“…Big city man like yourself, why risk your big time future to get sacked with a ghost?”
I didn’t believe her, I still don’t, but I will admit that I have not set foot in Richmond County, NC. I guess saying I don’t believe her rings very false, it feels false as I write it now. But I can’t say that I believe in witches or witchcraft, not the magical parts of it anyway, the controlling animals of it all. The story of the man witch, his desperate search for immortality that would cost him his soul, hinted at much more than a commune with nature and I can’t say that I believe that stuff because I’ve never seen it or experienced it for myself. I think my avoidance of Richmond County has more to do with preserving the fantasy of it all than fear of being seized by the spirit of a dead relative. If I drove to Ellerbe or Rockingham and stepped foot out of the car and was not instantly surrounded and filled up with magic, then the magic would be dead. My wonder at speaking with this woman would be extinguished.
“I won’t go to Richmond County,” I said to her.
“Good,” she said. “It is a bad time there now, anyway. Witches of a different coven have arrived there in recent years, two sisters, and they have created quite the stir up. They are disturbing the natural balance of magic there and native witches won’t stand them for much longer. There’s a war brewing in Richmond County, one that the interloper witches cannot win.”
“Who are these interlopers? Is there a coven of witches in Richmond County?”
“Not officially, but there are powerful families in the area who have cooperated to keep order to maintain their anonymity. The interlopers threaten to cause mass hysteria. Recently, they used their magic to lure a man away from his family. They convinced him that he had lived with them in their house, that he’d never had a wife who bore him children, and everybody in town is scandalized. It’s drama everyday and the man don’t seem to care about what his life was. And people starting to whisper. When they came to town, everybody was happy to have them. They opened a bakery that everybody was talking about for months. They make really nice carrot cake. The bakery still open even though most people in town stay away. The sisters get business from all over, and they ship internationally.”
“If there’s so much tension with the locals, why stay there?” I asked.
“Witches are powerful,” the woman explained. “Some are used to things going their way, and when they don’t, they can get stubborn and dig in to show their dominance.”
“Why did they come here in the first place? Where are they from?”
“Pacific Northwest witches. From what I gather, they’re here because they ran into trouble out there. They ended up in Richmond County by sheer coincidence, they found the shop for their bakery with an apartment on top for a good price. But I don’t believe in coincidence, do you, Wesley?”
“I guess I do.”
“Maybe you not as witchy as I thought. A witch knows better than to believe that things ain’t happening because they supposed to.”
“Why are they supposed to be in Richmond County stirring up trouble?”
“Most times it’s hard to understand until what needs to be done is done. From a human perspective, it can be hard to understand that bad or unfortunate things can lead to happiness or prosperity. Even if we know and understand that life is good and bad and all things are linked by the first thing that brought it all into existence, everything is linked by causality, and even if we can understand that objectively, it can still feel like bad stuff happens for no reason. But that is not true, everything happens for a reason, even if that reason is merely physics or extremely emotional.”
I nodded thoughtfully. The woman was very intelligent and I liked the way she spoke the English language. Her diction was the manifestation of all the years of her life, all the conversations she’d had and overheard, all of the books she’d consumed with an insatiable curiosity. The cadence of her voice was familiar and soothing and I could listen to her talk for hours.
“Do you think it will end violently?” I asked her.
She shrugged. “All I know is that it will end. I’ll keep you posted. But now, I think it’s time for a drink. How about you buy me some spiced sangria over at the Monk?”
I stood and offered my arm to her. She looped hers around mine and we walked arm in arm down the avenue.
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