Witch's Mystic Woods

by Marsha A. Moore

  “Well, keep hope that Irene put in the effort to advance enough in her witchcraft so her soul will reach empowerment after she passes.”

  Barely able to grasp the concept of Mom dying, the idea of afterlife hadn’t occurred to her. “Does Mom know if her soul will remain with us?”

  “I did, but not your father when he went with a heart attack. Best I can tell, the knowin’ beforehand depends on how long an ailin’ body lingers, has a quiet time of reflection.”

  “You’ve talked to Dad to know what happened to him?” She gripped a branch, eager to hear news of her father.

  “Yep. Told me Irene’s time is comin’. He’s trying not to attach his soul till she goes, in case she needs him beside her. The elderberries at the back of our property are callin’ to his soul though. Don’t know where Irene might end up, her bein’ a different sort of witch—maybe in her old sewin’ machine. Still, close ’nough to keep contact.”

  Larena dug her hands into her pockets to fend off the chill of nightfall. She wanted to ask him more questions, no matter how cold or tired she was. “Is it hard not to attach? What’s it like being empowered?”

  “At first, there’s a weightless feelin’ when you’re nothin’ but a goosefeather adriftin’ on a heavy breeze. Made me kinda giddy, like bein’ soused. Wanted to float everywhere. I traveled all over, visitin’ past relations, even back to see my grandparents in Ireland.”

  “Wow.” Her breath caught and the word sputtered out.

  “Then a strong pull of homesickness yanked me back. Tried fightin’ it, but was no use. I’d lose sense of where I was, and next thing I knew, I was in New York or along the Ohio River.”

  “Now, you never leave these ironwoods, do you?” Her questions about empowerment surged like bubbles rising to the surface as a pot began to boil.

  “Nope. Can’t. I tried to leave the homestead and lost connection to the outer world. Luckily, was only yards away and a wind tossed me back where I belong.”

  Larena wadded the lining of her pockets into her fists. “So, you’d lose access to your empowerment if you left the family lands? You’d have to stay if I sold the place and moved?”

  “May be. Not sure.”

  “And Dad, too.” The words scraped her throat. Her family could suffer if she gave up the land. If she allowed Shango to employ his elandine and make Reid terminate the takeover, the empowered spirits would be safe, but Reid would be in danger of desperate madness. The costs weighed heavily. Her back ached from worry about the future as well as stress over the present. “I hope Dad can comfort Mom. I try so hard but don’t know if I make a difference.”

  “How’re you holdin’ up?” Grandpa asked. “You look tired, gal.”

  “I am. I don’t think I could’ve kept the store open late another night. I haven’t slept much since Mom came home from the hospital.”

  “’Sides bein’ tired, how’s your magic? Did you get it back yet?”

  “No.” She hung her head, ashamed. “King Shango’s trying to help me understand what I need to do though. He’s even come up with a way for me to avoid losing the property. Not the best way—but something.”

  “Good. Good. A failsafe.” Twigs rattled together as he spoke.

  “He said he owed you.”

  “He does.” Grandpa laughed. “Glad to see the wily old fae is honoring past debts.”

  “Old? He looks like he’s no more than thirty.” She leaned against a fork of branches, too weary to stay on her feet.

  “Sakes, no. He’s at least five hundred years old. Fae age slowly.”

  “Gee. I guess so,” She said with a yawn. “Maybe after some sleep, I’ll be able to find a soft heart and see whatever’s between the visible and invisible. Seems the only way out of this mess.”

  “Nope, you’re still seein’ things wrong. It won’t solve anything that’s passed. It won’t fix Irene’s illness. Keepin’ compassion in your heart is all about lookin’ ahead, to bring you a happy future once yer ma is gone. But one thing’s fer sure—sleep will set you on the right track.” A thick branch swept gently into her side, encouraging her away from where she leaned. “You get on in. Get some rest.”

  “Thanks for the talk, Grandpa.” Larena plodded to the back porch, where the new burden of the elandine pressured her joints as she mounted the steps. Overcrowded with too many concerns, her brain emptied into a frozen fog.

  “There you are.” Betty met Larena at the mudroom doorway. “Thought you’d freeze to death out there talkin’ to Henry, but I know he’s a help, ’specially now. Let’s change Irene’s underthings before I leave since it’s easier with both of us.”

  Larena wriggled out of her coat, hung it on a hook, and followed into the dining room.

  Her mother’s slow, even breathing indicated she was asleep.

  Larena touched her mother’s shoulder. “Mom, we’re going to change you now.”

  When they rolled her to one side, her arms and legs hung limp, responding minimally to the disturbance. Only when the damp washcloth chilled her skin, did she groan and her eyes flash open. Moments later, she resettled into sleep.

  In the kitchen, Betty collected her things. “I tried to feed Irene, but she wouldn’t have any of it, just a few sips of juice. Hasn’t been eatin’ all day. Sleepin’ a lot. Probably tuckered out from the recent changes. So, you should be able to get some sleep, too.”

  “I noticed that. Hope nothing is wrong.” Larena followed her nose to the oven and pulled out a covered dish to find baked chicken and roast vegetables. “Oh, thank you. I was going for canned soup tonight. I’m so tired.”

  “You’ve been workin’ too many hours, so I decided to make your dinner.” Betty picked up an envelope and handed it to Larena. “As busy as we’ve been, I forgot to give this to you yesterday. It’s some business idea from a young man who said he works with you, and he also brought your mom a card that’s on the buffet.”

  Larena lifted a brow. Inside, she found a letter from Ben Peterson, a short list of possible modifications to their proposed contract. Without reading them, she wadded the page and flung it onto the counter. “Did he say he was Ben Peterson?”

  Betty scrunched her eyes together. “Oh, my. From the company wantin’ to take your land? He said his name was Ben, but that’s all. Oh, I wish I’d asked more. I’d seen his fancy SUV at the store before. I thought he was all right.”

  “It’s okay.” Larena hung her head. After all that had happened, what more could Ben Peterson or Sibeal do to her? “His letter won’t change anything. I’m not going to sell.”

  “It’ll all turn out. Don’t you worry.” Betty grabbed her coat from the mudroom and slipped it on. “But you do need some sleep to hold up for your Mom. Get some rest tonight.”

  After Betty left and Larena filled her stomach with the warm meal, she checked on Mom. In the dim light from the hallway, Larena massaged her mother’s hand dangling out of the covers.

  When at last her mother’s rhythmic snoring prompted Larena to yawn, she tucked the frail hand under the blanket.

  In the parlor, she paced between the couch and the bottom of the stairwell, trying to decide where to sleep. She sat down on the bottom step and rested her head against the baluster. This is not a choice. Time will not stand still, no matter how much you want it to so Mom won’t die. Life is moving ahead and you’ve got to go with it, starting right now, this minute.

  She rose, curled onto the couch, wrapped in two throws, and allowed sleep to claim her.

  A croaking, muddled sound woke her. She wormed out of the tangle of blankets and ran into the dining room, where her mother garbled a string of words. Larena switched on a lamp and opened her mouth to speak but stopped when Mom said her husband’s name.

  Her mother stared at an empty chair, her blue eyes clear like a summer sky, unblinking. Random audible words punctuated her muttering. “Lou, you…I am…do you.” She paused, her gaze intent, then nodded as if in response to something said in a conversation Laren
a couldn’t hear.

  Larena hung near the lamp on the buffet, watching and unacknowledged, a mere onlooker. Was Mom talking with Dad? Or someone else?

  Mom started talking again, her face animated as she delivered a sputtered, unintelligible monologue, as though trying to influence someone. Her persuasive speech, sometimes denigrating to a torrent of silent lip movements, lasted several minutes. Then, as before, she waited, eyes fixed and squinted, as if listening. Was she asleep and having some sort of lucid dream or was Dad really present? If so, Larena wished he’d make himself known to her. Perhaps her parents’ private interaction was too demanding? Regardless, whatever engaged her mother should not be interrupted.

  Larena took a slow step backward toward the door to give the private encounter more space. Without any perceptible airflow and no shift in the furnace’s function, a greeting card on the buffet beside her blew over. She watched and waited to see what the card would do.

  It inched toward her, and Larena held her breath. She picked up the card, and immediately dropped it. A spell burned her fingers—a toxic, dark spell. Too noxious for her to attempt reading the paper for traces of who applied the magic. Not that she could, without control of her tree mysticism skills.

  Pain and fury stabbed her heart. Ben had brought that card—a card with a horrid spell attached. For her mother! An old lady already suffering upon her final life’s journey. How dare he? Sibeal—it had to be her doing. How could that wicked woman do such a cruel act? Convulsive sobs and an infuriated scream ripped from Larena’s throat together. She doubled over and sank to the floor, head buried in hair and hands. Rage filled every part of her being. They had to pay for this.

  Through the storm brewing inside, a gentle sensation touched her head. Energy, warm and filled with tenderness, wrapped around her arms, held her tight.

  She leaned into the snug comfort, allowed her grief to flow into it. With tear-filled eyes, she looked up to find her mother asleep. “Dad?”

  The lamp flickered. Like reading a tree’s grain, she recognized the familiar vibrations of the unseen force. It was her father, come home to help.

  The invisible force pulled her to stand and helped her up the stairs to her room. Then the spirit dissipated.

  Shaking from fear, anger, and exhaustion, Larena hurriedly changed for bed and crawled under the covers. As she drifted to sleep, what she had witnessed tonight between her parents, along with the advice of the Summer Fae King, floated through her mind—see both what is visible and invisible.

  ***

  At breakfast the next morning, Larena attempted to get Mom to take her oatmeal. The event ended in a frustration of her grimaces and wheezy coughs and Larena’s panic. Dr. Sanborn’s anticipated downward milestone—the loss of ability to swallow—clenched her heart.

  After setting the bowl in the kitchen, Larena couldn’t face the truth. She paced around the butcher-block table, trying to convince herself that Mom’s symptoms would reverse. Maybe if Larena tried another food or a beverage. She poured a small glass of juice, added a straw, and returned to Mom’s side.

  Her mother struggled to suck the liquid, which only caused more turmoil when she choked and sputtered. The juice dribbled down the side of her jaw, and Larena caught it with a napkin. Mom groaned from the difficult endeavor.

  Larena leaned her mother forward and rubbed her upper back to help move any remaining fluid out of her throat.

  Resting back against her pillow, Mom tried to form words and failed. Her eyes bugged and her chin trembled. Her fear was palpable.

  Seeing the wicked greeting card still on the floor, Larena snatched it with a napkin and carried it to the kitchen. She stored it in a plastic sack and resisted the temptation to toss it into the burning barrel outside.

  As soon as Betty drove up, Larena pulled on her coat and met her at the back door. “I need to go over to Fable and see the owner for a few minutes before work. Mom’s not swallowing, as Dr. Sanborn said would happen. She just chokes and drools, even with liquids.”

  The large, matronly woman wrapped Larena into a bear hug. “Oh, honey. I’m so sorry. This is too quick.”

  Larena pulled back and blinked away tears. “Keep an eye on her. I changed and washed her already. Was up early. Couldn’t sleep.”

  “Did you get some rest though?”

  “Some. I went to bed early. Just woke up around four. Be back soon.” Larena picked up the offending bag, and, holding it at a distance, made her way to the shop. She gathered the charmed hat she’d made for Ben, wrapped it in holiday paper, and stuffed the small parcel into her coat’s flap pocket—ready to be delivered as soon as she could. He needed to pay for what he’d done to her mother. Revenge upon Sibeal seemed as necessary but more difficult. Perhaps Shango would have a plan.

  Larena left the store and made her way to the garage. She stowed the bespelled card in the back of the box truck, then managed to start the engine on the first try and cut quickly across the coven to Fable. Blocked by no other vehicles this time, she slipped into a parking spot at the general store’s curb. Good thing, since she only had thirty minutes before opening her own shop.

  She gathered the bag and scurried through the restaurant’s double doors. Finding no one inside, she called out a hello.

  When Wren appeared in the kitchen doorway with Cindy, a woman Larena knew from the coven, she cringed. Cindy’s mother Estelle was one of Sibeal’s haughty, founding-family friends.

  “Hi, Larena.” Cindy’s bobbed, Thirties-style hair bounced as she spoke. “I heard you’re supplying furniture for Fable. How cool. They’ve just hired me as a hostess for the dining room. Isn’t that great?”

  “Yes, it is. Congratulations.” Larena glanced behind them, looking for the king.

  “I can’t wait for the big opening with a Yule open house. Will you be here?” Cindy asked.

  “Um, I hadn’t thought. Maybe.” Partying was the last thing Larena wanted to do. She addressed Wren, “Is Shango around? I need to see him.”

  “Yes. Upstairs in his office. Follow me.” With a sweep of her feathery brown hair, she led Larena up the narrow staircase. Climbing proved tricky with the risers both higher than newer construction and also dished in the center from years of foot traffic. The landing opened onto an upstairs parlor.

  Through an open door, Shango sat at a large oak desk and stood when he noticed them approach. “Larena, come in. Have a seat. What can I do for you?”

  After Wren left, Larena deposited the bag on a corner of his desk and took the seat he gestured to across from him. “In there is a greeting card Ben Peterson gave my mother. It has a dark spell applied, which burned my fingers when I touched it. I’m so scared. My mother’s health has deteriorated a lot since that card arrived. She sleeps almost all the time and is having lucid conversations with my father’s spirit who is still not corporal in any object. Worst of all,” Larena’s voice caught in a dry sob as she gulped for air trying to explain everything in a hurry, “she now doesn’t have the ability to swallow—a symptom of the dementia the doctor said will cause her death. I knew all this was going to happen soon, but not this fast. I believe there’s a connection to the card and to Sibeal.”

  “I’m so sorry.” His brows pulled together. “If what you say is true, it’s unthinkable. A heinous use of magic.”

  “Why would anyone do this?” Tightness clenched her lungs. “Can you help my mother with your fae magic? Please.”

  Shango rested his elbows on the table and steepled his fingers against his lips. “I sincerely wish there was something I could do, but there is not. Even if I could find a way to block the spell, I cannot reverse what it’s already done.”

  “Please.” The word rasped against her throat, causing it to spasm with sobs she struggled to hold back. “You’re a king. If there is any chance. Please.”

  He shook his head and said with a soft voice, “I cannot undo the action. The best way to mitigate damages is for you to regain control of your magic through purit
y of heart and mind. That will put Sibeal in her place.”

  Larena tightened her face, a futile attempt to contain a torrent of emotions. Like a broken dam, her muscles gave way as pain, anger, and grief cascaded from her. “You keep saying that. Didn’t you hear me? Someone has tried to speed up my mother’s death. I want to rip Sibeal apart. And Ben, too, for delivering the card. Can’t you at least make them pay for this? How do you expect me to be calm and hold compassion for others? Other than for my mother?” Her rage spilled; she collapsed into a mess of hot tears, head buried into hands.

  He rose and rounded the desk to kneel beside her and massaged her shoulder. “Larena, try to listen. You are not holding compassion for your mother.”

  “That’s all I am doing and have been doing for more than a year,” she croaked through sobs. “I have no life of my own anymore.”

  “The words you used—I am doing, I have been doing, I have no life—are all centered around you, not your mother.”

  She stared at him in a daze, mind and heart too jumbled to comprehend.

  “You are reacting out of fear for yourself at the thought of losing her. Move your view outside yourself, so you can feel for her, lighten her fears, her load, as she takes her final journey. There will be time enough to grieve later. Embrace compassion for your mother. Do you understand?”

  A breath entered the recesses of her chest that had long been sealed shut. Her heart expanded. “Yes. I can do more for my mother.”

  He grinned and patted her arm. “Not more. You are already overburdened. Think quality, not quantity. It will be the pureness of compassion which will ease both her journey and yours into the future.”

  As she imagined embracing his idea, her arms and legs tingled with warmth. “I can do that.”

  “Good. Compassion will lead you to conquer what you now struggle against. With your heart softened, you’ll be able to view others, besides your mother, the same way. You will be kind to yourself without feeling self-pity. The nemeton will open to you, where you’ll gain its power to restore your magic and your future.”