Do you have any family heirlooms on the mantelpiece? They are old reminders of relatives past, but they are also relics of past lives — very human lives. Elizabeth finds that her jewel box, handed down to her from many generations ago, contains a memento that changes her life — and others.
Thanks to RexBrookdale for help with the editing.
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I dropped it.... Okay? It was just an accident. Really. Look up 'klutz' in the dictionary, and you will find my name: Elizabeth.
Little did I know, that being a fumble fingers would start the whole thing....
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I dropped my antique jewel box. Well, not that I have much jewel-type jewelry, but the box had been my many-greats grandmother's, and I had had it for years. My grandmother Louet had given it to me when I was about three. I didn't remember that part, but my mother had told me, some years later, that she had done so not long before she died. As her only living granddaughter, she had wanted to be sure I got it. She told my mother its story, to tell me later when I could appreciate it.
It wasn't that great, as stories go. The jewel box was an heirloom which had come down from my something-great grandmother, Prudence, who had been one of many people accused of being a witch in Salem, Massachusetts. Yes, that Salem. Fortunately for her, she had never been brought to trial. Many poor girls -- and even a few guys -- had been executed for witchcraft: a capital felony in those days. Even after the witch trials ended the stain had stuck, and Prudence lived the rest of her life under a cloud of suspicion. Her family had married her off to an older widower who had managed to have a daughter with her before he died — my something-minus-one great grandmother.
The box wasn't big; I'd accidentally lost it for like a whole month under a sheet of paper. Inside, it was only a couple of inches deep. The wood had dried out and cracked in places. The hinges were still in pretty good shape, though blackened and green with age; must have been brass or something. A well-meaning ancestor had put a coat of pink paint on it, but most of that had worn away, leaving just wood with a few pinkish spots in the deeper parts of the grain, and in the ding on one side.
I kept my jewels in it. Of course my 'jewels' were only trinkets and keepsakes: my baby bracelet, my class ring from high school, that kind of thing. There was exactly one semiprecious stone among them all — a specially polished star sapphire ring, a gift from my 'forever and ever' boyfriend from high school. The same boyfriend who had enthusiastically pursued my friend Melanie once her boobs got as big as mine.
Still the box was a family heirloom, and I knew I needed to treasure it and keep it safe. That's why I was devastated when I dropped it: I'd picked it up to move it, but the edge caught the corner of a book lying alongside it, and before I knew what had happened, there it lay on the floor.
The lid popped right off, but that wasn't any big surprise. The hinge screws had pulled out long before I'd gotten it, and I'd only taped them in place so I wouldn't lose them. I picked up both box and lid and fitted them back together as before; only this time I noticed there was a crack along the bottom of the box.
Oh nuts. What had I done now? I examined the crack ... the crevice was actually part of a thin, straight seam that ran along the base about a quarter inch from the outside edge. Since curiosity hadn't killed this cat — yet, I probed a little with my fingernail. The gap widened. The seam extended all the way around the box. A little more probing, and I discovered it was a separate piece that could be removed.
So far so good. I decided to stick my nose in a little farther. Who can resist the lure of a secret compartment? Not me. Inside lay a folded-up piece of old paper, brittle, and yellowed with age. It was a handwritten note, but what penmanship! Not calligraphy; none of the fancy changes in line weight and formalized structure and all that. No, this was everyday writing, but I'd never seen script so elegant. Some of the words didn't make sense; several 'f' letters were in the wrong places.
Suddenly I remembered seeing the same thing in a handwritten copy of the US Bill of Rights: 'Congress' had been spelled 'Congrefs'. My teacher had explained it was the way they used to write the letter 's' in some words. This was definitely an old note — maybe even written by Prudence herself.
The word 'Visitation'.was printed on the back — a title? What that meant, I hadn't a clue. Reading on it looked like some sort of recipe. 'Flowers of nitre'. 'Blood of a bat'. My English ancestors had had low standards about what constituted food; but even so, bat's blood seemed a stretch. Everything listed sounded gross, nasty, or vile, and the preparation directions were every bit as weird. "Mix at midnight under the light of a full moon. Stir only with a sprig of mistletoe."
A delightful chill of recognition scurried down my spine. Witchcraft! Multi-great grandmother Prudence had been a witch, and this was a magic potion. Then I gave myself a stout mental slap on the side of my head. Don't be silly.
Yet, here in my hand, I held the evidence.
* * * * * *
In July, I had a couple weeks of vacation coming to me. I decided that would be the time to experiment with umpty-great grandma Prudence's magic potion. In the weeks leading up to it, I had worked to find the ingredients. The Internet was a godsend. Who knew there were coven supply stores catering to the needs of modern witches? I didn't buy much, having more than a few doubts about their legitimacy; but I did find a vial of bat's blood. The man had said it was bat's blood.... Even if it turned out to be only 'blood of a small mammal', it might still be okay for the bat thing.
By the start of my vacation I had everything ready. I watched the sun go down, in the nude, as instructed. I was so shy I stood well back from my open bedroom window, out of sight. As the sun set, the full moon rose — I could see it out my bathroom window. At midnight, I began mixing ingredients in a cast-iron pot. When I'd finished the last incantation, the potion slowly turned luminous, and vapors arose from the liquid, giving off an intoxicating scent. I took one deep sniff, and spoke the command line of the spell. The concoction gave off a pulse of light, and a denser stream of murky vapor began to rise into the air. Hastily, I moved back from the kettle.
Up until this point the whole thing had been a lark, an experiment ... a way of feeling a connection with dear old whatever-great grandmother Prudence. Now for the first time, I was having second thoughts. Maybe being a klutz was not my only strong point. Maybe being stupidly foolhardy was my defining characteristic.
The vapor suddenly condensed into the figure of a man — tall, well-built ... and entirely naked. The naked part caught my attention, but then I noticed the overall reddish tint to his skin, and two short, sharp horns protruding from his forehead.
Uh oh.
