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Cross of Tarlis  *  The Dragon and the Rose  *  The Betrayed  *  Time of the Wolf  *  Face of a Stranger *  Silverdawn *   The Golden Idol 

JULIE D'ARCY'S

FACE OF A STRANGER

(C) Julie A. D'Arcy

Excerpt From  my 30,000 word Urban Fantasy Witch Romance

It was a half hour to midnight and icy cold. Isabella’s hand shook as she held the hurricane lamp she’d discovered in the garden shed, and watched the light cast eerie shadows around the old elevator cage as she rode it down the side of the cliff.

She was mad even to be out here. The elevator could stall. Or, it hadn’t been serviced in years. It would come unhinged, and she would be sent plunging to her death and no one would know, or stumble upon her body for days.

However, the elevator came to a creaking halt without incident. She opened the wrought iron door, picked up the lantern and stepped outside. Her feet sank into the dark loamy soil. Staggering, she righted herself and clutched her grandmother’s book of spells tighter to her chest.

Taking up the lamp, she trudged along the beach until she found the cave she had played in as a child, all the while casting apprehensive glances at the turbulent water pounding against the rocks only feet away. The spray stung her eyes, and the wind pulled her hood from her head and battered her hair against her skull.

There was a flat section of rock before the cave, which overlooked the water. It would be perfect for the spell. Spell, she thought with a tiny burst of hysterical laughter bubbling up from her chest. She was a fool to even contemplate that this would work, but the words beneath the heading in the book had dared her to hope. It had promised of a man she could put her faith in, trust, and who would love and protect her unconditionally. Could such a man exist? If so, she had never met such a paragon.

She lowered the book and ambled toward the cave in search of driftwood for a fire. In the past, there had always been an abundance of wood around the mouth of the cave, where it had washed up and been caught in the rocks. Gathering a good armful, she returned to where she had left the book and dropped the driftwood to the ground. The wood was uncommonly dry for this time of year, however, she pushed that thought from her mind and searched in the patchwork satchel she had found in her room. Pulling out several scraps of paper and a box of matches for the fire, she then unloaded the other objects she had stuffed into the bag. A golden heart-shaped necklace, she had unearthed in her childhood trinket box, an old but cherished photo of her parents and herself with Gran on their last Christmas together, a jar in which fluttered a beautiful blue and white butterfly, she’d caught in the garden just before sunset.  

Twisting the paper into tuffs, she poked it among the wood and set it alight. It was not long before the driftwood caught and a blaze brightened the stretch of flat rock. In the moonlight, she could just make out the occasional wave battering at the edges of the rock platform, and shivered. As a child she had heard of several people being swept from the rocks. Unconsciously took a step back and focused on the fire.

 The wind had dropped to a low breeze and as she lifted her face to the sky. A full moon peeked from behind the night clouds. All was in place for her spell, and what better night for a spell than Halloween itself. She had once read that on Halloween night the spirits of the dead came closest to the gates of the Otherworld, and some even believed that at midnight the gates were thrown wide open and until dawn’s first light the undead roamed again this earth.

The hair prickled the back of her neck and she shivered as an owl hooted in the distance. Apprehensively, she peered around, and then laughed shakily into the cold night air. She almost had herself believing in such foolishness. Perhaps there was a little bit of witch in her after all.

She crouched beside the lamp and pushed her arm into the light to read the time on her watch. Twelve o’clock. She straightened and drew the ebony cloak she had found in the cellar more securely around her shoulders. The garment had been dusty, but she had shaken it out. If she was to play the part of a witch, she’d thought she might as well look the part.

Picking up the spell book, she held it aloft. A gust of wind swept in from the north, and several pages flicked over. Lowering the book, Isabella raised a brow in disbelief. The book had opened to the exact same spell as it had in the cellar. She would have to accept the inevitable, that something magical was indeed at work here.

She balanced the book in one hand and picked up the necklace. It would represent her heart that she would give to the man she conjured. She prayed that she was not making a grave mistake. She looked down at the page in the firelight and read in a hesitant voice:

 “On this night when the moon is full

To the Goddess I make my call,         

        I add my heart to your fire.”

She dropped the locket into the center of the flame and the fire leaped higher. Before she could change her mind, she took up the photograph and dangled it by the corner, over the dancing flames as she read:

“Come earth, wind, fire and water,

Come hither and speak to your daughter.

        I add past love and watch it burn.”

The photograph of her family fluttered into the fire and she felt as if part of her heart had been torn from her breast as she watched it turn to ash.

The north wind howled across the sea, raged from the south, then the west, whipping her cape around her body and lashing her hair across her face, but the fire burned uncommonly high.

Through the darkness Isabella could see the waves on the shoreline looming higher, but instinctively she knew they would not harm her. She was invincible, one with the elements, infused with the power of the Mother Goddess. In her strange elation, she lifted her face to the heavens and rain touched her cheeks. Large drops fell, gathered and trickled down her face and throat, as she held the book up in offering. Her next words seemed to come unbidden to her tongue and she spoke loudly into the night, into the wind and rain.

“Grant to me that which this world has not bore,

A man who will be true, be my strength and make my heart soar,

Take this offering of life.”

She bent, took up the butterfly jar and released the lid, however, instead of the tiny creature making its escape, she watched in horror as it plunged to its death among the flames.

Stunned, she stared unseeing into the fire, but soon realized that perhaps this was meant to be. She only hoped the butterfly’s death had not in vain. She raised her gaze from the fire and looked around. Well, the spell had been cast. What now? The wind had dropped, the surf had subsided to a normal battering of the shoreline, and the rain had ceased. No man had appeared out of the surf, fallen from the sky or strode toward her from along the beach. Bitter disappointment was like a wound on her tongue as she dropped to her knees by the fire and read the words of the spell for a last time. The incantation, the locket, the photo, the butterfly, what more could she have done?

She should have known better than to believe in witchcraft, spells and true love. All lovely little myths that should have been treated as thus! She lowered the book to the rock and pulled her cloak more securely around her chilling body to wait. Perhaps all that was needed was a lapse in time.  She stretched out before the low burning fire and stared up at the moon.

If no great lover appeared, this would only be another disappointment to add to her list of many.