Omens Bite, page 12
Xena, in cat form, trotted beside her. The feline looked up at Mercy and chattered and mewed in the distinctive way Maine coons vocalize to their humans.
“Welp.” Mercy swung her wicker spellwork basket and grinned down at Xena. She’d felt so, so much better ever since they’d made the decision to invoke Freya’s aid. “Unlike Abigail, I can’t understand you, but I’m going to believe that you didn’t just chastise me and instead said that I’m too cool for school anyway.”
Xena made a very human-sounding snort, which caused Mercy to laugh.
“That feels good,” Mercy said. “Laughing feels good. Xena, I’m so tired of being sad and worried and stressed all the time. I’m going to remember to laugh more. Sod it! I’m going to start doing things that make me happy again.”
Xena chattered at her.
“Oh, I know, I know. I still have trees to save and gates to close—and a sister who has lost her mind. But does that mean I have to be Debbie Downer for the rest of my life?”
Xena’s response was a rolling rrrrow.
“Right? I don’t have to be screwed up just because my twin is.”
Xena’s answer was the feline version of a grumble.
The path emptied into the grassy clearing that surrounded the enormous apple tree. It was framed by maturing corn that had already grown as tall as Mercy. She stopped and wrapped her arms around herself as she gazed at the tree.
“It’s beautiful and bittersweet.” Mercy spoke more to herself than Xena. “The last time I was truly happy was here—when we were all together.” Tears burned the back of her throat and Mercy swallowed quickly. No more tears today! “Okay, I’m going to get everything ready. Are you sure you don’t want to zap yourself back to human form and help me?”
Xena hissed.
Mercy grinned cheekily at the cat. “Well, you could be naked.”
The feline’s slant-eyed look clearly said that she was already naked.
“Okay, fine. I’ll do it myself.” Humming a wordless tune Mercy put her basket on the ground. First, she took out the huge bouquet of happily blooming daisies—a favorite of Freya—from Abigail’s garden and placed it at the base of the apple tree, just below the heart that had been seared into its bark by her mom’s sacrifice. She’d tied the bouquet together with a velvet ribbon the blue of clear spring skies and Freya’s eyes, taking special care to make a beautiful bow.
Mercy returned to the basket and shook out the quilt she’d folded on top of her spellwork items. She lay it on the ground a few yards in front of the tree where the roots weren’t so gnarly. Then she slipped off her shoes. The sparse grass felt cool under her feet as she placed her five candles. The white candle went at the top point of the mini-pentagram just a few inches off her quilt. She placed the other four candles, brown and green to symbolize the earth, around her quilt at the points of the pentagram.
Next Mercy took out the velvet bag she’d filled with salt. She moved with confidence as she traced the shape of the pentagram to connect the five candles—with her quilt in the center. Satisfied, she pulled out the two remaining items in her basket—her small incense holder that was shaped like a miniature cauldron and her box of ritual matches. Mercy left the cauldron in the center of the blanket and strode to the white candle at the top of the pentagram.
“In the name of the Norse Goddess of Love and Beauty, my Freya, I open this pentagram!” Mercy lit the candle and then walked to the next point of the pentagram and the green candle waiting there. “I set this pentagram of power in the name of the Norse Goddess of Fertility, my Freya.” She lit the green candle and moved on to the brown candle that waited its turn at another point on the pentagram. “I set this pentagram of power in the name of the Norse Goddess of War, my Freya.” The brown candle blazed as she touched the flame to the wick, which made Mercy grin fiercely. She hurried to the next candle, the second green one. “I set this pentagram of power in the name of the Norse Goddess of Wealth, my Freya.” The candle caught easily and Mercy completed the pentagram at the second brown candle as she said, “And now this pentagram of power is complete in the name of the Norse Goddess of Divination and Magic, my Freya!” The brown candle flamed even brighter than the others.
Mercy returned to the quilt and the cauldron in the center of her opened pentagram. Xena sat beside the cauldron watching her with knowing eyes. Mercy seated herself so that the little cauldron was in front of her and she faced the apple tree. Then she lit the small charcoal circle she’d already placed within her cauldron. It sizzled and sparked, and within a few heartbeats smoke lifted from the paste-like mixture of myrrh and dried apple blossoms Mercy had smeared on the burner when she packed the basket.
As the fragrant smoke rose around them, twining among the fruit-laden boughs of the old tree, Mercy said, “Freya, I am Mercy Anne Goode, Green Witch newly accepted into your service—though since I was a little girl I’ve understood that I belonged to you. I know that you are with me—that you have seen my losses and my hurts. It—it feels like my world isn’t really mine anymore.” Mercy paused as she searched for the right words. She’d never formally invoked Freya before, and reading the grimoires of other Goode witches gave her very little guidance about how to do it. Apparently, calling on one’s goddess was so highly personal that, as Constance Goode wrote in 1911, I shall only write that I invoked my goddess. All else must be written only on my heart. Mercy drew a deep breath and continued. “Freya, I’ve lost my mom and now it feels like I’m also going to lose my sister. The gates are crumbling and I have no one to turn to for help except you. So I ask humbly, with love and respect, that you send me a sign or omen as to what I should do next. I—I’m lost, Freya.” Mercy caught her breath on a sob and had to wipe an escaping tear from her cheek before she finished. “Please help me.”
Mercy had intended to sit there and meditate—open to receiving any signs or omens from Freya—until the charcoal turned gray and the sweet invocation smoke dissipated. But almost immediately the smoke shifted. It poured from the little cauldron and lapped against the trunk of the apple tree. It engulfed the bouquet of daisies and wound around and around—as if Mercy was circling the tree with a thick stick of dried herbs
While she stared at the tree, almost forgetting to breathe, the bark began to shimmer like a light from within it had been suddenly switched on. And then the glistening surface rippled and Freya emerged from the tree. The goddess wore a golden helmet decorated with Valkyrie wings. Her hair, so blond it almost appeared silver, cascaded to her waist. She was dressed in a surprisingly simple robe of blue silk—the same color as her eyes, and wrapped in a cloak made of falcon feathers. She carried a sword with a pommel that glittered with jewels.
The shock of seeing her goddess in person was so overwhelming that Mercy could barely speak, but she did collect herself enough to bow so deeply her forehead brushed the quilt as she said, “Great Goddess! I greet you!”
You may rise, Mercy Anne Goode, Green Witch sworn to my service.
Mercy straightened and had to blink several times to accustom her eyes to the luminous presence of her goddess. “You came!” she blurted—and then Mercy pressed her hand against her mouth, shocked that she’d said something so obvious.
Freya’s laughter made fireflies—that should only have been visible on a summer night—appear in the air around her—shining with a goddess-touched light so that they blazed like living diamonds.
Yes, daughter, I heard your heartfelt call and I came. Freya’s robin’s-egg-blue gaze turned to Xena, who immediately bowed her head respectfully. Ah, Xena, it is good to see you—loyal familiar to the Goode family. You remind me of my own felines.
Xena’s purr rolled around them.
The goddess’s attention shifted back to Mercy. So, it is guidance you ask for, my young Green Witch?
Mercy clutched her hands together in her lap to keep them from trembling. “Yes, Freya.”
But I have been guiding you, Mercy Anne Goode, since the day you first heard Grandmother Oak breathe.
Mercy blinked in surprise. Being able to feel trees breathe was something she had been able to do since she was four years old. The summer day she’d touched the old oak in their backyard and felt it inhale and exhale was one of her earliest memories.
“You were there then? When I was just a little girl?”
I have always been here.
“Wow! That’s so awesome!” Mercy grinned—and then quickly sobered. “But I’ve felt so lost recently. The trees are sick—you know, the ones that guard the gates. And Hunter, my twin sister, is changing. Or has changed, and not for the better. I don’t know which and I don’t know what to do about it—about any of those things. Freya, I feel like I’m drowning.”
Yes, I am aware that the gates crumble and the trees sicken. And I know your sister, though she is not in my service.
“Will you help me? Will you tell me how to fix the trees? My magic works just fine unless I aim it at the trees. Then it just, I don’t know, fizzles. And Hunter—there’s something really wrong with her. I think—I think I caused it when I made her reject her god. I didn’t mean to do anything wrong! I thought the fact that she chose Tyr instead of a goddess was why the trees weren’t healing. Please help me, Freya.”
Daughter, it is the destiny of Goode witches to guard and nurture the trees that hold the gates to the Underworlds. Not even I can alter fate for you.
“But I don’t want it altered! I’m ready to fulfill my destiny. I just don’t know how.”
That is something I cannot tell you, as it involves choices you make freely, without the coercion of even your goddess. It is a thing the Goode sisters must discover for themselves.
“But Freya, Hunter and I aren’t doing anything together!”
Exactly. It is destined that you and Hunter have your own paths to follow—and in finding those paths you shall also find the answer, which will heal the trees and save the gates.
“I don’t understand. How are we supposed to fix the trees when we’re not even talking?”
Find your path, daughter, and you will find the way.
Mercy resisted the urge to sigh in frustration. “Can you help me with my magic? Help make it work better on the trees—to at least make them strong enough to hold on until I figure out whatever I need to figure out?”
You have been granted ample magic to do what needs be done, daughter. I cannot gift you with more without upsetting the natural order of things. Beware! What you do in this world is far-reaching—for good and ill! Abruptly the bright spring afternoon darkened and the boughs of the tree whipped as if a storm brewed. The Goode sisters must be careful where they seek power.
A cold shiver of foreboding fingered its way down Mercy’s spine. “I’ll be careful. I promise!”
As quickly as the darkness blanketed the sky the goddess’s smile chased it away. I do not doubt your fidelity, daughter. But ’tis a warning you need to hear. I shall reward your devotion with omens. As you discover your path I shall send you signs of my approval.
Mercy bowed her head again. “Oh, thank you, Freya! I’ll watch for your omens. I—I’ll try really hard to make you proud.”
Daughter, I have been proud of you since the day you opened yourself to Grandmother Oak. I believe in you—and in the woman you shall become. Now, in return for your gift of my favorite flower and the sweet scent of myrrh and apple blossoms with which you so lovingly invoke me, I leave you with a gift in return. The goddess pressed her lips to her hand and then blew the kiss at Mercy.
Mercy felt a jolt of warmth, like she’d been wrapped in a blanket newly taken from the dryer. Then, before she could say anything else Freya pulled the cloak of feathers around her. Light exploded from within the cloak and a huge falcon, more magnificent than any mundane bird, appeared in the place of the goddess. It flew low over Mercy—so low that its wings made her hair lift—and then it circled and dived for the center of the scorched heart and disappeared back within the tree.
The instant the goddess was gone the charcoal in Mercy’s cauldron turned gray, the fragrant smoke dissipated, and each of the five ritual candles blew out—closing the pentagram.
Mercy felt oddly light-headed. She wiped a hand across her face and looked at Xena, who was still staring at the apple tree.
“Oh. My. Goddess. That was amazing! Freya was here, Xena! My goddess actually came to me!”
Xena turned wide yellow eyes on Mercy and chattered at her—but inside Mercy’s head—Xena’s human voice echoed. Oh, kitten! It was quite the honor!
“I know, right? I didn’t think she’d actually…” Mercy’s words trailed off as she stared at the cat. “Wait, did you just say it was quite the honor?”
Xena blinked twice, slowly, then mewed, Indeed I did, kitten.
“Freya’s gift! She gave me the ability to hear you! Just like Abigail did!”
Chattering with excitement Xena rubbed against Mercy. Blessed Freya! What a lovely gift to bestow upon us.
“It’s so cool! It means Freya will help me! Even if the help is in the form of omens—which kinda bites because, you know, they’re symbols and such and can be misinterpreted. But I guess the more I get used to them, the easier they’ll be to understand.”
Xena’s chattering became tearful words floating through Mercy’s mind. You know what else it means, kitten? It means that I am now your familiar—connected to you until your death.
Mercy stroked the huge Maine coon’s silky fur. “Really?”
Really, my own sweet Green Witch. Xena curled up on Mercy’s lap as Abigail’s daughter put her arms around the cat and held her close.
As the afternoon faded into evening, the Green Witch, with her familiar close beside her, made their way home. Mercy’s steps were lighter than they had been since before Abigail had died. “Xena, I vow that I will be worthy of Freya’s love. I will find my path. I will fix the trees. I will even figure out what the bloody hell is wrong with Hunter.” Mercy opened the back gate to their yard and the Green Witch and cat gasped together in surprise.
The entire backyard was filled with daisies in full bloom.
“Now that’s an omen I do understand!” said Mercy happily.
Indeed, kitten! Xena chirped. I find that I am famished! Shall we—meaning you—open a can of lovely albacore and pour some cream to celebrate?
Mercy looked down at the big cat who rubbed against her legs as she purred loudly. “Are you always going to be inside my head like this?”
Of course, kitten! Is it not wonderful?
Mercy grinned cheekily down at her familiar. “Welp, it’s something, that’s for sure…”
Thirteen
Hunter’s hangnail wouldn’t stop bleeding. She’d stuck the gnawed edge of her index finger in her mouth, pressed her thumb against it, and flapped her hand under her desk, but the scarlet bubbles persisted. Each droplet slipped down her finger and splatted against the dark blue dress Kylie had insisted she borrow. Finally, she wrapped her finger in the cotton and squeezed.
Her blood was powerful. Powerful and uncontrolled. The last thing she needed was for it to drip onto the desk or the floor or anywhere else in this glorified daycare. She didn’t know what would happen if she got mad. Scratch that—when she got mad. These days, rage was a common occurrence.
With a sigh, she squeezed the wadded-up fabric around her finger and, again, let her attention slip to the right side of the room and land on her sister who she hadn’t seen since Mr. Parrott’s funeral the day before. Mercy’s long hair spilled over her shoulders and covered the back of the plastic desk chair. Hunter untangled her hand from her dress and combed her fingers through her own wavy black lengths. Maybe she would dye hers pink or blue or purple.
Mercy spun around in her seat. Hunter froze and her heartbeat skipped the way it had all those times she’d been caught pawing through her sister’s closet. Mercy narrowed her gaze, tilted her head to the side, and flipped her hair in perfect Mag fashion. She was no doubt thinking about what a disappointment Hunter was and how she, the ultra-important and wonderfully magical Green Witch, would heal the trees and figure out who was copying Polyphemus’s horrid murders. Hunter’s teeth creaked as she clenched her jaw. It wasn’t anything she hadn’t already thought about herself. But she would be the one to fix the trees and figure out a way to bring the copycat killer to justice. Even if Mercy didn’t believe her, Polyphemus was gone for good, but what if something had come through the disintegrating gate while she’d been dealing with the Cyclops? Hunter crossed her arms over her chest. She could defeat another monster. She had the perfect weapon. She had Amphitrite.
Mr. Cormican wrapped his knuckles against the whiteboard. “Hunter, you with us?”
Hunter’s breath hitched as she blinked and swept her gaze around the room. Mercy wasn’t the only person watching her.
She cocked her head and flipped her hair the way she’d watched her sister do only moments before. “Unfortunately.”
A few stray chuckles as Mr. Cormican pursed his lips and scratched his dark, closely cropped beard. “You want to tell us how speech and silence play a role throughout the text?”
Hunter glanced down at her desk and the large tree and clear blue sky on the cover of her unopened copy of Their Eyes Were Watching God. Like most of their assigned readings, she had read Hurston’s novel long before she knew what themes meant or that a book could have more than one. She’d had every intention of rereading it for class, but then her mom lit herself on fire, her sister became even more of a selfish brat, she betrayed her god, moved out, and discovered the power of blood magic. She’d left a few things out, but that just proved her point. She didn’t have enough time. Not that she could tell Mr. Cormican about her new goddess or that she’d recently cast a spell on two of her three friends.
She looked up at the clock and let out a relieved sigh. “Can I get a raincheck?” With a shrug, she pointed at the glowing red numbers. “Looks like we’re out of time.”
