The Witch's Homecoming

by Iris Kincaid

  “Then how was she able to make things move the way that we can, to lift grocery bags into the car without touching them, to make the grocery cart drive itself back to the trolley without touching it? It all sounds like the work of a witch to me.”

  Gwynifer grimaced. “It most certainly is the work of a witch.”

  It was time to pay a visit to Morfydd. She was lounging in her backyard as an army of mice ran back and forth in orderly fashion, apparently planting seeds in her garden for her. She didn’t even have to look around to know who her guests were. “I believe it has been over a decade since I got a visit from you, Gwynifer Couch. I hope your young friend will have a better record. We are, after all, on the same team.”

  “Why did you want to convince one of the Moles that Harriet Jolly was a witch?” Gwynifer asked.

  “Because this complacency is intolerable to me. We sit idly by, twiddling our thumbs, and they are continually scheming how to keep us down. I thought it would be instructive for everyone, Earthborn and Mole alike, to see what happens after one of them is mistaken to be one of us. She was just on the verge of being kicked off the city council. Her colleague would’ve seen to it. Her colleague also wouldn’t have rested until she lost her job at the high school.

  “Their insufferable bigotry would have become apparent to even the blindest among us. And the Moles themselves would have been thrown into crisis, not knowing whether to trust their own eyes, not knowing who among them was actually one of us in disguise. There would have been an epidemic of accusations as they turned on one another. Shame that she died first.”

  “You wanted to deliberately stoke conflict and wreak havoc, teach them to fear us more than they already do?” Gwynifer demanded.

  “Yes, that is precisely what I want. I tire of waiting for the first attack.”

  Gwynifer tugged Beryl away. “There is no arguing with her. She is unchanged in the last forty years and she will never be satisfied with anything less than complete chaos and hatred.”

  As they were driving home, they noticed a home being bulldozed over. Beryl asked Gwynifer to stop, and they climbed out and watched. Beryl then did her best to fill Gwynifer in on the Sinclair plans, which filled her mentor with anger and dismay.

  “Morfydd is full of poison, but there’s some truth in her fears. I’ve kept my distance from the Moles. Most of us have. We have not paid heed to this development, and look how far it has gone. The Moles can find a new home. We cannot. This is our ancestral home, and we cannot allow it to turn into something vile and ugly.”

  “No, we can’t,” Beryl agreed.

  Gwynifer was glad to hear that Beryl regarded Marvel Canyon as her home now. And she was ready to fight for it.

  Back at the café, they saw the unexpected sight of Emerson sitting and talking quietly with Whiskey Hodge on the lovely new deck that Emerson had constructed. Gwynifer went back to her house, and Beryl joined the other two.

  “I’m never going to enjoy another drink again, thanks to you. No, seriously. I just didn’t have the strength to do it myself. I tried time and time again. Could never quit. Now there’s no choice. I’m done with alcohol. Thanks to you. I’m grateful. Truly. But it’s not easy.”

  “I’ll do whatever I can to help,” Beryl said. “I’ll try to find something that will make it easier.”

  “That would be wonderful. Cause I still get the shakes pretty bad.”

  “I’ll see you real soon.”

  “And I was thinking, maybe I could bring my whole AA group here for coffee. Gotta lot of folks who keep fallin’ off the wagon. You’ll know what to do with them.”

  “I sure will.”

  Beryl clasped Whiskey’s hand tightly, and then she and Emerson watched Whiskey walk away. Beryl sighed happily. This was what she had always wanted, to really help someone. To make a difference in their life. And when it came down to it, this was way cooler than being a pharmacist.

  Emerson was very impressed. “You’ve got another customer inside. You’ve been very busy.”

  On cue, Aaron Ledger came outside the restaurant, his thick white hair almost in need of a fresh haircut.

  “There you are. I just wanted to ask . . . I’m really happy with my hair. But it would be so amazing if it was growing back in its original color. I mean, I know I’m an old guy, but all things are possible, yes? Maybe?”

  “Maybe. I’ll see if I can figure out how to do that.”

  “I don’t have long though. I’m headed for Miami on the nineteenth. Emerson, you’ll come over that morning and take care of the propane?”

  “The nineteenth. No problem.”

  “I’ll give you a call, Aaron. Who’s going to chair the city council after you’re gone?” Beryl asked.

  “Umm. Claudia Reyes. Yeah, that’s not such good news. Good thing you all already have your permit. New member will be voted in in a week. I’ll be here for a couple of weeks to oversee the transition. Okay, now, be sure to give me a call about the hair stuff.”

  “As soon as I can,” Beryl promised.

  They watched Aaron head for his car.

  “That’s what is so different between you and Oberon. He cared about me and was a great friend to me. But he didn’t have a whole lot of empathy for other Moles at all. He had all the abilities, the power, all the knowledge in the world, but he just didn’t have enough empathy to step in and try to help them out with their problems. He knew that he wasn’t the bridge between these two groups. But he knew that his children could be. Belonging to both groups, connected to everyone. Smart man.”

  “It’s always great to hear you talk about him. It’s just so surprising that you two became such good friends.”

  “Oberon had a vision. He thought that if every person, Earthborn and Mole, had just a single friend from the other side, it would change this town completely. It would be the foundation of a genuine peace. I was that friend for him.”

  What a remarkable man. Beryl wondered if that woman that he had stayed in Marvel Canyon for appreciated what she had in Emerson Briscoe. Probably not. Why hadn’t Beryl ever seen them together?

  And then another thought popped in her head—a real estate thought. She excused herself and went to chase down Lucinda.

  “That list that you gave me. It was of all the sales in town for the past twelve months. What about earlier? Can you give me a list for the previous twelve months?”

  “Sure. I can pull it up right now. But I can already guess that the Sinclair acquisitions have been going on for some time, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

  “Please pull that up for me. In the meantime, I have some special requests to work on.”

  Half an hour later, Lucinda presented Beryl with the list on her laptop. “Here it is. Do you need a printout?”

  “No, I just need to look this over.” Beryl scanned the list carefully. “Hmm.”

  “You’re not still obsessing about Austin Sinclair, are you? Because that could seriously ruin that option for us,” Lucinda fussed.

  “Invite Austin to come over tomorrow,” Beryl ordered. “Right after the café closes.”

  *****

  Austin Sinclair wasn’t the only one invited to the get-together. Gwynifer, Muriel, and Emerson were there, as well as all three Shimmer sisters, estate attorney Mr. Godfrey, Henry Colgate, the sheriff, and one of his deputies. They all got the full hospitality of the coffeehouse as Beryl urged them to have patience.

  There was a knock at the front door, and Aaron Ledger let himself in.

  “I got your message. I’m so excited. You did it. You really found something that’s going to give me my brown hair back?”

  Beryl gestured toward a large mug of tea. “It’s all ready for you.”

  Aaron rushed over. The tea had had a chance to cool, so he was able to gulp it down. He exhaled a loud breath of anticipation. To almost everyone’s surprise, his breath came out in a big purple smoky cloud.

  “What’s going on? This doesn’t mean my hair’s going
to come in purple, does it?”

  “No,” Beryl said. “But it does raise another interesting question. Why did you kill Harriet Jolly?”

  Everyone stared at Aaron Ledger in fresh amazement. The sheriff approached Aaron and cuffed his hands behind him.

  Beryl continued, “Did she steal one pen too many? Actually, you needed her to steal that pen. The pen that was rigged with the explosive. The pen that you handed her when you had her sign one final document at her last city council meeting. You knew that if you showed her a shiny beautiful pen, her klepto tendencies would ensure that it wound up in her purse.”

  “That–that is an outrageous accusation. Harriet was a respected colleague. Why on earth would I do such a thing?”

  “Because you were on opposite sides of the train station closing and you wanted the train station to close. You would have voted for the train station to close because that was your agreement with Austin Sinclair.”

  At the mention of his own name, Austin squirmed uncomfortably.

  “Harriet could have ruined that vote and you never would've been paid off. And Miami is a very expensive place. Better for you to have gone when you actually sold your house fourteen months ago. That was when I really knew. You sold your house fourteen months ago and you never left. Why would anyone stay in their house fourteen months after closing escrow?

  You never left because you had to stay here for the September seventeenth vote. He must've promised you quite a sum to swing the vote the way he needed. Harriet was going to ruin the plan, and you never would've gotten whatever bonus Austin Sinclair promised you. Possibly a South Beach condo? Courtesy of Sinclair Enterprises?”

  “Hey,” Austin protested. “I didn’t have anything to do with a murder. Just did a little harmless lobbying for changes I wanted to see in this town.”

  Aaron grimaced angrily, wanting to tell Austin to shut up but not wanting to implicate himself further.

  “You learned how to make the explosive from working with that federal agency ten years ago while testing explosives that would unlock the dam.”

  Turning to the sheriff, Beryl handed him a small clear vial. “Open this up in his apartment. It will turn purple if there are traces of the explosive chemicals there.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Shimmer. All right, Mr. Ledger. Let's go.”

  Gwynifer tried to suppress any show of pride. This was precisely the role that she had hoped Beryl would step into. Lucinda and Mosh were dumbfounded. Had their slacker sister just solved a murder?

  Beryl grinned triumphantly. “Anyone in the mood for a scone? It’s on the house.”

  EPILOGUE: CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  As much as Lucinda and Mosh Shimmer had protested that they really had no need of their witch powers and no desire to strengthen them, Beryl was delighted to see that an unconscious reliance on those powers was starting to be evident. When Mosh couldn’t reach a jar or box from the top kitchen or closet shelf, she would reach her hands out and will it to gently float down.

  When Lucinda, whose remote sales kept her busy, needed to type on her laptop, she would simply hold her hands over the keys, which proceeded to type out her intended words without her touch. “Why mess up my nails when I can do it this way? Normally, I have an assistant for these kinds of things.”

  And seriously, who can resist a toilet brush that takes care of the job all by itself?

  The grimoire mentioned so many herbs that were missing from the kitchen cabinets. Beryl finally had the time to find out exactly what might be in the attic.

  Indeed, the attic had the feel of exciting discoveries just waiting to be unlocked. But not only Oberon’s treasure but a legacy from the Cassaday sisters as well. It was an old diary, and the handwriting and words immediately identified it as the work of a young woman. Beryl was enthralled. It was an eerie, thoroughly human voice from the grave, from a young woman, a young witch who had lived under the very same roof.

  It was fascinating from so many different perspectives. Not the least of which was its historical context. The author was writing from the year 1918 and spoke passionately about the nation’s ongoing struggle for women’s suffrage.

  “The other Earthborn ones do not understand my concern in this matter. They think that the rules and laws of the Moles are so easily transcended by us, that we may do as we please and not be troubled by the restrictions they place on one another. But I have a different feeling on the matter. Even though so many of them do not like us and do not trust us, injustice amongst them still touches me. And to the extent that our worlds do intersect, I would like to be treated in a just and equal fashion. I think I would like to attend one of those suffrage rallies. I am curious about how they exert what little power they have. I already know how we exert ours.”

  Goodness. A witch and a suffragette! How old was she? Doubtless, her age and name would be mentioned in some future passage. Gwynifer had mentioned that the three sisters had all died at a tragically young age.

  “There seems to be some romantic mischief afoot. Peter is taking a great interest in Monique, which bothers Lucinda to no end, since she had an eye on him for so long.”

  That line stopped Beryl cold. Monique. That was Mosh’s given name. Lucinda. It seemed inconceivable that their father had named them after the ghosts who had lingered for a century and haunted his house for so many years. Beryl flipped wildly through the diary, looking for the final confirmation. When she found it, there was only one person who could possibly supply answers to all her questions.

  Gwynifer was with Mosh and Lucinda in the living room. Beryl waved the diary at her.

  “This journal belonged to one of the dead girls who used to live here. One of the Cassaday sisters. You said that their ghosts haunted my father for many years. That he spoke to them. That he befriended them and felt sorry for them.”

  Gwynifer nodded slowly. “All true. But you have come to hear what I haven’t told you.”

  “What didn’t she tell us?” Lucinda demanded.

  “That he named us after these ghosts. This diary belonged to Beryl Cassaday. And her sisters were Monique Cassaday and Lucinda Cassaday.”

  “Oh, that’s . . . I don’t know what that is. A little creepy, I guess,” Mosh responded. “But maybe also a little sweet. Kind of a tribute to these girls who died before their time and whom he felt so badly for.”

  “He did feel badly for them,” Gwynifer said. “Don’t we all, when we see young people die? Even though their deaths happened so long ago, the injustice of it was fresh with him because their voices were still in this house, in his ear.

  “I have given you some idea of the depth of your father’s strengths. But they went far beyond what you could possibly imagine. He could reach into the realm of the dead. He also had a strong affinity for the living. He was a master of fertility, and on more than one occasion, a couple who was having trouble conceiving became pregnant after he had crossed their paths.

  “And while his ethics could be debated endlessly, there was a core of compassion in him and a great vision for the future of this community. All of those qualities came together in the grandest and most ambitious scheme of his life. He resolved to usher the souls of the Cassaday sisters back to the land of the living.”

  “Back to the land of the living?” Beryl asked.

  “What does that even mean?’ Lucinda asked, ever impatient and wary of the next mystical revelation.

  “Babies are conceived all the time. At the moment of conception, there is an opportunity to match soul and body. To provide a vessel for the soul in limbo to have another chance at life.”

  Mosh sighed. Her worldly travels had exposed her to the widest variety of religious and spiritual beliefs and she always made a point to treat them respectively, no matter how unbelievable they struck her.

  “It sounds as if you’re talking about reincarnation.”

  “Yes, that is precisely what I mean. It was the fate of the Cassaday sisters that they have one more chance at life. That they
should be born again into the world, this time as the daughters of Oberon Shimmer.”

  Lucinda did not have Mosh’s tact or diplomacy. Not for something this far off the deep end. “That’s complete and utter nonsense.”

  “That is what you thought of your possession of magical abilities. But you are still new to the possibilities of our kind. I knew that you would be wanting proof, which is not easy to come by. Naturally, you would not have any direct memory of those former lives. The passage of birth wipes clean all of those remembrances. At least, I hope that it does. I would not want for you to remember your last terrifying moments of being drowned by despicably murderous townspeople.”

  Drowned? Beryl felt the blood drain from her face. But equally alarming were the looks of shock on the faces of Mosh and Lucinda.

  “I dream about drowning,” Mosh finally whispered. “I dream about it all the time.”

  “Me too,” Beryl said.

  They both looked at Lucinda, whose hands had covered her face in sheer horror. She didn’t have to say anything. They had all had the same drowning dream all their lives. Because they had once been drowned. Because they had been the Cassaday sisters.

  “How many souls dream of a second chance at life? Not all have your good fortune. You have been given a great gift, and with it comes great responsibility. Oberon heard your lamenting and did his utmost to see that your hopes and dreams might yet be brought to fruition. As the Cassadays, I congratulate you. As the Shimmers, I recognize that this must be rather surprising.”

  Try horrifying. At least for Lucinda and Mosh. First one and then the other ran out of the front door, unable to stand still any longer.

  Gwynifer turned to Beryl. “Go console your sisters. They weep in life as much as they did in the afterworld. They will need to lean on you. And I know this revelation falls heavily on you as well, but I know it will strengthen you. I am certain of it. Go. Hold tight to one another.”

  Beryl nodded in a daze and was about to stumble out the door when Gwynifer reached out to clasp her arm.