“What do you mean?”

“Oh, nothing,” Nora said. “I’m just a bad Catholic.”

“Perhaps you aren’t a bad Catholic,” she said. “Perhaps you’re just a very good pagan.”

“Cradle Catholic.”

“You’re old enough to leave the cradle,” Mercedes said. “Aren’t you?”

“There’s someone in my life who would be very put out if I did.”

“If there’s someone in your life trying to control your faith, you’re the one who should be put out, Mistress Nora.”

Nora tensed. Not often another woman put her on the defensive.

“You can just call me ‘Nora.’ The ‘Mistress’ is for those who want to serve.”

“It’s a title of respect, yes?”

“Well, yes.”

“I respect your work, Mistress. But I’m happy to call you whatever you like. So Nora it is.”

“Mercedes,” Nora said. “Unusual name for an American.”

She shrugged. “I’m impressed you say it right. Nobody ever says it right, even after I tell them.”

“It’s a French name,” Nora said. “No accents. Not like we say the car brand.”

Mare-SED-ess, not Mur-SAY-deez.

“You know French?” the woman asked.

“Some. My boyfriend is French. One of my boyfriends, I mean.”

Mercedes raised her eyebrow but made no comment. No comment necessary.

“Sorry,” Nora said. “I say that stuff all the time. I forget it makes some people uncomfortable.”

“I’m a witch. Does that make you uncomfortable?” Mercedes asked.

“You know, I always thought if a witch showed up at my house in the middle of the night, it would be to tell me there was such a thing as a tesseract. That’s from—”

“A Wrinkle in Time. I know. And there really is such a thing as a tesseract.”

“Is there?”

She nodded. “A tesseract,” Mercedes said, “is a cube cubed. A hypercube.”

“I’m impressed,” Nora said. “I didn’t know witches knew advanced geometry.”

“It’s also known as ‘sacred geometry.’ Some believe geometry is God’s native language and that by learning sacred geometry, one can access the mind of God.”

“Do you believe that?”

“I don’t recognize your god,” Mercedes said. “I serve the Goddess.”

“I thought everyone in this town was Catholic.”

Mercedes smiled. “Not everyone.”

She gestured toward her stomach. She was wearing a long red skirt that flared at her hips and a white top, cut off a few inches above her waist so that Nora could see the tattoos on her lower stomach. A sliver of moon on one side, a sliver of moon on the other, a full moon that surrounded her bellybutton.

Nora had seen that symbol before but couldn’t say what it was. “What’s your ink?”

“It’s the symbol of the Triple Moon Goddess,” Mercedes said. “Everyone in my coven gets marked with Her symbol. Not necessarily on the stomach, though. I just did that to cover a stretch mark. I made my daughter pay for it.”

She smiled and Nora knew she was joking.

“It’s pretty.”

“Thank you.” Mercedes nodded toward the armchairs set in front of Nora’s desk. “Shall we talk about why you came to see me?”