The Magick of Dark Root (Daughters of Dark Root)

by April Aasheim

  “What does it say, Grandma?” June Bug asked, trying to sound out the words.

  “That once we sign this document, the pact is sealed.”

  “I’ll get a pen,” Eve said.

  “No.” Mother pressed her pricked finger to the bottom of the scroll and motioned for us to do the same.

  One by one we each added our bloody mark.

  Once done, she rolled up the scroll and uncapped the vial. The sweet smell of frankincense wafted out.

  Mother dotted our foreheads with the oil saying, “You are all now part of a sisterhood that has been around since the very beginning. Do not take your duties lightly, for much is as stake.” She smeared a final drop of oil across the scroll, once again calling for Eve’s assistance. “A white candle. Lit please.”

  Eve presented her with the item and Mother raised the scroll overhead, then lowered it into the candle’s blue flame. In seconds it burned to ash.

  When there was nothing left of it, she closed her eyes.

  “You okay, Mama?” Merry asked.

  Mother nodded and opened her eyes.

  She was no longer the formidable Miss Sasha Shantay, but an old woman who could hardly lift her head.

  With heavy lids she said, “I’m fine. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to rest.”

  “I’ll stay with you,” I said, helping her to the bed.

  “No.” Her voice was firm but weak. “I need to be alone. Go be with your sisters now.”

  It was only a few steps to her bed, but every step was painful to watch. My heart was heavy as I left the room.

  Time was not only short, I thought. It was also unfair. Time gave us things then took them away. A cruel thief. And there was absolutely nothing we could do about it.

  Five

  MYSTERIOUS WAYS

  Miss Sasha’s Magick Shoppe

  Dark Root, Oregon

  November 2013

  “So what did you think of Mother’s show yesterday?” Eve asked, as she carefully removed an hourglass wrapped in tissue paper from a cardboard box, placing it on a display shelf next to a dozen others.

  I shrugged in response, returning to my own work.

  Eve and I sat on stools sorting inventory in the early morning before the shop opened, sliding our chairs across the floor in small increments to keep pace with the sun shining through the large window. It was rare to have sunshine at this time of year and we relished every moment of it.

  “Mother does like to put on a show,” I finally answered as I emptied a box and broke it down for recycling.

  “It’s a good sign, I guess,” Eve said, polishing a crystal figurine. “Kind of like the old days."

  “Better than her lying there, hooked to tubes,” I agreed, remembering how she looked just weeks before.

  “Agreed.” Eve stood, surveying her finished display. “Not bad, if I do say so, myself.”

  I had to admit that Miss Sasha’s Magick Shoppe––my mother’s old store and the cornerstone of downtown Dark Root––looked better than ever under my sister’s fashionable eye. A discriminating witch would find everything she needed here, from lava lamps to do-it-yourself potion kits. Eve had stocked and modernized the place, bringing in an eclectic mix of customers from old-school practitioners of the craft to curious hipsters.

  I grabbed the stack of cardboard and made my way to the back room.

  “Wow,” I called out as I ducked beneath the gauzy fabric that separated the two spaces. “You’ve been busy.”

  In the old days, we had used this room for storage, coffee breaks, and an occasional tarot card reading. But now it was another aspect of the store, a secret room for those with large pocketbooks or an advanced knowledge of the craft. Every shelf was piled with real parchment, old books, dove’s blood, crystal balls and even Ouija boards.

  “I need to put up an ‘Employees Only’ sign,” Eve said, as I returned to the main room with full box of inventory. “To keep the wannabees out of there.”

  “Please do. I don’t want to think about what would happen if a Ouija Board got into the wrong hands.”

  Eve raked her fingers through her hair. “I just don’t want them messing up my displays. Some of that crap in there is pretty expensive.”

  I looked at the clock above the door. “We’d better hurry.”

  Outside the window, a small crowd of women were gathering. Though most of our sales were made around Halloween, we still drew some customers up through the Christmas season. In January, tourism would come to a grinding halt until summertime.

  “They can wait. It’s not like there are any other places to buy this kind of stuff around here.” Eve pressed her lips together and turned to me. “She wants us to come back soon, you know? Maybe today.”

  “Who wants us to come back and where?” I peeked out the window again, noting that the line had doubled.

  A few women saw me and waved as I ducked out of sight.

  “Mom. Who else?”

  “Oh. Well, we are officially in training. Who knows how long it will take? I feel like I’m in school again. I hope she doesn’t give us homework.”

  “The whole blood-magic, soul-sisters thing seemed pretty juvenile to me,” Eve continued as she dusted a shelf where a collection of glass pyramids stood. Like Eve, her store was beautiful and pristine, with nothing out of place. “Something we’d do when we were ten.”

  “I guess so,” I agreed, unsure if she was miffed or musing. “But the way those words magically appeared on the parchment when you used the candle was pretty cool.”

  “Yeah, I was pretty great. I wish Paul had been there.”

  At Paul’s name, I glanced instinctively out the window to Dip Stix Café across the street, where he and Shane were already serving up breakfast. Paul was most likely in the kitchen, stirring gravy and flipping pancakes, while Shane greeted customers, took orders, and cleaned the tables. I turned my head slightly, hoping to catch site of Shane without Eve noticing.

  But she had an eagle eye when it came to things that interested her, and love always interested her.

  “As I see it,” she said, flipping the store sign to open and joining me at the window. “We can either summon Shane over here with a spell, or you can march your big butt over to Dip Stix and tell him you’ve been an idiot.”

  “Third option. You can stay out of it.”

  A small army of women pushed through the door.

  Eve looked longingly at her dwindling supply bins. Most of the old merchandise had been sold, and Eve hoped the new inventory would last through the holiday season. Taxes for the shop were coming due, and even with our sales, we probably wouldn't turn a profit for at least another year.

  But on this morning, the herd of women charged straight for me.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Eve grinned mischievously. “I told them that Maggie Magic was making an appearance today. Apparently you’re a bit of a celebrity around here. Who knew?”

  A dozen women surrounded me, thrusting notebooks and pens in my direction, drilling me with questions like, “How did you get all those flashlights to turn on?” and, “Do you teach classes?”

  I tucked my hair behind my ears, embarrassed by the newfound attention. The fact that I’d been AWOL since the event at Haunted Dark Root only added to my mystique.

  I signed everyone’s notebooks, all the while insisting that the ladies support Miss Sasha’s Magick Shoppe by buying things and telling their friends. As quickly as they had descended upon me, they receded back into the store.

  “Albert, it’s my money. I can spend it if I want it.” A plump, middle-aged woman spoke as she rifled through a bin of red candles to my right. “You don’t have any say in the matter anymore.”

  I did a quick glance around the shop, checking for “Albert.”

  As far as I could tell, she was alone.

  “The poor dear,” a woman with an armful of books on reincarnation said, as I rang her up. “She lost her husband Albert three years
ago and has been a little off her rocker ever since. Claims he follows her. Sad, if you ask me. But I guess losing a loved one can make you go a bit mad, don’t you think?”

  I watched as invisible Albert and his very visible wife argued about what to eat for breakfast, before leaving the shop and heading across the street to Dip Stix.

  Eve returned from the back room, placing a large glass bowl on the counter. Next, she pulled the corks from three glass vials and poured the contents into the bowl.

  I raised a curious eyebrow.

  “A new perfume I’m working on,” she explained, sprinkling rose petals and vanilla into the mixture and stirring the concoction with a silver spoon. “I'm hoping to have it perfected by Valentine’s Day. That should get us over the low-sales hump of the first quarter. If I get it right, it will drive men mad with lust. My own version of Obsession. I call it Man Attack.”

  “Charming,” I said, then added, “Sounds dangerous. Don’t you ever watch daytime TV?”

  “Some women like to be adored, Maggie.” Eve pulled a tube of liquid glitter from a drawer beneath the counter and added a squirt to the mixture.

  Several shoppers gathered around, asking questions about her potion. Eve obliged them––a little––assuring them that the finished product would be ready in February, when they could receive complimentary samples.

  When the morning rush had subsided, Eve carried the mixture to the back room and I followed. She set the bowl on a small table and then pointed to a set of long, slender vials on a silver tray. I fetched them, bewitched as always by her handiwork.

  Eve and I took different approaches to magick. She used spells and charms to work the craft, always measuring, adding, subtracting, and perfecting her skills.

  I was deemed a wilder, a witch born with strong powers but who lacked the discipline to wield them properly. In one way I envied her.

  In another way, it seemed like too much work.

  Eve filled the bottles then lifted one to the light. Not quite satisfied, she added a drop of something that smelled like Myrrh.

  “Your problem is that you’re afraid Shane will reject you,” she said, holding the vial once again to the light for inspection. “But one drop of this behind your ear and he won’t abandon you no matter whose kiddo you’re carrying.”

  “I thought we weren't supposed to use the craft for selfish purposes?” I said.

  We’d had this lesson drilled into us since we were old enough to cast a candy spell.

  “What’s selfish about love? Besides,” Eve said, her face taking on a gauzy look. “We were raised to be witches. Why not use our powers as we like, especially if we aren't hurting anyone? The old Council is gone, Maggie. We are the next generation. We get to decide how things are done now.”

  It was not the first time I’d wondered about this.

  Why were we given powers if we were always taught to keep them locked up? It was the mystical equivalent of keeping your virginity: don’t go giving it away to just anyone.

  “I’m not afraid Shane will reject me,” I said, as I corked her bottles.

  Eve and I worked well together, I realized, able to anticipate what one needed before the other asked. Before corking the final bottle, I sniffed the perfume. It smelled like roses, dreams, and sex.

  “I think you are afraid.” Eve took the tray and placed it on a high shelf, where customers wouldn’t see it.

  “Maybe a little,” I admitted as we moved back into the main area of the shop.

  “I knew it.”

  What I didn’t tell her was that the fear of Shane’s rejection was only part of the reason I kept my distance from him. What I feared even more was that I would tell him my news, and then he would court me, date me, maybe even ask me to marry him…but not because he loved me, because it was the right thing to do. And Shane lived by the cowboy code of always doing the right thing.

  That was something I couldn't live with.

  I caught sight of him in the Dip Stix window. He smiled at a pretty woman as he took her order.

  “One dab of Man Attack and you’ll never have to worry about that again,” Eve said, narrowing her eyes. “And believe me, honey, there are lots of those in the world, all waiting to snatch up someone like Shane Doler, without a second thought to you.”

  As Eve predicted, we were called once again to Mother’s house that afternoon.

  “Mama insists,” Merry explained on the phone, her voice a pitch higher than usual. “I told her we could do it this weekend, but she won’t hear anything of it. I guess we better humor her.”

  Eve and I closed the shop down early, ushering out several customers who’d been loitering for hours but hadn’t purchased a thing.

  At precisely four o’clock we gathered with Merry, June Bug, and Ruth Anne in front of Mother’s bedroom and waited. At 4:01, she opened the door wearing a dress four sizes too big, earrings that hung to her shoulders, blue house shoes, and a black-feathered boa. She puffed on an unlit cigar and croaked out the words “my girls!” as if speaking burnt her lungs.

  “These are for you,” she said, handing us each a slender white candle.

  She lit her own then passed the flame along to each of us in turn.

  Eve rolled up the carpet on the floor, uncovering the Pentagram. We seated ourselves in the same positions, except for Mother, who stood holding the post of her bed with one hand and her candle with the other. She was even paler than yesterday and looked so frail a gust of wind could blow her away. She stood with shaking hands and labored breath while we waited.

  After several hard breaths, she set her candle on her antique dresser, then reached into the top drawer, her fingers searching for something near the back. A smile crossed her face as she pulled out a small, dried-out tree branch that looked as brittle as she was.

  Holding the limb up for us to inspect she said, “Ruth Anne, do you remember this?” Ruth Anne’s face displayed not a hint of remembrance and Mother let out an exasperated sigh. “Did you learn nothing?”

  Mother tapped the stick on the dresser and a few meager sparks flickered at its tip.

  “Every witch needs a wand,” she said. “But for reasons I won’t mention now, only Ruth Anne has selected hers already.”

  Ruth Anne had left home when she was a teenager. After that, Mother had given up on most everything, including our continued training. One by one we’d all followed in Ruth Anne’s footsteps, leaving Dark Root, leaving Mother.

  “It’s okay, Mama,” Merry said, her voice soft as a butterfly’s wings. “We’re all here now.”

  “Yes.” Mother ran her tongue over her thin, cracked lips.

  She had never apologized for our childhoods: her relentless insistence that we study and follow in her footsteps, her desire to have everything and everyone around her be perfect, and her unwillingness to admit that she was ever wrong about anything.

  But in her eyes, I could see the guilt and the regret. I felt a surge of love for her now, and an even stronger need to protect her.

  “Ruth Anne,” she said, holding out the stick. “This wand is yours. I kept it safe for you.”

  Ruth Anne took the branch and turned it over in her hands.

  “Abracadabra!” she said, rapping the stick against her crossed leg. “What? No rabbit?”

  I shot my sister a warning look that took her aback. We had always been allies in mocking magic, and my lack of support caught her off guard.

  “There is certainly a time for humor,” Mother said. “But it is not now.”

  “Sorry,” Ruth Anne apologized, saying nothing more.

  “As you can see,” Mother continued, “Ruth Anne’s wand is not yet finished. Though she picked it herself and asked permission from the tree, she never completed the process.”

  “The process?” June Bug asked.

  “Yes. Before a wand and its witch become one, the wood must be stripped of its bark, anointed in a magick oil, and imbued with a gem. The wand must then spend a fortnight beneath its owne
r’s pillow, absorbing its witch’s character, and bestowing its power upon its owner. Every witch must pick her own wand, and every witch gets only one wand, so choose carefully.”

  “But a witch still has powers without the wand, right?” June Bug asked, raising her hand.

  “Yes. That’s right. A wand simply heightens her magic and refines her powers. They complement each other. And a wand picked from a tree grown in Dark Root, will be especially powerful.

  “It’s important that you think carefully about the type of witch you wish to become. Ruth Anne’s wand is made of maple. This will increase her powers in the realm of knowledge. There are trees that will aid you in glamour…” She looked at Eve. “…And healing.” She looked at Merry. “And, well, maybe temperance.” She looked at me. “But I leave that to your discretion. Choose wisely, ladies. The Solstice approaches and we must rebuild the dome over Dark Root. The dome will be stronger if you each have your wand during the ceremony.”

  “I thought we already cast that spell,” I said. “During Haunted Dark Root.”

  “That was to keep out the spirits and demons during Samhain, when the veil between worlds is thinnest. The Solstice ritual is meant to prevent practitioners from using the powerful magick residing within the sphere of Dark Root for evil purposes. Both spells work in conjunction with one another.”

  “By practitioners, do you mean other witches?” Eve asked.

  “Yes. Those who wish to wield the magick of Dark Root for the wrong reasons.” Mother put her hand to her chest and cleared her throat. “I’d like to see you all get your wands before I’m gone. Especially you, Magdalene.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Just focus on the time we have together now.”

  Anxiety welled up inside me. Time together now?

  “One more thing,” Mother said. “A witch always protects her wand. Though it will never be as powerful in the hands of another witch, it can still be used––or destroyed––by others.”

  “Where is your wand, Grandma?” June Bug asked.

  I cocked my head. For all Mother’s talk, I had never seen her use one.