Some Reviews! Publisher's Weekly cites Witches' Brew's "popular audience" and "impressive contributor's list," nothing that: "The volume boasts bewitching tales from the likes of Erica Jong, Louise Erdrich and Kathryn Ptacek, along with pieces from such unusual sources as Cotton Mather, Ben Franklin and theosophist H.P. Blavatsky." The Washington Post says that Erica Jong and Dean Koontz are "in undeniably spellbinding company in this compendium of prose and poetry celebrating the sisterhood of sorceresses." |
Excerpt from "Winter Solstice" by Evelyn Vaughn "Winter Solstice" first appeared in the online anthology STARDATES: INFINITE CELEBRATIONS from www.dreams-unlimited.com. Darkness surrounded the isolated cabin--in more ways than one. "This," murmured Ivy, watching her breath mist a cold pane of the cabin window, "is NOT what people mean when they call December a season of magic." Not that the wintery night beyond didn't have a hushed otherworldliness about it. Snow swirled out of the blackness so quietly, Ivy wasn't sure if she heard its tiny, gritty impact against the glass with her ears...or with less mundane senses. Magic, REAL magic, worked like that--so subtle it could hardly be differentiated from coincidence, or imagination, or even delusions. Chenille-sweatered arms braced against the windowsill, narrow chin pillowed on her arms, Ivy stared at her dark-haired, dark-eyed reflection. Sometimes, even the most devoted of witches found that kind of subtlety frustratingly anticlimactic. Maybe that's why so few potential magic users stayed with the discipline. Nowadays, people wanted the kind of instant pyrotechnics only MOVIE-witches produced. Ivy wasn't looking for laser beams and levitation--but over the last half-year, especially since the Harvest Moon, she'd become so desperate for a little proof, a little reassurance, that she ached for it, DREAMED about it. That's why she'd driven out here, by herself, on a day when her friends were preparing to party as only pagans could. "Magical quest, or fool's errand," she sighed, and in her breath's resulting fog she drew a squeaky, five-pointed star with one finger. "'Only my hair-dresser knows for sure.'" As the drawing began to weep from its outermost edges, she turned back to the too-cold room and faced her only companion for the Winter's Solstice. The gray tabby cat stared back, unblinking and unimpressed, from where she lay on the towel Ivy had laid out. She'd darted into the cabin while Ivy carried in her supplies for her night of vigil. Was the cat a visitor from the fairy realm, here to test Ivy's hospitality? A totem animal, arrived to guide her? Perhaps a future familiar.... Or maybe, just maybe, she was simply a stray cat, mooching for warmth and a handout. One never COULD tell, with magic... unless this night went as Ivy hoped. And she had a long night to get through before she found out. In any case, the temperatures had been dropping all afternoon. Now that a blizzard had moved in, wind howling in a way that could not sound LESS joyous, the cat would stay. "My dreams couldn't have arranged for me to do this on the SHORTEST night of the year, huh?" Ivy asked now, returning to her nylon camp chair by the rusty-grated fire. Lord and Lady, but it was cold. The flame's warmth seemed to extend only as far as its orange glow. OH, THE WEATHER OUTSIDE IS FRIGHTFUL.... The cat boosted herself up with her front legs to curl lithely around and chew at the back of one thigh, spread-toed foot high in the air, supremely unimpressed. Once, Ivy would have laughed at so classic a feline brush-off; now she barely managed a smile. A run of bad luck, from finances to health, had slowly disillusioned her, robbed her of her optimism one disappointment at a time. She'd tried to always do the right thing for so long! But now that she'd reached thirty, with little to show for it, she'd begun to question why. And that wasn't a big leap from questioning all the other intangibles of her life, magic included. Ivy's doctor diagnosed her as clinically depressed. He prescribed antidepressants, which she began to take, and a tranquilizer, which she hadn't touched. As if inspired by her efforts at healing herself, her dreams then gave her even more hopeful instructions--for her magic, anyway. Though almost intangible here on the physical realm, magic could appear VERY dramatic in dreams. So here Ivy sat, humming Yuletide carols to a stray cat in a dusty, rented cabin. She'd draped the walls with evergreen garlands, like a good little pagan, to symbolize continued life in the midst of winter's cold. The wreath she'd woven, as the storm blew in, represented the turning of the Year Wheel. On the rough-hewn mantle of the fireplace, she'd lit two pillar candles, green for the goddess and red for the god of old. Together, they added a perfume of bayberry and cinnamon to the rich scent of wood smoke and fresh pine. And between them, pillowed on silver-gray silk, lay all her hopes for her sanity, her life path--her magic. The decorative, double-edged knife had pewter blade, like a letter opener; it would be used on nothing in this physical realm, and in the astral realm, soft metals worked just fine. Its artist had etched an intricate design of oak-leaves up the blade, to match the carvings of leaves and acorns in its oaken handle. Ivy had never seen so beautiful an athame before buying this one. That she'd dreamed the importance of a ceremonial blade for weeks, with clear instructions for its use, only added to its enchantment. Planning and packing for this witchly version of a vision quest had given her more confidence than she'd felt in months. This was Yule, after all, the longest night of the year, an ancient holiday from which so many winter traditions evolved. Per her dreams, Ivy intended to spend the night meditating on the true meaning of the Winter Solstice and its returning light. Then--and this, she felt certain, was key--she would take her athame outside to catch the energy of the first rays of the new sun. Somehow, if she did that--and if her dreams really WERE instructions from the astral realm and not side-effects from her serontonin reuptake inhibitor--Ivy would finally gain proof that magic existed, that it worked... that it made a difference. For once and for always, all subtlety aside, she would KNOW. "Okay then--the true meaning of Yule," she said now to the cat, glad to have SOMEONE to bounce this off of. "Most of the pagans I know equate it with the rebirth of the sun, but some also talk about the myth of the Oak King, who wages heroic battle against the Holly--" Amidst the storm outside, Ivy heard a thump against the door. The tabby cat sat up, ready to run. The fire shrank, then stretched. When Ivy turned toward the old cabin's door, away from the fire, her breath misted in the air and warmed her quilted vest to moistness against her cheek. "...King," she finished faintly. For a long moment, she resisted investigating. How COULD there be anybody out on a night like tonight? But it was too cold to risk being wrong. She stood. The door opened on its own, dragged an arc across the floor toward her. Wind sliced in, hurling shards of frozen crystal and sending her chair skittering across the floor. It tormented the writhing fire and filled the cabin with an unnerving, otherworldly screech. "I'm a witch," Ivy reminded herself softly, to maintain calm as she watched the door open further. "A stone in the ancient circle. I can handle whatever this night sends." She would feel more confidence were it not so dark...and if she had more faith in magic, of late. From the swirling, shadowy white emerged a form of black, tall and broad-shouldered. It filled the doorway for a moment. Then it half-staggered, half-fell through the entrance, crumpling across the cold dirt floor. A glaze of ice that had crusted its heavy coat shattered into dagger-like shards. Magic or no magic--THIS was real. |
Witches' Brew -- Table of Contents Introduction (Yvonne Jocks) THE WICKED WITCH * MACBETH, Act IV, Scene 1 (William Shakespeare) * The Leather Funnel (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) * Witches' Hollow (August Derleth, NOT H.P. Lovecraft) * The Sorcerers (W. B. Yeats) * The Horned Women (Lady Wilde) * April in Paris (Ursula K. LeGuin) * Can the Double Murder? (H. P. Blavatsky) * Bridget Bishop (Cotton Mather) * Her Kind (Erica Jong) * Witch Trial at Mount Holly (Ben Franklin) * General Andrew Jackson and the Bell Witch (M. V. Ingram) WITCHCRAFT AS EMPOWERMENT * The Night (Emily Bronte) * Snatcher (Dean Koontz) * The Tea Room Beasts (P. N. Elrod) * The Witch's Ballad (Doreen Valiente) * Feathertop (Nathaniel Hawthorne) * The Witch's Steed (Ambrose Bierce) * The Goddess in the Ice (Harlan Ellison) * Figure of the Witch (Erica Jong) * Fleur (Louise Erdrich) * Toads and Diamonds (Charles Perrault) * A Pair of Eyes; or Modern Magic (Louisa May Alcott) * Exorcism (Ray Bradbury) * Nightside (Mercedes Lackey) * The Witch (Anton Chekov) THE NATURE WITCH * Witches' Creed (Doreen Valiente) * The Sorcerer's Apprentice (Brothers Grimm) * The Humming of Stars and Bees and Waves (Anita Endrezze) * Witchcraft was hung, in History (Emily Dickinson) * The Spell (David Gerrold) * Christmas Witch (Rosemary Edgehill) * Strange People (Louise Erdrich) * Reunion (Kathryn Ptacek) * The Witch's Daughter (Mary Wilkins Freeman) * Shall Earth No More Inspire Me (Emily Bronte) * Winter Solstice (Evelyn Vaughn) * The Witch (Mary Coleridge) * The Very Strange House Next Door (Shirley Jackson) * Smoke (Erica Jong) |
Here is the cover for WITCHES' BREW, a reprint anthology from Berkley Books with more stories about Witches (the good, the bad, and the pagan) by more authors than you might ever have guessed. Keep reading to see: |
Yvonne Jocks Von Jocks EvelynVaughn |
What do Ben Franklin, Erica Jong, and Emily Dickinson have in common? Witches' Brew Available Oct. 2002 |
Anthologies and Short Fiction |
Here is the cover for WITCHES' BREW, a reprint anthology from Berkley Books with more stories about Witches (the good, the bad, and the pagan) by more authors than you might ever have guessed. Keep reading to see: |
BACK-COVER COPY: "Double, double, toil and trouble, Fire burn, and caldron bubble." --from Macbeth by William Shakespeare Throughout history witches have always enthralled us. Be they good witches or bad witches, ancient sorcerers or modern-day Wiccans, their aura of magic, nature, and power is irresistible. Here, the greatest authors of all time are gathered together to stir up a little trouble. From Shakespeare's Wyrd Sisters in MACBETH to Dean Koontz's doddering old crone in "Snatcher" to Erica Jong's Mother Goddess in "Smoke," these works of prose and poetry capture the witch in all her guises: wicked, empowering, romantic, and pagan. No longer relegated to fairy-tale villains, witches have become potent personifications of feminine power--and have found a place in every genre of writing. So, leave your preconceived notions at the door and dive headfirst into WITCHES' BREW, the ultimate collection of witch literature. |
Witches' Brew -- Table of Contents Introduction (Yvonne Jocks) THE WICKED WITCH * MACBETH, Act IV, Scene 1 (William Shakespeare) * The Leather Funnel (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) * Witches' Hollow (August Derleth, NOT H.P. Lovecraft) * The Sorcerers (W. B. Yeats) * The Horned Women (Lady Wilde) * April in Paris (Ursula K. LeGuin) * Can the Double Murder? (H. P. Blavatsky) * Bridget Bishop (Cotton Mather) * Her Kind (Erica Jong) * Witch Trial at Mount Holly (Ben Franklin) * General Andrew Jackson and the Bell Witch (M. V. Ingram) WITCHCRAFT AS EMPOWERMENT * The Night (Emily Bronte) * Snatcher (Dean Koontz) * The Tea Room Beasts (P. N. Elrod) * The Witch's Ballad (Doreen Valiente) * Feathertop (Nathaniel Hawthorne) * The Witch's Steed (Ambrose Bierce) * The Goddess in the Ice (Harlan Ellison) * Figure of the Witch (Erica Jong) * Fleur (Louise Erdrich) * Toads and Diamonds (Charles Perrault) * A Pair of Eyes; or Modern Magic (Louisa May Alcott) * Exorcism (Ray Bradbury) * Nightside (Mercedes Lackey) * The Witch (Anton Chekov) THE NATURE WITCH * Witches' Creed (Doreen Valiente) * The Sorcerer's Apprentice (Brothers Grimm) * The Humming of Stars and Bees and Waves (Anita Endrezze) * Witchcraft was hung, in History (Emily Dickinson) * The Spell (David Gerrold) * Christmas Witch (Rosemary Edgehill) * Strange People (Louise Erdrich) * Reunion (Kathryn Ptacek) * The Witch's Daughter (Mary Wilkins Freeman) * Shall Earth No More Inspire Me (Emily Bronte) * Winter Solstice (Evelyn Vaughn) * The Witch (Mary Coleridge) * The Very Strange House Next Door (Shirley Jackson) * Smoke (Erica Jong) |
Introduction (by Yvonne Jocks) Who can remember a time when witches didn't fascinate? Magic-users sweep through children's stories as old as "Hansel and Grettel" and as current as Harry Potter, filling movie screens from Snow White to The Little Mermaid. They beckon to teenagers from television shows like Sabrina, the Teenaged Witch; Charmed; and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and from movies like The Craft and The Blair Witch Project. Even adults hear the call of the witches, since before Bewitched to well after Practical Magic. They captivate us. Some of us seek the witches' powers in the New Age shelves of our local bookstores, or at crystal- and incense- laden metaphysical shops. Others warn against the witches' popularityand perhaps try to remember their grandmother's instructions for warding off the evil eye. Still others find amusement in the prevalence of such pure make-believe. But are witches mere make-believe, anymore? Were they ever? Much of that depends on what you think of when you think of that one word: Witch. Modern practitioners point to the Anglo-Saxon word "wicce," meaning a wise-person, one who can bend or shape. To such followers of Wicca, one of the fastest growing religions in the country, a witch is someone who worships a Goddess along with (or even instead of) a God, and who practices positive, nature-oriented magic. Make believe? Hardly. Wiccans and neo-pagans have precedents in literature as ancient as the Akkadian epic, Gilgamesh, in which a priestess tames the beast-man Enkidu into a proper companion to the king. They recognize themselves in Irish epics, which are full of goddesses, prophetesses, and druids, and in King Arthur's misunderstood half-sister, Morgan la Fey. But what of the tragic Medea of Euripides, whose sorcery first wins and then destroys Jason of the Argonauts? What of the witch Circe, who seduces Homer's Odysseus, or Queen Dido, who turns to the black arts after her desertion by Virgil's Aeneus? For modern-day Wiccans, whose only rule is "Harm none," these witch stories offer less representation. Others see a witch as a powerful woman, usually one who uses her magic for ill. Dido, Circe, and Medea fit more comfortably into this definition. So do the classic Weird Sisters of Shakespeare's Macbeth, horror-movie witches, even fairy-tale antagonists from Snow White to The Little Mermaid. She is the cackling hag who lives alone and whose ugliness, like Medusa's, carries a horrid power. She is the untamed seductress whose siren song, like the Lorelei's, can lead man to his death. She is, frankly, the personification of feminine power, unshackled by patriarchal control. There have always been powerful women who threaten the status quo and are thus accused of witchcraft, from Joan of Arc to Susan B. Anthony. Make-believe? True, these women had powers hinging less on eye-of-newt than on recognizing their own strengths. But as far as metaphors go, the "evil witch" archetype does the job. How many relatively modern stories about witches still show the heroines giving up their powers to marry? How many of the older stories call the well-behaved, nurturing magic users mere "fairies" or "fairy godmothers," be they from Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream or any standard version of Cinderella? In Disney's Sleeping Beauty, the sweet but bumbling Flora, Fauna, and Merriweather are fairies. But the scorned Maleficent"Now you deal with me, oh prince, and all the powers of Hell!" By popular opinion, she's a witch. And in this, Maleficent invokes a third definition of the witch: a person, male or female, who gains supernatural power through dealing with demons or the devil. Easily the most frightening of all, this is the sort of witchcraft claimed by Anton LaVey and Alestair Crowley, the kind described in horrifying detail by H. P. Lovecraft. Such so-called "witches" create a public-relations nightmare for the aforementioned Wiccans, and have historically added fuel to the fires that burned powerful women like Joan of Arc. Whether or not a Faustian conspiracy exists, much less wields supernatural power, remains hotly debated in arenas from daytime talk-shows to Christian newsletters to occasional episodes of The X-Files. But make-believe or not, the consequences of such fear-mongering have proven all too real. Thus comes the suspense, the danger of witchcraftbe it danger to us, or to the more innocent among the witches. Witches enthrall us. And we let them. Their legacy of magical possibilities, of feminine power, even of dark conspiracy pervades our society and grips our imagination. Good or evil, fascinating or terrifying, holding powers we can barely comprehend and yet somehow accessible, witches call to us. A popular Wiccan bumper-sticker states that "We are Everywhere," and it's true. They are everywhere. Witches are in all cultures. They are from all times. And from the Puritanism of Nathaniel Hawthorne to the Wicca of Doreen Valiente, writers have never been able to resist the tingle down the spine, the air of mystery, and the call to power that is central in a really good witch's tale. So here, gathered for your enjoyment, are some of the best stories featuring witches. Running the gamut from ancient to modern, and from positive magic to dark thrillers, these selections will keep you up at night, make you think, andjust perhapsmake you wonder how much of the magic is real. It's a witches' brew, indeed, of the best in fiction about witches. Maybe it will cast its spell over you. --Yvonne Jocks Summer 2001 |
Frequently Asked Questions: Q: How did you get such a cool gig as collecting works already written, all on the topic of witches, compiling them into an anthology, and getting PAID for it? A: WITCHES' BREW is a great example on the importance of getting to know people in your chosen business. Berkley Books had already done two excellent reprint anthologies edited by John Richard Stephens: VAMPIRES, WINE & ROSES (which included works by Shakespeare, Poe, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Sting, among others) and INTO THE MUMMY'S TOMB (including Tennessee Williams, Mark Twain, and Rudyard Kipling!) Berkley's representative was speaking to an editor friend of mine and said that she wanted to find an author who both had some kind of academic credentials and a knowledge of modern Wicca, to do a similar work on witches. My editor friend recommended me, we proposed our anthology, and it became WITCHES' BREW. The larger portion of the advance from this book, by the way, went to buying the rights to all stories which weren't public domain. Q: What's "public domain?" A: If a work of literature is old enough, and its author has been dead long enough, it is considered Public Domain and can be reprinted for free. Shakespeare was PD. Koontz wasn't. Check out Project Guttenberg, on the internet, for an incredible collection of PD material. Q: Are all of the authors in this story famous? A: To some extent, yes, with only a few exceptions. This is a very broad collection, with historical pieces and modern pieces; pieces that would be considered "literary" and pieces that are more "pop." Some, like Shakespeare and Dickinson, are really really famous. Others, like Mary Wilkins Freeman and M. V. Ingram, were once more famous than they are now. Some, like Doreen Valiente and H. P. Blavatsky, are famous mainly among witches. Some, like Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill, are famous for writing contemporary popular fiction about witches. Some achieved literary fame long ago (Louisa May Alcott; Emily Bronte; Anton Chekov; Nathaniel Hawthorne). Some are currently achieving fame (Anita Endrezze; Louise Erdrich). Evelyn Vaughn is probably the least famous of the lot, but she had an "in." Q: Wait a minute, Ms. Yvonne Jocks, Editor. Aren't YOU Evelyn Vaughn? A: Well... yes. That's the "in." Q: (Looking annoyed and waiting for an explanation of such blatant egotism). A: Here's why I put "Winter Solstice" into the collection. For one thing, an editor who was working with me on the collection strongly urged me to. For another, I had included Rosemary Edghill, who is well known for writing mysteries about witches, and Mercedes Lackey, who is well known for writing horror about witches. It made sense to include an author who is well-known for writing romance about witches--and of those, Evelyn Vaughn is one of the major contenders. Okay, so Nora Roberts is even more of a contender, but most of her work on witches isn't short fiction. A third reason was, frankly, it was probably my only chance to appear in an anthology with William Shakespeare, Emily Bronte, and Shirley Jackson. I might not sell my soul for that, since my soul's pretty precious to me, but I'd pull a few strings. Q: The back cover copy mentions wicked witches. But Yvonne Jocks/Evelyn Vaugh has, in the past, mainly done projects that show witches in a positive light. What gives with selling out to the stereotype, huh? A: WITCHES' BREW is supposed to be a collection of works (mainly fiction) by famous people about witchcraft. If I were to leave out the stories that show witches in a bad light, I would have left out half of the biggest names I found. A lot of those stories really are cool, too--not PC, but cool. Also, the previous two Berkley collections (on mummies and vampires) clearly had a horror theme, so I assumed they wanted to continue that theme with witches. My compromise, for better or worse, was to include those works, but to include an equal number of stories in which the witches are portrayed positively. Q: But why'd you put the wicked witches first? A: It's the most familiar image to most readers. I figured I would meet the audience where they are most comfortable, then draw them to the newer image of witches. Besides, ending with your strongest piece is a common rhetorical strategy. Q: So what pieces or authors did you want to include, but couldn't? A: Isabel Allende's "Two Words" is one story I regret not including. The international copyright on her work was just too complicated for this project. I also regret not including some poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay: "The Harp Weaver," "The Singing Woman from the Wood's Edge," and/or "The Witch Wife." I'm not sure why we didn't get rights to those, but suspect that her work may have cost too much, since a recent, excellent biography of the poet has brought about a resurgence of interest in her work. I had to reject several great works by Ray Bradbury--"Witch Door," "April Witch," "Invisible Boy"--because the collection was just too long. There's a work by F. Scott Fitzgerald that I could not get hold of, and it would have been great to acquire a copy of Sidney Sheldon's pilot script for BEWITCHED. Maybe there'll be a WITCHES' BREW 2 -- there's certainly enough material out there for it! Q: What are your favorite pieces of those which ARE in the book? A: Emily Bronte's poems, I think, and Shirley Jackson's "The Very Strange House Next Door"--I've taught "The Lottery" to who-knows how many Comp 2 classes, and had heard rumors that Jackson wrote about witches, but the sources I initially found kept pointing me to stories that were more about deals with the devil and scary old men. So I gave up on cross-referencing and just started skimming every story by Jackson I could find, and was delighted by both "The Very Strange House Next Door" and its companion story, "Family Magician." They are a complete turn-around in tone from the dark "Lottery." I love P.N. Elrod's "Tea Room Beasts" every time I read it. I was also proud of finding Hawthorne's "Feathertop." Not that it's a hard story to find, but from the start there seemed to be an assumption that I would include Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown," another Comp 2 classic. Keeping Hawthorne was a given--he was related to a judge from the Salem Witch Trials, for pete's sake! But since "Young Goodman Brown" is already so very well-known, I wanted to include something different. "Feathertop" fit the bill. Q: (sarcastic) Like MACBETH isn't well-known? A: Come on. That's Shakespeare. He's always the exception. Q: Speaking of Shakespeare.... Some of these stories are pretty cool, but a couple are really hard to read. Why is that? A: Don't worry--it's not because you're stupid. (And on the incredibly small chance that you really are stupid, it's not JUST because of that. But if you pick up reprint anthologies to read, chances are you're not stupid). Stories and poems can be difficult for many reasons, but two in particular stand out. One: the work may be written deliberately to make you think, as so many critically acclaimed works are. That's the reason Ebert and Roeper sometimes really like movies that you couldn't pay the average movie-goer to see... they're film critics, so they appreciate films that don't just entertain but make them think. Some of the rest of us don't (and for some of us, it depends on the work. And our mood). Two: the older a piece is, the more likely that it will seem difficult to read. Shakespeare wrote for the masses, but four centuries later, most of us don't realize that, oh, "wherefore" means why, not where, so we get confused. It's nobody's fault but Time's. Gee, someone should write a passage about how all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death.... oh, wait. Shakespeare wrote that, too. Just because a work's difficult doesn't mean it's not worth reading. But feel free to skip the tough pieces unless you're in the mood for them. There won't be a test. Q: Are you encouraging people to become Satan Worshippers? A: (Thudding of head on desk) Q: (Annoyed silence) A: Ahem. First of all, although some Satanists do call themselves witches, most witches are in no way connected to Satan. Not all world religions believe in Satan, and paganism is one of those which does not. You may want to argue that by not worshipping Christ (or Allah) people are by default worshipping Satan, but that argument is so insulting and so sweeping, I give up on it (except to wonder why you're here in the first place if you truly believe that way). Second of all, this is a collection of stories for entertainment, not instructional, purposes (I should think the inclusion of "wicked witch" stories would counter the suspicion of propaganda). And third (of all), neither information nor entertainment is, in and of itself, powerful enough to seduce people away from any firmly held beliefs of theirs. People who approve of censorship seem to live in constant fear that exposure to whatever they don't agree with will corrupt the rest of the world. I, like most people who oppose censorship, live in hope that the more the rest of the world sees, the better equipped they are to judge for themselves. Read Milton's Areopagitica. Q: Are YOU a witch? A: I'm a Unitarian Universalist Pagan. Some people would say that makes me a witch, just as many would not, since--as WITCHES' BREW shows--the word "witch" means so very many different things to so very many different people. Me, I'm wary of labels, since they can often just confuse a situation further--especially north-by-northwest. When the wind is southerly is another matter.... Q: Well that was confusing. Wait, was that more Shakespeare? A: Yes. |
Excerpt from "Winter Solstice" by Evelyn Vaughn "Winter Solstice" first appeared in the online anthology STARDATES: INFINITE CELEBRATIONS from www.dreams-unlimited.com. Darkness surrounded the isolated cabin--in more ways than one. "This," murmured Ivy, watching her breath mist a cold pane of the cabin window, "is NOT what people mean when they call December a season of magic." Not that the wintery night beyond didn't have a hushed otherworldliness about it. Snow swirled out of the blackness so quietly, Ivy wasn't sure if she heard its tiny, gritty impact against the glass with her ears...or with less mundane senses. Magic, REAL magic, worked like that--so subtle it could hardly be differentiated from coincidence, or imagination, or even delusions. Chenille-sweatered arms braced against the windowsill, narrow chin pillowed on her arms, Ivy stared at her dark-haired, dark-eyed reflection. Sometimes, even the most devoted of witches found that kind of subtlety frustratingly anticlimactic. Maybe that's why so few potential magic users stayed with the discipline. Nowadays, people wanted the kind of instant pyrotechnics only MOVIE-witches produced. Ivy wasn't looking for laser beams and levitation--but over the last half-year, especially since the Harvest Moon, she'd become so desperate for a little proof, a little reassurance, that she ached for it, DREAMED about it. That's why she'd driven out here, by herself, on a day when her friends were preparing to party as only pagans could. "Magical quest, or fool's errand," she sighed, and in her breath's resulting fog she drew a squeaky, five-pointed star with one finger. "'Only my hair-dresser knows for sure.'" As the drawing began to weep from its outermost edges, she turned back to the too-cold room and faced her only companion for the Winter's Solstice. The gray tabby cat stared back, unblinking and unimpressed, from where she lay on the towel Ivy had laid out. She'd darted into the cabin while Ivy carried in her supplies for her night of vigil. Was the cat a visitor from the fairy realm, here to test Ivy's hospitality? A totem animal, arrived to guide her? Perhaps a future familiar.... Or maybe, just maybe, she was simply a stray cat, mooching for warmth and a handout. One never COULD tell, with magic... unless this night went as Ivy hoped. And she had a long night to get through before she found out. In any case, the temperatures had been dropping all afternoon. Now that a blizzard had moved in, wind howling in a way that could not sound LESS joyous, the cat would stay. "My dreams couldn't have arranged for me to do this on the SHORTEST night of the year, huh?" Ivy asked now, returning to her nylon camp chair by the rusty-grated fire. Lord and Lady, but it was cold. The flame's warmth seemed to extend only as far as its orange glow. OH, THE WEATHER OUTSIDE IS FRIGHTFUL.... The cat boosted herself up with her front legs to curl lithely around and chew at the back of one thigh, spread-toed foot high in the air, supremely unimpressed. Once, Ivy would have laughed at so classic a feline brush-off; now she barely managed a smile. A run of bad luck, from finances to health, had slowly disillusioned her, robbed her of her optimism one disappointment at a time. She'd tried to always do the right thing for so long! But now that she'd reached thirty, with little to show for it, she'd begun to question why. And that wasn't a big leap from questioning all the other intangibles of her life, magic included. Ivy's doctor diagnosed her as clinically depressed. He prescribed antidepressants, which she began to take, and a tranquilizer, which she hadn't touched. As if inspired by her efforts at healing herself, her dreams then gave her even more hopeful instructions--for her magic, anyway. Though almost intangible here on the physical realm, magic could appear VERY dramatic in dreams. So here Ivy sat, humming Yuletide carols to a stray cat in a dusty, rented cabin. She'd draped the walls with evergreen garlands, like a good little pagan, to symbolize continued life in the midst of winter's cold. The wreath she'd woven, as the storm blew in, represented the turning of the Year Wheel. On the rough-hewn mantle of the fireplace, she'd lit two pillar candles, green for the goddess and red for the god of old. Together, they added a perfume of bayberry and cinnamon to the rich scent of wood smoke and fresh pine. And between them, pillowed on silver-gray silk, lay all her hopes for her sanity, her life path--her magic. The decorative, double-edged knife had pewter blade, like a letter opener; it would be used on nothing in this physical realm, and in the astral realm, soft metals worked just fine. Its artist had etched an intricate design of oak-leaves up the blade, to match the carvings of leaves and acorns in its oaken handle. Ivy had never seen so beautiful an athame before buying this one. That she'd dreamed the importance of a ceremonial blade for weeks, with clear instructions for its use, only added to its enchantment. Planning and packing for this witchly version of a vision quest had given her more confidence than she'd felt in months. This was Yule, after all, the longest night of the year, an ancient holiday from which so many winter traditions evolved. Per her dreams, Ivy intended to spend the night meditating on the true meaning of the Winter Solstice and its returning light. Then--and this, she felt certain, was key--she would take her athame outside to catch the energy of the first rays of the new sun. Somehow, if she did that--and if her dreams really WERE instructions from the astral realm and not side-effects from her serontonin reuptake inhibitor--Ivy would finally gain proof that magic existed, that it worked... that it made a difference. For once and for always, all subtlety aside, she would KNOW. "Okay then--the true meaning of Yule," she said now to the cat, glad to have SOMEONE to bounce this off of. "Most of the pagans I know equate it with the rebirth of the sun, but some also talk about the myth of the Oak King, who wages heroic battle against the Holly--" Amidst the storm outside, Ivy heard a thump against the door. The tabby cat sat up, ready to run. The fire shrank, then stretched. When Ivy turned toward the old cabin's door, away from the fire, her breath misted in the air and warmed her quilted vest to moistness against her cheek. "...King," she finished faintly. For a long moment, she resisted investigating. How COULD there be anybody out on a night like tonight? But it was too cold to risk being wrong. She stood. The door opened on its own, dragged an arc across the floor toward her. Wind sliced in, hurling shards of frozen crystal and sending her chair skittering across the floor. It tormented the writhing fire and filled the cabin with an unnerving, otherworldly screech. "I'm a witch," Ivy reminded herself softly, to maintain calm as she watched the door open further. "A stone in the ancient circle. I can handle whatever this night sends." She would feel more confidence were it not so dark...and if she had more faith in magic, of late. From the swirling, shadowy white emerged a form of black, tall and broad-shouldered. It filled the doorway for a moment. Then it half-staggered, half-fell through the entrance, crumpling across the cold dirt floor. A glaze of ice that had crusted its heavy coat shattered into dagger-like shards. Magic or no magic--THIS was real. |
The Lovecraft Error I hate to admit having made a mistake. I mean, I REALLY hate it. But I did, so I might as well come clean about it. The story in Witches' Brew, attributed to H.P. Lovecraft? "Witches' Hollow?" Turns out Lovecraft didn't write it. August Derleth, whom I credit on p. 22 as completing the Lovecraft story, actually wrote the whole thing and only said it was the completion of a partial by Lovecraft. The source from which I got the story gave the same story. So did several websites which I'd glanced at. So I assumed the story was correct--but you know what they say about "assuming" (it makes a "ass" out of "u" and "me"). I only found out the truth when a reviewer for Publisher's Weekly wrote to my publisher, explaining Derleth's ploy. Ouch! For what it's worth, a standard rule for doing research is to go to the original source, but in this case, the more "original" the source (that being August Derleth) the less truthful. Also, we got signed permission to use "Witches Hollow" from the agency which handles the estates of both H.P. Lovecraft and August Derleth, so this isn't a legal issue. But when mistakes are made, they should when possible be corrected. So here you go. I regret not having caught it sooner, and thus perpetuating the deceit. On the bright side, it's my first mention in Publisher's Weekly and the notice is pretty positive, saying it's an "impressive contributors' list" and citing "bewitching tales from the likes of Erica Jong, Louise Erdrich and Kathryn Ptacek, along with pieces from such unusual sources as Cotton Mather, Ben Franklin and theosophist H.P. Blavatsky." Now, back to the witches! |
Some Reviews! Publisher's Weekly cites Witches' Brew's "popular audience" and "impressive contributor's list," nothing that: "The volume boasts bewitching tales from the likes of Erica Jong, Louise Erdrich and Kathryn Ptacek, along with pieces from such unusual sources as Cotton Mather, Ben Franklin and theosophist H.P. Blavatsky." The Washington Post says that Erica Jong and Dean Koontz are "in undeniably spellbinding company in this compendium of prose and poetry celebrating the sisterhood of sorceresses." |
