The Sinister Secrets of the Enchanting Blaze

by Constance Barker

  “I would not do that, not unless she asked. It would be too... personal, no?”

  Chapter 13

  Grace sat on the pink canopy bed, studying the candle, and thinking. She turned it over and over, seeing the owl in flight, the flecks of red and black in the white wax. Given the box in the attic, she started to form a theory. Paisley hadn’t gone looking for a dressed candle to burn away her fear. She had accidentally stumbled upon one. The box was from Will’s Boston apartment. Had he been searching for a way to eliminate his fears?

  As she considered it, she thought it was more likely that the candles had been given to William Cartwright. Perhaps by one of the drug dealers he met while working undercover. That dealer might have learned that Will was a cop. Maybe, just maybe, the power of the candle pushed the young narcotics cop toward taking his own life.

  It was possible to be influenced by magic, Grace knew. She had felt it herself a number of times. Her own thoughts had been turned against her. She had been half-transported to different places against her will. These things were done by ancient objects, artifacts infused with a power beyond understanding. But a candle? She held it at arm’s length. It seemed too simple a thing to influence human thought, human actions.

  Yet Paisley was gone. It was evident that she had half-burned the candle. It was proven that said candle was dressed for magic. Grace was of the opinion that the magic in question was from the black camp.

  Still, where did that leave her?

  She paced the room, tapping the candle against her palm. Why would Paisley run off after being exposed to this supposed fear-eliminating magic? Trying to sort through it, she put the candle on the sill where she found the half-burned one. Gazing down at the street, a scenario occurred. Not for Paisley, but for her brother.

  Like Grace, Will had been an acrophobe—afraid of heights. Was that his greatest fear? Was that Grace’s? She thought not. On several occasions, she had forced herself to overcome that fear. By facing her phobia, she had diminished its hold over her. Is that what Will did? Face his dread atop the Custom House Tower? And could that magic make him truly eradicate his fear...

  ...And jump?

  It was Grace who jumped at the bell-like tone in the room. She realized it was the iPad and hurried over. A message appeared.

  You have 9,723 responses to your post.

  You have 7,228 unread emails.

  At once, the message faded, with Grace having no access to the device. That many responses? she thought. Paisley wasn’t much of a social media butterfly. So why would seventeen hundred people...?

  The thought was so simple, so basic, so undeniable that it struck like lightning, rolled through her like thunder.

  Block the Mainline, the protestors closing bridges. It was bridges more than any other thing that Paisley spoke of, how she suspected their structures were faulty, and were sure to collapse under her. She was barely willing to cross one on her scooter, claiming that she closed her eyes, held her breath and throttled all the way up. She frequently rode the long way from Salem to New Carfax. She refused to cross even the short Essex Bridge at night. It was why Grace was so familiar with this address, and how to get here without crossing a bridge.

  Was she part of the protest, the bridge blockers? It made sense. Will worked in the narcotics unit, and Judge Marvin Stanton let notorious drug dealers walk. It would be an affront to Paisley. And really, what better way to alleviate your fear of bridges than closing them down?

  “Holy shitballs,” she said aloud.

  Grace pulled out her phone to check her newsfeeds. Before the app produced, a much larger, much darker thought raced through her brain. If Will, who worked as an undercover narcotics cop could be influenced... If Paisley, who, despite her sudden obsessions, had the strongest sense of self than anyone Grace had ever met could be influenced...

  Mom.

  Is that why Grace never saw it coming? Laura Longstreet’s husband had disappeared without a word, without a trace. Grace always thought that was what pushed her mother over the edge. That sudden, cruel parting that made Grace hate her father and cling even harder to her mother. As a teenager, she had seen her mother’s confused sorrow, the questions always on her mind. Never in a million years had Grace thought that Mom was so overwrought that she would hang herself. That she would leave her only child behind.

  Could it be possible? Was it just wishful thinking? Grace had spent years so infuriated at both her parents. She bared her teeth as she stared at the candle. Wanting to smash it on the floor, drive the waxy pieces into the rug, the hardwood, she stopped herself. Mom was always leery of Dad’s and Uncle Dave’s business. How had it never occurred to Grace that an object the two men were appraising had veered wildly out of control? On a number of occasions, Grace had almost been swept away herself. And she understood how dangerous Objets de Puissance could be.

  The question now stood, firmly planted, in Grace’s mind: Had magic killed her mother? Grace felt herself breathing too hard, breaking out in a sweat. She found the idea hard to think about—murderous magic, bewitching the innocent. Could she even find the courage, the strength, to open that evil, black box? Did she dare examine those contents? Most of her career, she had dealt with powers most people did not even believe in. There had been casualties. What had kept her going was the idea that, without her work, the list of the dead or missing would grow much longer.

  But what if that was not true? Perhaps any meddling in things beyond human would only bring disaster. Regardless of her intent, what if the family business was a catalyst for the endless succession of dangerous magic seething from an otherly reality?

  The notion crystallized her thoughts. Unable to break the matrix of her thinking, Grace stood, frozen, the idea moving circuitously, perpetually, in her mind. She had no idea how long she stood there. It wasn’t until her cell phone dinged that she came around.

  Shaking her head a little, she glanced at the screen. A text message from Rev. Swift. Shackled thoughts released, she swiped the message open.

  Hey, Grace. My Bro Sam knows an expert on sympathetic magic. Sister B. at Dark Enticements on Washington and Barton Square, Salem.

  Did she need an expert on sympathetic magic? Eyeing the candle, she thought she might. Grace checked the news feeds and saw no signs that Block the Mainline had gone into action. After texting a thanks to Rob Swift, she headed out of the house.

  Chapter 14

  She drove on Hamilton toward Essex Street. On the corner of Essex and Washington, a group of people were taking pictures with the statue of Samantha Stephens from “Bewitched.” Grace made a right and hunted for parking. October was tourist season in Salem. She found a spot across from the post office and walked back.

  The smell hit her when she walked into Dark Enticements. It was not the mingling of herbs, incense and dusty ingredients she would expect from a botánica or metaphysical bookstore. No, this was more a happy slap in the face.

  Chocolate...!

  “Whoa, there girlie, don’t hex up my place!”

  Behind a bar for sampling and drinking chocolate, a tall, slender woman with raven black hair and a purple wrap dress pointed at Grace. The dress was embroidered with stars and moons and she had a matching conical hat.

  “You one of those Boston coven members? You’re out of your territory.” The pointing hand turned into slowly waving fingers, shooing Grace out.

  At her neck, the cameo she had inherited from her mother grew warm. Grace was in the presence of magic. “Sorry, I’m looking for Sister B?”

  The woman side-eyed Grace, showing a severe profile and squinting a green eye at her. Confusion twisted her features for a brief second. “Why? Oh wait—let me guess.”

  Long, slender hands made vague gestures in the air around the woman’s head. She closed her eyes. Voice dropping half an octave, she pronounced: “A friend in dire need... evil in a purse... Paisley must be freed... bad becomes worse... my apologies... the way I converse... magic forces me... to divin
ate in verse...” The hands dropped, and the strange woman opened her eyes. “Damn. Six syllables on that last line. I’m slipping. Did any of that make sense?”

  Grace’s jaw dropped.

  “Oh, good!” Long fingers beckoned Grace to the bar. “Let’s see what you got. You look pretty stressed out. Want to sample some drinking chocolate?”

  “Yes, please!” Grace, who hadn’t eaten since breakfast, took a stool at the bar. “Are you Sister B?”

  The woman did a terrible impression of Sir Alec Guinness. “Now, that’s a name I’ve not heard in a long time. A long time.”

  Grace accepted a cup of thick dark goodness the woman dispensed from a machine behind the bar. “You’re not joining me?”

  “I own a chocolate shop. I’m sick to death of it.”

  “But you are Sister B? Sam Swift said you were an expert on sympathetic magic.”

  “Witchcraft,” the woman corrected. “I’m a witch. Long story short, I was raised in a devout Catholic family—Catholic school, church every day, the whole bit. Do you know what they do to a nice Catholic girl who has The Sight?”

  Grace sipped the rich, thick beverage. Her brain lit up at the taste. She could manage a negative shake of the head.

  “They lock her up in a convent when she turns sixteen. See, in the Catholic faith, anything magical or miraculous outside the domain of the church is considered satanic. So they locked me away to keep an eye on me. But I didn’t want to be Religious, and the Church didn’t want me as an avowed nun. So I looked up some books in the library. The first spell I cast was to win the weekly lottery, the Big Five. I took my eight grand and the first bus out of there. The bus broke down in Salem, next to a chocolate factory. I stepped off the bus and applied for a job. And, let me tell you, when you show up anywhere in a white linen shirt, a black bib dress and a wimple, you get tagged. I got the job, and all the girls called me Sister Beatrice. I mean, I went out and bought new clothes, but it just stuck. Sister B.”

  Chocolate trance fading, Grace eyed the woman. “I thought you said long story short.”

  “I could go on. About meeting the coven, opening my own shop, about living for poverty for a few years due to the Three-Fold Law—”

  “Actually, I’m kind of in trouble here. What you said, the thing about Paisley.”

  Sister B’s brows lowered. “Yeah, what is that about?”

  Grace smirked. “Talk about long stories.”

  “Keep it short. Start with what’s in your purse.”

  Not understanding how Sister B could know about it, Grace pulled out the candle. The witch took a half step back.

  “Smells like brujería.” Sister B examined the candle without touching it. She bent to look at the label on the bottom. “Santa Muerte, huh? I’ve never actually seen a vela sin miedo before. Your friend lit one?”

  Grace nodded. “By accident, I’m pretty sure.”

  “You know what this does?”

  Again, a nod. “It takes away your fear.”

  Sister B made a see-saw gesture. “Yeah, kinda. But this isn’t what you might term a self-help candle. You don’t just bargain with a bruja for one of these because you’re afraid of spiders. No, this is a curse, a direct attack. Because of the Three-Fold Law, that is, whatever you do to someone comes back at you three-fold when you work spells, the theoretically positive aspect of this curse keeps the conjurer safe. Karmically, I guess a layman would say.”

  “Black magic,” Grace whispered.

  “Black magic?” Sister B cackled—actually cackled—and slapped her hand on the bar. “Girlie, magic is like chocolate. The darker it is, the more real it is. And ‘white magic?’” She made quote marks in the air with her slender fingers. “Is about as real as ‘white chocolate.’” Again, finger quotes. “In other words, there’s no such thing as white chocolate or white magic.”

  Grace made a face. “White chocolate is a thing.”

  “It’s a thing, but it doesn’t have cocoa in it, or caffeine or theobromine—the things that make chocolate chocolate.”

  She tried to steer Sister B back to magic. “What would my friend do if she were cursed by the candle?”

  Sister B took the jar candle, slowly twirling it. “This thing has a lot of mojo. Blood magic, black kyanite. It’s one hell of a hex; very aggressive magic. It would cause the victim to pursue the eradication of their fear above all else.”

  “Can the spell be broken?” she watched the witch casually handling the candle

  Sister B nodded. “Oh, yeah. You just have to make the victim afraid again. Of course, once they get hexed, they’ll be utterly fearless.”

  When she handed the candle back, Grace hesitated. “I’ve been carrying them around. Will they curse me, too?”

  The witch shook her head. “Lighting the wick sends the spell to work. The victim offers fire. Besides, you’ve got some kind of magic protection on you. I’ve felt it since you walked in. I can’t get a read off you at all. Let’s give it some effort.”

  Once Grace took the candle, Sister B made some gestures in the air. At her neck, the sardonyx cameo tingled in warning. Raven hair rose around the witch’s head, as if Sister B was receiving a fierce electric shock. The warning sensation became a buzzing burn. Grace yelped, gripping the necklace.

  Sister B closed her eyes, face to the ceiling. In her deeper voice, the witch chanted:

  “Make clear to my inner sight

  Lined in brightest noonday light

  By words both plain and erudite

  Reveal her to me by this rite!”

  The charge from the necklace turned to burning. Grace could feel it on her neck, in her palm. In a few moments, Sister B’s hair dropped back down. The cameo’s warning faded. The witch shrugged. “That’s some strong protection. I took a shot. So who are you?”

  She had a reputation, and not necessarily a good one among magic circles. But the witch had provided some information. She acquiesced. “Grace Longstreet.”

  “Ah. A Longstreet. Someone comes in with a powerful magic object, but has no idea what it is—I should’ve suspected.”

  “What does that mean?”

  The witch folded her arms. “It means that you might know something about de-cursing ancient objects, but you know nothing about magic. We’re done here.”

  Chapter 15

  Back out on the street, Grace’s emotions whirled. She wasn’t sure whether to be angry at the curt dismissal, or freaked out that the woman had cast spells at her. Trying to clear her head, she took a deep breath. In the meanwhile, Sister B had pretty much confirmed Grace’s suspicion that Paisley was among the Block the Mainline protesters.

  It was hard to imagine Paisley walking on a major bridge. Even when Grace drove her over the little Essex Bridge, Paisley made a panicked face and held her breath. Given the many rivers in the North Shore area, gephyrophobia was an inconvenient anxiety disorder.

  While it was the best lead she’d had so far, albeit far from concrete, Grace was still left nowhere. Not even the police had been able to anticipate Block the Mainline’s flash mob protests. While they were nuisance protests at best, people were still riled up about blocked bridges.

  What was Grace supposed to do? Drive around crossing bridges until she ran into a protest group? She didn’t have time for that. The thought prompted her to check the time on her phone. Nine hours until midnight, and the anniversary of Will’s death. She hardly had any time at all.

  There was also a notification from Google News. Grace had muted the phone before walking into Dark Enticements, but she hadn’t even felt the phone buzz. She swiped right, and felt the wind go out of her.

  Protesters Gather on Tobin Bridge.

  Grace hurried down the street to the post office and her Prius. As she started the car, the first words from the radio were “bumper to bumper traffic on southbound Route 1.” With the dire traffic report in the background, she checked the news app. Breaking news: Protesters close Tobin Bridge. Local news carried helico
pter footage, or maybe it was drones, now, of the approach to the bridge. It was a virtual parking lot.

  What the hell could she do? Paisley was on that bridge—somehow, she just knew it. She called Pete Willoughby.

  “Hey, Grace, how’s your—”

  “Pete, I think Paisley’s on that bridge.”

  “Wait. What? I thought Paisley had a bridge phobia.”

  “She might try to hurt herself. The anniversary of Will’s death is midnight tonight.”

  Putting Pete on speaker, she sped off, cars already thickening on Salem streets. But where was she going? No way could she hope to reach the bridge. Traffic was already at a standstill, rush hour barely starting.

  “Let me get a hold of some friends on the State Police. We’ll put out a BOLO on her, make her a person at risk. How hard can it be to spot her? She’s got green hair and looks like Lady Dracula.”

  Grace made an illegal U-turn, an idea forming. “She’s a lot harder to spot than you’d think.”

  “Let us handle this, Grace. There’s no point in you trying to get to her. And if you think she’s a danger to herself, she may well be a danger to others.”

  Paisley being a danger to anything other than coffee that came from a civet’s butt seemed ludicrous. And yet...

  “Keep me updated, okay?” she asked. “Please?”

  “I will, Grace. Don’t worry. We’ll find her.”

  Retracing her path to the chocolate shop, she pulled up to The Old Lady’s house. It was too early for her to be home from work. Grace didn’t want to explain herself anyway. Unlocking the door, she raced for the stairs. Esmerelda was sitting with a little boy in the living room.

  “Feed the snake,” Grace shouted, running to the second floor.

  In Paisley’s room, she unceremoniously dumped the contents of the Goth’s bag on the pink bed. Wallet, makeup, makeup and more makeup. She fished through, finding a tiny key with an orange, heart-shaped plastic cover. Her fingers felt sweaty as she held it up.