Holiday Magick (7 page)

“Touched what?” the maid demanded, but Esther hardly heard her. Instead, she stared, white-faced, at the ball of crepe paper in her hand.

Everyone who touches the valentine falls in love with Jessamine
. It had been intended for Edward, yes, but the charm was open. It welcomed all. Not that Esther would have admitted this, not to her prospective clients, certainly not to the wailing Jessamine, but she hadn't kept up on her magical studies after graduating. Indeed, she hadn't learned much since Elisabeta's expulsion. She knew how to create the carrier and bind it to the spellcaster, but had never managed to make a spell intended for a specific recipient. It had never been a problem in the past, since the charms had always been personally delivered to their recipients, until this one.

This valentine had been sent via the United States Postal Service.

Worse, it seemed that Esther had done such a wonderful job in creating the valentine that Edward had shown it around to his neighbors and coworkers before rushing back to Central Massachusetts. Jessamine sobbed out the tale of how he, followed by a bevy of strangers, both men and women, had arrived on her doorstep, bearing all manner of gifts and tokens, along with Edward's landlady, the local barkeep, the butcher, and elderly Mr. Fullerton.

Mrs. Fullerton would not be amused.

“And they won't stop,” Jessamine sobbed. “They keep coming… No matter where I hide, they find me.” Jessamine's head drooped, and Esther patted her friend's shoulder. Before she could offer any words of encouragement, the maid peeked out the front window.

“Ma'am?” She beckoned Esther to the glass, holding the curtain aside. “I believe we'll be having a few more guests.”

Swallowing the lump in her throat, Esther looked. Appearing like wraiths from the grave, a veritable mob was making its way down the front walkway, trampling the azalea bushes her father so prized, calling out Jessamine's name. Most of them looked as if they'd walked all the way from New York, with their shambling gait and tattered clothes, their minds intent on one purpose.

Jessamine.

The lump in her throat now firmly lodged in her gut, Esther sprang into action. “We must break the spell!” Esther cried, grabbing Jessamine and fleeing to the pantry. “Quickly, I need sour and bitter things! Gather anything you see!”

In a few moments, they had assembled in the center of the kitchen table a jar of lemon curd, brined sardines, assorted pickles, and a decanter of whiskey. Esther raised an eyebrow at the whiskey, but didn't ask. Instead, she added a jar of mustard seed and grabbed a heavy pottery bowl, throwing the valentine in the bottom.

“What are you doing?” Jessamine demanded.

“Souring their feelings for you,” Esther replied, as she dumped first the lemon curd, and then the pickled eggs atop the card.

“Even Edward?”

“Even Edward.” Deciding that the whiskey wasn't such a bad idea, she dumped a jigger's worth atop the mess and threw the whole bowl into the hearth.

Nothing happened.

Esther and Jessamine stood before the hearth for one, two, three heartbeats, then Jessamine leaned toward the flames. Esther barely had time to clutch her arm and pull her back before the bowl cracked, and then a white light blinded them. Once her vision cleared, Esther found Jessamine looking at her expectantly.

“Did it work?” Jessamine asked.

“We shall see.” Cautiously, Esther stepped into the hall. Instead of the loud voices professing undying love for Jessamine, Esther only heard a few mumbled questions.

“Where am I?”

“How did we all end up here?”

“I've never been this late with the mail before, beggin' your pardon.”

“Jessamine!” Edward's voice carried above the rest, and he shouldered the others aside as he pushed into the house and swept Jessamine into his arms. Apparently, all this trouble with the valentine had been for naught; he'd truly loved her all along.

Esther, with the help of her maid, managed to usher the rest out the door, some with small purses, funded by Esther's non-spelled valentines, to pay for lodging and train tickets home. The last thing Esther needed was her father hearing of this incident, especially since she was running out of servants to blame for all the odd occurrences, and Esther did so get on with the maid.

Once all the guests had gone, either to the local inn or, in the case of Edward and Jessamine, to the Hillebrand homestead, Esther's maid fixed her with a piercing gaze. “Now, will you leave such charms alone, ma'am?”

Esther considered the hubbub of the night, the many lives turned upside down by her charm. Truly, matters of the heart were not to be meddled with.

Then, Esther thought of her fledgling business, the money it had already made, not to mention the additional fees she could charge for undoing such charms. All Esther had ever truly wanted was to make her own way in the world, free of any husband or father to tell her what to do. All she needed were a few more spell books, and a few more weeks of study, and her charms would be perfect. Elisabeta wouldn't have given up.

“Certainly not.”

Purim is a joyously festive, early spring holiday that celebrates the courage of Queen Esther, a young girl forced to hide her Jewish identity after being chosen, as the most beautiful woman in the land, to be the new bride to King Ahasuerus of Persia. As the traditional story goes, Esther's uncle Mordechai refused to pay homage to the king's advisor, Haman, so Haman convinced King Ahasuerus that the entire Jewish race needed to be destroyed. In one of the most famous acts of courage in Jewish history, Esther risked her own life to reveal her true Jewish identity to her husband, the king, and in doing so saved her people.

Purim is traditionally observed with the giving of sweets, the eating of a special triangle-shaped cookie called Hamantaschen, and general merry-making, including carnivals and games. It is the only Jewish holiday in which people are commanded to overindulge in food and drink. Jews also read the Megillah, a separate scroll chronicling Esther's story of bravery. Every time Haman's name is mentioned, listeners drown out his name with special “grogers,” or noisemakers. One of the most important aspects of Purim observance is dressing up in costume to commemorate Esther's hiding of her true identity. Some may call it a Jewish Halloween with elements of Mardi Gras.

However, what if Esther actually did more than hide her Jewish identity? What if she had to hide her magic—
and
her people's history from Haman?

I covered my nose and mouth with my sleeve, but the stench of burnt bodies penetrated the fabric and continued to assault my nostrils. To my right my oldest sister, Brucha, blanched and placed a hand on her enormous belly.

“You should not be here, Brucha.” Our mother shook her head, placed two fingers at her lips, and spat between them. “It's not good for the baby.”

“She's fine,” Brucha said.

Our middle sister, Tova, turned away from the carnage and whispered a Kadish, a prayer for the dead.

Mother sighed. “And you're so sure the baby is a girl this time? After five sons?”

“Maybe this sight will
scare
the baby into being born a girl.” I spoke under my breath, but they all heard me.

“Hadassah!” Tova gasped.

I shrugged one shoulder, dismissing their shocked faces. “Women endure this sort of thing because we have to. Men go to war over this and perish.”

A fat tear rolled down Mother's cheek. She gathered Brucha by the shoulders and motioned Tova and me to follow her away. “Is there no one who can stop him?” she asked the wind.

“Who?” I held Tova's hand and looked back over my shoulder one last time, staining onto my memory forever the image of the killing field, and the smoke rising from blackened tents where entire families had perished. The smoke from the destruction of this camp had risen so high into the air even we, miles away, saw it and came running. “Haman?”

My sisters and mother waved their hands in the air and shushed me.

Tova hissed into my ear. “Are you crazy? Would you call his very wrath upon our heads?”

“He's not HaShem,” I said. “He can't possibly hear me.”

“He followed us this far, over many lands and many seas.” My mother stopped, closed her eyes, and hung her head. “All the way to Persia. Who knows what that man is capable of? He sees everything. He hears everything. He
knows
everything!”

My nostrils flared. Through gritted teeth I said, “No one but HaShem has those powers. And Haman is most certainly not HaShem.”

My mother released a sob that turned into a wail. Brucha sighed and rubbed our mother's back. Tova clenched my hand and pulled me along.

“Stop upsetting our mother.”

“But—”

“Just stop it, Hadassah. I don't care if you say his name a million times, just don't do it in front of Mother. She's been through enough.” Tova stared over my shoulder toward the killing field. “She had sisters in that camp, you know. And nieces.” She ripped her gaze back to my eyes and leaned forward meaningfully. “So stop tormenting her. Especially you, stop tormenting her by saying his name.”

Especially me. I was an Esther, the third daughter of a third daughter of a third daughter. Three times three. My people believed the Esthers were capable of great magic. Another Esther, in the camp just destroyed, had dreamt of Persia, and our tribe had followed her here in the hopes of escaping Haman. I wondered if she had secretly known she was walking toward her own doom and that of her tribe. Or had this tragedy been part of HaShem's larger plan to save our people?

My own magic as an Esther had yet to be tried or tested, but I was hopeful, eager even, to prove I could help my people finally find peace, either by destroying Haman or by losing him. No matter where we went, he dogged our every step, but there had to be some place in this land where we could not be found. Perhaps with the other Esther gone, my chance to save my people would present itself.

The true origin of Haman's hatred for us was long lost to the desert winds, but many believed a blood feud all the way back to the time of Jacob had blackened Haman's heart, tainted his soul with evil, and given him unnatural life to hunt us down until he felt our debt was paid in full. Some said he despised our matriarchal ways because he hated women, but his reason didn't matter anymore. His name was a curse within my small tribe, whispered fearfully in shadows, told in stories to scare children. Behave, or Haman will get you!

I did not know how much more we could endure. From generation to generation, we had survived Haman's attempts to wipe us off the face of the earth. And while he terrorized us in the night and stole our daughters, never before had he annihilated an entire camp, even the boys and men.

Brucha, Tova, Mother, and I walked without speaking the rest of the way back to our own camp, the silence occasionally broken by my mother's sniffles and soft sobs. The stench of smoke stung my nostrils the entire way home, and the sun sliced like hot knives through my only tunic and into my back.