3. The Seven of Sie

Iona Deasy kneeled in front of her bed and silently eased open the drawer beneath it. It was early evening and the only light in her bedroom came from her bedside lamp, casting a dim, grey-blue light across her features. Slowly she reached inside the drawer, trying not to disturb the jumble of objects and keepsakes that lay there. At the back of the drawer, under a bulky photograph album, lay a long, thin package wrapped in a dark velvet cloth. Laying the photograph album to one side, she took out the package and unwrapped it quickly, her fingers trembling just a little. Inside the velvet wrapping lay a wand, an intricately carved wooden wand that had never done magic before her eyes, though she felt certain it was capable of it. She pressed an unruly lock of her long, pale blonde hair behind her ear and ran her finger along the undulating, indented surface of the wand. There was nothing to be seen that she hadn't seen before a hundred times, but as she reached the end of its length she felt her finger recoil, as if the object had an electrical charge in it. She put the covering back over the wand and slipped it into the side pocket of the overnight bag she had placed behind the door in case her mother came in and disturbed her.

As she was packing, a light seemed to flash outside the window. She lifted the curtain and looked out into the street. For a second she thought she saw a slender figure dressed in black standing beneath a street light opposite the house. But the next moment the figure was gone, so she let the curtain drop.

She reached up and took down her coat from where it was hanging on the back of her bedroom door and hurriedly put it on. A letter written to her parents accounting for her absence had already been tucked into the top drawer of her writing desk. With one last glance around what had been her bedroom since the age of seven, she picked up her bag and went out onto the landing.

Her parents were in the front room watching television as she slipped quietly down the stairs.

'I'm just going round to Claire's to study,' she called out as she passed in the hall.

'Ok,' came her mother's reply over the sound of the television.

She opened the front door and stepped out into the evening. There on the doorstep, barring her way, was a cat with silver fur. From its position on the doormat, the cat looked up at her with a withering stare. Iona leaned down to stroke him on the top of his head. He allowed her to stroke him once then pulled his head away. She stood up and he shifted his position slightly, so that he was still blocking her way.

'Don't be like that,' she said in a sad voice. 'You've seen magic. Now it's my turn. Let me go. I'll come back for you.'

The cat looked up at her again, its pupils dilated. Then it bit her leg. The bite didn't penetrate her jeans, but she let out a little yelp of surprise. She quickly composed herself, telling herself that it was beneath her to be so disconcerted by a cat, and strode off down the garden path. The cat immediately set off too, padding along at her side.

'Spectre, get back to the house!' she said in a low, chiding voice. As she paused to open the front gate he reared up and bit her again.

'Ouch!' she whispered, turning in the opening. 'It's too late, do you understand me? Too late.'

Spectre made no response. In a way she was pleased that he was making such a fuss over her departure.

'I'll give you one last chance,' she said finally, reaching into her bag and drawing out the wand. 'If you want me to stay, lead me to the owner of this wand, just like you led me to the wand itself.'

In response, Spectre got up slowly and slunk back up the garden path, before disappearing into a flower bed. Iona stared at the spot where he had disappeared. Once she was sure he wouldn't return, she closed the gate and stepped onto the street.

No sooner was she out on the pavement than a dark arm swished out of the dark and locked itself insistently in hers. She let out a mute cry, caught between fear of the arm that grabbed her and fear of drawing attention to herself.

She glanced down. The hand gripping her arm was slim and pale, with sculpted nails and two silver rings, transparent nail polish glinting off the streetlight.

'Keep quiet or go home,' said the voice that obviously went with the hand. She looked around at the speaker. The face she found herself looking at was half-hidden by a sweep of long black hair. The heavily made-up eye that was scrutinising her was poised between brown and green, the eyelid silver, mascara glistening. With her free hand the girl tugged her hair out of the rest of her face. The visible part of her face showed her to be pretty, and scarcely any older than Iona. The visible eye and half mouth had a jaded, distant look about them.

'Are you one of the Seven?' she asked excitedly.

'Let's not discuss that here,' said the girl, leading her down the lane, her arm firmly grasping hers, in the direction that went away from town and out into the countryside. They followed the lane until the pavement ran out. Beyond the tall hedge that ran along the lane, the floodlit ruins of a castle started to come into sight.

The girl paused and glanced back over her shoulder down the lane. Satisfied that they were far enough on from the last house, she turned around, her gaze cold and piercing.

'This is your last chance to change your mind,' she said, looking closely at Iona.

'I've made up my mind,' Iona replied. 'This is what I want.'

'What's that I wonder?' said the girl.

'I want to do what you can do.'

'Why?'

'Because I found this,' replied Iona. 'And since then I can't get it out of my mind.' As she spoke she drew the wand out of her bag and held it out under the moonlight. The dark-haired girl pursed her lips as she looked at the wand.

'What makes you think it's real?'

'Lillian says it's real.'

'You may not have understood her true meaning.'

'Maybe, but I know it's real. I just know. I've known it since I first found it.'

The girl looked up from the wand and up at Iona's face, which was still fixed on it.

'You're still at school I suppose,' she said in a matter-of-fact way.

'I'm dropping out.'

'So did I.'

Iona looked at the girl, who shot her a bitter sort of a smile in return.

'What's your name?' said Iona.

'Later,' said the girl.

'Do you regret choosing this life?' said Iona.

The girl smiled bitterly.

'No, there's no question of that.'

Iona looked up and down the deserted lane.

'So where are we going?'

'Oh it's not far.'

She tugged on her arm, and they continued on their way. The lane started to climb, passing to the side of the hill beneath the castle precincts.

'Not far from here?' said Iona. Had all of them come to her insignificant little town to test her?

'Look closely,' said the girl, casting her hand out in the darkness in front of them. 'Can you see the joins?'

Iona looked down at the cracked tarmac beneath their feet then at the dark countryside on either side of them. She had walked that lane a thousand times but it was less familiar in the dark. She strained her neck to the left, something striking her about the trees overhanging the road there.

'I don't remember there being fir trees here.'

She looked along the road, which continued into the darkness, the streetlights more distanced from one another, forming a dwindling line that seemed to lead upwards. When she looked back down the lane she could still make out the ghostly shape of the castle's northernmost battlements and beyond it, her town's faint lights.

'It's this way,' said the girl suddenly out of the darkness, throwing out her hand. A gravel track led off the road to the left, leading upwards into a forest of firs. A forest that didn't grow by the lane she knew.

The house only came into view once the track emerged from under the trees. Hemmed in by woodland, it stood side on to a small opening where mud and debris were reclaiming what might once have been a driveway. No light shone in its windows. Its walls, as far as they could be seen, were peeling and dilapidated.

'This isn't anywhere near my house,' said Iona.

'No, it's a long way away from there,' said the girl.

She nonchalantly pushed open the door and led Iona into a long and narrow hallway. Without the light scarcely any of it could be seen, other than the faint outline of the corners where the walls met the ceiling. Suddenly the walls seemed to glow with a pale and weak light that seemed to emit from nowhere, as no lamps were lit. As they progressed down the hall, the illumination followed them, as if they themselves were the source of the light.

They passed through a left-hand door, through a seemingly abandoned kitchen to a staircase that led downwards.

'Scared yet?' asked the girl with a smirk.

'No.'

'You're lying. You'll need to get better at that.'

Torches lined the walls of the basement. The room was perfectly round and apparently devoid of any furnishing.

'Nice touch,' said the girl. It wasn't clear whether she was talking to herself or to someone unseen. She led Iona to the middle of the room and paused.

'I've brought her,' she said in a louder voice, the words reverberating off the smooth dark walls.

The next moment they were no longer alone. As Iona glanced about her, figure after figure appeared in the torchlight. Within a few moments they were no longer two but six. Three of the new arrivals were men: two tall, one particularly so, the third smaller and of slighter build. The fourth figure was that of a girl, petite, with black hair and vaguely Asian features. The four figures kept their distance, standing at even intervals around them, watching silently, the light flickering on their impassive faces.

'Stand here in the centre,' said the girl who had brought Iona. 'She'll be here in a moment. Then we'll begin.'

With that, she walked away and took her station in the circle that had formed around Iona.

'She likes them young I see,' said one of the men, the tallest of them. He had ironic eyes, a grinning mouth with rather pointed teeth and a shaven, dome-shaped head.

'Young or not, what matters is how good she is,' said the other tall man. He was slim and handsome, with cropped blonde hair and glasses that seemed to hide his eyes.

'Lillian must have seen something special in her,' the first man continued.

Iona looked impassively back at the man. It was to be expected that they would distrust her, mock her even.

'She will have done,' cut in the girl who had brought her. She said no more and continued to look at Iona with the same distant stare, but Iona was grateful to her for it.

'Why do you carry a wand with you?' asked the third man. Like the girl, he also seemed scarcely older than Iona, only he had a straggly dark brown beard. His expression was not so much distant as altogether vacant.

'She found it,' said the girl, tilting her head towards the bearded youth. Her voice was gentler as it addressed him. 'It's what brought her to us.'

'It's a sad thing,' said the bearded youth. 'Abandoned by its owner.'

'What use are magic wands?' said the shaven-headed man with contempt.

'You wouldn't say that if you knew how to wield one,' said the blonde man.

'I have no need for that kind of magic,' the shaven-headed man retorted. 'Any idiot can be born with it, use it like an idiot, and eventually die, without ever knowing the first thing about the power they wielded. The Circle, on the other hand, requires intelligence and diligence and near endless patience to wield. We can wipe the smile off a wizard's face, then put it back without their ever knowing.'

'Yes, wizards are human beings, which makes them as vulnerable as anyone else,' interjected the Asian girl.

'We can take the wands out of a wizard's hand and make him turn it on himself. So what?' said the dark-haired girl.

'They think they wield incredible power,' said the shaven-headed man. 'But I see them for what they are.'

'By now you should have unlearned believing what you see,' said the girl, looking straight ahead.

'That's true, Rachel,' said another voice, one that was still hidden from them. Iona knew the voice. It was the voice of her teacher.

Lillian Herrick walked slowly into the room, no longer the neat, friendly school teacher Iona had known. She wore a long green dress and her hair was tied back, accentuating her pale face. No one could look away from her. She looked more beautiful than Iona imagined she could be and emanated a power that she had never felt before in her. She smiled at Iona as she walked towards her, and her nerves melted away. The task before her had never seemed simpler. She would make her teacher proud.

She took Iona's arm, guiding her round so that they were facing the assembled company together. She smiled discreetly at Iona then turned to address the gathering.

'We've been only six for too long now,' she said in a voice that was soft enough to be intimate, but loud enough to be heard by the entire company. 'Caleb is lost,' she continued, looking in particular at the girl called Rachel and the bearded boy next to her. 'He remains true to us; of that I'm sure. But he can't help us any more from wherever it is he's wandering. We need a seventh.'

She turned to Iona, placing her hand on the back of Iona's neck and running her fingers through her hair, and tilting Iona's head slightly so that she was looking directly into her eyes.

'After tonight we may have one.'

Iona maintained her gaze. Lilian moved her hand from Iona's neck to her face and touched her gently on the cheek.

'But first,' she said in a soft voice, taking her by the hand, 'before we know for certain, we need to hear the result of your studies, Iona.'

There was silence around the room.

'Are you ready?'

Iona nodded.

'Describe to us the Circle,' said Lillian, pressing the tips of her fingers into Iona's arm.

She began to speak in a clear voice.

'There are seven points on the circle, seven spokes on the wheel. There are seven circles, one within the other. '

The faces around the room were solemn, half immersed in darkness.

'Name them,' said Lillian, in little more than a whisper.

'The first, the outer circle, is the disguising of objects.

The second is the movement of objects.

The third is the making and unmaking of objects.

The fourth is the seeing into the mind of another.

The fifth is the creation of images in the mind of another.

The sixth is the insertion of real objects into another's reality.

In the seventh we walk through time and space, we walk beneath the red sky.'

She took a deep breath and stopped. The room remained silent. Her hand and lower arm felt cold and almost numb from where Lillian was squeezing it.

'Good,' she said. 'Now tell us how you gain access to the gifts.'

Iona glanced at Lillian for a second. The woman stood very close to her, watching her intently.

'You must make the circle turn. First the outer circle then the circles within it, moving inwards.

Each has its own incantation, seven words long. It must be repeated endlessly in sequences of seven, until the gift reveals itself. You never know when exactly, only that the gift always comes at a multiple of seven. But the more you practise, the more complete the dedication, they come sooner and sooner.'

'You say the gifts reveal themselves one by one,' said Lillian, speaking to her softly, as if there was no one else in the room. 'Do you mean that they're mastered one at a time, starting in the outer circles and gradually moving inwards?'

There was a short silence.

'No,' Iona replied calmly. 'Only when you reach the seventh can you attain the preceding six. The seventh is the first, the first is the seventh.'

'And what else?' Lillian asked, her voice lower. 'These are the techniques. But what other preparation must you first make? How must you prepare your mind and spirit?'

'Through guilt,' said Iona softly. 'Guilt is the force that drives the circle on. To unlock the gifts, you must corrupt yourself in full sight of purity. Be wrong in full sight of what is right. And never forgive yourself.'

'And what is its purpose?'

'The purpose?' replied Iona breathlessly. 'The purpose is decided by the practitioner. The original purpose was lost, if there ever was one.'

'I'm proud of you,' whispered Lilian gently to her. Again she turned to address the gathering.

'Each of you knows all too well what it takes to get as far as Iona has. You don't just borrow a book from the library and learn the lore by rote. But before we can accept Iona among us and close the circle around ourselves, we must have a demonstration. Then once again we will be the Seven of Sie'

She smiled at Iona, a smile Iona couldn't help but return. Lilian stepped back, leaving Iona alone in the centre of the room. She glanced around her, while the others looked on with grave faces, in anticipation of the demonstration. Then she closed her eyes, her lips moving rapidly but almost imperceptibly as she began the incantations. The circles rotated, on and on, until the darkness behind her closed eyelids took on form, colour and depth.

First they saw the night sky over a forest. Then the scene reconfigured within a copse of trees, where a woman in black stood in composed silence. After a few moments, there was a rustle of leaves and a cracking of twigs and a teenaged boy stepped warily into the glade. He had a pale, almost feminine face, partly covered by a long mop of side-parted dark brown hair. When he saw that someone was already standing under the trees, he stopped in his tracks.

The woman before him was perhaps in her thirties, with wild, straggly auburn hair. She was tall and thin, and her cheeks were sunken and pale.

'Did you come here looking for someone else?' she asked, looking at him with searching eyes.

'I come here alone usually,' he replied, a note of sullen defiance in his voice.

'Yes, you are usually alone,' replied the woman. 'Do you know who I am?'

'No,' he replied.

'In that case let me show you something, it might help you to understand.' From her black coat she drew out a small, carved wooden wand and held it up for him to see.

'Where did you get that?' said Simon Edwards, a touch of alarm in his voice.

'It's mine,' replied the woman breezily. 'I took it back from the girl who was keeping it. I am its rightful owner.'

His eyes widened in fear.

'You're the witch who left it here years ago?'

The witch smiled and said nothing.

'Where's Iona?' Simon blurted out.

'She's not here,' said the witch, a smirk on her lips. 'She always wanted to solve the mystery behind this wand. She always believed it to be a genuine magic wand, and that someday she would find its owner, the one who abandoned it. And finally she got her wish. She's with me now. It was a moment of great vindication for her. You, on the other hand, always tried to persuade her that it was an object without any power, nothing more than a joke shop replica.'

'I had a duty not to reveal the secrets of that wand,' replied Simon defiantly. 'But what do you mean, she's with you? If anything's happened to her, you'll have me and my people to deal with.'

'You mean deal with me and then wipe Iona's memory, so she's blissfully unaware of the truth again, I suppose. But however touching your concern for her may be, there's no need to get so uptight. She's in no danger. She joined me of her own free will. All I did was explain to her why I abandoned my wand and cloak here that day, why I turned my back on your magic, on wands like this one and the little conjuring tricks you can do with them. Why I gave up on innate magic, in favour of a better, stronger method.'

'If you gave up on magic you won't be needing that,' he replied.

'You're right. I don't. Now I have access to another kind of power, one that's open not just to those who can wield a wand because of fate or their genes. And this power is more potent and more subtle than your magic. Iona was very interested in what I had to say.'

Simon Edwards stared at her and said nothing.

'She's not very pleased with you, by the way,' said the witch. 'Hiding your abilities from her, guarding your precious magic when you knew how much she longed to know the truth.'

His face went pale.

'For years I've wanted to tell her,' he began with a faltering voice. 'But I'm under an oath to keep the wizarding world secret. That oath binds you too, even if you've given up on magic … I've come close to telling her a thousand times. But I thought it would change things between us. I didn't …'

'You were scared she would be jealous of you and your powers. Or did you think she'd just be interested in how you can do magic and not see the real you anymore?' the witch commented. 'You're really full of it, aren't you? What entitles you to think so highly of yourself, and to think of Iona as some silly little girl who wouldn't be able to control herself when she saw what comes out of the end of your wand?'

'It isn't like that,' he said weakly, 'Iona and I are friends. You make it sound sordid and nasty. You don't know anything about it.'

'But you are sordid,' said the witch, a look of scorn on her lips. 'Just like any other adolescent boy. It all just comes down to the fact that you want to stick your tongue down her throat. Which is the last thing she wants by the way.'

Simon stood in front of the witch in silence, his eyes wide.

'I'm going to find out who you are,' he said angrily, his chin trembling. 'There's something suspect about you. You're a disgrace to magic, innate or otherwise.'

The witch smirked as she listened to him.

'I only have one more thing to say,' she said. 'And that's good luck finding me. You may be needing this.' With that she threw the wand in his face. It bounced off his forehead and dropped to the ground, landing in the mud. He knelt down and picked up the wand, almost cradling it as he held it in his hands. When he looked up the witch was gone and he was alone again under the trees.

Iona opened her eyes. The candles had burned lower and the room was darker. Lillian had her arm around her shoulder, while the others still stood around her in a wide circle.

'A very entertaining show,' said Lilian, addressing the assembled company. 'Even the parts that were invention still held enough of the truth. You led him on expertly, and you knew just how to hurt him.'

The others were silent; Iona felt sure that if Lillian was impressed, they must be too.

'How do you feel?' said Lilian in a lower voice.

'Awful,' replied Iona slowly.

'A fleeting moment of lucidity,' replied Lilian. 'You try to hold onto it, but it slips away as quickly as it comes. You are our seventh, Iona, if you want to be.'

Iona raised her head, fixing the gaze of those in her line of sight through slightly glassy eyes.

She turned to Lilian.

'I do,' she said.