The Return of the Witch Read Online Free

magic did you find yourself most suited to?”
    â€œThey all had something to offer, something to teach me, of course, but you know, I kept coming back to what you had taught me, to working with Wicca, or the healing spells I learned from you. The way you had me connect with nature … which fitted right in with the shamans I stayed with. There was one in Siberia you would have loved! Have you ever been there?” When I shook my head she went on, animated now, her face brightened at the memories of the wonders she had seen. “I lived for three months with a Yakutsk shaman, in Russia but thousands of miles from Moscow. Just getting there took weeks. The land was so unspoiled, so wild, it made you feel how small a human being is. My time there really helped me put things in perspective. And the way she connected with the spirits of the place, it was mind-blowing.”
    â€œIt can’t have been easy without a translator.”
    â€œWe shared the common language of magic. And she did have a little English. That seemed to be enough. After that I went to America. I’d been given the name of a Hoodoo priest in Louisiana. You couldn’t imagine anything more different, but so powerful! The year before last I spent a full cycle of the Wiccan calendar on a remote island off the coast of West Wales, observing every ceremony and ritual to mark the seasons. It was such an incredible time! And recently, well, I’ve just returned from somewhere, from some one truly wonderful.”
    And so we talked. She spoke of her experiences and I listened, and I saw how it was that she had been transformed during my absence. And I saw the light of magic glowing within her. That spark, that scintilla of magic ability that I had seen when first we met, it had been brought into fiery life by the learned people she had sought out. She had become a splendid witch, knowledgeable and strong. Perhaps there was a real chance that, standing together, we could resist Gideon’s darkness. I went to bed that night clutching to me the small, bright hope that this was true.
    *   *   *
    I still couldn’t take in the fact that she’d come back! I mean, she was there, Elizabeth was really there with me again. It was mad. But then, no madder than so much of what I’d seen these past few years. And it had all started with her, and the cottage. And Gideon. Would I ever be able to think of him without getting so stirred up? What did I feel? Anger, of course, because of how he had deceived me, because he would have killed Elizabeth if he could have, and me, too. Hate? Yeah, that, too. And I was scared. I’d have been crazy not to be. I remembered how hard it was to trick him, how we nearly didn’t pull it off. That night in Batchcombe Woods it could all have ended very differently. And now someone was helping him. Who? Why? He would come to Willow Cottage, of course he would. Elizabeth was right about that. Well, we would be ready for him. This time, we’d deal with him once and for all.
    I was not the scatty teenager I used to be. I had changed in so many ways. Ways that mattered. If Gideon had known perhaps he would have thought twice about tackling me and Elizabeth again. Before, when I was just beginning to find out what being a witch really meant, when I was so new to it all, Elizabeth had to look after me. But I’d been a busy girl since then. I’d traveled, I’d faced life in wild, unfamiliar places, and I’d learned so much. The time had come, then, to use my new skills. To put all that listening and practicing to the test. I wondered what sort of magic, and what part of me I would need most. Being an eclectic witch meant I had a whole bag of tricks to choose from. I knew some people sneered at the way I had roamed the world, exploring different types of magic just as I explored different countries. More than once I’d been criticized for it. Diluting the craft.