Spell Catcher Chapter Three (working title)

I was sitting at the base of the big oak tree, legs stretched out in front of me and the rough bark was biting into my back. I had my eyes closed and my face was tilted towards the sky so I could feel the late autumn sun’s warmth upon it. The smell of damp earth and decomposing leaves made me smile. I loved this time of year.

The leaves on the ground crackled on my right and I knew Jenna was headed my way, probably with her nose buried in a book. She took slow easy steps, treading softly on the carpet of leaves.

“Hey Jenna,” I said without opening my eyes.

“I really don’t like it when you do that.” She said as she sat down beside me. She crossed her jean-clad legs and laid her book on her lap.

“Do what?” I asked as I twisted a piece of hair around my finger.

“Say hello before you even open your eyes.”

“It’s a gift.” I opened my eyes to look at her. “Where’s Sienna?”

“Swim team.”

A dark shadow beyond Jenna’s shoulder caught my eye. A flash of color swished in the breeze around the corner of the nearest building.

“Hey isn’t that Elder Graves?" Near the old stone building, where classes were held stood a figure in a full-length cape.

“Its like the cape she wore Saturday night, so it could be her.” Jenna shrugged her thin shoulders. “What does it matter?”

I thought for a moment. “It just seems strange for her to be here during the day. She teaches astronomy at night.”

“Maybe she forgot something.”

“Someone’s walking towards her. Can you see who it is?” I asked as I started chewing on my fingernail. I stopped chewing my fingernails three years ago so I knew I was anxious.

Jenna peered through her glasses as she pushed up the sleeves on her tan sweater. “Looks like Tamora. What do you suppose they're talking about?’

“Don’t know. Wanna find out?”

“What are you talking about?” She asked suspsiously.

“Look,” and I hoisted a thick book out of my silver messenger bag. On the front a large five sided star encased in a silver circle. Along the outside of the circle were the compass symbols; north at the top, east on the right, south at the bottom and west to the left. No words were written on the cove, but on the spine engraved at the bottom was RGY. I started flipping through it.

“Where’d you get that?” Her glasses were slipping down her nose and I wanted to push them up. They were bugging me.

“I picked this up in my mom’s work room. She’s always leaving it laying around.” Finally I found the page I was looking for. “Here it is. Do you have sea salt in your herb case? I ran out yesterday and forgot to get more.”

“Of course, but isn’t that your moms Book of Shadows?”

I didn’t say anything just continued to run my finger under the words.

After a moment she went back to rummaging around her bag. “Here, are we suppose to be doing this?”

“I don’t know. It doesn’t say what level you need to be.” I took out my clear glass bowl etched with stars and my brown leather herb case. “Will you open the circle?’

She nodded her head and started on the circle as I read though the spell in front of me. When she was done she nodded her head and sat waiting for me to continue.

“When I read the ingredients you get them.”

Jenna nodded again as I scanned the page once more. “Pinch of crushed Thyme for extra sensory perception, three slivers of the Althea root for psychic powers. Grind that up.” As I was ticking these items off Jenna was searching around for them and placing them in front of us.

“Wish Sienna was here,” she grumbled.

“Me too. Crush those Balsam and Edelweiss flowers. Ones for insight and the other is for invisibility. Sienna would do this quicker. Ok, only two more things. Corn, whole cob, but only the kennels and five tablespoons of Fennel, luck and protection are next. Mix them together while saying,” I read from the book.

Goddess of air and of wind
Lend me your strength to hear.
Over the distance in the light of this yard
Let me hear the two in my sight.

“Now sprinkle it around us in a circle.”

“So mote it be,” Jenna ended.

Silence, then…

~~~~~

“Did you learn?” Came a deep voice I recognized as Elder Graves.

“Just that mother is leaning towards High Elder Younge…”

“Shh…don’t say names. Who knows who’s listening?”

“Yes Elder Graves. Oops, sorry.” That one was Tamora.

“Yes, well go on.”

“Mom say ‘She’s’ got it right. That we should get rid of ‘it’.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“Well you must change her mind. The item is much too powerful to get rid of.”

“What does it do?” Whined the younger voice.

~~~~~

Silence followed.

“What happened?” Asked Jenna.

“I don’t know.” I pulled the book on to my lap and started flipping through the crinkly pages again. “Here it is. It has a limited length of time before it stops working. We could mix it again.”

“No, look they’re walking away from each other. The meeting must be over.”

“”What item do you think they were talking about?” I asked quietly.

Jenna thought for a moment, “I don’t know. Sienna should be done by now. Why don’t you do get her and meet me in the library.”

“OK.”

We packed our bags carefully with everything we had pulled out, then we walked off in different directions.



* * *


Sienna and I found Jenna sitting with her back to the floor to ceiling windows in the schools library. Three stacks of books sat on the table, higher then she was.

Around her were rows and rows of books. Some as old as time itself and some very new. Dust and time hung in the air, giving the room a musty smell. And it was cold; they always kept it cold in here.

I walked behind Sienna as we weaved our way to Jenna’s table. Her hair was still dripping water.

I tapped her on the shoulder and whispered, “Why didn’t you use a drying spell?”

“Not enough time.” She whispered back, “You came running in there so fast and started dragging me out.”

“Oops, sorry.”

As we approached I noticed that the library was empty. I couldn’t even see Mrs., Tiddle, the librarian.

“Why did you want us to meet in here?” I asked once we arrived at her table.

“I wanted to look up something.” She scanned the page she was on before continuing. “Did you tell her what we did?”

“Yes, she did.” Answered an angry Sienna.

“And she hit me for it.”

“You deserved it.”

“I most certainly did not!” I countered.

“Yes you did. I can’t believe you did something like that without me.”

After watching out exchange Jenna cleared her throat and looked at us over her glasses.

“Eww…don’t do that. You look like Mrs. Tiddle.” I shuttered.

“If you two are through then let’s get back to the reason we’re here.” She slid a book towards us. We sat down across from her and looked down at the image on the page. “I’ve found this while you were gone.”

“It’s a cup.” I said confused.

“Hello, it say’s it’s the Cup of Life.” Sienna said smacking my arm that was leaning on the table.

Through clenched teeth I said, “Well you please stop hitting me?” I studied the page while Jenna flipped through another book and Sienna wrung her blond hair out. On the page before me was a chalice made of gold. Around the base, embedded so they were flush with the base, were six stones.

“What are the stones on the base?” I asked either of them.

Jenna pulled the book back to her. “Mmmm… It alternates jade with emerald. Jade for long life and emerald in inner/outer balance.”

“Now to me it seems like the stem is made of some kind of wood, petrified if I’m not mistaken.”

Jenna nodded her head causing her glasses to slide further down her nose. Sienna stopped messing with her hair and studied the picture with us.

“So petrified wood, what in the Goddess name does petrified wood do? We haven’t even studied trees or shrubs.” I wailed to the ceiling.

Out of nowhere came a loud and harsh, “shhhh…”

“Sorry Mrs. Tiddle.” I still couldn’t see her anywhere.

Jenna tapped her finger against the picture getting my attention. “Petrified wood is longevity. Now look here, the bowl part has amber, bloodstone and aquamarine staggered. Amber and aquamarine both are used for healing. Amber has other attributes like strength and protection. Now bloodstone is courage, strength and it also helps bleeding stop.”

“So what you're saying is this cup will heal and prolong life plus five strength.” Sienna stated seriously.

“Looks like it, yeah.” I drummed my fingers on the polished wood table.

“Do you think this is what they were talking about, Tamora and Elder Graves?”

Jenna glanced at the other book she was looking at while I was reading about the chalice. “I found something else. Take a look at this, “ and she set the book on top of the other. “This is a amulet, The Amulet of Fertility.”

“Looks like a lower case g with its tail touching,” I said softly.

Jenna tapped the tail, “but look how thick it is and the circle at the top is almost as thick. There’s also jade embedded in the tail. If you stretch your imagination it looks like a mother holding her child.”

“Ok I can see it sorta. But how can this be a powerful item?” Sienna asked.

Jenna looked at the picture for a moment or two before saying, “remember two weeks ago we were at Baylee’s house and Elder Younge had the Elders over for a meeting?”

She paused and we nodded our heads. “I remember. They stayed forever that night. I remember mom being tired and distracted the next day.”

“When I went down to the kitchen I passed a small room. I heard voices arguing so I went closer. The door was opened a crack. Inside were Elder Graves and your mom. Elder Graves’ cape was flying around her like sharks in a feeding frenzy, but Elder Younge was just standing there calmly with hands folded in front of her.

Arms gesturing Elder Graves had just said, ‘you know how much it would mean to me,’ as I walked up to the door.

‘Yes Leeanna, I do. But its not going to happen.’ Elder Younge said calmly.

‘How can you deny me something this precious?’

‘I’m not denying you anything. I’m just forbidding you to use this for that. You must find another way to have one.’

At that time Elder Younge started moving towards the door, so I quickly ran into the kitchen.”

“And you didn’t say anything?” Asked Sienna amazed.

“I didn’t think anything of it at the time. Not until we heard Tamora and Elder Graves talking.”

“I’m confused. What makes you think they were talking about this amulet?” I asked. I could feel my eyebrows coming together. I was completely lost.

Jenna sighed, “precious, I got the idea when I remembered she said precious. Adults think babies are precious.”

“So this amulet which is made out of copper and jade, makes babies?”

“Yes, copper is healing and strength and jade also has fertility powers.” Jenna stated.

Sienna opened and closed her mouth twice before saying, “that’s a stretch don’t you think? I mean getting baby out of precious.”

“Have you ever seen the way she looks at the younger kids? It’s creepy, like she wants to take them home.” I stuttered, I remembered the way she looked at me.

“Well anyways, those are the two I could find.”

“What’s next?” Asked Sienna.

I looked at her incredulously. “Next? I think we should go tell me mom, that’s what’s next.”

“No!” Shouted Jenna loudly. I expected to hear Mrs. Tiddle but only silence followed. “No, we don’t have any proof.” This time her voice was soft.

We fell silent after that. Sienna pulled out her brush and ran it through her rapidly drying hair. Jenna continued to flip through the book that held the picture of the amulet.

I stared out the window. The sun was slowly sinking behind the mountain peaks off in the distance. I watched as the shadows deepened and the leaves shivered on the trees.

“Time to lock up ladies.” A voice startled me back to the library. Mrs. Tiddle had materialized out of nowhere.

We gathered up the two books and headed out the door. I glanced back to see our chubby, short librarian scanning the books we had left on the table. On her face was a worried expression. She dropped her horn-rimmed glasses to her chest by a chain and hurried off to the back room.

“Think we better lay low for awhile.” I whispered to my friends.

“Why?” Asked Sienna.

“Because I think Mrs. Tiddle just found out what we were looking for.” I said seriously.

We walked out into the chilly evening and started towards the uneven path through the woods. Before we separated to go to our own homes I stopped, “meet me at my house at ten tomorrow morning. My mom will be at Elder Scott’s house.”