Something Wicked, page 13
She gestured around the room, to the various herbs hanging from the ceiling and elaborate crystal chimes. The way the shop’s dim light filtered through all the different colored gems made it seem like we were standing inside a secret rainbow world. I wondered what this place must look like in the bright light of daytime.
“Honey is cute, at least. Try having the name Winchester as a clueless married adult when the popularity of Supernatural reached its highest point.” I shuddered. “It’s even worse because I have a brother named Sam. Though his last name is Black. Winchester is my married name. Still didn’t help.”
“Oof.” She faked a shudder. “I never did ask Eudora if your husband’s family was related to the same Winchesters who built that bonkers house in San Jose.”
“Winchester Mystery House? No. I mean, they might have some common relatives in the tree way back down the line, but he was definitely not in line to inherit any of that rifle heiress money. My divorce lawyer would know, believe me.”
I couldn’t believe how at ease I felt around Honey. I hadn’t known her more than five minutes and already felt like we were fast friends. It was very much the same as it had been when I’d met Amy. Eudora couldn’t have possibly known I would find my way to all these people, but at the same time it really felt like she had left me new friends along the way so I wouldn’t feel so lonely in my new town.
I felt safe here, the same way I had when I’d first entered The Earl’s Study.
In spite of everything that was going on—with the murder, with my less than stellar introduction to some of the other people in town—I was starting to believe that there might just be a place for me here after all.
“So,” Honey said, breaking up my internal reverie, “have you accidentally discovered your magic powers yet?”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Honey could have run me over with a semi-truck, and I would have been less surprised than I was by her completely calm and casual question.
“Ex-excuse me?” I sputtered.
Her smile faltered into a frown for the briefest fraction of a second, and then she shook it off and resumed smirking sweetly at me. “No, you can’t play dumb on this one, I know something had to happen to bring you here. That’s what Eudora said would go down. No one who has zero interest in magic just wanders into a witch shop.”
“I was having dinner next door,” I protested.
“You could have just as easily decided to kill time at the knitting store, pick up some yarn, start a new hobby.” Honey shook her head. “You can keep pretending like you’re not here to ask me questions, but Eudora told me you’d be coming not long after you got to town, and here you are. So, you can play dumb, or you can ask what you came to ask. I know what I would recommend, and you don’t look dumb to me.”
“Thank you?”
“Come on then—what was it?” She leaned onto the counter and propped her chin on her folded hands. In the light I could see that her eyes were an unusual shade of brown, almost orange. I’d never seen eyes that color on a person before.
It only took a few seconds for the story to come tumbling out of my mouth. “First, I made these scones that made people tell the truth.”
Honey chewed on the corner of one of her nails and lifted one shoulder in a half shrug. “I’m assuming you used some of Eudora’s blends for that?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s only partially on you, then. The reason those teas work so well is twofold. One, whoever uses them needs to channel their intentions into the brewing process. She includes a lot of steps about that in her instructions for those teas, but honestly ninety percent of what makes herbal magic work is to infuse your spells with the right intention. So, if someone believes in achieving what they want badly enough, then it works. It’s just basic manifestation. But Eudora’s teas work so well because she puts her intention into them. When she makes a love tea, she thinks about the people drinking it finding their soul mate; she thinks of weddings, of first dates, and she puts everything she can into the tea as she puts it together. Combine that with the intention of the user, and lo and behold: magic tea. So, you must have been pretty dead set on people telling you the truth when you made those scones. Her magic and your magic combined.” She knit her fingers together.
I nodded, but I only really processed half of what she was saying, she talked so fast.
“Why don’t you believe that’s why I came in?”
“Because as interesting and unique as it is to cast your first spell with baking, you had to believe there was a chance it would work, or you wouldn’t have tried it. No, I think what brought you in here was a lot weirder, because Eudora said you had no idea you were a witch. Something else had to make the lightbulb go off.”
“You know I’m a witch? She knew I was a witch?” I paused, then asked probably the most important iteration of the same question: “I’m a witch?”
Honey smiled. “That’s an awful lot of questions, but I’m going to answer them all at once. Yes. Now before you start freaking out—because you look like you might freak out—answer my question. What happened that made you come in here tonight?”
I was still reeling from her telling me I was a witch. It confirmed a lot of what I’d been thinking but still seemed too surreal to be believed. “I stopped time.”
For the first time, Honey’s expression shifted to something that wasn’t quite fear, but also wasn’t the same casual friendliness I’d seen since entering her shop.
“Can you run that by me one more time?”
“At the diner, during dinner, I tried to catch a glass of water, and I stopped time by accident.”
“Do me a favor, will you?”
“Sure?”
“Lock the door.”
A little chill raced down my spine, but for some reason I did as I was told and locked the shop’s door. Out of habit I even turned off the “Open” sign. Honey still looked slightly perturbed, so whatever it was she’d been expecting me to tell her, clearly the answer I’d given hadn’t been on her short list of possibilities.
“Did I do something wrong?” I asked. I was the tiniest bit afraid now, all my calm completely erased by being locked in the shop with a young witch I didn’t know all that well.
“Are you absolutely sure you stopped time?” Honey came around the counter and was standing in front of me now. She had a distinct smell to her, like vanilla and lavender, but also earthier. “Walk me through it.”
I explained what had happened at the diner, from the moment I knocked the glass over to the moment things started going again. Honey listened to me with hyper-focused attention, nodding periodically as I recounted the event.
Once I was finished, she said nothing but beckoned me to follow her as she pushed aside a curtain at the far end of the counter and went through. I hesitated. I could leave right now, pretend none of this had happened, and go on living my life in peace.
But she had known what I was before I set foot in this shop, and Eudora had known but never told me. I wanted to know why. I wanted to know what made her ask so many questions about had had happened in the diner, and more than anything I wanted to know what it meant that I was just now discovering I was a witch, thirty-five years into my life.
I followed her.
Chapter Thirty
The curtain opened to a narrow flight of stairs, which I followed upward, and at the top an open wood door let me into a charming, if small, apartment.
The hardwood floors were covered in layered rugs, and the walls were adorned with art that, like Eudora, seemed to heavily focus on magical women. Witches, warriors, priestesses, goddesses—you name it, and Honey had something depicting it, though her art had a distinctly more African influence than the stuff in Eudora’s house that was primarily made by dead white men.
An overstuffed armchair sat in one corner near a window that overlooked the street, and a well-worn loveseat draped in blankets faced the TV set on the opposite wall. With the exception of a bathroom and bedroom, it seemed like all the living spaces were combined into the one small main room. The kitchen was against a back wall and divided from the main room by an island with two stools tucked under the counter, which served as the closest thing to a dining room the apartment had.
More herbs hung from the ceiling over the island, and the room had a sweet basil and thyme fragrance to it.
Honey was standing behind the island. “Do you want a water? Tea? Wine? I’m definitely having wine.”
“Sure?” I wasn’t sure I loved that she needed to get wine immediately after I told her my story. That didn’t seem like a positive response.
She filled two glasses with a currant-colored wine and handed one to me. I pulled out one of the stools and took a seat, so we were facing each other. Once she’d taken a sip—or more accurately swallowed half the glass in a single gulp—she let out a long sigh and appeared to brace herself.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m going to assume you don’t know much about witches, am I right?”
I nodded. There was no hiding my ignorance, so I didn’t bother.
“Okay. I think when most people imagine witches, they think of Wiccans, modern practitioners who read tarot cards, collect crystals, and have nice gardens, but no real magic. They work in manifestation and intent, like we were talking about with the tea.”
I recalled the more dismissive way I’d thought of women like that and nodded again.
“Those people are definitely witches, but in a much more new world sense. Witches, real witches, don’t take anything away from them—their practice is generally very positive and doesn’t hurt anyone. But there are other kinds of witches out there, Phoebe. They have real magical powers, though their strength can vary. Some can do some very basic control of elements, others can heal, and some can even help makes wishes come true. Eudora excelled in helping with wish fulfillment. It was definitely her greatest power, and it’s why her teas were so popular and effective.”
“I guess that makes sense. So you’re saying that real witches have different levels of power, and some are naturally better at magic than others?”
“Yes, or better at certain kinds of magic. Think of it like high school classes. You’ll have a certain level of ability at all the subjects, but in some you’ll be an A student, whereas in others you’ll barely scrape by, and in some you’re so bad you’re looking for a fake doctor’s note to get you out of magical gym class.” She smiled at me. “Take me, for example. I’m not great at healing or wish fulfillment, but I’m great with influence. I can make people want to do things. And before you get weird about it, I can’t create the desire to do something. I more or less just have the power to compel indecisive people to make up their minds.”
“Do you help them make up their minds to buy things?”
A glint of mischief flashed in her eyes. “Like I said. I can’t make anyone do anything they didn’t already want to do.”
That made me smile and helped break the tension in the room, getting me back to the easier feeling I’d had when we were downstairs.
Honey went on. “No one is limited to one skill, but like I said, we’re all better with some gifts than others. I’m pretty good with dream magic and also location magic, which is helping find missing things. My mom is unbelievable at wish magic, just like Eudora was. But some things are a lot more difficult to master, or accomplish in the first place. There are some skills that even the oldest and strongest witches can’t use.” She gave me a meaningful look.
“I’m guessing the kind of magic that happened in the diner is pretty rare.” I swallowed hard, because the last thing I wanted was to learn I was a freak, even by witchy standards.
Honey shook her head and took another sip of wine. “Eudora was never sure what kind of gifts you’d have. When you were younger, she told me she tried to teach you about tea, I think hoping you’d share her gift. She wanted so badly for your powers to manifest before she passed, but I guess that never ended up happening. I know she wanted to guide you, and she tried to lay the groundwork when you were a child, but a witch has to come into her powers on her own. It usually happens a lot earlier in life, normally around puberty. For a long time, she wasn’t even sure you’d have magic, but it had bypassed your father and Eudora had no children. The power travels through families and typically shows up in the next generation’s daughters. It’s not unheard of for there to be male witches, but it’s a lot less common. Because it manifested in her, she strongly believed you would come into your power. But she waited and waited, and nothing.”
Look at me, a late-blooming disappointment of a witch. Just one more thing to add to the list of things I didn’t excel at.
“I had no idea. I wish she’d said something.”
“It’s hard to believe it until you experience it for yourself. It looks like she did her best to help even after she was gone, though. She told me to expect you, and she left you something.” Honey reached across the counter and picked up the crystal pendant hanging from my neck. “This is smoky moonstone. It’s for protection, but it also aids in manifestation. I think she was really trying to give you that extra little push. In your case, though, I think I understand now why the power stayed dormant for so long. You wouldn’t have been ready for it as a teenager. Heck, I’m not sure most people would be ready for it as an adult.”
“What do you mean?”
“Phoebe, the magic you did in the diner tonight is something we call probability magic.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It’s incredibly rare,” Honey explained. “I’ve only heard it mentioned in passing, and I think it’s been so long since we’ve seen someone do it that most witches don’t really believe that the gift ever existed. But if you did what you say you did tonight, I have no doubt at all. Probability magic is the ability to change the world around you, literally. You can’t adjust the past, but you have the option to change the present, which in effect can change the future.”
“Sorry to well, actually this, but can’t anyone change the present?”
Honey shook her head. “I don’t mean in terms of your actions. I mean you can stop things as they happen. The way you stopped time today is an example. A normal person couldn’t have kept that glass from breaking. And if it had broken, then maybe someone would have slipped on the spilled water. Or perhaps the waitress might have cut herself on the broken glass. So many things could have had a negative outcome because of one dropped glass of water. But you stopped it. That’s just the tiniest taste of what you can do if you learn to use your power.”
I still wasn’t sure I understood what she was telling me, especially since I still wasn’t totally convinced I believed I was a witch. There was just a lot of data to parse through, and my brain wasn’t wired to handle things that dealt with magic and fantasy.
“I can see this is a lot to process,” Honey said. “It’s always hard when you find out for the first time. I remember being so mad my mom didn’t tell me ahead of time. But nothing can really prepare you for your powers awakening. It’s something you need to evolve with. Eventually, you learn to do it as naturally as breathing.”
“Do I need a wand or something?”
Honey smirked. “No, no wand, no robes, no Hogwarts sorting hat. Your powers are all within you, and we can manifest our powers at will. It just takes time and lots of practice, but soon you can do it without evening thinking about it; it just becomes muscle memory.”
This was just too bizarre.
“So you’re saying eventually I’ll just be able to grant wishes or stop time at will?”
“Yes and no.” She finished off the last of her wine. “Your gift is so unique. It needs to be triggered. Stopping time is a big deal, and so is tweaking the course of events. From everything I’ve read, probability witches only really activate their powers in times of dire need. I know a falling glass doesn’t seem like much of an inciting incident, but I think I know why it happened. Your body and your powers were looking for an excuse to show you the magic you had in a way that was safe and low stakes, and so when that glass fell and you felt the need to catch it, you did. Again, probability magic is rare, but from what I’ve read it’s not something you command so much as something that is there for you when you really need it.”
“It’s a power of necessity, then.” Now that I was opening myself up to believing her, understanding began to flood in, and my brain started to assemble her explanation into a full picture of what I was capable of. “So if I saw someone about to step in front of a bus, I could probably stop them.”
“More than likely.”
“But I can’t wiggle my nose and make dinner appear, like in Bewitched?”
“Alas, no. We have a lot of cool gifts, but most of them are manipulation of our natural environment. We can’t just make things appear out of thin air—or make them disappear, for that matter. And another vital thing to remember is that you must only ever use your powers for good. If a witch tries to use her power for ill gain or injury to others, it twists. The power starts to feed on her energy, and more often than not those witches, um … well, they don’t live long, healthy lives—I’ll just say that. But for most witches, the desire to do good is innate. You want to use your gift to help others.”
I thought about what Rich had told me, about the ex-cons Eudora helped in her shop and how they never seemed to stick around long. I wondered if she’d used her powers to help them go on to lead happier, fuller lives by granting whatever wishes were closest to their hearts.
