Wiccan Sisters

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. "Rat! Rat! Rat!" I exclaimed. I ran to the side of the house and grabbed the water hose to put out the fire I had started in the backyard. When I put it out, I looked at the pile of slushy, wet ash that used to be a small tree. I then heard laughter behind me. I turned to see my sister, Crystal, who was seven years older than me, leaning up against the door frame with her arms folded.

"Mom's going to be pissed at you, Tabitha. She just planted that tree," Crystal said.

"Well, I didn't mean to. The spell I was practicing didn't work right," I replied.

"So, if burning down mom's tree wasn't your goal, what were you trying to do?"

I sighed. I really didn't want to tell Crystal about my project for the annual Witches Harvest Festival coming up in a few weeks, but Crystal, if anything, was a genius when it came to sparkly spells and incantations--and she knew it.

"I was trying to make the green leaves on that tree turn into the colors of Autumn and make them glow," I replied. "I tried it on that small tree first, and if that worked, I was going to do it to all the trees in the forest on the night of the festival for the incantation contest mom signed me up for."

"Well, thank goodness you started small," Crystal admonished, "'or you could have burned down the town!"

She was right. I could have unintentionally caused a disaster. "Don't remind me," I huffed.

"Anyway, that's a pretty ambitious spell for a ten year old," she replied. "Most fledgling witches and warlocks, your age, do something simple like levitate small objects in a creative way such as making pencils dance."

"Well, you didn't do something simple when you were my age!" I replied. "Mom keeps reminding me of how you won first place for turning a yellow squash, into a yellow Porsche!"

Crystal smiled. "Ahhh, the Cinderella Transportation spell. That was seven years ago. I remember it well. It's too bad the spell had a time limit on it. Dad loved driving it around for an hour."

"As he keeps telling me," I replied. "I just wanted to try something special like you did so they don't keep throwing your accomplishments in my face."

Crystal chuckled slightly. "Well, you aren't me. Why don't you just stick with what you're good at like trick broom riding. You almost won last year."

"And I would have too, if that bird hadn't flown into the straws of my broom and caused me to fall off on my last trick. But anyway, Mom said I need to up my level of sophistication, and I need to quit acting like a tomboy." I hesitated a moment. It made me cringe to ask Crystal for help, but my spell making sucked big time, and like it or not, she was my only option. "Do you think you can help me?"

Crystal grinned. "Sure, what are big sisters for. Come in the house and show me the spell you used in the family Grimoire. I'll help you straighten it out. I don't want you to embarrass our family by doing something we'll all regret."

When Crystal turned her back, I sneered and mumbled her last, smug statement.

"Did you say something, Tabitha?" Crystal asked.

"Oh, I just said you're right. I don't want to embarrass the family." I knew, she knew, I was mocking her, and I also knew, she knew, I wouldn't admit it to her face if I wanted her help.

We went to the family book of spells that was kept in the basement in a special room. "Show me the spell you used?"

I hesitated a moment. "Well, I didn't actually use any one spell. I wanted to be creative and modified two into one."

"You did what!" Crystal exclaimed, and then she slapped her forehead with the palm of her hand. "Unbelievable! It takes years of wording practice to create your own spells. You haven't even been in spell training class for a year yet. And what you were trying to do needs to be practiced in a safe environment," she scolded. She shook her head. "Show me the two spells."

I pointed them out. "It's the spell that makes things glow and one that makes things turn colors. I then added my own flair. You want me to recite it for you?"

"And have you burn down our house! No thank you. Don't say it, write it down."

I took a piece of paper from the desk drawer, dipped the quill pen in the bottle of ink and wrote:

Autumn's fire of colors bright,

Glow the leave of this tree tonight.

Summers gone and fall is here,

Burn in the colors we love so dear.

Crystal read what I wrote and rolled her eyes. "You're poetry sucks for one thing. Second, it's not night, it daylight. You have nothing in your wording that states to 'change' the colors. Instead you use the words burn and fire. So, the way you wrote it, you basically created a spell to burn down the tree." She then said sarcastically, "Congratulations."

I ignored her sarcasm. "So how do I create what I want to do?"

She hesitated a moment and sighed. "Truthfully, I don't have a clue."

I was actually surprised. "You don't! But your spells always come easy for you and are so good."

Crystal smiled warmly. "I just let you think that they do. I can't even tell you how many pounds squash I went through trying to create that Porsche for the first time." She laughed. "If we hadn't had a squash garden, Dad probably would have spent enough money buying me squash to equal nice down payment to pay on a real one."

I laughed with her. This was the first time in my life I could remember Crystal ever being truly open and actually civil with me. It was a side of her I'd never seen before and it felt nice for a change instead of us always bickering.

"So what do I do?" I asked. "I want Mom and Dad to be proud of me."

Crystal folded her arms. "They are, Tabitha. You know how often Dad throws in my face about your skill at trick broom riding! I suck at broom riding. Heck, you can do a back flip on a moving broom ten feet off the ground. I can't even do a back flip standing on the ground without a broom. Where Mom is pushing you to learn spells now, when I was your age, Dad kept pushing me to practice tricks on a broom. So, we are in the same boat, Dad used to push me, and now Mom is pushing you. So we are equal in that respect.

Suddenly, we heard Mom shout, "Tabitha! Crystal! What happened to my new tree!"

We both laughed. "Come on. You better go upstairs and face the music. Afterward, let's go out to the garden. I have an idea. How about we work on a levitation spell to have a squash do a back flip on a broom."

I was only scolded lightly after I told Mom how I burnt down her tree. She just told me to practice spells that were safer, and the cost of a new tree would come out of my allowance. Afterward, Crystal and I went out to the garden. Perhaps, this ushered in a new era between us. Instead of having a wicked sister, perhaps we could now be Wicca sisters.