Witch One Dunnit? (Rachael Penzra mystery) by Elizabeth Shawn

Author:Elizabeth Shawn [Shawn, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Outskirts Press
Published: 2011-08-28T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TEN

From the Wiccan Rede:

Heed the North Wind’s mighty gale

Lock the door and drop the sail.

The memorial service was bizarre. To say it was a mixture of cultures would be to understate the case. Most of those invited, and it was a private affair due to the publicity of murder, were local. The family was apparently just as small as Lucinda had claimed. She entered the town’s nondenominational church with two protective women hovering around her like well-trained guard dogs, but when it was time for the seating, they fell back behind the family pews, leaving her alone with Peter and Ronnie. The brother-in-law and his son were dressed normally; that is to say they wore formal suits and ties. Lucinda, though, had gone all out for her outré personality. She wore a long dress of soft, shimmering, rainbow colors, layer after layer dropping from her shoulders. If I hadn’t been able to see her arms pop out several times, I would have sworn there was no rhyme or reason to the shape of the dress. On her head she wore a tiara, flashing with diamonds (or reasonable facsimiles) and various other stones. She glittered and shone and flashed and sparkled at her daughter’s funeral.

There was nothing funny about it, though. She was dressed as though she was celebrating the death, and I had to respect the courage it took to defy convention. Only the tears hanging unreleased in her eyes gave any hint of loss. The man who spoke to us, whom I assumed was also a witch, wore a black robe and cowl. A somber black in his case, but his talk was anything but sorrowful. He spoke of beginnings and ends that flowed into one another, therefore never truly beginning or ending, only seeming to in our limited vision. He read a Native American poem, entreating us not to grieve for someone who was actually still with us – in the wind, the flowers, the day and the night.

He was a very gifted speaker. Afterwards I wasn’t sure if he was promoting reincarnation or simply reminding us that truth really was ashes to ashes, dust to dust, and every breath we took brought into our bodies a minute mote of what had been someone or something else at one time. We breathe in trees and birds, humans and oceans with every inhalation. It was unbelievably comforting to think about his words. Death hadn’t lost its entire stranglehold of fear, but I was left feeling there was no end of life, only different forms. I thought of Aunt Josie and her belief in the power contained in stones, as though even they were alive. I’d have to pay more attention to the world in the future.

I wondered how the locals who weren’t witches were handling the ceremony. None of them seemed particularly surprised or uncomfortable. They must have had some idea of what to expect.

Moondance, dressed only a little less fabulously than the chief mourner, wept openly. The rest of us were too enthralled by the talk to weep.

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