“Taking over what?”
“The shop. Man, I sure hope it doesn’t get sold. I like this job.”
“Anne owned the shop?” Raye asked. She was quicker on the uptake than he was.
“Of course.”
“Why ‘of course’?” Bobby wondered.
“She was a high priestess.”
Bobby glanced at Raye. She shrugged.
“The leader of the local coven,” Todd continued.
“It’s like a witch club,” Raye said.
“That’s right, dude.”
Bobby had never gotten used to women being referred to as dude. From Raye’s bemused expression she hadn’t either.
“I thought Ms. McKenna was a hospice worker.”
“She is.” The young man’s bright, eager expression fell. “Was.” He shook his head. “Why would anyone hurt her? She was a saint.”
“Can a witch be a saint?” Bobby asked.
“Joan of Arc,” Raye murmured.
“Good one.” Todd nodded approvingly. “Annie’s gift was to relieve suffering. She helped ease people from this world.”
That smelled like euthanasia. Which was still a crime as far as Bobby knew. “How?”
“Once people are in hospice, there’s not much to do but manage their pain, which usually means boatloads of narcotics. Some don’t want to spend the time they have left drugged out of their mind. Annie used herbals and massage instead of pills.”
“Herbals.” Bobby knew what that meant.
Todd rolled his eyes—part disgust, part amusement. “Dying people, dude.”
He had a point.
“Annie was gifted,” the kid continued.
“I’m not following.”
“She was an air witch.”
He still wasn’t.
Todd grabbed a piece of paper, drew a five-pointed star. “Four elements.” He tapped the eraser side of his pencil on each of the four nonascendant triangles. “Fire, air, water, earth.” He moved the eraser to the single ascendant point. “Spirit. Point up, shows spirit is more important than earthly concerns.”
“What about point down?” Bobby asked. He’d seen that too.
The kid made a face. “The earthly over the spirit. Satanism. Crazies.”
“Because witches are so sane,” Bobby muttered, ignoring Raye’s annoyed glance.
“Those who follow this path…”—Todd tapped the center of the pentagram—“are some of the sanest people I’ve ever known.”
Bobby was getting too much information out of this guy to argue and risk his clamming up so he swallowed further comments. “Anything else?” he asked.
Todd stared at him for a few seconds as if gauging how much he should say, then shrugged and went on. “The continuous line used to draw the star symbolizes the interconnection between the divine and the earthly.” Flipping the pencil point down, he drew a ring connecting the points of the star. “All is unified. Life is a circle—birth, death, rebirth.”
Bobby nearly said blah, blah, blah, but managed to stop himself. From the glance Raye shot his way, his expression had said it for him. At least Todd didn’t notice.
“Witches are elemental,” Todd continued. “An earth witch is good with herbs, a water witch with healing and cleansing.”
“But Anne was an air witch?” Raye asked.
“Right. If her talent had been medicine or healing, she would have been a nurse. Hospice isn’t about that. An air witch alleviates pain, and air rules the crossover.”
“Lost me,” Bobby said.
“The gates of death. An air witch is a necromancer. They can communicate with the dead.”
Raye started so violently, Bobby took her hand. It was freakishly cold for the warmth of the autumn day. He glanced at her. She wasn’t looking at him but at the kid.
“Communicate how?” she whispered.
“Hear them mostly. Clairaudience. But really powerful air witches can bring the dead across.”
“I refuse to believe in zombies,” Bobby said.
“We’re talking ghosts, dude.”
“Of course we are,” Raye said.
“Annie not only helped the dead cross over, she helped the living communicate with those they’ve lost.”
“Séances?” Bobby’s lip curled.
“Sometimes.”
“And I suppose she charged a hefty fee for them.”
“That wouldn’t be ethical. Besides, how can you charge the dead?”
“That wasn’t…” Bobby began, but Raye set a hand on his arm. “Shh.”
“Annie was training me,” Todd continued. “Now what am I going to do?”
“You seem to be doing just fine here,” Bobby said.
“She wasn’t training me in the store; she was training me to be a witch.”
“Isn’t that a warlock?”
“It’s the twenty-first century. No one uses that word anymore.”
“Except on Bewitched,” Raye said, and Todd snickered. “I thought witches were born not made.”
Bobby cast her a quick glance. How much research had she done before he arrived last night?
“To be an elemental, like Annie,” Todd said, “you have to inherit the craft. If you don’t you can still learn the way, assist the others, but real magic is beyond us.”