by Bailey Cates
The four of us moved within the perimeter of the tables, and Mungo tucked himself under the central table to be out of the way. Normally, I would have asked him to stay outside the circle, but I didn’t know what kind of magic the talisman might hold or whether it—or whoever had it—would resist being found. I wanted my little guy as protected as the rest of us, and the other witches didn’t protest his presence.
Jaida had placed a tarot deck next to Mimsey’s shew stone. Rather than the classic Rider-Waite cards, which she usually used for disposable spells like burning magic, this set depicted stylized dogs in vivid primary colors. The backs of the cards were all Great Danes. I smiled, since her familiar, Anubis, was a Great Dane who no doubt approved of his witch’s choice.
Lucy laid a device I’d never seen before on the other side: a thick silver wire and another of copper, twisted together in the middle to create a kind of handle for the two prongs of a Y.
“What’s that?” I asked.
Her lips curved in an easy smile. “My dowsing rod. I had Ben go home and get it this afternoon.”
“I’ve never seen you use it,” I said, fascinated.
“That’s because I’m really bad at it.” She laughed at the look on my face. “You know Mimsey is the only one of us who is any good at divination.”
I glanced at Jaida, who shrugged. “It’s true. I’ll do a spread, but I’m pretty sure the cards aren’t going to give us an address, if you know what I mean.”
“Then why . . . ?” I asked Lucy.
That smile again. “Just because I’m not great with the dowsing rod doesn’t mean it won’t work for you. As I recall, you actually pulled off a location spell of sorts back when you were just learning.”
“You’ll show me how?” I asked, feeling a little nervous.
She nodded. “Of course. Shall we begin?”
I placed the picture of the gris gris Mother Eulora had given me on the corner of the map, off the grid of streets but propped up so we could all see it. My aunt turned off the overhead lights, and I moved to the eastern table to begin pouring a fine line of salt along the floor, moving deosil to the south, then west and north. Lucy followed, lighting the candles behind me as I defined the spell circle with the salt. As she touched flame to wick, she invoked the elements of air, fire, and water, and ended with earth. I closed the circle in the east and returned to where the others were already seated at the table. Mimsey was on the north, better to access the elemental power of earth as she gazed into her stone. I sat across from her with Lucy on my left and Jaida on the right. Mungo leaned against my ankle, warm comfort in the semidarkness.
I’d never cast a full circle like this with only a portion of the members of the spellbook club. It felt weird. Incomplete.
“Mimsey, you go first.” I was itching to try Lucy’s dowsing rod, but Mimsey was the eldest and most experienced. Plus, as my aunt had pointed out, she was better than the rest of us at divination.
She didn’t argue. We all clasped hands, forming a circle within the circle. We closed our eyes, and Mimsey murmured, “We call upon the earth to reveal the location of Franklin Taite’s voodoo gris gris.”
Her words made me think of Declan trying to access Franklin’s dead spirit. I’d talked to him at the firehouse earlier in the afternoon, filling him in on the visit to Mother Eulora but not mentioning my plans for the evening. He probably thought I was at home—
Lucy squeezed my hand. “Focus,” she hissed.
I sent an apologetic look around the table and closed my eyes again, centering my attention back on the map, the gris gris, and my desire to find it. We joined in Mimsey’s invocation three more times, then fell silent and opened our eyes. The older witch bent forward over her crystal, probing it with her physical gaze as well as a deeper vision.
The orb seemed to grow a little brighter, the pink quartz pinker, the crystalline structure within called out in sharp relief. I scanned the surface, tried to delve deeper, but all I managed was a slight throbbing behind my forehead. I turned my energy toward Mimsey’s intention rather than my own. I felt the others doing the same, including a canine-flavored soupçon of energy from Mungo, still hunkered at my feet beneath the table.
From outside, the muffled sound of traffic. A horn honked, and a grumble of thunder echoed from far away. Mimsey’s eyelids fluttered, and I saw her grip Jaida and Lucy’s hands tighter as she leaned forward. I closed my eyes and imagined myself inside her shew stone, throwing out my senses in all directions, seeking the gris gris.
A confusion of images assaulted my mind’s eye, as well as scent and tactile impressions. I felt myself gasp, but I no longer felt like I was in my own body. I drifted, increasingly untethered, floating . . .
Fog. Smoke. My own reflection. Mimsey’s twinkling blue eyes. A glimmer of red. A heavy feeling in my chest. The rasp of slithering snakeskin. Fear. Angry desire. Blades and bones and the smell of something rotting . . .
Hands tightened on mine, and I heard a voice calling my name. A whining, then a sharp pain on my ankle brought me back to myself, eyes popping open. Mimsey was looking at me, her eyes wide but also delighted. The others had also turned their attention from the crystal ball to me. Lucy’s face was a picture of worry, while Jaida appeared more speculative.
“What?” I asked.
“So? Where’s the talisman?” Mimsey asked in return.
I lifted one shoulder and let it drop. “I don’t know.”
“Well, what did you see, then?” she demanded.
“Nothing. What about you?”
“I saw you see something.” She scowled.
I closed my eyes, trying to bring back the sensations. Finally, I shook my head. “I don’t know how to describe it.”
“But no gris gris,” Jaida said.
I shook my head. Mungo jumped up and put his paws on my leg. I dropped Jaida’s hand to stroke his head before reaching lower to rub my ankle where he’d nipped at it. “Thanks, little guy.”
He cocked his head to the side and blinked up at me with brow furrowed.
“No, really,” I said. “I think I could have gotten lost in that stone.”
Lucy shuddered. “Sometimes I wish I’d never told you about your gift of magic.”
I looked at her in surprise.
A small smile tugged at her lips. “Not really. But you scare the dickens out of me sometimes.”
“Sorry,” I said, ducking my head.
“Could the gris gris be shielded?” Jaida asked.
I gently extricated my fingers from Lucy’s grip, thinking of Connell’s warning that the talisman was hidden between layers of magic. Since Declan had been quite private about his previous experiences with his uncle, I hadn’t shared his nocturnal visit with the others. Now I simply said, “I wouldn’t be at all surprised. None of the impressions I got were of the talisman itself. Do you still want to try a tarot spread? That way, we’ll at least know whether it’s in the cards to keep looking.”
Jaida pursed her lips, which were still bright ruby from her day at the office. “I don’t think so.”
I felt the blood drain from my face. “You don’t think we’ll find it at all?
Jaida pointed at me. “That is exactly the kind of thinking we can’t afford. You can’t afford. As circumstances change, so do outcomes, but the cards will only capture now and the possibilities that exist now. That’s fine in most circumstances, but I won’t be responsible for putting any negative thoughts in your mind right now. Whatever the likelihood of your finding the talisman, you have to push forward.”
“Why are you so anxious for me to find it?”
Jaida tapped the table with vermillion nails. “You aren’t the only one who saw Dawn Taite collapse and almost die. I know you have a history with her uncle that the rest of us don’t, but we all want to help her.” She looked at Mimsey and Lucy, who both nodd
ed. “And that means we help you, because you’re the one who’s going to find that talisman. You know that, right?”
I felt the weight that had settled across my neck ever since Dawn had shown up at the Honeybee increase by half again. It was one thing for me to feel like I needed to help Franklin’s niece, but another altogether to carry the expectations of everyone else. Slowly, I said, “I guess so.”
“Well, then, let’s see you try this dowsing rod,” Lucy said with a smile in her voice.
Jaida nodded her encouragement. “Go on, Katie. If anyone can track down that talisman, you can.”
“Yes, dear,” Mimsey said. “We have faith in you.”
Yip!
I had to laugh. “Thanks, Mungo.”
Lucy held the dowsing rod with the copper wire in her right hand and the silver wire in her left. She balanced it across her fingers in a light grip, thumbs on top to prevent it from falling. Taking a deep breath, she said, “It’s the same idea as pendulum scrying to find things on a map,” she said. “You’ve done that a few times already.”
I nodded. This whole divination thing was so darn iffy, though. Even after practically falling into Mimsey’s shew stone, I didn’t feel any closer to the truth. Discouragement settled in my chest, but I straightened my shoulders, anyway, determined to do my best.
My aunt inhaled again, and I knew she was centering herself. Her eyelids closed halfway as she held her arms over the map. The dowsing rod stuck straight out, parallel to her fingers. Slowly, she moved it around the map, turning her shoulders in order to keep her arms straight. Back and forth, back and forth across the street grid, all the way out to Tybee Island, then over to Garden City.
I hadn’t eaten since Lucy had suggested this gathering of the spellbook club. In general, it was good not to eat before practicing magic, but I’d waited too long and now I felt a little light-headed, in addition to the noises my stomach was making.
Suddenly the rod dipped, and I stood to peer down at the map. But Lucy smiled and handed it to me. “That wasn’t a magical revelation. My arms are just tired. You try.”
I took the rod, happy to finally try dowsing, but still feeling defeated by all our failures so far. Either the gris gris didn’t want to be found, or whoever had it was very good at hiding it. Besides, I was hungry.
Imitating Lucy, I held the rod out over the map, muttering, “Come on, voodoo gris gris. Mother Eulora told me all about you, gave me your picture. We need you. Where are you?” The mother-of-pearl bracelet grew suddenly warm against my wrist. I was still standing, so when the tip of the rod suddenly nosedived in my hands, the sign was more than clear. The twisted metal end whipped straight down, the force against my fingers strong enough that I almost dropped it. The tip touched the map, and Jaida immediately leaned forward to note the location.
Mimsey clapped her hands, causing Mungo to run in tight circles around our feet. “Wonderful work, Katie! I knew you’d get the hang of divination one of these days.”
Lucy beamed at me. “You did very well, honey. That dowsing rod is my gift to you.”
“Yeah, nice job,” Jaida said, leaning over and marking the map with her fingertip. “But I wish we had a larger map. This is a whole block.”
I put the rod aside and leaned over to look. “It would help if we had some light. I can hardly make out the street names.”
“Let’s open the circle,” Lucy said. “And turn on the overheads.”
She and Mimsey made short work of it, going from east to north and around, widdershins this time. They thanked the elements, blew out the candles, and moved the tables aside. Lucy flipped on the overheads.
Together we clustered around the large table again, and Lucy marked the spot Jaida had been holding. It was a block on Lincoln, in the historic district and not far from the bakery. Quite close to Mother Eulora’s house, in fact—and in exactly the direction she’d pointed when she’d told us where Franklin had rented a room.
“I think Franklin may have lived there,” I said. “Either the talisman is still with his things, or he hid it nearby.”
Jaida’s skeptical look didn’t surprise me. “That might mean it isn’t really gone. Do you think he cloaked it, then? But why?”
“To hide it from the wrong people?” I wondered. “But Dawn said it was gone.”
“Maybe she didn’t know her uncle had hidden it,” Mimsey said, and Lucy made a sound of agreement.
“We have to go down there.” Jaida looked at her watch. “But it’s too late to start banging on doors. We’ll have better luck in the morning. I’ll be by around nine-thirty, and we’ll go together. Will that work?”
I looked at Lucy, who smiled. “Of course. Iris is working tomorrow morning.”
Mimsey nodded her approval. “I’m glad you’re going with Katie,” she said to Jaida. “The talisman may help her, or it may be dangerous. I won’t trust it until I see it for myself.”
Chapter 15
The rain fell across the Bug’s windshield in heavy sheets as I drove home. Mungo couldn’t have cared less about the weather outside; he’d hunkered down in my tote bag and gone to sleep before I even got past Oglethorpe Square. I tried to keep my attention firmly on the road, but I couldn’t help going back to my thoughts from my run that morning, and then again as I’d walked Mungo earlier that evening.
Both Quinn and Mother Eulora had mentioned that Franklin had been working on a case that involved human sacrifice.
That had to be some serious evil.
Let’s see, then. There were Poppa Jack, Marie LaFevre, Mambo Jeni, Mother Eulora, and Tanna. I already trusted that Mother Eulora was on my side, and felt the same about Poppa Jack, if only because of how he treated Cookie. The other two voodoo queens and Tanna were unknown quantities. But what about the other “new” people I’d met? I was fairly sure our young Goth employee wasn’t a secret voodoo practitioner who was into human sacrifice. Steve’s fancy new girlfriend from Hilton Head, though irritating, was also an unlikely suspect. But what about Oscar? He sure seemed to be a bossy pants with Cookie, but she said he disapproved of voodoo because of the curse placed on his sister. However, I didn’t know him well enough to be able to judge his motives or beliefs. Could he be lying to Cookie?
Human sacrifice, though? Seriously? All I knew was that Cookie felt she had to hide things from him, and that made me wonder what he was really like.
Margie’s house was dark when I pulled into my driveway, and I remembered her mention of a church function. Mungo and I rushed through the downpour from the car to the front door. Inside I turned on lights, closed the shutters, and headed for the kitchen.
I sighed with contentment after finishing up the leftover pork chops and corn pudding. The food brought me back to earth after the spell work. Mungo dozed in the doorway to the bathroom while I took a long, hot shower to further ground my energies. Then I donned my nighttime garb and snuggled under the patchwork coverlet on the bed, with a cup of chamomile tea. Before diving into the new John Sandford mystery, I checked in with Declan via text. His terse reply that he’d been called out to an accident on Interstate 16 wasn’t personal, I knew. At least he wasn’t fighting some huge conflagration. Car wrecks could be hard on the responders, but at least they weren’t as dangerous as fire. I sent good thoughts to whomever had been involved in the crash and placed my phone on the nightstand.
In the meantime, I was going to escape into a tale of murder and mayhem that had nothing to do with my real life. Mungo settled in next to me with a contented groan and promptly began sleeping off his pork chops. Three hours later, I was doing the same thing.
* * *
“What’s all this on the floor?” Iris asked. She was sweeping up around the espresso counter and now bent over to examine the small pile of white crystals her broom had gathered. The bakery would open in five minutes.
From where I was stocking the display
case, I could see it was salt. Lucy shot me a look and scrambled down from the stepstool where she’d been updating some of our menu items on the blackboard behind the counter. Wiping chalk dust on her calico apron, she said, “Someone must have spilled something. I’ll get you the dustpan.”
Iris straightened. “The tables are rearranged, too. Did you do that yesterday?”
Lucy and I exchanged a glance. “Um,” I said.
Iris pointed her finger at me. “Wait a minute . . .” She turned and walked around the area in front of the register, eyes intent on the floor. “I know what this is! I’ve read about it in that book I found in the reading area! Spells and Charms and Magic—Oh, My.”
Which enterprising witch put that there? I reminded myself to ask at the next spellbook-club meeting.
Iris whirled. “It’s salt, isn’t it?”
I gave a slow nod, and Lucy watched her with gentle curiosity.
“You cast a circle last night?” Her hands were on her hips now, her tone triumphant. “I knew it.”
Lucy moved to her and took both of Iris’ hands in her own. “We did. We were trying to find something to help Katie.”
“Help Katie?” Iris asked. “What’s wrong?” Now worry knitted her brow.
“Nothing’s the matter with me,” I said. “I’m trying to find out what happened to the woman who collapsed in here on Tuesday evening.”
“I can’t believe that happened during your book-club meeting,” Iris said.
“Weeelll . . .” Lucy drew out the word, and looked over her shoulder at me. I dipped my chin in encouragement, figuring it was now or never. “It’s not just a book club,” she said in a soft voice. “It’s a spellbook club.”
Iris stared at my aunt, then at me, then back at Lucy, who was still holding her hands. Then she let out a whoop of laughter. “You’re witches! Like, really! That’s awesome!” She gave Lucy a quick hug, then backed away with a big grin on her face and did a little two-step. “I work with witches,” she sang, then stopped. “Oh, my God. Can you actually curse people and change the weather and things?”
