Cate Tiernan: Book of Shadows

I made waving motions with my free hand, my brow furrowed with concentration. I felt the ache in my chest that signaled magickal workings. I began to breathe hard, and my sweat felt cold in the night air. Bree was crying and asking me to let her go.

I waved my hand at the bog, willing the roots to set Bree loose, to uncoil themselves, to stretch and open and relax and set her free. All the while I pulled steadily on her hand, easing her out as if I were a midwife and Bree was being born out of the bog.

Then she cried out, her face alight, and we rose gracefully, effortlessly in the air tonight. Her dress and legs were covered in dark slime, and though out hand's contact I felt the throbbing pain of her ankle. But she was free. I flew with her to the edge of the woods and set her down. Rising into the air, I left her there, weeping with relief, watching me as I rose higher in the sky, higher and higher, until I was just a speck and dawn began to break.

Then I was in a dark, rough room, like a barn. I was an infant. Baby Morgan. A woman was sitting on a bale of straw, holding me in her arms. It wasn't my mom, but she was rocking me and saying "My baby," over and over. I watched her with my round baby eyes, and I loved her and felt how she loved me.

I woke up, shaking and exhausted. I felt like I was battling the flu, as if I could lie down and sleep for a hundred years.

"You feeling better?" Mary K. asked that afternoon. I had gotten up and dressed around noon and had puttered around the house, doing laundry, taking out the recycling.

I thought about Cal and Bree and everyone having a circle tonight and I was aching to go. Cal probably expected me to go after what had happened yesterday. In fact I really had to go.

"Yeah," I answered Mary K. I picked up the phone to call Bree."I just didn't sleep well, woke up all headachy."

Mary K. mixed herself some chocolate milk and zapped it in the microwave. "Yeah? So everything's okay?"

"Sure. Why?"

She leaned against the countertop and sipped her hot chocolate. "I feel like there's something going on lately," she said.

I cradled the undialed phone on my shoulder. "Like what?"

"Well, like all of a sudden I feel like you're doing stuff that I don't know about," Mary K. said. "Not that I have to know all about your life," she added hastily. "You're older; you've always done other stuff. I just mean—" She stopped and rubbed her forehead with her hand. "You're not doing drugs, are you?" she blurted out.

I suddenly saw how things looked from her fourteen-year-old perspective. True, she was an old fourteen-year-old, but still. I was her big sister, she had picked up on my tension, and she was worried.

"Oh, Mary K., for God's sake," I said, hugging her. "No, I'm not doing drugs. And I'm not having sex or shoplifting or anything like that. Promise."

She pulled back. "What were those books about that Mom got so upset over?" she asked point-blank.

"I told you. Wicca. Crunchy tree-hugger stuff," I said.

"Then why was she so upset?" Mary K. pressed.

I took a deep breath, then turned to face her. "Wicca is the religion of witches," I explained.

Her beautiful brown eyes, so like Mom's, widened. "Really?"

"It's just, like, living in tune with nature. Picking up on stuff that already exists all around you. The power of nature. Life forces."

"Morgan, isn't witchcraft like Satan worshiping?" Mary K. asked, horrified.

"It really, really isn't," I said urgently, looking her in the eyes. "There's no Satan at all in Wicca. And it's completely forbidden to work black magic or to try to cause harm to anyone. Everything you send out into the world comes back to you threefold, so everyone tries to do good, always."

Mary K. still looked worried, but she was paying close attention.

"Look, in Wicca you basically just try to be a good person and live in harmony with nature and with other people," I said.

"And dance naked," she said, her eyes narrowing.

I rolled my eyes. "Not everyone does that, and for your info, I would rather be torn apart by wild animals. Wicca is all about what you are comfortable with, how much you want to participate. There's no animal sacrifice, no Satan worshiping, no dancing naked if you don't want to. No taking drugs, no pushing pins into voodoo dolls."

"Then why is Mom so freaked?" she countered.

I thought for a moment. "I think it's partly that she just doesn't know a lot about it. Partly it's that we're Catholic already, and she doesn't want me to change my religion. Other than that, I don't know. Her reaction was a lot stronger than I could believe. It just really pushes her buttons."

"Poor Mom," Mary K. murmured.

I frowned. "Look, I've been trying to respect Mom's feelings, but the more I know about Wicca, the more I know that it's not a bad thing. It's nothing to be afraid of. Mom will just have to believe me."

"This sucks," Mary K. said. "What should I do if they ask me?"

"Whatever you need to say is all right," I said. "I won't ask you to lie."

"Crap," she said. She shook her head, then rinsed out her mug and put it in the sink. "We're going to dinner at Aunt Margaret's, you know. She called this morning before you were up."

"Oh, no, I don't think I can," I said, thinking of tonight's circle. I couldn't miss another one.

"Hi, sweetie. How are you feeling?" my mom asked, coming into the kitchen with a basket of laundry balanced on her hip.

"Much better. Listen, Mom, I can't go to dinner at Aunt Margaret's tonight," I said. "I promised Bree I would go to her place." The lie slipped out of my mouth as easily as that.

"Oh," my mom said. "Can you call Bree and cancel it? I know Margaret loves seeing you."

"I want to see her, too," I said. "But I already told Bree I'd help her with her calculus." When in doubt, pull out school-work.

"Oh. Well." She looked like she was having trouble deciding whether to push it. "I guess that's all right. You're sixteen, after all. I suppose you can't go to every family thing."

Now I felt like crap.

"I just promised Bree," I said lamely. "She got a D on her last exam, and she freaked." I was very aware of Mary K watching this exchange and wished she weren't there.

"Okay," Mom said again. "Some other time."

"Okay," I said. With Mary K.'s gaze following me out of the room, I headed upstairs and flopped onto my bed, cradling my pillow.

The night surrounded Bree and me in the comfy interior of her car. Matt's house, where the circle would be, was about ten miles out of town. As soon as Bree picked me up, I sensed that she had a lot on her mind. So did I. After my dream last night I was actually relieved to see her safe and sound and, apart from her quietness, normal.

I thought about the thousands of hours we had spent in cars with each other, first with our parents or Bree's older brother, Ty, driving us, then, for the past year, driving ourselves. We'd had some of our best talks in cars, when it was just the two of us. It felt different tonight.

"Why didn't you tell me about the spell you put on Robbie?" Bree asked.

"I put a spell on the potion, not on Robbie," I clarified. "And I didn't tell anyone. I thought the whole thing was pointless. I was sure it wasn't going to work, and I didn't want to be embarrassed."

"Do you really believe that it worked?" she asked. Her dark eyes were on the road ahead, and Breezy's high beams cut through the night.

"I… I guess so," I said. "I mean, mostly because I can't think of what else could have done it. On Monday he had awful skin; now he looks great. I don't know what else to think."