In the Dreaming

by Isobel Bird

  “Sure,” Kate answered. “Now, tell me how long you’re here for. I suppose it’s just for the weekend, right?”

  “That’s the best part of the surprise,” her aunt said. “I’m here for a longer visit this time.”

  Kate couldn’t believe her good luck. Not only was her favorite aunt there, she was going to stay for a while. “A week?” she asked hopefully.

  “At least,” said her aunt. “It depends on how things go with the project I’m working on.”

  “This is so great,” Kate exclaimed. “What better way to spend the Fourth of July than with my favorite people?”

  “How about eating with your favorite people?” her father suggested as he came out with a platter piled high with hot dogs and headed for the grill. “I think your mother could use a hand bringing the rest of that food out here.”

  “Let’s go make ourselves useful,” Aunt Netty suggested to Kate.

  “You just sit down, Netty,” Mr. Morgan said. “The kids can help Teresa.”

  Aunt Netty groaned and made a face at Kate’s father. “Whatever you say, Joe,” she said, and sank back into the lawn chair.

  Kate went back into the kitchen, taking Tyler with her. Inside, she loaded him up with things to carry, all the while talking about her aunt.

  “She’s my mom’s little sister,” she informed him as she handed him a big bowl of chips. “She’s really funny, and she’s a photographer. She’s always going somewhere different to shoot for magazines. Wait until you see her stuff. She must be here on some kind of assignment.”

  “She seems really nice,” Tyler said, trying to juggle all the things Kate was handing him.

  “You can make more than one trip, you know,” her mother said.

  “Sorry,” said Kate, realizing that she’d overloaded her boyfriend and taking back the napkins she’d tried to squeeze under his arm. “I’m just so excited about Aunt Netty being here.”

  They went back outside, where Tyler helped Kate arrange things on the picnic table. When everything was ready, the whole family gathered around and began loading up their plates. Mr. Morgan stood by the grill, turning hot dogs and handing them out when they were done. Before long everyone was sitting in lawn chairs, happily eating and enjoying the beautiful sunny afternoon.

  “This sure beats cafeteria food,” Kyle said as he dug into his second piece of lasagna. “I think the university should hire you to cater for us, Mom.”

  “Your mother has enough business here to keep her working overtime,” Mr. Morgan commented. “Don’t give her any ideas. We hardly see her as it is.”

  “This really is amazing, Mrs. Morgan,” Tyler said as he nibbled on an ear of corn. “I can’t wait to try some of that cake.”

  “Do you want some potato salad, Aunt Netty?” Kate asked, glancing at her aunt’s plate. “You haven’t eaten very much.”

  “Thanks, sweetie,” Aunt Netty replied. “I’m all set. It’s all delicious, but like Tyler I’m trying to save room for that cake.”

  “That just means there’s more for me,” Kate said, getting up to refill her plate.

  “So, Tyler, tell me about yourself,” said Kate’s aunt when Kate returned and settled back into her seat beside her boyfriend. “Where did you and Kate meet?”

  Isobel Bird

  Join the circle…

  Book 1: So Mote It Be

  There’s practically nothing about February that Kate likes — the only bright spot is Valentine’s Day, and even that looks dreary with no likely prospects in sight. So when a love spell crosses her path, what’s a girl to do? Little does Kate know that her impulsive decision to cast a spell will have consequences — both good and bad — far beyond what she’d intended.

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  Book 2: Merry Meet

  Joined by an uneasy bond, Kate, Cooper, and Annie are resolved to explore their newfound fascination with witchcraft. The three very different girls attend an open pagan ritual, and while each is drawn to the power of witches, it becomes apparent that they must come together as three before they might begin to learn the ways of Wicca.

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  Book 3: Second Sight

  As Annie, Cooper, and Kate begin to learn the Craft, a girl in their town goes missing. Cooper has what she thinks are nightmares about it—until it becomes clear that she is having visions about what really happened to the girl. Cooper knows what she must do, but is terrified that it will mean revealing the secret she and her friends have kept until now.

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  CHAPTER 1

  “This is it,” Kate said, getting out of the car.

  Cooper and Annie climbed out and looked around. The cabin they had pulled up in front of was surrounded by pine trees. Behind it, the woods gave way to a sandy beach, and a short dock stretched out into the gently rolling waters of the lake. The cabin itself was small and painted white, with green shutters at the windows. It belonged to Kate’s family, and the three friends were using it for the weekend.

  “The lake might be warm enough for swimming,” Kate said. “And there’s a rowboat up by the house if we want to paddle around.”

  Annie checked her watch. “The ritual starts at six,” she said. “We should probably eat something and get dressed.”

  “Okay,” Cooper said as they made sandwiches in the cabin’s little kitchen a while later. “Tell me about what’s going on tonight. All I really know is that there will be a bunch of witches and pagans running around. Did Tyler tell you anything else?”

  Kate shook her head. “Not really,” she said. “He was kind of secretive about it. He just said that lots of different covens get together and do a lot of fun stuff. It all seems to center around this dance in the woods, which is why Sophia told us to make costumes. But that’s all I know about it.”

  “I see you dyed your hair for the occasion,” Annie commented as she gave Cooper’s pale green hair an approving glance.

  “It seemed sort of Midsummery,” Cooper said. “Not that I really know much about what Midsummer really is.”

  “I looked that up,” Annie said, clearly pleased that someone was giving her a chance to show off her recently acquired knowledge. “Midsummer is the longest day of the year, which also means it’s the shortest night. Pagans also call it Litha, although I couldn’t really find out what that means. I think it must have something to do with light.”

  “That’s it?” Cooper said. “That doesn’t sound like anything to make a big fuss about.”

  “Tell it to the old witches who made up the Wheel of the Year,” Annie replied. “I didn’t do it.”

  “I’m sure we’ll learn more about it when we get to the gathering,” Kate said. “And I’m sure it will be interesting. Every other sabbat celebration we’ve been to has been.”

  That was true. The three friends had only experienced two of the eight sabbats, or holidays, that made up what was called the Wheel of the Year, but both of those sabbats had had unforgettable results. At Ostara, the sabbat commemorating the beginning of spring, they had met two people who quickly became important in their lives. One was Sasha, a runaway who had later been taken in by a member of a local coven. The other was Tyler. He was Kate’s boyfriend—for now. She’d broken up with someone else to go out with Tyler, and recently a kiss between Kate and this ex-boyfriend, Scott, had raised some doubts in Kate about her feelings for Tyler. At the May Day sabbat of Beltane, Cooper had had her own experience with the power of magic when she’d come face-to-face with a dead girl who had been haunting her dreams, dragging them all into a roller coaster of an adventure that had culminated in Annie’s kidnapping and the unmasking of the girl’s murderer.

  Now they were about to celebrate the third sabbat of the year and a day they had committed themselves to studying with their Wicca class. School had ended for the year only a few days ago. Finals were behind them, and they had the long, lazy summer to look forward to. Starting it off with a celebration
with their Wiccan friends was the perfect beginning to what was sure to be a great couple of months. They’d each been working on a costume for the big event, and now it was time to show one another what they’d decided to be.

  “What do you think?” asked Cooper, showing Annie what looked like a short green dress covered in artificial leaves and flowers.

  “Now I understand the green hair,” Annie replied. “But what are you supposed to be, the Not-So-Jolly Green Giant?”

  “I’m a wood nymph,” Cooper said, holding up the dress. “I’m going to put leaves and flowers in my hair, too.”

  Annie looked doubtful. “I never really thought of you as the nymph type,” she said.

  Cooper reached into her bag and pulled something out. It was a flute. She played a few notes on it. “I’m the kind of nymph who leads people astray in the woods by tempting them with music,” she explained. “I never thought taking those stupid flute lessons when I was nine would pay off.”

  Annie shook her head. Cooper just wasn’t the spritely, sunshiny type. There was always an edge to her. She couldn’t be just a nymph; she had to be one with an attitude. That was okay, though. Annie had made a rather unusual costume choice as well. She opened the box she’d made Cooper pack so carefully and reached inside. She lifted out the mask she’d spent all week making out of papier-mâché and then carefully painting.

  “What is that thing?” said Kate.

  The mask Annie held in her hands looked like a giant pincushion. It had a short, rounded snout, and long points of rolled-up newspapers protruded like spikes all around it. The entire thing was painted in various shades of brown.

  “I’m going to be a hedgehog,” Annie explained, putting the mask over her head so that it settled on her shoulders. She peered out at Kate and Cooper through the two small eyeholes above the snout.

  “You’re going to be a hedgehog?” Kate repeated doubtfully.

  Annie nodded, her spiked head bobbing up and down. “I was reading about traditional Midsummer festivities in this book I got from the library,” she explained. “In some parts of Britain the people dressed up like forest animals and held parades through the streets. I thought it sounded cool.”

  “Don’t you dare make fun of my nymphiness while you have that thing on,” Cooper said.

  “You’re both way too weird,” commented Kate as she fetched her own costume out of her bag. Like Cooper’s, it was a short dress. Only it was made of glittery pink material that sparkled when it moved. And attached to the back was a pair of short wings.

  “You would be a faerie princess,” Cooper remarked.

  “And why not?” Kate demanded. “Besides, A Midsummer Night’s Dream was the last thing we read in English before the end of the year. It seemed fitting.”

  “Well, we’d better hurry and get ready if we want to be on time for this thing,” Annie said, taking off her hedgehog mask and picking up a sandwich.

  They ate quickly, then got to work getting dressed. Kate was the official makeup person, and she expertly applied color to Cooper’s face and then her own. Because she was wearing a mask, Annie was spared being painted, but she did have to put on the shirt and pants she’d chosen to go with her costume. When she was done and had put her mask back on, she looked like a giant hedgehog dressed in a person’s clothes.

  “That’s sort of creepy,” Kate said, surveying the finished product.

  “I think it’s cool,” said Cooper. “How do I look?”

  “Like a wood sprite,” Annie said.

  Kate had done Cooper’s eyes in several shades of green, and even used green lipstick. Combined with the green hair and the garland of flowers she had on her head, Cooper looked like some kind of strange forest creature.

  Cooper played a little trill on her flute, and Annie saw that even her fingernails were painted green. As for Kate, she really did look like a faerie. Her face was made up in pinks and reds, and she had applied sparkly glitter to her skin. She’d woven pink ribbons through her hair, and she was wearing a garland of roses. The wings attached to her dress shook gently when she moved, and her dress seemed to shimmer in the light.

  “We look fabulous,” she declared. “Let’s go.”

  They left the cabin and walked up the road, following the directions given to them by Tyler. At first they felt a little self-conscious, but soon they ran into other people walking along the road dressed in costumes, and they knew that they were going in the right direction. They also began to see tents of various colors scattered throughout the woods.

  “Do you recognize any of those people?” Annie asked Cooper and Kate as several gaily dressed women and men passed them, laughing and singing.

  “No,” Kate said. “But it would be hard to recognize anyone in costumes like these. I doubt Sophia or Archer or any of the witches from the coven will even know it’s us.”

  Ahead of them a hand-painted sign reading faerie gathering hung from a tree. The sign had an arrow pointing down a path, so they turned onto it and followed it through the woods. It wound through the trees, finally opening into a large clearing in which dozens of costumed people were standing.

  “This is amazing,” said Cooper as they looked around. They’d been to gatherings before, but none of them had been like this. Everywhere they looked there were women and men in beautiful, sometimes outlandish, outfits.

  Annie pointed to a man dressed as a fox, with pointy ears, glued-on whiskers, and a fluffy red tail emerging from the seat of his green pants. “See,” she said triumphantly. “I’m not the only animal here.”

  And she wasn’t. In fact, there were many people dressed as animals, including a frog, an owl, a bear, and two little kids dressed as butterflies who ran around the clearing chasing one another.

  “There’s another faerie princess,” Kate said huffily, pointing to a girl in a silver dress.

  “Don’t worry,” Cooper said. “Your wings are much nicer.”

  As they looked around they spotted a few people they knew. But before they could go over to speak to them a trumpet sounded and there was a flurry of excitement at the other side of the clearing as a group of people walked in. In the center of the group was a tall woman dressed in flowing pink robes. She carried a staff wound with flowers and ribbons, and there were more flowers in her hair. The people around her were ringing bells, playing musical instruments, and tossing flowers at the crowd.

  The woman walked into the center of the clearing and stopped. Everyone ceased talking and turned their attention to her. She waited until everyone was completely quiet and waiting for her to speak. Then she smiled.

  “Welcome to Midsummer!” she cried in a clear voice as the clearing erupted in applause and shouting.

  “Who is she?” Kate whispered to Annie and Cooper. But they didn’t know who the woman was any more than she did, and all they could do was wait to hear what she had to say.

  “As you all know, this is the longest day of the year,” the woman continued. “It is also one of the most magical. But it is not the ordered magic of ritual. It is the wild magic of the woods. The wild magic of Faerie.”

  At this the people around her cheered and played on their instruments until she held up her hand. They became quiet. Then she went on.

  “On this night the gates between the human world and the world of the Faes may be opened. But once opened they may not be shut again until the shortest night is over. Faerie magic cannot be controlled. I cannot tell you what will happen if we unlock those doors.”

  She paused to give the gathered people time to think about what she was saying. Then she looked slowly around the clearing, taking in the costumed crowd.

  “Do you wish to open those doors, my friends?” she asked. “Do you wish to invite the denizens of Faerie into these woods tonight? Are you ready to experience the magic of the Faes?”

  “We’re ready!” shouted a woman to Annie’s right.

  “Call them,” another cried.

  “Yes, call them,” others agreed.


  The woman held up her hand, bringing silence to the clearing.

  “Are there any who do not wish to have the doors opened?” she asked.

  She paused, waiting for an answer. It was as if the entire crowd was holding its breath in anticipation, hoping that no one would speak. When no one did, the woman smiled happily.

  “Very well,” she said. “We are in agreement. I will call them.”

  She held up her staff in one hand and pointed her other hand toward the woods. “At this time of fair midsummer,” she intoned in a singsong voice, “longest day and shortest night. Faerie magic, fill these woods, with joyous song and laughter bright.”

  There was total silence after she spoke. Then, far away, they heard the sound of bells ringing, followed by a peal of laughter.

  “The doors have been opened!” the woman cried, and everyone cheered. She raised her hand to silence them.

  “At midnight we will meet in this clearing to dance,” she said. “Until then, the woods are filled with many forms of merriment for your enjoyment. Go and seek them out. Return here when the moon is in the sky and you hear the sounds of my players playing. But be warned—the faeries are on the loose and their queen is looking for sport. You may encounter strange things in the woods. And if you are not careful, the faeries may take you away with them. Guard yourselves.”

  She turned and walked out of the clearing, followed by her companions. When she was gone, Kate turned to Annie and the others.

  “What was that all about?” she asked. “That didn’t seem like a ritual at all. What are we supposed to do now?”

  “Don’t look at me,” Cooper said. “I’m just a simple wood nymph.”

  “Annie?” Kate said.

  “I don’t know either,” Annie said, sounding distracted.

  “What’s wrong?” Kate asked her.

  “My paws,” Annie said. “I forgot my paws. I made these cool paws out of brown fur, and I wanted to wear them. They must be back in the cabin. I’m going to run back and get them.”