by Hailey North
Her mother worked a split shift so each afternoon she could return home to supervise Penelope’s homework, something that Penelope resented at the time, but later, when her academic scholarships provided the escape route she craved, she came to appreciate. But as soon as her mother returned to work for the evening dinner rush, Penelope would hightail it out the door, eager to breathe in the night air and talk to the stars that came out one by one.
Even now, as she walked the riverbank in her mind, the feeling of peace crept over her. Frogs croaked, crickets chirruped, and the birds in the trees called good evening.
From a far distance, she heard Mrs. Merlin speaking in a soothing voice. “You may return to this place at will. It is your home away from the world, it is your cocoon in which you may visualize the outcomes of your life. It is the place you will come to visit before you practice your candle magick.”
Penelope heard Mrs. Merlin’s words. She’d immersed herself so completely in her place of peace she’d left her other reality behind, so utterly she didn’t object to Mrs. Merlin’s reference to her practicing candle magick.
Something she normally would have protested as highly unlikely.
But this evening nothing felt as it normally did.
She’d been asked to marry a man.
She’d been kissed by another.
Penelope stirred and feathered her thumb across her mouth.
Mrs. Merlin guided her out of the visualization and back into the living room.
“Well?” asked the wee woman, sitting forward, hands on her knees.
“Interesting,” Penelope said.
Mrs. Merlin shook her head. “You’re a tough nut to crack, Penelope. Yet you’ve got the eyes of a seer, if you’d only free yourself to use them.”
Penelope stretched her arms over her head, feeling surprisingly energetic for someone who’d worked all day, dined at leisure, gone on a mysterious errand, been chased by a mugger, and been rescued by a Lothario. She sighed and sat up. “What’s next?”
Mrs. Merlin’s eyes twinkled. “I can see why you did so well in school.”
“How do you know that?”
“I don’t have to have been the valedictorian to be good at deductive reasoning, you know.”
“Right. Sorry. I was good at school and if I hadn’t been, goodness knows what my mother would have done to me.”
“Perhaps loved you for the good person you are?”
Penelope sighed and rose from the floor. “I hope so, but I honestly don’t know the answer to that question.”
“And she’s gone beyond and you can’t ask her?”
Penelope nodded. “You sure you don’t have some sort of advanced degree in that deductive reasoning?”
Mrs. Merlin smiled and bounded off the sofa. “Bring the goodies Mr. Gotho gave you to the dining table.”
Penelope obeyed, thinking again of the cherry-red candle. As she did so, the image of Tony kissing her, urging her to tell him what she wanted, claimed her mind.
“It’s okay to use the magick for yourself, you know,” Mrs. Merlin said from the tabletop, watching Penelope carefully.
“I wouldn’t want to be selfish.”
The woman shrugged. “Whyever not? As long as it’s not directly harmful to someone else, that is. We humans spend a lot of words and time denying our desires to be selfish, when what is selfish is essentially the purest form of energy in the universe.”
Penelope sat down on the edge of a chair next to Mrs. Merlin. “What do you mean?” she asked, thinking she did know what Mrs. Merlin meant, but that she couldn’t quite embrace the philosophy.
“Well,” Mrs. Merlin said, folding back the sleeves of her caftan, “let’s take you and Tony Olano, for example.”
“For example,” Penelope murmured, blushing.
“You’re obviously attracted to him. He’s at tracted to you. Yet you seem to think he’s not interested in you, the Penelope Sue Fields you define as your true self.”
Penelope frowned, concentrating on Mrs. Merlin’s words. “Well, I don’t see him as wanting me, Penelope the Nerd, Penelope the Vir—” She bit her tongue, embarrassed that she’d almost repeated this personal confession.
Mrs. Merlin didn’t seem to mind at all. “You think if he knows the real you he won’t like you at all. Though, if I were to place a bet, and I am a betting woman—oh, I do love a trip to the casino!—I’d say something’s happened between the two of you that gives you hope.”
“How do you know so much?”
Mrs. Merlin chuckled. “I don’t; I just guess really, really well.”
“I’ll say.”
“Anyway, my point is there’s nothing at all wrong with using candle magick to achieve your self-oriented wishes.” Mrs. Merlin winked. “There, do you like that term better? You want to use that cherry-red candle to summon desire, affection, even love from Tony Olano; there’s no harm, only good, that can come of it.”
Penelope laughed, hearing the nervousness in her voice. Wow, was she tempted to do just as Mrs. Merlin suggested. What harm could it do? After all, it was a ritual whose total effect would be to make her feel a little bit better. As long as she didn’t end up feeling completely foolish, that is.
“My only warning, as I said, has to do with wishing for yourself something that will bring harm to another,” Mrs. Merlin said, breaking into Penelope’s thoughts. “This you should not do. It’s very bad karma. But I think Tony Olano would welcome your spell,” she finished with a mischievous grin.
Penelope nodded, then returned to the business at hand. “First, let’s take care of you, Mrs. Merlin. Which of these things do you need?” With her question, Penelope began the first of two trips to ferry the magickal supplies from the couch to the tabletop.
“Ah!” Mrs. Merlin rubbed her hands together and walked right over to a black feather almost her size. “Raven,” she murmured, then turned to a waxy white pillar candle that had rolled onto its side. “Will you stand this up?”
Reaching for the candle, Penelope paused with her hand in midair. She couldn’t say why, but she didn’t feel right touching that candle. The cherry-red hadn’t affected her that way at all.
“It’s a powerful one,” Mrs. Merlin said, “so all the more reason to set it upright.”
Penelope nodded and turned the candle on its bottom. It was an inch higher than Mrs. Merlin. “How are you going to do anything with these?”
“Ever heard of Merlin’s assistant?” The woman laughed and pushed her glasses farther down her nose. “We start with this mirror and some sand, both of which I see Mr. Gotho has thoughtfully provided, and if you have something that smacks of those infernal tax people, that would help a lot.”
Penelope wrinkled her nose. She did have some tax papers in her briefcase, but she hesitated to offer them to the altar. She could just see them catching on fire from the candle flame. She yawned and tried to think what she could use. Yawning again, she said, “Couldn’t we do this tomorrow?”
“Do you think I like oatmeal that much?” Mrs. Merlin threw that retort over her shoulder as she walked around the rectangular mirror, scattering sand from a baggie over its surface.
“How selfish of me.” Penelope went in search of her briefcase. Of course Mrs. Merlin wanted to get back to her normal size as soon as possible. One sleep-deprived night shouldn’t be too much for Penelope to contribute. She’d come to enjoy Mrs. Merlin’s company and she had to admit she’d been learning a few things from her, too, but Mrs. Merlin clearly needed to set her life back to rights.
Penelope opened her briefcase and pulled out the file she’d brought with her in preparation for the next morning’s business breakfast. Inside was a copy of an Internal Revenue Service Opinion Letter issued to her firm’s prospective client, a ruling that if not reversed would result in a significant fiscal blow to the man’s company. Penelope had been mulling over the ruling and trying to come up with a supportable argument against it, but so far she hadn’t found such a basis, s
omething she knew the senior partner meeting her and the client in the morning had been counting on.
Since it was a photocopy of the original and the original was safe in her office, Penelope pulled it out, folded it so the letterhead showed and not the client’s name, then carried it over to Mrs. Merlin.
About to place it on the table, Penelope said, “Hey, wasn’t your original problem with the property tax collector, not the IRS?”
“Tax-schmax. What’s the difference? They’re both a bother.”
“If you’re sure . . .”
“It’s merely a representation.” Mrs. Merlin pointed toward the candle. “Put that right in the center of the altar.”
With a vague feeling that she might regret her actions in the morning, Penelope did as instructed. Grunting a bit, Mrs. Merlin nudged three objects alongside the white candle, almost as if marking compass points. To the right went the black feather, to the left she lugged an ice-blue marble Mr. Gotho had included; at the bottom she located a Moon Pie, an object that immediately piqued Penelope’s curiosity.
She pointed to the Moon Pie. “What is that for?”
Mrs. Merlin shot her a half-smile, half-frown. “It’s Mr. Gotho’s sense of humor. See, when you build an altar, you represent the North, East, West and South, which correspond to Earth, Air, Water, and Fire. Mr. Gotho likes to use the Moon Pie to symbolize South.”
“I take it he’s not from here.” Penelope spoke the words dryly. Already several people at her new firm had used that same phrase when referring to her. It was said partly as condemnation, partly as absolution. Being from somewhere else was grounds for forgiveness of ignorance of local customs and traditions.
Mrs. Merlin arched her brows, all the while studying her altar and muttering, “North, North, he didn’t send anything to represent Earth. Most perturbing, really!”
“Can’t you just pick something yourself?” Penelope found herself interested in Mrs. Merlin’s machinations, but she desperately wanted to go to bed. Once there, she wanted to hug to herself the physical and emotional memory of Tony’s lips on hers, then drift to sleep, a smile on her face.
“Guess I can.” Mrs. Merlin placed her hands on her hips, then swung to face Penelope. She stared at her, then said, “Give me an earring.”
“Why?”
“Lawyers. You guys question everything. You said use something, I picked your earring. Now give it to me.”
“No need to get testy.” Penelope pulled the back of the gold ball from her ear, the same earring Tony had returned to her the other evening. As her hand passed her cheek, she relived Tony’s touch. As fleeting as it had been, it had shaken her in a way David’s proposal hadn’t even begun to emulate.
And tomorrow night, she’d be having dinner with him! New Orleans truly was a magical city. Smiling now, she placed the earring on the spot Mrs. Merlin indicated, the rounded gold ball just touching the cherry-red candle.
The copy of the IRS Opinion Letter lay within the area formed by the four objects representing the compass points. Penelope stared at it, thinking she’d lost her mind. Rather than assisting with this spell, she would have been better served poring over code sections and case law at her office, trying to find a way to salvage the position of the company whose president she’d be meeting for breakfast in less than eight hours. Plus, she remembered with a start, with her car either stolen or towed, she’d have to take a cab in the morning.
Mrs. Merlin held forth her magick incense stick. “Please clear your mind, enter your place of peace, then when you are ready, go to the stove and light this with the flame from the burner.”
Penelope accepted the incense stick, attempted to banish all thoughts of something so mundane as a missing automobile, took a deep breath, then crossed the floor and flicked on the gas burner. She’d had a real estate firm locate an apartment for her back in February before she’d moved from the ice and snow of Chicago to the warmth of a New Orleans spring. Her one requirement: a gas stove. No decent cook could endure electric burners.
Coddling the flame on the stick, she walked back toward Mrs. Merlin. The miniature magician stood before her altar, her eyes closed, her arms lifted toward the candle. Without knowing why, Penelope knew she should light the powerful white candle without interrupting whatever meditative state Mrs. Merlin had entered.
Bending forward, she brought the flame of the incense stick to the wick of the candle.
It sputtered, caught, died out.
Frustrated, she joined the two again, then again. Just when she’d considered going in search of the matches she’d picked up from the table at Primo’s, the wick caught, almost a fiber at a time, then blossomed into life.
She caught her breath and stared into the candle’s flame.
For the first time in her life, she studied the light of the candle, saw the intense blue at the center of the flame, watched as it danced in a slow, almost sensual circular motion, then blew repeatedly toward the North, or head, of the altar that Mrs. Merlin had created.
Practically hypnotized, Penelope stared, losing herself in the dancing fire of the waxy white candle, giving herself over to a beauty and a power she’d never before recognized.
Mrs. Merlin seemed to do the same, staring now with her eyes opened wide, her tiny spectacles pushed up atop her carroty hair.
She murmured phrases under her breath, paused, then murmured again, gazing into the flame.
She blinked.
And vanished.
To Penelope’s astonishment, the letter she’d placed on the altar disappeared along with her miniature houseguest. Not burned, not singed, not blown off the table by a puff of air; simply no longer there.
Unnerved by what she’d just witnessed, Penelope stared at the spot where Mrs. Merlin had been only a moment earlier. The white candle flickered and danced, bobbing in a circular motion, glowing more orange than blue. Then it suddenly sputtered and died as its wick drowned in the molten wax surrounding it.
Without knowing she was going to do so, Penelope lifted the still-glowing incense stick.
Gazing at the unlit cherry-red candle, she heard Mrs. Merlin telling her it was okay to be selfish.
Penelope licked her lips, then mated the glowing tip of the incense stick with the wick of the cherry-red candle. As she did, she called to mind her place of peace.
In her mind she walked along the riverbank, passing by a tree. To her delight, Tony lazed just beneath the spreading branches of the tree, kicked back on a blanket. With a happier smile in his eyes than she had seen in actual life, he patted the spot next to him.
Penelope blinked. The flame swayed, slow and sensuous. Following it with her eyes, listening to the wispy sighs of the candle’s song, Penelope forgot to worry about whether she was supposed to light that candle without Mrs. Merlin being present.
For several minutes she remained entranced with the beauty of the candle and the tender feelings the aromatic scent aroused in her. Penelope began to understand Mrs. Merlin’s fascination with the art of candle magick.
The flame shot higher, then dipped.
With a shake of her head, Penelope drew back. She walked a few steps away from the table and studied it, seeing this time the clutter, the jumble, and the melting candle wax she’d have to clean.
With a sigh, she smothered the flame of the cherry-red candle and started to gather the items Mr. Gotho had sent. The apartment was too, too quiet. Imagining Mrs. Merlin lecturing or asking to be fed, Penelope smiled and decided to leave the magick items exactly as Mrs. Merlin had placed them for at least a day. Who knew? Perhaps she needed the altar to guide her safely to wherever it was her spell had carried her.
Home.
That’s where she’d wanted to go and Penelope hoped she’d accomplished her desire, and that the next morning when the irascible magician awakened it would be in her own bed, all five feet four and a half inches of her.
Wandering around her apartment, reviewing the events of the remarkable day, Penelope foun
d herself wishing she had a cat or a bird or even a hamster. Before tonight she’d never noticed how empty her apartment seemed.
Before Mrs. Merlin had entered her life, Penelope had been so busy working, working, working, she’d really only stopped in long enough to sleep, shower, and change one suit for another.
Only one annoyance clouded her mind, and that was the realization that she’d have to get up extra early to swing by the office to pick up another copy of the IRS Opinion Letter. What Mrs. Merlin had done with it, she had no idea. Penelope only hoped that in some way the original spell had also been successful, and that Mrs. Merlin’s dotty neighbor had been freed from the tax collector’s clutches.
But there was no way Penelope could appear at the meeting with the senior partner and the prospective client without a copy of the letter—and even more importantly, some suggestion to solve the man’s corporation’s tax dilemma.
Frustrated with herself for not having concentrated on it earlier, Penelope set her alarm for five a.m. and prepared for bed.
Instead of mulling over the various exceptions she might argue to the ruling, she let her mind drift as she slipped between the sheets.
Tony’s lips, warm, questing, yet tender and succoring, tugged at her mouth.
His arms, so strong and powerful, hugged her to him.
Penelope wriggled and clutched a pillow to her breast. “Oh, my,” she murmured, feeling the weight of him as he’d crushed her to the car seat, claiming her.
She ran her tongue over her lips and sighed. All thoughts of Raoul, her former fantasy man, had vanished as completely as Mrs. Merlin had disappeared from her dining table.
Raoul could not compete with the reality of Tony Olano.
Penelope’s breasts pushed upward, her back arching against the desire consuming her. Caught unawares by the out-of-control passion, she hovered between embarrassment and absolute rapture.
Finally, a smile on her face, Penelope urged herself to sleep, reassuring her rational mind she’d feel sane in the morning, and in almost the same moment promising the part of her mind that thrived on fantasies that she would dance with Tony in her dreams.
