The Coven (3 page)

Sobbing, I dashed my tears away with one hand, then wiped my nose on my sleeve. I turned on Das Boot’s heater, but of course it took forever for the engine to warm up.

I was turning onto Bree’s street before I remembered that we were no longer friends. If she hadn’t left those books on my porch, I wouldn’t know I was adopted. If Cal hadn’t come between us, she would never have left the books on my porch.

I cried harder, shaking with sobs, and spun into a sloppy U-turn right before I reached her driveway.Then I hit the gas and drove, my only destination to be away, away.

 

The next time my vision cleared, I had managed to fish a battered box of tissues from beneath the front seat. Damp, crumpled ones littered the passenger side and covered the floor. I had ended up heading north, out of town. The road followed a low valley, and early fog clung heavily to the asphalt. Das Boot plowed through it like a brick thrown through clouds. In the distance I saw a large, dark shadow off to the side of the road. It was the willow oak that we had parked under just last night, for Samhain. Where I had parked the first time I did a circle with Cal, weeks before. When magick had come into my life.

Without thinking, I swung my car off the road and bumped across the field, rolling to a stop beneath the oak’s low-hanging branches. Here I was hidden by fog, by the tree. I turned off my engine, leaned against the steering wheel, and tried to stop crying.

Adopted.
Every instance, every example of my being different from my family reared up in my face and mocked me. Yesterday they had been only family jokes—how the three of them are larks and I’m a night owl, how they’re unnaturally cheerful and I’m grumpy. How Mom and Mary K. are curvy and cute and I’m thin and intense. Today those jokes caused waves of pain as I remembered them one by one.

“Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!” I shouted, banging my fists against the hard metal steering wheel. “Dammit!” I whacked the wheel until my hands were numb, until I had gone through every curse I knew, until my throat was raw.

Then I wept again, lying down in the front seat. I don’t know how long I was there, cocooned in my car in the mist. From time to time I turned on the heater to stay warm.The windows fogged and steamed with my tears.

Gradually my sobs degenerated into shaky hiccups and the occasional shudder. Oh, Cal, I thought. I need Cal. As soon as I thought that, a rhyme came into my head:
In my mind I see you here. In my pain I need you near. Find me, trace me, where I be. Come here, come here, now to me.

I didn’t know where it came from, but by now I was getting used to the arrival of strange thoughts. I felt calmer hearing it, so I said it over and over again. I draped my arm over my eyes, praying desperately I would wake up in bed at home to find it had all been a nightmare.

Minutes later I jumped when someone tapped on the passenger’s-side window. My eyes snapped open, and I sat up, then cleared a space on the glass to see Cal, looking sleepy and rumpled and amazingly beautiful.

“You called?” he said, and my heart filled with sunlight. “Let me in—it’s freezing out here.”

It worked, I thought in awe. I called him with my thoughts. Magick.

I opened the door and moved over. He slid onto the front seat next to me, and it was amazingly natural to reach out, to feel his arms come around me.

“What’s the matter?” he said, his voice muffled against my hair. “What’s going on?” He held me away from him and searched my tear-blotched face with his eyes.

“I’m adopted!” I blurted out. “This morning I told my mom that I’m a blood witch, so she must be, and my dad, and my sister. They said no, it wasn’t true. So I ran downstairs to see my birth certificate, and it had another woman’s name—not my mother’s.”

I started crying again, even though I was embarrassed to have him see me like this. He pulled me closer and held my head to his shoulder. It was so comforting that I stopped crying again almost immediately.

“That’s a hard way to find out.” He kissed my temple, and a tiny shiver of pleasure raced up my spine. It’s a miracle, I thought: He still loves me, even today. It wasn’t a dream.

He pulled back, and we looked at each other in the hazy light. I couldn’t get over how beautiful he was. His skin was smooth and tan, even in November. His hair was thick beneath my fingers, dark and streaked with warm shades the color of walnuts. His eyes were surrounded by blunt, black lashes, with irises of a gold so fiery, they almost seemed to radiate heat.

I felt self-conscious as I realized he was examining me the same way I examined him. A tiny smile quirked the corner of his lips. “Left in a hurry, did you?”

That was when I realized I was still in my oversize football jersey and an ancient pair of my dad’s long johns, complete with flap in front. A large pair of brown, furry bear-feet slippers were on my feet. Cal reached down and tickled their claws. I thought about the silky matching outfits that Bree wears to sleep in, and with a pang and an indrawn breath I remembered she’d told me that she and Cal had gone to bed. I searched his eyes, wondering if it was true, wondering if I could bear knowing for sure.

But he was here now.With me.

“You’re the best thing I’ve seen all morning,” Cal said softly, stroking my arm. “I’m glad you called me. I missed you last night, after I went home.”

I looked down, thinking of him lying in his big, romantic bed, with curtains fluttering and candles flickering all around. He had been thinking of me as he lay there.

“Listen—how did you know how to call me? Did you read about it in a book?”

“No,” I said, thinking back.“I don’t think so. I was just sitting here, miserable, and I thought if you were here, I’d feel better, and then this little rhyme came into my head, so I said it.”

“Huh,” Cal said thoughtfully.

“Was I not supposed to?” I asked, confused. “Sometimes things just come into my head like that.”

“No, it’s okay,” said Cal. “It just means you’re strong. You have ancestral memories of spells. Not every witch does.” He nodded, thinking.

“So tell me more,” he said. “Your parents never told you about this before, your being adopted?” He kept his arm on the back of the seat, smoothing my hair and rubbing my neck.

“No.” I shook my head. “Never. And you’d think they would have—I’m so different from them.”

Cal cocked his head, looking at me. “I’ve never met your folks,” he said. “But you don’t look much like your sister; that’s true. Mary K. looks sweet.” He smiled. “She’s pretty.”

A hot jealousy started to burn in my chest.

“You don’t look sweet,” Cal went on. “You look serious. Deep. Like you’re thinking. And you’re more striking than pretty.You’re the kind of girl that you don’t notice is beautiful until you get real close.” His voice trailed off, and he brought his head closer to mine. “And then all of a sudden it hits you,” he whispered.“And you think, Goddess, make her mine.”

His lips touched mine again, and my thoughts whirled. I wrapped my arms around Cal’s shoulders and kissed him as deeply as I knew how, pulling him closer. All I wanted was to be with him, to never be apart.

Minutes passed in which I heard only our breathing, our lips coming together and parting, the crinkle of the vinyl seat as we moved to be closer. Soon Cal was lying on top of me, his weight pressing me into the seat. His hand was stroking up and down my side, along my ribs and curving around my hip. Then it was under the hem of my jersey, warm against my breast, and shock waves went through me.

“Stop!” I said, almost afraid. “Wait.”

My voice seemed to echo in the quiet car. Instantly Cal pulled his hand away. He held himself up, looking into my eyes, then leaned back against the driver’s door. He was breathing fast.

I was mortified.You idiot, I thought. He’s almost eighteen! He’s definitely had sex. Maybe even with Bree, a tiny voice added.

I shook my head. “Sorry,” I said, trying to sound casual. “It was just a surprise.”

“No, no,
I’m
sorry,” he said. He reached out and took my hand, and I was mesmerized by its warmth, its strength. “You call me here, and I jump on you. I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry.” He raised my fingers to his mouth and kissed them. “The thing is, I’ve been wanting to kiss you ever since I met you.” He smiled slightly.

I calmed down. “I’ve wanted to kiss you, too,” I admitted.

He smiled. “My witch,” he said, running a finger down my cheek, leaving a thin trail of heat. “Now, how did you tell your mother that you’re a blood witch?”

I sighed. “This morning she found a pile of my Wicca books, magick books, on the front porch. She stormed into my room, yelling at me, saying they were blasphemous.” I sounded more together than I felt, remembering that awful scene. “I thought she was being so hypocritical—I mean, if I’m a blood witch, then she and my dad would have to be, too. Right?”

“Pretty much,” said Cal. “Definitely, with someone who has powers as strong as yours, both your parents would have to be.”

I frowned. “What about only one parent?”

“An ordinary man and a female witch can’t conceive a baby,” Cal explained. “A male witch can get an ordinary woman pregnant, but it’s a conscious thing. And their baby would have very weak powers at best, or possibly none at all. Not like you.”

I felt like I had accomplished something: I was a powerful witch.

“Okay,” Cal said. “Now, why were your books on the front porch? Were you hiding them?”

“Yes,” I said bitterly. “At Bree’s house. This morning she left them on my porch. Because you and I kissed last night.”

“What?” Cal asked, a dark expression crossing his face.

I shrugged. “Bree really . . . wanted you. Wants you. And when you kissed me last night, I know she felt that I had betrayed her.” I swallowed and looked out the window. “I
did
betray her,” I said quietly. “I knew how she felt about you.”

Cal’s eyes dropped. He picked up a long strand of my hair and twined it around his hand, over and over. “How do
you
feel about me?” he asked after a moment.

Last night he had told me he loved me. I looked at him, seeing past him to the thin November sunlight that was burning away the fog. I breathed deeply, trying to slow the sudden, rapid patter of my pulse. “I love you,” I said. My voice came out a husky whisper.

Cal glanced up and caught my gaze. His eyes were very bright. “I love you, too. I’m sorry that Bree’s hurt, but just because she has feelings for me doesn’t mean we’re going to be together.”

Did that stop you from sleeping with her? I almost asked him, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to. I wasn’t sure I really wanted to know.

“And I’m sorry Bree is taking it out on you,” he said. He paused. “So your mom found the books and yelled. You thought she was hiding being a witch herself, right?”

“Yes. Not just her but my father and my sister,” I said. “But my parents went crazy when I said that. I’ve never seen them so upset. And I said, so, what? I’m
adopted
? And they got these horrible expressions on their faces. They wouldn’t answer me. And suddenly I had to know. So I ran downstairs and looked at my birth certificate.”

“And there was a different name.”

“Yeah. Maeve Riordan.”

Cal sat up straighter, alert. “Really?”

I stared at him. “What? Do you recognize that name?”

“It sounds familiar.” He looked out the window, thinking, frowning, then shook his head.“No, maybe not. I can’t place it.”

“Oh.” I swallowed my disappointment.

“What are you going to do now? Do you want to come to my house?” He smiled. “We could go swimming.”

“No, thank you,” I said, remembering when the circle had all gone skinny-dipping in his pool. I was the only one who had kept her clothes on.

Cal laughed. “I was disappointed that night, you know,” he said, looking at me.

“No, you weren’t,” I replied, crossing my arms over my chest. He chuckled softly.

“Seriously, do you want to come over? Or do you want me to come to your house, help you talk to your parents?”

“Thanks,” I said, touched by his offer. “But I think I should just go home by myself. With any luck, they all went to church, anyway. It’s All Saints’ Day.”

“What’s that?” Cal asked.

I remembered he wasn’t Catholic—wasn’t even Christian. “All Saints’ Day,” I said. “It’s the day after Halloween. It’s a special day of observance for Catholics. That’s when we go tend our family graves in cemeteries. Trim the grass, put out fresh flowers.”

“Cool,” said Cal. “That’s a nice tradition. It’s funny that it’s the day after Samhain. But then, it seems like a lot of Christian holidays came out of Wiccan ones, way back when.”

I nodded. “I know. But do me a favor and don’t mention that to my parents,” I said. “Anyway, I’d better get home.”

“Okay. Can I call you later?”

“Yes,” I said. I couldn’t stop myself from smiling.

“I think I’ll use the telephone,” he said, grinning.

I thought of how he had come when I had said my rhyme. I was still amazed that it had worked.

He let himself out of Das Boot into the chilly, crisp November air. He walked to his car and took off as I waved.

My world was flooded with sunlight. Cal loved me.

February 7, 1978

Two nights ago someone sprayed “Bloody Witch” on the side of Morag Sheehan’s shop. We’ve moved our circle to meeting out by the cliffs, down the coast a ways.

Last night, late, Mathair and I went out to Morag’s. Lucky it was a new moon—no light and a good time for spells.

 

1. Cast a circle completely around what you want to protect. (I had to include old Burdock’s sweetshop since the two buildings are joined.)

2. Purify the circle with salt. We used no lights or incense but salt, water, and earth.