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I followed her. Even though I hadn’t felt any residue of Jack Speros’s presence when I’d been here the night before last, I still tensed, wondering what I would do if he’d decided to take up residence in Hazel’s Airbnb after all.
But the space felt curiously neutral to me. Even without a lingering ghost, there still might have been some dregs of the violence enacted here left behind, part of the reason why I’d thought it would be a good idea to perform a thorough cleansing of the place.
However, I couldn’t sense a single thing. Henry’s deputies had been detailed but also careful, which was why I didn’t spy a single knickknack or other item out of place, not even some fingerprint powder left on a surface.
Chloe must have noticed the same things I had, because she said, sounding almost disappointed, “Maybe we don’t need to do this after all.”
“No, we still should, even if the house seems okay,” I replied. “It’s always better to take precautions, just in case.”
She was quiet for a moment, surveying the flowered couch, the prints that echoed the home’s bright colors of blue and green and yellow. Then she nodded, saying, “Well, I told you I wanted to learn from you, so this seems like it would be a good place to start.”
“This isn’t school,” I said, almost amused, and her shoulders lifted.
“Maybe not exactly, but it’s still better to work with someone who knows what they’re doing, right?”
I supposed she had a point there. While I’d never had any formal training myself, relying mostly on books and then later on, watching some YouTube videos from people who were respected members of the witchy community, I knew that not everyone had the same learning style. For Chloe, it might just be better for her to have an example right in front of her.
“Well,” I said, “the first thing we should do is get these white candles set out and lit, and then we can go from there.”
I was still holding the bag with all my ritual supplies, so I reached inside and handed one of the pillar candles to her, followed by the long-handled lighter I’d also brought. She set the candle down on the TV stand, which was placed against the eastern wall.
Soon enough, all the candles had been put in positions roughly corresponding to the four cardinal directions. She sent me a questioning look and I said, “Go ahead and light them. As you do so, imagine a sphere of white light surrounding this place and everything inside.”
A nod, and she went ahead and lit the candles one by one, even as I murmured, “Goddess, grant us peace and protection within this space.”
Once Chloe was done, she came back to me and set the long-tipped lighter down on the coffee table. “Do we smudge now?”
“We won’t be smudging at all,” I responded. “We’ll light the sage and carry it through the house, but that should be enough.”
Her expression was a little puzzled. “You don’t smudge the traditional way?”
“Sometimes,” I said. It seemed clear enough to me that most of what she’d learned had probably been gleaned from YouTube videos and maybe online articles and blogs, and she didn’t have a lot of real-life experience. So much of being a witch was about intuition, about going where your instincts and the universe guided you, rather than parroting rituals you’d learned from secondary sources. “I’ll do that when I’m moving into a new space, or sometimes if I feel a place’s energy has become stagnant. That’s not what I’m sensing here, though.” I paused there before adding, “Give yourself a moment to become still and absorb the energies of the space. I think you’ll see what I mean.”
Her brows drew together, and she gave a thoughtful nod. Then she closed her eyes and spread her arms wide, as though to drink in all the micro-currents in the air that surrounded us.
I held myself as still as I could, even though my feet were already beginning to hurt and I would much rather have made my way over to the couch and sat down. Doing so would have disturbed Chloe’s meditation, though, so I told myself this shouldn’t take very long and that I needed to be mindful of her process.
To my relief, she opened her eyes a moment later, her face now reflecting a sort of wonder. “You’re right,” she said. “Why didn’t I notice that before?”
“Probably because you haven’t had a lot of practice letting yourself simply be,” I replied. “Being a witch isn’t always about doing. Sometimes it’s about stillness.”
“Like meditation?”
I tilted my head, considering the question. “Sort of,” I said. “And I do meditate, but that’s a little different from what you just did now. In this particular situation, it’s more a case of letting yourself be open to whatever energies might exist in a space.”
“I definitely don’t think Jack is here,” she told me.
“Neither do I. But it’s still good to make sure the place is clear and neutral, and that protections are set up so you don’t have to worry about anything hostile coming near the house.”
Now her slate-gray eyes were wide, reflecting real fear. “You think whoever killed Jack might come back to get me, too?”
“Not exactly,” I replied quickly, since the last thing I wanted was for her to be in a fearful state when we cast the protection spells. It was very important to be in a calm and mindful place when working any kind of magic. “Honestly, I don’t really know what we’re dealing with here. If it was a personal grudge, then there would be no reason for the murderer to come anywhere close to the scene of the crime. But at the same time, I just think it’s smarter to put as much protection in place as possible.”
My words seemed to calm her, because the worried look left her eyes, and now she seemed more thoughtful than anything else. “I can see that.”
“Good,” I said. “Because I think it’s important for you to do the protection work.”
Once again, her eyes flared with concern. “I don’t know how to do that!”
