James Swain - Dark Magic

Her lower lip trembled. “Is that how I’m acting?”

“Yes.”

“All right. I’ll stop. Now please calm down.”

“Right.”

“I mean it. Your face is so angry. I hate when you get like this.”

“When did I ever get like this?”

“When we were young, and you babysat for me. Sometimes, you just boiled with anger.”

“Did you listen to me then?”

“Stop it. Please.”

He stared at the elevator door. The anger had been buried inside of him for as long as he could remember. When it reared its ugly head, there was no getting out of its way.

“I’ll try,” he said.

Milly met them at the front door to her apartment. She took the dead crow out of Peter’s hands and held it protectively against her chest. With her free hand, she touched the side of Peter’s face, and brushed back an errant strand of hair.

“Thank you for bringing him,” she said.

“He died trying to protect you and Holly,” Peter said.

“I know he did. Please come inside.”

She took them to her study. It was a small room with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lined with musty-smelling volumes on the occult. Milly had them sit on a leather couch, then wedged herself between them. She stroked the dead bird’s feathers while staring into space.

“These crows have been a part of my family for three centuries,” Milly said. “They first appeared when my ancestor, Mary Glover, was hanged for being a witch. Mary called out to the crows right before she was put to death, and the crows replied by making a terrible cawing sound. They’ve been making that sound ever since. Holly, would you fetch a towel from the kitchen?”

Holly rose from the couch and walked out of the room. Peter had been waiting for this opportunity, and placed his hand on Milly’s sleeve. “I need to speak with you in private.”

“Not tonight, Peter. I’m tired and upset, as I imagine you are as well.”

“You and Max can’t avoid me forever,” he said.

“Are we avoiding you?”

“It’s beginning to feel that way.”

Holly returned with a dish towel, which Milly used to wrap the dead bird. Peter sensed she was not looking forward to this conversation any more than he was. Milly spoke to her niece in a quiet voice. “Holly, be a dear, and leave us alone. Peter and I need to speak in private.”

“About what?” Holly asked, sounding annoyed.

“The past.”

“How can you be keeping secrets at a time like this?” Holly asked.

“I’m sorry, my dear.”

Holly’s shoes clomped across the wood floors. Milly laughed under her breath.

“I would give anything to be her age again,” she said.

Peter took the dead bird from her and placed it on the desk. Returning to the couch, he sat down beside the woman who’d help raise him, and took her frail, liver-spotted hands in both his own. “I want you to tell me about the children of Marble, and how my parents became part of the Order of Astrum,” he said.

“Who told you that?”

“My girlfriend. She and my assistant hacked the FBI’s computer. There was an article about the Order that claimed my parents were founding members. Is this true?”

His words had a powerful effect on her. Or perhaps, it was the memory being dredged to the surface after being buried for so long that caused her to pause. Her eyes took on the faraway expression of a person lost in a daydream.

“I don’t know the entire story, and I’m not sure that anyone does,” Milly said. “But I will tell you what your mother told me. Perhaps you will be able to figure out the rest.”

“Please,” he said.

“One day when your parents were small children, they were playing with three boys from their village. It was the dead of winter, and they were making a snowman in a field. Suddenly they heard a noise that sounded like a baby crying, and decided to investigate. They left the field and entered a forest, where they walked down a path until they came to a frozen pond where the townspeople sometimes ice-skated. Stuck in the middle of the pond was a black cat, which appeared to be having a problem standing on the ice, and was crying for help.

“I suppose your mother had heightened sensibilities at a young age, for she immediately became suspicious. She had never seen the cat before, and couldn’t understand how it had reached the middle of the pond, yet could not get back. Your mother suggested that they find a grown-up, and let them deal with the situation. The other children scoffed at her, and said they didn’t need an adult, they could save the animal themselves.

“The four boys ventured onto the pond, and tried to rescue the cat. Your father turned to your mother, and asked her to join them. I suppose the attraction between them had already begun, for your mother agreed, and walked onto the ice.

“Then, a peculiar thing happened. The cat stopped crying, and became deathly still. Your mother remembers that it began to make a strange sound, as if snorting at them. The next thing she knew, the ice began to crack all around her. The children screamed. One by one, they fell into the icy water. Your mother was the last to go into the drink. She had not taken her eyes off the cat, which proceeded to run away, and disappear into the woods.”

“It wasn’t hurt,” Peter said.

Milly shook her head.

“Was it a trap?”

She nodded.

“But by who?”

“Whoever owned the cat, I suppose.”

“I’m sorry. Please go on.”

“The children were heavily clothed, and quickly sank to the bottom of the pond,” Milly continued. “Your mother said it was very dark, and quite surreal. She could feel the others thrashing about in the water, but could not see them. She tried to save herself, but soon ran out of energy. Finally, she had no choice, and gave up.”

Peter swallowed hard. “What happened then?”

“That, as my generation used to say, is the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question. Your mother said they should have died. None of them could swim, nor were they wearing anything that would have helped them float. They should have died, and that would have been the end of their short, uneventful lives. Those were the exact words that your mother used when she told me the story. Only the children of Marble didn’t die. Something happened in the depths of that pond which forever changed them. They floated to the surface, and climbed out through the holes in the ice, and hurried back to the village.”

“How did they climb out if they couldn’t swim?”

“Your mother never explained that part.”

“You must have some theory.”

Milly shrugged and did not reply. Peter felt himself growing frustrated.

“Did they know they were psychic at that point?” he asked.

“That is a question I asked your mother,” Milly said. “She told me that it happened a short while later. Your father was pillaging the attic in his house when he found a chest that had belonged to his great-grandparents. The chest contained a talking board carved out of old wood with a matching planchette.”

“You mean a Ouija board?” Peter asked.

“A Ouija board is a game for children and drunk adults,” Milly said. “A talking board is used when speaking with the dead. The talking board in the attic of your father’s house was such a device. It had been carved from a single piece of wood, and contained the twenty-six letters of the alphabet, the numbers one through ten, and the arching sweep of a crescent moon with a black cat sitting within the moon and wearing a pentacle pendant around its neck. The cat bore a striking resemblance to the cat that had drawn the children to the pond, hence your father’s interest in it.

“Your father took the talking board from the attic, and went down the street to where your mother lived. He showed it to her, and she agreed that the cat on the board matched the cat they’d seen. She suggested they play a game with the board, and ask it a question. They sat at the kitchen table, placed their hands on the planchette, and asked the board if it was sunny or cloudy outside. To their surprise, the planchette raced across the board under its own power, and answered them. That was the beginning of the seances. Later, they invited their other three friends to join them.”