I followed the footsteps in my mind’s eyes, down the hallway, turning right and then left, stopping and hearing the clicking of the door, a female voice, a young officer who, I imagined, was speaking with the attorney. And then the door closed behind us. I could smell Abigail. I could smell her fear.
Mrs. Tangledwood put her purse on the floor. I leapt out and wrapped myself around Abigail’s leg. She scratched my head. “Be strong, Abigail,” I told her. Mrs. Tangledwood introduced Abigail to her attorney.
Mr. Bridgestone spoke, “The police have you in the vicinity the night of Lionel Foret’s murder behind the Leaf & Page. And they found your phone number in Bryson Wald’s phone.”
“What are you talking about?” Abigail asked.
Mrs. Twiggs placed her hand over her mouth. “Oh my, dear, they didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what? No one’s told me anything.” Abigail crossed her arms over her chest.
“Bryson Wald was found dead last night in the alley behind the Orange Peel,” Mr. Bridgestone said. “He was killed with the same weapon that was used to kill Lionel Foret.”
Abigail stopped breathing. “Be strong,” I told her again.
“Where were you last night?” The attorney asked.
“I was at the Orange Peel waiting for Bryson. He never showed up.”
“Have you told that to the police?”
“I haven’t said anything to them.”
Mr. Bridgestone cleared his throat.
Mrs. Twiggs said, “If she hasn’t been charged, they can’t keep her, can they? Can she go home?”
“They can hold her for 24 hours and then decide if she will be charged or not,” Mr. Bridgestone said. “There’s nothing I can do until they decide whether or not to charge her. We’ll talk more tomorrow.”
“Abigail, listen to me very carefully. I’m going to stay with you tonight,” I spoke into her mind.
“Terra, how?”
“I want you to trust me and clear your mind tonight like we did together and meet me in the clarity. There I am as I was, and whatever powers I had as a witch are strong.”
“Terra, I can’t get there without you.”
“You can, Abigail, you’re capable of so much more than you know. Trust me. I will reach out to you.”
I stopped talking. I was afraid Abigail would hear the voices that were speaking to me, the dark voices that filled the small holding room, darting out from the corners, slithering from the shadows, hissing, “We’re coming for you, Abigail.”
I climbed back into Mrs. Tangledwood’s purse. The last words I left hanging in the air were, “Be strong, Abigail.”
A Free Spirit
I checked the clock over the cash register. It was nearly 9 p.m. Mrs. Twiggs was told that was when the lights were extinguished in the holding cells at the police station. I had tried for nearly an hour to reach out to Abigail without success. I felt her safe as long as the fluorescent lights hummed overhead. Not that those dark creatures couldn’t reach out in the light, but more because Abigail felt safer with the lights on. The unseen is always scarier than the seen and foul creatures prey more easily on the weak.
Mrs. Twiggs paced up and down in front of the cash register, mumbling to herself. Mrs. Tangledwood sat by the fire, reading a book, Pixel in her lap. “Terra, I’ve been reading something very interesting about transfixation. Actually that’s not what it’s called here, but I believe it’s the same principle.”
I leapt onto the back of her chair to see what she was reading. I was surprised to see it was written in Mandarin. “Oh, yes, Terra, I can speak and read several languages. This is an original copy of the philosopher’s Tse-uhe writing. Mrs. Twiggs found for me. He came to America during the railroad boom. He wrote journals about the Chinese laborers who came over to build the Trans-Pacific line. He was somewhat of a shaman to them . He practiced WH, the spirit medium of the ancient Chinese sorcerers. There’s an interesting passage here about a Chinese laborer who was caught in an avalanche of falling rocks while placing dynamite in a tunnel. He was buried alive for many days. Tse-uhe describes how he was able to communicate with the buried worker telepathically to help keep him alive. He used spirit bowls filled with different liquids. By rubbing his finger along the rim, he tuned in to find the right frequency to connect with the laborer’s spirit.”
“Mrs. Tangledwood, I’ve tried reaching Abigail. I was able to lock in her frequency when she was sitting across from me but I cannot reach out to her now. Something is blocking me,” I said.
“Tse-uhe had the same problem with the trapped man. The frequency could not penetrate through granite.”
A flash of understanding came across me. It was not the distance that was blocking my call to Abigail or the solid limestone walls of the jail. It was the voices I heard in the police station. They were screaming at Abigail, blocking her from hearing me. She couldn’t hear them when she was awake and the lights were on but they were there in her subconscious in the shadows. When the lights turn off, the boogieman under the bed becomes real. Her imagination would wander, drawing the voices in and then they would devour her.
I turned to Mrs. Tangledwood. “How did Tse-uhe reach the laborer?”
“He left his body and entered the trapped man’s body.”
I jumped off the back of the chair. Elizabeth had warned me to never attempt that level of transfixation. Leaving your consciousness was one level of transfixation, your spirit stayed in your body protected but transfixing your true light, what the humans call your spirit and leaving your body, left you unprotected. Like Elizabeth if my earthly body was destroyed I would be floating in the atmosphere, lost for eternity. Pixel jumped on my back. “What’s wrong, Terra? Terra, you scared. Pixel here. Pixel help Terra.” Uncontrollably I started licking the back of Pixel’s head, cleaning his fur. I didn’t even stop to think how disgusting that was. It seemed catlike.
“Pixel, I'm leaving for a little while.”
“Pixel, come too.” He sat not leaving me an argument.
“No, Pixel, you can’t follow me.”
“Pixel, go where Terra go. No more talk.”
“Pixel, I’m going to sleep for a while.” I stopped trying to figure out how to explain transfixation to Pixel. I began again. “I’m going to dream and visit Abigail and stay with her tonight but I need you to watch over me.”
“Pixel, no understand. You sleep, you here.”
“Pixel you have to promise me you will not leave my side while I sleep no matter what happens. OK? Can you do that for Terra?”
“I will not leave Terra.” Pixel lay on top of me. I closed my eyes. When we were young girls, seven or eight years old, Prudence and I borrowed Elizabeth’s book of spells, our girlish curiosity having gotten the better of us. We stole away into the woods on a summer afternoon pretending we were one of the old ones, the great witches who once walked the earth. We sat for hours, staring at the book too afraid to open it. It was Prudence who finally found the courage. As she unsnapped the clasp, the book flipped like a zoetrope giving the illustrations the illusion of motion. The pages stopped on a chapter titled Transfixation. We huddled together, holding hands and read the incantation out loud. Before we could finish we felt our bodies being lifted off the ground--being pulled by our hair by Elizabeth. “Prudence, Terra, you wicked girls.” She scooped up the book and never said another word about it.
As Pixel kept watch, I recited that incantation and then I left my body behind.
Windows to the Soul
I stood in the shadows, the mist flickering around me, engulfing me. Memories swirled around me, some were my own, some belonged to others. A familiar voice whispered, “Terra.” Elizabeth appeared in the mist. She hugged me and then pulled back. “You wicked girl. What have you done?” she scolded me.