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blank, like journals. Some were like cheap notebooks; some were fancier, with marbled endpapers and deckle-edged leaves; and some were bound in gold-stamped leather, oversize and heavy. I felt sudden distaste for the girlish, pink vinyl-covered journal I’d been keeping since ninth grade.
    Fifteen minutes later Bree had chosen a couple of Wiccan reference books, and I had settled on one about a woman who had suddenly discovered Wicca when she was in her thirties and how it had changed her life. It seemed to explain Wicca in a personal way. The books were kind of expensive, and I don’t have Bree’s access to parental credit, so I was getting only one.
    We headed to the counter.
    “This it for you?” the store clerk asked Bree.
    “Uh-huh.” Bree dug in her purse for her wallet. “We can swap books when we’re finished,” she said to me.
    “Good idea,” I said.
    “Do you have everything you need for Samhain?” the clerk asked.
    “Samhain?” Bree looked up.
    “One of the biggest Wiccan festivals,” the clerk said and pointed to a poster tacked to the wall with rusty thumb-tacks. It depicted a large purple wheel. At the top it said The Witches’ Sabbats. At eight points around the wheel were the names of Wiccan celebrations and their dates. Mabon appeared at nine o’clock on the wheel. At about ten-thirty was the word Samhain, October 31. My eyes scanned the wheel, fascinated. Yule, Imbolc, Ostara, Beltane, Litha, Lammas, Mabon, Samhain. The very words were strange and also somehow familiar and poetic-sounding to me.
    Tapping it with his finger, the clerk said, “Get your black and orange candles now.”
    “Oh, right,” Bree said, nodding.
    “If you need more information, there are a couple of great books about our festivals, sabbats, and esbats,” said the clerk. He was speaking to Bree but looking at me. I was dying for the books but didn’t have enough money with me.
    “Hang on—let me get them.” Bree followed him back to the bookshelves to get the ones he recommended.
    I heard a lightbulb flickering overhead and felt the spiral of incense smoke rising above its little stand. As I stood there, it seemed as if everything around me was actually vibrating, almost. As if it was full of energy, like a beehive. I blinked and shook my head. My hair suddenly felt heavy. I wished Cal were there.
    The clerk returned while Bree continued browsing. He stared at me.The silence was so awkward I broke it. “Why is magic spelled with a K here?” I heard myself asking him
    “To distinguish it from illusionary magic,” he responded, as though it was very strange of me not to know this.
    He went right back to his silent stare. “What’s your name?” he finally asked me in a soft voice.
    I looked at him. “Um, Morgan.Why?”
    “I mean, who are you?” Though soft, the soft voice was quietly insistent.
    Who am I? I frowned at him.What did he want me to say? “I’m a junior at Widow’s Vale,” I offered awkwardly.
    The clerk looked puzzled, as if he were asking me a question in English and I was insisting on answering in Spanish.
    Bree came back, holding a book called Sabbats: Past and Present, by Sarah Morningstar.
    “I’ll get this, too,” she said, sliding it onto the counter. The clerk silently rang it up.
    Then, as Bree took her paper bag, he said to me, “You might be interested in one of our history books.” He reached for it beneath the worn wooden counter.
    It’s black, I thought, and he pulled out a black-covered paperback. Its title was The Seven Great Clans: Origins of Witchcraft Examined .
    I stared at the book, tempted to blurt out, “That’s mine!” But of course it wasn’t mine—I had never seen it before. I wondered why it seemed so familiar.
    “It’s practically required reading,” the clerk said, looking at me. “It’s important to know about blood witches,” he went on. “You never know when you might meet one.”
    I nodded quickly. “I’ll take it,” I said, and