I swung my head toward the noise that had come from the rear of the cottage. My first thought was that something had been thrown against the house, and I headed directly to the back door. Twitching the shade aside to look, I saw nothing amiss. Slowly, I opened the back door, half-expecting to see a ball or something, but instead discovered a bird that lay twitching on the porch.
“Oh, did you fly into the window?” I knelt down to get a closer look, and it broke my heart when I realized that the bird wasn’t merely dazed, it was dying. “Poor bird,” I murmured. Even as I reminded myself that a bird flying against a window was a common occurrence, I still felt uneasy. Rising to my feet, I studied the property behind the cottage. Nothing was out of place, and yet I held completely still, listening to the pre-dawn noises.
I waited, and when nothing else happened, I went back into the kitchen and retrieved a plastic grocery bag. By the time I got back to the porch, the bird had died.
Thankful that Willow was still sleeping and wouldn’t have to see the bird, I picked it up with the bag, and carried it directly to the outdoor garbage cans. I was turning to walk back inside when I spotted a shimmer on the ground. What would make that sort of reflection? I wondered, pausing in mid-step. I bent over for a closer look, and saw that something had been drawn in a bare patch of lawn along the edge of the sidewalk.
The hair rose on the back of my neck, and my stomach tightened painfully as I studied the symbol. “That’s not something Willow would have done playing,” I said, shining the light from my cell phone on the ground. “That’s a rune.”
Thurisaz, a Norse rune that symbolized a ‘thorn’ had been carved into the soft dirt. Thanks to my mother’s proclivities, I knew that this particular rune could be used for cursing and hexing. And in fact, this rune had been drawn reversed. Meaning the intentions were to lure out the negative qualities of the symbol, namely: evil, malice and hatred.
Slowly and carefully, I made my way down the rest of the driveway, searching for any other symbols. I found the second rune, Nauthiz, drawn on the stonework used as decorative trim at the corner of the cottage. It too was reversed. With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I snapped a quick photo with my phone.
While runes were considered generally positive, like any magickal system they could be twisted into serving darker purposes. The reversed Nauthiz rune could invoke: distress, confusion, and poverty. I blew out a shaky breath as I considered the second symbol. It had been inscribed with chalk, meaning it hadn’t been there very long. A week at most, considering we hadn’t had any rain in the past few days.
“God damn it,” I hissed, and went back to get a picture of the first rune I’d found.
As the sun rose, I walked around the cottage searching for anything else that didn’t belong. I found three more occult symbols, including an inverted pentagram, and while I wasn’t particularly afraid after my discoveries…I was starting to become downright pissed.
It would take a little time and effort, but I could counteract any of the maleficence directed toward us. After all, I had recently stocked up on protection magick supplies at Enchantments.
I was finishing up my second pass around the cottage when I saw a flash of color in the bushes. Using a fallen branch from the magnolia tree in the yard, I knelt, reaching up inside the bush with the stick, and pulled something out. It plopped onto the grass, rolling toward me, and my anger turned to horror.
I’d found another fashion doll. The doll had been originally intended to be a ‘younger sister’ to her famous Malibu style sibling. What had me gulping back fear was that the doll had been made over to look exactly like Willow.
I sat back on my butt, staring at the poppet resting in the grass. “Lord almighty,” I whispered. On the first night we’d moved in Willow had found a doll, I remembered, and I’d burned the nasty thing in the fireplace. I’d even gone as far as to break my own long-standing ‘no magick’ rule by working a quick banishing spell over it.
While that first doll had its hair all tied in knots, the hair of this doll was styled in two long brown pigtails. The same way Willow preferred to wear her hair. It had on a blue floral dress too. Again, similar to the one my daughter favored. The difference between this doll and the other was that this doll had been bound in intricate knots of twine and string, and lastly a black ribbon had been stapled across its mouth.
The evil emanating from it made me want to vomit.
My phone chimed, alerting me of a text, and I recoiled at the sound. I glanced down and saw that it was a message from Holly.
Good morning. How goes the preparation for the wedding reception at the carriage house?
There was no such thing as coincidence. If Holly was contacting me this early, I needed to reach out to her first, before I did anything else.
I need your help. Serious magickal problem. I texted back. From what I can tell the outside of my cottage has had hexes laid all around it. I hit send and followed up my text with the photos of every symbol that I’d found.
I sat in the grass waiting for her to read the message, look over the photos, and hopefully, respond.
I got the photos. I’m on my way. Holly texted back a few minutes later. I’m walking out the door right now.
There’s more. I texted back to Holly. It’s much worse than the others.
The text had barely been delivered when my phone rang. The read out showed that it was Holly. I
