Rowan's Responsibility

by Terri Reid

  “Really?” Agnes reproached her companion. “I haven’t seen you laying off the carbs lately. You have no room to criticize.”

  In response, the giant canine lay down on the ledge several feet above her, casually crossed his front paws and yawned widely.

  “Everybody’s a comedian,” Agnes muttered as she fought to gain the last few feet and reach him. She took a deep breath, stepped over him, and continued up the path.

  “By the way,” she said over her shoulder, “comedians get dry dog food for breakfast.”

  With what looked like a canine grin, Fuzzy leapt up and followed her the rest of the way to the top of the bluff.

  The dark night pooled around the edges of the black stone. Agnes stepped forward to the edge and could see thousands of stars in the night sky, linked together in constellations as old as time. She breathed in deeply and could feel the power from nature enter her bloodstream like a fine sparkling wine. The wind picked up, and her long, black dress and her auburn hair danced in response.

  Fuzzy walked up next to her and sat, his head reaching her waist. Unconsciously, Agnes placed her hand on his head and felt another link to the natural world. “I can feel it,” she whispered. “It’s beginning.”

  Suddenly, the night sky changed, and a swirl of iridescent color appeared above her. It shimmered and danced, a living entity of power and beauty. Agnes felt the magnetic energy skim over her skin, felt the power and awe of the Northern Lights as forcefully as those first Native Americans who stood on these same shores and watched the gift sent from the gods.

  Lifting her hand from Fuzzy’s head, she lifted both arms to sky. The sleeves of her dress slipped back to reveal the hammered silver cuff bracelet, it’s runes glowing in the night.

  “Creator of the Northern Lights,

  Send to me the second sight,

  Show what the future holds for me,

  As I ask, so mote it be.”

  Chapter Three

  The bar was about a mile farther down the road past the turn-off Henry had taken, nestled on the edge of the woods. The gravel parking lot contained everything from old model pickups to shiny, new sportscars. The sign above the thick, wooden door read “Dark Arts” and pictured a group of men pouring beer into a cauldron.

  The interior was dimly lit, with dark wood paneling and a bar made from vintage barn wood. The symbols and signs on the posts and near the door could be considered clever decorating and marketing. But those who understood knew they were for protection and power.

  In the corner of the bar there was one booth situated away from the day-to-day bustle of the beer trade. It was a booth that was reserved for the owner and his particular group of friends. And tonight, they were waiting for one more to make their circle complete.

  The door opened, and a tall man dressed all in black walked in. Without even glancing around the room, he moved immediately to the booth in the corner. The others quickly moved over to give him room to sit.

  “How did it go?” one of the men asked the newcomer.

  “I took him out,” he said softly. “His motorcycle went one way, and he went the other.”

  “Is he dead?” the first asked.

  The newest member smiled slowly. “He will be by morning,” he said. “He was out cold when I left him, and some wolf is bound to take care of him before dawn.”

  Another member, one who’d had too many beers that night, shook his head. “What do you mean?” he asked, his voice raised higher than the rest of the group. “We ain’t seen no wolves round these parts for years. ‘Least none that will touch a human.”

  The newest member of the team turned to him and met his eyes. Suddenly, brown eyes turned to feral, yellow ones, and a low, whispered growl rumbled in the corner. “Do you want me to demonstrate?” the newest member of the group asked, his voice deep and rough.

  “No, sorry, no,” the unfortunate drunk replied. “I didn’t mean nothing, really.”

  “Leave us,” the man in black growled, his eyes slowly changing back to brown.

  The drunk frantically climbed out of the booth, stumbling over all of the others in his hurry to get out. Finally, nearly on his knees next to the booth, he turned back to the man in black. “I’m so sorry,” he slobbered. “Really. I didn’t mean anything. Nothing at all.”

  The man reached out and grabbed the drunk by the collar of his shirt. “You’re lucky I don’t make an example of you right here and now,” the man said, his voice low and lethal. “If I hear that you have betrayed anything about our coven…”

  “No,” the drunk replied, shaking his head, his eyes wide with fear. “I would never betray the coven.”

  “I’ll know if you do,” the man said. “And I also know where you and your family live.”

  He jerked the drunk backwards and then released his hold on his shirt. Off-balance, the drunk fell back with an audible thump against the thick, wood floors. Then he rolled over and crawled away from the table on his hands and knees.

  The man in black snorted with pleasure. “What an ass,” he sneered.

  “You didn’t have to treat him like that.”

  The man in black looked across the table to the man sitting directly across from him. “You’ve got a problem with me, Donovan?” he asked.

  Donovan nodded slowly. “Yes, Abbott. I have a problem when we bully and mock the men who are part of the inner circle,” he said. “Wooster was just asking a question.”

  “He was getting his courage out of a bottle,” Abbott replied. “And that’s dangerous to all of us.”

  “Then you shouldn’t have invited him,” Donovan said. “We don’t need weak links.”

  Abbott smiled. “You’re right. We don’t,” he said.

  Donovan reached over and grabbed Abbott’s arm tightly. “Don’t you even think about doing something to Wooster or his family,” he threatened.

  “And what would you do about it if I did?” Abbott mocked.

  Suddenly, the skin on Abbott’s arm where Donovan gripped it began to turn red. Wisps of steam rose from between Donovan’s fingers.

  “Hey,” Abbott cried, trying to pull away. “Hey, you’re burning me.”

  Donovan leaned closer. “It doesn’t matter if you’re a black stag or a snarling wolf. Everything burns.”

  Chapter Four

  “Where the hell have you been?”

  Agnes stopped at the edge of the forest and looked at the three young women waiting for her. She immediately placed her hand on Fuzzy’s head and calmly shrugged. “Fuzzy needed to go out—” she began.

  “Don’t even,” Cat Willoughby, her oldest daughter interrupted. “We all felt it, so don’t even bother lying.”

  Cat’s curly, black hair was wrapped in a scarf, and she was dressed in an oversized t-shirt with the word “Jamaica” emblazoned on the front and a pair of black shorts. With her hands firmly on her hips and her eyes filled with disapproval, Agnes could definitely see the influences of Cat’s Jamaican father. Agnes felt a rush of love towards her daughter. Cat had just turned thirty and had decided that she had to be the sane one in the family. Agnes bit back a smile. I supposed someone should, she thought.

  Agnes strolled casually over to them, Fuzzy alongside her. “Well, if you all felt it,” she replied, “why did you ask me where I’ve been?”

  “Because we couldn’t believe that you would go up to the bluff alone,” Rowan, her middle daughter, scolded.

  Agnes grinned. She couldn’t help it. Rowan, her red-headed middle child, was the product of a liaison with a visiting professor from Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. He was soft-spoken, kind, and very solicitous towards her during their brief liaison. Although he must have been a Libra, she thought, because he needed to find balance in everything they did. He also, as Agnes recalled, had one of the most amazing bodies she’d ever seen. Rowan had inherited his kindness, his warmth, and his amazing ability to take care of all the people he loved. Which also meant she worried, a lot. And she protected her own
heart from others.

  Agnes smiled at Rowan. “But, darling, I’ve been going up to the bluff alone for a long time,” she replied. “Before you were even born.”

  “Actually, you were probably conceived on that bluff,” Hazel, her youngest daughter, inserted with a cheeky grin. “Right, Mom?”

  “Hazel, that’s not an appropriate question for you to ask your mother,” Agnes replied, trying to remain serious.

  Hazel’s father had been a brilliant aeronautical engineer from Denver, literally a rocket scientist, with an unquenchable thirst for the outdoors and for herbal remedies, especially the kind one smoked. He was only in Wisconsin for a month, but it was enough time for him to sweep Agnes off her feet and leave her with a souvenir of a summer love that, even though it was twenty-five years earlier, still made her sigh.

  “That’s a bunch of crap,” Hazel said, stepping forward and linking her arm through her mother’s. “And it’s also a bunch of crap to discount our concern. You know you’ve been feeling light-headed. A bluff that’s a hundred feet above the lake isn’t the best place for you right now.”

  Hazel led her forward, between the other two sisters, and they all walked toward the back porch of their old Victorian home.

  “The lilacs smell so good,” Agnes commented as they got closer to the house. “I love the smell of lilacs in the springtime.”

  “What did you see?” Cat said, ignoring her mother’s ruse to change the subject.

  Agnes sighed. She was not going to win this one.

  “Let’s go in and make tea,” she suggested. “Then I’ll tell you everything, okay?”

  “Can’t, I’ve got a date…” Hazel stopped when her sisters both sent her glaring looks.

  She nodded slowly. “I’ve got a call to make,” she revised. “I’ll join you guys in a few minutes.” She slipped away from the others and dashed up the stairs into the house. Rowan moved next to her mother and took Hazel’s place, guiding her mother to the porch.

  “She could go on her date,” Agnes said. “This is nothing that can’t wait until the morning.”

  “Then why did you go out tonight?” Cat asked.

  “I had to,” Agnes admitted. “There is something in the air.”

  “If there’s something in the air, her date can wait,” Cat replied. “If we need to be prepared, we also need to be united.”

  Rowan nodded. “Cat’s right,” she replied, walking up the stairs with her mother. “She’s bossy, but she’s right. Besides, I thought the guy was a total loser.”

  “I heard that,” Hazel called from house.

  Rowan looked up and laughed. “Good,” she said. “Now I won’t have to repeat it to your face.”

  The light from the kitchen spilled out onto the white, planked floor of the wrap-around back porch. Rowan stopped at the collection of white wicker chairs grouped comfortably around a small table. “Do we want to sit out here and enjoy the evening?” she asked. “I can make the tea and bring it out.”

  Agnes paused for a moment, listening to the woods around them and allowing her sixth sense to explore her surroundings. Suddenly, she shivered, and a fission of fear slipped up her spine. Fuzzy whined softly, then walked to the edge of the porch and growled.

  “In the house I think,” Agnes said with a firm nod. “In the house. And I agree with Patience. Let’s lock the doors tonight.”

  Chapter Five

  Agnes sat at the kitchen table and watched, delighted, as her daughters readied the room for their conversation. She was pleased to see how well they worked together, each with their own skills and temperament. And, she thought, closing her eyes for a moment to ward off the worry, they would need each other if the signs she saw came to pass.

  “Where’s the rosemary essential oil?” Cat asked, as she searched through the white paneled, kitchen cabinets. “Why is that always missing? Hazel did you take it?”

  “Oh! My bad. It’s in my bathroom,” Hazel replied. “I was using it in my shampoo. I’ll run up and get it.”

  “Bring some salt up with you,” Rowan said, handing her sister a familiar navy-blue container of table salt from the blue slate counter top. “The door to the attic isn’t protected.”

  “Got it,” Hazel replied. “Anything else?”

  “Make sure the upstairs windows are closed and locked,” Cat said. “And call us if you feel anything weird.”

  “Oh. Don’t worry about that,” Hazel said. “You’ll hear me if I run into an evil spirit.”

  Rowan laughed and pushed up her glasses once again. “Your scream will probably frighten it away.”

  Hazel nodded. “If not, my smell will,” she replied, lifting her arm and sniffing. “I haven’t had a chance to shower since I was mucking out the goats’ stalls this afternoon.”

  “Yeah, we know,” Cat said with a grin.

  “Funny,” Hazel replied, turning to go up the stairs. “Everyone thinks they’re a funny witch.”

  “You said the ‘w’ word, not the ‘b’ word, right?” Rowan called after her.

  Hazel’s laughter could be heard echoing down the stairs.

  The kettle started to steam, so Rowan picked it up and poured the hot water into the waiting teapot. Instantly, the fragrance of the herbs they’d grown in their own gardens rose up in the steam, and Rowan inhaled deeply. The infusion of sage and ginger root held the strongest scents, but Rowan could also discern the sweetness of the red clover and alfalfa leaf. Having crafted the special blend herself, she knew that the combination of herbs and dried elderberries would offer them all the calming influences they needed.

  Letting the tea steep, Rowan walked over to her older sister and lowered her voice. “What are you feeling?”

  Cat looked over her shoulder, saw her mother watching them and sighed. “Even though she’s old, she still hears better than all of us,” she whispered back.

  “I heard that,” Agnes said. “And I’m not old. Fifty is the new thirty.”

  “So, does that make me ten?” Cat asked, picking up a platter of sliced apples and cheese and placing it in the middle of the table.

  “No, that makes you a smart ass,” Agnes replied easily.

  “Mother, such language,” Rowan responding with a chuckle. “You’re supposed to be setting a good example.”

  Agnes picked up a slice of sharp cheddar, took a dainty bite and then shook her head. “Actually, I heard someone say that when the mother acts like the worst example, the children grow up to be very responsible because they have to counter their parent’s behavior.”

  “So that was your cunning plan,” Rowan replied, turning back to the counter and picking up the teapot. “Well, it looks like it worked.”

  “What worked?” Hazel asked as she bounced down the last couple of stairs into the kitchen. She handed Cat the small bottle of essential oils and then also sat down at the table.

  “Mom just confessed that she’s been acting like an irresponsible child all of her adult life in order for us to become responsible adults,” Cat said as she added drops of the oil to the water in the diffuser.

  Rowan sat down at the table after pouring some tea into her mother’s cup and placed the pot in the middle of the table.

  “Really?” Hazel said, picking up the pot and pouring some of the tea into her cup. “Well, that’s fairly genius.” She turned to her mother. “I never thought you were that smart.”

  “Brat,” Agnes said affectionately. “My ploy obviously didn’t work on you.”

  Hazel picked up an apple slice and bit into it with gusto. “Well, because I’m the youngest, I had two very proper mothers in my older sisters,” she said. “So, I totally blame them.”

  Agnes nodded. “I can live with that,” she teased. “Your behavior is your sisters’ fault.”

  Cat joined them at the table and shook her head. “I will accept anything up until the age of fourteen,” she said with a smile. “Then it’s all on her. She always had a mind of her own.”

  Rowan nodded. �
��A mind that few of us can understand.”

  Hazel stuck out her tongue at her sisters and then chuckled. “Our coven of crazies,” she teased. “I love it.”

  “The Willoughby Witches,” Cat said. “Long may we reign.”

  Smiling at her daughters, Agnes breathed deeply, inhaling the invigorating scent of rosemary that was filling the room. She felt the protective elements of the herb calm her, and she finally felt relaxed. She took a sip of her tea and then turned to her daughters. “And now it’s time to put the power of the Willoughby Witches to the test,” she said seriously. “I believe we are getting closer to the ending days of our ancestors’ spell.”

  Chapter Six

  Cradling her teacup in her hands, Rowan sat back in her chair. “The spell,” she began. “The one the three sisters created? Your great-great-great-something or other?”

  Agnes shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Well, I’m glad you were paying so much attention when I taught you about them,” she said ironically. “They were my great-great-grandmother and her sisters. They were born in the mid-1800s and were from Whitewater, Wisconsin.”

  Cat nodded and picked up a piece of cheese. “Right. Whitewater was called Second Salem because of all the witches that left New England and settled there,” she said.

  “Well, yes and no,” Agnes replied. “The first Salem Witch trials were held in the late 1600s, and mainly those who were not witches were killed.” She shook her head. “Really, I still don’t understand how those men thought that anyone with power would simply allow themselves to be put through that kind of torture.”

  She took another sip of tea to calm herself. “Anyway, the trials had pretty much died out in the United States by the end of that century, although witch trials continued to be held throughout Europe until the mid-1800s. But in America, those of the Blood felt safe again, practicing their talents with discretion, not bringing any attention to themselves.”