While the night dew was still on the grass, we finished breakfast and took our baskets out into the cool morning: air. This was Michael’s first Lammas, and even though he had just gotten off work, he was in a happy mood. I wished I could say that about Penny.
We silently gathered vegetables, fruit, and flowers before walking to the Grove. Michael made a small fire and I gave the dedication. Michael and I didn’t yet know why Penny looked so sad, but we caught her mood.
I began the lesson, reading from a little book.
The First Basic Principle of Magic. Magic follows the laws of Nature.
The good Magus never asks for things that are absurd in the eyes of Nature.
Work with Nature when ever you can, poor Initiate. This is called Science, and is a part of magic. Use it wisely. Only God can override this basic truth, and He only does so for good reasons.
No one was in the mood to ask questions. I wasn’t in the mood to try to answer them. I closed my eyes. We sat quietly for a few minutes, Penny staring at the ground. Then a wonderful thing happened. A low humming tone crept into the silence, than danced up to a happy trill. Michael had brought out his recorder and was playing his new music! It was like birds twittering and swooping, or Fairies dancing and playing. I didn’t open my eyes at first, but I could feel a smile on my face. Some low notes were like
drums beating. It felt like the whole forest had come alive through Michael’s recorder.
I opened my eyes. Penny was smiling. But she was crying too. I snuggled close to her and wrapped my arms around my best friend. The music ended in a twittering that got slower and slower and faded away, as if it had gone to sleep.
In the silence that followed, Penny rubbed her eyes and said, “I have a spell to cast.” Tears were still on her face as she went up to the altar on her knees and brought out a blue candle. “There’s a girl in my class who was in a car accident two days ago. She’s my best friend except for you guys. I’m going to light this candle and ask all the Spirits to help her get better. She’s really neat. Her dog was hurt too, so I’m lighting a brown candle for him.” She lit the brown candle, and then brought out a necklace with some shells on it and put it on the altar. “I’m going to visit her in the hospital today, and I want to give her this, and I want it to have lots of magic to help her get better.”
Penny fell silent and just looked at the candles. I knew what she was doing because I had done it — asking and begging and pleading and willing the magic to work, trying to pour out her own strength into the spell. Michael started playing a quiet little tune. After a couple of minutes she put the shell necklace away and blew out the candles.
I picked up the basket of flowers, and Michael got the fruits and vegetables. I started passing flowers to both Penny and Michael, and he started giving me vegetables. We kept passing them back and forth around the circle, and we started laughing. Even Penny. We passed her squash and flowers and strawberries and things so fast she didn’t know what to do with it all, so she began to pile it around the altar.
Then Michael brought a little bag out of his cloak. “After you told me the story of Lammas, I asked Frank how I could tell which year a sack of flour was from. He showed me the codes on the bags. I watched, and the first bag that came in that was from this year, I opened and saved out a cup of flour. Then this morning I made this little loaf from it.”
“Wow!” Penny took the tiny loaf of bread and set it on the altar. “That’s wonderful, Michael!”
“Spirits,” Michael said, “please accept this little gift from me, and help
Penny’s friend to get better.”
I had an idea. “As we share the bread, lets think about our new friend, Issa.” Michael broke the bread and we munched in silence. It tasted fresh and nutty, almost still warm. I remembered all the times we had been with Issa, and all the things he had said. After a while Michael broke the silence.
“I think he would make a good Wood Sprite, and we should tell him we do magic.”
Penny was looking sad again — I think she was worried about her friend.
She wiped her eyes and said, “What will he do? I mean I’m kind of Ariel’s assistant, and I’m the swimming and running teacher, and I read Tarot.
Michael is the bard and he’s just about the best at fire making now, and he’s in charge of the bread . . .”
“He knows all about Jewish stuff, and he says there’s a lot of magic in it,”
Michael said.
“Maybe we’ll just have to wait and see,” I said. “Maybe he won’t know what he’s best at until he does it with us for a while.”
“We need to make sure he understands exactly what kind of magic we do
— white!” Michael said.
“Yeah, and if there’s anything that isn’t white about Jewish magic, we don’t do it!” Penny said.
“It sounds like he wants to do magic,” I said.
“But he has to sign the Pact before he can do magic with us,” Michael said.
“And do the training,” Penny said. “I know we have to be flexible, but it looks like he can do it all.”
I
nodded.
We took the vegetables to the little house on Carter Road, and Penny took the flowers to give to her friend in the hospital. Michael called Issa and arranged for him to meet us at the park the next afternoon.
We lay in the grass on one side of the playground, all our faces toward the center of the circle. Some kids were on the swings and some teenagers were throwing a Frisbee. Penny was talking.
“. . . and we have a secret Grove where we do our magic, but only white magic is done there, and only good Spirits are welcome. Anyone who brings
evil or selfishness there is in trouble. Because we do most of our training in woods and trees, and being quick and quiet is important to us, we call ourselves Wood Sprites.”
“Hmm . . .” Issa began, “I’m surprised there are any magical people in this town.”
“If you want to join us, you will have to sign a Pact of secrecy and honesty,”
Michael said.
Issa was thinking. “I’d like to,” he said, smiling.
Michael told him about all the tests for mastery of the elements, and I described the holidays we celebrated. He offered to teach us the Jewish holidays and customs, and what he knew about Jewish mysticism. After we finished talking, we all ran through the woods together, the rest of us going slow because Issa wasn’t used to it. Then, tired and happy, we headed for my house.
Since my little desk wasn’t big enough for all of us, we set candles on the floor, sat around them, and I got out the Grimoire and handed it to Penny.
“This is our most special book,” I said. “It contains all our magical ideas and records. Our Pact is in here, but you can’t use the whole book until you pass your first tests.”
“May I look at the cover?” Issa asked.
After a glance at me, Penny handed it to him.
“Do you know what this is? It looks like stylized Hebrew letters.”
“It was the only one with that cover,” I said. “The lady at the store said it was strange and no one else wanted it.”
“I can almost read a few words.. Someday, may I bring my Hebrew book and try to figure it out?”
I looked at Penny and Michael. “Sure. When I got it, I wondered if it said something. The Pact is short. Penny will read it to you.”
He listened as Penny read. “It sounds okay to me.”
“Now read it to yourself,” Penny said. “It must be signed in your own blood.”
Issa looked at me a little worried, but then smiled. While he read the Pact, Michael pulled out his recorder and played a simple, happy tune.
“How do I sign it?”
Penny put the pen together and I got out scratch paper and a tissue. She helped him get a drop of blood into the pen. He tried the pen, than signed his name. The rest of our signatures were brown now. Only Issa’s was bright red.