The Witch Haven

by Sasha Peyton Smith

  Her words sting. “You can’t ask me to do this.”

  The fury in her eyes dims, her face falls, and all the power and determination leaches out of her. It’s as if she’s a star collapsing in on itself. She sinks down on the bench; her shoulders crumble inward. “It’s not fair.”

  My anger retreats as quickly as it came. Her usually foxlike face is soft and flushed, like she might cry. I sit down on the bench next to her and put my arm around her bony shoulders. “I know.”

  “What makes you so special?” She looks at the ground as she says it. A single fat tear hits the stone bench.

  “I don’t know,” I answer honestly. I wish I did.

  If I could give the power inside me to Maxine, I don’t know if I would. But I know how much it hurts to want more than what you have.

  The interaction leaves a pit in my stomach that lasts until after dinner. If I am “gifted” with this power when others are not, what do I have to show for it? What have I really done? I’m wasting the gift I have when others like Maxine would do anything to possess it. And maybe Maxine would do more. Be better.

  I peel off to my room as soon as the dishes are magically cleared from the table. I know who I need to see.

  I fall into the dream space with all the grace of a Model T hurtling down a gravel road.

  In this dream I’m in the basement of the Commodore Club. The torches on the wall flicker, and the puddle of crimson blood in the middle of the floor is still wet. Crystal glasses sit lined up on the bar, waiting to be smashed.

  I walk to the bar and run my finger along the rim of one of the highball glasses. Suddenly it’s filled with blood too. The room smells of it.

  “Hiya, Frances.” The sight of Finn’s unruly hair and sharp cheekbones is a relief.

  “Hi, Finn.” My mouth forms a smile around his name. “How did you know I’d be here?”

  “A hunch. I’m beginning to think all this time we’re spending inside each other’s heads is…” He doesn’t finish the sentence. Is he thinking of the last moment we saw each other too? Has he too lost sleep, staring up at the ceiling in the dark thinking of the brush of his fingers at my waist?

  I’m not sure what to say next. I wanted desperately to talk to him, but I don’t know how to verbalize the slippery mass of bad feelings sitting heaving in my chest.

  “Are you all right?” he asks.

  “I’m fine.”

  “There’s something you want. I can see it in your eyes,” he teases.

  It’s been two weeks since the Commodore Club, a week since Coney Island, and I’m sick of waiting to make another move. “I want to find the scrying mirror for the Resurrection.”

  Finn raises his eyebrows. On my second day here, Maxine told me she’d once heard there was a magical black market in the city. If anyone knows more, it has to be Finn. I’m angry at myself for not thinking of this market and the possibility of the mirror being there sooner. “Do you know anything about a magical market in the city?”

  Maybe I’m being delusional, maybe I’m being selfish, but I hope including Maxine in an adventure to the city will help her. I can’t give her my powers, but we can continue to discover more of the magical world together. Two birds. One stone.

  Finn chews on his lower lip for a moment. “It’s on the Upper West Side. I’ve never been.”

  A thrill zips through me. “But it does exist?” I marvel at the idea that witches live dispersed through the city, enough of them to have a market, to have a whole world right under the noses of the non-magical.

  “Yes, it’s a place to trade in spells, magical objects, general mystical things. Boss and Vykotsky control most of the magical folk in the city, but there are enough hedge witches making a go of it on their own to merit a meeting place.”

  Excitement courses through me as I picture the market. “How soon can we go? Once we have the mirror, we only need the graveyard dust and something that belonged to William.”

  I still don’t have a plan for that last one. My mother and I left our apartment quickly; William’s belongings ended up on the curb or repossessed by the tenement board to settle our debts. I think one of our downstairs neighbors ended up with a few of his shirts; Finn and I could break in, try our luck. Or I could return to our old school and find a library book with his name in it, perhaps.

  Finn interrupts my train of thought. “It’s a market for witches—they don’t allow Sons in. They’ll spot me from a mile away. But I have a contact: ask for Miss Soraya when you get there.”

  “Get where?”

  “It’s in the basement of the natural history museum. The market is held on every full moon.”

  And with that, he is gone.

  * * *

  Despite our fight yesterday, Maxine doesn’t flinch when I sit down next to her in the library.

  “I have a present for you,” I say.

  She raises her eyebrows. “Oh?”

  I’m eager to put everything from earlier behind us. “We’re going on an adventure. The magical market you’ve heard about is real, and we’re going to go.”

  She doesn’t take much convincing. We take to the stacks. In the astrology section Maxine finds a hefty tome that tells us the next full moon is this Tuesday.

  I trace my finger over the tiny ink illustration of the moon. “That’s lucky.”

  “More than lucky,” Maxine replies. “Helen will be gone this week for a family funeral upstate. I’ll tell Vykotsky I’ve felt a new pupil and need the ambulance. You and Lena can come along.”

  “This feels too easy.”

  “Perhaps that means it’s right,” Maxine replies with a shrug.

  “Surely they’ll notice when we don’t return with a new student,” I say.

  “I’ll tell them I was wrong.”

  And so on Tuesday night, Lena and I meet Maxine in the back building where the ambulance is stored and crawl into the front bench seat, the three of us packed together like sardines.

  “Tell me again where you learned to drive?” Lena asks, a nervous edge to her voice.

  Maxine wiggles her eyebrows. “Helen taught me two years ago, and I’ve only crashed once.”

  Lena turns to Maxine, a horrified look on her face. “Once?”

  “That man’s leg healed fine, I assume.”

  With a turn of the key and a crank of the lever, the ambulance roars to life, drowning out our protests.

  The dark drive from Queens to Manhattan doesn’t take long, though crossing over the churning dark of the East River still makes my stomach turn.

  These journeys into the city are beginning to feel routine. With Maxine and Lena beside me, I feel more at home than ever.

  We pull up to the imposing American Museum of Natural History, and Maxine throws the ambulance into park on the curb.

  The brownstone building stretches along most of West Seventy-Seventh Street. The sun has set, and electric streetlamps have the museum lit up like a Gothic castle. I half expect Lord Byron to greet us at the door.

  “It’s even creepier knowing it’s full of dead things,” Lena says.

  If there is a market inside, there is no sign of it from here. The street is quiet. The windows of the museum are dark. We see no figures moving inside or out. The night is cold and clear. I shiver under my cape.

  “How confident are we that Finn knew what he was talking about?” Maxine asks.

  “He said the market isn’t open to Sons,” I say. “Maybe he was given bad information.”

  Maxine stomps her foot, either in frustration or to keep moving for warmth. “Well, we came all this way.”

  Together the three of us climb the marble steps to the main entrance. Lena tugs on the brass handle of the double doors. They rattle uselessly, locked.

  “Perhaps there’s another entrance,” I offer.

  “Or perhaps it’s a test,” Lena replies, peering down at the lock.

  She extends her hands, whispers, “Briseadh,” and the door unlocks with a clink.

/>   Maxine and I both raise our brows. “Well done,” Maxine says.

  Inside the museum is freezing and near pitch dark. The light from the street doesn’t filter in well. It’s all long shadows and black hallways. The checkered black-and-white floors look recently waxed. They stretch endlessly, branching off into exhibit halls. Above us, the ceiling is easily three times as high as the Haxahaven entryway. It is so quiet, even our breathing echoes. The girl I was just a month ago would have been terrified, but I set my shoulders square with the confidence there is nothing in this building more terrifying than the three of us.

  “Well, Frances, what do we do now?” Maxine whispers.

  It’s a fair question. One I don’t have the answer to. I look along the four dark halls extending from the atrium; none have any sign of life, as quiet as the dead animals they house.

  The clicking sounds of feet on the marble floor make the three of us go still all at once. Lena has my hand in a vise. Maxine clutches my shoulder.

  And then, from one of the many branching halls, appears a woman.

  She’s wearing a long black dress. Her dark hair is pinned back in a bun serious enough to match the look in her eyes. She’s middle-aged, perhaps midforties.

  “How’d you get out?” she asks us by way of greeting. The crystal necklaces she wears clack together with each step she takes.

  “Does it matter?” Maxine stands up tall, no sign of the fear that had her clinging to me moments ago. “Regardless, we can’t stay long.”

  “Finn said you were smart.” The woman’s face softens a bit. “I’m Miss Soraya. I suppose you’d better follow me.”

  Miss Soraya takes us down a nondescript staircase, then through a dim catalog room filled to the brim with shelves of dead birds. It stretches on for what must be the better part of a city block. Some of them are in jars that glow a little green in the low light. Others are laid out gently, their tiny dead feet wrapped in twine. This whole place gives me the creeps.

  Miss Soraya stops at a dark wood shelf labeled RARE BIRDS OF NORTH AMERICA.

  She smiles, but the corners of her mouth go out instead of up, so it isn’t exactly reassuring. With a gloved hand, she feels along the shelf until she finds a seam. She pushes, and the wall swings back, revealing a secret door.

  From somewhere beyond the door, comes the gentle rumble of voices, footsteps.

  Anticipation tingles in my fingertips. I’ve gotten good at stepping into the unknown.

  I follow her. Maxine and Lena, holding hands, are close behind.

  The room we step into takes my breath away.

  It is as big as a dance hall, but windowless. The floors and walls are gleaming tile, in a green so dark, it’s almost black. Above us hang brass chandeliers, with cutouts in the shape of stars. In the center of the room is a white marble statue of Joan of Arc being burned at the stake.

  Along the walls are stalls staffed by women, overflowing with objects that look more like a sparkly trash heap than goods for sale. Piles of crystals, twisted-up pieces of metal, herbs, dripping candles, sculptures of hands, and stacks of dusty books.

  About a dozen women of all kinds mill about, haggling, buying up magical supplies like they would meat at the market. Some remind me of my previous clients, dressed in well-tailored silks with pearls dripping off their necks, their sweeping hats adorned with flowers and feathers. Others are in factory clothes. One is in a black-and-white maid’s uniform. They’re tall and short, of all races and ages. Some keep to themselves. Some are gathered in small groups, chatting like old friends.

  The smell of incense is so powerful, it makes my eyes water.

  It’s thrilling to see a place so alive with magic. Free of the sterility of Mrs. Vykotsky’s school or the brutality of Boss Olan’s club. Perhaps there is another option, a place I could belong.

  Miss Soraya waves a wrinkled hand. “Welcome to the Bizarre Bazaar, ladies. On the right you’ll find spell supplies. On the left you’ll find magical objects. In the back you’ll find whatever Yasmine Hawkins has scrounged up this week. Best of luck with whatever you Haxahaven girls get up to these days.”

  The sapphire necklace in the pocket of Maxine’s overcoat jingles as we walk over to the first table. I’m not sure where to start, but I follow Maxine’s confident steps. It’s her job to cart girls off to a fake tuberculosis sanitarium—I suppose asking a stranger at a magical black market for a mirror can’t be more difficult than that.

  In awed silence Maxine, Lena, and I flit between tables. One is covered with tall tapers in all the shades of the rainbow. Another sells divination cards. At the table next to me, a middle-aged woman presses a hag stone into Lena’s hands. She passes me one too. It’s smooth like a river rock, but with an oblong hole through the center.

  “I can’t pay you,” I reply, confused.

  She shakes her head. “You need it more than I do.”

  I don’t like the disquieting way she looks at us, like she knows something about us we don’t.

  Her expression is reflected on many women’s faces in the market, some combination of pity and discomfort. I wonder how many of them once wore this same Haxahaven cape.

  I push past my mild sense of unease. I could spend hours here, thumbing over copper coins, amulets, towers of crystal, tiny iron cauldrons—the objects seem endless.

  Lena, Maxine, and I converge at a stall in the back corner of the market. The woman sitting behind the table has white hair down to her waist. She’s selling candles etched with runes.

  “Vykotsky know you’re here?” She looks us up and down, her mouth turned in a frown.

  “Of course.” Maxine smiles sweetly.

  “Oh the young, you all think you’re such good liars. What are you looking for? Trouble? You look like you’re looking for trouble.”

  “We’re looking for a scrying mirror,” I reply.

  “Ah, so you are looking for trouble.” She clucks. “Can’t help you, I’m afraid.”

  Maxine pulls the necklace from her pocket. “Does this change your mind?”

  The woman sighs heavily. “Not everything can be bought with money, dear.”

  “What can it be bought with?” I ask. There’s nothing I wouldn’t give.

  “From the three of you? Nothing. It’s for your own good.”

  “That seems to be an excuse only ever given to women,” Maxine sneers.

  The woman with the long white hair almost smiles. “Smart and looking for trouble. The three of you are dangerous indeed. I cannot help you. But perhaps Therese Theresi has less sense than I do.”

  “Where is she?” Lena asks.

  “Three o’clock.” She gestures with her head.

  I open my mouth to say thank you, but before I can, Lena’s hand pulls me away, and we slink off in the direction of someone who can, hopefully, help us.

  Therese Theresi has a table covered in evil-eye charms; their blue irises gaze up at me. They match Therese’s eyes, an unsettling shade of turquoise set against weathered skin. Next to her till there is a sign in black ink, but I don’t read Greek, so I don’t know what it says.

  “We’re looking for a mirror,” Maxine says by way of greeting.

  She continues her work thumbing through a deck of gold-edged cards, not looking up at us. “What kind of mirror, child?”

  “A scrying mirror. Something old. Something that works.”

  “Working is subjective. It’s all about intention. A bowl of grape juice works with the right intention.”

  Maxine puts her hands on her hips. “I don’t want a bowl of grape juice—I want a scrying mirror.”

  Therese scrunches up her already extraordinarily wrinkled face, finally looking up at us. “Why?”

  Maxine replies, “That’s none of your business.” At the same time Lena replies, “Normal things.”

  “What can you pay?” Therese asks in a thick, Greek accent.

  “This.” Maxine dangles the necklace from her elegant fingers.

  Therese click
s her tongue, unimpressed. “I don’t want your jewels.” My heart sinks. If she won’t take the necklace, we don’t have anything else.

  “Do you have the mirror or not?” Maxine asks. She taps the toe of her boot impatiently against the marble floors.

  Therese looks at her through narrowed eyes, assessing and unnerving. “I have the mirror.”

  “What’s the price?” I ask. I’m afraid to hear her answer.

  She considers us, one by one. The way she studies me makes me want to crawl out of my own skin. What does she see underneath my trembling desperation?

  “I need to know you’re serious.” She purses her lips. “I need to know you’re committed to the kind of sisterhood this magic requires. Before you scry, you need an anchor. Can you be each other’s anchors?”

  I don’t know what she means by anchor, but the seriousness of her tone frightens me. I felt so confident walking in, but seeing all of these objects, these women, makes me realize just how little I still understand about magic.

  “Yes, yes, Lena and Frances are my anchors,” Maxine sighs. She doesn’t share my fear. “I adore them very much. We’ll take the mirror now.”

  Therese shakes her head, her earrings jangle a tuneless song. “Not so fast, child,” she scolds. “Tell me about your sisters.”

  “What about them?” Maxine replies, like she finds the question ridiculous.

  “Tell me how they got their magic.”

  I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this.

  “The same way we all did.” The tapping of her foot is getting louder, faster too. “Their souls are both a gift and a curse. We get it. Spare me the lecture, I beg you.”

  “No.” Therese shakes her head. “Tell me about the day it happened.”

  “Frances killed a man. Lena might have too.”

  “I didn’t.” Lena speaks up from behind me.

  “See?” Therese shakes her head again. “You don’t know each other at all. How can there be trust without knowledge?”

  “We know other things,” Maxine says. “More important things.”