s if it would make any difference!” shrieked Beth. “This is not the way to treat people!”

  Toril slammed the door shut, ran up stairs to her room, and swished the curtains to a close.

  Beth smoothed out her tousled red hair. “So you know what you’re doing, Toril, huh?” thought Beth. “You don’t. You really don’t.”

  The Circle

  I spent my days at the cemetery, and my nights in the darkness. Total darkness. I can’t see any light, and yet, I disrespect the memory of my Nan and my parents by not getting myself together. Eighteen months of feeling numb. Enough is enough. Maybe I had to go through this hell so that I would actually want to feel alive again.

  Beth may have been certain that Don Curie was responsible for the death of her parents, but I could not be sure what happened to Ronald and Daphne Winter. Not for certain.

  I had not needed the knock on the door from the police for their official findings. One was a male officer, who gave me the news. His female counterpart smiled awkwardly and asked if there was anything they could do.

  I declined the offer, shut the door, and feeling dizzy and numb, sat down until the Dawsons banged down on my front window.

  “Romilly, it’s not good for you to be here on your own,” Mrs Dawson would say. “I knew your parents well. You stay in here all the time. Sometimes I see you staring blankly from your bedroom window. Please, tell me you’ll come round some time.”

  The funeral, what I remember of it, was a big occasion. Many from my father’s workplace had come, and offered me their condolences. There was a decision taken not to have the caskets open, because my Mum did not look anything like herself. I suppose the make-up people did their best. At least, that was the official line.

  The truth was, the mark of terror Dana left on people would literally scare living people to death. So we elected to have closed caskets.

  I sat through Fr McArdle’s sermon, expertly delivered as ever. He would even throw in a few lines that made a few of the mourners chuckle.

  Beth had clasped a hand over my gloved one, and though I was barely there, I could certainly feel her presence. It was a reassuring one at a time when everything was a mess.

  After we left, the vultures on my mother’s side encircled us.

  Beth waved away questions on who was to get the house, and when would the wills be read.

  “Can’t you see she’s in mourning? You inconsiderate gobshites! All you care about is money!”

  “Romilly, we’ll be back. We have to sort this out,” said a woman claiming to be my aunt - someone who I did not recognise.

  “Will you just get lost, all of you!” shouted Beth. “Come on, Romilly, we shouldn’t stay around long enough to be pecked to death by these vultures.”

  “What she needs, is her family around her, not some bible bashing lunatic. You don’t have any idea what she’s going through.”

  If I was feeling coherent, and could have raised myself above the numbness I was feeling, I would have wanted to protect Beth from my so-called family. Beth was right. These people were vultures. They didn’t care that my parents were gone.

  I would have expected her to shoot some Irish barbs, but she declined.

  “With respect, to whoever you are, I fully understand what she’s going through. And I’ll not thank you for staying a million miles away from Romilly.”

  You are a star, Bethany.

  I mumbled something, but I felt numb, listless, and though I didn’t know it yet, I needed Beth’s friendship more than ever.r />
  “It’ll be Jacinta in two days time,” said Beth. “I don’t expect Toril will be coming. If you don’t want to go, I’ll understand. Jay will too.”

  I managed to get some words out that made sense.

  “I do want to go, but I’m a little troubled by that last image I have of her. I think Jacinta would want me to remember her in that way, you know?”

  Beth looked concerned at me, but I felt she wouldn’t mind, whatever I decided.

  I wanted to scold myself for feeling the same way about my parents passing as I did about my Nan. Dear Mum and Dad, it’s just so typical of you, leaving me like this.