BOSTON
Bridget scans the surroundings. ‘Maybe we should try to get in through the back.’
‘Makes sense.’ Luna motions her to go first. They make their way to the little alleyway next to the house. A solid door blocks their entry into the yard. Bridget gets out her tools to break in, but Luna reaches past her, puts her hand on the lock and says simply ‘open!’ It clicks open. Bridget can’t hide her scowl. ‘You should try it sometimes,’ winks Luna. Bridget pushes the door open and is ready to step in, when Luna grabs her arm and pulls her back ‘This is a witch’s garden, not something to enter lightly.’ Damn it, she can be so stupid, this time she motions for her mother to go first. Luna throws her arms wide, and it’s as a wave pulses from her, sure enough, sparks light up the garden. It’s protected. ‘Do you want to take care of this?’ motions Luna.
‘No. Go ahead. I don’t want to mess it up.’
‘Try it. No pain, no gain. How do you expect to sharpen your skills?’
‘We don’t have time for me to fiddle around. The police could show up with a warrant anytime. Now hurry up.’
‘As you wish,’ Luna closes her eyes and it looks like she’s drawing power from the earth. Bridget follows her movements closely, now she sees her mother using the available energy around her. For a moment, she forgets to watch the alley and is fascinated by the grace of the weaving that Luna is making. Her Mom is a formidable witch. She seems to use the plants in the garden to dismantle the security. Bridget would have never thought of that. Slowly the tension level in the garden subsides, and Luna nods that they can go in.
This garden is very different from Tara’s garden. It feels as if the plants are reaching for you, it’s not as tranquil as she would expect. They walk over a small path that seems to wind through the whole garden. Even Bridget recognizes some very toxic plants. There seem to be way more insects than usual. A colossal spider made a web between two trees, centipedes, potato bugs, roaches, you name it, quickly scurry away. Finally, the path opens up and reveals the back door. Luna steps aside, Bridget feels the door, it’s open. A musky smell comes from inside the house. For a moment, they get that fuzzy sweet old lady feeling. Bridget shakes it off; this must be a remnant of a spell used on Hayes and Connor. Very slowly she opens the door, from her back pocket she draws her wand. A small-satisfied smile plays over Luna’s lips. Bridget doesn’t step inside, but she touches the wall with her wand and asks with her inner voice ‘Is it open, is it safe. Can we pass in the Goddess name?’ As if she had flipped a switch the whole house lights up. Bright red angry lines seem to travel all through the house. Luna peeks over her shoulder. ‘Well, that will be a challenge.’
‘Can you deactivate that?’ As it doesn’t look like they could maneuver in between the lines.
‘No, it’s too complex, it would take days.’
‘We don’t have days. So, this is it?’
Luna rolls her eyes. ‘How did you ever become a detective? Don’t give up so easily. There is always a way.’
‘I’m not giving up. But if we can’t defuse it, what will happen when the police arrive and set it off.’ Bridget absentmindedly plays with the two amulets around her neck. Luna touches the one Tara had given her. ‘That might work.’
Luna gives Bridget a little push, and she steps in the path of the first angry red line.
‘Hey! What the hell are you doing?’ Frantically she wants to step back, but the line seems to flow around the shield and stay connected. She freezes.
‘Sometimes it’s best not to over think it.’
Bridget gives her mother another killer look. ‘What about you?’
Luna smiles and pulls a similar amulet from her pocket. ‘What kind of Witch would I be if I showed up unprepared?’ Again, Luna knows to hit her where it hurts. It takes everything Bridget has to let this slide and focus on why they are here. The earlier awe she felt for her mother is gone like a puff of smoke. She can’t wait for Luna to go back to New Orleans.
‘Let’s get this over with,’ she says instead.
‘Do you want to split up?’
Bridget shakes her head. ‘It feels too easy, let us stick together.’
The house is quiet, the musky smell hangs throughout the house, but now they’re aware of the effect it doesn’t touch them anymore. The interior is stark and modern, nothing cozy about it. The grey blinds are shut, and the little light that filters through makes the house feel spooky. Vampires are the first thing that comes to mind as they wander through the empty rooms with designer furniture. There’s nothing personal on the wall and nothing witch-related. There must be something; this lady didn’t cook up her spells on that twenty-thousand-dollar couch. Luna motions Bridget over to the hallway, a door is there, Bridget hadn’t seen that earlier.
‘It had a spell on it,’ whispers Luna. Bridget grumbles, she has to use her senses. Right.
They make their way down the stairs, it’s pitch black down here. Bridget gets her flashlight out and almost screams when she finds herself face to face with a goat skull. So much for being a tough detective. Luna suppresses a laugh behind her. It keeps getting worse and worse. All sorts of animal skulls are hanging from the ceiling, rows of shelves are fitted along the walls and hold every dark witch necessity that you can think of and then some more. The place has been emptied in a hurry, but there’s still plenty left behind. Intrigued, they walk along the shelves and stop and stare at various curious items. But nothing is as scary as the table that dominates the middle of the room. The legs of the table are wood carvings of humans in the most horrific poses. They look tortured and screaming. It’s like she can actually hear their voices. The images are so lifelike; Bridget could swear they were moving. When Luna touches the table, a yelp escapes her. Blisters form on her hand. ‘Oh my God, this is awful.’
‘Are you okay?’
For once, Luna seems lost for words. A tear escapes her. ‘I think… I think… there are souls in there.’
‘What?!’ Horror shows on Bridget’s face.
‘We need to try to free them.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘These… these people have been tortured for a long time. We can’t leave them like this.’
Cal and Lucy stop in front of the house. ‘We’re too late. Somebody is in the house.’
Cal looks around but doesn’t see anything. ‘I don’t see anybody.’
‘I can feel it.’ Lucy throws the door open, right when Connor parks his car in front of the house.
‘Shit! Grandma, get back in.’ Lucy shuts the car door, while Cal takes off at what he hopes is an inconspicuous speed. In his rear-view mirror, he sees Connor getting out. ‘What do we do now?’
Lucy glances back. ‘Loop around the block and park across the street, maybe we’ll get a chance to slip in unnoticed. A pity it’s not the female detective.’
Connor stands in front of the house. This whole case makes his hair stand up in the back of his neck. Hayes is not herself. While she was busy getting a warrant, he thought he would do some more investigating himself. It all seems to start here, at the creepy house.
Bridget and Luna hear banging on the door.
‘We’re out of time, the police are here, we have to go.’
‘I need to do this, you go.’ Luna rushes past the shelves and quickly grabs some herbs, candles and feathers. ‘Go! I can do this.’ She starts to put the candles in the four corners with a snap of her fingers she activates a circle, it’s not the way to do it, but it just has to work. She rushes around the table while she sprinkles salt around it and starts an incantation in a language Bridget hadn’t heard before. It sounds ancient, the table seems to respond. It bulges and swells. Luna is super focused. Bridget feels useless and goes to the bottom of the stairs, it’s quiet now. Maybe it was just the mailman or something.
‘Hurry up!’ But Luna is in a trance and doesn’t hear her. She waves with
the feathers and her incantation reaches a high. A loud boom. The whole house rocks on its foundations, the souls escape in a funnel of light. Searching for a way out; it rushes up the stairs and knocking Bridget over. Then it blows out the windows and the front door. It throws Connor off his feet. One soul hovers in front of Luna. It seems to say thank you while tears stream down her face. And then it evaporates into the air. Bridget and Luna scramble up. For a moment, it’s very quiet. Then Bridget hears somebody shouting something. It’s Connor calling for back up. He draws his gun and carefully approaches the house. Luna stares at the table, it exploded from the inside out. Wood splinters are stuck in everything; she even picks some out of her cheek. A small drop of blood starts to flow down her cheek. Bridget quickly looks around and notices a small dark booklet on a ledge. In an impulse, she puts it into her pocket. There is no place to hide, so Bridget rushes up the stairs and drags Luna up behind her.
Lucy’s anger rolls out of her in waves. Somebody set her souls free, all that hard work. It also shorted her wards. This is infuriating. From her car, she sees the chaos, a police car comes charging around the corner, siren screaming. Connor slowly approaching the house with his gun drawn. She can’t imagine it’s the work of that ignorant girl, that Granddaughter of Tara. It’s clear she doesn’t have the skills, so does that mean Tara is in the house? It would be typically something that she would do. Bleeding heart. Cal starts the car. ‘Wait,’ says Lucy ‘I want to see which witch did this.’ Cal turns off the car again and stays quiet.
Connor looks around in the hallway when Bridget comes up the stairs followed by Luna. In a reflex he points his gun out at Bridget. ‘Freeze!’
‘Wow! Connor, it’s me.’ Confusion washes over his face when he recognizes Bridget. ‘Madigan? What the hell did you do?’
Bridget minds races, she can’t tell him they freed souls. ‘We must have triggered some device.’
‘What are you doing here?! And who’s that? Is there anybody else in the house?’ Connor frantically looks around and points his gun at Luna.
More police cars stop in front of the house and they hear them shouting outside.
‘She’s my Mom. You can put your gun down. There’s nobody else here.’
‘ALL CLEAR!’ Connor shouts to the police outside. One of them takes a peek through the broken window. ‘You’re sure?’
‘Let’s do a sweep to double check.’ To Bridget, he says, ‘You have a lot of explaining to do. Trespassing. Messing up the investigation. What a mess!’ Bridget shrugs.
‘Did you at least find anything?’
‘Take a look down below, this Granny was into some weird shit.’ Connor looks at the stairs, ‘let’s take a look.’ Bridget follows him down, while she says to her mother. ‘Wait outside. Don’t talk to anyone.’ A police officer escorts her out. ‘Follow me, Ma’am. We need to have you checked out.’ Luna only now realizes blood is still flowing down her cheek. ‘Don’t worry I’m fine.’ She fishes a handkerchief from her pocket and pushes it against her cheek.
Connor takes in the devastation in the basement. ‘What the hell happened here?’
Absentmindedly, Bridget fingers the little book she found inside. No need to mention that to Connor. ‘I don’t know, the table exploded, it must have had some sort of explosive attached.’
‘You’ve been lucky.’ Connor’s eyes glance over all the wooden pieces stuck in the walls.
Outside, Lucy looks at Luna and instantly recognizes another powerful witch. Next to her Cal gasps ‘Wow, Grandma, she must be family.’ Luna resembles Tara and of course also Lucy.
‘Yes, she is. Did you see her when you were in New Orleans?’
‘No, I would have remembered.’
Lucy throws out a little probe with an almost careless flick of her wrist. Instantly, Luna turns around and zones in on her.
‘Drive.’ Luna starts to walk towards them. Cal starts the car and speeds away.
Luna turns to Bridget who just steps outside. ‘It was her!’
When the car turns around the corner, it gets hit by a spell. The car bounces and swirls but manages to make the turn and disappears. Bridget is ready to give her mother a tongue lash, when she turns she sees Luna is looking around and zones in on a couple across the street. Bridget follows her gaze and recognizes Gwen. ‘Damn.’ Quickly, she crosses the street. Gwen and the unknown young man hesitate and decide to stay put. Luna had followed her daughter as magic is involved she better make sure to have her back.
‘Gwen. What are you doing here?’ demands Bridget.
‘Do you think we would sit at home and let the police handle this? We’re here to get our property back.’
‘It’s not here,’ says Luna. Gwen cocks her head and Luna feels a gentle caress over her aura. How rude. She doesn’t hesitate to return the gesture. This witch is airy, like the Madigans are fiery. Bridget steps in between the two women.
‘You shouldn’t be here. We’ll handle this. It’s a police investigation and this is an active crime scene.’
Dripping with sarcasm, the young man chimes in, ‘You and your Mom. Police investigation my ass. You want it for yourself.’ Gwen puts her hand on his arm, and he falls quiet.
‘We know how important it is to you. You have to trust us and let us handle this.’
Gwen can’t hide her skepticism ‘You promise to give it back?’
‘Madigan!’ Connor joins them not pleased with her. ‘What are you doing?’
Bridget answers smoothly, ‘We hoped they might have seen the license plate of the car.’
‘We did,’ says Gwen, ‘The number is NW7834.’
‘Thank you,’ Connor waves over a police officer. ‘Please give him your statement.’
Bridget and Luna take the opportunity to quietly move away.
‘Do you promise?’ Whispers Gwen’s voice in her head while she walks away. Bridget pretends she didn’t hear that.
This is apparently the day to get shouted at. The Captain is exploding, his face turning bright red, and the spray of saliva coming from his mouth fascinates Bridget. She has never seen him so angry.
‘What the hell do you think you were doing?! Interfering in an investigation. Losing a suspect.’ Bridget opens her mouth—
‘Don’t! There is nothing you can say right now that I want to hear. This is such a mess. Taking your mother to a suspect’s house?! I gave you the benefit of the doubt. Not anymore, you’re suspended. Give me your badge.’
‘But Sir?!’
‘GIVE ME YOUR BADGE!’
Slowly Bridget gets her badge and gun out. This hurts much more than she ever thought it could.
‘What now?’
‘Now you go home and cool off. First, we are going to get to the bottom of this case. Then we’ll see what we will do with you.’
Bridget sputters, but the Captain silences her. ‘Go! I don’t want to see you.’
He turns his back on her. She’s dismissed.
A million thoughts race through Bridget’s head. She scratches her leg; just what she needs, a stupid itch. Luna leans on the corner of Tom’s desk, staring at a picture of Tom. Like she’s a million miles away. What is going on? Is it a by-product of the spell?
Gosh, now the itch is on her back. She tries to reach the spot, but her arms are too short. Finally, a doorpost provides some relief, she scratches her back along the edge of the doorframe. Ahhhh, much better. She walks over to Luna. ‘Come, Luna, we need to go.’
‘We need to go and see Tom’
‘Why? He’s healed, he will be out of the hospital soon enough.’
‘He’s been through a trauma. Do you want to have him sort this out by himself? We used magic. We need to help him make sense of this all.’
The itch moved to her arm, vigorously she scratches, but all her attention is on her Mom. Unconsciously she mumbles a spell, ‘Itch go aw
ay, I don’t need you today. Let me be, so mote it be.’ The itch vanishes.
Bridget weighs her options; her mother might be right. ‘Okay. Let’s see how he’s doing and we can give him an update. Or something. We need to get our story straight.’
Ping. A text message from Ceri; ‘Much better! Keep it up.’
Well, that’s the only positive so far. For the first time, she had reacted.
Lucy and Cal have changed cars and are restlessly waiting across the street until the police are finally gone from the house. It’s dark, now is their best chance. Lucy is already by the door, Cal rushes to keep up. Lucy feels the air, but only humans have been here recently. Impatient she opens the door and without hesitation goes down the stairs. Her whole basement is empty. The police took everything. Those witches messed up her plan. Everything should have burned down. She has to have her little book back. ‘We need to go to the police station.’
‘We can’t break in there.’
‘We’re witches.’ Lucy can no longer contain her anger and lashes out with her wand, and the now lifeless table catches fire. ‘Let’s go.’ The fire starts to spread while they walk out. Even before they drive off, the first flames are visible behind the windows. Lucy doesn’t look back.
PART 4
FOUR OF PENTACLES ‘PROTECTION’
‘Your silence will not protect you’
—Audre Lorde
NEW ORLEANS
The early morning sun washes over the Madigan’s garden. Tara watches from her windowsill. The birds are awake; the bees are already buzzing and gathering their nectar from the abundance of flowers in the yard. For a couple more minutes, she lets the sun rays warm her old bones. The last couple of days have been invigorating. As the house came back to life. Ever since Seamus has passed away, it seems that the heart of the family has been ripped out. He was always the driving force, the glue that kept them all together. His energy, artistic visions, and colorful character were intoxicating. Now it appears that her granddaughter has brought home such a man. Wes’s view of the world, his whirlwind personality lights up the house. Maeve is coming out of her shell, and the others are stopping by more often. Strange how one person can have such a positive impact. Bridget probably doesn’t realize what a special person she has found. Like Tara never fully appreciated Seamus. Slowly she turns to his portrait. ‘Did I take you for granted?’ Seamus gives her a tender smile, which seems to tell her not to take it so hard. ‘Right. Let us see what the day will bring.’ She grabbed the card from her altar, put it back in the deck, shuffles, and fans the cards. Her left hand lingers over the fan, back and forth. This one! She pulls the four of pentacles, her face falls. A possum fiercely protects his pentacles. The miser, what is she over protecting? What is she holding onto too tight? With a sigh, she puts it on her altar. Again she glances at Seamus. ‘I know; it could be much worse. Not a great card, but definitely not a bad one either.’
The Dagger Page 14