The Witching Hour (The Witches Pendragon Mystery Series Book 1) (11 page)

I should have taken Manon up on her offer. When Hatha learned I had hexed someone, let alone an upstanding member of the community, she became angrier than I had ever seen before. For the first time in my life, I saw her face turn bright purple. But wait a second, I’m get ahead of myself. Let me return the narrative to what happened when I insisted Manon tell me about Lucien.

“It’s not what you think Noelle,” Manon said to me. “In fact, I can’t even believe your mind would go there. Nothing sordid is happening between me and that poor boy.”

“Then why are you seeing him in secret?”

“Oh, Noelle, if you must know, I’ve been trying to help him. He’s come into my store with his sister a handful of times. She’s pregnant. A little young to be pregnant in my opinion, but that’s none of my business. She knows she’s having a little girl and so she comes in to buy pieces for her layette. By the amount of money she spends, I believe they come from money, Lucien and his sister.”

“Helping him with what? Make it snappy, visitors have to leave in five minutes,” I say, glancing at my cell phone which I’ve pulled from my pocket.

“Well, you see, I noticed he always looked so sad. So one day I asked him why and we got to talking. Lucien is unlucky in love, others spurn him. He just had a huge falling out with some girl that he adored and so…I…I…took pity on him.”

“Noooo, you didn’t!” I accuse, understanding exactly what she’s done. “Hatha will hang you by your thumbs!”

“B-but you don’t understand, he gets picked on, pushed around. They call him a talentless freak. He gets horrible grades at school, and he’s lost all confidence. His fellow classmates think he’s a joke. They locked him in a broom closet and left him there for the entire school day.”

“What have you done?” I clasp my hands to my mouth at the horror of it all. What did Hatha say about us not giving potions to the locals?

“How is it different than Elfie’s
Chocolate Surprises
?” she stares back at me with a determined look. What? Did Sheila tell her we put drops of
The Persuader
into the
Chocolate Surprises
or is she just talking about the cannabis?

“What have you given him?” I demand, tapping my foot.

“Everything is changing for him…you have to understand…he’s become very confident…he’s joined the local basketball team and was the lead scorer. He says the girls are starting to be interested in him, and one girl has completely fallen…”

“NO! Love potion! You’ve given him, oh what does Hatha call that stuff now? It’s in the big red bottle.
La Crème Passionelle
, that’s what you gave him! You know that even in the Feral Forest, we weren’t ever allowed to mess with that stuff.”

“I’ve given him a bit of love potion…a few drops…and some confidence booster…”

“Manon!”

“Please, you can’t tell Hatha, I’ll be thrown out of the order, or, er, coven. Noelle, if you’d seen how miserable he was, you would have done the same.” Her voice trails off, because at that moment the cell phone I’m holding in my pocket begins to ring.

“Oh no…I see…I see…my goodness, that’s terrible…right then, I’m coming home,” I murmur into the phone watching Manon’s eyes widen in fright with each utterance.

“What is it?” Manon asks, sitting upright in her bed.

I hit the end button key on my touch screen phone, and slide it back into my coat pocket. The news has been so bad that I’m in somewhat of a daze.

“Noelle? Is everything okay?”

“That was Sheila,” I reply, “She said Camille called. Elfie went in search of a tennis ball in the woods this afternoon and never came back…”

Manon gives a small snort. “That woman can’t find her way out of a witch’s hat. How many times has she gotten lost in Amboise? How could anybody get lost here? The town is so small.”

“Sheila thinks it’s more than that…”

“She had a vision?”

“She did, and she saw Elfie unconscious on some sort of concrete floor in a dark room.”

“Quick Noelle, call the doctor and tell him to discharge me tonight. I’m coming home,” Manon tries to sit up in her hospital bed, but gives a little groan as she does. Her shoulder is still causing her a lot of pain. When the knife came down, it cut deep into her shoulder, cutting all kinds of strings or tendons or whatever it is the doctors called them. I don’t really understand modern anatomy. We witches of 546 A.D. have a whole different view of how to cure physical ailments.

“No, I’m sure Hatha wouldn’t want you to go. You need to get better.  Someone will be here tomorrow to help you check out.”

I leave a pleading Manon behind and high-tail it home to find Hendra and Hatha throwing things into the mini-bus. Sheila’s with them.

“I want to come too,” I say, “I’ll close down the chocolate shop until we find her.”

Hatha looks stern. “It’s not a good idea. Hendra, Monique, and I will find Elfie. Camille is there to help us as well. And Sheila’s coming. Sheila is the one I really need.”

I hang my head a little. I suppose being the witch whose only talent is the stone-limb hex is not very useful. Still, I don’t know how I’ll make it through the night not knowing where Elfie is.

“You are needed at your shop, and Beatrice will continue to run Manon’s clothing store. We need the income. It’s not a good idea to close them down.”

With those words, the four witches climb into the bus, a very nervous Sheila at the wheel. Sheila starts the engine, but has a great deal of trouble finding reverse. She puts the mini-bus into first and roars over one of the potted topiaries bringing it crashing to the ground. Still, I admire her determination. With a rather grinding tone, she forces the Volkswagen into reverse, and heads down the drive backwards, swerving all over. A second later she whips the mini bus around and it disappears into the dark of the night.

Goodness, Sheila is as awful a driver as Hatha. 

I say a quick prayer to Eostre, “Please get every other car off the highway between here and Chloret tonight. Oh, and please let Elfie be found immediately.”

I, Sheila, drive like a Pict thundering across the highlands, chasing the Roman invaders back behind Emperor Hadrian’s ridiculous wall. I rev the engine of the mini-bus, careening around corners, flying through the night. I pull into the driveway at Chateau Trisse doing well over 60 km an hour.

“Slow down!” Hatha and Hendra shout at me. I don’t listen to them. I can’t. I’m so worried about the vision I had of Elfie unconscious on a floor somewhere that I’m driving as quickly as possible. But when I see a woman standing in the driveway, I slam on the brakes. The bus comes to a jarring halt only a few feet from the petrified woman.

“Claire-Elaine, are you all right?” Hatha slides open the side door and jumps out.

“I-I thought she was going to run me down…I thought it was my end of days,” Claire-Elaine splutters.

Really now, are we Picts the only ones with nerves of steel? I would never run anyone down.

“Sheila of the Picts,” I say and present myself with a low bow to Claire-Elaine.

“Who?” Claire-Elaine asks. The poor thing is still rattled. Her forehead is creased into an unflattering amount of wrinkles.

“Ah, allow me to present our sister Sheila, she is from the highlands,” Hatha says and throws me a look.

“The highlands of America?” Claire-Elaine murmurs as if in a trance, “Your order is originally from America, correct?”

“Th-that’s right, the highlands of America. That would be…” Hatha looks thoughtful, she has no idea of the geography of the New World, “Pittsburgh…yes…she’s from the greater Pittsburgh area. Cleveland to be precise. But no matter, the important thing is Sheila is the one who had the vision.”

At this, Claire-Elaine begins to cry. Not just a soft sob, but a full scale wail of one who has lost all her marbles. This pretty, delicate woman is dressed to the nines, in a chocolate-colored Channel suit, with a scarf printed in autumn leaves fastened around her throat. Her outfit says “pulled together” but her blubbering says “I’ve lost it. I’m at wit’s end.”

“Now, now dear, we will resolve this quickly. We’ll find her,” Hatha says, embracing the woman fondly.

Claire-Elaine shakes her head. “The police were here. They did a search of the Chateau and all the grounds. They found nothing. Although they say that if Sister Elfie is still missing by this time tomorrow, they will bring hounds and initiate a full search.”

“Very good, very good,” Hatha nods her head, and then adds with a glance in my direction, “But with any luck we will have found her by then.”

“She’s not the only one who’s missing,” Claire-Elaine says tentatively as Hatha releases her from the embrace.

What does she mean, ‘Elfie’s not the only one missing?’ In my vision, I only saw one person lying on that dark concrete floor.

Just then, a gust of wind picks up and I pull my tartan wool sweater tight around me.

“My daughters don’t know it yet, but my husband appears to be missing too. I tried to reach him on his cell. There was no answer, so I called the hotel he was staying at in Paris. They said I must have made some mistake, he never checked in, nor did he ever have a reservation.”

Hatha shoots me a knowing look.

“Do you have a picture of him I could see, sometimes pictures help bring on my visions,” I offer.

Is it my imagination or did Hatha just shoot me a disapproving look? Am I not supposed to tell people about my visions?

“You have visions, Sister Sheila from Pittsburg?” Claire-Elaine asks. “I have heard of nuns with visions, like Saint Catherine.”

“Why don’t we all go inside?” Hatha shepherds us with wide arms up the steps. We don’t even bother to grab the overnight bags we brought along. I don’t think any of us will be changing into our pajamas tonight.

Once inside, we find Claire-Elaine’s two daughters using Camille as a jungle gym. Camille is on her hands and knees playing some strange game where she has to put different parts of her bodies on different colored circles. The children are under her, over her, and laughing hysterically. Camille’s so sweet to try to keep their spirits up at such a dire time. But when Hatha charges into the room, wearing a deep frown, Camille jumps up, sending the children crashing down around her.

“Camille, would you mind putting the girls to bed?”

At these words, the two girls look positively frightened. That’s right, the ghost strikes at night. Hatha examines their faces and adds gently, “And please watch over them while they sleep.”

This is not enough for the oldest girl, who has a head full of curls the color of flax.
“No, no, auntie Camille, it’s too early for bed,” she protests. It’s not early, it’s nearly ten o’clock. Soon it will be the Witching Hour. We need to find Elfie while our powers are the strongest.

As soon as Camille leaves with the girls, I repeat my vision for the sake of Claire-Elaine.

“I saw her, only briefly, early this afternoon. It happened as I was leading our goat Merlin, that’s what we’ve decide to call him because that is the modern name of Master Merllyd...”

“Ahem!” Hatha cuts me off, with a watch-what-your-saying look.

Right. She’s right. What was I thinking? “I mean, um, that’s the legendary name of the great wizard Merllyd who we have all read about in books. Anyway, I was leading our goat around the backyard so he could polish off a few weeds.”

Standing beside me, Hatha motions for me to go faster.

“And right there in the middle of watching Merlin mowing down a thistle, I saw Elfie in a dark, cramped room, lying on a slab floor of concrete……that’s all I saw. She was unconscious….oh wait…..”

“Sheila, dear, what is it?” Hatha calls.

“I always get a little dizzy when the visions come.” I explain, as my eyesight grows hazy and the red room before me goes out of focus. “Imagine looking at something like a goat eating a weed and then having the goat being replaced with a young woman lying unconscious on a dark floor. It’s terribly disorienting.”

“My goodness!” I hear Claire-Elaine’s voice as if through a tunnel. “Don’t tell me you’re having a vision right now? You look awful. Your eyes have gone cross-eyed and you’re as pale as–”

“A Shreem Shroom,” Hendra, says finishing her sentence. I hear Claire-Elaine ask what a Shreem Shroom is, but the voice is so far away.

“I see her now,” I mumble. “She’s…she’s awake in a small underground room. And she’s standing on some sort of a rickety ladder…she’s pushing at something over her head, a door or something.”

“I know exactly where that is,” a small voice cries, surprising everyone.

All of our heads swivel to see Claire-Elaine’s oldest daughter step into the room.

“What’s this, Mathilde?” cries Claire-Elaine rising to her feet, “What do you mean you know where it is? And why aren’t you in bed?”

Camille comes careening into the room, with the other child on her hip. “So sorry. Slippery little monkeys. I looked away for a second and this one was gone.” She gives Mathilde a serious look.

“It’s the bunker, in case there’s ever a plutonic war,” the small child says. “Daddy showed it to me once.”

“What is a plutonic war?” I ask, confused.

“I think she means nuclear war,” Claire-Elaine clarifies, still looking as if she’s in a trance.

“That’s right, the pluclear war. There’s a bunker for it. Daddy showed it to me once. It’s small and dark and has a concrete floor.”

We barely breathe as the small child speaks these words. Could it be true? Could the child actually know where Elfie is?

“Mathilde, would you be able to show Mommy where the bunker is?”

“Of course,” Mathilde is so confident that she hops up and down on her tiny feet.

“
The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion together; and the chicken shall follow the donkey, and a little child shall lead them,” Monique rattles off as her pointed hat wobbles on her head.

Indeed! A little child shall lead us!
This is one of Monique’s favorite sayings, although she seems to throw in different animals every time.

“We will need some flashlights,” Mathilde says thoughtfully. “It’s dark out there in the woods.”

Twenty minutes later, after Camille changes Mathilde out of her pajamas and back into a warm set of clothes, we set off. Monique stays behind to watch over the youngest daughter who, everyone agrees, should not be out and about at such a late hour.

Wrapped in a heavy coat, with thick rubber boots on her feet, Mathilde leads the way. Most of us have flashlights, except for Hendra and Hatha, who have lived so long in the Feral Forest that they can see in the dark. The leaves under our feet make loud crunching noises as we head deep into the woods. After fifteen minutes or so, it’s obvious we’re going in circles, having passed a large outcropping of rocks twice. Mathilde sticks out her bottom lip and I see that she is near tears.

“I thought it was right here.” She points a chubby finger at the ground. “I remember it wasn’t far from all these rocks.”

“Sweetie, think, we’ve passed this crop of rocks twice now, you’re leading us around in circles,” Claire-Elaine says gently. She’s trying to keep it together, but by the quaver in her voice, I think her nerves are about to give away again.

“It’s just…I…I only went there once with Daddy, and the door to the bunker was all covered with leaves. It was hard to see then and it was full daylight. Now that it’s dark, it’s almost impossible to see anything.” The poor girl begins to sob and Hatha’s quick to bend down and embrace her. “There, there, Mathilde, you’re doing your best, we know. We’ll find it any minute now.”

Mathilde is momentarily comforted by this. Her sobbing changes to the occasional sniffle.

“Quick, Sisters, kick the leaves around with your boots, it has to be here somewhere,” Hendra commands.

I move my foot through the thick leaves, pointing my flashlight to the ground, searching for the door to the bunker with my boot. The others are doing the same. Although we work diligently for several minutes, we find nothing.

Soon the moon is straight overhead. It’s the Witching Hour, and we still haven’t found a thing. The child must have led us to the wrong place.

“Shh,” Hendra hisses all of a sudden, “What was that?”

From behind a large oak tree that is smackdab inside the circle of rocks, we hear a tiny, noise … a thump, thump, thump. Camille moves fast, striding across the forest floor.

“It’s here! This is it!” I am just in time to watch Camille shove a bunch of leaves out of the way. Excitedly she reaches down and tugs at something…I think it is a brass ring…yes, it’s a brass ring lying on the ground. She pulls on it and the bunker door flies open. Out tumbles Elfie.

“Oh thank you, Eostre!” I cry as Hatha rushes over and grabs Elfie up in her arms.

“Oh my dear, smart Elfie,” she cries, “Thank you for pounding on that door, otherwise we might not have found you.”

“Yes,” comes a woman’s sharp voice. “You’re all so clever and smart. And now what am I going to do with so many of you?”

I turn on my boot-clad heel to see a middle-aged woman with blond hair cut into a bob. It’s too dark to make out her facial features, but in my mind I picture the woman wearing a harsh expression like Adolf Hitler in the books Monique brings home from the library. By the reflection of moonbeam off metal, I know that she holds a gun in her hand; a gun which she points at the seven of us.

“Margaritte? What on earth are you doing here?” Claire-Elaine asks the woman who has emerged out of the dark.

“Committing murder, in a just a few seconds, that is. Now, all of you move close together and stay where I can see you. Anyone who makes a sudden movement will be shot immediately.”

“How dare you say such a thing it front of a child!” sputters Hendra.

I glance at the poor little girl and can’t even imagine the horror little Mathilde must feel. I, myself, am caught up in my own fear. I’ve never had a gun pointed at me before –crossbow yes– but never a gun.

We all take a few steps closer to each other, as directed. Although I’m not sure why we’re doing this woman’s bidding since she claims she’s going to kill us.

“Margaritte, have you lost your mind?” Claire-Elaine asks.

“It was you who was supposed to lose your mind, Claire,” Margaritte spits. “The ghostly haunts were supposed to send you fleeing. Yet you didn’t go. Not even when you thought your daughters were in danger. You stayed on and on. And I kept having to be scarier, ratcheting up the haunting. Yes, it was I who pulled the covers off of Mathilde. I raked my fingers down your daughter’s back, and did you leave? No. You’re still here, and you have all given me no choice as to what I must do. Of course, nobody will ever find your seven bodies in the bunker.”

“HAVE YOU LOST ALL YOUR MARBLES!” comes a deep voice. A man emerges from the depth of the woods and hits Margaritte broadside, knocking her to the ground. The gun flies from the woman’s hands and is caught, quite deftly in one of Camille’s large paws.

“Alain, Alain, what are you doing?” Claire-Elaine shrieks, and I realize this man must be her husband, the Count of Trisse.