by Cate Tiernan
On the way downstairs I gripped the handrail tightly. Outside, the rain swept across my face. I blinked and hurried toward Das Boot. My car was freezing inside, with icy vinyl seats and a cold steering wheel. My wet, cold hands turned the key in the starter.
The words kept throbbing in my head. Blood witch. Blood witch. Blood witch.
CHAPTER 17 Trapped
"In 1217 witchfinders imprisoned a Vikraut witch. Yet on the following morn the cell was empty. Thus comes the saying 'Better to kill a witch three times than to lock her up once. for a witch cannot be contained."
— Witches, Mages, and Warlocks,
Altus Polydarmus, 1618
October. I've put away my old journal. This is my first entry into my Book of Shadows. I don't know if I'm doing it right. I've never seen another BOS. But I wanted to document my coming alive, this autumn, this year. I'm coming alive as a witch, and it's the happiest and the scariest thing I've ever done.
"And it was just so amazing," I said, peeling the top off my yogurt. "The whole garden was laid out in eight spokes, like the sabbat wheel. All these plants for healing and cooking. And they were all nuns! Catholic nuns!" I spooned up some yogurt and looked around my lunch table.
We were in the school cafeteria, and Robbie had made the mistake of casually asking how the church trip had gone on Sunday—his family goes to my church. Now I wouldn't shut up about it.
"You gotta watch those nuns," Robbie said, drinking his milk shake.
"Gosh, it is just everywhere." Jenna shook her head. She wiped her lips with a paper napkin and pushed her hair back over her shoulders. "Now that I know about it, it seems like traces of Wicca are everywhere I look. My mom was talking about going up to Red Kill to buy a pumpkin for Halloween, and I realized where that tradition really comes from."
"Hey," said Ethan sleepily, sinking into a chair next to Sharon. "Sup?" His eyes were red, and his long ringlets were clotted above his collar.
Sharon looked at him in disgust, edging away from him as if he would get dirt on her pristine tartan skirt and white oxford shirt. "Are you ever not stoned?" she asked.
"I'm not stoned now," Ethan said. "I have a cold."
I glanced over at him and could sense his muzzy headed-ness and stuffed-up sinuses.
"Ethan doesn't smoke anymore," Cal said quietly. "Right, Ethan?"
Ethan looked irritated and opened a can of cranberry juice from the school machine. "That's right, man. I get high on life," he said.
Cal laughed.
"Next you'll be telling me I have to be a damn vegetarian or something," Ethan grumbled.
"Anything but that," Robbie said sarcastically.
Sharon wiggled away from Ethan, looking prissy. Gold bracelets clinked on her wrist, and she speared a piece of teriyaki chicken with a chopstick.
"Watch out for her cooties," Beth whispered to Ethan. Today she wore a diamond in her nose and another diamond bindi on her forehead. She looked exotic, her green eyes glowing catlike against her dark skin.
Sharon made a face at her as Ethan started laughing and choked on his juice.
Bree and I shared a look, then Bree's eyes fastened on Cal. Steadfastly I went back to eating my yogurt. We sat there, overflowing our lunch table designed to seat eight: me and Bree; Raven and Beth, with their nose rings and dyed hair and mehendi tattoos; Jenna and Matt, the perfect couple; Ethan and Robbie, scruffy and rough; Sharon Goodfine, stuck-up princess; and Cal, tying us all together, giving us something in common. He looked around the table at us, seeming happy to be here, glad to be with us. We were the privileged nine. His new coven, if we wanted to be.
I wanted to be.
"Morgan! Wait!" Jenna called as I headed to my car. It was Friday afternoon, another week gone. I waited for her to catch up and shifted my backpack to the other shoulder.
"Are you coming to the circle tomorrow night?" Jenna asked when she was close enough. "It's going to be at my house. I thought we could make sushi."
I felt like an alcoholic being offered a cold, strong drink. The thought of going to another circle, feeling the magick coiling through my veins, having that magickal intimacy with Cal, practically made me want to whimper.
"I really want to," I said hesitantly.
"Why wouldn't you come?" she asked, her eyes confused. "You seem so interested in Wicca. And Cal said you have a gift for it."
I sighed. "My parents are totally against it," I explained. "I'm dying to come, but I just can't face the scene at home if I do."
"Tell them I'm having a party," Jenna said. "Or that you're sleeping over at my place. We missed you last week. It's more fun when you're there."
I grinned wryly. "You mean no one fell over, clutching her chest?"
She laughed. "No," she said. "But Cal said you were just extra sensitive, right?"
Matt walked up and put his hand around Jenna's waist and she smiled up at him. I wondered if they ever fought, ever questioned their love for each other.
"That's me," I said. "Sensitive Morgan."
"Well, try to come if you can," Jenna said.
"Okay," I said. "I'll try. Thanks."
I got in my car, thinking how nice Jenna was and how I had never known it because before this we had always been in different social groups.
"We're just going to hang out. You want to come?" Mary K. asked me on Saturday night. "Jaycee's rented some cheesy movie, and we're going to eat popcorn and make fun of it."
I smiled at her. "Sounds almost irresistible. But somehow I'm managing to resist it. Bree and I may see a movie. Will Bakker be at Jaycee's?"
Mary K. shook her head. "No. He and his dad went to a Giants game in New Jersey."
"Are things okay with him?" I asked.
"Uh-huh." Mary K. brushed her hair until it was shiny and smooth, then looped it up in a ponytail in back. She looked adorable and casual, perfect for hanging out at a girlfriend's house.
Soon after Mary K. rode off into the chilly night to bike the half mile to Jaycee's house, my mom and dad came into the living room, all dressed up.
"Where's the show at?" I asked, propping my socked feet up on the couch.
"Where's the show playing," my mom corrected my grammar.
"That too," I said, and gave her a smile. She made a mock-disapproving face.
"Over in Burdocksville," she answered, fastening a pearl necklace around her neck. "At the community center. We should be back by eleven or so, and we told Mary K. we'd pick her up on the way home. Leave a note if you and Bree decide to go out."
"Okay," I said.
"Come on, Mary Grace, we're going to be late," my dad said.
"Bye, sweetie," my mom called. Then they were gone, and I was alone in the house. I ran upstairs and changed into an Indian-print top and a pair of gray pants. I brushed my hair hard and decided to leave it down. I even opened the bathroom drawer, looked at Mary K.'s huge collection of eye shadows and blushes and concealers. I had no idea what to do with most of the stuff and didn't have time to learn, so I just put on a layer of lip gloss and headed for the door.
Jenna lived in Hudson Estates, a fairly new subdivision filled with mansions. I grabbed my keys and a jacket and shoved my feet into my clogs. I was thinking, Circle, circle, circle, and my mind was spinning with excitement. As I was opening the door to leave, the phone rang.
To answer or not to answer? I lunged for the phone on the fourth ring, thinking it might be Jenna with a change of plans, but I suddenly knew even before I had the receiver to my ear that it was Ms. Fiorello, my mom's colleague. "Hello?" I said impatiently.
"Morgan? This is Betty Fiorello."
"Hi," I said, thinking, I know, I know.
"Hi, hon," she said. "Listen, I just got your mom on her cell phone, and she said you might be home."
"Uh-huh?" My heart was racing, my blood pounding. All I wanted was to see Cal, to feel the magick again flowing through me.
"Listen. I need to stop by and pick up some signs. Your mom said they were in the ga
rage. I have two new listings, and I'm doing three open houses tomorrow, if you can believe it, and I seem to have run out of signs."
Ms. Fiorello has the most annoying voice in the world. I wanted to scream.
"Okay…," I said politely.
"So is it all right if I come by in, say, forty-five minutes?" Ms. Fiorello asked.
I glanced at the clock frantically. "C–Could you come a little earlier?" I asked." I was, um, thinking of going to a movie."
"Oh. I'm sorry. I'll try. But I just have to wait for Mr. Fiorello to get home with the car," she said.
Crap, I thought. "I could leave the signs outside," I suggested. "In front of the garage."
"Oh, dear," said Ms. Fiorello, continuing to ruin my life. "You know, I think I have to look through them myself. I'm not sure which ones I'll need until I see them."
My mom had about a hundred real estate signs in the garage. I couldn't pile them all outside. Thoughts flew through my head, but I couldn't see a way out. Dammit. "Well, I guess I don't absolutely have to go to the movie," I hinted ungraciously, hoping she'd take the hint.
She didn't. "I'm so sorry, dear. Was this a date?" she asked.
"No," I said sourly. I needed to hang up before I started screaming at her. "See you in forty-five minutes," I said curtly, and hung up the phone. I felt like crying. For a bitter minute I wondered if maybe my mom had put Ms. Fiorello up to this to check on me. No, that seemed unlikely.
While I waited for Ms. Fiorello, I cleaned the kitchen and started the dishwasher: Cinderella, getting very late for the ball. I put a load of my clothes into the washer. Then I played music really loud and sang along for a while at the top of my lungs. I put my wet clothes into the dryer and set the timer for forty-five minutes.
Finally, over an hour later, Ms. Fiorello showed up. I let her into the garage, and she poked around in my moms signs for what felt like a lifetime. I sat on the garage steps glumly, my head in my hand. She picked out about eight signs, then cheerfully thanked me.
"No problem," I lied politely, letting her out. "Bye, Ms. Fiorello."
"Good-bye, dear," she said.
By the time she left, it was almost ten o'clock. There was no point in driving twenty minutes to Jenna's house when the circle would already be underway. I couldn't just break in three-quarters of the way through.
As I collapsed on our living-room sofa, my misery was compounded by the fear that I was falling too far behind the rest of the Wicca group to join in again. What if Cal gave up on me? What if they wouldn't let me come to another circle?
I felt almost desperate. I seized on an idea that had been floating around my brain for a while. If I couldn't explore Wicca with the group, I could at least work a little on my own. Then at least I could prove to Cal and the rest of them that I really was dedicated. I was going to try to do a magick spell. I even had an idea for a spell to try. The next day I would drive up to Practical Magick and buy the ingredients.
CHAPTER 18 Consequences
"Forget not that witches live among us as neighbors, and practice their craft in secret, even as we conduct honest, God-fearing lives."
— Witches, Mages, and Warlocks,
Altus Polydarmus, 1618
Sunday my family and I went to church, then to the Widow's Diner for brunch. As soon as I got home, I called Jenna. She was out, so I left a message on her machine, explaining what happened the night before and apologizing for not making it to the circle. Then I called Bree, but she wasn't home, either. I left a message for her, too, trying not imagine her at Cal's house, in Cal's room. After that I sat the dining table for hours, doing homework and losing myself in complicated, tidy mathematical equations, so satisfying in their clear solutions, they seemed almost magickal themselves.
I stopped by Practical Magick just before it closed, at five that afternoon. I bought all the ingredients I needed, but I waited until later that night, until my parents and sister were already in bed, before I began my spell.
I left the door to my room open a crack so I could hear if my mom or dad or Mary K. suddenly stirred. I took out my book on herbal magick. Cal had said I was sensitive—that I had a gift for magick. I needed to know if that was true.
Opening the book Herbal Rituals for the Beginner, I flipped to "Clarifying the Skin."
I checked my list. Was it a waning moon? Check. In my reading I had learned that spells for gathering, calling, increasing, prosperity, and so on were done while the moon was waxing, or getting fuller. Spells for banishing, decreasing, limiting, and so on were done while the moon was waning. It sort of made sense if you thought about it.
The spell I chose specified catnip to increase beauty, cucumber and angelica to promote healing, chamomile and rosemary for purification.
My room is carpeted, but I found I could still make a chalk circle. Before closing the circle, I moved my book and everything else I would need into it. Three candles made enough light to read by. Next I trickled a line of salt around my circle and said, "With this salt, I purify my circle."
The rest of the spell consisted of crunching things up with a mortar and pestle, pouring boiling water (from a thermos) over the herbs in a measuring cup, and writing a person's name on a piece of paper and burning it over a candle. At exactly midnight I read the book's spell words in a whisper:
"So beauty in is beauty out,
This potion make your blemish nowt
This healing water makes you pure,
And thus your beauty will endure."
I read this quickly while the clock downstairs was striking midnight. At the very last bong of the clock, I said the final word. In the next instant all the hairs on my arms stood up, the three candles went out, and a huge bolt of lightning made my room glow white. The next second brought a boom of thunder so loud, it reverberated in my chest.
I almost peed in my pants. I stared wildly out the window to see if the house had caught on fire, then I got to my feet and flicked on my lamp. We still had electricity.
My heart was crashing around my rib cage. On the one hand, it seemed so far-fetched and melodramatic that this would happen exactly when I was doing a spell, it was almost funny. On the other hand, I felt like God had seen what I was doing and sent a bolt of angry lightning to warn me off. You that's crazy. I told myself, taking long, deep breaths to quiet my heart.
Quickly I cleaned up all my spell stuff. I poured my tincture into a small, clean Tupperware container and tucked it into my backpack. Within minutes I was in bed with the lights out.
Outside, it was pouring and thundering in our biggest autumn storm so far. And my heart was still pounding.
"Here, try this," I said casually to Robbie on Monday morning. I pushed the container into his hands.
"What is this?" he asked. "Salad dressing? What am I supposed to do with this?"
"It's a facial wash I got from my mom," I explained. "It works really well."
He looked at me, and I met his eyes for a few seconds before I looked away, wondering if I looked as guilty as I felt, not telling him the truth. In a sense, experimenting on him.
"Yeah, okay," he said, putting the capped container into his backpack.
"How was the circle on Saturday?" I whispered to Bree in homeroom. "I'm really sorry I missed it. I tried to call you to see how it went."
"Oh, I got your message," she said regretfully. "My dad and I went to the city yesterday, and I didn't get back till late. Sorry. Got my hair cut, though."
It looked exactly the same, maybe an eighth of an inch shorter.
"It looks great. Anyway, how are things with Cal?"
Her classic brows wrinkled a bit. "Cal is… elusive," she said finally. "He's playing hard to get. I've tried to be alone with him, but it's impossible."
I nodded, hoping my expression of sympathy was winning out over my feelings of relief.
"Yeah. It's starting to really annoy me," she said glumly.
I thought about telling her that I had done a spell for Robbie and that
I was waiting to see what would happen. But, I couldn't form the words, and it, along with my feelings for Cal, became another secret I kept from my best friend.
On Wednesday morning Bree and some of the other members of the circle were sitting on the benches as usual. When I walked up to them, Raven gave me a snide look, but Cal seemed completely sincere when he invited me to sit down.
"I really am sorry about Saturday," I said, mostly to Cal, I guess. "I was all set to drive over to Jenna's when this woman my mom works with called and insisted on dropping by to pick up some stuff. It took forever, and I was so frustrated—"
"I've heard your excuse already, and it's fairly lame," Raven interrupted.
I waited for Bree to step in and defend me in our traditional best-friend solidarity, but she was silent.
"Don't worry about it, Morgan," Cal said easily, washing away the awkwardness left hanging in the air.
At that moment Robbie appeared, and we all just stared. His skin looked better than it had since seventh grade.
Bree's dark eyes flicked to him, grazing his face and processing what she saw. "Robbie," she said. "God, you look terrific."
Robbie shrugged casually and dropped his backpack on the ground. I looked at him closely. His face was still broken out, but if his skin before had been a two on a scale of one to ten, with one being the worst, now it was up to a seven.
I saw Cal glance at him thoughtfully. Then he looked at me, as though assessing my involvement. It was like he knew everything. But he couldn't didn't so I kept quiet.
Keep it to yourself, I commanded Robbie silently. Don't tell anyone what I gave you. Inside, I was elated and flushed with a sense of awe. Had my spell potion really worked? What else could it be? Robbie had been seeing a dermatologist for years, with no visible improvement. Now he shows up after two days of my tincture and looks great. Did this mean I was actually a witch? No, it couldn't be that. I reminded myself. My parents weren't blood witches. I was safe from that. But maybe I did have a small gift for magick.