by Isobel Bird
More and more young people are becoming involved in Wicca, and more and more often issues like the wearing of pagan-oriented jewelry and starting Wiccan-related groups in schools are being addressed by school administrations. If you find yourself involved in a situation where your rights as a Wiccan are being violated, know that the law is on your side. If you have to fight against a school administration that doesn’t support your rights – either because they simply don’t understand what Wicca is or because they don’t agree with it – try to view it as an opportunity to educate people. Talk to newspapers and television reporters. Get them interested in your story. Talk to your fellow students. Use the information available to you to let others know what Wicca is and (just as important) isn’t. Remember, you are a representative for Wicca when you do these things. Present the Craft in a way that is positive, but also shows that you know your rights. When you do that, you empower yourself and you help others understand how important it is to respect one another’s beliefs.
– Isobel Bird
Follow the
with Book 9:
Through the Veil
Annie stood on the street, looking up at the house in front of her. The street lamp beside her cast a warm pool of light around her feet, which were bare, and the cold night air chilled her skin. She rubbed her arms, shivering. Why am I outside? she wondered.
Fire! Annie thought. That house is on fire!
Then she knew where she was and why the house was so familiar to her. It wasn’t just any house. It was her house. Not the house she lived in now in Beecher Falls with her Aunt Sarah and her younger sister, Meg, but the house she had lived in when she was a little girl. It was her house, and it was burning.
Not again, she thought, fear overcoming her as she realized what was happening. Not again.
She tried to move, but her feet wouldn’t carry her forward. All she could do was watch as the flames in the window grew brighter. She wanted to scream, to call for help, but her voice was frozen inside of her. She knew that behind the window she was lying on the couch, where she’d fallen asleep after sneaking downstairs to plug in the Christmas tree lights and watch them twinkle. And she knew that her parents and Meg were still asleep upstairs, oblivious to the danger that was creeping toward them as the flames spread quickly through the house.
But now she had a chance to save her whole family. She knew that. All she had to do was run into the house. All she had to do was get her feet to move. She could find them and lead them to safety. They wouldn’t have to die because of her.
She tried to move forward, but she couldn’t. She was frozen, helpless, as she watched her house burn with her parents inside of it. No matter how much she tried to will herself forward her body wouldn’t obey her. Something was holding her back.
She woke up then, knowing instantly that the dream was over. That was how it always ended. But she hadn’t had the dream in almost three years. Why had it come back now?
About the Author
Isobel Bird has been involved in the world of paganism and witchcraft for many years. She lives and dances beneath the moon somewhere in New England.
Credits
Cover art © 2001 by Cliff Nielsen
Cover © 2001 by HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.
THE FIVE PATHS. Copyright © 2001 by Isobel Bird. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
KNOW YOUR RIGHTS. Copyright © 2001 by Isobel Bird.
ePub edition. September 2001 ISBN 9780061756559
Print edition first published in 2001 by HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.
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