Ivy Sparks
It took me forever to get out of the house tonight. Grandma hasn’t let me out of her sight since before the sun went down. She knows I’m up to something.
I’m sure she doesn’t even need to use any sort of power or anything to figure it out. First new moon after I’ve turned eighteen, not like that really means anything in The Way, but that is the magic age at which the world at large says I’m an independent adult. So of course I’m looking to get myself into trouble.
At least I made it out of the house with enough time to get out to my own spot in the woods well before midnight. Under the new moon, out in the woods two miles outside of the small town of Stokers Mill, it gets powerfully dark at night despite the clean, white snow on the ground. I don’t dare use a flashlight or a candle to guide me, because Grandma would see the glow immediately. Using The Way is completely out of the question as well. She’d pick that up on our property even quicker than me aiming a spotlight into the big bay window at the front of the house. Fortunately, she prepared me for circumstances exactly like this, teaching me to memorize the routes out to our sacred spaces so I can find them blindfolded. “Learn to travel without using your senses, and it will be harder for others to sense you,” she always told me.
It has taken me a while, but I can now get out to my own circle on my own on a dark night, and not by counting steps or anything. My feet have learned to tell where I am by the feel of the ground, where it is harder or softer, how it slopes. I have learned to use my ears when there is a breeze. It whispers through birch differently than through aspen or through spruce and fir, even in January when many of the trees have no leaves. I’ve worked in my space enough now that as I come closer, I can feel it, a light pressure in my chest and a feeling of calm that settles over me.
By the time I step into the tiny clearing, my eyes have adjusted to the darkness enough that I can see a little bit by the soft bluish starlight that filters through the leaves of the tall trees that surround me. It’s enough to make out the five gray stones pretty easily, and barely make out the pale whiter stones between. We had a brief thaw earlier in the day, so I can see a little bit of clear ice in the small depression I’d created in the center of the circle.
I walk around the outside of the circle five times, clockwise, mindful of the two places where tree roots break the surface and could trip me. After the last circuit, I step into the circle. I light small candles and set them around the basin, then fill it from my water bottle. From under my sweater, I pull a small satchel of herbs and sprinkle them into the water. The last thing I do is take a short branch of very dry pine with magic words written on it, and I light it from one of the candles. As the brown needles ignite, I walk backwards out of the circle. Never turn your back on the gate once you’ve opened it, Grandma always told me. Even if you haven’t called anything yet, never turn your back on the gate.
The thought of Grandma makes me look around. If she knew I was out here opening gates, even a tiny one, she’d have my hide.
Still, it’s just a tiny one. A little, itty-bitty one, that would only open for a couple of minutes. Not big enough to bring anything serious in, and not long enough for it to cause any actual trouble. Just a little bit of mischief is all I aim to do.
As the flames crawl up the pine branch, reaching the words I’ve inked into it, I read them aloud. I feel an undeniable rush of power as the ink glows so much brighter than the rest of the flame, searing the arcane characters into my eyes. I have to keep concentrating on reading and not just shouting, “It works! I’m doing it!” out of sheer excitement. This is my first time ever opening a gate on my own, and things are happening exactly as they should.
As the first phrase is consumed by the flames, a glow forms just above the basin, drawing light from the ring of candles around it. I say the second phrase, and the candle flames turn black as more of their light gets pulled into the glowing space above the basin. With the third phrase, light returns to the candles, and the space above the basin becomes so deep black that it stands out sharply against the darkness of the moonless night.
I recite the final phrase, and pause. There is no sound, but I feel a sudden thud against my chest like being in front of one of the big speakers at a concert when the big bass drum kicks. I stand silent and wait. Everything tells me that the spell has worked. A little imp should come through at any moment now. I know he’ll only be here for a short time, so I’d rehearsed what I want to ask it. Imps, like all Demons, are extremely literal creatures, and quite skilled at twisting your exact words to mean exactly what you don’t intend them to. So I’d spent the full afternoon agonizing over how to very precisely word the two questions I’d be able to get out before the imp got pulled back through the gate.
Still, nothing is happening, and I don’t know why. The words lit up, the light moved and the darkness coalesced, the silent boom cracked through the space. All I have to do now is hold my concentration until something comes through the gate. I try to hold my breath under control without thinking about it. I try not to think about the rivulet of sweat running down my back, cold and tingling along my spine. I peer into the very dark space, waiting to see what will show its face.
I mean, I cast the spell for something small. I didn’t think it would be something so small I couldn’t see it.
I manage to keep my concentration up until the gate closes. Maybe I managed to keep it open for a few seconds longer than the spell was designed for by sheer willpower, but that was it. The harsh nothingness above the basin fades into the mere darkness. The candles flutter and spit a few times, but don’t go out. In their thin light, I see that the scatter of herbs in the basin has been consumed, as it should have been.
What happened? I look back over the spell, and can’t think of anything that went differently than I expected. Everything that should have happened in response to my actions happened. It was a flawless spell, and it accomplished nothing.
As I walk back into the circle to start cleaning up, I hear a twig snap behind me. I freeze. It’s got to be Grandma, and I realize that’s why the spell didn’t go off. Grandma must have been right behind me the entire time, interfering with my gate. I’d watched her, once, pull a minor demon through and control it for a full twenty minutes. If she was standing behind me, not wanting a little imp to come through, there is not a single imp that would come through my gate.
I take a deep breath, bracing myself for the tongue lashing that I certainly deserved for coming out and invoking an imp just for fun. I turn around, and even though the person behind me is too far back into the trees that I can’t make them out, I can tell it’s not Grandma. Whoever it is, they’re not tall enough for Grandma, not thin enough. To be honest I should be scared that somebody is sneaking up behind me, practicing witchcraft in the woods, but I’m so relieved it’s not Grandma that I forget to worry that they might be dangerous to me.
As a sigh of relief escapes me, despite my best effort to restrain it, the person just beyond the edge of the clearing laughs.
It’s Nathan Marsh, foster-brother of my best friend, Kate. I’ve known him since he was just three years old. I don’t know what kind of life he had before Kate’s family took him in, but I know it wasn’t good. Without Kate’s family, he probably would have gone down a much darker path, but with them, he’s turned into a pretty decent guy. His past still shows in how often he gets himself into trouble with his foster family, or the school, sometimes even the law. It’s never anything malicious or mean-spirited, though. More that he lacks judgment, and too often acts impulsively on his bad ideas. Most of his days are good days, and that spontaneity makes him lively and exciting and fun to be around. Some days, he just takes it too far, though.
Another good thing about Nathan is that nothing really seems to surprise, shock, or befuddle him. He takes every strange thing he sees, every unusual quirk about everybody he knows, and he just takes it in stride.
So far, I’ve hidden from him the fact that Grandma and I are witches. Well, Grandma is a witch, I’m still essentially a witch-in-training, but if I were to tell Nathan that, he wouldn’t freak out or be offended. If anything, he’d ask me to cast some sort of spell for him or another.
“Uh. Hi?” I say, thankful that invocations are one of the spells that you don’t do naked. Yeah, Nathan is very easy going, but he’s not the kind of guy that really needs to see all that much of me.
Nathan comes up to the edge of my circle, but does not cross it. “I have seen this place before. Always wondered what it was,” he says.
“Well. It’s mine,” I say. “I come out here to think and meditate when I need to get away for a bit.”
“It’s very nice,” he says. “May I?” He points toward the ground at the edge of my circle.
“Uh…” I say. “Why don’t you just wait there, and you can walk me home, alright?”
“Right here?” he asks, again pointing at the invisible line that delineates my circle.
“Yes,” I say, quickly blowing out my candles and putting them into my bag. I stir the water in the basin counterclockwise, scooping a little bit into my hand and tossing it out of the circle. With the fire extinguished and the basin symbolically emptied, my little space is now just normal space again.
“Can I help you with anything?” Nathan asks.
“Nope. I’ve got everything under control,” I say.
He holds out his hand to me as I step past the ring of stones. I take it with a light squeeze.