Tarnished and Torn: A Witchcraft Mystery Read online

  “I’m going to go find the vintage stuff,” I told Bronwyn and Maya, who were inspecting a series of delicate hand-knotted necklaces made by a woman whose name tag read, appropriately, SAPPHIRE STONE. As for me . . . I have a finite supply of shopping energy. I wanted to spend it on items for the store. “How about we meet in an hour? Is there a refreshment stand or food court?”

  “Let’s check the map,” Maya said, studying a brochure that included a map of vendors. Before we left Aunt Cora’s Closet this morning she had drawn red circles around a few names. “Okay . . . there are a few antique-jewelry dealers in the back right corner, directly in front of the big blue curtain. And the food court’s over there, to the side. See you in an hour, then?”

  “I’ll be there,” I said, and headed off.

  As I made my way through the venue, I remembered why I generally avoid crowds. The sensations generated by the life forces of so many people together can be overpowering. Outside, in the fresh air, the sensations are dispersed, but in an enclosed space—even a cavernous one like the Cow Palace—I start to feel unnerved, jangly.

  Which might have accounted for the annoying, just-out-of-my-grasp conviction that something was wrong. It wasn’t anything specific, nothing I could put my finger on; just a vague glimmer, like the here-one-moment, gone-the-next mirage one might encounter on an insufferably long, hot Texas highway.

  I pivoted slowly, turning 360 degrees, searching for something out of the ordinary: a practitioner with a pulsing purple-gray aura, for example, or an out-of-control familiar. Or maybe a surprise appearance of Aidan Rhodes, the powerful witch who was self-appointed godfather to the local magical folk.

  But all I saw were mothers and daughters enjoying a day together, sharp-eyed merchants shopping for deals or hawking their wares, artisans and jewelry makers in search of supplies. And mounds of gemstones, trinkets, and baubles decorating every horizontal surface.

  Perhaps I was sensing the presence of a practitioner or two in the throng, but that was nothing to worry about. After all, there are many more witches, sorcerers, and psychics walking around than the average person would ever imagine. In such a large crowd as this, it wasn’t a stretch to think there might be a handful of powerful folks engaged in nothing more sinister than, say, hunting for the perfect brooch as a birthday present for their mothers-in-law.

  Shaking off the vague impressions, I made my way toward the back right corner and stopped to admire a stand featuring jewelry made from antique votive figures called milagros. The tiny charms represented body parts: legs, arms, head, heart. Traditionally, the figures were used to pray for health; I had seen chapel walls in Mexico so laden with milagros, it was a wonder the aged adobe didn’t crumble under the weight. Recently, jewelry makers and artists had discovered the appealing little charms and often incorporated them into their designs. Though tempted, I reminded myself I was in the vintage business. The only new items I carried were my own spirit bottles, talismans, and pentacles; I had no intention of turning Aunt Cora’s Closet into a spiritual supply store, but I indulged in a tiny witchy sideline.

  The next dealer was more up my professional alley: she specialized in Bakelite jewelry. Bakelite is an early form of hard plastic that comes in a rainbow of vivid colors; it is very much in demand by collectors. Plus, the rather bulky, funky design sense of the late ’50s and early ’60s was hugely popular among Aunt Cora’s Closet clientele. This time I let myself give in to temptation. I spent a good portion of my Gem Faire budget, but wound up with a satisfying jumble of bangles and earrings tucked into one canvas tote.

  Just beyond the Bakelite table I noticed a big sign that announced GRISELDA’S ANTIQUE JEWELRY AND GEMS.

  Behind the horseshoe display counter, I presumed, stood Griselda. An abundance of frowsy hair had been dyed an egg-yolk yellow, and hazel eyes were outlined with dramatic black kohl, like Bronwyn wore. Her bright teal T-shirt read KISS ME, I’M BAVARIAN, and orange-and-yellow tie-dyed stretch leggings strained to contain her voluptuous figure. A pawnshop’s worth of gold chains and tarnished silver medallions hung from her neck, both wrists were manacled in dozens of broad bracelets and slim bangles, sparkly rings adorned each finger, and multiple earrings and cuffs decorated her ears. She was hard to ignore.

  A snippet of an old poem my mother used to repeat came back to me: “with rings on her fingers and bells on her toes, she will have music wherever she goes . . .” I fought the urge to peek behind the counter to see if she wore anklets and toe rings.

  Griselda’s brocade-draped tables were loaded with antique gold lockets, tarnished silver pendants, and brooches made of bronze and mother of pearl. A large tray lined with deep purple velvet held dozens of gold and silver rings, some of which twinkled with semiprecious gems and rhinestones.

  At the moment the only part of Griselda visible was the seat of her tie-dyed stretch pants straining across her backside as she vigorously rooted through a stack of boxes. Tossing aside crumpled newspapers, she unearthed more decorative items and placed them on the orange-and-purple paisley tablecloth. She jingled pleasantly with each enthusiastic movement.

  She glanced up at me, but didn’t speak until two teenagers stopped by the display, oohing and aahing over the fine old pieces. Griselda straightened and gave them a welcoming, gap-toothed smile.

  “This one’s a beaut,” said Griselda, speaking excellent English with only a trace of a German accent. She held up a silver chain with a dented and tarnished but stunning, gem-encrusted silver medallion. “Belonged to a tavern wench in Madagascar, and it was given to her by her one true love, a sailor who never returned from the sea.”

  The girls seemed rapt, admiring the medallion.

  “If you look deep into the blue opal you’ll see the ocean”—Griselda paused dramatically—“and if you believe in true love, you will be able to see flashes of the lightning from the storm that sent him down to his watery grave.”

  The girls giggled and teased each other about what they saw in the depths of the opal.

  “Could I try it on?” asked the younger of the two, a pretty, petite teenager who looked Latina, with almond eyes and straight black hair hanging nearly to her waist.

  Griselda held the medallion out to her, but the other teen put out her hand to stop her friend.

  “Wait, Marisela. Don’t. Don’t you know opals are bad luck?” The girl was lovely, exotic-looking, with a glittering nose ring and hair plaited into a multitude of braids. She had dusky skin, her eyes were a celadon green, and her hair was the light golden brown of clover honey.

  “Seriously?” said Marisela. “I swear, Shawnelle, you’re as bad as my mom with all the superstitions.”

  “Whatever,” Shawnelle replied with a shrug. “But if your teeth start falling out or your face breaks out with a ton of zits, don’t come crying to me.”

  Marisela hesitated. “Oh, I guess . . . yeah, seems like I’ve heard something about opals being bad luck before. Never mind.”

  Griselda snorted loudly, laid the medallion on a silk-covered stand, and—apparently realizing she wasn’t going to make the sale—started unpacking more boxes.

  “Besides,” said the green-eyed Shawnelle as she slipped one ring after another onto her long, slim fingers and held out her hand, admiring each in turn. “We’re here on a mission. Remember?”

  “Oh, right. ’Scuse me. Do you have any tiaras?” Marisela asked in the general direction of Griselda’s backside.

  “Tiaras? Nein. No tiaras,” came the muffled reply. Griselda muttered something about opals and bad luck under her breath.

  “Opals aren’t necessarily bad luck,” I volunteered, unable to contain myself. I’m no gemologist, but opals are a very special kind of stone . . . and I hated it when people misinterpreted old legends. “They’re almost alive, and like any living thing they require the proper care and respect.”

  “Really?” Marisela asked. “You’re saying they’re, like, alive, alive?”

  “No way. Stones can’t
be alive; they’re minerals,” Shawnelle interjected. “My mom told me opals were bad luck unless . . . unless maybe they’re your birthstone?”

  I started to respond, but the girls’ attention was diverted when a buff young man ducked through the massive curtains that separated the staging area behind the booths from the show floor. Tall, large, and extremely fit, he had short blond hair, a prominent nose, and ice blue eyes.

  Impressive biceps bulged under the weight of the cardboard boxes he carried in each arm. “Wo?”

  “Bitte stell’es dorthin.” Griselda gestured to a spot on the floor next to the half-unpacked one.

  He grunted with the effort of setting his burden down gently.

  “Danke, Johannes,” she said, and asked him to bring in the rest of the boxes, as it was the last day. My German vocabulary consists of about ten words, but there are enough English cognates that I caught the gist of what they were saying.

  The girls fell silent, shy and smiling in the presence of the handsome young man. He nodded in their direction and made a comment in German to Griselda, who waved him off.

  “My birthstone’s aquamarine,” Marisela said, and with a smile in the direction of Johannes she reached out toward the medallion. “But . . . hey, Shawnelle, check me out. I’m braving the curse . . .”

  “Nein, don’t—” said Johannes, reaching out, but a sharp remark from Griselda made him stop abruptly. He ducked back through the parting in the curtains.

  Griselda met my gaze and rolled her eyes, in a “What are ya gonna do?” gesture. Then she turned back to the girls. “You two lookin’ for something special?” she demanded, apparently trying to encourage the girls to leave. Even though there weren’t hordes of customers clamoring to buy Griselda’s goods, some merchants hold a special disdain for browsers.

  “Like I was saying, I’m looking for a tiara for my sister,” repeated Marisela. “It’s her quinceañera. But mom doesn’t want to buy a brand new one; she wants an old one that looks like it got passed down through the family.”

  “How about a nice pendant?” suggested Griselda, holding out a shallow tray containing a mishmash of tangled chains and medallions. “I got plenty without opals. Or what about a ring?”

  “It has to be a tiara, for a quinceañera.”

  “Don’t even know what that is.”

  “You don’t? Seriously?” asked Marisela. “It’s, like, this awesome party when a girl turns quince, or fifteen. I had mine last year. It was awesome.”

  “Way awesome,” Shawnelle agreed with a nod.

  “Awesome,” Griselda echoed. “Still don’t got any tiaras.”

  I had desperately wanted a quinceañera when I turned fifteen, but my grandmother Graciela had called the custom “expensive foolishness.” Akin to a sweet-sixteen birthday, quinceañeras are a rite of passage in many Latino cultures and celebrate a girl’s transition to womanhood. Looking back on it now, I suspected Graciela—usually a stickler for observing her native Mexican and Indian traditions—had been trying to save me the embarrassment of having no one show up at my party.

  “I have a couple of tiaras at my store,” I said to the girls, handing them each a business card.

  “Vintage clothes?” Marisela read the card and nodded. “Cool. Hey, do you have any formal dresses that would work for a quinceañera? My sister and I still haven’t found exactly the right dresses yet, and it’s, like, coming up real soon.”

  “I do, yes.” I smiled, thinking of the scads of taffeta, netting, silks, and satins crowding the racks at Aunt Cora’s Closet. Depending on a family’s economic situation, a quinceañera can be a lavish affair on the scale of a wedding. The price tag for costuming alone could run into the thousands. Vintage was a fun, relatively inexpensive alternative.

  “Cool. Maybe we’ll come check it out.”

  “I look forward to it.”

  “Those rings look good on you,” Griselda said to Shawnelle. “You have nice hands for rings. Men like that.”

  “I like this one,” said Shawnelle, looking down at a large hunk of turquoise in a setting of tarnished, worked silver. “But . . . I guess I should save my money.”

  Griselda rolled her eyes and, once again sensing she wasn’t going to make a sale, returned to her unpacking.

  Now that the object of their admiration had ducked back behind the blue curtains, the girls’ enthusiasm waned. They wandered off.

  Griselda added several necklaces to the velvet-lined tray, and then set up a little stand that held a jewel-encrusted athame, or sacred ceremonial knife.

  Wait just a gol-durned second.

  An athame? Could Griselda be a witch?

  Once upon a time I was confident that I could recognize my own kind. But ever since moving to San Francisco I had met believers of all types, making it difficult to tell who was a self-defined practicing witch, a sorcerer, a Wiccan, a hoodoo, a Feri, or an adherent of one of the myriad other belief systems and magical traditions. There were so many I lost track.

  I had been distracted by Griselda’s wild outfit and funny mannerisms—could I have missed the sort of aural presence that might indicate she was a practitioner?

  “May I see the opal medallion, please?” I asked, in a bid to keep Griselda talking. I supposed it wasn’t really my business whether she was a witch or not—especially if she had taken steps to hide her identity through a cloaking spell or protective charm—but I was always interested in possible kindred spirits.

  Besides, that unsettled, wrong feeling I had before . . . I still couldn’t shake it.

  Griselda’s kohl-blackened eyes fixed on mine. I waited to feel a flash of recognition or to sense the aura of a practitioner. I felt nothing to indicate supernatural powers . . . but there was something. A vague sense of the sinister.

  Not coming from Griselda herself, but behind me.

  At that moment Griselda’s hazel eyes shifted to something over my shoulder and widened ever so slightly.

  The back of my neck tingled.

  I whirled around.

  No one. Nothing. Although thousands of shoppers mobbed the aisles of the Cow Palace, here in the corner we were, for all intents and purposes, alone.

  I turned back to Griselda. Without speaking, she picked up the medallion and held it out to me.

  I cupped the necklace in both hands, sharing my warmth with it. I waited, concentrated, and felt . . . not much. I really was one sorry excuse for a witch when it came to jewelry. But opals held water within their depths, which was one reason they were so fragile. I wasn’t kidding when I said they were alive. So I did sense a slight, tiny shimmer . . . like when I tried to scry by looking into my crystal ball. Almost . . . but not quite.

  “You know about opals, do you?”

  “It’s my grandmother’s birthstone. She has several. She wears them every day and treats them with oil, keeps them from the sun.”

  “Smart woman. They like to be with their owners at all times, and treated with respect, as you said.” She nodded, studying me. “Where you from?”

  “Texas originally. I’ve traveled a lot, though. Haven’t been back for a while.”

  “You still talk funny.”

  “So I’ve been told.” I’d been working on losing my twang, but it was stubborn. Still, given Griselda’s own accent it seemed like a pot-calling-the-kettle-black accusation. “You have some lovely items. My shop, Aunt Cora’s Closet, specializes in vintage clothing. I’m here hoping to score some nice vintage stuff today. But your prices . . .”

  “What’s wrong with ’em?”

  “Nothing. These are lovely pieces.” I gestured to the antique brooches laid out enticingly on the paisley brocade covering cheap card tables. “I was just wondering whether you might consider a wholesale rate—”

  “This is wholesale.”

  “Maybe a bulk rate?”

  “You’re a bargainer, huh?” Her eyes flickered to a point over my shoulder again. “Tell you what. You come back at the end of the day, once the hungry cr
owds have been through, and maybe I’ll make you a deal. Don’t like to pack all this stuff back up. If I’ve got a bunch on my hands at the end of the show, we can talk then.”

  She looked at me just a mite too intensely. Was she trying to telegraph that she wanted to see me later?

  “But I can’t guarantee you’ll get much at that point,” Griselda added. “Just the dregs. You might want to pick out a few choice pieces now.”

  Who is the bargainer now? I smiled, trying to shake off my suspicions. Surely Griselda was just a businesswoman keeping an eye on the crowd, trying to sell her inventory at the highest possible price.

  “Where’s this shop of yours?”

  I handed her my business card. She returned the favor and passed me a bright purple, shiny one with sparkles.

  “Hey, you’re on Haight Street? Lily Ivory?” she said, her eyes again shifting slightly. She lowered her voice. “I’m staying at a bed-and-breakfast right over there—the, uh, Morning House. You know this place?”

  “I think I’ve walked past it. The Haight’s a great neighborhood, isn’t it?”

  “Sure. Maybe I should come see your store. I—” She cut herself off when Johannes appeared with two more boxes. One was noticeably battered, and Mull had been written in black magic marker on the side.

  “Why do you bring this one?” Griselda chastised him. “It’s junk, says so right there on the side.”

  “You want I put it back?”

  “Dummer Junge . . . Ja, put it—” Griselda stopped midanswer and looked at me out of the corner of her eye. “Unless you’d like to buy it. Give you a good price. Good stuff here.”

  “You just said it was junk.”

  “Junk jewelry. This not the same as junk. There is a place for rhinestones, no?” She flapped my business card in my direction. “Vintage—this means old and used, no?”

  “I prefer to think of my inventory as classic.”

  She gave a dismissive wave. “You say you’re looking for inexpensive items for your shop. There are some good pieces here.”