Morrigan Mather and the Silver Star
Book One Of The Witchhaven Chronicles
By Holly King
Copyright © 2011 by Holly King
Dedicated to the “real” Morrigan,
The coolest daughter ever!
Teen Witch Exiled to Appalachia!
Morrigan Mather was a fifteen-year-old genius (IQ 156) on the fast track to over-achievement in suburban Portland, Oregon – where being a slightly-nerdy second-generation Wiccan priestess was merely unusual. Then her grandmother died and she and her big Brady-Bunchy stepfamily all move across the continent into her sprawling, beautiful old Victorian house . . . in rural Appalachia.
And it’s a big family: Mom, Dad, one brother, one step-brother, two half-sisters and a half-brother – and that’s just the kids who still live at home! The Maylands of North Carolina are gorgeous, the very bones of the Earth, and Morrigan and her pagan family have never felt closer to the natural world they adore. But they aren’t inclined to hide their religion from the suspicious country folk, either, and go into the broom-closet. The Town of Millers Ferry has been there since before the Civil War – but will it survive a whole family full of out-of-the-broom-closet witches?
Like any true genius, Morrigan sees the locals’ fear and distrust as a challenge. From the first day of school at Northern High, her openly-displayed silver pentagram causes a fuss, and her unwillingness to remove it get her kicked out. As she fights for the right to openly display the symbol of her faith, and tries to educate people in the reality of Wicca, she’s guided by the goddess Athena in the struggle and gains some unlikely allies: a big-nosed goth girl named Catherine, a reallllly cute “bad boy” from the trailer park, Ryan, and – most surprising of all – one of the town’s two Baptist preachers.
But her family’s faith has attracted enemies, too: an evangelical English teacher at school, her husband – the other, more conservative Baptist preacher in town – and an ignorant, drunken convenience store owner who thinks its open-season on witches! It’s going to take all the Wisdom of the goddess and the simple magick of Wicca to help Morrigan steer her way through the conflict and strife in a way that will keep her and her family safe and free to practice their religion in peace. But she’s up to the feat – Morrigan Mather hasn’t met a challenge she couldn’t handle, yet!
Chapter One:
I Have First Day Jitters
“There’s the new girl!” one of three nearly-identical sophomores whispered as I approached my locker – number 19, an auspicious number. For me, at least. I don’t know why they bothered to whisper, unless they meant for me to hear it, but they probably did. They were those kinds of girls. They were clustered around one end of the bank of lockers, so I didn’t have to pick my way through them, but they were all but pointing and staring at me. I ignored them.
Well, I gave them a glance and a slight smile, but I didn’t engage them directly as I flipped open the notebook where I had written my school-issued locker combination. 21-04-27. I should have had it memorized by then, but I wanted to be sure. It was hard enough being the new girl. I’d done my best to avoid the fetid taint of nerdom by getting contact lenses over the summer and upgrading my wardrobe and hairstyle in the move here. Not being able to work my locker properly would be a spazzy move, and I really didn’t need to get pegged as the spazzy new girl on Day One in my new school.
They tittered amongst each other like three inane birds in their first-day-of-school Wal-Mart best, as subtle with their summary judgments as a hand grenade. I opened the big metal box and started putting my new textbooks inside, trying not to appear too aloof or too uncomfortable. I posted the school map the school secretary had given me on the inside, as well as my class schedule, using the “Go Vikings!” stickers that had come with the orientation packet as tape.
I’d have to bring some stuff in to decorate it tomorrow, something inane and innocuous from a magazine. Not like the picture of the Parthenon that had graced my locker in Middle School. Maybe something with a vampire, or a guy with a surfboard – my best bet to avoid getting labeled the brainy, spazzy nerdy new girl prematurely. I’ve got a 156 IQ, so that was almost inevitable, but I was hoping to make a few friends before the cell door of geekhood got slammed behind me.
“So, you’re the new girl,” the tallest one – and only natural blonde in the group – said. It wasn’t a question. But I answered anyway.
“Yeah, hi, I’m Morrigan,” I said, as I stuffed my math book into my book bag for the next class. “Morrigan Mather. I just moved here from Oregon.”
“Oregon?” the shortest blonde asked, mispronouncing it. “That’s out west, right?”
I suppressed a groan and an eye roll as I zipped up the bag. Basic geography was obviously not her strong suit – no potential challenge for my future valedictorian award, there, I saw. “Yes, it’s just above California, just below Washington state,” I agreed, pleasantly. Mother says you catch more flies with honey, of course, so I tried to be sweet. For flies.
“So why did you move to Mayberry?” the third one finally blurted out.
Honestly, I was beginning to wonder myself.
The tiny village nearest the school was called Millers Ferry, no apostrophe, but the local kids – and several of the adults – all called it “Mayberry”, after the ancient black-and-white television show their ancestors once watched.
Dad tried to explain to me that The Andy Griffith Show was part of North Carolina’s culture, along with Blackbeard, Sir Walter Raleigh and the Wright Brothers. I’ve seen maybe six episodes of the show, but it was enough to understand why the comparison was apt: if there was a better example of mythical small-town quaintness mixed with stunning scenery and abject Appalachian poverty than Millers Ferry, I’d yet to see it. The mountain scenery was gorgeous, and the downtown district was adorable, but lamentably small. Just a few charming historic buildings amongst a ring of concrete block and prefab steel commercial buildings. The Millers Ferry city limits included four hundred and fifty souls, with another few thousand living in the Appalachian hills around it.
And now I was one of them. Welcome to Mayberry.
“My family moved into my grandmother’s house after she died,” I explained, simply. No need to elaborate. Keep it simple. Easy to understand. One-syllable, if I could help it. Obviously I wasn’t dealing with Quiz Bowl material, here.
But the way the three held themselves, it was clear that they were the Social Committee for Popular Blonde Girls, and they were sizing me up. Personally, none of them would have lasted a day with that title at the suburban school in Portland I had been scheduled to attend this autumn, but their eagerness to fit me into my place in the social hierarchy at Northern County High School was amusing. It was also juvenile, boorish, and a little rude, but that describes most teenage girls
.
“Oh, I guess that means that you’re old Mrs. Hendrick’s granddaughter,” the leader of the pack – who still hadn’t introduced herself – said in that accent, nodding sagely. “She has that old farmhouse up on the ridge, right? Had?” she corrected.
“Yeah,” I nodded. “It’s beautiful. A little run down, but we’re fixing it up.” It is, too, a big, sprawling Victorian built over a century ago by my great-grandfather, the town doctor at the time. It had been in Mom’s family ever since. Of course, one of the reasons I loved it was that I not only got my own room, it just happened to be in one of two elegant period cone-capped spires that projected from the roof on either side. A real Disney princess tower, just slightly in need of paint and insulation.
“I always liked that place, the middle-girl said, earning a withering stare from the short one. “I sold Girl Scout cookies up there a few years ago. You’re grandmother was a nice lady.”
“I wouldn’t know,” I sighed. “I only met her twice. She and my mom . . . had issues.” I turned towards them, slamming my locker shut a little too hard, and slung my backpack over my shoulder in the universally-approved high school style. As I turned towards them, I watched all three of their eyes get big. Real big. I felt a surge of adrenaline rise up my spine as they caught sight of my jewelry.
“Ohmygod!” the smallest one said, putting her hand to her mouth.
“Um . . .” the leader said, uncertainly. Confusion reigned in her myopic little brain.
“Wow,” the third one chimed in belatedly, her eyes as big as hubcaps.
No, it wasn’t my boobs they were staring at, unfortunately. Oh, they’re growing, but painfully slowly. No, it was what was between them, suspended on a silver chain I wore around my neck.
My pentagram.
“So,” I continued, casually, like they didn’t think I’d suddenly sprouted horns or something, “What are your names?”
The leader recovered most quickly, and was the first to drag her eyes off of my chest. “I’m Amy Porter,” she said, putting her hand on her own chest, “and these are my friends Leslie Buxton and Audrey Cooper. We’ve been friends since fourth grade,” she said, as if that made any difference. “So . . . welcome to Northern, Morgan.”
I suppressed a wince – my name is Morrigan, not Morgan, but I rarely hear the ‘i’ pronounced properly. I was used to that. You kind of showed you were my friend when you learned how to properly pronounce my name, I’d figured out long ago. Calling me “Morgan,” without the extra vowel, put you in a different category.
“Thank you, Amy,” I said, cheerfully, extending my hand. Amy’s eyes bugged out a little, as if I had leprosy or something, but to her credit she did extend her hand and shook mine. I started to shake Leslie’s hand, but the middle girl was still obsessing about my jewelry, so I decided to stop while I was ahead. “Um, can you point me toward . . . room 203?” I asked. “I’m still a bit turned around, here.” I had a map right in my locker, but I figured I’d give her the chance to help me out on my first day and demonstrate what kind of person she was.
“Sure, Morgan,” Amy said, smoothly. “That’s Mr. Mathewson’s class. I had him last year for pre-algebra. Just take those stairs there up to the second floor, and it will be on your left.” It was the kind of overly-plastic voice my mother used to use on sales calls. I thanked her with a smile that was just a little over the top.
“See you ladies around,” I called, cheerfully. “I gotta scoot – I need the math teacher to sign off on my placement tests.”
“Nice meeting you, Morgan!” Amy said with more faux cheerfulness. And as I walked away, the three blondes huddled and continued their fake stage-whispers. I got out of there as fast as possible, so the only word I really heard were “. . . freak . . .”
I sighed, a sinking feeling coming over me. I’d expected it, of course – you just can’t go to a new school without running into the self-appointed keepers of the cool, but I’d hoped it would be a day or so before word got out. But by the time the bell rang for lunch, the word was out: New Girl was a Freak.
I sat and ate my peanut butter and jelly sandwich by myself and read through the student handbook, while the whispers and stares started pouring in. It was a little annoying – I mean, a girl likes to get attention, of course, but this wasn’t the kind I was looking for. But my mother had warned me how the natives would react before we even moved here. It was inevitable.
* * *
My family moved here in late June, after my grandmother died the previous January and left my mother an inheritance. Not much, just the farmhouse, a few rental properties (trailers, mostly), and just over a thousand acres of mountainside in the southern Appalachians. I had visited here exactly once my entire childhood, when Mom took me and Lugh (yes, it’s spelled “lug”, but it’s pronounced “lou”), my older brother, here for her mom’s ninetieth birthday a few years ago.
It was a difficult memory – Mom and Grandma never stopped arguing, and while Grandma never had an unkind word for us kids, she let into Mom hardcore about how she and her new husband were raising us (mine and Lugh’s dad died when I was six), and how Mom and her sister both were pretty much a gross disappointment to my grandmother on all fronts, regardless of the topic. Career ambitions? Check. Fitness for motherhood? Check. A profound lack of morals? Check. You name it, Mom never measured up to my grandmother’s standards.
I didn’t mind, of course – Mom was about the best mother I could ask for. She used to be a real estate agent in Portland before Dad died, and then she opened her own bakery for a while – Mom bakes like a dream. But then she met Bill Mather, fell in love, and got married.
Bill was a designer for Lockheed-Martin at the time, but even back then in a suit and tie he still looked a lot like a Viking lord. Big, stout (but not fat) and a beard half way down his chest like Santa Claus, Bill had saved my mother from grief and helped her forge a new life. He took to me and Lugh like we were his own kids, which was good, because he had a few himself: my stepbrother Chad (who was in the Army now) my stepsister Freya (who was in her sophomore year at Northwestern) and my stepbrother Alex, who was nearly the same age as Lugh. Lugh and Alex got along great, being only a few months apart, and you’d never know by how they acted that they weren’t blood relatives.
But then Mom decided she wasn’t done having kids, so she and Bill pumped out Carrie (now in 3h grade), Brigit (1nd grade) and little Gwidion, the cutest kindergartener ever. In our old house in Oregon that meant pretty tight quarters – I’d had to share a room with Carrie, while Lugh and Alex shared one, and the little kids were all crammed into the nursery. It was a big house, but “big” in modern terms meant 4 bedrooms and two and a half baths – not something designed for two adults and six kids, a whole whacky 21st century Brady Bunch. When my older two step-siblings visited, it was like living in a refugee camp.
A very expensive refugee camp. Bill got laid off by Lockheed, he sued and got a big settlement. Mom had just sold her business (a trendy gourmet bakery), so between the two of them they were able to justify finding a bigger place than they’d had. My folks were already looking around for someplace bigger when my grandmother took a turn for the worse. In spite of how awful she was to Mom, she absolutely hated my aunt Janet, so Mom got almost the entire estate. I had expected her to liquidate it, but that didn’t happen. Instead, after she and Bill visited for my grandmother’s funeral, Bill fell in love with the place, Mom got all nostalgic for country living and strong social connections, and so they decided to up-root our extensive family and move out to the sticks.
Hello, sticks.
I went through all of the classic stages of grief when they informed the rest of us. I happened to be going through a “I’ll never be popular in this damned school!” phase, due to the Oregonian version of Amy, my old nemesis Kimberly Antel. She spent all of her free time spreading rumors and hating on me, dooming me to a forbidding, dateless existence in the suburbs of Portland. So when they asked me, I was ready to pack then and there. I have since argued that I was not in my right mind, but my folks don’t seem to care. I said yes, so we came to rural Appalachia.
Despite my personal regret over that hasty decision, it wouldn’t have made any difference. Dad – and yes, I call Bill Dad, or even Daddy – fell in love with the place, the scenery, the people, the whole redneck lifestyle. And once Mom gets a notion in her head, like relocating a huge family across a continent so that they can suffer the original small-town existence that drove her away in the first place, then it’s pretty much going to happen. And since Bill had a pile of money (and yet more, once we sold our modest home at the peak of the real-estate market) and the legacy property was paid for, he was ecstatic about the move and the chance to finally become “A gentleman of leisure.”.
Alex and Lugh were a little reluctant at first, but they’re boys. As long as there was access to the Internet and videogames, they were happy. The little kids didn’t get much of a say, but at the time Gwid couldn’t even talk in complete sentences, so there you are.
So now I was in lovely, picturesque, rustic southern Appalachia, surrounded by hicks and good ol’ boys, with a 156 IQ and a fresh start – marred only by the vicious rumors that started about me within hours of my arrival at Northern High.
It’s about that necklace. My pentagram.
You see, I’m a witch.
Not the pointy-hatted stereotype (OK, maybe I do have a pointy hat, but it’s purely for sentimental reasons) with the warts, green skin, etc. No, me, my mother, my aunt Janet are all for-real-though Wiccans. Witches. And the pentagram is a sacred symbol of ours.
For the whole family, really, as Bill was a Norse pagan long before he met Mom (his mother’s people were Swedes) and that meant he worshipped the Aesir and the Vanyir, ancient Norse gods like Thor and Odin and Frey. No surprise that Alex followed in that path, as did Chad and their sister (duh!) Freya. Freya has long golden blonde hair that would make you hate her on sight if she wasn’t such a good, down-to-earth person. I like my stepsister.
Anyway, Lugh tends to follow the Celtic gods, like Mom and me, only he doesn’t mind mixing and matching sometimes as needed. Heck, none of us do, actually, because we use the Greek and Roman gods, as well as deities from other cultures, as needed.
Anyway, we’re Pagans. Neo-Pagans. Freaky-deeky nature-loving, tree-hugging, trash-removing, Goddess-worshipping, recycling pagans. That’s unusual, even for Oregon, but Oregon has a justified reputation for both liberalism and tolerance. I probably knew a dozen or so pagan kids (or kids interested in studying Wicca and Paganism) in my school. About half of those had parents who practiced. But in my old school there were four hundred-sixty-one rising ninth graders. Here, there were less people than that within two miles of me.
Back home a pentagram might inspire a conversation, and usually led to a “I knew a witch once – nice lady” sorts of approval. Kind of like some people do with Jews or African Americans when they want to be seen as tolerant. I’d had some pretty intense discussions from time to time, sometimes even with adults, about our religious beliefs. I’d only had one person try to convert me, actually, and that was to being B’hai. But for the most part, our religion was accepted and rarely came up. I got more grief for being the Smart Girl than I did for being the Witch Girl.
And now we were in the Bible belt.
I started to think maybe facing Kimberly Antel in ninth grade might not have been so bad after all.
* * *
The only teacher who noticed my star all day was Mrs. Lenworth, my fifth period English teacher. Unfortunately, in retrospect she was the last one who should have seen it.
She was a very well put-together woman in her early fifties, with just a trace of Southern accent and not a hint of the local Appalachian accent, which sounds even stranger to my Northwestern ears. She was the only one of my teachers who bothered to display her credentials in her class, I noticed. Her college and high school diplomas were neatly displayed along with her teaching license and certifications on the wall above the white board.
It was designed to impress the ignorant. From what I could tell, Mrs. Lenworth only had six years of post secondary education to her name, but by the way she displayed them, you would have thought she’d racked up a couple of Ivy League doctorates and a MacArthur grant.
She began by handing out the syllabus, just like everyone else, and going over a list of her expectations, mixed in with various uplifting platitudes about the value of a classical education even in the face of the modern world, blah, blah, blah. It wasn’t half bad, as introductory speeches go, but nothing particularly inspiring either. She walked around the room as she spoke, using calm, well-controlled gestures and sharp enunciations to help make her points. Her first fifteen minute monologue was easily summarizable as: Books are important. I hear you. I’m a hardcore nerd, and literature is a passion of mine. But she could have stopped after five minutes.
But when she came by my desk, she affixed me with the same look she gave everyone else – meeting the eyes, trying to make a connection, standard teacher-stuff. But just as she was turning away towards the next student, she did a double-take, and spent another thirty seconds talking while she stood there, looking at me. Staring at me. Then she continued.
We got our first novel assignment, Watership Down, and our first writing assignment for next Friday, a couple of paragraphs on the organization of the rabbits. Basic stuff. I could do it in my sleep. That was our ‘out-of-class’ novel, which was separate from our ‘class novel’, the one we’d be discussing every day – she’d announce that one tomorrow. She explained that it allowed her to squeeze in two extra books that way, which she seemed pretty proud about. Then she took questions, pointed out a few classroom rules that didn’t differ substantially from any other classroom’s rules, and then the bell rang.
I was grabbing my books and trying to figure out where my next class was when she called me.
“Morrigan Mather? Please see me.”
I shrugged to myself, pleased that she’d at least made the attempt to pronounce my name right. I slung my backpack and waded through the teenagers until I got to her desk.
“Yes?” I asked.
“Yes, ma’am,” she corrected, quietly. “You are the new girl from Oregon?”
“Yes,” I nodded, then added a little self-consciously, “ma’am.” I had noticed the Southern fetish about formality and manners, but this was the first time someone was rubbing my nose in it.
“I saw your transcripts from your old school,” she said, evenly. “The scores are impressive. You test well, at any rate,” she added, which felt like a back-handed compliment. “I do hope you’ll consider looking into some of our English Department extracurricular activities, once you get settled. We run the Quiz Bowl and partner with the Social Studies department to sponsor the Junior United Nations. You’ll find a full description of them in your student handbook.”
“I’ll consider it,” I agreed. I’d been pretty good at forensics, back home, but Northern didn’t have a forensics team. I was shocked that they had a JUN.
“Please do. And you might want to take a glance at the school’s dress code, while you’re at it. I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said, dismissing me.
“Uh, sure,” I said, walking away confused. I stumbled off through the thick crowd until someone tripped me – or I tripped over something – the point is I tripped. And almost fell, if a scruffy-looking dude in a faded Army T-shirt hadn’t caught me.
“Whoa, there!” he said, as he prevented me from doing a face-plant outside of the boys’ bathroom – perhaps the single grossest place to do so. I have brothers, I know what I’m talking about. The dude who caught me was tall and thin, about my brothers’ age, and had a big brown bunch of curly hair and ears that stuck out too far. But in a really, really cute way.
“Thanks!” I said, relieved. I guess I was flustered after Mrs. Lenworth’s odd conversation. Falling into the arms of Mr. Cute & Scruffy didn’t help my composure. “That would have been . . . unfortunate.”
“You think?” he quipped, smiling a big goofy smile. He would have looked nerdy, except for the Army shirt. And, I noticed, strange looking boots. “I’m Ryan,” he said, as he let me get my balance back.
“Morrigan,” I sighed. “Morrigan Mather. Just moved here. I’m the freaky new girl.”
“Yeah, I heard about you,” he said. That got my attention.
“Heard about me?” I asked, one eyebrow up. Mom calls it my “Spock Face” because she says it feels like Mr. Spock on Star Trek is looking at you and deciding what kind of alien you are. “Already? I’ve only been here an hour and a half!”
“Oh!” Ryan said, realizing how tawdry that sounded. “I mean, I overheard a couple of the bimbettes giving you the total verbal smackdown. And anyone who can make Amy, Leslie and whatshername freak out like that, I figure I gotta meet them. Her. You.” Aw, he was being all nervous and cute! Did that mean he liked me?
“Here I am,” I said, raising my arms to ‘present’ me. “Only I’ve got maybe three minutes to get to my next class . . . gym?”
“Oh, no!” he said, mimicking horror. “That’s The Clydesdale. You can find her over there,” he said, pointing out the window in the corridor, “in that big gym-shaped building deceptively labeled ‘gymnasium’.”
“Wow,” I said, my mouth open a little.
“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Never heard sarcasm before?”
“No,” I dismissed. “Just didn’t think anyone in this town could use ‘deceptively’ in a sentence. Properly. Way to go, Ryan,” I said, sarcastically punching him in the arm, like dweeby guys do to other dweeby guys.
“Here, if you try to go the long way you’ll be late,” he said, when he saw me stalk off towards the stairs. “I’ll show you the short-cut.”
Reluctantly, I followed him, wondering if he wasn’t a serial-killer disguised as a nerdy teen-aged boy. I still hadn’t made up my mind when he pushed me through a ten-inch gap in the chain link fence next to the cafeteria. Then he led me around the back, which smelled just lovely, but put us just behind the rear entrance to the locker rooms. I still had maybe a minute to spare.
“It’s borderline illegal, but sometimes it’s the only way you can get here in time. I’ve got gym next period, though, and Biology is right over here,” he said, pointing to one of the trailer units. “They keep it out here so the smell of formaldehyde doesn’t make people puke.”
“How thoughtful,” I said, looking around for the entrance. Ryan pointed it out for me without any more sarcastic quips. “Hey, aren’t you afraid of associating with the New Freaky Girl?” I asked.
“Um, I’m not so concerned about my reputation,” he laughed. “Not with the one I’ve got.”
“And what is that supposed to mean?” I asked, waiting another testosterone-drenched tale of how he was really studying to be an international mercenary or a kick boxer or something else practical.
“You’ll find out,” he sighed. “Let’s just say that if you’re still associating with me in three weeks, you’ll be the exception.”
“Nice to meet you Ryan,” I said, pushing open the door. He only made a token glance to see if there were any naked females in proximity to the door, which makes him an utter gentleman in 15 year-old terms.
“You too, Morrigan,” he said – very nearly pronouncing it right. My opinion of him climbed.
And that’s how I met Ryan. And yes, he became my love interest. Good eye. But let’s not jump ahead, shall we? I’ve got a story to tell, here.
That night I got off the bus and walked the depressingly long driveway between our new house and the first paved road. It was nearly half a mile, which for pampered urban types such as myself constituted a workout. Alex and Lugh were comparing notes about their classes, two of which they shared, and the nubile young ladies within. Both of them were a year ahead of me, so they felt free to objectify all of the girls in my grade as well, which I suppose should have made me feel honored in some sick and twisted way.
“Hey, you wore your star?” Lugh asked. As my full brother, he’s a little more sensitive to my presence than Alex. “That was awfully brave of you!”
“Why not?” I asked, crossly. Yes, I see the pun. “It’s my religion.”
“Good luck with that,” Alex nodded, sagely.
“I know,” I sighed, “I’ve already gotten some crass comments by the social committee. Screw them,” I said. I wasn’t feeling brave enough to use actual profanity, but the sentiment was right. “Why didn’t you wear yours?” I asked Lugh.
He shrugged. “Just forgot it, I guess. I don’t wear it all the time, like you do. Not really a ‘jewelry’ kind of guy.”
“Unless it’s an earring,” Alex pointed out, helpfully. “He thinks it will help him get girls.”
“Do not!” Lugh said, annoyed.
“Do too,” Alex laughed.
“It will help him get sepsis,” I muttered. “Anyway, people will get used to it. It’s just some jewelry. I’m more worried about the thin pickin’s of cute boys. Wall-to-wall rednecks and dirtbags.”
“Aw, give ‘em a chance,” Alex insisted. “Some of them might be very nice dirtbags.”
“You’re such a glass-half-full kind of guy,” I said, rolling my eyes. Brothers.
But secretly I was glad I had them to talk to about today, because I didn’t want to get Mom involved. With six kids in school, she needed to focus her time and efforts where they were needed most – with out three youngest siblings. I couldn’t wait to hear how Gwid’s first day at kindergarten went, for instance. That was a warm and happy thought that drove away all the anxiety about the pentagram.
Little did I know . . .
Chapter Two:
I Make A Friend And An Enemy
I tried to put a good face on things as I got ready for school the next day – Dad says that a positive mental attitude is 90 percent of success, something he picked up in the Marines, I think – but I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something stirring in the Force. I even considered not wearing my star that day. But I resented the implications, that I really was some kind of freak.
Besides, I always feel better with it. Mom had it specially made for me when she and Aunt Janet and her coven in Oregon initiated me two years ago. She told me then that it was a tangible sign that the Goddess (and, by extension, Mom) was always watching over me and protecting me. It’s gorgeous, too – Mom knew some really smooth jewelry designers in Portland, and the one she got to do it did a stunning job. Silver, with five tiny amethysts where the point meets the circle. It was too pretty to hide, and truthfully I felt a little naked without it now after wearing every day for two years.
Everything seemed to go normally until third period. Social Studies, with Mrs. Evans. I hadn’t formed an opinion about her at that point, except that she could put a room full of ADHD kids to sleep with her lecturing style. I was struggling not to pass out myself while she briefly sketched out the complexities of the feudal relationship in Medieval Europe, and how it provided the foundation for the French Revolution . . . or something like that . . . when the TA showed up. For me. I had been summoned to the Guidance Counselor.
I had to ask directions twice before I found his office, a quiet cell-like space tucked in the back of the Vocational classes. There were actually two Guidance offices, but the other office was vacant. I knocked tentatively on the door, and heard a friendly, “Come in!” . . . so I went in.
“You wanted to see me?” I asked, hesitantly. “I’m Morrigan Mather.”
“Ah! Yes! Ms. Mather!” the balding counselor (“Mr. Jerry Pratt”, his nameplate read in institutional-grade letters across fake plastic wood grain) said, half rising. “Come in, come in! Take a chair.”
“Thanks,” I grunted, and dropped my bookbag to the floor with a thump before sliding into the chair facing his desk. “What can I do for you?”
“Well, a few things,” he began, friendly enough. “First, I want to welcome you here to Northern. How are you making the adjustment?”
“Slowly,” I admitted. “But it seems okay so far. A lot different from back home.”
“Yes, yes, of course,” he murmured, as he studied something on the antiquated computer in front of him. “Especially for a bright girl like you, I imagine. I see here you won the National Council of Teachers of English essay award a few years back?”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “Among others. Junior quiz bowl, forensics team, Latin club, Honor Society—”
“No athletics?”
I shrugged. “I ran cross-country last year. I was good at it, but the practice was at 5:30 in the morning, which was murder. Took two years of kung fu. Oh, and I was on swim team for the first two years in Middle School, speaking of brutal practice schedules.”
“Pity we don’t have a pool. Or a cross country team. As a matter of fact, Morgan—”
“Actually,” I interrupted, “It’s pronounced ‘mor-i-gan’, but you can make that middle syllable as soft as you like.”
“Very good, thank you,” he murmured, making a note in my brand-new file. “As I was saying, I’m concerned that you will find the curriculum we offer here at Northern a little . . . limiting.”
“I know you don’t have the bells and whistles that I would have gotten in Portland, but it’ll be all right. There’s the Internet. If nothing else, my chances of being class valedictorian have gone up dramatically.”
“Funny!” Mr. Pratt smiled, indulgently. “But true, nonetheless. It’s my job to make sure all of our students get a complete education – or as complete as the budget allows – and work to their fullest potential. I know you’re still settling in, but please feel free to call on me if you start getting bored. As strapped as the county is for cash, I do have access to resources that will help you with college preparation. You do plan on attending college, don’t you?”
“Eventually,” I said, evenly. “I’d like to finish high school, first.”
“I’m pleased to hear that. Any . . . other troubles?” he asked, hesitantly. If he glanced at my star, I didn’t notice it. I almost said something about yesterday, but decided against it. I didn’t want to come off as whiny.
“Not really,” I said. “Oh, finding new friends, learning my way around, figuring out which bus is mine, that sort of thing. But nothing else.”
“Glad to hear it,” he said, nodding. “Not everyone around here is exactly welcoming to newcomers, but . . . well, to be honest, I went to high school with your mother, so it’s hard to exactly say y’all are newcomers.”
“You went to school with Mom?” I asked, suddenly intrigued by this exercise. “What was she like?”
He chuckled. “She was an inspired idealist, a real earth-cookie when it came to stopping apartheid and social justice and stuff like that. And pretty as the day is long – you favor her a bit. But she was destined for bigger and better things than this little village. To be honest, I was shocked when I heard she was moving back.”
“She’s still an earth-cookie,” I agreed, “but she’s had enough of the big city life, I guess. She did the climbing–the-corporate-ladder thing, the own-your-own-artisan-business thing, and the super-suburban mom thing. I think she just got tired and wanted to slow things down. And my stepdad was crazy about the mountains here, so . . .”
“. . . so here we are,” he smiled. “Oh, and I should ask you, have you read the student handbook?”
I nodded. It had taken all of eight minutes, as it was about a dozen stapled sheets inside a garish cover with a stylized Viking on the front – our mascot was the ‘raider’. It was pretty standard: no PDAs, don’t do drugs, honor code, dress code, don’t bring guns to school – that last one made me feel better, because nothing deters a crazed maniac with a firearm like a student handbook regulation.
“Good, if you don’t mind signing this, stating you read and understand it,” he said, sliding a sheet towards me. I shrugged and signed, after reading it.
“Thanks,” he sighed. “That’s about it. You can go back to . . . you have Mrs. Evans? My condolences. If it makes you feel better, she’s not the most boring teacher at the school.”
“Good to know,” I smiled, and rose.
“Oh, and one last thing,” he added as I was leaving. “You might find your . . . choice of jewelry might cause some raised eyebrows. I’m all for letting kids express their individuality, but just to warn you, the folks around here are wonderful people . . . wonderful, ignorant people.” He didn’t say anything else after that, so I wandered back to class . . . slowly. Mrs. Evans was that soporific.
Things went smoothly after that, and I even made a new friend at lunch. I had seen what the cafeteria had to offer, and since Mom is such a good cook I asked her to make my lunch instead. She had to do that for my little sibs anyway, so she didn’t mind. I was eating in the courtyard space between Classroom Wing A and Classroom Wing B, when an odd-looking girl shambled up to me.
“Odd-looking” is relative. In Portland, she would have looked like every other tragically hip goth emo barista in town. But here in Mayberry she stuck out like a neon sign. A flashing black neon sign.
Her hair was dyed black, she had OD’d on eyeliner, and she wore a plain black top of a vintage cut. Her face was kind of round, but she wore long hair anyway, so most of it flopped over her eyes, which were a pretty blue. Her black jeans were tucked into the top of her combat boots, and if she didn’t have a tattoo yet, it was only a matter of time. And she was sucking on a cigarette, which I hated, because Bill smoked and because they’re hideously bad for you. Smoking had been so rare as to be noteworthy in Oregon. In North Carolina, almost half the people I saw smoked.
“Hey,” she said, as she approached. “You the new girl?”
“Yes,” I said, after some hesitation. “I’m Morrigan.”
“Catherine,” she said, a trace of imperiousness in her voice. “Not ‘Kathy’, not ‘Kate’, just ‘Catherine’. Catherine Hicks.”
“You want to sit down?”
“I don’t eat lunch,” she said, like she was bragging about it.
“I didn’t offer lunch, just a seat. But if you want an apple . . .”
“Nah,” she dismissed. But she did sit down next to me. “So, how do you like the boondocks, Morrigan?” she asked, nailing the pronunciation the first time. Good sign.
“So far, so good,” I shrugged. “People talk funny, but apart from that . . .”
“Yeah, I suppose we do, some,” she agreed. “So do you. What do your folks do?”
“They’re . . . kinda semi-retired.” I told her the story of grandma’s house and my life story, abbreviated version. She nodded.
“That’s cool. My dad works as a postal carrier and my mom runs the flower shop in what passes for ‘downtown’ Millers Ferry.”
“Sibs?”
“Nope. You?”
“Two older brothers, one a step, two younger half-sisters and a younger half-brother. Oh, and an older step-brother and step-sister, non-residential. It’s confusing,” I admitted.
“Life in the Twenty-First century,” she snorted, before taking another drag. “Oh. You mind if I smoke?” she asked.
“Philosophically, yes,” I decided. “Personally, no. My dad’s been trying to quit for years. I hate it, but I can stand it. As long as the conversation holds out. Then it’s a good excuse to be elsewhere.”
“You make an excellent point,” Catherine chuckled. “I think I’m not going to hate you.”
“I’m getting the feeling that’s as close to ‘like’ as I’m going to get,” I smiled back. “Don’t worry, I’ll win you over in time. So, you’re the resident goth community, I take it?”
She scowled, peering out at the rest of the student body. “Me and maybe a few others. But they claim you’re a goth around here if you wear anything black you didn’t buy from Wal-Mart or advertises a country singer. Low expectations.”
“That seems to be the standard,” I said, glumly. “I just realized last night that our first real paper isn’t due for a month . . . in English class. I’m scandalized: back home, they’d have you writing your very first day.”
“Get used to it,” she said, the frustration steaming in her voice. “They can’t set the bar too high, or the morons might get loose. So we have to suffer.”
“I heard that there were some . . .” I hesitated to use the word, but I was trying to be generous, “cool extra-curricular activities?”
“Marching band? FFA? No, thanks. I’m going into JUNC just to go to New York, but I’m not exactly Quiz Bowl material. And those are the ‘fun’ things,” she said, morosely.
“Yeah, I can see why you’d be bummed,” I admitted. “And now I’m bummed, too. Thanks for sharing.”
“Just a happy ray of sunshine, me. Well, Morrigan, let me introduce you to the social experiment that is Northern High. Over there,” she said, indicating a knot of better-dressed kids clustered around a picnic table, “are the upper- class, that is, the small group of kids who live in town and don’t have free school lunch. They’re about 90 percent tools, but one or two are decent. Probably not the Harpies,” she said, indicating the three blondes who seemed to be at the nexus of the group.
“Then you have the middle-class kids,” she said, pointing to another corner, where a similarly dressed bunch was hanging out and eating sandwiches. “Slightly larger pool, from town and the outskirts, only half of ‘em are on free school lunch. That’s the group that spawned me.
“Then there are the hillbillies. Rednecks. Good ol’ boys. Motorheads. They mostly come from the tiny little hamlets tucked away in the bottomlands in the mountains, proper. And some are parked up on the ridges. I know for a fact that two of them don’t have phones at home, and one has no power. Dirt poor, and have been for generations. See that guy? He’s got a kid. And that dude has already served a thirty-day jaunt for under-aged drinking. And rough – they’re the guys who keep our drop-out rate interesting,” she said, indicating a spot on the wall where a large group of scruffy-looking teens was clustered, noisily. Most were smoking in direct violation of the rules, and t-shirts under unbuttoned plaid button-downs, jeans with holes in the knees, huge wallet chains and ball caps were the uniform.
“Please tell me there’s a geek-and-nerd section?” I pleaded.
“Oh, mais oui,” she nodded. “They hang out in the library at lunch, mostly. About six guys, four girls. Jocks stick to the cafeteria. Assorted random misfits roam the halls at will. So that’s the basic rundown on this place, all 178 students worth.”
“I’m sure I’ll fit in just fine,” I said. “But I’ll stick to outside. I like it outside.”
“Cling to your small pleasures,” she agreed. “Otherwise you’ll go crazy and end up on prom committee, or something equally droll. Hey, everyone’s talking about your pentagram,” she said, casually. “You’ve got half the school freaked out that you’re a Satanist. Which, by the way, scores you enormous cool points, true or not. But I’m the type to avoid the hysteria and get the facts. So, you’re a Wiccan?” she asked, just a hair on the cautious side. I could appreciate that. I’m cautious when I see someone wearing a pentagram openly, too. Proud, but cautious.
“Yeah. Second generation,” I added. “My mom has been practicing for years, and she raised all of us that way.”
“That,” she pronounced, exhaling, “is the single coolest thing I’ve heard in a year.”
“Thanks.”
“I have about a million questions, and four more minutes of lunch, so I’m going to table them and just chill about it. I’m sure you’re sick of explaining it all to the muggles.”
“Actually, we – my family, that is – call them ‘mundanes’. Although technically the word is ‘cowan’, but we don’t use that as much. And I don’t mind answering questions – it’s a cool religion. I love it,” I said, sincerely. “And there’s so much . . . bullshit out there about it,” I said, the novelty of profanity giving me a little thrill, “that I enjoy dispelling the lies. I’m not preachy about it, but I’ll answer your questions. Does that mean we’re friends? If it won’t blow your ‘desperate outsider’ persona.”
“Friends? Sure . . . just no Barbies, ‘kay? And you know how I said that it was really cool that you’re a Wiccan?”
“Yeah?”
“Just to warn you, that’s probably a minority opinion.”
The bell rang before I could really follow up on that. Pity.
* * *
Mrs. Lenworth was beginning a discussion on our first piece of class literature for the year, A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream. I love Shakespeare, and that was one of my favorite plays, so I was pretty excited when she made the announcement. She did seem to stare at me a little, but called on me twice and verbally praised me in front of the class. I actually had a decent time that day, a glimmer of sunshine. Then Mrs. Lenworth started to rain all over me.
“Miss Mather, will you please see me after class?” she asked. I figured she was going to try to recruit me into Quiz Bowl, since she was one of the sponsors. No such luck.
“Yes? Ma’am?” I added hastily, remembering her reaction to my blunt manner yesterday.
“Miss Mather, didn’t I ask you to read the student handbook in regards to the dress code last night? I took the liberty of asking Mr. Pratt to speak to you about it.”
“Yes. And I did.” I was about to add what a compelling piece of literature it was, but the tone in her voice made me think that wouldn’t have gone over well. I looked down at what I was wearing – light blue jeans and a yellow top with a V neck, on the sincerely held belief that it would somehow amplify what “cleavage” I had working for me. On my feet were my red Chucks, because I don’t have the same fetish for footwear that most girls have. I love my Chucks. “Why?”
“Because you apparently missed the section about appropriate jewelry. Your . . . necklace is not permitted under the school rules.”
I just stared at her. “I beg your pardon?”
“I believe you heard me,” she said, a trifle more sternly. “The section denoting restrictions on ‘advertisements or endorsements of drugs and/or alcohol, disruptive, demeaning, offensive or derogatory speech or symbols, or gang-related symbols’,” she quoted from memory.
“Um, I seem to be missing something here,” I said, confused. “How is the jewelry I’m wearing endorse drugs, alcohol, or offensive . . . anything?
“If I have to be explicit,” she said, enunciating every word, “then I shall: you might not be aware of it, but your necklace is a Satanic symbol, a gang-related symbol, and it has no place here at Northern High School. What you wear . . . and do . . . on your own time is, of course, your business. But there are certain standards of behavior the school community expects in our students . . . and dabbling in the occult is not one of them.” The disapproval in her voice was almost tangible. I stared, my mouth agape, a surge of adrenaline washing over me.
“Ms. Lenworth,” I began, my voice low as I struggled to be respectful, “my pentagram is a symbol of my religion. It is not a ‘gang symbol’, and it is certainly not a ‘Satanic symbol’. And practicing my religion is not ‘dabbling in the occult’.”
She sneered at me. “It’s a sign of witchcraft.” She said it like I was supposed to shrink away and make the sign of the cross. Instead I just looked confused.
“Well . . . yes,” I said, stating the obvious. “I’m a witch. Witches wear pentagrams. That makes sense, doesn’t it?”
She rolled her eyes derisively. “Miss Mather, I assure you, you are not a witch. You might pretend to be, but you have no special powers: you are just a regular little girl.”
“Well, you’re wrong about two out three,” I blurted out, as I got angry. “Because I don’t have ‘special powers’ and I’m not just a ‘regular little girl,’ I’m an ‘extraordinary young lady.’ But I am a real witch, and if you think I’m going to take off my pentagram because you can’t interpret the damn school rules correctly, you are mistaken!” I said defiantly.
I had a lot more I wanted to say, but my tone and my attitude caught her a little off guard – her turn to stare with her mouth agape – and Mom always says to leave on a high note. It’s more dramatic. I was feeling pretty dramatic.
So I turned on my heel and walked out, singing sweetly over my shoulder, “See you tomorrow!”
* * *
“So, you really stirred up the teacher’s lounge,” that odd boy, Ryan, commented when I slipped through the shortcut behind the cafeteria.
“Huh?” I said, eloquently.
“I overheard Mr. Sparks – Lenworth came in and raised a fuss. Your name came up.” Mr. Sparks was the assistant principal, I remembered, a stout gentleman who walked with a slight limp.
“She’s upset because I wear a pentagram,” I volunteered. “I’m a witch, we wear pentagrams. Go figure.”
“You’re . . . a witch?” he asked, shocked. “I thought you just picked that up at Hot Topic or something—”
“Don’t even start,” I groaned. “Look, yes, I’m a Wiccan. No big deal. It’s a religion, just like any other one, just more fun and with an arguably cooler wardrobe.”
“Hey!” Ryan said, defensively, “I was just asking. I’m kind of an atheist, myself.”
“Peachy. Look, Ryan, you seem like a nice guy, but the truth is I’m having a crappy day, and I have to face Gym, now, and I’d rather not waste all of this on you when you’re obviously trying to be nice to me. So . . . how about you come by and see me at lunch tomorrow, and properly flirt with me?”
“I wasn’t – I was just – I—” he stammered, eyes wide with terror.
“It’s a date, then,” I said, glumly, and shut the door to the girl’s locker room on him.
I was pissed. I mean, livid in a way I’d never felt before. I felt betrayed! I felt oppressed! I felt discriminated against! I knew Mrs. Lenworth spoke out of ignorance, of which there was an abundant supply in Mayberry, but that didn’t make me feel any less offended. I obsessed about it for hours, through Gym, through Economics, through the bus ride home, and on up to my room and the sanctity of my laptop.
I spent a few hours before dinner venting online to my friends back in Oregon, who I was missing terribly, and I felt better. I nearly mentioned it to Mom at dinner, but the little kids were reciting all the exciting news about kitty cats and Elmo and other important stuff, so I just shut up and ate. My mood didn’t escape Mom’s attention (nothing ever does) but she did me the courtesy of not asking me about it.
What to do? On the one hand, I could knuckle under to the ugly hand of authority and leave it at home – thus depriving me of an important security blanket and freedom of expression and religion under the First Amendment. On the other hand I could go all Norma Rae and lead a pagan crusade – what an ironic oxymoron! – to the highest courts in the land, letting none stand against my righteous wrath.
I was so torn up about it I meditated on it, after homework. Side note: the homework was about twice as easy as I was used to, and I blew through most of my assignments for the entire week in a fit of academic rage. Then I meditated on it.
That’s what witches do when we’re upset, we meditate. Not exactly in the Eastern sense, though it’s not too far removed from it. You sit with your butt on a small pillow, cross your legs under you, light a few candles on your altar (mine was a milk crate covered with a board and a red cloth at the moment) and let your mind calmly and serenely examine the problem from all angles to see what Wisdom might dictate.
Or, if Wisdom was feeling shy that day, you could always invoke your anima and see what the Goddess might say. Or the God, if you ever needed a male perspective. I won’t say exactly what I came up with that night, except that it involved not rocking the social boat at school during my very first week and getting branded an outcast. I’d take the middle way: passive resistance. I’d wear my pentagram like Mrs. Lenworth and I had never spoken, putting the onus back on her. If passive resistance was good enough for Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, Jr., maybe it would work for me.
I went to bed that night feeling refreshed and confident that I would prevail, humming ‘We Shall Overcome’ as I drifted off.
Chapter Three:
I Get The Day Off
The next day I didn’t make it to third period.
Apparently Lenworth, or one of her spies, had seen me boldly wearing my silver pentagram around a lightweight black turtleneck – and if you were wondering if I was trying to intimidate her a little with my color selection, officially it was just what I felt like wearing that day. I also skipped the contacts and wore my glasses for the first time. I actually look kind of cute in glasses, and they make you look smarter. That day I wanted to look as brilliant as possible.
But fifteen minutes after second period began, the intercom requested that I come to the office. I muttered something about paperwork on the way out, but there were whispers behind be – and a battle in front of me. I felt a thrill rise up my spine as I went to the office, and silently invoked Athena’s help. Morrigan was the Irish war-goddess I was named for, but I’d always been partial to Pallas Athene, the big brain behind Western Civilization, through her crafty Athenians. So was Mom, at least enough to include her as my middle name. She was Goddess of Wisdom and Warfare, and I’d need help along both lines.
And basketweaving. Just thought I’d mention that, too. She’s multi-talented.
When I got into the office, Mr. Sparks and Mr. Pratt were waiting for me, looking uneasy. Mrs. Lenworth was nowhere to be seen.
“Oh, Morrigan, come in,” Pratt said to me, nervously. He pulled up a chair after I did.
“So, what’s this about?” I asked.
“It seems Mrs. Lenworth has complained that you are in violation of the school’s dress code policy by wearing that pentagram,” he said, pronouncing the word in his slow Southern drawl as if was strange in his mouth. “She then said that you were defiant with her when she asked you to remove it.”
“Well, there’s more to it than that,” I countered, “but that’s the essence of our conversation.”
“Well, may I ask you why you chose to be defiant with Mrs. Lenworth, instead of complying with school policy?” he asked patiently.
“Because she was wrong. My pentagram doesn’t violate school policy. It’s a simple symbol of my religion,” I stated, boldly. Okay, maybe I was trembling a little.
“She mentioned that, that you called Witchcraft a religion,” he commented. “She also said she tried to dissuade you from making such a claim, but that you defiantly persisted.”
“Well, of course I did!” I answered, sputtering. “Because she’s wrong! Witchcraft is a religion, and I’m a properly initiated witch!”
He looked at me smugly. “Now, young lady, I enjoy the whims of popular culture as much as anyone. I’m partial to Anne Rice novels, and I admit to watching Charmed as a guilty pleasure. But pretending you’re a witch because you read about it in Harry Potter—”