The Hex Breaker's Eyes

by Shaun Tennant

  “Well?” he asks.

  I look at Ryan, and he’s still normal. Then I look at Marlie, who is also just a regular colour.

  “Can we turn the lights off? I don’t see it.”

  “I thought you were a seer? Pretty bad seer if you can’t see.”

  I think maybe he’s trying to fool me; maybe he didn’t cast a hex at all. I say as much, and he mocks me with fake laughter. “I cast a hex to weaken the immune system. Not harmful in short doses, but definitely easy for a seer to spot. If she were actually a seer.”

  I look back at Ryan and see nothing. I look at Marlene and see the same total lack of evidence. Could the guy have cast it on himself? No, I don’t see anything on him either. Finally, I realize the game he’s playing and walk a few feet away from the desk, where there’s a mirror. In my reflection, I’m surrounded by a red fog.

  “It’s red. It’s all around me, in the air.” I hold out my arm and look at myself, but see nothing. It only shows up in the mirror. “Why can I only see it in the mirror?”

  The shopkeeper nods in appreciation. “A mirror is a second sight. It reveals the truth.”

  “Like a vampire casting no reflection?” Ryan asks.

  “No such thing,” the clerk says.

  “How did you cast a hex on me?” I ask. “I didn’t give you anything of mine.”

  The shopkeeper holds his hand up, pinching his forefinger and thumb together. It looks like he isn’t even holding anything. “One of your hairs.”

  “That’s enough to cast a hex?” Ryan asks, a little shocked.

  “More than enough. It grew from your body. It’s way more potent than a bracelet or a pin. In medieval times, people burned their hair after they cut it, just to make sure their enemies couldn’t get their hands on it.”

  He pulls on the hair a little and it comes away from the rest of the talisman, breaking the hex. He holds it out to me, and I actually reach out to take my stray hair back.

  I come back toward the desk. “So you say there’s no such thing as vampires? But there is such a thing as black root?”

  The shopkeeper smirks. “Of course there is.” He opens a drawer behind the counter and pulls out a small plastic baggie of thin black fibres that look a bit like saffron. “And it is extremely dangerous, and we don’t sell it here, understand?”

  “Of course,” I say, reaching out for the baggie.

  We ring up the sale, which is egregiously expensive and requires a split between our three debit cards, and then we head for the door.

  “I mean it about that potion,” he says. “That girl who went crazy was a friend. She was a seer too. Don’t drink it.”

  I nod, and open the door to leave. As the door’s shutting behind us, he shouts. “And if you change your mind, there are no refunds!”

  17

  Sunday, January 27

  We couldn’t actually make the potion after we got home yesterday. That’s the tough part about brewing up a batch of magic hallucinogen: you really can’t do it when your parents are home. Ryan, Marlene and I promised to get in touch with each other as soon as one of us had a parent-free house to brew in, which never happened yesterday. Today Marlene called and said her parents were going to Collingwood to watch an afternoon movie, which meant three hours of uninterrupted kitchen time for us.

  I’m watching a pot of water boil as Marlene lines up the ingredients on the counter. The magic requires that the various ingredients are added to the brew in a specific sequence, so we have to get it right. In addition to brewing the potion, we also have to recite the spell that will enchant the liquid with whatever magical properties will open my perception to allow me to better use my sixth sense.

  Marlene will read from the spellbook, and when she pauses, I will respond with “Sight beyond sight,” and then drop one of the ingredients into the pot. Once all ingredients are boiling, we will remove the pot from the burner, cover it, and let it steep for a while. Then I am to dunk a cup into the pot, scoop up some potion, and drink it down. Considering that this brew will contain boiled rat eye, I fully expect it will be disgusting. I just hope I can actually drink the stuff without puking.

  “With the sun in the sky and the earth below,” Marlene reads.

  “Sight beyond sight,” I say, and drop a shrivelled funky-smelling mushroom into the pot.

  “With Gods in heaven and the devil below,” she continues.

  “Sight beyond sight.” I drop a dried purple flower into the water, where it floats.

  “A light unseen, a sound unheard.”

  “Sight beyond sight.” In goes a spoonful of fish roe.

  “In a foreign tongue, the unspoken word.”

  “Sight beyond sight.” I scoop the pickled rat’s eye out of its jar and drop it in.

  “The five senses of man, this world of thorns.”

  “Sight beyond sight.” I dump in a powder that we made from yet another mushroom.

  “The knowledge of Gods, a new sense born.”

  “Sight beyond sight.” I crack an ordinary chicken egg into the pot, where it begins to poach.

  “Bless this potion and your servant by,” she says.

  “Sight beyond sight.” I add the black root, making sure it goes into the water and doesn’t just sit on top of the egg.

  “Opening your servant’s all-seeing eye.”

  “Sight beyond sight.” I add the last ingredient, something personal of mine to bind the potion to my energy. Normally this would be a talisman binding the caster to the subject of the hex, but in this case I’m both the ‘witch’ and the ‘subject’ so I don’t need to do that.

  I have chosen to add my mom’s wedding band to the brew. I wear it on my necklace every day, which gives it a strong connection to me, and since it’s metal the hot water won’t wreck it. Once that’s added, I pick up the lid and cover the pot, then step aside so Marlene can slide the pot to a different burner where it’s off the heat.

  “Amen,” says Ryan, who has watched this procedure from several feet away where wouldn’t be in anyone’s way. “Now what?”

  “Now we let it sit,” says Marlene. “It has to steep a while, just like tea. Once it’s cooled down enough to drink, Mindee gets to drink it.”

  “Gross,” he says, making a face. When he sees my displeasure he corrects himself with, “I mean... I’m sure it’s delicious.”

  We sit at the table and wait, each of us absentmindedly reading one of the many pages scattered over the table. Marlene’s parents’ home is littered with newspapers, magazines and any other sort of reading material, so there’s a lot to keep us occupied since we have nothing to say to each other. We’ve just cooked up a magic recipe that might send me into a crazy drug trip, and somehow talking about school or gossip or anything normal would just be disrespectful to the complete insanity we’ve just carried out. After a couple minutes of silence, I turn to Ryan.

  “Have you been to see Tam?”

  “Yeah, I went to the hospital last night. Her mom was waiting and I guess she never told her folks we split up since they were really happy I was there.

  “How was Tam?” I ask.

  “The same. Her right hand and left leg have no feeling at all. The rest of her is fine. The MRI found nothing wrong, no nerve damage or anything. It’s nothing permanent. One doctor told her folks it might be psychosomatic.”

  “Like she’s faking it?” Marlene asks.

  “Yeah.”

  “I guess he’s right,” I say. “I mean, not really. But there’s no medical reason she’s sick. It’s magic and magic doesn’t show up on a blood test.”

  “Her parents are freaked,” Ryan says. “They worry that the next muscle to go will be her heart or her lungs. I mean, if this thing shuts down her diaphragm so she can’t breathe…”

  “It’s not going to.” I say. “I will find this thing. If the potion works, I ought to be able to sniff out magic like a bloodhound. That talisman’s as good as destroyed already.”

  “And what if
all the potion does is make you crazy like you’re on PCP and you end up in jail? What then?” Ryan’s head slumps and I think he’s worried he’ll start crying.

  “It won’t,” I say. “Just watch.” I sound confident, and I almost convince myself that I really am sure this will work. But then I picture my mother, locked behind a heavy door because her mind wouldn’t let her live a normal life, and I know that under my false confidence I’m terrified.

  No. Scratch that. I’m not terrified. I won’t let myself be.

  I’m fired up, angry that this is happening to Tam, and I’m done waiting for a solution. I’m not going to wait around until I chicken out; I’m going to track that spell down right now. This afternoon. I stand up, march over to the pot, pick up a mug, and dunk it in. I hold the lip of my mug against the side of the pot so the floating grossness doesn’t flow into the cup, only liquid.

  The water has turned dark brown, likely infused by the black root, and I get a good amount, almost three-quarters of a mugful. “For Tam,” I say, and lift the mug to my lips. It’s incredibly sour. The taste makes me squeeze my eyes shut and I have to force myself to gulp it down. I know that once I stop, and the aftertaste hits me, I’ll be so repulsed that I won’t want to finish. So I just keep gulping away, and swallow the entire mug of vile potion. When I finish, my mouth is filled with a flavour like a combination of raw ginger and vinegar. I retch, and taste bile at the back of my mouth, but I force myself to keep it down. Ten seconds after I drank it, my mouth still tastes disgusting, but I don’t think I’m going to puke. (Hopefully. Yeck.)

  “You didn’t say the words,” Marlene says.

  “What?”

  “Right before you drink it you’re supposed to say ‘Goddess protect me,’ to avoid anything going wrong. You didn’t say it.”

  “You didn’t tell me to say it.”

  “I tried, but you were in such a rush to drink it you didn’t even hear me.” Ryan nods in agreement, so I guess Marlie did try to warn me. Still, either of them could have shouted ‘stop’ instead of just sitting at the table and watching me drink the stuff.

  “Does that mean it won’t work?”

  “I don’t know. Do you see anything different than usual?”

  I don’t. The world of Marlene’s kitchen looks completely normal. “Nothing,” I say. “Maybe we should take a walk?”

  We leave the pot on the stove and head outside into the freezing January air to take a walk around the neighbourhood. I’m looking around, trying to see if anything is different. Marlene and Ryan are looking at me, trying to see if I’m different.

  After a half-hour of walking around, we head back to Marlene’s house to clean up before her parents get back.

  “Are you stoned?” Ryan asks when we get back to the house. “Do you feel funny?”

  “I don’t know what stoned feels like,” I say. “But I think I’m nothing. Normal.”

  “I thought that black stuff was supposed to make you trip out. Even if we did it wrong, drinking that stuff should make you see something.” We take off our coats and boots and head to the kitchen.

  “No, I’m fine,” I say.

  Marlene heads to the book and looks at the instructions again. “If you’re really feeling no effects,” she says. “Then I think we must have screwed up the potion. We did it wrong.”

  “You mean I did it wrong,” I say. “Since I skipped the last step.”

  Marlene shrugs and closes the book. “We could go buy more stuff. Try again.”

  “When?” I say, my voice loud and angry. “Next weekend? Tam might not have that long.”

  “We’ll find a way to save her,” Ryan says. But I know what both of them really think. It’s the same thing I’m thinking. That I blew our only chance of tracking down the hex.

  It’s my fault the potion didn’t work. And Tam’s the one who’ll suffer for my mistake. Just like she’s suffering right now because Sydney blames Tam for my meddling in her spell. I’m the one who sees the hexes, I’m the one who broke in and stole the talisman. I’m the one who got us all involved in this. If I had just kept Tam out of it, she’d be fine right now. But I got her involved, and like always I let her do the talking while I stayed quiet in the background. I let her take the blame for my actions and my ideas. And now, when I finally have to stand up without Tam to fight my battles for me, I get the spell wrong.

  My best friend might die, and I’m the only person to blame.

  I stick my hand into the cold pot of slimy magic gunk, feel around the bottom and find my ring. I pull it out, shake off some of the broth and then stick my hand under the tap and turn it on. I try to get the nasty stuff off both my hand and the metal, but I think I’ll have to use some jewellery cleaner at home before I can wear it without smelling the potion.

  Going through this cleaning routine has managed to distract me, put my mind on something other than Tam, so that I have managed to avoid breaking down crying.

  “I’ll see ya tomorrow,” I say one the washing is done, and head for the door.

  “I’m going to the hospital tonight for visiting hours. Want to come?” Ryan says.

  “No,” I say, trying not to let him see the water in my eyes, or hear the quiver in my voice. “I can’t see her right now.”

  I head out into the cold afternoon, alone, and finally let my tears leak out.

  18

  Alone in my room, chewing a mouthful of mint gum after brushing my teeth three times, I wonder what I did so wrong. We used the ingredients, we said the spell, and we got the sequence right. Marlene said I failed to ask for protection, but that doesn’t mean we didn’t brew the potion correctly. So how did we get it wrong?

  I remember my early theory that Ryan was the person who hexed Tamara, and suddenly my already sick stomach feels even more nauseous. Ryan’s back in Tam and her family’s good graces because of this. He gets to spend every night with Tam, even after she dumped him. He’s skipping basketball for her now, just like she wanted him to. Maybe Ryan really is the person I should be investigating. After all, we kept the potion ingredients stashed in Ryan’s basement after he drove us home from the magic shop. What if he sabotaged us? Swapped out the mushroom for a more common variety, or the powder for some spice mix from his pantry?

  I spend the entire night going over the spell in my mind. Sight beyond sight. Marlene read the words, I repeated the response. I added the ingredients in the right order, and we said the words. Yet I feel nothing, see nothing. The potion didn’t do anything. How is that possible?

  By the time morning comes around, after a night where I didn’t sleep for even a minute, I’m convinced. Ryan must have sabotaged the spell. Marlene and I have to try it again, and without Ryan knowing.

  But first, I’ll have to spend a day of school with him and not let him realize I’m suspicious.

  Monday January 28

  My dad just dropped me off outside the school, and I’m not even inside before I see Ryan climbing out of his mom’s BMW. I ignore him and slip inside, since I’m pretty sure he hasn’t seen me yet. I quickly abandon my books into my locker, knowing that I’m going to be lectured in every class today since I didn’t do any of my weekend homework. Before Marlene or Ryan can find me, I head straight to class. Everyone always waits for the bell before going to class, so when I get there the only person in the room is my teacher, Miss Walchuk. I sit down at my normal desk without saying anything, and the young teacher looks up from her lesson plan and makes a confused face at me.

  “Good morning, Mindee,” she says.

  “Morning,” I manage to mutter. So tired.

  “What brings you in so early?” she sounds peppy and friendly as always, and I wonder how people can be so happy in the morning.

  “My best friend’s in the hospital so it’s not like there’s anyone to talk to at my locker.”

  “That’s tough. Who’s in the hospital?”

  “Tamara. You know her?”

  “Sure I do. She was in here last semest
er. Lot of energy. Is it anything serious?”

  “Nobody knows,” I say. Inside, I’m screaming because I do know what it is. It’s very serious. It will likely kill her.

  “Well let me know how she’s doing. It’s always tough when you go through something like that.”

  I lay my head down and close my eyes until the bell rings and summons the other students. Miss Walchuk doesn’t ask when I fail to hand in my report, and I promise myself that I’ll make up all that work once I can be sure that Tam’s OK.

  After first period, I head straight to French, where I normally sit with Tam. I have the binder for it in my bag already, so I can avoid my locker and any potential Ryan sightings between classes. Sitting beside an empty chair, I continue to oscillate between blaming myself for getting the spell wrong and blaming Ryan for somehow, maybe, sabotaging it.

  I almost cry when the teacher starts getting people to go through their French conversations, since my partner was Tam. I explain to Mme. St. Pierre that my partner is in the hospital, but she just says that I should have prepared my half of the conversation, and then says that I should be able to converse with her taking Tam’s role. I refuse to do it, and end up with a zero on the assignment. Behind me, the loudmouth known as Ashley Horton whispers insults that since Tam’s voice isn’t broken I should have studied. Ashley is one of the people who taunted me in grade eight about how hilarious it was that my mom died. When I turn around to tell her to shut her mouth about Tam, Mme. St. Pierre scolds me for disrupting other kids’ presentations.

  Throughout all of this, the world looks normal. Without Tam around, I can see no hexes. Sydney is suspended for fighting Dina, so I can’t go look at her and try to see if there’s any magical aura around her that the potion might have revealed to me. For all that shopkeeper’s talk about the dangers of black root, I haven’t even seen so much as a funny glow in the last day.