Calm Before the Witch Storm

by Constance Barker

  Nann grimaced at the growing total on the register. “What do you know about the VHS?”

  Gert’s scanning didn’t slow. “Bunch of weirdos. They used to meet on the third floor of Cemetery Center. That was back in the ’80s. Heard they might start up again, what with the boys going missing.”

  She slid the paper so that Nann could read the headline, but she’d already seen it on the news. “Have you heard that the third floor of Cemetery Center is haunted?”

  “Nope. But there was supposed to be a vampire up there. That’s going way back.”

  Nann dragged out her bank card. “Vampire. Is that what the V in VHS stands for?”

  Gert shrugged. “Some say. Others say it stands for Van, as in Helsing, Van Helsing Society. You seen Dracula?”

  Nann had seen many Draculas, and even a few Van Helsings. “So if it stands for vampire—”

  “You got it. Vampire Hunter Society. Like I said, a bunch of weirdos.” She handed Nann a receipt.

  SHE DROVE QUICKLY TO the store. Darkening clouds overhead looked to let go any second, and she couldn’t fit the ladder in Cricket with the top on. After hauling her purchases inside and reattaching the top, she stepped back into the street, getting the whole storefront in her vision. Drawing her Athame, she drew a circle in the air around the store. Inside the imaginary ring, she drew an eight-pointed start and chanted:

  “Steady are the stars and stable is the ground,

  Sun and Moon sweeping around and around

  The Wheel of the Year shall run my foes down,

  Outside this circle let danger be bound.”

  Rain poured from the sky at her last word and she ducked inside. Gloom of the day and the lack of light inside combined. Nann figured she’d better replace the blubs closest to the windows first.

  It only took an hour to figure out the folding ladder. Nann was not mechanically inclined. “How many Druids does it take to change a lightbulb?” she asked herself as she climbed to the top. The store lights were antique industrial pendants that looked like green, upside down funnels. They hung low enough for her to reach from the penultimate rung. As she worked, she realized that it didn’t matter which ones she started with. She didn’t want to change bulbs with the switches on.

  Rain poured down the panes. Outside, a dearth of noisy construction workers, garbage trucks or buses reminded her how far away from home she was. At the same time, she felt cozy in her new space. Memories of her summers spent in Port Argent combined with her quiet drive past farms. So far, this whole adventure made her feel more Druid-y.

  Last bulb screwed in, she moved to the bank of switches by the check-out counter. “Et voila, we have light!” Against the dark day, the shop positively glowed with warmth. She scowled. Now fully illuminated, she could see that the floors needed a thorough cleaning.

  A knock fell on the door. “C’mon in, it’s open.”

  “I can’t,” a muffled voice said. Zinnia, Nann saw, soaked to the bone.

  She opened the door, but Zinnia didn’t step inside. “Come in already, it’s pouring out.”

  “I want to,” Zinnia grunted, “but my feet won’t go! I can’t get into my store. I have a class in half an hour.”

  The protection ceremony, Nann realized. Maybe Zinnia was dangerous. But how could she be? She looked all hapless and miserable. And really wet. Drawing the Athame, she asked: “Do you promise not to eat me?”

  Zinnia’s features snapped in surprise. “What? Well, okay, I promise. I just need to get dried off before my students arrive.”

  She stepped back and circled Zinnia with the knife.

  “My ceremony I now must amend,

  I lower the shield; allow in a friend.”

  Zinnia stumbled in, the protective barrier instantly gone. Once she steadied herself, she gave Nann shameful eyes. “You know.”

  “I thought you were sick. Do you turn into an alligator, or a crocodile?”

  Her mouth and eyes drooped in misery, her blonde hair dripping on the floor. “I don’t know. Ever since that spring break in Cancun when I was in art school...”

  Nann didn’t want to say it out loud, and felt relieved when Zinnia did.

  “I’m not the one taking the boys.” She held out her little finger. “Pinky swear, it’s not me.”

  Hooking fingers, Nann looked deeply into Zinnia’s eyes.

  “Pinky, pinky, ring bell

  Whoever tells lies

  Will descend down into hell

  Never shall she rise.”

  “Holy cow, you take your pinky swears seriously!”

  Nann threw her hands in the air. “I gotta, Zinnia. There’s something loose out there. You just seemed to be... I don’t know. A candidate for something loose? I need to figure out what’s taking those boys. My gut tells me it isn’t a serial killer, or anything human.”

  “I get it. My art classes are what gets me by. I love kids.” Her eyebrows rose. “Not for lunch, I mean. Gosh, by now I figured I’d be married with a bunch. Not too many guys would put up with the whole giant reptile thing.”

  “With guys, you never know.”

  “Honestly, it’s not too bad. Near the full moon, I crave a lot of meat. When it hits, I just like to be warm. It usually only lasts a day.”

  She recalled Zinnia wolfing down a pound of cheeseburger at Margie’s, the heat lamps, the electric blankets. “I’m convinced it’s not you, but what could be taking those boys?”

  Zinnia shrugged. “The only thing I ever heard about children being kidnapped were from fairy tales. You know, Hansel and Gretel, gingerbread house.”

  Her words nearly made Nann take a step back. “A witch.”

  SHE PUSHED A FLAT-HEAD mop around the floor, squirting solution with a spray bottle, until she worked herself into a corner. Sun broke through the clouds, the rain slacking off. Traffic now filled the street. Heading outside, she saw cars parking in the lot across the street. More searchers, more volunteers, hunting for the missing children.

  Cars arrived in front of Cemetery Center, doors opening to admit Zinnia’s students. Nann couldn’t help herself. She did a head count. Zinnia hadn’t eaten any of them. Speaking of which.

  “Hey, Zinnia, you wanna get lunch? I’m starving.”

  “Heck yes, let me lock up. Margie’s?”

  “We just went there. Isn’t there someplace else?”

  “Nope.”

  Tink was there when they arrived in Cricket. No fights broke out, and only one man swayed drunkenly at the bar. “How’s the car running?”

  “Great! I love it.” Nann took a menu from a scowling Margie. “It’s nice and cool in here. I didn’t realize how hot it was outside. Only one of the fans work at my store.”

  They picked a booth in the corner. “I can fix them,” Tink folded herself on the bench. “I can fix anything.”

  “Except your dating life,” Zinnia smirked.

  “Or yours.” Tink sighed. “When you’re six-two, and work on cars for a living, guys just think you bat for the other team.”

  “If you’re squat like me, guys don’t think anything about you.” She studied the menu. “Maybe I shouldn’t have sent a recent photo to the guy I was supposed to meet at Kim’s.”

  “Oh, stop it, both of you. Tink, you’re like a super-model. Zinnia, you’re a pint-sized Marilyn Monroe. You’re both gorgeous. It’s just this town. It’s kinda depressing. And depression is contagious. But there must be a few eligible bachelors around. Or at least a fun time or two. How about that Branden, Zinnia?”

  “Out of my league.”

  Nann waved a hand. “Get out.”

  “I’m out!”

  Tink hid behind a menu. “Don’t say that too loud.”

  Margie waddled over with an order pad. “This whole town should’ve blown up and dried away when the mill closed. There’s no more game in the woods for sports tourism, Port Argent has the best beach. But until the mill is completely shut down, people will still hang on, hoping and waiting. Damn, I
’m depressing myself. Is it too early for shots?”

  Chapter 5

  Tink agreed to fix the fans if Nann paid for lunch. Nann watched her test the circuit with a little device. “These things have power. Huh. You know where the breakers are?”

  “Yep. I’ll switch ’em off.”

  Both of them watched three state police cars drive up the street. Remembering Tink’s exposed ears, Nann asked: “What do you make of all that?”

  “It’s three now. Maybe a serial killer thing.”

  “I think it’s something... less human.”

  Tink gave her a long look, but didn’t speak.

  “I thought it was Zinnia.”

  “You know about the alligator thing? Crocodile? Caiman?”

  Nann nodded. “I also know she’s probably the sweetest woman I’ve ever met.”

  Tink adjusted her bandana. “You saw the ears, didn’t you?”

  She shrugged. “Pretty hard to miss.”

  “Right. Fairy tales, Fae creatures, missing children. You think I have something to do with it?”

  Nann sighed. “No, not really. But from what I’ve seen on the news, read in the paper, those boys just walked out of their house in the middle of the night. They weren’t abducted, there was no break-in. It just sounds like—”

  “Magic.” Tink pursed her lips and stuck a screwdriver in the fan. “This town attracts it, that’s for sure, good and bad.”

  “Vampires,” Nann said, “Ghosts. Were-gators.”

  “A witch like you.” Tink got down and moved the ladder to the next fan.

  “An elf like you.”

  Tink smiled as she scaled. “I’m not an elf. I’m a shop goblin.”

  “A what?”

  “You heard of the shoemaker and the elves? Well, those weren’t elves, they were shop goblins. Popular media tends to get the nomenclature wrong.”

  “Huh. Okay, what then? If it’s a Hansel-and-Gretel-thing, I just arrived, so they weren’t eating my gingerbread house.”

  “I’m not good with Fae stuff. My clan Yannieat’ Ingeh are an odd bunch. Most Fae are allergic to metal, sometimes as bad as a human with a bee sting or peanut allergy. But my clan loves metal, loves machines. Being outcasts, as we smell stinky to our fellow Fae, we tend to spend more time in this realm. I’m really not up on my lore.”

  “My store focuses on occult books. I hope I can find some answers there. I just feel like I should be doing something in the meanwhile.”

  Tink moved to another fan. “I get it. Being the helpful goblin sort, my Uncle Tink was a member of the VHS. That was back when there was supposed to be a vampire around. You know about that, right?”

  “Your uncle, a shop goblin, hunted vampires?”

  “Supposedly, this one arrived with the French during the French and Indian War. One form of Van Helsing Society or another believed they ended the Marquise Charlotte’s reign of terror a bunch of times. Uncle Tink said they got her for good back in 1984. Put her in consecrated ground. End of story.”

  Nann took in the information. “So it’s not a vampire, then.”

  “Well, I haven’t heard about any bite marks. At the same time, the VHS is meeting tonight.”

  “Maybe they know something we don’t.”

  Tink moved to the next fan and tinkered. “Vampires? Come on. I think the society is an excuse to get drunk and run around with mallets and stakes. I don’t believe in vampires. Yow!”

  Nann hurried forward. Not that she could do much if Tink fell off the ladder. “What is it?”

  “Shock!” She shook her hand rapidly. “I thought you shut off the breakers!”

  “I did.”

  Tink took the voltage meter out of her pocket. “Huh. No power. How weird.”

  LIGHTS, FANS, PAINTING, floors; Nann leaned near the display window and took it in. There wasn’t much left to do until the books arrived tomorrow. Zinnia came in, giving the place the once-over.

  “Looking Gucci.”

  Tink descended the ladder. “Definitely lit.”

  “Needs toilet seats. What is it with toilet seats around here?”

  Tink and Zinnia exchanged a look.

  “Anyway, I was thinking about joining the search for Jacob Learner and Roy Barber.”

  “I have my phone forwarded. Not that I’m expecting any business,” Tink said.

  Zinnia shrugged. “I only had the one class today.”

  They headed out. Morning rain filled the air with humidity. By the time they walked the block and a half to the parking lot entrance, Nann felt a trickle of sweat down her back and her hair exploding. The hundred feet or so of roadway spread out to the size of four football fields. Police and volunteers all parked near the exit. On the far side of the blacktop stood a fence with gates open.

  Weed trees occupied both sides of the roadway. They followed cracked asphalt and crab grass downhill. “Why are they searching here?” Nann was sad to hear the panting in her words.

  “The woods below the bluffs are a traditional body dump site,” Tink said. “Rumrunners used it during prohibition, and organized crime when this town was booming.”

  They walked on, the woods thickening. “This is one long road.”

  “When the mill was built, they were using canals to move the paper. Then things changed to trucks, and they had to build this road.” Zinnia stopped at a fork. “It really doesn’t matter which way we go. It’s one big circle.”

  Signs hidden in the trees dictated an entrance, and a no entrance. Entrance looked to go downhill. Incongruously, they found more signs a half mile later, one pointing to employee parking, the other directing trucks. They stayed on the truck route.

  “Used to be a road on the bluffs, Ontario Shores Drive, but the bluff collapsed a while ago.” Zinnia pointed at some tumbled sawhorses.

  The mill revealed itself from the top down. They rounded the road, and Nann saw smokestacks. Below them was an enormous brick factory. The seeming miles of blacktop surrounding filled a little valley. Dark brick glowered in the afternoon sun, glass in the windows glinting harshly. She thought the whole thing looked like a wart in a dimple.

  “Those hills are actually piles of waste sludge,” Tink said. “They just dumped their toxic garbage for years until the EPA thing in the ’70s.”

  “Mountains of garbage?” Nann couldn’t believe it.

  “All these woods are second-growth. The plant used up all the trees around before importing logs from Canada. They dumped toxic waste into the creek, the canal, and Lake Ontario.” Tink sighed.

  “But they stopped all that,” Zinnia said. “They got the pollution problem under control. The trees grew back. Some of them. And look, the sludge hills are covered with grass and trees. They almost look pretty now.”

  “I hated the way this place smelled,” Tink said.

  They descended, Zinnia pointing out features. “That’s the art paper building, where my dad worked. Oh, and there’s the barge bay. They floated paper to the Oswego Canal from there.”

  It seemed to take forever, but eventually they ended up on the far side of the mill. Orange vests peeked through the green of the woods They left the road, making their way toward the searchers. A police SUV, acting as a post for a fence of yellow crime scene tape, parked at the base of a waste sludge hill. For a moment, they stood staring at the place where little Roy Billingsly’s body was discovered.

  “You here to help?” A sheriff’s deputy interrupted their impromptu vigil. He was medium height, medium build, but Nann saw that the color of his eyes was like a coniferous forest at dusk.

  “Hi. Yeah.” Nann nodded. “If it’s okay.”

  “We’ll take what we can get. Let me get your information. There’s a line forming to move north, up the bluff.”

  “Is this your way of asking me for my phone number?” Despite the seriously grim situation, Nann felt drawn to the man. Especially when he smiled.

  He lifted his clipboard. “This is official business. But I do have a busin
ess card.”

  Nann pretended to rummage in the conjure bag. In reality, she whispered a spell and fished out a fresh business card. They exchanged.

  “Brooklyn? I thought I heard New Yorker in your accent.”

  “The address is wrong, but the cell number is good.” Nann looked at his card. Deputy Keith Schwenk. “My new store is in Cemetery Center.”

  Dept. Keith Schwenk tipped his ball cap at her. “I’ll have to drop by.”

  Ten minutes later, they walked in a spread-out line uphill. Nann shuddered at the nature of their task, and at the same time felt glad she could do something to help. If nothing else, she’d met a cute guy. Was it so wrong?

  Way off to the right, she saw men with dogs. The going was steep. Nann scanned the leaf litter for... clues, she supposed. In less than an hour, they exited the trees and looked out over Lake Ontario, its blue filling the entire horizon. The group gathered on a broken road. You could still see where parts of it had fallen away.

  Zinnia’s face glowed red and glistened. Even Tink was out of breath. The police in the group studied a map and marched the team west along the uneven pavement. They would start down again, covering the next grid.

  Nann considered trying a ceremony to find the missing boys. But remembering Zinnia’s take on witches and Hansel and Gretel, she decided to keep it under wraps. At least in public.

  From up here, the waste sludge hills looked taller than the mill’s smokestacks. Nann thought Zinnia was right. They did look kinda pretty. Not at all natural, but pretty. She lost sight of them as they plunged back into the woods.

  “WELL, AT LEAST WE GOT some exercise.” Zinnia tried to put a bright face on it.

  Tink nodded. “And Nann did some inappropriate flirting.”

  They’d spent all afternoon walking up the bluff and back down again. But their group had found nothing. Other search parties turned up empty as well. As for Nann, she hadn’t seen so much as a chipmunk or a bird. Maybe it was the toxicity in the land, but the forest felt empty and wrong.