Page 9 of Jingle Spells

Delilah’s head was starting to spin. It was too much. Too many voices, too many childhood memories, too much everything. She needed air. But as she turned to escape, a commotion from above caught her attention. The ladder beneath Nate had begun to wobble precariously. He’d lost control of the garland; his balance was off. Nate was going over.

From her inside coat pocket, Delilah removed a simple wand, carved from the branch of an ancient yew tree. She raised the wand toward Nate, her eyes closed for concentration. Just as Nate began to fall, an invisible force caught him in mid-air and gently lowered him to the floor, while the ladder clattered down beside him.

A hush fell over the lobby. Even the argumentative ornaments went quiet.

“God, Del! Thanks so much!” Nate jogged across the room to wrap Deliliah in a grateful bear hug. “I’m so glad you were here for that!”

“Holy shit!” Scarlett exclaimed. “Thank you! Since when can you do that?”

But Delilah only shrugged. “It’s nothing. Something I picked up with Luna, when we were in Australia. Just a goofy magic trick.”

“Um, sis? Telekinesis is super impressive. It’s not some goofy⁠—”

A harsh voice cut Scarlett off. A deeply unimpressed voice. The voice of Kelly Melrose. “What in the name of all the goddesses in creation is that thing in your hand?”

The thing in Delilah’s hand was, of course, a wand. In Oak Haven, a wand was a very unwelcome thing, indeed.

The power of Oak Haven witches sprang from a grove of oak trees that sits at the top of a hill, just above their little village. Oak Haven’s young witches grew up playing hide-and-seek among the trees, drinking water from the same stream that feeds the grove itself. Magic became part of their bones, their blood, their very souls. As a result, no sacred objects were required. No wands or cauldrons or herbs were ever necessary for Oak Haven’s particular brand of magic.

But when Delilah and Luna visited a coven in the Dartry Mountains of Ireland, a warlock had presented Del with a wand anyway. It had been carved from a branch of Eó Ruis, one of his people’s Guardian Trees. She thanked him but explained that no, wands were not for her. The warlock demurred. “This is yours,” he’d said. “It has always been yours. It’s been waiting for you here.”

Alas, Kelly Melrose was taking a rather different view.

“I ask again: what is that thing?”

Delilah sighed. She’d known this particular moment was coming; she’d just hoped to be home for more than ten minutes before it arrived. “It’s a wand, Mama.”

“The witches of Oak Haven do not use props. What, are you a prop comic now? Are you Carrot Top?”

Nate nudged Scarlett, whispering, “Your mom knows who Carrot Top is?!”

“It was a gift, Mama. And yes, of course I know that wands are not typically a part of our practice. But I’ve been surprised to discover that the wand actually does help focus whatever I’m⁠—”

“We do not use wands! Our magic thrums in our flesh and blood—leaning on some foreign object is an insult to your foremothers! Weak men with gout use walking sticks, and weak witches use wands.”

Scarlett tried to intervene. “Mama, it’s not a big deal. You’re acting like she came home with a face tattoo or something.”

“I would have preferred it,” Kelly snapped. “And not a big deal? Betraying your ancestry with some phallic shortcut? Not a big deal? Delilah, I insist you put that cursed thing away immediately.”

“Mama, come on . . .”

“We do not use wands in Oak Haven!” She turned sharply away and marched back toward her meeting. “Do not let me see you with it again.”

“I need some air,” Delilah announced. Between her mother’s constant judgment and her father’s inescapable memory, it was all too much. Before anyone could stop her, Delilah was heading out the front door. She heard Scarlett call out, but Delilah didn’t turn back. Whatever was happening in town, whatever crisis had brought her home, it had to be better than drowning in her family.

Chapter 4

We Four Kings (of the Hardware Store Are)

The moment Jasper turned the key in the ignition, George Michael’s voice filled the car with his doleful tenor: “Last Christmas, I⁠—”

“Nope.” He jabbed the radio off. “You did nothing of the kind, Georgie my boy.”

Connecting his phone to the car, he scrolled to his personally curated playlist: That Old Man Bach Sure Slaps. The magnificent precision of the Brandenburg Concertos was just the thing to help him work through this mystery in a rational way.

Back in his office, that liquor license was still sitting on his desk, mocking everything he thought he knew about the northwest corner of the county. Come on, 278 West 113th Street? He’d personally cataloged every road in that region. The very idea that he might have missed so much? No. No way.

Absolutely not.