Dark Black Magic

Chapter One (c)

Skyler

The following morning, I went downstairs. Grandma was in the kitchen waving a cinnamon besom across the doorframe.

"I felt an ill wind rush through the house last night," she said.

"Was it Grandpa?" I asked, with a hint of sarcasm.

"No, it was something else... something evil," she replied with a shudder.

I thought about the blessing and had an uneasy feeling.

Where had Grandma found that blessing? I didn't recognise it from the family grimoires or one of the many book of shadows that we'd inherited over the years.

The language was unlike any language I'd ever heard before. It wasn't one of the dead classical languages like Latin or ancient Greek. Somehow, it felt older than that - more primordial.

"Grandma, where did you get the harvest blessing from?"

"I got it from Marge."

"Marge?" I replied incredulously. "Marge, who works at the thriftstore?"

"Yes, she's the one with the two handsome grandsons. Both, who I might add, are single. I could introduce you next time we head into town. Marco is a fantastic baker with arms like a bodybuilder, while his brother Francis is a college linebacker with a backside like a-"

"Are either of them experts in dead languages?"

Grandma's eyes widen in surprise, "Experts in dead languages? I think you are setting the bar a bit bloody high, my girl. You want a boyfriend, not a scholar."

"Grandma, I'm not romantically interested in them. I'm just trying to understand how they knew what that blessing was."

My Grandma stared at me for a few seconds, speechless and then went to the kitchen table and picked up a piece of paper with the blessing on it.

She held it up, and I was stunned to see that it was a completely different blessing. The blessing was in English and sat inside a cartoon border of psychotic pumpkins that danced and laughed.

The blessing read:

'Pumpkin, pumpkin, pumpkin,

Grow, grow, grow;

Let your orange skin,

Glow, glow, glow;

Before autumn flies, we deserve your,

Pie; pie; pie.

So...,

Pumpkin, pumpkin, pumpkin,

Grow, grow, grow!'

That was not the piece of paper I had read from last night.

Grandma shuffled closer to me and lowered her voice. "Skyler, did you have a sneaky try of Granny's secret medicinal mushroom?"

"No, I was not high on hallucinogenic mushrooms. There was a paper right there, and it had these strange words-"

Grandma patted my shoulder. "There was one time when I had a bit of the old shroomies and ended up on the cabin roof declaring war on the King of Frogs in nothing but a pair of rain boots. So we've all been there, duck."

I gritted my teeth and repeated, "I was not high."

My grandmother shot me a wink and returned to her rowan berries. I stared at the blessing in my hands and was irritated by the small laughing cartoon pumpkins. This fluffy bunny garbage wasn't what I had read last night.

I screwed up the paper and tossed it into the stove.

Later that morning, I put on my brown walking shoes and green cloak. I still couldn't understand what happened yesterday, but I wanted to check on our pumpkins to see if they had grown. At least then, I could determine whether the blessing was a harvest blessing.

I followed the path from the front door to the vegetable garden around the back of the cabin. The storm had blown orange and brown leaves across the path, along with a few downed branches.

With the toe of my boot, I kicked aside some of the larger branches so that Grandma wouldn't fall over them.

I followed the path to the wooden gate that heralded the entrance to the garden. I didn't go into the garden immediately. I wanted to check that the storm did not damage any fencing that encircled our garden. A compromise in the fence meant that any rabbit or deer could wander into our garden and help themselves.

I studied the fencing carefully, checking for loose posts or broken wires. When I came to the rear of the garden, I noticed something strange in the corner of my eye. Something was lying in the pumpkin patch.

I ran into the garden to get a closer look and was stunned to see the body of a young man lying naked between two enormous pumpkins.

He was face down, bum up, snoring into the dirt.

I untied my cloak and threw it over his body.

I looked back at the house and yelled, "Grandma, come quick! There's a naked man in the vegetable garden."