Chapter 2
Thursday night was always ‘check in’ night. It was meant to be to talk about the practice of magick and the Veil, but really it was an excuse to get drunk and talk about their shops, business, customers, magick and their sex lives … or lack of sex lives.
Rowan walked up the hill of Clarence Drive and into the newsagent’s to buy some carrot cake and two bottles of wine for the meeting with the girls later. Although they met up once a week, the chat in the WhatsApp group felt like it ran every minute of the day, especially with Cat.
She checked her watch. Half past five. Six o’clock at Morven’s, as usual.
She was looking forward to seeing them and wondered if she should tell them about the strange man in the shop. Probably not, she thought, as she paid for the wine.
The bottles clinked as she walked up to the top of Clarence Drive and onto Hyndland Road. The evening was mild for January, the sky streaked in pale pink above the rooftops, and the street lamps were just coming on along the terrace.
Turning left at Epicures Restaurant, she heard her name being shouted.
“Rowan! Rowan!”
She turned around. It was Isla, hurrying to catch up with her.
“Isla. How are you doing?” she said as they hugged before falling into step together. She had never really been a hugger until she met the rest of her coven. Now it felt natural, like saying hello.
“I’m good.”
“You look gorgeous. You straightened your hair?” Rowan said, admiring her green dress and long black hair tied into a ponytail. She always looks beautiful, Rowan thought.
“Yeah, I was getting tired of the mop. I like it like this,” Isla said, running her ponytail through her hand. “And you, you look great. Any news?”
“No, nothing really,” Rowan said. They walked in silence for a moment before she asked, “Have you been practising your energy tracking on the coven?”
“Yeah, actually. I tracked Orla the other day when she was in Edinburgh.”
They chatted easily as they walked along Princes Terrace together.
Once they were buzzed in and reached the front door, Cat answered. Barefoot, long skirt, a skimpy T-shirt on, and looking as if she was bouncing off the walls again.
“Hiya,” she said, hugging both of them. “Come in, come in. Good to see you.”
Rowan handed over the bag with the wine and carrot cake. “Just brought a few essentials.”
Cat looked in the bag. “Excellent. More wine for the collection. We’re going to be pissed tonight.”
“No, it’s not that kind of night,” Rowan said. “I’m just going to have a few and then I’ll head down the road.”
“Oh! Everything okay?” Cat asked, rubbing Rowan’s arm gently.
“Yeah, yeah. Just fancy an early night. One of those things, you know.”
“Get it. Totally get it,” Cat said, bouncing through to the kitchen with the bottles of wine.
Morven came through from the living room and gave Rowan a hug. “Oh, great to see you. I was thinking about you this week,” Morven said, flicking a short blonde strand behind her ear.
Rowan frowned. “Why?”
“You’ll find out.”
“Oh, God. What have you done?” Rowan said, feeling a little deflated.
This is probably about getting me a man again, she thought. They were always trying to set her and Orla up with somebody or other.
The others were all in happy relationships. Isla and Alistair, Cat and Morven, Elspeth and Cal, Fiona and Robert. That left Orla and Rowan.
“Have you decorated the place?” Rowan said, looking around the hallway with its dark panelling and Timorous Beasties wallpaper.
“Yeah, we put up the wallpaper. I was getting tired of the painted walls. And we fitted a new chandelier.”
Rowan looked up at the brushed-bronze chandelier. “Oh, that’s beautiful,” she said.
She passed the hallway mirror and checked herself before going into the living room. Her long, flowing red skirt and sleeveless blue top, with her red hair bouncing over the top of it, looked good. Her sandals clipped as she walked to the living room with Isla.
When she opened the door the others were all there already, chatting around a table full of food. Crisps, peanuts, sandwiches. The room smelled of red wine and something warm from the kitchen. They all seemed to look up in unison.
“Hey, Rowan! Hey, Isla!” they said, and stood up to hug them.
She was never really a girly girl until the coven came together.
Or maybe deep down, she was.
Cat looked around the group mischievously as they settled down on the sofas and chairs.
“So, what’s been going on?” Cat said.
This was a weekly game. They would go around the group and each tell the others what had happened in their week. Anything interesting. Anything unusual. Anything magickal. And anything to do with romance.
Cat looked at Isla first to kick off proceedings.
“Nothing to report,” Isla said, as she nibbled on a cheese and pickle sandwich.
“How are you and Alistair doing?” Cat asked, grinning.
Isla raised her eyebrows and smiled. “We’re good. We’re very good, actually. Really good.”
The group burst out laughing.
Elspeth and Fiona exchanged glances and laughed as they looked back at Isla.
“So,” Cat said, leaning forward. “Have yous?—”
Cat made a thrusting motion with her hips, slight but unmistakable.
“Cat. For goodness sake,” Morven said, laughing as she took a sip of wine.
“Oh my God,” Isla said, shaking her head and laughing.
“Well?” Cat said.
“If you must know, yes, we have.”
“Finally!” Orla said.
The group erupted into a barrage of questions.
“I knew it! I knew it!” Orla said. “Give us the details.”
“Nope. Not giving you any details. Don’t ask. I’m not that type of girl. Me and Alistair have taken it to the next level. That’s all I’m saying.”
She looked around the room with quiet satisfaction. “So, nothing magickal to report. Nothing business-wise to report. Just my perfect love life. That’s me done. On to the next one.” She looked at Elspeth beside her.
Elspeth looked down at the floor, then looked up sheepishly and pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose.
“Well, me and Cal are still going great. It’s all very …” she clasped her hands together. “Romantic. He’s just a beautiful, kind man. I don’t think I could have asked for more. It’s just getting stronger all the time.”
“Oh, Jesus,” Orla said. “You sound like someone from a Disney movie.” She shook her head.
Rowan watched Elspeth’s face soften as she talked about Cal and felt something tug inside her. Not jealousy. Something quieter. The recognition of a warmth she hadn’t felt in a long time.
Elspeth laughed. “I know, I know. That’s what it feels like, honestly, but it’s true.
It’s just all perfect.” She shook her head, as if embarrassed by her own happiness.
“Anyways. Business is good. The patisserie always picks up this time of year, and we’re introducing a new range of magickal cakes. ”
“Magickal cakes,” Cat repeated. “I want one.”
“You’ll get one,” Elspeth said, smiling. “I brought them over for after.”
“And on the magickal front?” Rowan asked.
Elspeth’s expression shifted. “I felt something a little strange this week.”
“Strange how?” Morven asked, leaning forward.
“Well, you know how we’re all practising getting in touch with the Veil, just making sure it’s okay, like Rowan and Jean taught us?”
Morven nodded.
“I reached out, just as normal, just practising. And I felt something. It wasn’t a tear.
We’ve all felt what a tear feels like. But it was like a bump.
Almost a dent.” She paused, searching for the right words.
“I don’t know how to describe it. It was just strange.
That’s the best way I can put it. A dent. ”
“In the Veil?” Morven asked.
“Yeah.”
Morven frowned. “So, when you’re thinking about the Veil, Elspeth, what do you see in your mind’s eye?”
Elspeth frowned for a second. “I think I see it as like a dome. It’s like a dome over the top of our world.
Not our witchy world, but the human world, the non-witch world.
And it’s like an upside-down dome. And when I project my energy out and touch it, that’s what I tend to feel.
And when I reached the outskirts of the dome, that’s when I felt the dent. The bump.”
“Right, okay,” Morven said. “That kind of explains it. When you said dent, I couldn’t quite get what you were saying.”
Rowan said nothing. But her palm, the one with Jean’s brooch fused into the skin, had gone warm.
“So, nothing else came of it?” Rowan asked, keeping her voice even.
Elspeth looked at her. “No, nothing,” she said, shaking her head and frowning. “But apart from that, nothing magickal. It’s all been okay this week. I’ve had a great week.”
“Oh, that’s good,” Cat said, looking at Morven.
Morven smiled as the rest of the group’s eyes turned to her.
“My love life has been hellish, as per usual.”
“Oi!” Cat said, and threw a cushion at her, laughing.
“No, me and Cat are just as strong as ever, and I think you all know about it from the WhatsApp messages everybody’s getting.”
The rest of the group laughed.
“It’s funny that you said that, Elspeth, about the dent,” Morven said, “because I felt that something wasn’t quite right this week too.
But there was no explanation for it. That’s why I didn’t even put it in the group chat.
I just felt off. That’s it. Nothing untoward.
Just off.” She took a sip of wine. “I’ve felt that before and never really reported it, because it could just be me.
Could be my magickal energy interacting with the Veil’s energy.
But it just felt off for some reason. So, it might be something if you’re feeling it too. ”
Rowan looked between Elspeth and Morven. Two of them. Two of them had felt it this week. And she’d felt the echo during her tending that morning. Three.
She kept that thought to herself for now.
“Business-wise, the Belladonna Thorn is still ticking over. And I think all of you are sending people my way, just like we’re doing with each other. So, that’s good.”
“I’ve sent a few more people over to your shop as well,” Fiona said, smiling at Morven.