Once again the apprentices were gathered in the barn for education on magical animals.
"Today we're going to hear about cats," Thora said. "Almost everyone, wizards and non-wizards alike agree that cats are an aloof species. In many cultures black cats were associated with witches or wizards and thought to be familiars."
Heidi put up her hand. "Yes, Heidi," Thora said.
"When the wizards and witches from the Hungarian Academy of the Arcane were visiting, I noticed that many of them had either cats, owls, toads or other familiars with them. I'm even sure one of them had a bat. Then why don't we have familiars?" Heidi sat down again.
"The answer is at least partly in what I already have said." Thora answered. "Cats, especially the black cat is associated with witches, the same goes for toads and partly owls. And as many of you Nordic witches and wizards come from non-wizarding families, we decided to not complicate the matter by adding familiars. Some of us do in fact have familiars, but we are all better off if they are not taken notice of. I agree with Cassandra, your dear mother, on this. There's no reason to tempt a further investigation in this school."
Thora went over to the open window and made a peculiar sound, something between a meow and a hoot. A smallish owl flew through the window and landed on the table in front of her. It hooted softly and folded its wings.
"This is my familiar," Thora said in a soft voice. "Her name is Brúnleit, she is a Short eared owl, in Icelandic a cat-owl, kattugla. Normally you cannot see the ears, as they only stand up when she feels threatened." The owl turned around, facing the apprentices, Its claws made clicking noises against the table as she turned.
Susan sat looking at the small owl. It was maybe half as big as the owls from her grandma's clothes line. But the coloration was much the same. Only the eyes were brighter, yellow instead of orange and surrounded by black rings, which looked as if she was wearing a mask. She was beautiful. Susan wanted to stroke the owl. The owl slowly turned its head back at Thora and then around at the apprentices again. The owl locked eyes with Susan and clicked her beak. Susan smiled.
Then Thora made the strange sound once again, fed Brúnleit a small biscuit from her pocket and carried her to the window and let her fly into the beautiful Autumn afternoon.
***
"But we were talking about cats," Thora continued. "The cat, when not totally black is a harmless enough familiar, so that some of you, I am sure, already has a cat as familiar. Maybe even without knowing it."
Susan thought back on the summer before last. She and Linda had been sure they had a poltergeist or some other ghost in the cellar. Often when one of them came down there a big wooden plate that father had bought to make some project, was swaying from side to side as if pushed by an invisible hand. They even tried placing an old tape recorder in the cellar, but the noises on the tape were indistinct and could be only the muffled sounds of family's activity or echoes from the laundry service across the road. Then one day Susan and Linda were in search of screws for their homemade letterboxes and once again they saw the big board swaying to and fro. But now there was a sound, a recognizable sound. A soft meowing came from behind the board. Susan and Linda ran up the stairs and told Mom and Dad that the ghost in the cellar was not a ghost, but a cat! Some hours later they went back down again, and the meowing resumed, louder, more insistent. They looked behind the board. A small black and white kitten looked up at them. Father with his long arms came to the rescue and pulled the kitten from behind the board They named it Meow, because it was fun to have a vat able to say its own name, and fed it milk and bread with liverwurst and it grew and thrived.
Unfortunately their mother was right when she told them that when a mother cat feels threatened, she moves her litter, and the last kitten to be moved is always the weakest. As the cat grew it became clear that it was almost blind and could not learn how to handle this handicap. It kept on just running straight ahead, banging its head into things and getting caught in between table legs and in odd corners. In the end Susan, Linda and her mother found out why. All the black cats with white markings, like Meow, fell from the same tomcat, called Gravestone Tom. He was big and beautiful, with a shiny black fur and torn ears. He lived in the graveyard where he was often seen sunning himself on the tombstones. He dominated all the cats in the nearby streets, and chased all other tomcats out of his territory. He was father, brother, grandfather as well as uncle to Meow. In the end Meow was brought to the vet and euthanized. She was a danger to herself and a full time job for the family.
Susan did not hear much of Thora's lesson on cats, but as she, maybe inevitably, drifted to owls, Susan pricked up her ears.
***
After the lesson had ended all the apprentices went outside. Only Susan and a pair of the others stayed in the Barn. Susan did not want to go outside, she felt moody. She did not feel like going for a walk in the sunshine.
She climbed the broad, blue stairs, and then navigated the narrow stairs leading to the libraries. She went into the smallest of them, as she remembered that the books on owls and other familiars were located there. After a short search she found a big, dusty volume called Information on Arcane Familiars. She looked in the index, and discovered that the animals were ordered alphabetically. This made it easier. She quickly flicked past Adder, Badger, Bat, Bear, Black Mamba, Blackbird, Boar, Buffalo and Buzzard to arrive at Cat, and read: "Cats often choose the witch or wizard. A perfectly black cat is the best familiars, but often associated with evil wizards. Also black cats with white markings or even a red cat can be excellent familiars. Sometimes ...
Thora entered the room. "Hi Susan, studying on your own?"
"Yes, I wanted to know more about cats as familiars, you see, I think I once had one, but something went wrong." And Susan told Thora all about Meow, the inbred, stupid cat, who had insisted on staying close to Susan at all times.
"Yes," Thora said slowly. "That might have been the result of imperfect bounding, or something else. Familiars are not always as they should be."
"And owls," Susan said. "My Grandma has two big owls sitting on her clothes line. They seemed to understand me, and I them. I would so like to have a owl as familiar. "
"Maybe when you get older. An owl is a very messy familiar, demanding a lot of space. I live outside of town, just like your Granny. Owls need to hunt."
***
The smaller laboratory on the second floor was devoted to the transformation of small animals and inanimate objects. On the shelves running all around the walls over the doors and windows stood a ridiculous amount of stuffed animals. Some were old and decrepit, with hairless snouts and torn ears, some looked new and almost alive. Susan was happy to find at least three different owls on the broader shelves in the back of the room. Tenderly she took them from the shelf and handed them down to Thora who placed them on a table. Susan climbed down the ladder, and concentrated on the three owls at the table. "This one," she said to Thora, "this one looks like the owls on my Grandma's clothesline." The stuffed owl looked sick, and Susan needed little encouragement to pump Thora for her knowledge about owls and their diseases. Thora's knowledge in such matters was formidable, and they spent the next couple of hours happily ensconced in discussions about less savoury symptoms of diverse diseases among owls and other flying familiars. Jon stood in the door, his unruly hair even more disorderly than usual. For how long he had been standing there neither Thora nor Susan could have told you. He cleared his throat. Susan and Thora looked up, and Thora asked him what he wanted. "If you're quite done discussing Avian pox, I'd like to have a word with you concerning the vaccine for yellow fever," Jon answered. "Just a sec," Thora answered, "We've have to put all these stuffed animals back. Taavi wants this room for some experiments of his on crickets and grasshoppers" Jon left and Susan asked: "Is Taavi really going to experiment on grasshoppers?" "That's what he told me," Thora said earnestly, "and I think he meant to involve you in the catching, 'summoning' he called it, of crickets and grasshoppers." "Thanks for the warning," Susan said warmly. "I better go and study the names for those in Icelandic." Susan ran off and Thora sent a fond smile in her direction.
***
A Sunny Day
The toasting sunshine crept slowly over Susan's back as she sat in the Barn, listening to one of Jon's lectures of magic in the Nordic countries in the centuries since the decree of magic in 1618. It was a long tale of persecutions, marginalisation and underground magic. Susan was bored. All this might have been interesting another day. But not today. It was summer, she could hear the murmurs from fields and animals outside, savouring the wonderful day. The hands of the clock had never crept more slowly around their circle.
***
Biology - A Mouse
This biology lesson was strange. Take a lantern with a candle inside. find a place to sit alone, say the appropriate spell, and open up to the wildlife of the Island. The green team spread out, and when Susan no longer could see any of her team mates, she looked for a suitable spot to sit in.
Susan found an old beech tree in a nice, sunny spot. She placed the lantern on a stump next to the big tree and sat down under the tree. She looked around. No life to be seen, only the leaves moved, not a bird, not a butterfly, not even an ant. But they were asked to restraint themselves to bigger animals, mammals were the best for this first try. Susan tried to open her mind, tried to feel the inhabitants of tree and leaf. She said the spell, carefully articulating the Icelandic syllables, and leaned back against the tree. The sun shone into her eyes, she closed them and listened. The leaves were softly rustling, a branch was rubbing against another with an almost inaudible almost bubbling sound. She considered moving closer to the water, but then again, she did not want to meet the mind of a fish or a crustacean. She would stay here, and hope to meet some sort of animal before she had to light the lantern. Of course she hoped for an owl. She had not forgotten the owls at Grandma's clothes line. She wondered what the owls would tell her if they could, how it would be to be an owl, to be able to fly and soar through the air, to see in the dark, sit on the branches of a tree, and have a nest up there. What would owls do in rain, and how did they keep warm in winter? They did not hibernate as the hedgehogs, or fly south as swallows and peewits.
The tree she was leaning against had a very rough bark, and her back felt imprinted with marks. She was hungry, so very hungry. "Raisins," she thought, "Oh raisins would be nice. Or cheese. Or sausage. Sausage is better. But here is not any. There's a candle up there. I can eat that." Susan opened her eyes. "Candles? I do not eat candles. What nonsense is this; some kind of dream."
Then she saw the mouse sitting next to her sandal. "Mouse," she said softly. "Was it your thoughts? Do you want something to eat?"
The answer was in her brain, a tiny little thing, but very clear: "HUNGRY!" She slowly opened the lantern and pulled out the candle. "Do you really want to eat this?" she said incredulously, and placed the candle on the ground beside her. The mouse smelled the candle, the tiny whiskers twitching with delight. Then it began nibbling. Susan felt the hunger being sated, she leant back once more against the tree and studied the mouse. It was an ordinary house mouse, rather big, brownish, but very thin. She could almost see the ribs under the skin. The whiskers were constantly moving, the beady eyes darting to and fro and the nose was twitching even when the mouse was not eating.
"What do you smell, little mouse?" Susan asked softly. The answer was a jumble of sensations, warm soil, earthworms, the fatty-brittle feeling of candle on teeth, birds' chirping, mouldy branches, smells of beetles and lizards, Sunshine on hot fur and beechnuts not yet ripe and tongue-curlingly bitter.Susan could only open up to all this, and try to make it meaningful. She tried thinking calming, do not be afraid of me-thoughts at the mouse, but she really had no idea if the mouse understood or not.
When the mouse had eaten a large bite out of the candle, Susan picked it up again. She broke off the lower half and dropped it to the ground, cramming the upper half back into the holder inside the lantern. "You keep that, little mouse. Now I have to go." Susan said softly.
And carefully, afraid to scare off the little creature, she got up, took the lantern and made her way to the beach. She walked along the beach, looking for belemnites among the stones on the beach. She did not find any, only a perfect round stone with a hole in it, a lucky stone. She held the stone in one hand and the lantern in the other. She had not wholly understood why the lantern was a necessary prop for calling and listening to animals. Except that it had worked in finding her a hungry mouse.
***
Susan was not the first to return to Unicorn Farm, neither was she the last. The tables in the barn were laden with bread and cold delicacies, and big, steaming pots of tea kept hot by magic.
Thora and Taavi sat at either side of the doors. And when Susan entered, Taavi told her to place the lantern in one of the crates by the door, eat and drink, get warm and return to him. She laded a plate and filled up a mug, then she stood by the stove, eating and drinking until she stopped being cold and hungry. She just stood for a few minutes, collecting her thoughts.
Taavi bade her sit down next to him and tell about what had happened. Susan recounted all of what had happened to her, and ended up by asking if mice really ate candles. "You really listened in on the thoughts of a mouse. That was very good for a second try. Now, please, go and sit somewhere, before talking to anybody else I want you to write down everything you remember. And yes, mice eat candles. It's mostly wax and paraffin after all, not much to live off in that mixture, but totally harmless."
Susan took her notebook and pencils and sat by a table near the stove. She wrote an account of her meeting with the mouse, and what happened afterwards. This made her remember the stone with a hole, and she pulled it out and looked at it. It was white, but the white was like some sort of rough glazing. Susan tried rubbing and polishing the stone. It did not change. She looked through the hole, and the world seemed just a bit more colourful. Taavi came over to her. "So, you found a lucky stone. What do you know about them?"
"My aunt hangs them on her house in a string, she collects them. She says they bring luck and keep lightening away. I don't know if it's true or not. I do not remember reading about hem anywhere."
"Bullshit! Don't people ever teach something useful nowadays? Oh! Pardon my French, Susan," Taavi said when she looked a bit shocked. "I keep forgetting that not all apprentices have wizarding parents."
Susan smiled at him. "it seems there's more to lucky stones than luck and averting lightening," Susan said. "Could you tell me more. please?"
"I could, but I do not have the time right now. Either you go to the library and find Stones and their Use by Magical Properties written by Jasper Flint, or you wait until everyone is back. Or better still, do both. Go to the library, get the book, return here and read. When all green team members have returned, and my duties done, I'll come over and tell you a bit more. I think we can manage before school's out for today."
"Thank you!" Susan said and ran out through the barn door, over the yard to the old living quarters on the other side. Inside the gate she turned right, opened the small blue door, and ran up two flights of old, hollowed stairs to the second floor of the building. She paused. Where was that library? A long corridor stretched in both directions with lots of doors. The only one she recognized was the one right in front of her. That was the infirmary, more often used as a guest room, and not in use right now. She heard voices coming from the other end of the corridor. Angry voices.
"You are on thin ice, there!" she recognized Torben's loud voice.
"Oh, but it is still more white than black, even if a bit grey on the edges." a woman's voice answered. Susan thought it might be Martine or Birgitta.
"A bit!" Torben said in a loud incredulous voice.
Susan made a dash for the infirmary door and got inside, not quite closing the door. Quickly and without a sound she pulled a stool behind the curtain in the niche meant for examination of sick people and stood on it.
The woman's voice answered: "But you told me to go on and call on him if I wanted."
"It was a joke for Heaven's sake," Torben pleaded. "I never thought you'd actually do it."
"Did you hear something? too" the woman asked full of suspicion.
"No I did not. Old houses like this one are often full of strange noises," Torben answered, "and the door to the infirmary's open. You might have heard it creaking."
"I'll check," the woman said.
Susan stood still, clutching the stone. "I just hope she's not going to use magic," Susan thought.
"No, no-one inside," the woman said and closed the door.
Susan drew a breath, and realized she had been holding it for a long time. She dared not move until she heard the door to the teachers' rooms close, cutting off the voices. She had only been able to hear a few more words, none of them meaningful to her. She opened the door and assured herself that nobody was in the corridor any longer. Then she walked away from the teachers' rooms. And on the last door to the left big letters said LIBRARY. Susan went inside, found the book she sought in the section with books on nature and elements, and sat down.
Soon she was immersed in reading about lucky stones.
"Lucky stones or Holey stones are also known as Holy stones, Wish stones or Witch stones or even Fairy stones. They are often hung by doorways, over beds to refresh your body, mind, and spirit with healing energy, or around the neck of an animal (pet or livestock) to protect from bad luck and to ward off evil spirits."
"Holey stones are know as Eye stones, too and used as truth stones; when looking through the hole you will know if another person speaks the truth. You might be lucky and see fairies if looking through the hole at the right time. But remember, fairies are tricky creatures, and do not take kindly to this sort of spying. If the Witch Stone was found in the ocean, looking at the water through the hole may aid you in discovering Sea Spirits, Mermaids and Mermen. If it was found in a forest, it might help you connect with Dryads (Tree Spirits)."
"They can be used in weather magic for the breaking up of stormy weather. This is done by threading a cord through the hole and swinging it through the air."
"Some sources, especially in German call them Adder Stones or Snake Eggs and say that they offer protection against snake bites."
"Witch Stones are used as anti-magic amulets, because of the common belief that magic cannot work on living water, and since the holes in Witch Stones are made by the force of this element, the stones retain water’s anti-magic properties."
***
Suddenly Susan remembered that she was supposed to wait for Taavi in the Barn, not hide away in the library. "Return here and read!" he had said. The incidence with the voices had left her a bit shaken. She felt very vulnerable as she slipped into the long corridor with the book firmly planted under her left arm. But the long slightly twisting corridor lay deserted in the gloomy afternoon light. Taavi was taking the lanterns from Marja and Josta the two Finnish sisters, slender and evanescent like the birch trees for which they were named. They were wet and cold, and went directly to the oven, when Taavi let them go. Susan rose, filled two big mugs with hot tea and went over to them.
"Thank you, Susan!" Josta the oldest of the sisters said. "My fingers need thawing up. I'm frigid."
Marja added: "Thanks, but you know, we're not supposed to talk until we've written our experiences."
"Oh!" Susan said. "A simple 'thank you' and polite small talk won't harm. But I'm off anyway," she added as she saw Taavi waving at her.
"Yes Taavi," Susan said. I got the book, sorry about reading it in the library, but something strange happened on my way up there."
"Are you sure you want to talk about it here?" Taavi asked.
"No, let's go for a walk." Susan said.
Together they walked out of the barn, following the path down to the beach, while Susan told Taavi about the voices and what they had said.
"Are you sure you remember correctly? 'Call on him'. What could they mean, and who is he?" Taavi said, as Susan ended her tale.
"I'm quite sure, I heard them clearly" Susan answered. "They were close to me and angry at that. They were certain no one was near, else they'd not have spoken out like that."
"And she did not use magic to see if anybody was in the infirmary?"
"No, And I stood on the stool. Quiet as a mouse - why do you say this? Mice are so not quiet - Anyway I did not move even a little finger. And I clutched the lucky stone."
"You did, how extraordinary. Maybe it really acts as a counter to magic. Let me try." Professor Taavi drew his wand. "Now imagine that I'm the lady, trying to make you reveal yourself with the aid of magic. Do as you did in the infirmary."
Susan clutched the stone closed her eyes and imagined herself back in the small niche in the sick room. Oh, please don't use magic, she thought.
Taavi looked at his wand. Then he shook his head and mumbled a spell. "I see you now," he said. "But I did not feel like using magic. If I had not been warned, I would not have been aware of it. You, or you and that stone, are not immune to magic at all, but you make me not want to use my magic. It's a compulsion, not very strong, but definitely there. This bears watching. And you just keep that stone handy at all times."
"Thank you, professor, Yes I will."
Together they returned to the Barn, just in time for the dismission for the day.
***
Winter at Unicorn Farm
After the hot, wonderful summer where Susan's adventures in Paris , at Grandma's place and in Sweden took place, a winter followed. And not just any winter, but a winter with the worst snowstorm for at least a hundred years. The text is only a sketch of an idea that has been ghosting around inside my brain for long. I hope to expand it
Feeling totally helpless was not an alien feeling to Susan, she often felt that way in school. But at the Unicorn Farm! This was new. Tomorrow the new year would start, and she had no idea how she was going to make it in time. All the metal parts lay spread over the table in the back of the barn. It was supposed to go together to form a miniature dragon, but how? She began to suspect that something was totally wrong. Her assignment, no call that a Quest, was to honour the dragons by assembling that statue before sunset tomorrow. But how ever much she tried, cast spells or used mundane glue, it did not in any way resemble a dragon. A wave of fury rose up inside her. It was hard enough to come to the Unicorn Farm in the middle of the winter holidays, and the once in a lifetime snowstorm roaring outside did not help any. Soon darkness would fall!
***
The fates did not want her to succeed, that dastard statue. Some parts must be missing and others mixed in. her thoughts went astray. Outside the windows the snow was falling in droves and she thought back at the mornings radio news warning about not venturing out due to snowstorms and drifting. But this day was going to be the exam in teleportation for the younger ones at Unicorn Farm among those Susan and Heidi. Nobody and nothing, not even two metres of snow, could have kept her at home. But she felt sorry for Grandma. She had phoned that morning. Her house actually was covered in two metres of snow. She had to climb the steep ladder to the attic, put on her snowshoes and go out through the hatch to go shopping. Susan had promised to come and help later that day - she hoped, fervently hoped, that she would finally pass her teleporting test. That would make keeping her promise so much easier. She stared at the armoured belly of the statue ... parts were still missing from there, and even a saint would have lost patience by now. She thought back. Dragons from the Ming dynasty were not supposed to have legs, or were they supposed to have many legs. That blasted statue. She gave up, left the statue at the table and went in search of Jon. He had to help her.
Opening the door, they almost collided. "Sorry Susan," he said, his white teeth bright in his friendly, dark face. "I gave you the wrong box. Most of the parts for that dragon is NOT in the box marked 'Dragon', but in the one marked 'Wolfheart'. However this happened, nobody knows." Jon went to the cupboard and took out another crate, almost identical to the one at the table. Susan pushed aside the wrong parts and poured out the contents of the Wolfheart crate. Yes. There an eye, here a leg and a tongue. This looked like it could turn into a dragon.
After putting together the statue, Susan went to the small room in the attic. She needed to find at least some modicum of serenity before her turn came up ...
Jon knocked on the door. "Susan, are you in there? The exams are starting in a few minutes."
Frantically Susan gathered her wits and joined the small group in the corridor. "No need to fear," Jon said. "You all know how to do it, and what to do. You can do it. Relax!"
They went to an unused part of the Farm buildings. In the cellar of the teachers' building were among other bric-a-brac, the remains of an old puppet theatre; and Jon had used the dolls and the theatre to explain and demonstrate the hows and whys of teleporting. From there it was like being in a dream. As her turn came up, she did the moves, and said the words, and she was no longer in front of the theatre, but in the Barn. All the other teachers sat there and applauded her loudly.
The next voyager to appear was Heidi. And Susan applauded with the others and the teachers. Then Heidi and Susan hugged one another - now they were free to come and go, and Susan could go help out Grandma who was almost buried in the snow drifts.
***
As soon as they had eaten, Susan dressed in winter attire and went in search of Jon. She was insecure, and needed reassurance. She found him in the cellar room, packing away the old puppet theatre.
"Jon," she said. "Can I really go everywhere, I want?"
"Yes you can," Jon answered in an earnest voice. "Only take good care not to be seen coming or going. Where are you thinking of going?"
"I have to go to my Grandma. She lives near by, and she phoned this morning. She has been snowed in. And I promised to come and help her."
"The snow is helping," Jon said, again in a very serious voice. "Nobody is around watching you or your grandma's house. And if you know the place, you can go there."
"Really? Everywhere? Could I go to Germany and visit Ella's grandmother?"
"Yes and no. As with cleaning and many other things, it would be, well not easier, but better using mundane means. You would expend loads of energy going that far, and would be sleeping for days after arriving. It gets easier with practise, but never easy. This is the reason behind our portals network; they do not demand the massive output of energy to use. But if your Grandma lives close to here, you're in no trouble. Get going." Jon smiled an encouraging smile and turned to the dolls theatre again.
Susan thanked Jon and thought of the smelly outhouse. Better to appear somewhere unseen. In the very last second she stopped. If the house was buried in snow, the outhouse would be a trap.
"Jon," she said, and he turned towards her. "Can I appear in the air above somewhere? Nobody ever thought of teleporting in this much snow. I don't like the idea of appearing in her living room."
Jon smiled broadly. "Of course you can, Susan. Just think of the place. And get going already."
His confidence in her ability did more than his words accounted for. Susan imagined the garden seen from above, there the outhouse, here some apple trees and behind her and a little to the right the white gate leading to the brook. She said the words, swished her wand and suddenly the biting cold of the outdoors was around her. She used the snow magic and floated slowly down to stand gingerly on the surface of the snow. Everything was almost buried in snow, only the very top of the house with chimney and the top of the roof was visible over the snow banks. Keeping the spell at a minimum she walked over the drifts. She followed Grandmas instructions and went around the house. In the end of the house pointing away from the water and the winds, a hatch could be seen. And tracks in the snow leading in and out showed Susan that Grandma had used this hatch as a door. She opened it and went in. She had been in the attic before, when helping thatch the roof, the hatch leading down to the kitchen was easily found even in the semi darkness. She climbed through and stood in Grandma's cosy kitchen.
"Oh, there you are," grandma said her beady eyes shining warmly. "Do you need a cup of coffee now, or would you like to go shopping first?"
"Let me get the shopping over with first" Susan answered. "The roads are getting worse all the time."
"Maybe you could pop in and ask Auntie G if she needs anything. I think she should not try and brave the roads either. She fell and almost broke an arm on her way home."
"I will," Susan said, climbing the steep, rickety ladder to the attic.
"I'll tie some rope to the beams up there while you're away," Granny said. "That way you can raise and lower the loot without having to climb through hatches and down breakneck ladders."
"Smart," Susan said. "I'll leave the hatch open then."
"Please do! With all that snow insulating the house here won't be cold. Everything has a silver lining."
Auntie G gave her a shopping list, lent her a bigger basket and gave her some more money along with some admonitions.
As soon as Susan was well away from the house, she cast the snow magic and danced through the half blizzard up to the mini-market. She did not trust her teleporting powers, as the mini-market was not a place she went that often.
The shop was not crammed, but it held more customers than Susan had ever seen. Then again normally she trekked up there with the cousins to buy ice-cream on hot summer's days, not for shopping. She found all the items on both lists.
The lady behind the counter recognized Susan, a tribute to her fabled memory, and scolded Grandma and Auntie G for sending her out in the inclement weather. "No," Susan said, "I'll be alright. Grandma is not getting any younger, and auntie G slipped and sprained a wrist arriving home. I volunteered. It's really not that far, and I love snow!"
Teleporting back again was the obvious solution, but Susan had told the truth about loving snow. She once again activated the snow magic, and warm and cosy she danced home, now with the winds mostly in her back.
Over a cup of coffee and bread with home-made jam, Susan told some of what had happened at the Christmas party at the Farm. She told about the exotic dresses and the fabulous food from all over the world.
Then Susan noticed the time: "I got to get back," she said. It will soon be dark, and the snowstorm seems not to be wanting to stop any time soon."
"How will you get home,Susan?" Auntie G asked solicitously.
"The same way as I got here. It's not really that far, and I love snow."
"Susan will manage, don't you worry," Grandma said winking at Susan.
Susan dressed in all her winter things and once again climbed the rickety ladder. Auntie G rose and held on to it.
"Thanks!" Susan said, "those swaying motions make me dizzy. What a luck the ladder is not that tall." Susan could almost touch the roof in Grandmas kitchen with her head, Auntie G laughed: "No it really is not."
Susan walked as far as the white gate before teleporting back to the cellar of the Unicorn Farm.
As she arrived, she saw Torben leaving the cellar via the far off staircase, and a shredded letter was smouldering in the fireplace: "Slökkvið!" Susan said instinctively and pulled the burnt and torn pieces out of the fire.
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