* * *
“I look like a hag!” Sally protested as she and Opal navigated around a large puddle in the crosswalk. She pulled up the hood of her hot-pink rain jacket against the rain and hurried to keep up with Opal. She glanced up at the low ceiling of gray clouds and tried to ignore the uncomfortable chill settling into her prematurely aging bones. “Next thing you know, my teeth are going to start falling out!”
“It’s not that bad.”
“Not that bad?!” Sally grabbed Opal by the sleeve. “I have lines across my face! My hands are wrinkled! My hair is all white! I’m turning into an old lady.” Sally started to hyperventilate.
“Mmm. I’d say you look more middle-aged than old. Maybe not even that. More like 40,” Opal offered. “Maybe.”
“I look 40?!” Sally shrieked. A man in an expensive trench coat glanced at her as he hurried past. Hands shaking, Sally clutched her bookbag against her chest—careful not to crush Baron inside—and wiped moisture away from her cheeks, not knowing if it was the rain or her tears. “But that’s ancient—I’m only 16!”
Opal took Sally’s arm and kept walking up NW 12th Avenue toward Burnside.
“Look, we’re going to get to the bottom of this, all right? Besides, I’d say your hair is more streaked with silver, not completely white.”
“That’s supposed to make me feel better?” Sally laughed bitterly. She glanced at the storefronts as they passed. Before she embarked on her magickal quest to save the world, she would have stopped in at Cargo to peruse the funky imports, and then grab a hot chocolate and a scoop of pear sorbetto at Mio Gelato. But in her present state, she silently cursed the little pleasures she’d denied herself while planning and implementing Odin’s Return.
Fat lot of good it had done. If she looked like a 40-year-old today, who’s to say she wouldn’t be mistaken for her smelly Great-Aunt Rachel—or worse, a corpse—this time tomorrow?
Sally’s bag shifted in her arms as they hurried across a busy intersection. “Easy, Baron. We’ll think of something,” she whispered to her cat.
But what if she and Opal couldn’t fix this?
They reached the other side of the street, and Sally stopped and pulled on Opal’s elbow again. “And just how am I supposed to explain this to my parents? They don’t even know I’m a witch!”
Opal sighed and rested her hands on the wet shoulders of Sally’s rain slicker. “I know you’re upset, but we have to keep calm and think this thing through.” She adjusted the dark, square-framed glasses on her face. “Maybe what’s happened is only temporary. Maybe it will wear off if you just stop doing your magick for a while.”
Tears formed at the corners of Sally’s eyes. “And give up on a golden environmental age? Just forget about making the planet a better place? I don’t think so. And who’s to say that stopping would make things better? What if I don’t go back to myself again unless I finish?”
Opal shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Sally looked down at the pavement and kicked at the shallow puddle she found herself standing in. “And what if I don’t get back to normal no matter what I do?”
“Look, we’re not going to solve anything standing out here in the rain.”
Opal pulled Sally forward again. They rounded the corner onto West Burnside and soon found themselves at the main entrance of Powells City of Books. As they entered the crowded bookstore, Sally lowered the hood of her jacket and opened her backpack just far enough to pull out Kleinhaber’s Rhythms of the Runes. Sally clutched the book to her chest. Now that she looked more like an unkempt, middle-aged spinster, she felt ridiculous in her hot-pink rain jacket and matching Nikes.
Opal steered them toward the Customer Service counter, and they got into line behind a red-haired woman in a turquoise power suit and a graying man who was losing his battle to keep a pair of cranky six-year-olds in check. One of the boys hung on his father’s arm like it was a jungle gym, while the other kicked at a nearby magazine rack and sent copies of Wired, Home Computing, and Red Herring flying.
Sally elbowed Opal and nodded toward the man. “If I don’t fix this, maybe I can get a job as his nanny. Or his wife.”
“Will you stop it already? Aren’t you always the one telling me to think positively? That negativity only interferes with . . . Whatever?”
Sally shoved her right hand into her pocket, but she couldn’t keep her fingers still. She tapped her forefinger against her thumb and winced at the flash of pain.
“Opal! I almost forgot.” Sally held her thumb up in Opal’s face. “Look what happened this morning.”
Opal squinted at the angry, red lines burnt into the pad of Sally’s thumb. “What is that?”
“Uruz. My runes were hot! Enough to burn me.” Sally clutched her book tighter and rubbed at her scar. “Nothing in any of the books said anything about red-hot runes or turning into a hag overnight.”
The line moved forward. The man ahead of them was trying to ask for directions to the parenting books while one of his boys attempted to scale the Customer Service counter and the other made paper airplanes out of a stack of walking maps of Portland.
“Maybe this is the wrong thing to say, because I don’t exactly want to encourage you to experiment further . . .”
“I’m not experimenting, Opal. I know what I’m doing.”
“Umm . . . Yeah.” Opal glanced at Sally’s burnt thumb and then at the wrinkles on her face and the streaks of gray in her hair. “If you say so. But what I was going to say is that I’ve been casting spells for a lot longer than you, and nothing like this ever happened to me.”
“Yeah, I get it. I’m cursed. I’m a horrible witch. Instead of calling it Odin’s Spell of Magickal Return, maybe I should rename it something like Wrinkled Sally’s Spell of Outrageous Doom.”
Opal laughed, then immediately stopped, but it was too late. Sally’s eyes were brimming with tears again.
“That’s not what I meant. I meant when I practice, nothing happens—at least, nothing that I can definitely say was due to my spell. Remember Jimmy Vogel in my Economics class last year? I couldn’t even get him to look at me, much less ask me out.”
Opal nudged Sally gently, and she smiled. “You’re actually making things happen. Just not the things you want.”
Sally sniffed and wiped the tears from her eyes. “But what do I tell these people?” She nodded toward the two women manning the Customer Service desk, both of whom were trying to entertain their customer’s twin boys while recommending books on single parenting.
Sally turned the book over in her hands. “All of Kleinhaber’s books are out of print. They had to special order it for me from some collector in Glasgow. It’s pretty beat up, but it still cost a lot of money.”
“How about, ‘Excuse me, but this expensive, defective book you sold me ended up costing me my youth? I’d like my money and my body back, please?’”
Sally giggled. The man in front of them grabbed each of his boys by the arm and dragged them away. She and Opal stepped forward, and Sally’s breath caught in her throat.
“Can I help you?” asked the young girl behind the counter. She was probably not much older than Sally. Her dark hair hung in curls about her shoulders, and Sally noticed the distinct scents of fresh sage, lavender, and sweetgrass rising from her.
Quality stuff, Sally thought to herself.
“Can I help you?” she asked again.
Opal nudged her.
“Don’t, don’t I know you . . . ?” Sally stammered.
There was something curiously familiar about the young woman behind the counter. Maybe an older girl from school, or one of Opal’s college friends? Opal’s face didn’t show any sign of recognition.
The dark-haired girl smiled. “Maybe. I’m in here a lot.” She brushed her hair back, revealing her name tag: Saga. Sally had to squint to read it. It was bad enough having a face full of wrinkles and hair streaked with gray, but was her eyesight going, too?
“Sa
ga.” Sally stared at her. There was something not quite genuine about Saga, like she was just going through the motions of appearing friendly and engaged. “Huh.”
“Umm, we’re here about a defective book . . . ?” Opal tried to take the book out of Sally’s arms, but Sally held onto it tighter before she remembered why she’d come to Powells.
“Right. I need to speak to someone about returning this book.” Sally gestured with the thick volume in her hands, then pulled it back toward her chest. “I bought it here last month. It was a special order. I didn’t keep the receipt.”
“The book is defective?” Saga rested her elbows on the desk.
“Defective?” Sally looked down at the book in her hands and frowned. “Well, actually, yes.” She looked Saga directly in the eye. “Yes, purely and entirely defective.”
“May I?” Saga reached for the book, and Sally reluctantly let it go. She inched closer to the counter as Saga turned the book over in her hands, examining the binding.
Sally nudged Opal and nodded at the bookstore clerk. “Saga,” she whispered, but all she got from Opal was a blank look.
Sally couldn’t place the girl’s face, but she’d instantly recognized the name. Saga was the Norse goddess of history. Maybe her parents were Norse or Teutonic witches? Maybe they could help?
Sally smiled, and laugh lines creased the edges of her mouth. Just that morning she’d cast her spell to awaken the slumbering gods. She felt sure this young woman’s name tag was a sign.
This struck Sally as suddenly very funny. Her laughter burst out of her, and she immediately held her hands over her mouth.
Saga looked up with raised eyebrows. Even Opal looked at her strangely.
“It’s just that, well, that book is kind of about you.” She gestured toward the volume in Saga’s hands. “You know, Saga? The Viking goddess? There’s a lot in that book about her. Maybe your parents like mythology?”
Saga didn’t answer. She stared at Sally for a moment, then went back to examining the volume.
Opal bent down close to Sally. “Might want to lay off the magick references.”
Sally shrugged, not liking the way both her slicker and her aged skin now hung loose at her shoulders. Baron squirmed and mewled pitifully inside her backpack. Sally held the bag close to her chest and tried to pet her cat through the ballistic material.
“There’s some wear along the spine.” Saga held up the book for Sally to see. “Looks like normal creasing, given the age of the book.”
“It’s not the outside that’s the problem.” Sally reached forward and turned the pages of the book as Saga held it. She flipped immediately to page 240.
Sally pointed to the page numbers on the left and right facing pages. “Missing pages.”
Saga nodded, not looking up.
“And here.” Sally turned more pages. “Six more missing here.” She flipped farther forward in the book. “And twelve pages missing here! There are some other places, but those are the worst. It’s dangerous to have that kind of material missing!”
Saga looked up with a lifted eyebrow. “Dangerous, you say.” She studied Sally for a long moment, then closed the book and put it down on the counter. She turned to the other employee beside her. “What do you think, Bonnie?”
Bonnie was probably nearing thirty and had the pointed peaks of what looked like an angular, Celtic knot—dark red ink against olive skin—peeking out from beneath the collar of her mock turtleneck. She looked up from the computer and glanced first at Sally and then at Saga who directed her attention to the leather-bound book on the counter.
“I’m the Customer Service Manager, ma’am. Bonnie Radcliffe.” Bonnie reached across the counter to shake Sally’s hand. “What can I do for you?”
Sally bristled at the introduction. Had she just been called ma’am? She must look worse than she’d thought. Opal had to elbow her again.
“Right. I’m Sally Dahl.” She gestured toward the book in Saga’s hands, then hesitated. Should she be telling people her real name, when she looked like this? If she ran into someone she knew, would they even recognize her?
Sally swallowed. “I ordered this from Europe. It’s a rare book. There are lots of pages missing. I need those missing pages,” Sally declared more forcefully. “Or another copy of the book. Maybe you have another one?”
Bonnie nodded. “Let me see what we have available.” She turned to the computer and started typing.
Saga stared down at the book’s cover. “You’re interested in runes?”
“Yes.” Sally sounded more defensive than she intended. “They’re, uh, kind of a hobby.”
“Mmm.” Saga stared silently at Sally. Opal turned toward one of the magazine racks, picked up a copy of Northwest Handyman, and pretended to read. Sally wanted to look away, but couldn’t. Her heart pounded in her chest, and her face flushed hot.
Dear gods! Sally whimpered silently and clutched her bag tighter. Am I having a heart attack? Baron protested against being suddenly squeezed, but Sally ignored him.
Saga finally dropped her gaze and went back to examining the book. A sigh of relief washed over Sally, but she could still feel anxious adrenaline coursing through her veins.
Opal put a hand on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”
Sally nodded. “Yeah, fine,” she choked.
“I know something about runes,” Saga offered, still looking down at the pages of Rhythms of the Runes.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Dahl. We don’t have any other copies in our system.” Bonnie turned away from the computer and nodded toward the book. “If this was a special order, like you say, we might be able to find another one for you at another bookseller. It would take some time, of course . . .”
“But I need these missing pages now!” Sally cried. “This is important!”
A few customers browsing nearby stopped and looked toward Customer Service. Bonnie leaned closer to Sally and lowered her voice.
“I understand you’re disappointed, Ms. Dahl. I would be, too, if I’d ordered a rare book only to find that it was missing so many pages. If you’d like, you can return the book and we’ll refund your money. And we can keep looking for another copy for you.” Bonnie gestured toward the computer terminal.
“Why don’t we do that?” Opal offered. “You can take some time to rest, and try again later.”
Tears sprang to Sally’s eyes as she stomped her foot on the linoleum tiles. “No, it can’t wait! I need this book—all of it! It has to be today, Opal. Don’t you know what’s happening?”
Bonnie looked quickly to Opal, who shook her head, then frowned at Sally. “No, ma’am. What is happening?”
Sally inhaled painfully, trying to get her heart rate under control. It wouldn’t do any good to make herself sick. She closed her eyes tight, hoping beyond hope that when she opened them again, she’d be back in her bedroom, where she’d awaken from this very strange dream, and could then get back to work on saving the world.
“Ms. Dahl? Are you all right?”
With a pitiful moan, Sally opened her eyes and met Bonnie’s concerned gaze.
“No. I’m not all right. None of this is okay.” Sally gestured toward the book on the counter. “I need those missing pages to complete some very important work. I don’t even know how to tell you what a big deal this is. And Opal, I know you don’t really understand it either, and maybe that’s my fault for not trying to explain it to you or include you sooner. But it’s super huge. It’s literally of global importance.”
“Okay . . .” Bonnie responded with obvious suspicion in her voice.
Opal leaned against the counter. “Sally, come on.”
Sally gestured in the air above her. “See, the planets are in nearly perfect alignment with the constellations, and the Black Moon—the second New Moon in the month—is coming . . . This hasn’t happened before! And it all has to be timed down to the minute. It all has to be perfect! But if I don’t have the right information, I might do
it wrong. See? I mean, look at me! Do you see what’s happened?”
Sally felt light-headed. She stopped trying to pantomime constellations in the sky, and leaned against the counter for support. Opal rested a hand on her shoulder to help steady her, and when Sally looked up, she caught Saga staring at her with her head cocked to one side.
Sally’s face brightened. “You know what I’m talking about, don’t you? You said you know about runes, and with a name like Saga . . .”
Bonnie turned to look at Saga, but the younger woman just shook her head and turned away.
“Sally, do you need a glass of water or something?” Opal patted her friend’s back. “Do you want to sit down?”
Sally sighed in exasperation. “Please, just help me get the missing pages. You’ve no idea how much I’ve put into this. How much it has taken out of me . . .” Sally looked down at her skinny ankles sticking out of her Nikes. “This isn’t what I really look like. Opal can tell you. Something went wrong. I need those pages. I need to make this right. If I don’t get it done by 1:32 Sunday morning, everything will fall apart!”
Saga turned back around. “What did you say?”
Bonnie reached for the telephone on the counter. “You know what? I’m going to call someone I think can help . . .”
“Come on, Sally.” Opal was tugging her away from the Customer Service desk. “She’s calling security, you know.”
“No! Please.” Sally reached out to grab her book from the counter. “I’m not trying to cause trouble. Honest. This is just really, really important.”
“Apparently.” Bonnie sighed and put down the phone. “So, what do you want to do here? Do you want to return the book? Do you want us to try to find you another one?”
Sally shook her head and wiped at her nose with the back of her hand. “No. There’s no time.” She squeaked out a hiccup, trying to swallow her tears. “I’ll have to figure out something else.”
“All right. You let us know if you change your mind.” Bonnie leaned down on her elbows on the counter. “We do want you to be happy with your book. If you want us to fix this, we will.”
“See? That’s good.” Opal nodded at Bonnie with a smile. “We can come back later and maybe have them start looking for another copy. Okay?”
Sally pressed her lips together and nodded. She glanced at Saga, who stood back and silently stared at her. Sally’s head was pounding, and she knew her nose was running. Sniffing back more tears, Sally backed away from the counter and opened her backpack to put the book back inside, shoving Baron out of the way to make room.
The cat mewled loudly.
Sally looked up at Bonnie just as Baron poked his head out of the backpack.
Bonnie shook her head vigorously. “Ma’am, I’m sorry, but you cannot have that cat in here. Only service animals are allowed inside the building.”
Fresh tears rolled down Sally’s cheeks. “It’s okay. I’m going.”
Baron fought back as she pushed him back down into the bag, swatting at her fingers and growling in complaint.
“Baron,” Sally’s voice cracked. “Please, just cooperate.”
Opal put her arm around her friend’s shoulders and walked her a few paces away from the Customer Service desk.
“I’m sorry I lost it,” Sally sighed.
“It’s okay.” Opal smiled. “You’re stressed out. You haven’t been sleeping. So you overcompensated and threw a tantrum? It happens.”
“I wasn’t exaggerating.” Sally tugged on the smoky quartz pendant around her neck and pressed her fingers against the engraved “R” shape. “You helped me pick out this necklace last year at Pagan Faire. Raido. The journey rune.”
Opal nodded. “I remember.”
“I’ve worn it every day since, usually tucked under my clothes so my parents won’t notice. I even wear it while I’m sleeping.”
“I don’t understand where you’re going with this.”
Sally forgot that her friend didn’t know nearly as much about runes as she did. She pulled Rhythms of the Runes back out of her bag and started flipping through the pages. “Here. I’ll show you.”
“It’s a reminder to relinquish control to the will of the gods.”
Sally turned and was astonished to see Saga standing behind her.
“There’s only so much change that one person can force,” Saga continued. “The rest is up to the powers that be.”
“But it doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t try,” Sally protested.
“No, it doesn’t. But it does mean that sometimes, if you push too hard, you can have a really bad day.” Saga smiled. “Feel like you’ve gotten hit by one of Thor’s thunderbolts?”
Sally grimaced. “Something like that.”
Saga touched Sally on the wrist. “I’ve got something that might help.”
Saga walked back toward the Customer Service desk and stepped behind the counter.
“There is something wrong with that woman,” Bonnie commented to Saga, not bothering to lower her voice. “But you’ve gotta love Portland. You can’t throw a rock around here without hitting a Pagan of one stripe or another. Myself included.” She laughed. “I just wish the crazy ones didn’t make the rest of us look so bad.”
Not even a yard away, Opal gave Bonnie a withering scowl. Bonnie shrugged and stepped over to the computer terminal.
“Maybe she’ll put a hex on that publisher over the missing pages.” Bonnie started typing. “Like it’s a matter of life or death. Some people just take their beliefs way too seriously.”
Sally saw that Saga wasn’t listening. Instead, she was laying bundles of dried herbs on the counter.
“Thursday is definitely my favorite day of the week,” Bonnie crooned as she picked up one of the bundles and held it to her nose. “Because that’s when you bring in these amazing smudge sticks.” Bonnie waved a wand of lavender and sweetgrass in the air. “Tell your mother she should be selling these, not giving them away. She could make decent money selling these through New Renaissance or Moonshadow.”
Saga sorted through the bundled herbs and selected one. “I’ll pass that along.” Saga stepped out from behind the counter and headed toward Sally and Opal. She handed a bundle of sage and lavender to Sally. “Do you know what this is?”
“A smudge stick?” Sally breathed in the woody fragrance and felt her body relax.
Saga looked Sally directly in the eye. “You can use it to purify a space, ward off negativity, or just to help you focus. Understand?”
“But my parents will never let me burn something like this in the house.”
Opal saw Saga glance at Sally’s wrinkled forehead and graying eyebrows.
“That’s okay,” Opal interjected a little too cheerfully. “You can use it at my apartment, Aunt Sally.”
“Aunt Sally . . . ?” Sally looked up at Opal in confusion. “What—?”
“But first you wanted to dye that gray out of your hair, remember?”
Sally reached up to touch her brittle hair. “Oh! Right!”
Saga’s eyes narrowed as she looked back and forth between Sally and Opal.
Sally faked a laugh. “Sometimes I get a little mixed up.”
Saga locked her eyes on Sally’s face. “Are you going to be okay?”
Under the girl’s steady gaze, Sally felt that same rush of adrenaline that had hit her before. Sally nodded, feeling her palms starting to sweat as she held the smudge stick tightly.
Saga took a step back, and Sally’s entire body sighed in relief. “Good luck.”
Opal turned Sally toward the door. “Sorry. I didn’t know how to explain that comment you made about your parents. You know, while you look like . . .”
“Like a frumpy spinster?”
“Yeah.” Opal reached for one of the doors at the main entrance. “We can come up with a plan over lunch.”
Sally looked back over her shoulder at the dark-haired girl behind the counter, then allowed herself to be led outside into
the rain.
~ six ~