“Don’t call me feeble-minded jest ’cause you’re older. Why, Mama always said—”
“Hear me good, Zeke and Cle-em,” I pronounced the second name as though it were two syllables. “It’s three in the morning. That’s the witchin’ hour, for sure. Now y’all are gonna tell me what in the Sam Hill you’re doin’ here and what you’re after, or I’m gonna use this here wand to make both of ya’ll into my pet zombies.”
Two Adam’s apples started bobbing some more.
“D-don’t, please, ma’am witch,” said Clem. “We . . .”
“Keep your big trap shut, boy,” said his brother in a harsh whisper.
Just then, Oscar tripped on the lace train of a wedding dress, and the dressmaker’s mannequin teetered then fell to the floor with a resounding crash. Startled, Oscar dropped the smudge bundle on the ivory satin. I lunged to grab it, but Oscar managed to pick it up and stomp the sparks out with his piggy hooves. Taking advantage of the distraction, the men started backing toward the shop door, Clem holding a carved wooden Maltese cross at arm’s length in front of him.
“I’m not a vampire,” I scoffed. “That won’t work.”
“Don’t need to,” Zeke replied, and held up a gun, its dull black muzzle pointed straight at me.
“Now, we don’t want no trouble, ma’am,” said Zeke. “We’re gonna walk on outta here, and you gonna keep that wand down by your side. Ya hear?”
I may be a powerful witch, but I’m as mortal as the next person, and I don’t go up against firearms. Even when armed with pussy willow sticks.
Clem and Zeke slipped through the door and slammed it behind them, the little bell pealing forlornly in the silent night.
• • •
The next morning I got up early to cast one whopper of a protection spell over the store.
Under the circumstances, the spell was necessary for my safety and peace of mind but, as with all magic, there was a cost. A spell strong enough to discourage intruders would also mute the creativity and independent thought of all within the shop. I would remain largely unaffected by it since I was the witch casting the spell, but it seemed unethical to subject my friends to it without their knowledge or permission. I soothed my conscience by telling myself it was just temporary and, considering how things might have turned out last night, it was warranted.
And I felt thoroughly justified later that morning.
“Where did this bag of clothes come from?” I asked Bronwyn.
“Maya brought it in yesterday, right before we closed. Someone left it on the stoop.”
This wasn’t all that unusual. Though we purchased most of our vintage clothing, many people wanted their discarded clothes to go to a good home and used Aunt Cora’s Closet rather like the Salvation Army donation center.
What was unusual was that the knotted neck of the bag was ringed by a twist of rowan.
Carefully avoiding the rowan, I dragged the bag outside by one corner. On the sidewalk, the early-morning sun was already blazing hot.
Bronwyn followed me, and Conrad got up from the curb and joined us, watching as I tore a hole in the side of the plastic bag.
Clothes. I half expected something ghastly, like evidence of a spell done with blood sacrifice. But the bag appeared to be full of vintage clothes: even without looking closely I could see a men’s antique flax linen shirt and Victorian-style white undergarments trimmed with hand-tatted lace—the kind Lucille would be able to salvage for her new dresses, even if the garments were stained beyond repair.
“Dudette, you should go work for Homeland Security. I thought you were totally gonna blow the bag up!” said Conrad, a gleeful tone in his voice.
“Everything okay, Lily?” Bronwyn asked. She was clearly worried about me lately, and I didn’t blame her. “Maya will be here within the hour. We can ask her if she knows anything more about the bag or who dropped it.”
“No worries. Conrad’s right; I was overreacting.” Not every piece of rowan is meant to quell the powers of witches, I reminded myself. Whole rowan trees were lovely, and they never bothered me at all unless they were imbued with the power of a well-cast spell. On the other hand, I didn’t want to take any chances. Ignoring Bronwyn’s questioning look, I asked Conrad to take the bag around to the trash bin in back of the store.
“I need to run out for a bit, Bronwyn. Will you watch the store?”
“Of course.”
It was high time to try to find Aidan Rhodes, the self-appointed godfather of Bay Area witches. If he knew Carlotta Hummel in Germany, it was certainly possible this was why her sister Griselda had come to San Francisco. Perhaps before Carlotta was killed, she gave her sister something—a powerful ring, for instance—that Griselda smuggled in under the guise of the Gem Faire, and perhaps she got it to Aidan before she was killed. Somehow.
At the very least, it was worth hearing what Aidan had to say for himself. It was becoming clear to me that I needed some supernatural help with this situation. Sailor was AWOL, and this wasn’t my voodoo friend Herve’s kind of magic. And though I didn’t exactly trust him, Aidan had helped me in the past.
Unfortunately, despite my prodding Oscar had been close-muzzled about Aidan’s whereabouts. I could usually count on him to know where Aidan could be found, but Oscar had been so silent I was beginning to think he really didn’t know where Aidan was. Oscar was reasonably good at keeping mum in the short run, but was terrible at keeping secrets over the long haul—he usually slipped up and mentioned something. Not this time.
Still, it was worth a visit to his office. So I headed to the Fisherman’s Wharf Wax Museum.
I zipped down the Embarcadero, past the Ferry Building farmer’s market and the old port buildings, most of which were now in the process of being converted into restaurants and tourist destinations. Some time ago San Francisco—like so many other port cities—realized that giving over prime waterfront spots to working people was a waste as far as tourism was concerned. Much of the city’s actual shipping business had shifted to China Basin, or across the bay to the port of Oakland.
I waited at an intersection to let a streetcar pass before I turned left, then took a right to sneak up on the Wax Museum on Jefferson, the street that ran in front of Fisherman’s Wharf and was always chock-full of happy tourists stuffed with crab, clam chowder, and sourdough bread.
Parking in this area was a real bear, and while I generally take my chances and wait my turn like everybody else, last night’s encounter had left me with a sense of urgency. When I spied a gas-guzzling SUV hogging two parking spaces I used my parking charm to convince its owner to abandon his crab feast and move his vehicle. I slipped into the first space, and a Johnny-on-the-spot Honda grabbed the spot behind me.
When I breezed past the young woman at the Wax Museum’s ticket booth without pausing, she put her battered romance novel facedown on the counter and yelled, “Hey!”
I ignored her. Clarinda didn’t like me, and kept trying to get me to pay the admission fee even though she knew darned well I wasn’t there to ooh and aah over the wax figures.
“I said, ‘Hey’!” Clarinda said, chasing after me.
I stopped. Clarinda never left the ticket booth. “What’s up?”
“He’s not here.”
“Where is he, then?”
Clarinda shrugged, conveying so much more than uncertainty or lack of knowledge. Together with her Queen of the Dead goth outfit, pale skin, black hair and eye makeup, multiple piercings, and “I don’t know you but I know I hate you” gaze, the shrug suggested I should not only get the hell out of her space, but also put my head where the sun doesn’t shine.
“Are you sure about that?”
Her lip curled.
“Fine. When will he be back?”
Another shrug, this one saying “Even if I knew, I wouldn’t tell you.”
“I’m goi
ng to check his office, in any case.”
“It’s your funeral,” she said to my back as I turned and started up the stairs. I’m pretty sure she mumbled something under her breath, but I didn’t strain to hear. I got the gist.
Upstairs, I hurried past the Chamber of Horrors—though I knew it was all fun and games, it still made me nervous—and through the exhibit of European explorers to the walnut door to Aidan’s office. When he wasn’t there—or didn’t want to be disturbed—the door was hidden by a glamour that made it invisible to those with normal sight. Even to me it was almost invisible, but since I knew it was there I approached and rapped on it loudly.
A loud, scratchy meow was the only reply, and I spotted a pure white, long-haired cat atop the ledge over the door. This was Noctemus, Aidan’s familiar. We did not get along. She had, however, helped me to discover part of Aidan’s secret: that he bore burn scars on half of his face. Similar to my father.
Looking into the cat’s periwinkle eyes—so reminiscent of her master’s—I said, “I need to speak with him. It’s very important.”
The cat meowed again. Not being an animal whisperer or a mind reader, I had no idea if this meant Noctemus would communicate to Aidan that I needed him, if she was telling me to go wherever a cat familiar might send someone if she could, or if it was just a random feline response to being spoken to.
Frustrated, I tried the door handle just in case. It was locked. I wondered whether I should try to break in. I was in the habit of taking liberties with Aidan, but he was a powerful witch, and one of these days I just might end up getting burned.
Speaking of getting burned . . . Aidan had told me himself that he used to work with my father, and had hinted at some kind of spell gone wrong. It made sense that they had both been burned in the same incident years ago. But that was all I knew about any shared past between them.
Frustrated, I kicked the door. The cat meowed in reproach.
“Well, that’s what he gets for not keeping in touch.”
Noctemus hissed at me and strolled away, her upright tail twitching.
I sighed and threaded my way back through the museum.
A crowd of children with matching yellow summer camp T-shirts were darting about, shrieking and tittering nervously in the Chamber of Horrors, which I studiously avoided. Personally, I much preferred the exhibit called the Palace of Living Art, which featured wax portrayals of famous paintings like the Mona Lisa, but also slightly more obscure works such as American Gothic, Whistler’s Mother, and the Laughing Cavalier. The figures of movie stars were pretty fun, and even the Wicked Witch of the West from The Wizard of Oz wasn’t so bad . . . though frankly all of these wax figures, fictional or not, gave me the willies.
Not far from Aidan’s apparently abandoned office was a new addition to the museum’s collection: Mary Ellen Pleasant. The plaque described her as THE MOTHER OF CIVIL RIGHTS IN SAN FRANCISCO. Not so long ago I had agreed to have this sculpture made as payment to a voodoo priestess who had helped me out.
As I looked into the figure’s dark eyes I found it unsettling . . . but, then, I found all the wax figures disquieting. We people are so much more than our human form; I know that better than most. Nonetheless it is our living tissue that allows us to remain on this plane, to vibrate in such a way that we maintain our physical presence in this world. This is why so many magical systems use poppets as stand-ins for people, and even the pentagram features a star in the shape of a human: arms, legs, head.
Like all the wax figures, Mary Ellen Pleasant was dressed in authentic clothing. I wondered if the museum’s artists had selected items in the proper style for the period, or if Herve, voodoo priest and a party to the deal I had brokered to create Pleasant’s wax representation, had given the museum some of Pleasant’s real clothes. I tried to sense any vibrations from the clothing, but the figure was too far away and the room was too crowded with random vibrations from the museum’s visitors.
After glancing around to see if anyone was watching, I ducked under the velvet ropes meant to keep visitors at bay and felt the figure’s watered silk gown.
The dress was authentic, not a reproduction. This explained the fine, hand-tatted lace, which was unusual in even the most authentically re-created ensemble. The gown’s vibrations were brilliant, much stronger than normal in historic fibers; I picked up fierce determination, a pride mixed with fear and hate. I wasn’t surprised by the complexity of the vibrations. Pleasant had led a difficult but important life—born a slave before the Civil War, she had worked with the Underground Railroad, had for a time passed as white, was married several times, and had repeatedly challenged civic authorities and the courts over civil rights issues.
Hers was the sort of dress that, were it in my store, could be worn only by a select few. It would overwhelm most people.
“Hey, lady!” said a girl of about eight. She wore a yellow camp T-shirt, jeans, and a pink headband. “You’re not s’posed to go past the ropes! Not s’posed to touch the clothes. You could get it dirty!”
I blushed as other children ringed Mary Ellen Pleasant’s sculpture, watching me in disapproval. How embarrassing.
“You’re right,” I said, stepping behind the rope. “That was wrong of me. I apologize.”
The outrage on the little faces suggested my apology wasn’t enough. “I’m a, um . . . I’m a consultant for the museum. A fashion specialist.”
“Where’s your badge?” she asked.
“My what?”
“Your badge,” she explained impatiently. “All the museum workers have badges. That’s how you know they’re okay to talk to if you get lost.”
Busted. The other children looked equally unconvinced. I stared at them, unsure what to do. Fortunately a teenage girl—one of the camp counselors, judging by her yellow T-shirt and jeans—appeared and announced it was time for lunch. I breathed a sigh of relief as they marched off.
Over the years I had gone up against all sorts of challenges, but the scathing disapproval of children? That, apparently, never got easier.
As I turned to leave, Mary Ellen Pleasant’s jewelry caught my eye. Around the sculpture’s neck hung strands of Mardi Gras beads and a near-black medallion that appeared to be made of twine. After confirming the children had indeed left the area, I reached out and made a discovery as I touched it: the medallion was made of hair, plaited and twisted so tightly that it resembled braided silk.
I looked longingly at Aidan’s nearly invisible door. I would bet my cauldron he knew whether the hair amulets were significant and why, or what the Ballcap boys were after. How ironic. Angry with him for banishing Sailor, I had been giving Aidan the cold shoulder for the past several weeks. Now that I needed him, he was nowhere to be found.
Feeling frustrated, I left the museum—calling out cheerfully to Clarinda as I passed the ticket booth—and drove back to the store. Bronwyn was helping a customer at the register, so I headed to the workroom to call Renna, the one Rom witch I knew. Her phone rang and rang until finally bumping me to voice mail. I left a message asking if I could stop by for a visit, and gave her my number so she could call me back.
As I sat with my hand on the telephone, pondering my next move, it dawned on me that Maya was hanging up clothes I hadn’t seen before.
“Are those from our thrift-store outing?” I asked, though I doubted they were. I almost always remember the clothing that has passed through my hands.
“No, they were left by the front door yesterday.”
“In the black plastic bag? I threw those away.”
An odd expression on her face, Maya continued to hang up piece after piece, smoothing their wrinkles with her hands. “Is that why they were out in the alley? I wondered.”
“You brought them back in?”
“They’re perfectly decent. And look: several are men’s, and we don’t have much of that.”
It was true that women’s fashions make up the bulk of vintage clothing. But as a norm, we draw the line at picking up clothes from the trash. And we certainly never put out clothing that hasn’t been laundered and mended.
“Why don’t you let me take care of those, Maya? You could start sorting through the clothes we bought yesterday at the thrift store.”
She shrugged and allowed herself to be led into the main shop floor of Aunt Cora’s Closet, where Bronwyn needed help at the register.
“Don’t forget, Lily,” Maya said. “The fire dance is tonight in Golden Gate Park, and all are welcome.”
“Oh, I haven’t forgotten,” I said as I ducked back into the workroom.
In fact, Maya’s involvement in the fire dancing was very much at the forefront of my mind.
Chapter 10
I tried to assess the dubious clothes, but found nothing untoward—in fact, the most suspicious thing about them was their lack of vibrations. This wasn’t unknown for clothes of their age, however. If the vibrations of former owners weren’t that strong to begin with and then the items were tucked away in a drafty attic for several decades, they were sometimes devoid of all but the most subtle sensations.
Or . . . was it possible that the rowan really was working at damping down my sensations? I noted loops of rowan on two of the hangers. Maya probably found them in the bag, thought they were pretty, and used them to adorn the clothing. It was the sort of thing I did all the time—and these loops looked like something I would have made, like my sachets of rosemary and sage. She wouldn’t have known any better.
But it chilled me to think that Aunt Cora’s Closet could be accessed so easily by those with mal intent. Had Clem and Zeke left the bag in an attempt to dilute my powers?
I blew out a frustrated breath, shoved all of the clothes—and the rowan—into a new Hefty bag, and hauled it back out to the trash—inside the Dumpster. Surely Maya wouldn’t cross that line.
That evening I filled a backpack with precautionary supplies: herbs, a candle, amulets, a small jar of protective brew. Then I added a few more pedestrian items: a flashlight, a warm sweater. Even on the warmest San Francisco nights, a wall of fog could quickly engulf the city, causing the temperature to plummet within minutes.
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