Witch Clan: Matriarchs, John Stormm [great reads txt] 📗

garden took on a golden hue.

Her head buzzed with bright images that flashed in her mind in a myriad of impressions. There was a feeling of welcoming, of bright joy and the simple pleasure of lapping sweet cream. Looking over at the bowl, several winged faeries hovered around the china bowl dipping their faces to the cream inside. Gratitude and sweetness touched her mind from several directions at once. It was almost dizzying the way the fair folk communicated. She could sense their traits in common with her grandson. She sat back down on the bench to catch her breath and watch the display of aerial acrobatics as the creatures played with her and Johnny. He was thrilled to introduce his grandma to his fae friends and they seemed genuinely touched she came to visit and brought such a wonderful gift with her. It was a timeless party in her honor and she only lacked a crown and scepter to complete the honors.

She looked down at her long knife laying beside her on the bench. Two pixies were trying to lift it as a couple others came forth to help. For a moment, Emma wanted to call out to them not to take her precious knife, but that was selfish. Humans rarely got to see what she was seeing even now, or experience the bright spirits of the fae as she did. It seemed the least she could do to let them have the broken old knife. A solemn look crossed Johnny's face and he came forward to comfort her as though he knew what it meant to her.

“They want to fix it for you, Grandma,” he said, hugging her. “They say you are a mighty grandma. They will bring it back when they fix it, and it will be better than ever.”

“Bless them,” she said softly. “Bless them all.”

It seemed as though a whole day had past, but the sun rose on schedule and Willard came out to find her and Johnny sitting together on the bench in the garden.

“I thought I’d find you two out here,” he said. “I took the liberty of making coffee and French toast if either of you would be interested. Leona is still fast asleep. I didn’t have the heart to wake her.”

“Let her rest, dear,” she said. “She’s probably dreaming about faeries.”

“There’s been a lot of those kinds of dreams lately, I noticed.” Willard chuckled.


* * *


Emma felt naked without her long knife belted underneath her apron. Besides being a ceremonial implement, it was her trusted tool. She had been tying back some of her climbing roses to the posts on the front porch and kept finding herself reaching for the knife that was not there when she needed to cut some twine. Maybe she could get another few years of good use from it after the faeries fixed it. All the old stories suggested that when it came to repairs, the fair folk were not to be surpassed and when they did such a thing, some unusual blessing or curse might be included in the making. Maybe they’ll make me a knife that will never grow dull or break. That would be nice of them. Even her father would have been honored that the spirits of the earth would bless his handcrafted blade. He always said having witches in the family was lucky for his tribe. Willard’s attitude about the craft reminded her a bit of her father. She smiled.

She stood high on the step ladder, just above the eaves of the front porch. She was going to have to get down to find a knife to cut off a sucker vine that was growing over the gutter and not producing any blooms. She was about to call it quits when a bright silvery gleam caught her eye from the gutter next to the rainspout. Peering over the edge, she found the gleaming came from a silver pommel on the end of a polished wooden handle to something sticking out of the rainspout. Reaching up and over the eaves into the gutter, she extracted her knife and sheath out of the rainspout. It was breathtaking. If it weren’t for the concentric ovals in the opalescent grain of the rich golden hued wooden handle, and her name burned in rich umber hues into the oaken haft, she would not have recognized her own knife. The old cowhide scabbard looked polished and new with Celtic knot work designs laced round about the entire length. She drew the blade forth. It had been completely reforged and polished to a high sheen. A silver crosspiece guard had been added and the old basic diamond cross section was now noticeably wider with a central blood groove on either side. Engraved carefully down the groove were the runes:

witch : blayd

A runic equivalent for "Witch Blayd." It seemed a fair analogy for a witch's atheme. It was so wonderfully done that she hesitated to use it for such a mundane task as cutting a piece of twine or pruning an unproductive creeper, but then tools were only valuable when they were used. She uttered a word of thanks to the fair folk and applied the blade to the thorny vine only to find that as soon as the blade came into contact, the severed vine fell away. Razor sharp hardly described the steel in her hands. She wiped the blade on her apron and replaced it in its sheath.

"No more pruning roses for you, old friend," she muttered. "You're obviously intended now for greater things."

The House Only Half In This World

Emma ran for her life through the deep forest gloom. The branches and thorns caught at her face and her clothing and hindered her progress. Her skirt and petticoats clung to her legs like warm wet blankets further impeding her ability to gather any more speed to escape the nightmarish creature that stalked her. A familiar weight slapped against her thigh as she ran for all she was worth. Up ahead a clearing appeared and she took hope that she might make better speed after she left the confines of the forest. Bursting out from the trees and underbrush into the clean light of the full moon she skidded to a halt. The ground dropped away into a yawning precipice. There was no where left to go.

Her heart hammered its exertion in her breast and the sweet metallic taste of adrenalin coated her mouth as she drew her long knife and turned to face the horror that was hot on her heels through those haunted woods. It was not her old knife in her hand, but something new and yet familiar. The moonlight gleamed along the length of its rune carved blade like a living thing and extended itself into the gaping maw that crashed through the brush to occupy her clearing. It never made it another step closer as the nightmare was consumed in moonbeams at the forest edge. She looked with wonder at the deadly thing of beauty in her hand. On its warm wooden haft a familiar name confronted her, burned there years ago. It said...

"Emma." Willard shook her gently. "Are you alright, babe? You're having a bad dream or something. I got some coffee perking and the kids will be up soon."

"I'm okay," she said groggily and stretched. "It was a doozey of a dream, but it came out alright in the end. That's what matters."

Getting dressed to head out for the kitchen, she stopped to admire her long knife. It was hard to believe that it was not just a dream. The old chipped and scarred blade was now a thing of exquisite beauty. The forces of the Sidhe, she had so feared offending, were proving her most valuable allies. It was because of Johnny. Had she left the little fellow to fend for himself at the convent... she shuddered to think of the wave upon wave of misery that would afflict her and her family, and quite possibly more than that.

Blessings as big as this didn't come frivolously. There was an underlying reason. Mother Nature always provided a bumper crop, the year before a long drought or a bad storm. Danu took care of her own and nothing was left to chance. Counting one's blessings usually meant marshalling their forces. The sound of Leona scuffing on her shoes overhead broke her out of her reverie. There was breakfast to be made and budding young witches to train. She belted her knife under her apron and availed herself of Willard’s coffee.

* * *

The forest was warm and cheery in the beams of sunlight that broke through the ancient oaks and assorted hardwood canopies. The children didn’t wander very far from her side as Johnny had already warned Leona that Elvyra lived near these woods. Emma spotted a section of rotting logs, hoping to gather sulfur shelves. The kids were walking the logs pretending they were bridges high up in the trees as she searched the lower sides for mushroom growths. Suddenly, Elvyra appeared with her basket over her arm.

‘The old hen is out with her fledglings today, I see,” Elvyra said smugly.

“They are learning well to hunt for themselves,” she boasted. “I have my granddaughter to train as well.”

“We’ve met,” Elvyra responded shortly.

“So I’ve heard,” she replied, looking askance at the woman. “Sometimes, innocent things people say and do get taken for threats.”