by Tess Lake
“Harlow, come with me,” Aunt Cass commanded. She took off, not caring what it looked like, and I followed behind. I heard Jack call out to me, and Mom say something about everyone heading back, the protests from Jon that it wasn’t safe, and also from Varrius, Art and Boris. I’d had three margaritas and I could feel the alcohol sloshing around in my blood. It was probably the only thing keeping me from feeling completely terrified. The moment we were far enough away from the forest dinner table Aunt Cass threw up a small globe of light ahead of us.
“Is this safe?” I gasped as I followed along behind.
“Not at all,” she said. The magic around us was gritty, full of mud, and the further we went through the dark, the worse it felt. It began to feel rough, like sandpaper.
Aunt Cass stopped so abruptly I crashed into the back of her. There in front of us was a clearing. Kneeling on the ground, hunched over, was a man wearing ragged clothing. He had black hair and his face was in shadow.
Aunt Cass walked slowly forward into the clearing, her arms stretched wide as though she was trying to calm a wild animal.
“You’re safe,” she said to the man. At the sound of her voice he turned towards us. He looked past Aunt Cass and then at me, his blue eyes glinting in the moonlight.
“Marguerite? Is that you?” he said. I took a step towards him and from the way his expression changed he must’ve understood that I was not whoever this Marguerite was. He groaned in pain and then leaped to his feet.
“Stay away Torrents,” he said through gritted teeth. Then he bolted faster than any man should be able to run, disappearing into the darkness. We heard another tree crash to the ground, felled by his passage.
It wasn’t long before it was only me and Aunt Cass standing in the clearing, the quiet sounds of the night around us.
“Is he the monster? Who’s Marguerite?” I asked.
Aunt Cass looked at me. “I think you are,” she said.
Chapter Twelve
I was unloading boxes of books from the trunk of Red’s sports car when I Slipped. Sometimes a slip is unnoticeable except for the effects. This was not one of those times. It was yet another blistering day but I was hit with a deep chill as though someone had thrown a bucket of ice cubes at me. It went through my body in a shock and then I stood there, gasping, clutching a box waiting to see what would happen next. I didn’t have to wait long–lines of frost crept up the sides of the box where I was touching it. I dropped it back into the trunk in alarm.
“No, no, no, no, no,” I moaned. If I was going to turn into some Ice Princess, that would ruin everything, including my job. I’d likely have to quit and stay stuck at home, or worse head out to Truer Island to hide in that cave again.
As I stood there, gulping air and feeling my heart thudding in my chest, I realized I could no longer feel the heat beating down upon me. A moment ago I’d been sweating like crazy. Now I felt as though it was simply a pleasant day.
I took a few more deep breaths to calm myself and then reached out to touch the box again. It took only a few seconds for thin white lines of frost to creep out from the tip of my finger and down the side of the box. I held my finger there for a moment until the icy line stopped moving. Well that was a relief of sorts. It seemed there was some limit to how far it would go, at least at the moment. I pulled my hand away from the box and watched as the stripes of frost vanished in the sun glaring down.
Another experiment was in order. I touched the box with my elbow. No frost. I put the box on the ground and rested my toe against it. All clear. It looked like it was contained to my hands, at least for now.
Maybe it would be okay. Hey, who knows, maybe for once one of these slip powers would come in handy. Like carrying around my own air conditioning. I only had a few more boxes to take inside for Red’s session and then I’d be free. I wasn’t due to see her again until after lunch. It would give me time to figure out something.
I reached out and grabbed one of the boxes with both hands but then put it down when it frosted over. I had to come up with a plan and quick if I was to drop off these boxes without anyone seeing that they were covered in frost. I certainly didn’t need to add another fiasco to the list of recent fiascos. Such as last night, for example. After Aunt Cass and I had returned from the forest there had been a blister of lies. Aunt Cass had said she thought she’d seen a wild pig in the forest a few days earlier that had had an injured leg and that was why she’d rushed out into the darkness. Our guests understandably weren’t quite sure what to make of this excuse. I knew the moms’ boyfriends, Boris and Varrius, simply thought that Aunt Cass was eccentric, or perhaps crazy. Everyone else who knew she was a witch tried to take it in their stride. The meal had finished soon after that. Mom appeared afraid that something else would occur and so she’d served dessert and then the night had fizzled out. As we were walking back to the cars, I had told the lie to Red that Aunt Cass was eccentric and cared deeply about injured wildlife. I overheard Jack saying the same thing to his parents. Whether they’d believed us was another thing entirely.
Me, Jack, Jonas and Peta were due to go to dinner with Jack’s parents at Valhalla Viking on Thursday night and I hoped it would give us a chance to talk properly. I was hoping that they would see that although perhaps certain members of my family were a little kooky, I was perfectly normal. It was starting to look like this might not be possible though, not if every time I picked up my glass of water it would freeze solid in my hand.
At that thought I wondered how powerful it was. Could I pick up a glass of water and have it freeze in my hand?
My thoughts were interrupted by Red calling out to me from the exhibition hall doorway.
“Harlow, can you bring the boxes in, we’re about to begin,” she said before rushing back inside.
It didn’t look like I had any other choices - I was going to have to make a run for it. There were no gloves in the sports car, and nothing else I could use to put a barrier between my hands on the boxes. So I grabbed one and rushed inside as fast as I could, dumping it hurriedly with the others. Red was sitting at a table going over her notes for the morning session and didn’t look up to see the spiraling frost on the side of the box. I went back and forth two more times before I finally delivered all the boxes. Thankfully, as soon as I put them down, the frost disappeared due to the hot weather.
“Thanks for that, Harlow, so I’ll see you after lunch?” Red asked me.
“I’ll see you then,” I said and then got out of there as soon as I could. I needed to find somebody I knew, somebody who knew I was a witch and see if when they came close to me if I felt cold. It might certainly be possible to hide this slip witch power but not if people who walked by me started freezing.
I’d planned to see Ollie this morning to talk to him about the name Marguerite so perhaps this could be two birds with one stone. As I walked away from the exhibition center heading in the direction of the library, it did feel as though this new slip power wasn’t so bad. The sun was glaring down and all around me tourists were red-faced and sweaty but I felt fine. I made my way through them, careful to keep my hands close to my sides to avoid any accidental bumps. As I walked through the streets my mind drifted back to last night. The man in the clearing who had bolted after speaking to us had looked at me and called me Marguerite. I was convinced it was no coincidence. Some time ago, after defeating the Shadow Witch, I’d seen a glimpse of the past. Juliet Stern, young and wild, riding on a horse galloping past the Torrent Mansion being chased by her friend, the unnamed Torrent witch. The second girl on horseback had looked like me. I was convinced that thanks to the man last night we now had a name for her: Marguerite Torrent. She’d had a daughter Rosetta. Neither the moms nor Aunt Cass knew who Marguerite might be.
I hadn’t had a chance yet to discuss this properly with the family. After everyone had left last night, Aunt Cass had vanished, presumably heading to her lair, and the moms had returned to their end of the mansion to look after all the guests up t
here. Molly and Luce had gone with their respective boyfriends, and Jack had given me a kiss before taking his parents with him. I’d been left at home with only a sleeping Adams to keep me company.
As I headed towards the library, my mind kept drifting all over the place. I wondered if I should read Juliet Stern’s journal again. It was sitting in my lair up in one of the abandoned cottages behind the mansion. Now that I knew the name Marguerite, would it appear in her journal?
I even briefly wondered whether Hattie Stern would recognize the name before I remembered she was gone, off on some mysterious expedition that required a protective charm from Aunt Cass. As for the man himself–who was he? There was no doubt the magic around him had turned muddy but he had simply been a man, not a monster. Could he transform? How could a man be destroying trees in the forest? He hadn’t looked that strong.
I was pondering these things when I turned a corner onto the road where the library was and then stopped dead in my tracks. There, across the road, was an abandoned hardware store. The large weathered door had seen better days. In the middle of it, about two foot high, carved into the wood, was the strange symbol that I’d seen on Ollie’s website. The one that had been drawn on doors and carved into trees around Harlot Bay more than a hundred years ago. I crossed the road, moving between the tourists who were seemingly ignoring the symbol. As I came closer to it I saw there were chips of wood on the ground left over from the symbol carving. I approached it cautiously, expecting to feel some magical influence but there was none. It was merely a symbol carved into a door. I touched it with my fingers. Where the symbol had been carved the wood appeared new, light pine in color, a contrast to the aged wood around it. I ran my finger down it. It was smooth as though it had been done by a machine.
Was this the work of the Mysterious Mysteries? Had Rufus and Dawn been out here last night carving a symbol into a door so they could later “discover” it?
Given they had a history of vandalism it seemed entirely possible that they could be to blame. After all, what better way to hype their show than to claim to have discovered some monster from the deep past and then replicate the symbols that had appeared the last time it had been roaming the streets.
I stepped back from the symbol and used my phone to take a photo. I’d have to talk to Ollie and the family, and also possibly Sheriff Hardy.
It was already bad enough that the writers were investigating in town. If the Mysterious Mysteries brought attention to Harlot Bay who knows how many wannabe monster hunters would turn up?
I left the symbol behind, shoving my phone back into my pocket after it started to ice over. That was certainly a problem I hadn’t expected.
I passed by Sheriff Hardy’s car as I went into the library and briefly wondered why he’d be here. I didn’t have to wonder for long. As soon as I went inside I saw Ollie and Sheriff Hardy standing over in a small alcove talking in low tones. I walked over and after have a quick look around to make sure no one was listening said, “This might be a strange question, but do you feel freezing cold when you’re around me?”
Both men looked at me, not quite sure what to say. Sheriff Hardy had many years on the police force to bring out his police face, a sort of impassive wall that gave away nothing. Ollie didn’t have this experience, though, and so he was merely puzzled.
“Is this a… you know, thing?” Ollie said, almost in a whisper.
“I think I’ve accidentally turned into an Ice Princess. Here I’ll show you,” I said. I grabbed a book from a nearby shelf and it only took a moment of holding it for frost to coat the cover. I handed it to Ollie, and his eyes widened as he looked at it.
“It happened this morning. So what I need to know is that if you’re near me do I feel freezing cold? Because that’s going to be a big problem,” I said.
“No, I don’t think but let’s try this,” Sheriff Hardy said. He reached out and before I could stop him, grabbed my wrist. He only held it for a moment before he let go with a start. When he turned his hand towards me. I saw that there were thin streaks of frost across his palm. Oh Goddess, had it started to spread already?
“Okay, well, it’s not as bad as I thought, but it’s still pretty bad,” I sighed. “Anyway, what were you guys talking about before I interrupted?” I asked.
“You were walking through the town. Didn’t you see all of those symbols? We have at least ten carved into doors and walls, and twenty more spray painted everywhere,” Sheriff Hardy said.
What? I had only seen one. But then again I hadn’t been concentrating on my surroundings, my mind full of other things.
“I saw the one across the street but there’s more?” I asked.
“A lot more. It looks like they all happened last night,” Sheriff Hardy said.
“I can check my website, but I’m not sure it’s possible to know who read the article to be honest,” Ollie said, picking up the conversation they’d been having.
“My guess is that it’s the Mysterious Mysteries. This would fit perfectly into their story that there’s a monster in Harlot Bay,” I said.
I may have spoken a little louder than I intended, because Sheriff Hardy took a quick look around before responding.
“But didn’t you see some man out in the forest last night, someone possibly supernatural who’d been knocking down trees. Could it have been him?” he said.
For a moment I felt sorry for Sheriff Hardy. I think he’d always known there was something very strange about our family and he ignored this when he would turn to us for unofficial help with mysterious police cases. Then he’d gotten together with Aunt Ro and discovered that she was a witch and so were the rest of us. Now he was trying to be the Sheriff of a small town where he never knew if the crimes that occurred were ordinary ones or had some supernatural origin.
“I have no idea if it was that man in the forest. But doesn’t spray paint sound like a modern thing? That symbol that’s down the road looks like it’s been carved with modern tools. I don’t know why but I don’t feel that the man last night would know anything about spray paint,” I said. Even as I spoke I realized I was suddenly understanding something about the man we’d seen last night. Sure, he’d been dressed in ragged clothing but now I realized it had been very old ragged clothing, not a modern style. The last time I’d seen people dressed like that was when I’d had the problem of seeing into the past. I filed this piece of information away. It was something to tell Aunt Cass and the moms later on.
“Do you know of anyone else who has come to talk to you about the symbols, or anyone who seemed too interested?” Sheriff Hardy asked Ollie.
“There are a lot of people. I get emails from all over the world. This morning there was a couple here asking me about it.”
“What did they look like?” I blurted out before Sheriff Hardy could say anything.
“Tall guy, muscly, quite scary looking. Looked like a Navy Seal,” Ollie said.
“Was the woman with him much much shorter?” I asked.
“Yeah, that was right,” Ollie said.
“It sounds like you know them,” Sheriff Hardy said.
“The tall one is TJ McKenna, he’s an author, and the woman would be Jenna Cheng, another author here for Writerpalooza,” I said.
“Why would they be here asking about the symbol?” Sheriff Hardy said.
Although Sheriff Hardy was married to Aunt Ro and now technically my uncle, and therefore on the inside, I still hesitated as I thought about what to tell him. Should I tell him that the writers were investigating on their own? That they thought something strange was happening in Harlot Bay, but I didn’t know exactly what they were doing?
I took too long thinking though and I must’ve had some look on my face because Sheriff Hardy growled, “Harlow, tell me the truth.”
“Fine. I don’t know for sure but I think some of the authors in town who were with me that night Carl Stern was attacked have been running their own investigation,” I said.
Sheriff Hardy p
inched the bridge of his nose and let out a sigh.
“Bad enough that I’ve had the Torrents tangled up in investigations, but now I have a bunch of authors too? That one from last night, Red, is she involved as well?” he asked.
“Um, I think she might be,” I said, feeling like the biggest snitch in the world.
“Should I have not told those two about the symbol?” Ollie asked.
“It’s fine, it’s historical information. It’s free for anyone. But now I’m going to have to question them to see if they were involved,” Sheriff Hardy said.
“Do you think some of the authors might have put all those symbols around the town?” I asked.
“I’m not quite sure, but I’ve also become aware that perhaps the man who was attacked a few nights ago, Carl, was involved in a publicity stunt and that it may have gone terribly wrong. So they could be involved, although I don’t know why they would be,” Sheriff Hardy said. He said goodbye to us after that, leaving Ollie and me alone, standing in the alcove looking at each other. Ollie ran his hands through his hair and let out a sigh.
“I know this is all about… you know… magic, but it still feels so crazy sometimes,” Ollie said in an undertone.
I was once again reminded that although both Ollie and Will knew that our family were witches, it was a recent discovery for them. I didn’t want to start talking about magic and possibly upset him any further, so I changed the topic.
“I have a name I need you to research for me,” I told him. “I think she’s one of our family members. Her name is Marguerite Torrent and she would have had a daughter, Rosetta. We only know as far back as my grandmother’s grandmother and I have a suspicion that she is somewhere in our family tree before that. Could you look into it for us?” I asked.
Ollie’s mood brightened noticeably. He loved research and so constructing a family tree was perfect for him.
“I’ll get right on it, Harlow,” he said and then touched me on the hand. He pulled his hand back an instant later though, obviously at the cold that was emanating from my skin.
