Fire! Its Alive!

When I first started writing Farfadel novels, I did not have access to a fireplace. Fire was a fun thing to dabble with via candles on occasion.

But now? Its been two years of living with a wood burning stove, and this winter I’m actively trying to keep it alive and burning to heat our tiny home. And, well, I’ve noticed a large change in how I approach fire.

Maybe its my overactive imagination, but I’ve started enacting rules from my Farfadel novels around my own fire! For example, I do not speak to the fire, unless I am certain what I say cannot be taken out of context to cause damage or silliness. I am cautious, really, not to speak disrespectful things around the fire. You wouldn’t want the Fire Lady to appear, in spirit of course, but I wouldn’t want to piss off the element of fire!

It sounds silly, right? But I’ve really come to see the fire as a living entity within my home. I cajole it quietly some days, trying to get it to burn higher. It burns my hands when I try and feed it without my thick gloves on. I wake up grudgingly to feed it at nighttime, and relay the care thereof with my wife.

Now, I can’t say this has affected my writing that much. But it has brought my writing about fire to be more… alive? For me, at least. It has brought what I thought of as a silly, fun thing, into a real life application!

I dont have great shards of wisdom to share about this. On one hand, I do feel like this brings my novels eerily into a realm of reality im not sure I want them to be. In another, it reminds me cozily of the truth and reality that permeates all things. So… I have no great conclusion. But I wish you well, wherever you are, and hope you are warm and safe 😊 ❤

On Being Trans and Pagan

First of all, what with recent events being what they are, I encourage you all to go and support those protesting in the states. Give to help bail out those who have been arrested, and please get into letter-writing mode if you can’t protest.

That being said, I wanted to talk about something that struck me while working on a children’s drawing. This one in particular.

Now, for those of you who are visually impaired or who haven’t been following me for a while, this is an image of my very trans birdie beating a drum and singing while wearing a cloak and antlers. He is surrounded by a salt circle within which are placed a goblet, tiny cauldron with smoke coming out of it, a crystal, and a candle. Essentially, the little trans birdie is doing a ritual with the four elements and singing while incarnating the Horned God or some other horned deity.

Now, while drawing this out, it struck me that it could be seen as ‘hard’ to have the trans birdie invoking a masculine deity, as in it would be hard for a trans man to incarnate such an epidemy of masculinity. But then I thought that isn’t it overly hard for anyone to do?

Here’s my first point: the epidemy of masculinity, the Horned God, is equally far from everyone, trans or not, because they’re a deity and we’re mere mortals. No matter your view on deity, they’re that, impossibly far away, and we’re us. So, trans or not, we’re all impossibly far from this ideal personified, just as we are all embodiments of it. It’s a paradox, if you will, one that is solved only when a devotee offers up their body for possession during an invocation. Then, only then, does one truly reach peak ‘masculinity’.

But can only a cis man do the invocation properly? I don’t think so. I really think that, cis or trans or enby, or probably even a woman, one can invoke the Horned one (or any other male deity) in order to experience what it feels like to possess that energy, because, in the grand scheme of things, it is still a deity descending into a mortal body. To argue that it must be only ‘this type’ or ‘that type’ of body, in my opinion, is to argue over a millimeters’ difference when the deity has to cross aeons to reach us. The deity is already transcending so much in order to get into the body, is it really a big deal whether it’s male or female, so long as its receptive? I don’t think so. So long story short, my trans birdie (and all other trans men and enbies or even women) can do the ‘male’ invocations.

Second, while thinking on this, a thought came to me on the validity of trans masculinity. It came to me that, in paganism, one can be a mortal person and suddenly invoke a god, and be recognized as this god. During this invocation, the deity is recognized as such and treated with reverence required. So why don’t we apply this to transgender identities? This notion of being a female body hosting male energy that was invoked into it by birth is absolutely not so different from our deity invocations. Yet it brings to mind my interactions with pagans who kept saying to me that I was ‘so feminine’ and that I had ‘female’ energy (which was very upsetting for me). Why is it that, for deities, we can see the spirit but not for trans people?

I think that, as pagans, we tend to view the energy as being created by the body, rather than being summoned into it. We view them as interdependent and co-creating. But if we begin viewing the spirit as not entirely dependent on the body (at least in a gendered way), but rather as hosted by it, then we can see the difference.

Furthermore, for trans and/or enby people, I want to suggest invocations as a way to test out your gender. Are you considering becoming a man? Invoke the Horned God, or any other male deity you are comfortable with, and see how the ‘energy’ feels to you.

Why? Not only will it give you a ‘feel’ of masculinity, but often with invocations, the human/invoker will feel as if they have the deities’ body and accoutrements. In the case of the Horned God, one might feel as if they are bearing horns and a large phallus.

So try it out, and see if you like those feelings. You could even consider summoning the opposite and comparing and contrasting your emotions and sensations.

If this generates interest (or even if it doesn’t), I will make a full post about how to do a private ritual summoning deities for gender consideration. Hey, maybe even a ritual divination on discerning your gender/insight into your gender could be fun too.

So anyways, I want to wish you all a safe and happy day. Take care y’all ❤

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Six, Part One

That supper, after the madame left, everyone waxed on about how the ritual had been so ground-shaking. Everyone meaning Amethyst, Paulette, and Crystal, that is. Paulette, who had never attended a ritual before, was blown out of her waters.

Eyes wide, Paulette gasped for the umpteenth time that “There was just so much energy!”

“I told you she was good,” gloated Amethyst, digging happily into her shepherd’s pie.

“I felt so much!” continued Paulette, eyes about to pop out of her head.

“It was such an experience,” gloated Amethyst, obviously so pleased with herself.

Sapphire cleared her throat. “So are we all pleased? No more worries?”

“Oh, the air feels so much better! Everything is fresher! It’s just – cleansed!” said Amethyst, gesturing grandiosely and almost whacking Cheryl on the back of the head.

“Oh yes,” nodded Crystal around a mouthful. “I think the place is cleansed.”

Sapphire nodded, smiling patiently as Crystal and Paulette raved on some more. Then, Bjorn popped up a word.

“I think we can get started on moving along,” he said with a nod. “Nothin’ bad should be coming down the pipes now.”

I knocked firmly on the wooden table. “Knock on wood,” I muttered savagely as everyone stared at me.

“Well! That’s good,” said Sapphire with a dry edge to her words. “Tomorrow the last of our staff arrives. Then the next day, our students. I trust you will all be ready.”

Crystal looked like she was facing down an angry boar. Amethyst looked like she’d just pooped herself.

Paulette was nodding along happily. Trust the math teacher to have everything organized already.

“I think with tomorrow, we should be able to get everything in order,” I said with a nod.

“Yeah,” said Amethyst with a waver in her voice.

Sapphire nodded like a snake staring down a very squeaky mouse. The mouse was Amethyst in this case, and she was busily not looking at Sapphire in favor of her plate.

“Well,” said Bjorn, clapping his massive hands together. “I am so glad not to be a teacher!” and then he belly laughed. Ivy high-fived with him and then with the security guard.

Yeah, well. Us teachers all looked like we’d been kicked in the teeth. Just – ugh. I was sure that if tomorrow was a good work day, I could tie up all my loose ends and get my laundry done and do a private ritual for success. Provided no more shenanigans occur, of course.

Of course, right? What could go wrong? Now that the place was ‘cleansed’ there was nothing for us to worry about, right?

I didn’t believe that for one hoot, as my grandma would say. I was going to do my own protection ritual tonight, and wear an amulet or something. We’d see where the spirit moved me, but I was definitely doing something.

So it was that after supper, I locked myself in my room and took a deep breath. I opted against doing my rituals in the nude, seeing as there was still no curtain over that glaring window, and I didn’t want to flash the security guard.

I cast my circle, did my invocations, and was sitting cross-legged on the floor before my altar, braiding a witch’s ladder for protection when the fire alarm went off.

My head popped up, and I realized that this was either a drill, or… something had caught fire. Again with the fire element?

Tucking my half braided ladder into my pocket, I thanked my lucky stars that I wasn’t in the nude for this.

In the hallway, the staff were poking their heads out of their rooms. A twinge of white sage smell wove through the air, and I had a good idea what was going on. Someone was burning sage, and it set off the fire alarm. Typical.

Sapphire marched down the hallway, fire glinting in her eyes. “Everyone out,” she ordered coolly as she strode down the hallway. She shooed everyone and marched towards the only door that was still closed. “Get out-” she was saying as she pulled the door open.

A giant cloud of black smoke erupted over her as she pulled it open.

“Help!” came Amethyst’s cry. “It’s on fire!”

Sapphire yanked a fire extinguisher off the wall that just so happened to be there. Then she pulled the pin and hosed down the room. From inside the room there was a sound of Amethyst coughing and spluttering. Sapphire marched into the room, still hosing away.

Without thinking, I found myself by the doorway and poking my head into the smoke-filled room.

The bed was completely covered in white mousse. Sapphire was pulling it away from the wall and checking the wall for fire, hosing down tiny flames that were on the floor. Amethyst stood to the side, coughing and waving her hands before herself.

“I was just trying to sage the room!” she wailed to us, the cluster of onlookers who had certainly not evacuated.

Sapphire turned. “Didn’t I say to get out?”

I snapped back like I’d whacked. Bjorn began to usher us all out, Amethyst tearfully joining us.

And that was how we spent that evening out on the grass, sitting around while the firemen (who were alerted by the fire alarm) poked around the building.

“I was just sageing my room,” sobbed Amethyst for the umpteenth time. We were all sitting on the grass, whacking at mosquitoes, and the mood was generally low.

“It’s against the rules to sage inside,” I muttered under my breath as I pulled out my witch’s ladder and began to finish braiding it.

“How did you know?” wailed Amethyst at me while Crystal rubbed her shoulders.

“It was written in one of those emails about all the rules,” I said tartly, trying not to be bitter but, really, I was pissed. “Burning incense indoors was specifically prohibited. Wax melts were suggested as a solution.”

Amethyst’s mouth flapped, and she burst into tears. “It’s okay,” soothed Crystal. “You didn’t know.”

I raised my eyebrows. Aurora raised her eyebrows. Paulette raised her eyebrows, sucking in a breath. Cheryl sucked on a cigarette and huffed out smoke. “She’s gonna eat you alive, kiddo,” she said to Amethyst.

I nodded, flinching at the same time. Yeah. Sapphire must be downright pissed.

Except when the firemen were leaving, Sapphire marched over to us. “Everyone back inside,” she said, sounding exhausted and frustrated. “It’s safe. It only touched the surface of the walls, didn’t get inside.”

Everyone nodded and began to rise up. My knees popped and I was up. Amethyst had her head down and looked like a kid trying to sneak past the adult. I was expecting Sapphire to bark at her, to take her aside and lecture her angrily. Except that wasn’t the case.

“Amethyst, a word please,” said Sapphire with a sigh.

Amethyst nodded tearily. The rest of us slunk away. While we walked, I caught snippets of sounds on the wind, and none of it sounded harsh. In fact, Sapphire just sounded tired.

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Five, Part One

“She’s here!” squealed Amethyst, stating the obvious.

The car looked like someone had taken a hammer to it, and a sledgehammer to other parts of it. It rattled as it drove up the gravel driveway, and seemed to just give up the ghost as it turned off before us.

Us, that is, being most of the teachers, the security guard, and Sapphire. Sapphire stood at the front, arms crossed and a pleasant look on her face that might have been trademarked by some makeup company, it was so neutral. She was poised, collected, and looked professional.

So, obviously, Amethyst had to run forward, squealing and shaking her hands with shawls flying. “Hello!” she squealed as she ran around the car.

Whatever might have been happy in Sapphire’s face turned grim. Her chest rose and lowered in a sigh, but she kept her poise.

On the other side of the car, I heard a weird accent. I saw a large shape and bright colors. There was a brief hug wherein Amethyst’s shawl draped around the figure – and then they both stepped from around the car.

The woman was large, round about the middle. Very round. Her hair was dark and frizzed out at the sides with whatever would cooperate being pulled back into a ponytail. She was wearing bright colors in strange shapes zig-zagged across her shirt on a black background. Her skirts swished and swished in a horrid shade that looked like a washed out grass stain. Or maybe vomit. She was wearing sandals.

“Ah! Hello! Bonjour!” she said, with a parisian accent as she walked over.

“Bonjour, comment allez vous?” said Sapphire in fluent french, greeting her and asking how she was. She offered a hand, which the madame clasped in both of hers.

“Ah! You have such strong hands!” declared the madame. She looked Sapphire up and down. “You try too hard. And you-” she waved expressively, bangles jangling around her wrists. “Need to get in tune with your inner goddess. Maybe you should masturbate a bit more.”

“I am so glad you came here for this banishing,” said Sapphire in sickly sweet tones as she tried to draw back her hand.

“Mmm,” the woman closed her eyes. “I sense a love affair. A -”

Sapphire yanked her hand free. “I thought you had been explained that we wanted a banishing from you-”

“Oh! Madam! I am intuitive!” she declared, hands butterflying about herself. “I do and say as the spirit calls!”

“Well, the staff have been very anxious about the state of our property, spiritually speaking,” said Sapphire sweetly. “They, especially,” and here she designated Amethyst with a hand “are very eager for you to do what needs to be done with this place.”

“Ah! But! I say and do what the spirit demands! And you!” she gestured up and down to Sapphire. “You are a woman who does not accept herself! You need to embrace your inner-”

“That is not what you are being paid for,” said Sapphire tartly.

The woman rolled her eyes wildly, shaking a hand to the sky. “But the spirits are speaking! And you need to accept yourself! Embrace your feminine side!”

“Alright, I’ll keep that in mind. What about the land?” and Sapphire gestured to the building. “Do you want a tour?”

“Oh no, I will go where the spirit tells me to go!” She flicked out her hands, taking in a deep breath with her eyes closed. She then exhaled loudly. Inhaled loudly. Exhaled loudly. Then, like she was trying to waft incense closer, she waved a hand up to her face. “I’m sensing a disturbance. A tension, a sort of-”

Sapphire’s face could be described as → unimpressed. Strangely enough, that’s exactly how I felt as well.

“Some dramatic pain, maybe a death, a -”

Sapphire heaved a sigh.

“Lo-ots of pain, a history that is long and-”

“It’s an old building, yes,” said Sapphire icily.

The woman inhaled loudly again. “I am seeing a young woman, maybe lovers,”

I looked around. Amethyst was watching with rapturous attention. Crystal was starry-eyed. Aurora was perplexed.

“I sense-” another big inhale that could have sucked in a bee. Then her eyes popped open and she zeroed in on something past us. “That pond!”

“It’s a pond, yes,” said Sapphire softly.

The woman rushed forward, circling around us and making a beeline for the pond. Sapphire drew a sharp breath and followed, clearly irritated. We all followed, a little herd that was fascinated with these ongoings.

The woman drew to a standstill beside the pond. “Right here!” again, more hand waving and inhaling with eyes closed. “Someone was murdered!”

“How interesting,” said Sapphire dryly, but we barely heard it.

“Oh my!” declared Amethyst, waving her arms as she reached between Sapphire and the madame. “Could that be the bad vibes?”

“Quite sure it was the decades of children being tortured here that did it,” said Sapphire in a dark snap. Then, too late, you could see it in her face that she realized what she’d said.

The madame gawked. “What happened here?”

“I didn’t tell her!” stage whispered Amethyst with bulging eyes.

Sapphire smiled and shrugged, folding her arms behind her back. “A residential school is all.”

“What’s that?” asked the madame, suddenly losing her accent and waving demeanor.

“A native school,” said Amethyst.

“That’s not what a residential school was,” snapped Sapphire. “It was run by nuns, and the children were prisoners.” then, to the madame, she said “Look it up later. It’s not important now. Now we just need you to feel.”

That placated the woman somewhat. With a nod, she did the whole inhaling thing again. This time, she exhaled loudly through her mouth. Her eyes popped open. “Where did the ritual take place? The one you spoke to me about?” she said to Amethyst.

“Oh! This way!” and Amethyst began rushing away, the madame in tow. With their backs to her, Sapphire paused as if wondering if she really wanted to follow. Then, determined, she did.

Once we had reached the other side of the building where the firepit was, the madame gasped. “I feel so much aggression! Anger! Fire!”

“Well, we are by the fire pit,” said Sapphire tartly.

“Oh yes but, ahhh,” another inhale and hand waving. “This is-” a quick exhale then another inhale. “I sense a fiery spirit. Maybe a dragon.”

“One of the statues that burned was a dragon statue!” squeaked Amethyst.

“Mmmm,” said the madame most wisely. Now she swam her hands around above the fire pit, closing her eyes as if it took all her focus. Another inhale.

Mentally, I made a note that if any of my students wanted to breathe like that, they were getting detention. No matter their excuses or ‘feelings’.

As if reading my mind, the madame said “I feel,” another giant inhale. She wafted air up to herself – then sneezed. “Oh, you can still smell the plastic,” she said, grossed out and now waving the air in the other direction.

I wanted to smack my forehead with a palm. This was just too much.

“How about that banishing ritual?” Sapphire asks pointedly, crossing her arms over her chest. “We,” she checked her phone “don’t have that much time.”

“Oh, my dear, you can’t rush the spirit,” the woman gushed, still waving her arms as if swishing them in water.

“I’m only paying you for an hour,” said Sapphire tartly.

“It does not matter, I don’t do it for the money,” said the madame, closing her eyes again.

Sapphire looked quite angry at this, and I sympathized. How else would she get this person to leave?

“But, I can sense your impatience,” the madame said. Lowering her arms, she drew herself up and sniffed one final time. “We shall begin the ritual.”

Oh good goddess! I breathed a sigh of relief. But then I paused, realizing that it was this woman who was leading a ritual… did I really want to see that?

Yes, yes I did, said that part of me who loved binge-watching dramas. I really did.

We trailed along after the madame as she marched past to her car. “I didn’t know what would be required, so I brought whatever the spirit moved me for,” she declared as she approached her beat-up car.

Then, like an old school peddler from some poor village, she began drawing out stuff. And stuff. And stuff.

There was > a shaman’s drum, three different bundles of white sage, a wand covered in polymer clay decorations and crystals and feathers, a hooded cloak, a handful of candles, chakra stones, rune stones, and sticks.

And that was trip one.

Then there was a cauldron full of crystals, statues of the goddess and god, more candles (this time chakra colored), cone incense, a jug of water, pink salt in a salt shaker, and a silver circlet which she quickly popped onto her own head, as if afraid someone would steal it away.

Back around the fire pit, I simply stared as she began sorting through her miniature mountain of stuff. Then she turned around and faced us. “Alright!” she called out. “I’m going to need twelve volunteers! We need to be thirteen!”

Oh, good goddess. Now I was torn. I wanted in, but I also wanted to not be involved. I wanted the knowledge, but not to be stained by this ink. Crap.

Sapphire, for her part, was obviously not curious. She had backed away a good three steps from the madame. Amethyst was waving a hand ecstatically. By my side, Crystal was humming and nodding, slowly stretching an arm up.

I decided to hold back. You know what? I could be curious but I didn’t want to be injured. I could watch from outside and get a view, and that should be enough for me. That should be enough for me.

Except, dummy me, I hadn’t realized that we were already thirteen, including Sapphire. So if Sapphire backed out, everyone else had to go in.

“Come, come!” called out the madame. “We need to be thirteen!”

And I, the only one who had stood back (besides Sapphire, who was now almost a dozen feet away somehow) grudgingly walked over to the circle.

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Four Part Two

“Next,” Sapphire nodded to the security guard, who was at my other side.

“Well,” he said, leaning back and puffing himself up. “I did say that a fire extinguisher should have been nearby, and I’m going to repeat that. And I think it’s a downright bad sign for an altar to go up in flames-”

And I just tuned it out after that. He wheedled on and on, saying how safety should always come first and not actually sounding sad or thoughtful at all. After five minutes, he finished with “yeah, safety.” And then he smiled as if he’d actually said something.

Next was the phys ed teacher, Maria. “You know, I’ve got native ancestry,” she said boldly. “Not sure from which tribe, but definitely in there somewhere, way back where.”

Always a good start to anything. Claim ancestry to back up your claim.

“I think it was the shell that did it,” Maria continued. “You’re not supposed to burn it in a shell. It’s offensive. I think there’s a connection there between burning offensively and your shrine catching on fire.”

“But it was white sage!” Amethyst declared, as offended as could be. “It would have purified-”

“Not your turn to talk,” muttered Sapphire, still writing.

“It can’t be that!” finished Amethyst, crossing her arms over her heaving bosom.

Maria held up her hands. “Just taking a native’s perspective on it.”

“This was a residential school,” said Sapphire cautiously. “Perhaps we need to be extra cautious to be respectful of native traditions. There has been enough harm to them committed on this land.”

Maria nodded righteously, but Amethyst burst up. “But it was not disrespectful!”

“Sit down. Next,” demanded Sapphire.

Amethyst thumped down, face crinkling with restrained tears.

Bjorn was next. He mumbled that it was ‘quite the fire’ and that he ‘wasn’t sure what to make of it’, which was all lies. Except for it being a big fire. That it had been. But not having an opinion? Despite his big beaming smile at the end, the guy was obviously just not wanting to tread on toes.

After Bjorn was Crystal, who went on a similarly cautious walk-around of the issue. Then there was – MoonRaven, our nurse.

“I think it shows a deep disturbance in the psyche of this place,” she said with a nod. “Definitely wouldn’t be surprised if there’s some native burial grounds here or something.”

“Children were sometimes buried on the residential school lands,” said Sapphire with a nod, scribbling away.

Great! So now it was official-ish! We were on a native burial ground. Just perfect.

I barely heard the thoughts of Ivy, Sapphire’s secretary, but Paulette drew herself up with gumption. “I think we didn’t exercise perfect caution, and it bit us in the butt,” she said defiantly.

Amethyst looked away angrily.

“We are all to blame in some part,” she went on to say. “But good ritual is like math. I know math, and so ritual,” she paused “I think I second what Thunder said. It didn’t quite go right. We ought to look inside instead of just outside. What did we do that made them, the spirits, want to set our stuff on fire?”

Not just ‘our’ stuff, but Amethysts’ stuff specifically, I noted silently to myself.

Then, it was Amethyst.

Sapphire designated her with a hand, and the entire table held its breath. Probably, even the wood of this table literally stopped being porous for a minute. That’s how the energy was in the air right then.

Amethyst stood up, clearing her throat. Pen still scribbling, Sapphire said “You can sit down,” in a very flat voice.

Amethyst sat down with a face. Sapphire completely ignored it, still jotting down stuff. Then she looked up, just to see the whole table holding its breath and amethyst staring angrily at Sapphire.

Sapphire straightened, shaking out her hand. “It’s your turn to talk. So talk.” Let us have it, she seemed to say. I braced myself mentally, deciding that I would keep in mind that Amethyst was a … fully fledged adult who ought to be in control of her emotions? Eh, oh well. Good luck to us all.

Amethyst sucked in a breath, then said with a broken voice damp with tears “I can’t believe you all have been attacking me!”

Sapphire kept a very neutral face, but she wasn’t writing this down.

“I, held that ritual,” Amethyst was breathing in heaves and starts. “Out of the goodness of my heart!”

“We weren’t questioning that,” started Paulette, only to be interrupted by Sapphire.

“Not your turn,” Sapphire said flatly, still not writing anythign down.

“I, do NOT see the point of all these ad hominem attacks!” Amethyst wailed, tears beginning to stream down her face.

“They were not ad hominem attacks,” said Sapphire matter of factly, clasping her hands over her notepad.

Amethyst wasn’t listening, gulping and sobbing. “I did my best! And you,” here she looked directly at me “Attacked me! After my shrine burned! And you!” she glared at Sapphire. “you brought us all to this evil infested place!”

Sapphire raised just one eyebrow in a very unimpressed way. It was sexy as hell. But now was not the moment to dissolve into a pile of goo at her feet.

“I can’t imagine the sorts of trauma that the children who come here will have to endure!” she wailed. “This place is dangerous! Haunted! And you,” she looked around the table “Will blame them for their own problems!”

Amethyst rose up to her feet, glaring Sapphire down. “I can’t believe this place! I can’t believe you!” she shrieked at Sapphire. “I am a high priestess! I know how to do ritual! And you are all doubting me-”

“Actually, it is because you are a high priestess that we are holding you responsible for the results of your ritual,” said Sapphire tartly. “You led a ritual that, according to some of us, may have been poorly done. Surely if you weren’t powerful your mistakes wouldn’t have had such a catastrophic result.”

Was she- trying to compliment Amethyst? Was she? Was it working? Amethyst was standing there, mouth ajar.

Sapphire looked down at her paper, tapping her notes with her pen. “Your ritual’s result was dangerous, and seems to have greatly upset you. However, it is not an attack against your personality or powers or will. I think everyone here will agree that you did it out of goodness and concern. We all appreciate your presence, I am also sure. I think that, what I have mainly heard around this table, is that your ritual’s disaster was caused both by your own accident as well as the spirits of this land. The spirit’s actions are not your fault.”

Amethyst sniffled. Sapphire pressed on. “No one here wants to attack you.”

With a sob, Amethyst plunked back down onto the bench. It squeaked loudly, or was that her?

“We are all worried,” Sapphire insisted. “The way the ritual ended was a powerful sign. I think what we need is to work together to solve this issue, instead of letting it divide us.”

Amethyst nodded with another squeak. She held out her arms for a hug from Sapphire. Sapphire cleared her throat. “I uh, not the hugging type but uh?”

“Group hug!” declared Crystal, lurching up from her spot.

Oh, good Goddess. Cries of ‘Group hug!’ went up, and the table mobilized itself. Like a swarm with Amethyst as the wounded bee, everyone rushed to coagulate around her.

I sat there, me and Sapphire exchanging a look while everyone else patted Amethyst and exchanged body warmth. I shrugged. “Not a hugger,” I said. Sapphire nodded, smiling awkwardly at this display.

After a few moments of hugging and patting and laughing through tears (in Amethyst’s case) everyone took their places again.

“Alright, we have one more person to hear from, then we brainstorm solutions,” said Sapphire before handing ‘the floor’ to the woman sitting at her right.

The woman, who I recognized as the detention teacher, merely shrugged. “I think it’s all been said,” she said warm-heartedly. “I really hope we can find a working solution, and make sure that this place will have good luck and protection going on.”

Everyone nodded and hummed appreciatively at that.

“Alright, good,” Sapphire said with determination. Flipping through her notebook, she drew a packet of cue cards from the back and set them before herself. “We are now going to try and find solutions.”

Everyone leaned forward eagerly.

Once again, the air was full of suspense. Possibilities! Endless opportunities!

“So,” Sapphire flipped through her notes. “It seems like we need to fix whatever it was that caused the upset. Maybe a ‘we’re sorry’ sort of ritual, to pacify the spirits?”

There were hums and haws around the table. I nodded vigorously. Sapphire wrote in large ‘we’re sorry’ on a cue card and set that before herself. Then she took another and, while talking, wrote ‘banish’ on it. “We could banish all negativity-”

And that, that’s where it went screwy, if you ask me.

“That’s what we need!” declared Amethyst, gasping in awe at her own revelation. “A banisher!”

“M-hmm,” said Sapphire, “we can-”

“No, we bring in a real expert!” exclaimed Amethyst.

Sapphire just looked at her, shoulders heaving in a sigh.

Amethyst waved her hands as if ushering us all to lean in and share this secret. Except she was now talking super loud and fast. “I know a lady! A real witch! And I mean- she teaches!”

Uh, okay? You’re saying that to a room full of teachers, but okay?

“M-hmm?” Sapphire set down her pen, face completely nonplussed.

“We can have her come and – we don’t even need to tell her what we think! She will just,” Amethyst swept her arm sideways as if clearing the table to spite the floor. “Everything! Clean it all! She’s intuitive!”

“Oh, that could be nice!” chirped in Crystal.

Aurora nodded.

“A real expert!” claimed Amethyst. “And she’s cheap! Only a hundred an hour!”

“A hundred an hour?” asked Sapphire tartly.

“Oh yes!” said Amethyst. “That’s cheap!”

I … wasn’t so sure. Neither were several others. And yet – Amethyst was passionately ranting on, declaring this woman a ‘friend in the Goddess’ and a ‘good, strong soul’ and a ‘really skilled banisher’!

“It won’t hurt to try,” suggested Bjorn.

Sapphire raised her eyebrows.

“I will message her!” Amethyst began rifling in her bosom and pockets. “If she’s available, we must have her come before the children get here-”

“If we decide to call upon her,” said Sapphire tartly.

“I think it’s worth a shot,” said Paulette slowly.

Aurora nodded. “Sometimes a blank slate, without judgment, is the best thing.”

Sapphire nodded slowly while Amethyst typed away at her phone. “This is an emer-gen-cy,” said Amethyst, probably narrating what she was typing. “We need this woman straight aways!”

Sapphire raised an eyebrow. “And, what accreditations does she have?”

“Oh!” Amethyst raised her hands. “She does it all! Fairy reiki, dragon summonings, elf shamanism, elder channeling, you name it!”

Sapphire, to her credit, kept on a very composed face. “Elf shamanism?”

“Yes!”

Uh.

Sapphire stared off into the void as if somehow broken. “Hmm,” was all she said.

I tried to rescue this situation. “Well, I’m sure that if we were to put our heads to it, we could do another ritual that would fix things.”

“I’m not leading another ritual,” said Amethyst tartly.

Sapphire looked to Aurora. “You could, if you’d like. Or I could.”

Amethyst looked pointedly at Aurora. “How experienced are you at banishing? It can get gritty sometimes!”

Aurora kept her cool. “I haven’t led many rituals.”

Amethyst, eyes bulging, pointed to her phone. “This lady has seen it all! Demon summonings, oh!” the phone buzzed and Amethyst grinned. “She says she can be here today!”

“Alright, all in favor of this raise your hand,” said Sapphire grimly, as if she already knew the outcome.

Most of the table raised their hands, to my surprise.

“Hmm,” said Sapphire grimly. To Amethyst, she said “So where was this lady trained?”

“Oh, she’s intuitive,” said Amethyst. “Do I tell her to come?”

Sapphire smiled grimly, like she was telling someone to nail her inside a coffin. “Yes. Do it.”

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Four Part One

I slept awfully that night. An oppressive force soaked through my troubled dreams, and I woke in the middle of the night with the feeling of a weight on my chest.

‘Sleep!’ an angry voice in my head order. ‘Go to sleep you little rat!’

‘Yeah, I’m trying!’ I thought back angrily before flipping over and pressing a pillow over my head.

After that, I slept like a rock, but a rock that was at the bottom of a river, covered in turbulence and being crawled over by bottom feeders and creepy crawlies like that. It was deep, but unpleasant.

I couldn’t remember what had made it so unpleasant when I woke up to the sound of someone else’s alarm going off. No pleasant chimes and chirping of birds from my phone. No, Bjorn’s beep-beep was a full five minutes of sleep ahead of mine.

I wanted to throw a pillow across the room. Five minutes of sleep stolen from me! Five! Whole! Minutes!

Deteremined to get my night’s worth of shut-eye, I put the pillow over my head and rolled over. Blissful rest sifted over me for maybe, oh, a minute? Just enough for me to feel rested and charmingly happy. Then, a woman’s wail belted out, complete with crystals and chimes and healing twang-twangs in the background. I couldn’t recognize any words, but I was sure it was from some chakra awakening disc or something.

I bolted up, smacking my pillow over my legs. No sleep! No sleep for me!

Grumpy beyond reasoning, I rolled out of bed. Grabbing up my stuff, I made my way to the communal men’s bathroom where I had an aggressive shower. About halfway into it, I realized I was throwing a tantrum over five minutes of sleep. A bit ridiculous, if you asked me on a normal day.

So I tried to calm down. I figured this was leftover bad vibes from last night, both from the ritual and my strange sleep. Why would a spirit try and wake me up, only to tell me to go back to sleep? Weird.

I visualized white light coming down from the water spout, hosing me with cleansing properties and washing all my nastiness away. Relaxing, I just stood there and rested, feeling blissful and spiritually happy.

It worked for about five minutes. After that, for whatever fucking reason, the water turned ice cold in a snap. Maybe it was on some sort of timer that was meant to save hot water or something like that. Well, it worked. I got out of there, cursing and swearing under my breath like a very unhappy christian.

Once more in a bad mood, but doing my best to control it, I slapped my clothes on over my damp body and left my hair to its thing and marched out of there.

I got out of there, head down and scowling to myself. There was the math teacher and Sapphire milling around while Crystal and Aurora were lazily making their way to the showers.

“Shoes,” was called after me, and I half smiled to myself before shutting myself into my room. There, I passed a hand in my hair – my very gooey hair. My very, very, conditioned hair.

“Fuck!” I exclaimed, realizing that while I had let the water bathe me from the face down, I’d wholly forgotten to rinse out my hair. Which, by the way, had some very manly conditioner in it. It was supposed to make my hair flex and do push-ups on its own or something.

But I was hell-bent on not going back into the shower, sulking it like a child and feeling like my very adult patience was already running thin. So I toweled off my hair, hoping that that would be enough.

Hint: it was not. But I wasn’t in the habit of checking my reflection before leaving my rooms or apartments. Usually, my hair was fine from the bathroom reflection → where I had obviously not done a check-up, now had I?

Deciding that I was going to be patient and kind today whether I wanted to or not, I left my room, locking it as I went.

“Hey,” said Crystal, walking up to me. She was also freshly showered and just leaving her room, smelling like palo santo and had a big grin on to boot it. But over her shoulder, I saw Amethyst approaching, solemn and dressed in black with no silver.

“Hmm,” I said, deciding that this was going to be an interesting day.

It was. Amethyst walked with me and Crystal and Bjorn, emanating an air of solemn drama. Crystal tried to smile and comment on the beauty of the day (which was beautiful. All sunny and stuff.), but Amethyst gave her a cold stare. Crystal muttered that it was a beautiful day anyways, and that was that. We made our way to the eating hall, where the other teachers and staff were trickling in.

Breakfast was a muted affair. At least it was for me – until someone commented on my hair. I lifted my head at that.

“Done something to your hair?” asked – what was her name again? The math teacher. Paulette! She was sitting across from me in boho styled clothes, her mousy hair in a shoulder-length frizz.

Frowning, I reached up to my hair. It was still slick, but should have dried by now. I made a face. “I forgot to rinse out my conditioner,” I muttered under my breath. Then, with another face, I asked “Does it look that bad?”

She began to giggle hysterically. I couldn’t help but grin at myself.

“Just don’t do that when the students are here,” she said, half-laughing. It made me grin more. Life was fine, I decided. There was stuff to laugh about- and then a loud voice clearing made our faces drop.

Amethyst was standing imperiously, looking around the table as if we were all about to be judged by herself.

Sapphire set down her spoon with a severe expression. “This can wait until after breakfast! Can’t it?”

Amethyst trembled in outrage. “Food is the time to discuss openly-”

“It is a time to rest,” said Sapphire tartly. “And we want everyone’s attention on the issue, not on their food. People might want to take notes.”

“Cakes and ale is always a time for discussion-”

“This is not cakes and ale, this is,” Sapphire looked down the table. “Soy milk and fruit loops. So sit down.”

Amethyst thumped down, eyes teary. She sniffled in a miffed way. I was grateful for the reprieve. I did want to eat in peace.

“This is going to be fun,” muttered Paulette to me as some small chit-chat rose around the table. I raised my eyebrows and nodded.

All too quickly, my bowl of cereal and toasts were gone. Trays were taken away. We were all sitting back down at the table, and Sapphire had taken out a notebook and pen, bearing a painstakingly patient expression.

“Very well,” she said, with the air of a long-patient military commander about to hear about all their troops’ shenanigans. “The floor is open. We will-” Amethyst shot up to her feet. Sapphire’s eyes narrowed but she continued, lifting her right hand “Go around the table starting from my right-”

“Counter-clockwise?!” demanded Amethyst as if this was an outrage.

Sapphire lowered her right hand to lift her left. “Starting from my left. But that means you’re almost last to speak,” she said pointedly at Amethyst.

Amethyst sat back down, nodding like a martyr. Sapphire looked down at her notebook. “So. Here’s how we will proceed. First we are going to discuss our thoughts on last night’s episode. Then, once we’ve all voiced our worries and impressions, we are going to try and brainstorm some ideas. Resolutions.”

Everyone nodded. “Sounds good,” chirped Cheryl.

“So, you have the floor.” Sapphire turned to Aurora, who was directly to her left. I realized with a dismal twist in my stomach that there was only Aurora and Cheryl, then it was my turn to speak.

Aurora took in a breath. Her makeup was on a savage point, all hued in red and purple, her corset laced tightly and her hair in a dramatic updo. But for all that explosion of personality, she was quiet for a moment.

“I think, theoretically, that last night was a disaster, in many senses,” she said. “We definitely started off from a space of impurity, hence the chaos happening, but by allowing such destruction to happen, we’ve made the situation worse. I think. And,” she took a pause, starign down at the table before herself. “I think that there definitely needs to be some action taken. Last night was an improbable coincidence, but I do think it was a sign that something is wrong. Personally, I do not have a big ‘radar’. I don’t sense much. But I do know that such things are often signs from the beyond. So,” and then she shrugged in dismissal. “That’s that.”

Sapphire nodded, scribbling away at her notebook. “Any particular fears? We will get to how to fix this later, for now we’re just focusing on expressing ourselves.”

“Well, I think I speak for everyone when I say,” she looked at Amethyst “that we are all terribly sorry for your loss. Those were cherished pieces for you, and it’s a huge loss to lose a statue, never mind several.”

The table nodded all around (even Sapphire) and Amethyst bowed her head tearily.

“Thank you,” said Sapphire. Then she gestured to Cheryl with a hand. “Cheryl?”

Cheryl inhaled like she was dragging on a cigarette, fingers pressing over her lips. Then she shook her head and let it all out. “It was a bloody frickin’ disaster. I don’t know what went wrong, but that’s bad vibes right there. If there wasn’t any to start out with, there certainly is now. How do fix it, I don’t know,”

“We’ll be getting to that later,” murmured Sapphire.

“Yeah, well,” Cheryl made a face. “We’ve got work to do. That’s where I stand.”

Sapphire nodded and jotted down some more stuff. Then she pointed at me with a palm.

I wanted to hide under the table.

“Uhm,” I fidgeted, then clasped my hands before me on the table. Staring at them, I tried to make sense of everything I felt. “From the perspective of someone who was helping to run the ritual last night,” I paused again, hoping this wouldn’t go over too badly. “I think that perhaps the ritual didn’t go over well.”

There was a pause. Eyebrows raised as if to say ‘you think?’ and I realized I’d probably missed the point.

“What I mean, is, uh, I think something about the ritual made it all go down in flames.”

There was a loud gasp from Amethyst. Everyone else cringed or remained neutral as best they could. Amethyst gawked and looked up and down the table. I cringed so badly.

“I’m sorry, but it didn’t,” oh gulp “feel? Quite right. I uh-”

“How can you say that?” squeaked Amethyst.

Sapphire held up a hand. “Keep on, Thunder.”

I cleared my throat and stared down at my hands. Focus, focus. “I think, and this is maybe just my opinion,” but I doubted it, but I also doubted anyone else would speak up on it. “that the ritual was poorly executed in some way, and that this discord of energy-”

Another outraged gasp.

I barrelled on. “This may have been what caused the fire to get going. It was definitely a sign, but a sign of what? We’ve got to think beyond black and white, bad and good. So, I think we should really, critically, think about ‘why’ the altar went up in flames.”

There was a dramatic pause. I looked around, watching the stiffly poised faces around me, and the shell-shocked look on Amethyst’s face. “I’m done,” I muttered.

“What are you saying?” shrieked Amethyst. “That it’s my fault?”

“Not directly,” I muttered, but the damage was done.

“How can you say that?!” Amethyst shrieked, up on her feet now and trembling with indignation. “I worked so hard on that ritual! I asked you to officiate! I tried so hard, even placing people correctly-”

“Please sit down, it’s not your turn to talk,” said Sapphire dryly.

“Am I not allowed to defend myself?” Amethyst railed.

“You haven’t been attacked. Sit down,” was the command.

Amethyst plunked down, breath heaving and tears barely restrained.

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Three Part Two

The fire licked up the oil, and I jumped back. Amethyst screamed, and suddenly the chair was a fire pit, flames jumping a foot in height.

“Move!” Sapphire was at my side, drawing us back from the fire. “Get back! There’s water in there!”

“My- my – my,” Amethyst tried to reach at the fire, but Sapphire was herding her away. I took the cue and backed away, ushering everyone else to back away. I didn’t quite get what Sapphire meant by the water thing, until I heard the ‘pow!’ of the mason jar of sacred water breaking.

With a giant hiss, the flames burst three feet higher and out to the sides at the contact with the water. It was an inferno.

The chair collapsed sideways, tipping everything onto the grass in a haphazard pile. Having learned our lesson this time, we all backed away even more. But the theatrics were done with. The chair smoldered, the horrid smell of burning plastic filling the air. Amethyst sobbed, hands pressed over her nose and mouth, eyes spilling over with tears as she watched her shrine material burn.

Ouch. Yeah. Nevermind the emotional attachment, there was hundreds of dollars worth of material that had just gone up in flames. During her own ritual. Ouch, ouch.

Trying not to think of all the emotional disaster, I turned to Amethyst. She was sagging against Sapphire, who looked like she didn’t know what to do, but was still holding up Amethyst.

I whisked over to Amethyst’s side. “Dismiss the fire and air,” I said gently. “That’s going to help. Maybe some things can still be salvaged.”

Like a snowman in hell, but hey, it did the trick. Amethyst drew herself back up and, in a tremulous voice, she said “I dismiss you, element of fire! In perfect love and,” here she sobbed “perfect trust.” And then she seemed to pull herself together a little more, repeating the phrase for the element of air. She detached herself from Sapphire and, pointing out her finger, drew back in the circle. Then, stunned, we all stood and watched the smoldering fires.

“A fire extinguisher,” said the security guard, nodding his head. “That’s what we should have on hand.”

“Definitely,” said Sapphire coolly, in a tone that said ‘thanks, Watson’.

Amethyst peered into the rubble. There was no salvaging those poor statues. They had been plastic, and were now twisted lumps of charred yuck. The white sage was still burning with a tiny flame, the shell beneath it cracked. The pyramid was still alive, at least. So was the polymer clay decorations that had been on the wand, which was completely gone.

“Well,” Crystal put an arm around Amethyst’s shoulders. “At least they weren’t summoned into the statues yet.”

Amethyst nodded, eyes tearing again.

“Wow,” muttered Aurora. “I’ve never heard of this sort of thing happening.”

Sapphire was having none of it. “Oil catching fire? Happens in every kitchen. Now-”

“This is a sign!” wailed Amethyst, drawing herself up to glare at Sapphire. “My statues have been burned!”

“Oil catches fire,” said Sapphire tartly.

Well, that drew scowls from even me. Calling this an accident was, well, a bit like saying someone accidentally slapped you in the face. Sure, it can happen, but…

“Alright, look,” Sapphire held up a hand. “It’s late, and we’re all upset. Let’s go to sleep. Meditate on this, collect your thoughts, and we will see what needs to be done tomorrow, alright? How about that?”

Grim nods were held all around. Slowly, we all began to trickle away. I hung back with several others to walk with Amethyst, murmuring comforting words to her. Crystal did the best of it though, an arm around Amethyst and telling her not to worry. “We’ll sort this out,” she said, as if murder had just been committed.

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Three Part One

The sun was beginning to set. It wasn’t quite hitting the horizon, but it was definitely on its way there. We had about, maximum, an hour of light left. I told myself that we should be well done and over with by that time, but I knew it was a lie. We wouldn’t be done until three am, if Amethyst didn’t insist on doing something else special for that occasion.

It was then that I wondered if I was getting paid enough for all this drama. Seriously, I thought, I’m holding ritual with a bunch of random pagans who aren’t even of my particular faith – it’s like a very strange pagan gathering. A very strange one, I thought, taking a look around and especially at the corgi-turned-witch.

“Merry meet, everyone!” cheered Amethyst as our little troupe of mish-mashed pagans arrived at the fire pit. A fire was already crackling there, a bit crooked and piled precariously high. “Brightest blessings and -” her eyes landed on me, then flicked to Sapphire. “No ritual robes?”

I shrugged and held up my wand. “Brought a stick!” I said playfully.

There was several snorts, as my wand was a bit more than a stick. It was a carefully carved twist of wood with engravings → but it might as well have been a stick for the big frown that it brought up on Amethyst’s face.

“No robes?”

I waved my wand feebly, hoping to redeem myself. But it flopped like cold spaghetti onto the floor. Amethyst looked at me with a frown. “You’re not even wearing black.”

I looked down. Green t-shirt, jeans, brown shoes… Okay, maybe not the witchiest attire but… one look to Sapphire’s gray suit and I figured it couldn’t be all that bad.

“Ritual robes are not necessary for many of the faith,” said Sapphire primly.

“Yes, actually,” said Aurora.

Amethyst’s frown settled on Sapphire, then hopped around. Then, just as she was trying to smile, she looked down. Her eyes landed on the irreverently dressed corgi. She paused. Her eyes looked to Sapphire, who smirked.

Ruffling her shawls around herself, Amethyst cleared her throat. The group began to settle around the fire pit. I tentatively stepped to her side, but that wasn’t good enough. “You go here,” and she positioned me beside her, then began flitting around positioning people. I stared on in abject shock as she had Bjorn stand switch places with the math teacher, then ordered Crystal and Aurora to swap sides of the fire. Then she fretted, frowning at the principal. “I just don’t know where you go,” Amethyst huffed, wringing her hands.

The principal flashed a smile that was a bit nasty and gestured to the earth beneath her. “I go right here.”

The innuendo flew like an unseen dove over Amethyst’s head. “No, no, maybe over here?” And she gestured to beside Bjorn, then while the principal walked over, Amethyst shook her head and pointed a little more to the left. Biting down on her patience visibly, Sapphire stood there, which just so happened to be on the polar end of the circle from where I was standing. Our eyes met and I tried a feeble smile. She raised an eyebrow. My smiled widened.

“Ah! Perfection!” Amethyst crowed as she ran around the circle to come and stand beside me, to my right. “Now!” she turned around and gestured us back. “We need to include the altar! Widen the circle! Bigger circle, everyone!”

Indeed, just behind where I had been standing, outside of the circle of light of the fire, was one of the chairs, covered with a cloth beneath which poked up various things. Curious excitement and morbid realism clashed within me.

On one hand, I was all ‘ooo, flashy wiccan goodies! I wonder what kind of statues she brought!’, but the realistic part of me figured it was going to be badly painted plastic things with pointed breasts and giant phalluses that could knock out a satyr. Good grief, the stuff was probably a glitter fest and hideous.

Amethyst shuffled the chair/altar farther into the light of the circle, getting it dangerously close to the fire.

“Watch the fire,” said Sapphire, ever the grim voice of reason.

“It’s not too close,” said Crystal.

“Just close enough,” beamed Amethyst, rushing around to check its distance. I found it a tad bit close, but hey. It wasn’t catching on fire and it wasn’t my stuff.

Satisfied with her altar, Amethyst drew the cloth back from it, revealing all her goodies. A crooning of oohs and aahs went up from nearly everyone. As a whole, the group leaned forward to look.

There was several statues to say an understatement. There was a small army of statues would be more accurate.

There was a dragon statue. There was three fairies, one sitting on a moon and all with glittering wings. There was a chunky buddha, the lucky one that was laughing and with a bag slung over his shoulder. There was three goddesses on a stand, the triple moon framed behind them. There was a pan with (mercifully) no whack-a-mole penis. There was even a Kali, dancing on her husband’s body with a lolling tongue.

“We have everything we need!” cheered Amethyst, shaking her arms in the air as if this was the first step to victory.

“Did you buy all these today?” asked Sapphire, seemingly in awe of the army.

“Only some, the rest are part of my shrine,” said Amethyst with a cheerful flap of the hand. “Now,” she began pointing at the rest of the shrine things. “We have white sage, a seashell to burn it in, all the pink salt we need,” which apparently, was a whole jar full of the stuff “we have moon water,” a large jar of it “our candle holders for the elements,” which, oh goddess, were each sculpted things with pointy breasts and large phalluses “incense,” because apparently we needed stick incense as well. “The bell,” an ornate thing with leaves and twigs on it. “The sacred oil,” a little glass decanter full of what looked like seasoned olive oil. “a pyramid,” a pink crystal pyramid the size of a palm, because why not? “and!” she drew up the piece de resistance. Which was, just to rub Sapphire the wrong way, two circlets.

“To represent the Goddess and God,” said Amethyst, beaming as she held them up. “No one will be wearing them,” she flashed a smile at the very stoic Sapphire. “But they will remain on the shrine.”

Sapphire flashed back a similarly double meaning smile. Glowing with her victory, Amethyst placed them at the head of the shrine.

Aurora piped up. “You do know you’re not supposed to burn the white sage in the shell, right? It’s offensive to lots of Native American beliefs.”

“Yeah,” I muttered.

Amethyst flashed her beaming smile. “I’ve never heard of that. But White Sage is purifying, so it’ll destroy any negativity from the shell,” and she flipped a hand at Aurora to dismiss that idea.

The principal raised her eyebrows and folded her arms across her chest. It really was too bad she was straight across from me. Her face was just too expressive right now.

But Aurora wasn’t done. “Are you lighting a candle for each of the elements?”

Amethyst nodded as she rearranged everything on the altar a final time.

“So a flame is going to represent the element of water?” asked Aurora slowly.

The principal snorted, badly disguising it as a cough, then she seemingly did choke on herself and coughed. Bjorn was grinning widely.

Amethyst drew herself up, readjusting her shawl on her shoulders primly. “The flames represent their presence, their essence, and their spirit!” Then, waving her arms as if to dispel any more questions, she said “We are going to begin!”

Okay, well, that was a way to start things off.

Everyone shuffled their stance a little wider, as if bracing themselves for what was to come. Deep breaths were had. But that was all before me, in the rest of the circle. Amethyst was already beginning, sweeping her arms out and upwards to the sky, letting out a warbling cry.

Warbling was the word for it. It wasn’t one note, nor was it several clear or distinct ones. It was a battle cry of sorts. Or perhaps a dying wail of all our prides and prejudices giving up the ghost.

Dramatically Amethyst thrust her hands down, as if flicking lots of goo off herself while uplifting her face to the stars that had begun peeking out.

Oh, I insanely regretted being here. I wanted to break circle and leave – would it really be breaking circle if the circle hadn’t been cast yet?

But already, it was too late for that. With a flair of the arm, Amethyst picked up her wand from the side of the altar. Gulp. Here we go.

Like a certain video game character, Amethyst struck a pose, wand up in the air and legs braced for war. In a large arc, she drew the wand down to point towards the ground at our backs. “Above, below, and in the in-betweens, I cast a circle! So MOTE IT BE!” she fairly boomed out the words.

Well, I thought as she began walking around us. She was stern-faced and stiffly holding out her wand to trace the circle in the air about us. In the back of my mind, I couldn’t help but think that if there was wildlife observing us, they’d be startled by our strange social rituals. And, oh my, suppose a Christian was to drive by? It was a good thing the building blocked us from the view of the road…

My mind was racing with humiliated thoughts as Amethyst marched back. She drew the circle closed behind me, drawing the line up and seemingly sewing it shut with her wand. She then turned to face the rest of us, belting out “The circle is cast! As above, so below!”

Pretty sure that wasn’t how that phrase was supposed to be used, but oh well.

“Yay,” muttered someone, unironically.

Amethyst stood there, glaring off into the space between us. The fire crumbled on itself a little, shifting as it tumbled lower.

Amethyst placed her wand back on the altar. Then she selected the white sage, the shell, and drew a lighter from her bra. “Here, hold this in sacred trust,” she said, handing me the shell.

Uh, okay. I held it carefully in both hands, the papers tucked under my arm. On first try, Amethyst lit the white sage bundle. “Thank you,” she said loudly, taking the shell from me and setting the white sage in it.

Well if we had any hard of hearing spirits around, at least they could hear us.

Then, like a video game character having unlocked something, she thrust the sage and shell up into the air. “I cleanse this space, by the power of the ancients, ancestors of all, sacred lineage, and powers within!” She fairly bellowed before beginning to march around behind us, waving around the white sage that was still sitting in the shell.

The sage burned well (always a good sign), the smoke wafting out and out as Amethyst walked around. In fact, there was a lot of sage smoke going around. A heckton. A lot times a lot. The air was turning thick and mist-like when Amethyst finally placed the sage bundle back upon the altar. My nostrils were burning with the smell.

Amethyst straightened beside me, taking in deep breaths with her eyes closed and arms lifted a little at her side. Bjorn sneezed into his sleeve. Drawing a final deep breath, Amethyst opened her eyes. With purpose, one could say, she strode the step to the altar and picked up the incense. With a flick of the lighter, she set the stick a-burnin’. Again, she held it dramatically high, declaring that it was lit in so many words. “By this incense, living proof of fire and air,” say what? Everybody knows fire and air exist? “I cleanse this circle!”

Once more, she marched around, wafting the stick. I began to feel sleepy. And irritated. And bored. I looked down into my papers, and saw that I didn’t have anything to do until the elements, watchtowers, and Goddesses were invoked. Then I had to invoke the phallus-thumping god with flowery words and – oh my. Such words. Much phallus, much thump, as the internet would say.

I was still staring in dismay at these words when Amethyst returned, doing a final waft with the incense. It smelt sweet, but there was a hint of acrid in the air. Maybe it was cheap incense.

Humming loudly, Amethyst then poured a chunk of pink salt into the sacred water. She shook the jar, still humming with her eyes closed. Then, holding it aloft in what I was going to call the ‘hero pose’ she declared that she was, by this water and salt, “living proof of water and earth, consecrating this circle to the sacred work of the Goddess and God!”

Well, that was it. Now she was doing another lap and we were all just standing there. Boredom settled in even harder.

Alright, focus Thunder, I told myself. This doesn’t have to be painful unless you make it! Focus on the numenous! Focus, my friend!

So I closed my eyes, took deep breaths, and tried to feel. But there was that acrid smell in the back of my throat. There was no wind, there was just smoke. I felt irritated, like I was itchy all over. Something just felt wrong. Annoyingly wrong.

Wow, I thought to myself, I’m being such a jerk. I mean, this isn’t my way of doing a circle, but I really shouldn’t be so judgemental, right?

So I made sure to put on a smile when Amethyst finished her last lap, sprinkling salted water in all directions. She beamed at me, then at the circle, and placed the salt back on the altar.

She picked up the oil and struck a two-handed ‘hero pose’. “Oh, great Goddess and God! Bless this oil with your purity of thought and power, so that we may be like you in our essences!”

Then, solemn as she could be, she turned to me, tipping the decanter over with her finger plugged in it. So unsanitary. “Blessed be,” she said emotionally before reaching down and sprinkling my feet with the oil. She then repeated the phrase, sprinkling my knees, my hips, my chest, and my face.

It was a good thing I wasn’t wearing something that I didn’t mind getting olive oil stains on, I thought grouchily in the back of my mind.

On she went, blessing every one in the circle like that. Alright, I may be a stick in the mud, but that blessing was usually reserved for the high priest and high priestess to do to each other.

So guess what? I waited for my turn to bless her, watching attentively as she went around the circle and blessed every single one.

Except when she took her stand by my side, she didn’t hand me the sacred oil. Instead, she blessed herself, murmuring ‘Blessed be’ and sprinkling herself all the way up.

I had to stop myself from gaping. How? Why? What?

Then, beaming as if she was fully enlightened now, Amethyst placed the oil back onto the altar. Alright, okay, I thought. Let’s move on to – I checked my papers – the watchtowers. Good gods I was bored.

Of course, thinking you are bored in a ritual is just asking for trouble, right? Spirits love to play tricks and we seemed like the perfect victims.

As she reached for a candleholder, Amethyst knocked over the sacred oil with her arm. Splat! Oil splattered over the altar, dousing the Kali statue and beginning to pour out onto the chair.

“Oops!” Amethyst snatched up the bottle, chuckling to herself. “Guess they wanted a blessing too!” and she set the oil bottle upright. Then, smiling to herself, she picked up the candleholder.

It was painted with white swirls on a black background, with the silhouette of a hunky man on it. Perched atop it all was a tall candle.

Clearing her throat, Amethyst picked up her papers that she had folded into a corner of the altar. I groaned inside, thinking that if there was enough of an incantation that she needed to read it, we’d be here a while.

And I was right.

“oh, element of air! Brilliance of the mind, wind of the sky,

Oh, element of intellect! Element of the high mountains that caress the sky,”

I groaned inside, annoyed and so annoyed. Just annoyed. On and on Amethyst waxed, invoking the element until she dramatically lit the candle, culminating with a “I summon you!”

Oh, finally, I thought as she set that candle holder back onto the altar in the small puddle of oil that was collected there. Now only three times more of that to go. Ughhhh.

Amethyst picked up the next candleholder, which was fire, symbolized by bright orange flames painted all over the candleholder, which was in the shape of another hunky man. And then, lighter in one hand and candleholder in the other, the invocation began.

I sighed. Alright, I did it. I really, really, was fed up. I was tired, sick of this, and was it me or that acrid smell was just getting worse? What element of air had she invoked?

A wind picked up, wafting the fire towards us. The smell got worse, like the smell of burning plastic –

OH SHIT! I thought, as something clicked into place in my head and I stared at the altar chair, very much a plastic lawn chair coated in oil next to a fire that was blowing towards it.

Okay, stay calm, I thought. Just pull the chair away from the fire.

So I stepped towards the fire just as Amethyst finished her schpiel and lit the candle. “What are you doing?” asked Amethyst, still using her boombox voice mode.

“Just pulling this away from the fire,” I muttered as I tried to drag it back. But it wouldn’t drag. And just then, Amethyst set the candle of fire onto the altar.

I’mma go out there and say that, ritually speaking, it was a bad move. She set the element of fire onto the almost burning chair. What could go wrong?

Fwoosh. The tip of the chair, which I suppose had been smoldering until then (hence the horrible acrid smell), officially caught fire.

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Two part Two

Sapphire. Did she always walk into places like a breath of cool, no-nonsense fresh air? Or more like a tornado? Or, would she some days bring a bit of laughter and cheer with herself?

Staring at the work on my laptop, I thought about these very important (not) questions. What sort of things did Sapphire like? What was her service dog called? What were her core beliefs, the things that fueled her life forward?

“Thunder!”

“Jesus!” I yelled, jumping up in my chair and nearly toppling the whole thing over.

Sapphire stepped up to my side, corgi in tow. Her arms were crossed over her chest and a smirk was on her lips. “The irony of that, in this place,” she said.

I shook my head, trying not to feel like an idiot. “I’m sorry, I was – focused.”

“At least you weren’t masturbating,” she said flatly. “Your door was open so I just came in. I’ll be sure to knock next time.”

I nodded some more, like a bobblehead. “Sure.” And then I couldn’t stop myself from adding. “And walk loudly too, just for safety.”

She smiled. Oh my gods, she actually smiled. It was a beautiful thing. And then it vanished.

“So,” she took a look at my computer screen, then back at me. “How goes the work? Are your course plans ready?”

“Yes, I uh- getting ready.”

She leveled me a serious look. “Getting?”

I held up a hand. “Very much nearly there. Don’t worry. I’ll be ready in a day.”

“Good. That’s what I want to hear. Have you gone over the students? Their names and faces?”

“Uh, yes.” Just a little, and it showed in my voice. Another ‘serious look’ from her.

“I’ll have a good grasp by the time they arrive,” I said. “I usually learn their names better in person.”

She nodded curtly. “Everyone does. Do you have any concerns or things you wanted to talk to me about?”

“Uh, no?”

Her eyebrows rose. “Really?”

I paused, looking from her to my computer. “Physics is pretty straight-forward. I’ve been teaching it for a while. I mean,” I held up my hands. “I’ve gone over the sample meditations for the beginning of classes. I can do that. Everything else seems pretty under control. So,”

“Oh,” she looked at the window. “Alright. Good.” Then, looking down at her corgi, she said “You’re the first one without questions today.”

“Oh,” was I supposed to have questions?

“Which is fine,” she added sharply to me. “As long as you’re sure? No worries? Some are particularly worried about the state of this building.”

I pressed my lips together. “Well, I uh, haven’t, uh,” I shrugged limply. “No. I,”

Sapphire smiled at me. My brain drew a complete blank.

“Well, don’t hesitate to let me know if there are any pressing issues.” She straightened even more and the smile vanished. “Have a good day. Lunch is soon, by the way.”

“Oh, yeah, thanks,” I said, sounding every bit absent-minded and weird. I watched her reflection in the window leave. Within a few seconds, she knocked on Crystal’s door.

“Shoes!” was heard, predictably.

I chuckled to myself. Then, with a sigh, I returned to my classwork. Yep, it was going to go well.

I remember, very distinctly, wondering what could possibly go wrong.

Hah. Hahahaha.

////

Lunch was a grueling affair. Amethyst raved on about how we needed more time! More time!

“I spent all morning writing this ritual- and I just feel so compelled to, like, cleanse this place inside and outside and-”

I speared my fried eggs, and raised my eyebrows at Bjorn. He smiled back cheekily. I silently wondered how many times Amethyst would say the word ‘feel’ in a conversation.

As it turned out, a lot. A frickin’ lot. Even Crystal’s eyes seemed to be getting glazed over by the time that Amethyst dabbed her eyes with a corner of her shawl and announced “I’m getting emotional.”

I couldn’t be the only one who wanted to roll my eyes at that.

“Must be the energy,” said Crystal gently.

“This place is SO unstable!” sobbed Amethyst, tears running down her cheeks.

“It has been cleansed, you know,” said the principal under her breath from the other end of the table.

“By who?” wailed Amethyst. “I still feel so much residual -”

“A shaman,” said Sapphire tartly to her plate. “A Mohawk.”

There was a silence. Bjorn nodded wisely, leaning back in his chair to say to her around Crystal. “That sounds like good.”

Like good?

“Very good,” said Sapphire stiffly. “They did a nice job.” she leaned forward conspiratorially, eyes flashing above a smirk. “You should have felt the place before they came by.”

“Why did you ever take this place?” wailed Amethyst. “It’s going to cause us nothing but trouble!”

Sapphire set her utensils down with her napkin on her plate. “It was a decision with the investors.”

Well, yep. True. I nodded. Investors were a thing. She probably didn’t have all that much say in everything some times-

“But this place, can’t you just feel -”

“Well, it’s what we have,” said Sapphire as she rose, collecting her tray. “I expect you to still perform your best, and to keep the theatrics away from the students.” She leveled a glare around the table. “We don’t need them to start making up ghost stories as excuses.”

“But what if- oh no no No!” Amethyst threw her napkin down like it was the proverbial medieval glove. “We have to do this ritual before the children arrive! We can’t have them here like this!”

“Suit yourself,” said the principal in a calm tone. She turned to walk away, and I faintly wished I was doing the same.

“We’ll do it tonight!” Amethyst called out to her. Sapphire nodded, dumping her tray in its allocated spot. She was walking away when Amethyst jumped up and shouted out “You’ll have to be there!”

Sapphire froze, even her back looking unhappy. She turned around, face neutral.

“Pardon?” she asked as if this was a bad joke.

“We need to be thirteen!” pleaded Amethyst. “You can’t not be there! Or the whole energy will be off!”

Sapphire paused. “We are thirteen?”

“Yes!” Amethyst burst. The table nodded.

Sapphire paused. Then, with a shrug she said “If you insist on doing it tonight. But the second security guard will be arriving tomorrow in the evening, as will our social worker and psychologist. So,” she held up her hands. “You could wait until then.”

“Oh no!” Amethyst looked around the table desperately. “Then we won’t be thirteen!”

If telepathy was a thing, we all heard the ‘so what?’ and a few curse words that went through the principal’s mind.

But Sapphire was collected, she was cool, and she was a professional. She would not swear in front of us, I was sure of it. Instead she folded her hands before herself and tilted her head to the side in an understanding sort of way. “Is it that important to you?”

Amethyst looked ready to choke. I half expected her to start seizing or something. “We need to be thirteen! Haven’t you -”

“There are many covens that aren’t specifically thirteen members,” interrupted Aurora.

“Exactly,” said Sapphire calmly. “But if it will put your mind at rest, I will participate.”

“Oh, thank you!” crowed Amethyst. Holding out her arms, she rushed towards Sapphire for a hug. Sapphire turned to walk away – and got hugged from behind. Amethyst squeezed the very stiff figure, sniffling through tears. “We’ll all get through this together!”

Oh, Goddess.

 

That afternoon, Amethyst supposedly went to the nearest supply shop to get all the necessaries for the ritual.

“I think she’s a bit high strung,” said Crystal, standing on one foot by my desk.

“A little,” I said testily. Crystal smiled at me.

“She runs her own coven,” said Crystal. “She’s very qualified.”

I had already guessed the coven part. High priestesses were – just a breed of their own I supposed. Not that high priests were any better (hah!).

“I just hope the ritual will go well,” I said flatly. I didn’t want to have a headache argument over who was more ‘spiritually qualified’ than who. I didn’t want to hear about why one ritual might work better than another. For all I cared, this place ought to be plenty clean enough. I mean, my nightmares were probably just normal teaching anxiety.

Crystal hummed, fidgeting with a dreadlock. Then, looking intently at a bead in her haid, she asked too casually “You’ve got weird vibes about this place, don’t you?”

I nodded half heartedly. “Yeah. But-”

“Oh, me too!” she gasped as if this was such a relief. “Aurora thinks I’m exaggerating and I know that it’s already been cleansed but-” she plopped down onto the edge of my bed. “Don’t you think it feels weird around here?”

I nodded, wondering how I was going to get her out of my room now, without being rude.

As it turned out, I wasn’t able to. Crystal talked and talked about these ‘just weird’ nightmares she’d had last night, and about how the principal was ‘way too strict’ and how ‘the children are going to pick up on this’ and how the sun didn’t even seem to shine around here.

“It’s just always so cloudy!” she was saying as someone knocked on my rooms’ doorframe.

“Hey,” said Aurora.

“Hey!” we said in unison. Crystal schooched over on the bed and patted it, inviting Aurora over in all her gothic glory.

Great, another person in here. Now how was I going to get my stuff done?

“So, does anyone else have a bad feeling about this ritual tonight?” Aurora asked as she sat down on the bed.

I wanted to slam my head on the desk. Crystal, however, lit into it like feelings were the new drug.

“I really don’t know!” she said.

And bam. Another hour or so gone. My eyes were dry and I was downright grouchy when the time came for supper.

I made the mistake of not outrunning anyone on the walk over there. Had I done that, I wouldn’t have been just picking up a bowl when Amethyst burst into the eating hall.

“Nobody eat!” she shrieked, running in with papers in one hand and a giant eco-friendly shopping bag under her other arm, bursting full of stuff.

The chef raised her eyebrows, just about to ladle chow mein into my bowl. I almost reached across the counter to pour it in. But Amethyst rushed up to us, panting.

“What are you all thinking?” She looked around the hall, but we were all in the one line at the counter. “We need to do the ritual! Have you forgotten?” And she shoved the papers at me, all crinkled and sweaty from her grip.

Sapphire’s cool voice rang out. “Yes, but it’s supper time. We can do ritual after-”

“Oh no! A beginner’s mistake! You see, the cakes and ale is for after the ritual -”

“I think she knows that,” I muttered, but Amethyst wasn’t listening, preaching as if our principal was an uneducated Baptist or something.

“You see, fasting is very potent,” said Amethyst, beaming at everyone. “Our magic will be pure and-”

“Your food’ll be cold,” said the chef, nonplussed with this whole idea.

Amethyst smiled in a way that said ‘elementary, dear Watson’. “There’s a microwave, I’m sure.”

We all looked around. There was, indeed, a lonely black microwave in the corner of the kitchen.

“I have all the essentials,” Amethyst was babbling, rifling in her eco-friendly shopping bag. I took a look at the papers in my hand. Namely, I noticed the thickness and the quantity of the print on the page.

Hopefully, I split the stack in two and tried to hand her half. “You’ll want your half,” I mumbled.

“Oh, no, that is your half!” she said cheerfully, waving a hand at me.

Aw, fuck. How long was this ritual going to be?

“So! I will go set up! Everyone, in ritual robes and makeup and-”

“Robes?” echoed Sapphire in a disbelieving tone.

Amethyst ignored her. “And bring your wands and whatever you want charged with protective energy!” Then she beamed again at everyone.

Cheryl took off her apron and fairly threw it onto the counter. Sapphire looked like she wanted to hit herself over the head with something brick-like. Aurora looked tense. Crystal, however, looked so thrilled.

“Okay,” I muttered. “I’ll uh, get my stuff.”

We walked like a very unhappy troupe to the staff’s quarters. No one said much on the way there, and less as we all split off into our own rooms.

I’ll admit, a bunch of silly thoughts went through my head as I began grabbing my stuff. It’s always exciting, preparing for a ritual. You get to see an aspect of people you don’t normally see. It’s an intimate glimpse into them. So, naturally, hormones raging, I wondered what Sapphire would be wearing. A flowing skirt? Horus eyes?

I was being an idiot, obviously. It didn’t matter what she wore, because it was none of my business. She was my boss.

So I grabbed my wand, drew out a crystal from my stash to have it charged with protective energy, and took a moment to leaf through the ritual. Holy fucks. It was full of long poetry, so much so that I wouldn’t be surprised if we were drawing down the moon and the sun and stars, just for the fucks of it all. What, did she copy out the full Wiccan Rede into here? The Charge of the Goddess as well? For fuck’s sake.

I left my room and was nearly attacked by Bjorn. In fact, the guy did pretend to attack me, bearing a sword and all.

“JESUS!” I yelled, shielding myself with the ritual papers from this viking that had just burst out of nowhere. Because, uh, yeah. Bjorn was wearing leather cuffs, a rugged one hundred percent natural fibers shirt that was beige, pants and a leather belt, and the giant sword. There was even a drinking horn at his belt.

Bjorn laughed, swinging his sword up onto his shoulder. Then, laughter done with, he chuckled at me. “You’re not getting dressed?” As if it was a capital crime.

“I don’t,” I shrugged and looked down at myself. “No robes.”

“Oh,” said Crystal, appearing behind me. She was dressed much the same, but had a shawl on, and was bearing even more necklaces and had a wand in hand.

One by one, everyone else appeared. It was a shocking revelation for each. The chef, Cheryl, came out in full viking gear, with a small spear with runes on it. Aurora looked like she’d taken a bath in her gothic makeup palette, and was wearing ripped stockings and a lolita skirt. The math teacher, Paulette, was wearing boho chic with a modern witch’s hat on. Maria, the phys ed teacher, was wearing a medieval dress that just so happened to look extremely witchy.

And then Sapphire stepped out of her room.

She may as well have come out with a cloud of smoke, bats flying and stars sparkling in her hair, for what it was worth. Everyone had obviously been waiting for her by the stares she received. And, just to set the record straight, she was wearing the exact same suit as before. Her hair hadn’t changed. Her makeup hadn’t changed. But what had changed –

“Aww!” crooned Crystal, crouching down. “She’s in ritual gear!”

Indeed, the little corgi, grinning in that way corgis do, had on a little costume cape and witch’s hat tied onto its head. It was so adorable and hilarious, I wanted to crack up laughing.

“Alright,” said the principal primly. Then, eyeing Crystal she said “Don’t pet her.” Crystal ‘awwed’ and straightened. Sapphire straightened her shoulders and looked around. “Let’s do this.”

Welcome to Circlet School ~ Chapter Two Part One

Put up wards, she said. It will be fine, she said. Well, fuck no!

I’d set up my shrine, as any good pagan will do. I then prayed to the Goddess and God and asked them to protect my room from oogie boogie activity. Then, even though I was exhausted, I sprinkled salt all around my room. So far, it seemed good. Sure, the window looked cold and menacing, but a curtain would surely fix that.

I went to bed damned and determined to be positive about this venture. Sure, the place was haunted. But we were Wiccans! That shouldn’t be a problem. Witches unite! What good were we if we constantly fled from supernatural activity?

This, I decided, was going to be a great venture. I put my head on the pillow, closed my eyes, and told myself that yes, all was going to be good.

And then the nightmares struck.

I was in a dark corridor in a school. Monsters crawled over the walls, hanging with caterpillar like bodies and moth like faces with wings for mouths. Wow, I thought, the children have grown.

I pushed a door, and entered a classroom. There, the seats were filled with monsters. Saliva drooling, axe-bearing, monsters. They watched me with fly-like eyes, their large bodies bulging from the seats.

Wow, I thought. Still not combing their hair, I see. What brats!

‘Brats’ stuck in my mind as I jolted awake.

Sitting up in bed, I looked around. What the hot fuckery was that? What the-?

My tiny room looked back at me. Suddenly, I was envious of the principal for having a service dog. Something alive to keep her company when she woke up.

I rolled out of bed and stood, stretching. What time was it? Was it too early? What had woken me up, aside from the nightmare?

Checking my cellphone, I found it to be six am. Fabulous. Just a tad bit early, but not too bad, really.

Trying not to sulk about the sleep I lost, I kneeled before my shrine for a moment of prayer. I closed my eyes and relaxed, focusing my thoughts on the God and Goddess, asking them for insight about the dream. A state of peace came over me and I felt revelations flowing to me, like a gateway was opening. I remembered the principal speaking about the residential school and-

It was brutally interrupted by a viking voice roaring “RAGNAROOOOOOK”.

Metal guitars chimed in and music began wailing from the room next to mine, then was silenced mid-riff.

“Sorry!” our residential viking’s voice called out. “Forgot to turn off my alarm!”

I wanted to slam my head against the wall. Alright, I was cranky now. Very cranky. I hated getting interrupted mid-prayer, mid-ritual, mid-sacred stuff.

Okay, okay. I tried to refocus. Ground, channel my thoughts, and focus on the God and Goddess. But my mojo was broken. I couldn’t stop thinking about Ragnarooooook. Ugh.

Giving up, I shed my sleep gear (not a onesie, normal respectable pajamas) and dressed in the first thing that touched my hand. Jeans and a plain black t-shirt. Then, in my socks, I walked out to go to the bathroom at the end of the hall.

In the hallway, I crossed paths with the principal walking away from the bathroom. She was in a long-sleeved shirt and pressed pants, and shoes. “Good morning,” we chimed in at each other, her in a steely voice and me drowsy. Then, over her shoulder, she called at me. “Shoes!”

Oh, goodness. I pinched the brow of my nose and fairly ran into the bathroom.

In the eating hall, half an hour later, I was sitting across a table from the ‘viking dude’.

“I’m so sorry about the alarm,” he said for the umpteenth time.

I chewed on that, deciding about hexing him or not. I’m joking. Of course I shouldn’t be hexing. Plus it was against the rules of this damned place.

“No problem,” I muttered before taking another bite of cereal.

“I’m really, so sorry,” he said.

“That alarm has got to go,” said Crystal as she dropped her tray down next to him. “Hi Thunder,” she said to me.

I grunted around my cereals.

The viking began apologizing again. Crystal nodded, propping her feet up on the bench beside me. Bare feet.

“You need shoes,” I said, gulping down my mouthful.

Crystal winked at me. “She won’t notice if I keep my feet up like this.”

That might have worked if the staff weren’t all congregating around the same table, being ours. Aurora arrived, the cook left the kitchen to come sit, and I found myself sitting in the middle of everyone with what looked like an empty spot beside me.

Once more, people introduced themselves. I began trying to keep track of names. Amethyst was the shawled woman – still wearing so much black and silver. Bjorn was the viking. Cheryl was the chef.

“Shoes,” announced the principal, seemingly appearing out of nowhere with her tray.

Crystal lowered her feet guiltily. The principal plopped her tray next to me, her corgi shuffling to lay down beneath her. The principal sat, straight-backed and cold of aura. Her hair was impeccable, there was a hint of eyeliner, and her lips were a sraight line.

I tried not to stare. She looked tired, but strict as ever. Butterflies did their thing in my stomach. I focused on my cereal, hoping not to spill them on myself.

Chatter resumed, somewhat quieter. Hahaha. As if.

“I had such bad dreams last night!” announced Amethyst tearfully for the whole world and the other ones beyond to hear. It would have been an excellent summoning.

The principal looked completely nonplussed as she buttered her toast.

“Those poor children! I couldn’t help but think of them all night-”

The principal opened a sachet of sugar and dumped it into her coffee.

One by one, voices chimed in. Most hadn’t slept well. All felt terrible for the ‘poor children’. The principal focused on her food, nodding as she listened.

“I dreamed I was teaching a class full of monsters,” I piped in.

“Hopefully not a prediction,” said the principal dryly, knocking twice on the wooden table.

“How can you say that?” wailed Amethyst. “Children have died and suffered here!”

I’m a teacher, I thought groggily. That’s why.

But I had to admit. Compared to everyone else’s overflowing sympathy, my dream was terribly badly placed.

“Ritual has been done,” said the principal crisply. “But if you feel more needs to be done, you are welcome to do so.” She nodded at the chef. “I’m sure there is enough salt in the kitchen for everyone to use-”

“Oh but we must use himalayan salt!” squeaked Amethyst. “And, you know, it’s supposed to sit on the altar for a moon’s cycle for it to be blessed!”

The principal’s face remained stoically neutral. “If you feel the need-”

“We should do a ritual!” Amethyst fanned her hands (and arms, and shawls) around herself as if to draw in everyone’s aura to her. “We must!”

Bjorn didn’t seem completely thrilled. We exchanged a look, but shrugged. Crystal was alert and nodding quickly. Farther down, the chef was captivated and Aurora seemed interested.

“The souls of these children need to be released!” wailed Amethyst.

The principal’s eyebrows rose, but she bit into her toast.

“Let me see, we will have to do a banishing of all negativity,” Amethyst said, looking up at the ceiling as if answers were written there. “We will have to invoke Demeter-”

“Evoke, I hope you mean,” said the principal starchly.

“Sorry?” said Amethyst, totally not sorry.

“You’re not allowed to bring a deity into yourself,” said the principal while stirring her coffee. “But you may summon, so that means evoking, not invoking.”

“Oh, yes,” said Amethyst feebly. But then she waved her arms and re-invigorated herself. “A banishing! What moon phase are we in?”

There was a rustle of phones being drawn out.

“Waxing,” someone announced.

Amethyst sighed loudly. “That will not do! We will have to wait for the waning!”

“Or you could just do it tonight,” said the principal. “The students will be arriving in three days, you don’t have much time to do this.”

“On a waxing moon?” Amethyst was gaping as if, well, as if someone had contradicted her.

“Some would say it doesn’t matter,” said the principal flatly.

“I agree,” chirped in the chef, Cheryl.

“If we raise enough energy, it should be fine,” said Crystal happily.

Amethyst was still gaping. “but the moon-”

“Or wait,” said the principal, standing. “but you all have three days before the students get here. I suggest you get your classes in order, as well as familiarize yourself with their names and faces. It’s all in the emails.”

The principal walked away, and something inside me sighed wistfully. But then she was out of the hall, and it was silent.

Amethyst was flustered. “I can’t believe she isn’t staying to help!”

“She probably still has plenty to do,” I mumbled. Like the rest of us, actually. This wasn’t going to be a cakewalk.

“But we have spirits here!” Amethyst’s eyes grew wide. “These poor children-”

“Well,” Bjorn leaned back in his chair, massive frame stretching his shirt out as he straightened. “Didn’t she say she’d already had the place cleansed? It can probably wait.”

I nodded at that.

But Amethyst did certainly not nod. “I feel like this is pressing. These children, all this pain- it is going to transfer into our school year if we are not careful!”

Crystal nodded empathetically. I sensed drama. Then came the kicker.

“I’ll write out the ritual,” said Amethyst with a haughty sniff. “I’m a high priestess, I can do that.”

I almost smacked my face with a palm. Oh, good gods. As if it took a special Goddess-given stamp to be able to write rituals. But okay, sure.

“In my coven,” began Amethyst, and my eyes wanted to glaze over.

But, as it turned out, most of us didn’t have covens. So everyone listened with rapt attention, thoroughly impressed or at least interested. I have to say, I was curious. I didn’t attend other rituals aside from those of my coven that often, and sometimes I found their going-ons to be thoroughly dramatic and binge-worthy.

Amethyst went on and on about how, in her coven this and in her coven that. “There must always be the high priest and the high priestess,” she went on so passionately. “Otherwise the whole ritual will be imbalanced and the whole energy will be just so off and-”

Okay, my eyes did glaze over for a few minutes there. Did she think we didn’t know any of this?

A foot nudged me under the table, drawing me out of my thoughts. The whole table was staring at me.

“Will you?” asked Amethyst.

I blinked, looking around. “What?”

Amethyst was leaning earnestly over the table, eyes glued to me. “Will you be the priest for the ritual?”

I looked to Bjorn, offering him with a palm. Look! Wayyyy more manly manly over there-> but he was shaking his head and leaning back with his beefy arms crossed over his chest. “I ain’t Wiccan,” he said cheekily. Then, for added victory (or to deal a death-blow to me maybe) he said “I’ve never led ritual.”

“He’s not even a first grade,” said Amethyst passionately. “You’re third grade, right? You can help me lead!”

Help her? Oh, good gods no. I looked down the table. Ah. Hah hah. Bjorn and I were the two only males here. “No one else male-identifying?” I asked hopefully, fishing out there for some trans or non-binary person to step forward and take the spot from me.

No such luck.

“We need a priest in order to bring balance to this out of balance place, so full of male toxicity-”

“Okay, I’ll do it,” I said, feeling it was my duty. Of course, I regretted it the instant I said it.

“Oh good!” Amethyst said dramatically. “We’ll have to wait for the full moon, of course, if not the waning, but I’ll write it out and get the material- and we will need to be thirteen, so she will have to be there-”

“What’s her name? By the way?” I asked suddenly.

All heads turned. “I forgot,” I said, feeling stupid. I knew her last name was on the contract somewhere, but I wanted to know her magical name.

Amethyst smiled forgivingly at me. “Sapphire. Her name is Sapphire.”

Oh, okay. Sapphire.