by Tanya Milne
I hadn’t known that putting distance between Ezra and me was going to feel this bad. I heard the word witchcraft and looked up at Noah, who’d spoken.
‘Sorry, what did you say?’ I asked.
Noah studied me for a split second longer than necessary. ‘I was saying what a strange coincidence that we’re studying witchcraft when that new law has just been passed.’
I avoided exchanging glances with Elijah and kept my voice even. ‘What new law?’
‘Apparently, witchcraft is now against the law and anyone caught practicing it will be arrested and charged.’
‘What!?’ I said again, louder than intended.
‘I know, it’s a bit odd,’ said Elijah, giving me a quick look to pull it together. ‘But we all know Orpheus Blackthorn is nuts, so I guess it’s no real surprise. He’ll be banning unicorns next.’
Anna and Noah laughed, but a smile didn’t even reach my face. The wedge between Ezra and I would need to be permanent; there was no chance for us now.
Elijah and Anna started talking as though there were no one else in the room. Noah, sitting next to me, leant towards me. ‘You’re very quiet. Care to talk about it?’
‘Just a bit tired,’ I said, checking my watch, calculating that I had three more hours until I could head home.
‘Look, I need to ask you, did Ezra ask you to the dance?’
I wanted to click my fingers and disappear, but it was better to rip the Band-Aid off in one day.
‘He did,’ I said quietly, remembering his sweet note.
‘Oh,’ he said, the smile slipping from his face. ‘And did you accept?’
‘I said no, actually.’ I watched his face, hope igniting his every feature. ‘I told him I don’t dance. Last place I’d go.’
Noah turned his head on an angle.
‘You should ask Jen. I know she likes you and I bet she likes to dance,’ I said.
And I bet she’d like to kiss you.
‘Oh,’ said Noah. ‘I didn’t want to ask Jen. I don’t like Jen.’ He sighed. ‘I like you, Eva. Can’t you see?’
I looked up at him. Every part of him was high in the sky, flying in the breeze. This was so much harder than I thought.
‘Noah, I think you’re great and I like you a lot, as a friend. I’m sorry.’
Noah’s face went blotchy and he turned away.
‘I thought so,’ he said. ‘You like Ezra.’
My face started to burn, and my words came out loud and blunt. ‘Noah, I don’t like anyone, okay. And anyway, it’s none of your business.’ Standing quickly, I grabbed my bag, and then strode away from the table, my head spinning.
I’d had enough thinking about boys, and thanks to my ongoing battle with my parents, I had delayed learning about witchcraft. Enough was enough – tonight I would make a start.
Chapter Ten
As Elijah and I walked through our front door after school, I sensed tension in the air. We stopped and glanced around. Normally the house was quiet and peaceful at this time of day with our parents at work, but the house seemed braced, ready for something.
‘Is that you, Elijah, Eva?’ said Dad, walking from the kitchen.
I blinked a few times as I took a good look at Dad. He had lost weight, and his body and face looked hollow. I felt the sharp prick of guilt.
‘You okay?’ I asked, walking to hug my dad, who was so much like Elijah – funny, loving and caring.
Dad took me in his arms and hugged me tight. ‘Can’t tell you how good it is to see you up and about.’
‘What about me?’ said Elijah, crossing his arms and tapping his foot, barely able to contain the smile on his face.
‘Come here, son,’ said Dad, who hugged Elijah as he had hugged me. He stood back and ruffled Elijah’s hair. ‘Since when did you get taller than me?’
‘Since like two years ago, old man.’
Dad laughed, but all of a sudden he appeared far more like an old man than the youthful dad he’d always been.
‘What’s wrong?’ I asked.
‘Everything is okay, but we need to chat.’
We followed Dad into the kitchen, where he had hot chocolates set out for us, just as he did when we were little and he had something he wanted to talk to us about.
‘This must be serious,’ said Elijah.
Dad laughed nervously.
‘Out with it, Dad,’ I said, taking my seat.
Dad glanced between the two of us. ‘I’m not sure whether you’ve heard, but Orpheus Blackthorn has introduced a set of new laws today that places us all in more danger.’
‘We heard that anyone caught practising witchcraft will be arrested and punished,’ I said.
‘What’s going on, Dad? No one has been anti-witchcraft since like the 1600s,’ said Elijah.
Dad nodded, his face pale. He was quiet when he spoke. ‘I know, it’s almost impossible to believe. But what you may not realise is that religious fanatics have been opposed to witchcraft for all the ages – they see it as a form of the devil. We can only assume that Orpheus believes this as well.’
‘He’s nuts,’ said Elijah before taking a sip from his drink. ‘At least he’ll never find out about us.’
Dad gazed at me and swallowed. ‘It’s become very dangerous for our kind. Orpheus is becoming like a…dictator before our eyes.’
A dictator?
But that didn’t happen here, where we lived. And certainly not in 2025.
‘He’s displaying all of the character traits. A thirst for absolute power, fanaticism, special police, unlimited control, and that dangerous blend of charisma and paranoia.’
‘Surely someone can do something about it?’ I said.
‘You would think so, but the rest of the world is trying to get on their feet again. We’re a small country that no one cares about. And besides, he’s started to censor our communication.’
‘What!’ Elijah and I said at the same time.
‘That’s not in the news, so you will need to keep that a secret, but it’s true. My boss, who knows someone who works for Orpheus, told him. They’re monitoring our mail, and there’s talk they’ll start monitoring our phones.’
I sat back in my chair. I felt as though I’d swallowed a thousand stones that sat in the base of my stomach.
‘This can’t be happening,’ said Elijah.
‘I’m afraid, son, that it can and is.’
‘Can’t we move home, say our family back home needs us?’ said Elijah.
Dad looked away, his eyes filling with tears.
I put my hand on his arm. ‘Dad, what’s wrong?’
He wiped his tears away. ‘They’re under investigation for witchcraft.’
‘By Orpheus? But they live over a hundred kilometres away,’ said Elijah.
‘He’s controlling our whole country. Everything that’s happening here is happening everywhere,’ said Dad.
‘Are they…okay?’ I asked.
‘For now,’ said Dad. ‘Our family has long associations with witchcraft. There are people who remember, people who have turned on our family. But they have no proof, so they’re just watching our relatives closely.’
‘What?’ I stood up and paced the kitchen. ‘How can this even be happening?’
‘I know, it’s very hard to believe, but still, we must,’ said Dad.
‘Do they know we’re related?’ said Elijah. His face appeared to be set in stone.
‘No, not yet. We’re lucky we left when we did. Lucky we told people we were moving countries.’
I remembered back to that lie we were forced to tell to everyone; a lie I had resented; a lie that we were lucky to have told.
‘This is madness,’ I mumbled, thinking of my family back home. My aunts, uncles and cousins, all under the watchful eyes of a madman – Ezra’s dad.
‘I know, but that’s why we need to be so careful.’
‘I agree. We shouldn’t even talk about it anymore, even say the word out loud,’ said Elijah.
Dad and Elijah watched me.
I thought about the promise I’d made to myself only hours ago, to start learning how to become the witch I was born to be.
‘Eva, you know how your mother and I agreed that you can learn witchcraft.’
I narrowed my eyes and waited.
‘But not right now. It’s too dangerous for you, for Elijah and us all,’ said Dad.
Elijah’s violet-blue eyes stared intently at me. If I lied, he would know. If I demanded to start learning, I would send fear into his heart. I glanced out through the window at the tree branches that swayed to the rhythm of the wind.
‘Eva,’ said Dad. ‘Please tell me you agree to wait.’
I sat up straighter and looked my dad in the eyes. ‘I will try to, Dad. Really, I will, but I can’t promise. The desire within me is strong. It burns in my veins and I don’t know if I’ll be able to deny it.’
Elijah’s mouth literally dropped open, while Dad watched me in a way he hadn’t before, as if he’d seen another whole side to me he hadn’t known about.
‘C’mon, sis, you can’t be serious. This is…’
‘I know, Elijah. I know what’s at stake and like I said, I will go against my own desire and try my hardest to pretend I’m not the person I am. But I can’t promise, because this feeling I have inside me may be stronger than I am. So, I’m not going to tell you what you want to hear, because that would be a lie.’
Dad put his hand on my arm. ‘Eva, I appreciate your honesty and believe it or not, I understand. In all my years of witchcraft, I’ve seen many things, and although I’ve never seen anyone with a…desire like yours, I’ve read about it.’
Elijah stared at me as though I had two heads. It was the first time we hadn’t seen eye to eye on something so fundamentally important.
‘I’m sorry, Elijah,’ I said, standing, knocking my chair to the ground before turning and racing up the stairs and into my attic bedroom, where I shut my door and locked it behind me.
Big, fat tears welled up in my eyes and ran down my face. I grabbed a tissue and wiped them away, yelping as the tissue pressed against my black eye. In front of me my mirror revealed that my normal olive skin as pale as a cloud, my hair long and wild, my left eye as black as the night and my right eye swollen and red. But there, within my face, was something I’d never seen before. Where there had been softness was an edge. Where there had been innocence was innocence lost. I looked uncertain, wary; I looked like a witch.
I stepped back from the mirror, but I was still there, staring like an accusation. A fine film of sweat covered my body. I turned and walked to bed, then lay down as still as the air inside a cave.
In the last few months, my life had turned inside out and upside down. Nothing made sense on one level, but on another level – for the first time – it made perfect sense. Now that I knew my identity, I couldn’t deny it. I closed my eyes and tried to calm the storm raging inside me.
Finally, my heart slowed and my mind cleared. I opened my eyes and looked up at the books on my bedside table. Some of the books faced in the opposite direction to where I’d placed them. I sat up, my eyes raking the room, realising that my belongings were now slightly out of place.
My skin crawled. Someone had been in my room.
I jumped from bed and walked around my room, feeling as though my sanctuary had been invaded. Why would someone come into my room? I checked my window. It was still locked. Someone had to come from inside the house.
Inside!
The lightbulb in my head went on. Of course, the book on witchcraft. My parents had been in here, searching for it. My heartbeat sped up as I looked down at the floorboard that hid my book – my only link to who I really was.
I listened for a few seconds, but the house was quiet. I quickly made my way to the rug, raised it and released the floorboard. There, sitting exactly where I’d left it those few weeks ago, was my book.
Carefully, I picked up the book, heavy in my hands. Sitting back on my bed, I traced my fingers over the five-pointed star surrounded by a circle that connected each point. Within each of the points of the star were five different elemental symbols – earth, air, water, fire, and spirit. It was the same symbol on the necklace my mother gave me when I was a girl. A necklace I’d been forbidden to wear as it was a family heirloom, but I sometimes wore if I could hide it behind my clothes. I put my hand there now, as I sometimes did when I wore it, and felt a warmth spread through me.
The desire to open the book was strong. I remembered back to the promise I’d made myself to learn my craft, and then I remembered my promise to try to resist the temptation to learn.
The battle within me was strong. I felt the pull and push, and I knew which part was winning. I put the book down on the ground as though it were on fire. The front cover opened and there, staring up at me, were words, ancient words. Before I could look away, I started to read, the words quietly released from my lips.
Deep inside her lies a sleeping witch
Resting for a thousand years
But the moon up high now shines upon her face
Inside her, her soul stirs
Slowly now until she is wide awake
One by one
Whispers from a thousand souls
The living and the dead
Stir her five powers to life
Now, within her very being lie the two sides to her witching power
Will she turn her head towards the sun
and give light to those souls in need
Or will the dark hand of the night take her
Down, down into its depths
And teach her to do its bidding
Choose carefully, dear witch, for once a path is chosen
It cannot be undone
I finished reading at the same time that I heard heavy footsteps on the stairs.
Elijah!
Sent to talk some sense into me, no doubt. All my life I had nothing to hide from him. But now my path had turned away from his. I couldn’t let him see the book, know that I had read some of it, realise where I hid it.
He knocked on the door, tried the door handle.
‘Eva,’ he said, sounding more like our dad than ever. ‘Open up. We need to talk.’
I took in the book in my hands, the open floorboard and upturned rug.
‘Go away!’ I said.
For a few moments he was quiet, and I pictured his face as he realised that he no longer understood his sister.
‘Nope, I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to stand here until you let me in.’
Crap! Crap! Crap!
I could hear Elijah’s heavy breathing outside my door.
‘Come on, sis – open up, why don’t you?’
‘I need five minutes, Elijah, then I’ll come find you.’
‘Five minutes,’ said Elijah before letting out a long sigh and trudging off down the stairs.
I turned to the open book in my hands and the words sitting there, questions swirling through my brain. My hand rested, hot and heavy, on the book, and the desire to turn the page burned within me. Through the windows, I watched the blue sky soften as the hands of time moved towards sunset.
I heard my mum’s car in the driveway and could picture her face as Dad told her about our conversation, and my promise that was hardly a promise at all. I gently closed the book, then placed it back into its home that hid it from the world.
As I stood, my head felt light and dizzy and my body cold, so cold – so much for a gentle re-entry into school. I picked up my phone from my desk and sent Elijah and my parents a message.
Hey – am exhausted. Going to have a quick nap and will be down. X
‘And you can grill me then,’ I added silently.
I unlocked my door, took off my shoes and climbed into bed before letting sleep claim me.
When I woke, I sensed someone was in my bedroom. Adrenalin flooded my body – my eyes shot open and I sat up.
‘It’s just me,’ said Elijah, who was sit
ting in my comfy chair in the corner of the room, in the darkness.
‘What are you doing here? You scared the living daylights out of me.’
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to. I was worried about you… Wanted to make sure you were okay after everything that happened yesterday.’
‘Yesterday? What time is it?’
Elijah checked his wristwatch. ‘2.05 p.m. – the witching hour.’
In that moment my life rushed back to me – Ezra, Noah, my family all wanting something from me that I couldn’t give. A heavy weight returned and I slumped back into bed.
‘You should go and get some sleep, Elijah. I’m okay.’
‘The thing is, sis, you are not okay, not yourself. I’m worried about you.’
I let out a long sigh. ‘I know, there’s a lot going on, but I don’t want to worry you or Mum and Dad.’
‘You seem different,’ he said.
I remembered back to looking into the mirror yesterday, thinking the same thing. There was no point lying to my twin – the other half of my being.
‘I am different, Elijah. I don’t understand it, but I’m changing and like I said, I can’t totally control it.’
Elijah gasped.
‘But I will try. I promise.’
Try harder.
‘Don’t you feel it too? Knowing you are a witch?’
Elijah’s eyes glistened silver in the dark. ‘It makes sense to me, knowing who I am. And yes, I want to learn more, like you. But when the time is right. The burning need to know it now just isn’t there. There’s nothing there for me that I have to learn to control.’
I pulled my legs up to my chest, rested my chin on them.
‘How can we be so different?’ Elijah said quietly. ‘We’ve never been different before.’
‘I don’t understand it either.’