Page 14 of Rewitched

She glanced at the clothes in her wardrobe, the alternative heap draped over the armchair. One spell that she did cast every day without fail was to bring forth the clothes that she should wear for whatever occasion was on the agenda—her nifty Idoneus Indumentum incantation that teenage Belle had perfected as a priority within a few weeks of gaining powers. It saved a lot of indecision in the mirror, but probably wouldn’t qualify as proof of full endarkenment.

With a flick of her finger, an old favourite sailed towards her. An emerald green dress, suitably witchy but nothing as to garner strange looks on a packed train. It was comfortable, reliable. Plus, it had pockets.

She would shove the required coven cape and hat in her backpack once she remembered where she’d put them. Noticing the time, she zapped her wet hair dry (Capillus Aura, another useful one) and grabbed a pair of boots.

“Jinxy, wish me luck.”

Jinx glanced up with her usual catty mix of affection and disdain.

Sliding aside the clutter on the coffee table, Belle pulled out the letter. The writing, a little crumpled now, glowed like embers as she reread the words off almost by heart. The Cheers! at the end was starting to grate.

Please bring with you to your hearing your bestowed sooth stone for the Selcouth endarkenment presentation…

She sighed. She’d nearly forgotten.

It had been a long time since she’d seen that thing. Finding it now would be nothing short of a miracle. While she wasn’t quite up to conducting those yet, she did have a quick Perdita Invenio, a lost-and-found incantation up her sleeve. With a small finger turn, she completed a circle of tiny stars. In moments, she heard the stifled rattling sound of something trying to escape.

“Well, I would never have found you in there.”

Rummaging in the corner of her dresser drawer, delving amongst bottles, tubs and endless hair bobbles, Belle felt her fingers wrap around a small bundle of silk scarf tied into a knot. She unfurled it carefully to uncover the brooch hidden away inside. It fitted perfectly into the palm of her hand, the delicate case carved from shell that framed a pebble-sized jewel, a chunky shard of lacklustre grey glass. A little underwhelming in all honesty, considering its apparent status as a mysterious, magical artefact.

It had been years since she’d seen it. She tossed it over in her hand. The glass was always murky, inky, but the inside moved and swirled slowly like smoke behind glass, like tiny storm clouds gathering. It had been a strange birthday gift from her grandmother fifteen years ago.

“When the time comes, you’ll appreciate it,” Alvina Blackthorn had said, closing her granddaughter’s fingers over the gift with a gentle tap. It had gone unexplained and unsurprisingly unworn, teenagers not usually being big on brooches. The glass was forgotten about, shoved into a jewellery box before she could think to ask much more about it. Now, with her grandmother gone, it was another souvenir of unasked questions, unspoken conversations. Belle’s questions about the stone had joined the pile, insignificant compared to other words that she longed to speak with her nan. She pinned the brooch onto the strap of her dress.

“I’ll take all the luck I can get today.”

Although it was instantly hidden by her dark hair, Belle was taken aback, bolstered ever so slightly by a warm feeling. Something that once belonged to her grandmother, her precious and caring and cherished nan, tying them together as soon as it rested against her chest. The small, quiet reminder of an ever-loving presence.

5

At the Willow

AS IT TRANSPIRED and as should have probably been expected from a witchcraft high headquarters, Hecate House was not easy to find. The letter only gave sparse detail—Highgate Cemetery, London—which Bonnie explained in another frantic phone call was to be expected. The exact entrance to Hecate House regularly incarnated, changing every full moon so as to minimise the chance of non-wicche folk stumbling across it. It was left to a witch’s intuition to locate it for themselves again and to figure out how to open the entrance, which Belle quickly decided was extremely unhelpful and stupid.

She emerged from the humid Underground to find autumn giving a sleepy sigh across the city. Leaves skipped like skimming stones, and a damp breeze rippled silkily at her ankles. It was welcome after a sticky journey across almost the entire breadth of the city. A drizzle slipped down from the sky and threatened to soak her from head to toe in a matter of minutes, so she hastily threw an umbrella over her head. Rainy London could be a miserable feeling—heads down, socks soaked, arms folded fiercely across chests—but it fit this time of year like a glove, the smell of damp ground and muddy earth tailored to the place.

Belle snuck her first glance at the entrance to Highgate Cemetery, elegant and sombre, framed by a pointed Gothic arch. The entryway was cloudy with damp and centuries of soot on a street that was quiet and peaceful, save for a handful of passersby wrapped in waterproofs and clutching takeaway cups. Belle, feeling as though she may as well have hung a sign around her neck declaring “Lost Witch,” gave them an awkward “nothing to worry about” wave for inexplicable reasons.

She had hoped that when it came to it, Hecate House would call to her. A carried voice on the air, a beckoning finger. She’d heard stories of the cemetery whispering with a disembodied voice, enticing people to look back over their shoulder, only for them to see nothing and nobody behind them. With no such helpful spectres presenting themselves post-breakfast, this was evidently where Belle’s intuition and abilities were supposed to take over. It seemed to be happening increasingly often—this moment where she’d look around for the responsible adult to guide her with a hand at the small of her back before the gut-punch realisation that she was on her own to make the call. The creased, well-thumbed pocket A–Z sticking out of her bag could only take her so far. Magic had to point the rest of the way, along with a few aged signposts.

Belle tried to trust that instinct was pulling her feet in the right direction amongst a landscape of thousands of gravestones, jutting from the gums of the soil like chipped teeth. Weeping angels looked down over those below, one sweetly sleeping on the job. Sombre obelisks, looming crosses and veiled urns depicted snakes swallowing their own tails for eternity. Everything was coated in a watery sheen, speckles of rain flickering the picture like old film. The minutes were ticking by alarmingly quickly on Belle’s watch, but time in the cemetery felt halted. In perpetual memory, in loving memory, in precious memory…all gulped down by the silence.

Doing her best to follow the weathered signs, she eventually found herself at the grand dark tunnel of Egyptian Avenue and took a moment to hold a stitch that was blooming above her hip. The main path was flanked by a pair of looming obelisks that could have touched the sky itself. Then appeared a shady, circular avenue, lined with delicate sunken tombs like tiny terraced houses. The vaults, built around the roots of an ageing cedar tree up high, looked oddly welcoming with their cold, moss-cushioned eternal rest behind front doors. A rest sounded great, frankly.

One step farther, and Belle felt it. That crest of a wave breaking, the force upon her senses that told her others of magical persuasion were nearby. Of course Hecate House had to be here—the most revered, supernaturally charged part of the cemetery. She followed the trodden path around the grand circle like a lasso, past ancient family crypts and tombs of the historic London elite, scanning for a possible entrance. A caretaker sweeping an enormous pile of wet leaves into a neat mountain remained oblivious to the witch who was looking a little unhinged and very unsure.

“Please. Please. Please tell me I don’t have to break into a tomb. That does not feel like a good thing to do.”

Belle glanced at the dark doorways of each vault. The darkness, the ice cold, whatever else might be inside. “Why would a high witch headquarters be anything to do with a tomb? Of all the places. You’re magic. You can choose anywhere. Next time, choose a Maldives water villa, guys.”

She stopped in her tracks at what had appeared on the path. She’d done a full loop, and the Victorian lamp-post in front of her, the only one, standing alone in the circle, had not been there before. Had it? It was unassuming enough to go unnoticed—if you didn’t happen to be looking for an undisclosed entrance to a witch headquarters.

Belle hesitated, questioning herself. The lamp-post reminded her of stories that Bonnie had read to her before bed when she was young. Inevitably stories of witches, in so many forms and worlds. There’d been a matching lamp to this one in their local church graveyard, where they’d walked together in all weathers, hunting down specific weeds, rare crabgrass, downy thistles and oily feathers for Bonnie’s brewing. Bonnie would remind her daughter, long before powers came into play, to never doubt that wise lions, powerful witches and mystical wardrobes were all very, very real and waiting to be found. To venture past the lamp-post in the story had always led to strange adventures and great changes in fortune. It had always led to witches.

“This has to be it.”

Her instincts said fire. Belle focused on the unlit tinder inside and tipped her finger up towards it, a nest of tiny sparks conjuring a small flame behind the glass. Instantly, the iron frame filled with tawny light, pleasant against the damp grey air. The lamplight landed simply and selectively on just one weeping willow tree, which covered the opposite walls in a cascade. Against the drizzle, the glow coated each sweeping leaf like a cobweb, falling as if to spotlight that tree alone.