Small Town Witch (The Fae of Calaveras County)

by Kristen S. Walker

  Lindsey turned her head away from me. “She could go to the human school and fit in just fine.”

  I was shocked by what I was hearing. “Do you not like her because she’s human? Is that it—you’re afraid that if there’s a new human girl, then she’s going to be competition with you for the human boys like Peter and Robert?”

  Lindsey turned bright red. “It’s not that, I swear. I just want to wait until I learn more about her, and right now, I don’t have a good feeling about this.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You’re overreacting. Do you want to come hang out with her after school? Julie said I should show her around downtown.”

  Lindsey stiffened. “I have plans with Peter.”

  I shrugged. “Okay. I’ll find out more about her, anyways. So chill.”

  Tuesday afternoon was when Akasha went to the library every week, and I hung around downtown waiting for her. I parked on the street next to the library and let Akasha out with her books. “We’ll be at the Drip. Just text when you’re done,” I told her before she disappeared.

  Heather and I walked from there to Main Street. The best coffee shop for miles was “What a Drip Coffee and Bagels”, or the Drip for short, at the north end of downtown. My mom’s magic shop, Rose’s Garden, was next door. The Drip had plenty of space to sit inside, with large windows on two of the walls, and a small patio area outdoors. The owners—a middle-aged gay couple—were pretty friendly to us, and didn’t complain about teens loitering around for a few hours.

  After Heather got a coffee and I got a chai tea, we found a spot to sit outside.

  There wasn’t much to tell in a grand tour of Madrone: you could see most of the downtown area from where we sat, and after a few minutes I ran out of landmarks to point out. I went back to talking about school. “Have you picked your elective yet?”

  She shook her head. “I was getting a tour around the school during last period today. Which one are you in?”

  “Photography with Jennifer, ah, Mrs. Hartford,” I said, catching myself. Heather probably wouldn’t know any of the teachers on a first name basis yet.

  “Do you have to be good at photography to join?”

  “Not really, it’s pretty casual, and Mrs. Hartford loves to introduce new people to everything. It’s cool because we learn how to develop all of our own film, and once you’ve passed the test, you’re allowed to come and use the dark room almost any time you like.” I’ve been doing photography since I started at Crowther, and it was one of my favorite classes. “And we also make the yearbook.”

  “I’ll join photography with you, then,” Heather said.

  “You don’t have to do that just because of me. Our class is a pretty diverse group, so you’ll find someone in every elective,” I said quickly.

  She looked up at me and blinked her huge, dark eyes. “It’s very bright out here. Do you think there’s room for us to sit inside?”

  “Oh, sure.” We went back inside and found a table away from the windows. I saw Heather visibly relax. “Are you photosensitive?” I asked.

  She looked at me sharply. “How did you know?”

  “My dad’s a doctor. I’ve picked up a little medical jargon.”

  “So, your father is a doctor. Is he also a witch?”

  I shook my head. “He’s not into magic,” I said. “My mom is the witch in the family. Well, and me.” I frowned. “How did you know—?”

  Heather looked down at my right hand. “You have the mark.”

  I touched my hand, covering up the mark. All witches get a distinctive mark when they enter into the pact that gives them their magical powers. Mine is a five-pointed star on the ring finger of my right hand. After three years, I’m still not used to it.

  I was starting to get nervous about the way that Heather was looking at me. Was she judging my choice? “Is your family, um, religious?” I asked. Most religions still have a major problem with witches.

  “No,” she said. “Actually, I thought maybe because of your family situation, you would understand mine better.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “What kind of family situation?”

  “The kind where you look human, but you are still not quite normal,” she said.

  I frowned, trying to figure out what she meant. “I thought you were human.”

  She cleared her throat. “I am human, but my parents are vampires.”

  I stared at her. She was very pale, and she didn’t like being out in the sun, but she didn’t look supernaturally strong. She actually seemed weaker than a human. “Isn’t that called a dhampir?”

  Heather shook her head. “A dhampir has a vampire father and a human mother, so they get some of a vampire’s strengths and weaknesses. Both of my parents are vampires, so they shouldn’t be able to have kids at all. But there is a, hm, magical work-around.”

  I leaned forward, my curiosity getting the better of me. “How does that work?”

  Heather blushed and looked down. “I don’t really know all the technical details.”

  “I’m sorry.” I sat back in my seat. “But what does that make you, then?”

  “Totally human, with a lot of medical problems.” Heather cleared her throat again and recited, as if she explained this often, “Vampire parents are granted permission to have offspring if they also have fulfilled the requirements for turning a new vampire. The assumption is that, when the child reaches adulthood, they will be turned to make up for their fragility.”

  “So, when you turn eighteen—”

  “—My parents will turn me.” Heather looked at me closely. “Do you think that will be a problem?”

  “I don’t think so. No one has ever given me a hard time for being a witch, especially at Crowther, where so many of the students are different.” I smiled. “Besides, you haven’t, um, changed yet. You shouldn’t be judged by what your parents are.”

  Heather sat up straight and stuck her chin out. “My parents are very nice people,” she said. “We keep a small herd of cows, follow all of the laws about their licenses and registration, and they never—you know. You should meet them sometime.”

  I felt bad for insulting her family, so I said quickly, “I’d be happy to meet your parents.” Well, they could be nice. I’ve never met a vampire before. I wondered how my mother would feel about it. I decided not to tell her right away.

  Heather gave me a large smile. “Thank you.”

  I nodded and smiled back. “So, do you want to come to a party with me this weekend?”

  Tuesday night, I helped out my mom in the kitchen while she made dinner. She was baking quiches so she set me to grating all of the cheese. There were three different kinds of cheese in big blocks. I sat down at the kitchen table with a big metal bowl and the cheese grater, and went to work.

  Mom stood over the kitchen counter, rolling out the pie dough. The wooden rolling pin thumped in an uneven rhythm. “Who were you with this afternoon while your sister was at the library? I saw you with another girl downtown, but she wasn’t any of your friends that I know.”

  It didn’t surprise me that my mom had seen us together when I was hanging out next door to her store. “That was Heather, the new girl at school,” I said. “Mrs. Almquist said that someone should show her around town and make her feel welcome.”

  “And Lindsey didn’t want to go with you two?”

  “No, she had plans with Peter.” The first block of Swiss cheese was almost finished. I held onto it with just my fingertips so that I could grate as much of it as possible, but I had to watch carefully to make sure that I didn’t scrape myself on the grater.

  “With Peter? What happened to Robert?” Mom said.

  I gave up on the last little piece of Swiss and dropped it into the bowl. I picked up the next block and used scissors to snip open the plastic wrap. “She broke up with Robert a few weeks ago, remember? At first, she was hoping that they would get back together, but now she’s just trying to get over him.”

  Mom put down the rolling pin an
d turned to look at me. “What do her parents think about her dating so many different boys?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t think they care. Two guys aren’t that many. Lots of teens date around, so it’s not a big deal. She’s just figuring out what she wants.”

  Mom shook her head and turned back to the pie crust. “I can’t believe that her mom doesn’t worry about her more. This is the kind of thing that I didn’t want you getting exposed to in a public school. I hope that you’re sensible enough to realize that you don’t need to date half the boys in school to figure out what you want.” She lifted the crust off of the cutting board and placed it in the waiting pan. “You know, I didn’t even start dating until I went to college, and by then I was old enough to know that I wanted a serious relationship when I met your father.”

  I sighed and rolled my eyes, because I knew that she couldn’t see me. I’ve heard the story about my parents’ perfect relationship a million times. “I know, and now you’re living happily ever after,” I said, hoping that if I jumped to the end she wouldn’t feel the need to tell the whole thing again.

  “I hope that you girls can learn from my example.” She finished crimping the pie crust around the edge of the pan and reached for her pie weights. “So tell me about the new girl. Where did she move here from?”

  I frowned, trying to remember the less shocking parts of our conversation. “Um, I think it was somewhere on the east coast. She’s still getting used to all of the big trees. I think that she’ll fit in well at school, though. She’s pretty nice.”

  Mom put the pan with the pie crust in the oven and looked at me with raised eyebrows. “She likes the school? Is she not human?”

  “No, she’s definitely human,” I said quickly. I bent over the cheese so that she couldn’t see my face. I’m always worried that my mom will be able to tell when I’m lying. “She’s just, um, used to hanging around magikin. And she’s really nice, like, probably the sweetest girl that I’ve ever met. I think we’re going to be pretty good friends.”

  Mom smiled. “Well, it’s good to make new friends. Just don’t forget the old ones.”

  Then I remembered that Lindsey didn’t like Heather. Maybe I could get her to change her mind if she got to know Heather better, if she knew that Heather wasn’t going to steal Robert or Peter. Heather didn’t seem like the kind of girl to chase boys, anyways.

  “It’s not like I have to choose between my friends,” I told my mom. I stopped grating and shook out my hand. “Do I really have to grate all of this by hand? My arm is already getting tired.”

  Mom came over and looked down at the cheeses on the table. “You picked the softest cheese first,” she said. “You could have saved the easy one for last. Keep going.”

  I grumbled to myself as I picked up the next block.

  Mom went back to her work, ignoring my complaints. “Why don’t you invite her over to our house for dinner on Thursday? That way I can get to know her for myself.”

  “Sure, I’ll ask her.”

  On Thursday morning, Akasha and I were walking up to the front of the school when Kai walked up to me holding two cups from What a Drip. He held one out to me with a smile.

  I stopped and took it carefully from him. The cup was hot under the sleeve. “What’s this for?”

  “I stopped for coffee on the way to school today, so I picked up a drink for you, too,” he said. “You like chai tea, right?”

  “I’m going in,” Akasha said over her shoulder. She went up the stairs to the school building. I watched her out of the corner of my eye and saw that once again, she stopped and waited for someone else to open the door before she went in.

  I turned back to Kai and nodded. “Chai tea is my favorite. But how did you know that?”

  “Oh, uh,” Kai stammered, looking down at his feet. “I think I heard you say once that you drank tea instead of coffee.”

  I shrugged. “Well, thank you. It was a nice gesture.” I sipped the tea. The morning was chilly, and the hot drink warmed up my insides.

  We both stood there for a few minutes, sipping our drinks. I didn’t know what else to say.

  “So,” Kai said at last, “you’re going to be at the party this weekend, right?”

  “Yeah, I’ll probably be there the whole time. My parents don’t care if I spend the night at the castle.”

  “Cool.” Kai took a deep breath and let it out again. “Are you going with anyone else?”

  I glanced at him, and looked away. “I’m going with Heather.”

  Kai laughed—then he looked at me and stopped short. “You’re serious? I thought you were getting kind of close with the new girl, but I had no idea that—”

  “I’m giving her a ride on my broom.” I gave him a sharp look.

  “Oh, so you’re just going as friends, then,” he said, raising an eyebrow at me.

  “Of course!” I said. I swirled the tea in my cup. “She’s new in town and she doesn’t know anyone. I want to help her fit in. You know that I don’t date.”

  He held up his hands in surrender. “Okay, I was just asking.”

  “Are you going with anyone?” I asked. “A girlfriend, maybe?”

  Kai shrugged. “No one I know that wants to go with me.” He cleared his throat and looked at his watch. “Well, I think that we had better go in to class. Don’t want to be late.”

  I nodded and followed him in the front door.

  On Thursday afternoon, Heather came by the photography classroom. The room was in the new extension off the main school building, because the original ranch house didn’t have any rooms that could be easily converted into a darkroom.

  Jennifer, the teacher, had agreed to let Heather try out the class to see if she wanted to keep it as her elective. The first thing she asked was how much she knew.

  Heather admitted that she was an extreme beginner because her family had never owned a film camera before.

  “My mom bought one of those new digital cameras a couple of years ago,” Heather said. “I could ask her if I could just borrow that. Isn’t it basically the same thing anyways?”

  Jennifer shook her head. “It’s not the same thing at all. The quality of digital cameras has improved recently, so they will probably become the equals of traditional cameras in the future in terms of the final image, but the process is entirely different, and that’s half of what we do in this class.”

  Jennifer spent a considerable amount of time taking Heather around the room, showing off examples of things that we’d done, and took her into the darkroom with all of the chemicals and equipment for developing film and making prints.

  In the end, Heather was convinced to borrow one of the school’s simpler loaner cameras to try it out and get a feel for it. “Just explore with it,” Jennifer said. “Don’t worry about how the image is going to turn out. Learn to look at the world through the viewfinder and take snapshots of anything that interests you, at home or school or wherever you go. When you’ve finished a few rolls of film, we’ll develop them together and maybe we’ll discover something surprising.”

  I helped Heather load her first roll of film and suggested that we go outside so she could try it out. “You’re not using a flash yet, so you’ll get better shots when you have a lot of natural light. I’m sorry, but maybe we can try to stay in the shade,” I added, seeing her already start to flinch at the idea of going out into the sun.

  I brought my own camera along for pictures. The ranch setting of Crowther had a lot of great spots for landscape shots. Heather followed me around and dutifully took her own pictures of everything that I was shooting.

  After a while, she lowered the camera. “Do you always just take pictures outside, with plants and stuff?”

  I shook my head. “No, you can take pictures of whatever you want. My favorite thing to shoot is people. People are harder to get than plants, though, because they keep moving. I go through a lot of awkward shots to get just a few good ones.”

  Heather held up her camera an
d snapped a picture of me. “Like that?”

  “Yeah.” I flashed a smile. “I get candid shots around school, and then ask people later if I can give it to the school paper or put it in the yearbook. And I take pictures at home of my family.”

  Heather looked down at the ground. “I won’t be able to take pictures of my parents. They don’t show up on film.” She looked at me. “What’s your family like? I met your sister, but what about your parents? Is it weird that only half of you are witches?”

  I shrugged. “Not really. We’re just like any family, I guess. And Akasha will be a witch in the spring, if she passes the test on her birthday.”

  Heather kicked a rock with her shoe and watched it bounce down the hill. “Did you always want to be a witch?”

  “Of course.” I took a picture of her standing there, squinting against the sunlight. “My mom was a witch, and I wanted to be able to do magic like her. I’m still learning a lot, but flying—there’s nothing like flying.”

  She turned and squinted at me. “Really? So it’s worth all the trouble—registering with the Faerie Court, and passing the test, and swearing the oath—just so you can fly?”

  “It’s not that much trouble.” I’d survived the test, and going to Faerie Court was something that I did all the time with my friends. “But yes. Just for flying, it’s worth it. When you come over to my house for dinner tonight, I’ll take you out flying and you’ll see. Feeling the wind on your face, and getting that brand new perspective on the world when you’re up there without any people or things around—it’s just beautiful. You can bring your camera and try it out some more.”

  She smiled. “That sounds like fun.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  The Ghost Town

  On Thursday night Heather joined my family for dinner. We sat at the table out on the porch, eating grilled chicken and potato salad. The temperature dropped as the sun set, making the evening pleasant. The weather during the day was hot here in mid-September, although at night it got cold. It was also the perfect time in the evening for mosquitoes, but Mom made an anti-bug charm that kept the porch—and the house—fairly well protected against creepy crawlies, so none of us were worried about getting bit.