Chapter 3

Mysti stormed into her shop. Her favored chimes slammed against the door. Two broke and fell at her feet. Everything shattered just like her life. A rock had chipped the heel of her shoe and she’d twisted her ankle. She pulled the shoe off and threw it across the store. Tears started again. The nine blocks she had walked hadn’t settled the fire that burned in her heart or her gut.

Sammy had followed in her car, but Mysti was too mad to accept any form of an apology. She had been set up. By Sam. By Dad. By Begley. Or all three. They were in cahoots on this witch hunt.

She swiped her face with the back of her hand and drew in a deep breath. Limping to the far end of the store, she fumbled with her keys until she found the right one. She shoved it into the locked cabinet and jerked open the door. A single fat black candle sat on the shelf. She hesitated at first, but grabbed the banishing instrument and hobbled back to the center of her shop.

“How dare he!” She slammed the candle in the middle of a table where she and her customers usually enjoyed a relaxing cup of tea. “I’ll show that Begley some witchcraft.”

Spellbinding teas and divinations were just a small dose of what she could do to him with this candle. Digging through her pocket, she slammed a purple Bic lighter next to it.

She couldn’t light it. Not yet.

She kicked off her other shoe and hurried around her shop, gathering white, pink, and yellow colored candles, herbs, and crystals. She placed each of them in strategic locations along the perimeter of her store and lit each candle before moving on. She lit the herbs, bound tightly with a hemp string, and sat them in an incense bowl to let them smolder. Then she gathered all of her G chord bells and tied them with fishing line.

She moved the chairs around and tied the filament to a nail in the exposed rafters on her ceiling. They once held white lights for Christmas and other happy occasions. Now they would hold harmonizing tones to stabilize her percepts. Next, she located a box fan in the back storage and brought it out to set on the register counter. She plugged it in and let the breeze blow the bells.

Candles burned, herbs smoldered, bells tinkled, and ocean waves rolled out of the therapy sound machine. She cranked it up as loud as it would go, until the vibrations penetrated her breastbone.

Mysti inhaled slowly and closed her eyes. She lifted her arms, as if she were in the water, high above her head with the swelling of the ocean sound, and lowered them just as fluidly. Inhale. Exhale. “Breathe deeply,” she chanted. “You are worthy. You are beautiful. You are in complete harmony with the Earth.

“Reverend Begley is an ass...” she chanted, almost amused by her wit.

The enchantment shattered as the irritating wind chimes clanged against her front door. The last thing she needed was a customer coming in right now. Or her family— “Sam, I told you I—”

Her eyes darted to the man blanched by sunlight pouring in behind him. She cleared her throat. “How may I help you?” she said still in her chanting vocalizations.

“Miss Gladstone?” the man said.

She knew that voice. “My name ... is Mystery Stonestar. Now’s not a very good time. Could you come back tomorrow?”

“Yes ma’am.” He stepped further into her store. Who was he? The door slowly swung closed and the blanching light ceased to wash out his features.

“Oh!” Her hand shot up to her throat. “It’s you!”

“Miss Stonestar, I’m Alexander Cayd—”

“I know who you are.” She bumped into her sales counter. She didn’t even realize she was moving backward.

Pastor Cayden moved toward her. “Oh. Well. I don’t want to—”

“Then why are you here, Pastor?” She spat the word as if it were inky poison on her tongue. A raw scrape on his cheek indicated he had been injured during his attempt to break up her dad and Reverend Begley. She fought her instincts to offer him a healing salve.

“Now. Now give me a chance. Please.” He stepped closer to her.

She pressed her bottom hard against the solid table.

“First, I want you to call me Lex. P-please. And second, Mystery, I wanted to come apologize and see if you were all right.”

“Huh. Really?” Mysti slid to her left and rounded the obstacle that kept her from backing farther away. Her chin quivered. Tears filled her eyes anew. “You need to get out of my store. You-you’re disrupting all my balance and harmony.”

He looked around the store at the many bells swinging in the breeze of the box fan.

Mysti touched her tummy. The various candles’ aromas blended into a sweet sickly smell, mixed with the herbs smoldering, it nauseated her now.

Cayden’s eyes landed on the black candle she had not lit. He stared at it a long time, and then slowly returned his gaze to her. “You don’t want to light that.”

“Oh, I don’t? What makes you think that?”

“Because you’re doing everything you can to regain your balance. That candle is the last thing you want to utilize to deal with all the negative feelings you’re harboring right now.

“Oh? And what do you know about my negative feelings ... right now?”

“You’re feeling betrayed, humiliated, singled out, ostracized.” He took another step. “You feel like you just stood before a witch’s trial and regardless of the truth, you were convicted. You’re hurt, angry, and want to strike back.”

That described her feelings exactly. But, how could he possibly know all this?

“Who are you to tell me what I’m feeling?”

“I’m nobody, really, Mystery.” Compassion filled his eyes. “I’m a man who witnessed you endure a public and personal tongue lashing. And, quite frankly, a very non-Biblical verbal assault.”

She stared at him. That dark suit, that purple tie. He had intrigued her when she first saw him. Now he was here in her little store, saying he cared about what had just happened to her. Saying he didn’t agree with the high and mighty Reverend Doctor Obadiah Begley. He had tried to stop the pompous ass. He got wounded because of it. Was he for real?