A polite murmur went around the circle acknowledging my thanks. Even Moondance said something about the goddess welcoming gratitude from wherever it came.

I continued. “It’s just that seeing you all here – some of you whom I’ve enjoyed knowing without knowing you were … um … witches, has made me realize how little I know about witches. Do you inherit your power? Do all children of witches become witches? Are you all … ?”

“Human?” Ann finished for me helpfully. “Yes, those of us here who have identified ourselves as witches are human.”

“As to your other questions,” Ann continued. “No, not all children of witches become witches. The power appears in some, but not others. Conversely, sometimes a witch will appear in a family with no history of witchcraft. We call such witches self-made.”

“I’m one of those,” Joan Ryan said. “I discovered my powers during my junior year at Mt. Holyrood. I met Liz at the boarding school where I had my first teaching job.” Liz and Joan exchanged a look that seemed freighted with sadness. “And she recommended me for my job here. I came here in 1915 …” She saw the startled look on my face and laughed.

“Are you all older than you look?” I asked.

“Some witches choose to extend their life spans,” Liz replied, patting her hair.

“While others don’t,” Ann Chase added, looking down at her twisted hands.

“There’s invariably always a price to be paid for any use of magic,” Soheila said. “Ann has chosen to expend hers … elsewhere.” There followed an awkward silence during which I guessed that the members of the circle knew where Ann’s power was used but respected her privacy too much to say so.

Moondance interrupted the silence with a snort. “Are we going to natter on all morning about our problems or are we going to do some magic? I thought we came here this morning to help Brock.”

“How can you do that?” I asked.

“We’re going to form a circle and generate energy within it to draw Brock back from the shadows,” Liz answered. “The Norns have agreed to join our circle to strengthen our power. It is always dangerous, though, to generate this much energy. Is everyone sure they are willing to take the risk?” Liz looked around the circle, studying each face. When she reached me, I felt a disturbance – a slight pressure of air against my face, like the air puff released during an eye exam.

“Good,” Liz said briskly. “Everyone is sincerely committed to the circle.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

LIZ ASKED TARA, as the youngest member, to draw the circle.

The young mother got up and removed a blue Morton’s salt box from a canvas bag. She flipped open the metal spout and poured it on the living room floor as she walked in a counter-clockwise circle around the group, including Brock. The women began to chant softly, some in Latin, others in languages that might have been Old Norse, Gaelic and Anglo-Saxon. Dory Browne had explained to me last winter that spells were in the old languages that were spoken when the fey had first started teaching humans magic.