Scent of a Witch

Chapter 1

The vice-like grip that had seized Maeve’s lungs the last few days slowly released as she reached behind the antique traveling desk. Ding. The bell on the front door indicated someone had walked out of the consignment shop. Light footsteps approached as she pushed the button in. Then a panel revealed what she sought. A velvet jewelry box, discolored by age, lay inside. Once most likely a brilliant red, the box had faded to a soft pink. With as much speed as she could muster, she reached within the panel and grabbed the box. Expensive perfume invaded Maeve’s nostrils like a conquering army. Seconds was all the time she had. Fingers lightly shaking, pulse thundering in her mind, she opened the box.

Air flowed into her lungs like a dam being released. The white female silhouette on top of a light blue background encased in a gold frame and with a matching gold chain looked back at her. Tears prickled in her eyes.

“Finally,” she whispered.

“Did you find what you needed hun?” asked the blue-haired buxom shop owner in a twangy drawl.

“Yes, ma’am. I did. Thank you ever so much,” Maeve replied instinctively, her manners falling into place.

“Wonderful,” the woman saturated in rose perfume squealed.

“I insist I pay you for all the trouble I caused,” Maeve stated, reaching toward her shoulder where she always kept cash under her bra strap. All the color blanched from the little old lady’s face as she shook her head and fluttered her hands back and forth.

“I won’t have it. You hear me young lady. That there is yours. It belongs in the family.” She placed her hands on her round hips and narrowed her eyes. Then, seeing a customer at the cash register, she turned to leave. Only to stop abruptly, close her eyes, and hold her breath.

“Child, you need to git…now. Out that way there, then take a left, and you’ll be back on Main Street,” she insisted, shoving Maeve with a force she didn’t look to have. Without conscious thought, Maeve obeyed, and her feet carried her through the door.

In the alley behind the old brick building, she stopped and opened the box again. With great care she pulled the necklace out and, holding it by the chain in front of her, she turned it around to reveal the back. In an ancient language as easy on her lips as English she whispered: “Once hidden. Undercover. In disguise. I ask only, you unveil your secrets for but a moment, to my eyes.”

 Solid gold backing distorted in a wispy sort of haze and revealed what she asked. Her eyes closed and she fought the maelstrom of feelings that always seemed to be there awaiting release. Remembering the woman’s insistence, she put the necklace around her neck then headed down the alley.

Maeve walked the sidewalks of downtown Franklin, exploring the little specialty shops, stopping briefly at the old café on the corner, giving the appearance of a normal tourist in the historic Tennessee town.

However, Maeve was anything but normal, and the directions in which she chose to walk were no accident. She was on the hunt and could already claim one success.

She stopped to take a deep breath and inhaled the scents of coffee, baked bread, gasoline fumes, and autumn leaves all mingled together. There, on the tail end of the onslaught of smells, was the one that had led her on this journey. Gardenias. A fragrance one simply would not expect at the end of October, nor in the attic of her grandmother’s old home. And especially not outside the antique shop where she’d found the treasure she desperately needed. But there it was again…another figurative bread crumb.

Without hesitation, she followed the pull of the flowery musk.

The crowds around her seemed to close in on themselves and kept her from passing. A street vendor with a cart took up the entire corner sidewalk and, out of nowhere, a line formed suddenly for his treats of hotdogs, hamburgers, and soda. With an urgency she herself couldn’t even understand, Maeve pushed and shoved through the throng of people to a destination she didn’t know, on a trail she could only smell…and at times could merely feel.