Something Wicca This Way Comes (3 page)

“
Can I pick you up?” She
asked, carefully sliding her hands lower to support his
surprisingly large figure. Feral cats often became nervous about
getting picked up, but the big grey fellow just leaned into her
arms and braced himself against her chest.

Blinking dark sapphire eyes up at her, he
began a gravelly purr that delighted her.

“
Such a sweet boy,” she
smiled. “Would you like to come home with me?”

As if he understood and approved, the
purring grew louder. She only hoped that her waiting friends didn’t
mind.

A Circle of Thirteen

By the time the girls reached Mary’s house,
they were once more in high spirits.

The big gray tomcat showed no fear for being
enclosed in a moving vehicle. In fact, he almost made a nuisance
out of himself, exploring each of the bags that Beth had prepared
until she started to complain.

“
He’s going to get cat
hair all over my spell ingredients,” she moaned. “Don’t blame me if
you end up growing whiskers on your chin or fur on your ears. You
can blame your silly love affair with all things
feline.”

Liz decided that was a pretty good threat
and quickly pulled the cat up onto her lap.

Mary came running out of the house the
moment they pulled into her driveway.

"You're late," she complained as Beth and
Liz scooted over to make room for her on the back seat. "What took
you so long?"

"Liz had to stop and pick up a stray cat,"
Judy replied with a smirk.

"Only after you nearly hit him with your
car," Liz returned without any malice.

If nothing else came of this evening, she
was glad that she'd found the feline. He was quite friendly and
responsive, for a cat. Whenever she spoke to him, he would look
right at her with those incredible blue eyes and blink or meow, as
if he were fascinated by what she had to say.

"Typical Liz," Mary teased. "You better
hurry, Judy. The rest of the girls will be waiting for us."

Sure enough, when they finally made it to
the meadow beyond the lumber mill, they were met by some very
anxious friends.

"You're late!" Bev pointed out, and Judy was
again quick to blame it on Liz's need to rescue everything and
anything that purred.

This time, Liz just made a face at the other
girl.

"Do you think I should lock him in the
car?"

"Heavens no!" Judy yelped in answer. "If he
makes a mess in there, my parents will never loan it to me again.
You'll just have to hold him."

"Or you could just let him go," Bev
recommended. "I mean, he's only a stray, right?"

Liz frowned.

"Not anymore," she declared. "He belongs to
me now."

The big tom offered one of his gravely
meows, as if to emphasis her claim.

"And we all hope that you're very happy
together," Mary teased, "but I'm going to need something more than
a cat to warm my bed. So can we please get on with the ritual?"

"Yes!" Beth eagerly agreed. "Everyone not
holding a cat, please help carry bags and start gathering wood for
the fire."

As if sensing the excitement in the air, the
cat began to squirm, putting up such a fuss Liz was forced to let
him go. But instead of dashing away into the trees, as she’d
expected him to do, the feline stayed close to her side.

“
There you go,” Bev
gestured towards the cat and then the car. “Now you have free hands
to help out.”

It didn't take long before the girls had a
roaring bonfire built within a large pit in the center of the
meadow.

Liz could see from the layers of ash in the
pit that the girls had done this many times before.

What she hadn't expected was the enormous
cauldron that was unloaded from the trunk of Betty's car, along
with an old wooden chest that had strange symbols carved all over
its surface.

"It's an altar," Beth explained when she saw
Liz studying it. "Each of us have a small personal one that we use
at home and store all of our tools in, but we use this larger one
for group rituals."

"What sorts of tools?" Liz asked, imagining
Ouija boards and voodoo dolls. There was a lot that she didn't know
about witchcraft.

“
Wands, bells, feathers,
we use all sorts of things. It just depends on what sort of spell
or ritual we might be performing,” Beth offered a huge smile.
“You’ll see a few of them tonight. Then, if you decide you want to
join us more permanently, I’ll help you make your own.”

She pulled a small stack of index cards from
her pocket, each of them covered in carefully written directions.
At the top of each card was a girl’s name and several included one
of the four elements; air, fire, water and earth.

“
Could you pass these out
for me while I set up the candles?”

“
Of course,” Liz assured
her. Yet as she handed out the cards, she found herself entranced
by the preparations going on around her.

The thick white candles that Beth was
setting up at strategic points around the bonfire smelled amazing
and looked as if they’d been handmade. Each was inscribed, but Liz
was too far away to see what they said.

“
Come over here, Liz,”
Karen instructed. “We need to cast the circle.”

She did as her friend instructed, walking to
join the girls that were standing just outside of the large ring
that Beth had created with the candles.

Beth picked up an intricately carved staff
that had been placed beside the altar near the center of her
circle, beside the bonfire. She carried it out to where the other
girls were standing.

“
The circle is now to be
cast. Let all those who enter here do so in perfect love and in
perfect trust,” the blonde intoned in a warm voice. She then
lowered one end of the staff and began to drag it in a large circle
that spanned all of the tools and candles they’d carefully laid
out.

Then she returned the staff to its place
beside the altar and collected a smaller candle from among those
placed on and around the altar. She lit the candle with a burning
twig from the fire and carried it to the eastern edge of the
circle, where the first of the large inscribed candles was
seated.

As she lit the candle, Beth solemnly
chanted, “Guardians of the East, I call upon you to watch over the
rites of our coven. Powers of knowledge and wisdom, guided by Air,
we ask that you keep watch over us tonight within this circle. Let
all who enter the circle under your guidance do so in perfect love
and perfect trust.”

Then she circled around to the southern
candle and lit it while saying, “Guardians of the South, I call
upon you to watch over the rites of this secret coven. Powers of
energy and will, guided by Fire, we ask that you keep watch over us
tonight within this circle. Let all who enter the circle under your
guidance do so in perfect love and perfect trust.”

She then circled to the west.

“
Guardians of the West, I
call upon you to watch over the rites of this secret coven. Powers
of passion and emotion, guided by Water, we ask that you keep watch
over us tonight within this circle. Let all who enter the circle
under your guidance do so in perfect love and perfect
trust.”

And finally to the north.

“
Guardians of the North, I
call upon you to watch over the rites of this secret coven. Powers
of endurance and strength, guided by Earth, we ask that you keep
watch over us tonight within this circle. Let all who enter the
circle under your guidance do so in perfect love and perfect
trust.”

Beth then returned to the east, standing
just inside the circle and facing her friends.

“
The circle has been cast,
enter now embraced by the light and love of the
Goddess.”

Liz hesitated, because only Bev stepped
towards the edge of the circle to meet Beth.

“
How do you enter the
circle?” Beth asked the girl.

“
In perfect love and
perfect trust,” Bev answered.

When Beth gave a slight nod, Bev stepped
over the ring drawn into the ground and went to stand on the other
side of the bonfire. Almost immediately the next girl stepped up to
present herself and each of them walked to a different place within
the circle after they’d been accepted.

This continued until only Karen and Liz
stood outside of the ring.

“
When you enter, just walk
over to stand beside the altar,” Karen guided with a gentle smile.
“Once you’ve been initiated, we’ll assign you a role in the ritual.
For now you can just stand by Beth and watch how everything is
done.”

As her turn came to enter, Liz hesitated,
glancing down at the cat near her feet. Yet before she could decide
what must be done with him, the grey tom turned and walked several
feet away. Tail lashing, he seated himself and peered back at her
with slightly narrowed eyes.

Could he sense the magic in that ring drawn
into the ground? Liz had always heard that cats were particularly
sensitive to paranormal energy.

Whatever his reasons, she was relieved as
she stepped forward to present herself as the others had done.

A Twist of Fate

"Mary is riding home with Donna," Beth told
Liz as they collected half melted candles and scattered herb
pouches. "They're having a slumber party at her house tonight, if
you'd like to go."

"I think I'd rather go home and get some
sleep," Liz told her, checking to make sure that her feline shadow
was staying close by. "Plus, I want to settle this big guy into his
new home."

Beth rolled her eyes at the cat, then stole
a curious glance at her friend.

"What did you think of the ritual?"

"It was so beautiful," Liz answered with an
honest smile. "But I wasn't sure if I understood the part about
power and magic filling the town of Aspire and creating an
invisible beacon to summon strangers?"

"To summon the good hearted and handsome
strangers, like he who offered this token." Beth corrected and
finished for her. "Now you can see why I was so eager to swipe his
napkin from the trash."

"Not really," Liz admitted.

"Basically, we cast a big spell to bring us
some real men," Bev piped up from nearby. "You may not have
noticed, but its slim pickings around here. Most eligible bachelors
are in a hurry to move away. What is a good witch to do?"

"Really? You can do that?"

"We just did," Bev laughed.

"So will you join us? We could do so much
more with a full coven of thirteen."

"I'd love to," Liz assured her. "But I feel
like there is so much for me to learn."

"Don't worry," Beth assured her. "We'll
teach you. I'll come pick you up tomorrow and we can get started
making some of the basic tools you'll need."

Once their circle was cleared and everything
was packed back into the cars, the girls headed home.

It was late when they reached Liz's house,
long past her usual midnight curfew, but her parents were already
in bed.

Carrying the big tomcat with her, she crept
quietly down the hall and into her bedroom. There she place her new
pet on the bed and quickly changed into her night gown.

It made her chuckle when the cat looked away
as she began to undress.

"Such a gentleman," she cooed, giving him an
affectionate rub behind one ear.

To her surprise, he slipped out from beneath
her hand and jumped to the floor. There he began to pace back and
forth making a strange mumbling sound that wasn't really a meow and
miles from being a purr.

He reminded her of her father when her came
home from work with a problem that he couldn't quite work out in
his head.