The Witches of Dark Root

by April Aasheim [paranormal]

  “Compliments of the chef,” he said.

  I bit into a biscuit that was so hard I was afraid I’d chip a tooth. “It’s like eating a rock.”

  “Sorry, that’s all we had left.”

  Shane scratched his head and regarded the town. The streets were quieter now, with just a few people milling about. But that would change at dusk when everyone returned for the parade, the dance, and the lighting ceremony.

  “I ran out of candy about an hour ago,” he added, turning back to us. “...And I’ve been giving the trick-or-treaters complimentary menus and napkins. I'm surprised my place hasn’t been toilet-papered yet.”

  “That’s nothing,” Eve said. “I’ve been giving the little ones makeovers. Twenty bags of fun-sized candy bars doesn’t go as far as it used to.”

  “All in all, a pretty good day,” I said, not admitting that I had been pilfering from her candy bowl whenever she used the restroom. “The candles get here yet?”

  “No.” Eve threw up her arms and slapped them down at her side in frustration. “I did some scrounging and we have around thirty white tapers, but I’m guessing we need at least three hundred.”

  A female shop owner I recognized waddled towards us.

  “I just wanted to thank you young people so much for getting this started,” she called out. “I’ve made more money today than I have in the last year. Albert is very happy.” She held up a fistful of cash, looked longingly at the biscuits, and crossed the street to spend some of her newly acquired money at Dip Stix.

  “Good work, ladies,” Shane said.

  “I can’t wait to be done with the parade,” I tugged at the black dress that was shrink-wrapping itself around my body as the day grew more humid. “I need to get out of this thing.”

  “I can’t wait, either.” Shane’s eyes twinkled like the lights in his window. “I want to see you in that sweater dress again.”

  I felt my face redden to the color of my hair.

  “Oh?” Eve raised an eyebrow.

  I was sure she was going to say something catty. I hadn’t shown her the dress for fear she would make fun of me.

  She surprised me by saying, “I’m sure you are going to look beautiful.”

  And I think she meant it.

  The sun set behind the trees as we assembled for the parade.

  Our float, The Witches of Dark Root, was traditionally the last one in line, signaling the beginning of the evening’s activities. But Paul and Eve thought we should go first this year, so they could be done in time to change costumes for their Sonny and Cher extravaganza. We would be followed by the Mayor’s car and the Home School marching band.

  I wasn’t happy with the lineup, but it did mean we could be done first, allowing me to keep an eye out for Leah.

  Our float was an old wagon decorated with chrysanthemums and drawn by two black horses.

  I stood in the center, pretending to stir a black cauldron as my eyes looked out from beneath the brim of my pointy hat, scanning faces in the crowd. Shane sat up front with the driver, seemingly at home and still in his cowboy gear. Merry, Eve, June Bug and Paul sat on bales of hay along the edge of the wagon bed, waving to the crowd and throwing out plastic spider rings. Some older kids ran behind them, begging for lollipops while Eve lectured them on the dangers of eating too much sugar.

  We were nearly at the end of Main Street when I spotted Leah, lurking near one of the shops. She was dressed in a jacket, jeans and sneakers, easy to spot in a crowd of costumed spectators. I gave a quick glance to my companions, hiked up my long dress and side-stepped to the side of the wagon.

  “Maggie!” I heard Shane call out as I leapt from the cart, wincing as my slippered feet crashed down on the hard pavement. My hat flew from my head and was immediately snatched up by a young mother in the front row.

  I gave them a perfunctory curtsey then took off after Leah.

  I fought my way through the crowd, almost tripping over a kid carrying a jack-o’-lantern and pushing through a couple dressed as John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

  “Leah, wait!” I called, but she kept running.

  She neared the edge of the bandstand. For a second, I thought I’d lost her; the crowd near the bandstand was as thick as Shane’s gravy. Leah was small and quick, able to squirm through narrow openings through the wall of people.

  “I have the circle!” I lied as she weaved in and out of the folding chairs by the stage.

  Why had she wanted to meet me if she was just going to run?

  Someone grabbed my wrist. Startled, I turned to see Shane.

  “Where are you going?” he demanded, pulling me to a stop.

  I pointed to Leah, “That woman has the spell we need to wake up Mother.”

  Shane looked at me with a blank face.

  “Please,” I said. “Just trust me.”

  He nodded and bolted after Leah, pulling me along behind him. We raced along together, dashing after Leah as she wove skillfully through the horde. She had the advantage of not needing to be careful, knocking into old women and pushing over children in her desire to escape. Even so, Shane and I were gaining ground. Leah looked back, her face ashen, then quickly changed direction, running for the bouncy house.

  “We have her,” I said, knowing there was only one entrance. But when we looked inside, I was surprised to find only two young children playing.

  I shook my head. How could she have just disappeared?

  “She probably didn’t have the anti-spell anyway,” I muttered, still scanning faces in the crowd. “...Or she wouldn’t have run.”

  Shane closed his eyes, squeezing them shut. Within the span of a breath he said, “I know where she is.”

  He grabbed my hand and we headed east, down a long dirt road that led into the woods. I checked the ground for Leah’s footprints, but the earth was dry and kept her secret.

  “I don’t think she’s here,” I panted. My lungs burned. My heart raced. The trees closed in, shutting out what was left of the light of the waning moon.

  “Now it’s your turn to trust me,” Shane said, turning onto a branching path, almost invisible through the undergrowth.

  I gripped his arm and followed closer.

  Soon we reached a clearing, a large round area illuminated by the sliver of moon. I squinted, trying to pull up a memory. This was the clearing I had run to when I was a kid, the clearing where Merry and Shane had found me crying. And here was Leah, standing in the center of it.

  We stared at each other, our mouths agape with disbelief.

  “So, you found a tracker,” she said, eyeing Shane with a look that rested somewhere between admiration and loathing.

  “I prefer the term, ‘remote viewer,’” Shane answered.

  I looked at Shane, confused. Tracker? Remote viewer? I had no idea what any of that meant.

  “You didn’t bring the circle.” Leah turned her attention to me, sneering, “...I would feel it on you.”

  “Leah,” I said. “There is no circle. If you could really feel it, you would know that. It’s just a metaphor.”

  “You’re lying!” Her hands turned into claws and her mouth twisted with rage. Her hair seemed to stand on end.

  “It’s over, Leah,” I spat. I was tired, done with games. “Give me the anti-spell.”

  “It’s not over! It will never be over!”

  Leah charged at me, nearly flying across the space between us. She was on me in a moment, knocking me back and landing on top of me. Her hands clamped around my wrists. We wrestled on the ground and I fought to break free.

  Shane rushed to intervene. Leah let go of one of my hands, aiming a bony finger at him. A translucent blue orb flew from her fingertip, crashing into his chest. Shane went immediately stiff, his entire body frozen in place. Leah kept her hand up, raised and steady, maintaining the spell as she watched me out of the corner of her eye.

  With her attention divided, I grabbed her raised hand and pulled her across my body, slamming her into the ground. Now I
was on top, straddling her. Her glasses toppled from her face and she clawed at the dirt, searching for them.

  “You bitch!” I said, taking her tiny wrists in one of my hands.

  Her legs kicked but couldn’t quite reach me. I took a handful of her hair with my free hand and slammed her head down in the dirt.

  “Maggie, stop!” Shane was now free, disorientated and reaching for us.

  Overcome with rage and not thinking, I thrust out my hand. A silver spark shot from my palm, hitting Shane and launching him back across the glen.

  I returned my attention to Leah. “Give me the goddamned anti-spell!” I lifted my arm and slapped her hard across the face.

  Who did she think she was? How dare she mess with me and my family and think there wouldn’t be consequences? I was taking that anti-spell from her, one way or another.

  “Tell me!” I hit her again, striking her nose. Blood gushed across her face. Leah squirmed beneath me, kicking and clawing, trying to bite at my arm that still held her wrists.

  I hated her, hated her for all she had taken from me. Michael. My father. And now she was trying to take my mother.

  “You can’t have her!” I shouted. I pinned her hands over her head, holding them against the ground.

  “Please stop,” she begged, twisting and turning.

  “Tell me where it is!”

  “I don’t have it!” she said. The blood from her nose had reached one of her ears, trickling in.

  “You’re a liar!” I moved my free hand to her neck, squeezing, feeling the veins pump against my palm. She flounced, gasping for breath.

  I might burn in hell for what I was about to do, but she would be there with me.

  My free hand slid down my side, into my pocket, and around the cold blades of the scissors. I didn’t need magic. I pulled them out, letting her see the glint of moonlight on the steel. My soul felt as cold as the weapon in my hand.

  “Maggie, stop!” Shane called, trying to pull himself to his feet. “You don’t want to do this!”

  My eyes flickered towards him, then back to Leah. He didn’t know anything about her. He didn’t know how she had used me, hurt me, stolen what was mine.

  Leah managed to tuck her face into the crook of one of her arms, whimpering. “I don’t have the anti-spell. I swear. That page was missing when I found the book.”

  “I don’t believe you!”

  “I promise! We were just so desperate...” Leah’s wet eyes widened, tears mixing with blood. “You can’t do this. We’re sisters!”

  My grip tightened and I yanked her by the hair, forcing her face sideways and planting a knee on her bloody cheek. I lowered the scissors, letting them hover just centimeters from her ear.

  “You had your chance,” I said, pulling the blades apart as she screamed.

  Snip.

  Her long brown hair fell into the dirt, separated from her head. I used the scissors again and again, until all that remained were uneven chunks of darker brown, closely cropped on her head.

  “Go!” I said, rolling off her when I’d finished and tossing the scissors into the trees.

  Leah scrambled to her feet, looked at her shorn hair on the ground, and then ran for the dark path opposite the way we had come in.

  “Maggie!” Shane reached me, swallowing me in his arms.

  “I couldn’t get the anti-spell,” I sobbed, wiping my nose on his shirt. “Mother isn’t going to get better. I failed.”

  “No, you didn’t fail. You passed, Maggie,” he said, pulling me closer. “It’s going to be okay.”

  “But nothing’s changed,” I said, taking one final glance at the path Leah had gone down.

  I could have followed, but I knew that wouldn’t save my mother. It wouldn’t save me, either.

  An owl hooted somewhere in the woods, a comforting sound as Shane wrapped his arm around my shoulders and escorted me out. He kicked the brush out of my way and carried me over the rougher spots. At last we emerged and a million twinkling stars greeted us.

  “I’m sorry about throwing you back,” I said, still in shock. “I was just so filled with anger. I have no idea how I did that. I didn’t know I had that kind of power.”

  “I did. And don’t apologize. It was actually kind of sexy. Dominated by two women in one night!”

  I slugged him in the shoulder, then remembered something. “You knew exactly where she was. You knew where I was that night I got lost when we were kids. And you found me at the bus stop the night I came to Dark Root. You’re a warlock!”

  “Again, I prefer the term remote viewer. A gift I inherited from my mother. She could find anything. The only woman I ever met who never lost her purse.”

  I let him lift me over a pile of mud or manure, I wasn’t sure which. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I said.

  “After the original council splintered, your mother had some reservations about a man’s role in witchery. Uncle Joe trained me on the sly. Besides,” he said, dusting off the back of my dress. “You weren’t really sold on the magic thing, then. But after what I just witnessed, I’m guessing all that’s changed.”

  “A tracker huh? I could really use you.” I thought about all the things I’d lost.

  “Use me all you want,” Shane replied, as we stepped into the lights of downtown Main Street. Eve and Paul were singing, ‘I Got You, Babe,’ to a crowd of several hundred people.

  Merry spotted me and ran over, whispering that we still had no candles for the lighting ceremony.

  I waved her off. “We’ll figure it out. We always do.”

  Shane and I crossed the street towards Dip Stix. “Now let’s get you cleaned up,” he said, unlocking the door and flipping on the light.

  It took a second for my eyes to adjust and to see the figure sitting at the corner booth.

  “Ruth Anne!” I almost chocked as I raced towards her.

  “Surprise!” she said, her mouth forming a half-smile as she stood to hug me.

  We cried, holding each other so tightly, I wasn’t sure whose tears were whose anymore.

  I looked at Shane, once again surprised by his ability to keep secrets. He grinned and stuffed his hands in his pocket.

  “I told you I was good at finding things,” he said.

  “He’s a frickin’ genius,” Ruth Anne admitted. “I had even changed my name.”

  “The internet is a powerful tool. I’m not sure what we warlocks did before it came along,” Shane joked.

  “You can tell me the details later,” I said, not letting go of my sister.

  Her hair was still short, wisps of brown hitting just above her shoulders. And she still wore the same large glasses she had always worn. She looked absolutely perfect.

  “The others know you are here?” I asked.

  Ruth Ann nodded. “I got in this afternoon. Shane thought we should wait and surprise you after the parade. If I would have known it was going to take you two this long to get here, I would have brought a book.”

  “Sorry.” I bit my lip and gave Shane a knowing look. “We were a little delayed.” Then, remembering the day Shane had confessed to liking older, intelligent women, I suddenly felt like I was intruding.

  “I, uh...” I stepped back, almost without knowing I did it. “...I should probably leave you two alone. I need to get ready for the lighting ceremony.”

  Ruth Anne grabbed me again, whispering in my ear. “Don’t be an idiot. He’s not interested in me.” She kissed me on the cheek, then winked. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve been confined to this restaurant for most of the day. I’d like to get some of that caramel popcorn I’ve been smelling through the window for hours...”

  “We’ll catch you out there after Maggie changes,” Shane said. “Thanks for being such a good sport, Ruth Anne.”

  I gave my sister a final smile and headed towards the restroom to get ready for the lighting ceremony. After all these years, I couldn’t believe I was seeing her again. No matter what I may have believed before, I was now a firm
believer in miracles.

  As I carefully applied my makeup and straightened my hair, I studied my face in the mirror. It was almost imperceptible, but I could see that in the last few months it had changed. It was softer now. And older.

  “You almost ready?” Shane called to me, knocking on the bathroom door. “The natives are growing restless.”

  “Yes,” I said, blotting my red lips on a piece of toilet paper.

  I still wasn’t sure how we were going to manage the lighting ceremony. We’d probably need at least three hundred white candles. Everyone was counting on me to supply them. I stood at the sink for several moments, staring at my reflection and racking my brain for a solution, but I came up empty. After everything we had been through. I couldn’t believe that Haunted Dark Root might fail because of a candle shortage.

  “Damn it!” I hit the sink with my hand in frustration.

  A light bulb popped above me, then went out.

  And I had an idea.

  Twenty-Nine: Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me

  Shane and I walked into the night, down the now-empty sidewalks and towards the bandstand at the edge of town.

  The number of spectators had nearly doubled in the half hour we were inside Dip Stix, preparing. Paul was serenading the crowd sans Eve with an acoustic version of ‘Love Potion Number Nine.’ The crowd clapped along, but there was a feeling of restlessness in the air. They were all waiting for the moment when they could take part in the traditional lighting ceremony, helping to ‘ward off evil’ for another year.

  “You look beautiful, sis,” Merry said, as I made my way up the back steps of the stage, joining her, June Bug and Ruth Anne.

  “Thank you,” I said, pulling at the blue-green sweater dress. It felt tighter than the last time I tried it on. No one seemed to notice; they were too busy focusing on my transformation.

  “I can’t believe you got that hair to behave,” Eve said, touching a strand that had been highlighted a honey-yellow during my trip to Linsburg. “And check out those boots! Are they real leather? I can’t believe you’ve been keeping them from me! I might have to borrow them.”