The Secret of Isobel Key (14 page)

Tammy glanced at the white grains on the floor with a critical eye. “It kind of looks like an egg, I think, but I guess that shouldn't matter. It connects like a circle, and that's what you want, right?”

“Right.” Lou sat down as close to the center of her salt circle as she could estimate and closed her eyes, concentrating on her breathing.

“Remind me again, why the salt?” Tammy's voice broke into her thoughts, and Lou opened one eye to glance up at her best friend.

“It's for protection. Negative energy can't come past the salt for some reason, and I need all the help I can get. Besides, it's what the book said.” Tammy nodded skeptically, and Lou closed her eyes again.

“Lou, is something supposed to happen?” Tammy sounded like a child, and Lou sighed and opened her eyes.

“Tammy, I don't know. I do know that I'm supposed to meditate, and I can't do that if you keep talking to me. Why don't you read your guidebook or something so you won't be bored?”

Tammy looked hurt, but nodded. “I don't really want to watch you summon evil spirits, anyways. I'll sit in front of the door, though, so no one will bother you.” She took her book and stepped into the hall, letting the door swing closed. Lou sighed. Firmly pushing thoughts of Tammy out of her mind, Lou closed her eyes again and tried to steady her breathing.

When she felt her heartbeat slow to a sluggish pace, Lou opened her eyes. The room seemed brighter somehow, but everything seemed a little hazy. She lifted the crystal up to her face, and stared without seeing into the center of the sphere. Her eyes unfocussed and her ears started to buzz, but Lou didn't notice. She simply sat, staring at nothing, trying to find answers.

Time passed differently for Isobel after her sister's death. By the time the New Year had come and gone, she emerged from her cottage, but the people of the village were seeking her out less and less, for they feared that the death of her sister had unhinged her mind.

Isobel did not reassure them, remaining as solitary as ever and only leaving her cottage to tend to the ill when she was summoned. No one visited her, none that is save her niece, little Nan, who came whenever she could slip away from her father and her new stepmother. Sometimes folk would see her coming and going, and while they all knew that Alexander Nairn had forbidden his child to have contact with her aunt, no one was willing to tell him what they had seen. The villagers realized that the visits from the little girl were the only bright spots left in Isobel's life, and they bore her no ill will; they would not take away her last joy.

The years passed by, and Isobel grew more and more isolated from the village. The births she attended steadily slowed to a trickle until at last she was not called at all. Whether she noticed or cared was a mystery, for the only person that ever saw her anymore was her niece. The child was growing up quite nicely, and would, everyone agreed, one day make a lovely young woman. Her devotion to her aunt marked her as loyal and kind, and while the villagers avoided Isobel, they were pleased to see her niece taking such an interest in her. What the two talked about on her visits, no one knew, but it was no wonder the poor little girl wanted to spend time with her mother's sister.

Janet Nairn, Alexander's second wife, finally conceived a child, though the villagers whispered that she would not carry any babe of Alexander Nairn's to term, because of their ill-timed marriage and his lack of care for the spirits of the dead, including his first wife. No one wanted to tell Isobel the news, but it was certain that her niece informed her, as frequently as she visited the cottage in the woods. No one knew what Isobel thought of Janet's pregnancy, if she thought of it at all. Isobel stayed in her cottage and did not come out, even to offer congratulations to the wife of her brother-in-law. Although she did not speak of such things, it was correctly assumed that Isobel blamed Alexander Nairn for the death of her sister, and the villagers were certain that a measure of her malice would be directed at his second wife, whom he wed in such haste after Margaret's death. Despite this knowledge, no one of St. Andrews stopped to worry that Isobel might, in her unhinged state, plot against her former brother-in-law, and no one anticipated that she would seek vengeance.

No one could have guessed what would happen, and no one was prepared when it did.

When Lou opened her eyes, the dormitory was dark. She stood up, stiff from sitting for so long, and began searching for a pen and paper to try and jot down the disjointed images she had seen. Fire, yes that was clear, and blood, so much blood that remembering it made her ill. The other images were more vague, and the longer she thought about them, the more she found them slipping away from her.

Frustrated, she threw her pen across the room, and it bounced off the door before rolling on the floor. Tammy poked her head into the room.

“So, did the spirits tell you anything?” She teased, bending to pick up the pen that Lou had thrown.

“No!” Lou snapped, frustrated with her friend's attitude and herself for not remembering more of what she had seen. “I know I saw things, I just can't remember much, just blood, and fire, and… oh, this is frustrating! I feel like I saw exactly what happened before Isobel was arrested, but I can't quite hang on to the memory.” She smacked her hand down on the table. “Damn it. I was so sure this would help me, and instead I feel more confused!” She crumpled up the paper she had been writing on, and flung it into the wastebasket. She flopped on her bed, sulking.

Tammy fished the paper out of the basket. “Look. Do you really think this kind of mumbo-jumbo works?”

Lou looked at her friend and then buried her face in the pillow. “Yes.”

Tammy snorted. “That's just creepy.”

The pillow muffled Lou's voice, but Tammy could still make out her words. “It's not creepy, it's called divination. That's what I was trying to do. The woman at the store said I could, and I wanted to believe her, so I tried, but it was a waste!”

“What woman, and what store?”

Lou sighed and told Tammy about her tarot reading, but as she told the story, Tammy crossed her arms and shook her head.

Finally, Tammy swallowed nervously. “Lou, you didn't fail. That stuff is all made up, anyways, and besides, only the nut jobs who sacrifice squirrels really believe in that crap.”

Lou shook her head stubbornly, her hand straying to the pentacle hidden beneath her shirt. “It isn't just the nut jobs, Tammy. Lots of people believe in magic, in one form or another. Not everyone who uses divination or calls themselves a witch is crazy, and for that matter, absolutely no one who practices Wicca would ever sacrifice another living being, even a squirrel. That goes against the Rede.”

Tammy was silent, staring at her as if she had grown another head.

“Witches believe that you have free will and freedom of action, but you cannot use your actions to knowingly do harm to anyone or anything else. That's the Rede, ‘an it harm none, do what you will. It's like the witch's Golden Rule.'” Lou looked straight at Tammy as she spoke, willing her friend to understand what she was saying. “It's basically the same code of ethics that every major religion believes.”

Tammy shook her head forcefully. “I don't know where you heard about that stuff, but it sounds dangerous to me.”

Lou shook her head, exasperated. “Wicca is a peaceful religion. That's what I've been trying to tell you.”

Tammy
wouldn't meet her eyes. “Lou, you've been reading too many weird books. Let's just forget all this, okay?”

Lou sighed. Now was not the time to try to explain to Tammy, but she wouldn't give up. “We can drop it for now. But will you at least think about what I've said?”

Tammy nodded slightly, then turned on her heel and left the room. Lou was left alone in the gathering dark, a smudged salt circle on the floor, the crystal still clutched in her hand.

When Janet Nairn's time came, her husband sent Nan to stay with his parents and then promptly fetched his good friend the doctor. The doctor and Janet labored through the night, but for all his skill, she was stone dead before dawn. The child she had been carrying, a son, took one breath of the cold air, and followed his mother to the grave. The birthing room was a grisly scene; there had been so much blood lost that the doctor wondered if Janet had died of internal hemorrhaging. Could he have saved her? He stared at the body in grief as he whispered a final prayer. When the room had been silent many minutes, Alexander Nairn could wait no longer, and pushed into the chamber. He saw his wife's still and blood-soaked body, and his eyes beheld the doctor wrapping a shroud around his tiny child, and he was struck mad. He lunged at the doctor, and began throttling him around the neck. His strong hands gripped tightly, and his eyes glazed over with rage. Overcome with fear, the doctor reached his hand out to the side, searching for something to cling to. He was not yet ready to die, and at once his fingers closed around his wickedly sharp scalpel, still sitting there on the table. He hesitated for an instant, but then he thrust the knife upward with all his strength. His assailant dropped like a stone, blood foaming out of his mouth, his eyes wild in his skull, and the doctor stood by, frozen, while Alexander Nairn perished.

After a moment's pause, the doctor bent to remove his scalpel from the body of his friend. He didn't notice that his hands were shaking as he cleaned the blade with a cloth and placed it inside his case. Calmly, he went to the washbasin and rinsed the blood from his hands. The ritual soothed him, and he tried to think his way out of the terrible situation. Self-defense or not, he could not risk his practice over this misunderstanding. As he straightened his clothes, his mind was working furiously, and by the time he had been set to rights, he had a plan.

He stepped out of the Nairn's blue painted front door and called to a boy passing in the street. He gave the lad a coin and sent him to fetch the old midwife who lived just beyond town. He claimed that Janet Nairn swore she wanted no one else to deliver her child, and, the doctor smiled as he spoke, he was not one to let professional jealousy keep him from doing exactly as his patient wished. When the boy set off at a trot, the doctor surveyed the street, and finding it satisfactorily empty, turned away from the Nairn house and headed back to his own establishment, vanishing into the misty morning.

“Lou, you have a phone call.” The receptionist poked her head around the corner to the hostel library, where Lou was curled up in a comfy chair.

Lifting the green receiver in her hand, Lou paused, wondering if Brian was calling to schedule another date. Her voice shook with excitement as she said, “Hello?”

“Louisa? Can you hear me, dear?”

Lou's heart fell. “I can hear you, Mother. What's wrong?”

“How's Scotland, dear?”

“It's--rainy. But it's fine. Why did you call?”

Her mother huffed indignantly. “Can't a mother call her daughter on Christmas?”

Lou glanced at the calendar behind the desk and slapped her forehead. “Of course! I'm so sorry I didn't call last night. I haven't really been paying attention to the days.”

Silence descended on the line. After a moment, her mother said, “Well?”

“Oh! Merry Christmas.”

“And Merry Christmas to you, too. I must admit, I was afraid that you'd forgotten all about Christmas.”

“I'd forgotten what day it is, but I haven't forgotten you and Dad. I'm sorry I didn't call.”

Her mother sighed. “That's not what I mean. Some of the things Tammy said made me worry.”

Lou felt her palms growing slick with sweat. “What did Tammy say?”

Her mother laughed gently. “She called us to wish us a happy holiday, and she mentioned that you'd been mixed up in some silly hocus pocus.” Her tone was light, but her words were sharp.

Lou drew a deep breath. “That's not a conversation I want to have with you right now, Mother.”

There was a pause. “Just remember, Louisa, that you're part of our family. I hate to think you'd do anything to shame us.”

Gritting her teeth, Lou struggled to answer. “I always do my best to make you proud.”

“And you do, Louisa, you do. Just don't let your brain rot in that Scottish air!”

Lou changed the subject. “We've been doing some historical research while we're here. Scotland is really interesting.”

Her mother sighed. “I was worried about that, too. What's the point of spending your vacation doing research? It's not like you can bring anything you find to your job, now is it?”

Lou's heart stopped. Had Tammy told her mother that she quit her job? “What do you mean?” She asked carefully.

“Well, dear, there's certainly no reason for a bookstore clerk to conduct research. It's a shame you don't have a job that demands more of you.”

Feeling her shoulders tense, Lou took a deep breath. “You're right. I'll have to start looking for another job when we come back.”

“Don't worry about that right now, Louisa. Just enjoy your vacation. I hope you girls find time to go to church. I'm sure a town named after a saint has at least one church!”

Lou rolled her eyes. “Bye, Mom. Merry Christmas.”

After Lou hung up the phone, she headed up the stairs to confront her best friend.

Tammy
was sprawled across her bed, reading a tattered romance novel. She glanced up when Lou entered the room, and sat up immediately.

“What's wrong?”

Lou's anger bubbled over. “What's wrong? I just got off the phone with my mother. What do you think could be wrong?”

Tammy dog-eared her book and set it to one side. “Did you wish her a Merry Christmas for me?”