by M L Garza
And she was glaring right at them.
“It’s about time you showed up,” she snapped at Rachel and Mirriam. “You should have been back here ages ago.”
The haunted car was completely out of the shed now, held back only by the mass of bungee cords and ropes that Rachel and Alice had managed to find.
“Nascentes morimur finisque ab origine pendet!” the car added.
“We’re here now,” Mirriam said in that calming voice that worked on the surliest of witches and warlocks. “Let’s head inside and we’ll figure out what to do.”
What to do, it seemed, was to offer up Madeline’s roast currently cooking in the oven. The boggart had turned down a glass of blood, so the only thing left to do was give it meat, the bigger the better.
“I’ve been saving up ages to afford a roast like this!” the woman objected when Mirriam suggested it.
“That boggart is not going to come out quietly,” Rachel’s aunt explained. “So it’s either the roast or it will go after something living. We can always fetch your cat if you like.”
Rachel frowned but let her speak. She knew her aunt would never sacrifice a cat, but it was still cruel to bring such a thing up. It was hard enough getting support around town without alienating their few true friends.
Yet the point was made, and Madeline eventually relented. Together, the four women staged it on the largest platter Madeline owned and walked it out toward the haunted car. The witches carried it the rest of the way past the porch, each murmuring a spell of protection around themselves.
It was only a boggart, but one couldn’t be too careful these days.
“Ready?” Aunt Mirriam asked when they stood about three feet away from the thing.
“Ready.”
They slowly lay the platter down, keeping an eye on the car that was growing more and more frantic in its movements. It strained against the ropes and revved its engine in an effort to break free.
“De minimis non curat lex!”
“Come and get it, you little beast,” Mirriam hissed low. “Come on out.”
The headlights flashed at her in anger.
Rachel reached into her pocket for a small vial, but her aunt’s hand on her arm stilled her.
“Wait, dear. Let’s see what it does.”
At first, it didn’t do anything. They stood across from each other, the Ashwood witches and the haunted car, each waiting for one to make the first move. The roast between them gave off a tantalizing smell in the meantime, and Rachel was half tempted to bring it inside if the boggart didn’t want it.
Then the car shifted once. Twice.
Then the headlights switched off with an audible click. Something was happening.
Rachel twitched and Mirriam tightened her hand around her arm. “Hold on…”
There was some movement from within the car and at last the creature emerged from the poor car. Boggarts rarely took a form that wasn’t some nightmare concocted by their victim, but this one looked old and weakened. It was a shadowy thing about the size of a cat that hobbled on two legs. The black of its skin was a void that had no texture, and its eyes were a bottomless white.
Thankfully those eyes were focused on the roast beef in front of it and not on the witches. It was an annoying little thing, but even weak like this, it was dangerous.
“Igne natura renovatur integra,” it mumbled to itself as it crept closer.
Mirriam and Rachel shared a look that needed no words. Almost there…
The boggart reached the platter of meat before it remembered the witches nearby. It snapped its head up and hissed, grasping the meat with sharp claws.
Now!
“We greet the Masters of the Element of Fire,” the two witches chanted in unison. “The Element of destruction and renewal. The Element that cleanses all things.”
“Memento mori!” the boggart howled at Rachel, pointing at her with one of its deadly claws. This was no random phrase born of old age and sickness.
This was a message.
Remember, you must die.
A shiver ran up her spine, but she had no desire to suffer the beast any longer. With one hand, Rachel grabbed the vial of salt and popped the cork with her thumb. With her other hand, she grabbed her aunt’s and harmonized their power. A witch was strongest when they were with their sisters. Not alone.
The boggart screamed where the salt made contact with its skin, but she flicked the vial again and again. With her third assault, the tiny demon erupted into flames.
It didn’t last long after that. Boggarts were creatures of darkness and cold, and never could withstand heat for very long. With one last whimper, it dissolved into a tiny pile of ash, returned to the evil pit from whence it came.
Rachel lowered her hands, followed by her aunt. The power slowly seeped from them, the Element of Fire dissipating like a snuffed candle. Mirriam’s eyes were glowing softly in the coming twilight, and Rachel knew hers looked much the same. Elemental magic always had a funny effect on their kind.
“Is it over?” came a voice behind them.
Alice and Madeline peeked out from behind the screen door, their eyes wide with fright. For all the strange things that tended to happen in the little town of Ashwood Falls, it would still be startling for a normal human to see and hear something like this just outside their door.
Good thing they don’t know about that harpy nest we had to clear last summer, thought Rachel.
“It’s over,” Aunt Mirriam said. “Anything else that might be wrong with it is just the car.”
Rachel poked the pile of ash and the ruined roast with a foot. “Shame about the food though. It looked great.”
Madeline shrugged and opened the door wider to beckon them in. “Price I pay for living in this town, I suppose,” she said. “Come on inside and at least let me get you something for your trouble.”
“No need,” the older witch said. “You know we work on the house for you and your family.”
“I wouldn’t say no to any bear claws you might have laying around though!” Rachel chimed in. Her aunt nudged her with a shoulder but laughed.
Madeline laughed as well and waved her inside. “I’ll see what I can find. Alice, toss the roast in the back for the racoons. Looks like we’re having hot dogs tonight.”
The younger witch looked over to her aunt and grinned. “Come on, I think we earned some donuts, don’t you?”
“Yes yes. Go on.” Mirriam nudged her toward the house and together they made their way inside. And for a moment, Rachel could forget Samhain and the task before her. For a moment, she was just a young witch enjoying a job with her aunt.
And it was the best feeling in the world.
Chapter 6
The ride home was quiet, the silence only broken by Stevie Nicks crooning over the stereo. She always was one of Aunt Mirriam’s favorites, and reportedly Rachel’s mother’s too. It was silly, but in a way it gave her one more connection to the woman, and so the silence was welcome and the music savored.
Rachel finished her last bear claw just as they pulled up to the mansion and leaned back with a relaxed sigh. She felt happy for the first time in a long while. It was like when she was a little girl first learning from her aunt about simple conjurations and astral projections and...
That's it!
She paused mid-step on her way back to the house and smiled softly, hoping it didn't appear too suspicious. "You know," she said suddenly. "I think maybe you're right."
"Hm? About what, love?"
Rachel looked up at the great building before facing her aunt again as if that explained enough. Then she shrugged and smiled again. "I've spent too long practicing in this place and clearly that's not helping anything. Maybe some real rest would do me some good. Today went just fine with the boggart, didn’t it?"
Her aunt, wise enough to never take her at face value, lifted an eyebrow. "Now that doesn't sound like you. You've done nothing but live as a hermit for the past six months. If Madeline
herself didn’t call, I wouldn’t have believed you ever ventured out today."
Rachel lifted her still-injured hand from her assault on the altar and chuckled. "And see where that's gotten me. I think I'm going to call it for the day. Cars speaking Latin is more than enough excitement for me."
Mirriam leaned forward and kissed her forehead softly. "That's the first sensible thing that's come out of your mouth all week. Go lay down while I help Kathy and Danielle with dinner."
Rachel nodded and they entered the house, she walking toward the stairs and Mirriam to the side hall.
"Shall I wake you when it's time to come down?" Mirriam asked as they parted.
"Uh, sure," Rachel said, not really hearing her. She was already planning her next move, rehearsing the words in her mind. While a simpler spell, this one also worked on precision.
God, aren’t there any incantations that will let me be lazy now and then? I really went into the wrong field...
When she got to her room at the top of the stairs, Rachel shut her door and hoped it would stay that way. Even this one she wasn't allowed to lock, but it still allowed more privacy than the public ceremonial chambers. Hopefully, her aunt would spread the word that her poor belabored niece was laying down and not to disturb her unless dinner was ready or the house was burning down, if that, and she might yet have a moment to get some answers at last.
Changing into the most comfortable set of pajama pants and tank top she owned, Rachel lit a white candle and a bundle of sage at the head of her bed and lay down in the center of it. No answers existed in this realm, so she had to seek them elsewhere.
The veil between the realm of the living and the Summerlands, the Land of the Next, was thin this time of year. It made her transition easier, but it increased the danger as well. It was what made the Leviathan stir in its lair further down, and it made the spirits restless to wander the Earth on the night of Samhain. It was what allowed a sickly boggart to emerge into the mortal realm so easily.
If anything saw her as a possible tether to the mortal world, she might not return alone from this astral projection.
She might not even return at all.
But she had to try. She needed those answers from her Spirit guides and anyone else who might be curious enough to come.
"I call upon my Brother the Wolf and my Sister the Crow. I call upon the Flame and the Wave and the Earth and the Sky. I call upon my ancestors and the spirits of those yet to come. I call upon those who would guide me and lead me through this most sacred of duties."
Now these words, these obeyed her. Rachel felt the magic finally fill the room where once it was absent, and she couldn't help but to breathe in a great sigh of relief. The gift hadn't abandoned her after all. She wasn’t reduced to mere boggart exorcisms. It wasn't that she was lacking, not truly. It had to be something else, and now she finally had the means to find out what it was.
As the magic filled the space around her, Rachel allowed it to take command. She needed its guidance if she was going to succeed in the coming trials ahead, and to do that, she had to surrender completely.
An unnatural breeze swept back her hair, smelling of lilacs and long-forgotten memories. She heard a voice in that breeze, something she almost recognized, but when she reached for it, it was gone again.
Mother? Mother, is that you?
"Brother Wolf, Sister Crow," she breathed. "Please. I beseech thee. I beg of thee. Show me what to do."
She heard that strange voice on the breeze again and the flapping of great wings. Her spirit familiars, the Crow and Wolf, appeared before her in her Mind's Eye, patient and loving as they ever were. In many ways, they were as much parents to her as her true parents were, as much as Mirriam was. Rarely did Rachel ever call upon them in the Spirit Realm, but no matter when she did, they never failed to appear or show her what needed to be done.
Yet this time, they did not come alone. Between the pair came a third animal, one she had never seen before. This was Rabbit, clever and swift, but what was she doing here?
Rachel rose to her feet and stepped forward, feeling her pants catch on the invisible stalks of long grass of a meadow not actually there. It did not have to be in existence to be real, after all.
"I greet you, Rabbit," she said, offering a hand to the Spirit. "Are you here to help me?"
"Rabbit?" the Spirit said, wrinkling her nose in laughter. "Rabbit, you say?"
I know that voice...
As with a dream, astral projections into the Spirit Realm was no true linear journey. One moment she was looking at the Rabbit, and another, Rachel was face to face with a woman she had not seen in twenty long years. Time in the Summerlands had only made her more beautiful, but it was her without a doubt. She would know her anywhere. If she were blind and deaf, Rachel would know her.
"Mom," she said, swallowing back tears. "Is it really you?"
The woman who was once Rabbit nodded and held open her arms, her own eyes, identical to Rachel's, brimming with tears. "It really is," she said. "Come here, my love."
Rachel ran forward, her quest for the destruction of the Leviathan momentarily forgotten. It didn't matter that this wasn't technically real; what was considered real anyway? Her mother felt real enough in her embrace, and the tears flowing down her cheeks felt real too. Her heart slowly mending itself after years suffering in pieces was real, and so the magic made it so. What did either woman care for any mortal definition of what was real and what wasn't?
"What are you doing here?" Rachel asked, burying her face into her mother's neck so as to breathe in her unique scent. "I thought I'd never see you again."
"You called for help, didn't you? How could I deny my little girl in her hour of need?" Catharine said, holding her tightly. "Your famliars led me to you the moment you came to the border of the Summerlands."
Rachel pulled back just enough to look at her, though not enough to break the embrace. This might be her only chance and she did not want it wasted. "But I've been here dozens of times," she said. "Ever since my first initiation into the coven, I've been here for advice."
Her mother nodded and brushed back a lock of hair from her daughter's face. "I know," she said. "But never for something like this. Never for the Leviathan."
And like that, the reason for her coming came rushing back, and the smile fell from Rachel's face. The Leviathan. The beast that took her mother from her and threatened all of mankind. The beast that could destroy so much more if she did not do what needed to be done.
"I don't have the missing pages of the spell, Mom," she admitted. "I don't know what to do."
"The Leviathan is strong, Rachel. So much stronger than any one witch. I wish I could tell you some secret that would help you defeat it, but I can't." Her mother looked away a moment, pained, before meeting her eyes again. "And there's more. A danger even greater than the Leviathan itself."
"What?" Rachel asked, eyes widening. "What do you mean? What could be worse than the Leviathan?"
Catharine's pain seemed to grow within her, but she shook her head. "I wish I could tell you everything," she said. "But so much prevents me from doing so. You are not safe, my daughter. So much works against you, and it is not only the Leviathan you must fear, though it is the Leviathan which may ultimately end your life as it did mine."
"Tell me how to defeat it, Mom!" Rachel said, but she could already feel the pull of the mortal realm growing stronger. "I can't do this without you. Tell me what you know."
"I know the missing pages aren't the only secrets of the spell, daughter," her mother said as she slipped out of her grasp. “There is so much they’re not telling you.”
"What other secrets? Do you mean the coven?"
But her mother was fading away faster now, changing back into the form of her Rabbit familiar. "Be brave, daughter," Catharine reminded her. "The Leviathan is not your only enemy, and you may find aid where it is least expected."
The sweet breeze of the Summerlands blew once more and took her mothe
r away with it. Not even Brother Wolf or Sister Crow remained behind to offer solace for the poor woman. How double-sided these visits to the Spirit Realm could be, to offer such kindness and cruelty in the same moment. It almost made her regret coming at all, but she knew she couldn't regret it entirely. Not when she got to see the one person she missed most of all. No, she would endure anything if only to see her mother only a moment longer.
Rachel would carry that memory of her scent and cherish it for the rest of her life, even if they never met again in the meadows of the Summerlands.
"Thank you," she whispered to the magic, and she let it take it's peaceful leave of her.
When next she opened her eyes, Rachel was again in her bedroom in the coven's headquarters, alone at last. She was still missing the pages of the spell that would have allowed her to defeat the Leviathan, and worse, now she had an additional mystery to solve. Yet somehow, it felt as though she were closer than ever to her final goal.
Samhain was only a few days away now. One way or another, this battle would come. She would need her whole family with her when it did, and if her mother's warning was any indication, the Leviathan wasn't the only creature after her either. An attack could come from anywhere, at any time. It only strengthened her resolve to remain true to her people and trust them to see her through the worst of it, just as the High Priestess Sierra promised. Though the threat of a secret her mother hinted at... what did that mean?
And the boggart’s warning… Remember, you must die.
"Rachel?"
Her heart jumped up into her throat, and the last of the Summer breezes disappeared altogether. "Aunt Mirriam. Don't sneak up on me like that!"
Her aunt had her head peeking through a crack in the door, looking at her with a concerned frown. "I was hardly sneaking, my dear. Are you alright? You look as though you've seen a ghost, and you didn’t answer when I knocked."
You don't know the half of it.
"I sought help from the Summerlands," Rachel said, her voice shaking though she didn't know why. It was not the first time she had done so, nor would it be the last. It was her aunt, in fact, who taught her how to safely traverse the lands between the mortal and the spirit.
