Page 64 of The Witches of Cambridge

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

On the night of the senior dance, the Radcliffe Quad was illuminated by paper lanterns strung through the trees. Graduating students wore tea-length dresses in pastel colors, their hair caught up with silver pins, shimmering in the pale lantern light. Ava wore jeans and a black sweater as she and Jack walked among the trees. She’d been having visions of a woman tied up in knots, and a danger that she couldn’t quite make out, some sort of monster, one who held the key to every door.

The crows that followed Ava numbered twelve as always, but then, a block away, she noticed a thirteenth crow overhead, and to her surprise, its feathers were snowy white. Ava had the feeling she had come to the end of a story, and if she wanted to find out what happened next she would have to follow the white crow. They went along Mount Auburn Street to the cemetery, and when the crow flew inside, Ava crept beneath the fence, with Jack at her heels. She skirted the thornbushes and the ivy, making her way to Hyacinth Path. She walked along until the white crow perched in an oak tree. There were the three black stones and the flowers that bloomed at night. Ava knelt to dig through the dirt with her hands. The dark soil was soft and damp, but soon enough she hit something hard. It was the tin she had read about in the first witch’s letters, the one that held the witch-hunter’s eye. The one that had held the black necklace. Ava sat back on her heels, her breath coming quick.

Dear Reader, I am writing this for you, should you ever be in need.

Ava opened the tin slowly. Inside was a square of white cloth torn from the dress the first witch had worn when she buried the cursed artifact that had taken away her magic. The onyx necklace had existed before the Bible was written, before Troy and Alexandria were cities, crafted in the time when magic was everywhere. There were those who believed it to be the necklace that had belonged to Harmonia in Greek mythology and been crafted by Hephaestus, blacksmith to the gods. According to legend the necklace brought great misfortune, causing disaster for all who wore it. All the same, it had great power, and Ava slipped the tin into her pocket. It was heavier than she would have imagined, for it carried the weight of all the magic it had captured. That was when Ava knew that all you carried belonged to you.

Ava placed the tin in her desk drawer. It was a dangerous object, one that could destroy you, but should you be in need, it would be there for you. Magic or not, the first witch had written, who we are should always be our decision.

One bright afternoon, Lauren walked past the Grolier Poetry Book Shop, a place where she’d often spent hours searching for books. On this occasion, she stopped where she was, blindsided, for there in the window she spied a small painting, a landscape that was as unique and identifiable as a fingerprint. She instantly recognized the work of the artist. Black and blue as a bruise. Grass, petals, hedges, and a cherry tree, the very one she had told Carrick about, only now it was blooming blue against a starry black sky. Lauren went inside to ask if the painting was for sale.

“Amazing, isn’t it?” the clerk said.

The rendering of the moody landscape was clearly a love letter. Lauren could feel the ink on her skin, as if the artist had his hands all over her.

“I think it’s just for display,” the clerk informed her. “I’d have to check.”

“I’m buying it,” Lauren insisted. She glared at the clerk, for she clearly was not about to take no for an answer. She paid full price, then waited for the painting to be wrapped in brown paper and tied up with string. It was framed, but still small enough to be tucked into her book bag. Lauren took her prize home and set it on her desk. She wondered if a single one of her poems could measure up to the sheer emotion in this painting.

“That’s lovely,” Ava said to Lauren when she came by her room. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Because there is nothing like it, Lauren wanted to say. It was one of a kind, something she should never have taken for granted.

Ava looked more closely. “It reminds me of you, if you were a field of flowers.”

Lauren tried to resist, but that night she went to Carrick’s. The alley was dodgy and mostly deserted, except for a couple of boys who were hanging around, wanting tattoos when they were clearly too young.

“Can you talk to Goliath for us?” one scrawny fellow asked. He was likely twelve or thirteen, but already he had a big mouth. “We have cash if he’ll give us tattoos.”

“Ask him yourself,” Lauren said. “And don’t call him that.”

“He’ll listen to you,” another boy said. This one looked like he would grow up to be more trouble than he was worth. “Tell him when he’s got your clothes off.”

While the group of boys laughed, impressed by their own bravado, Lauren lifted her arms and called down a hard, icy rain that seemed like an attack. The boys let out yelps as the rain splattered all around them and they quickly scattered in search of shelter. They called her crazy as they took off. Witch, someone cried out, and another shouted that she had to be a lunatic to want to fuck a monster. Lauren stood there drenched, her eye makeup running down her face in black lines. This was the poem she would write. How she stood there in the alley, how he threw open the door when he heard the ruckus and pulled her inside, how her clothes were sopping wet when he took them off, how she knew it was a mistake and told him so, how she told him it didn’t mean anything, how he didn’t answer because he knew she was trying to convince herself, not him, how when he kissed her she wished it would never end.

“I have your painting,” she informed him. They were still in bed, wrapped around one another. Everything that most people kept on the inside, Carrick revealed on the outside. His brother’s name, the tendrils of Medusa’s hair, the phoenix along with Pegasus, the dragon of chaos, and the archangel Michael. “I paid full price,” she said.

“That was stupid.” Carrick shook his head as if she were the biggest fool he knew. “I would have given it to you for free.” He gave her a look and grinned. “But you probably wouldn’t have wanted it then. It wouldn’t have meant anything.”

Lauren climbed out of bed, and Carrick watched her get dressed. He was looking at her as if he were someone in love.

“This is the last time,” Lauren told him.

“Right. You wouldn’t want it to mean anything.”

“Because it doesn’t.”

“It might mean something when I’m gone.”

“Where would you go?” Lauren was surprised to find that she sounded unhappy at the thought.

“What do you think happens when you stay in one place?” Carrick asked her.

Lauren shrugged, confused. She didn’t want to leave, but she was going to anyway. “Nothing,” she answered.

“Exactly,” Carrick said.