Previously
“I told you Tegan, I don’t lie. Tegan can go to your school with those nails. There are reasons stopping Thomas from doing so, but not Tegan.” My Grandma cut me off.

“I am Thomas!” I yelled, and my Grandma just calmly straightened the skirt I was wearing.

“Tegan, I don’t lie. You unfortunately still have to learn the cost of lying.”

“You really are a witch! If I go to school like this I will be at best teased and humiliated. I could be beaten, possibly even to death.”

Grandma just gave me a look, you know the one adult’s give to an overly petulant child, while they marshal their thoughts to rip into the child’s outburst and make them feel a few inches tall and at least five years younger than they really are. I guess it is not really mature to yell insults, especially when the person you are calling a witch actually is one, but she really got me ticked. Did she not care that I could be killed?

Grandma calmly got my attention then let me know. “Thomas likely could, but Tegan wouldn’t have those worries. Now calm down, we have much to discuss and I don’t want to send you to bed without supper, as if you were a naughty little girl. However, if you behave so then young lady, I will treat you as you behave.”

All my bluster and rage were extinguished like a flame snuffed. I sagged back into the sofa and sighed. “Why do you want me to be Tegan?”

“I told you I don’t lie…

“No, you said you had two choices. You could call me on all the lies letting them all know I was your grandson, Thomas, or make me Tegan.” I interrupted my Grandma.

“Bravo!” My Grandma started clapping. “Finally, you see to the meat of the matter.” Personally, I could have done without the celebration, but she was bubbling with excitement.

“I want a witch to teach, Tegan. Your Mum didn’t even have a flicker of the gift. Your sister Helen was barely any better, but Thomas, a boy, when witches are always female, he had potential.” My Grandma got increasingly excited as she continued. “The book accepted his imagination, but you shouldn’t dream your life away. I can’t teach Thomas much.”

Grandma sighed, and then as if sharing a secret leaned in a placed her hand over mine that was holding the book.“Why Tegan, I often felt that I couldn’t even teach him the absolute basics to not get himself in debt to magic.”

Well I never! She patted my hand as I stared at her gob-smacked at her brazenly insulting me as if I wasn’t the one, she was insulting. “His gift could pass to his daughter if he was lucky to have one, but even if I see my great-granddaughter born how much time would I get to share witchcraft with her.” While I still tried to work out how to interrupt and deny that I had been un-teachable my Grandma looked deeply into my eyes as if daring me to challenge those insults.

“I told you taking short-cuts is costly in life. More so in trying to grow in magic. If I want to share in the treading of a life in witchcraft, I will get less time to share with your daughter, if you even have one, than I will with you. Further, if you Tegan get pregnant and have a daughter with the gift then I share in the teaching of two witches.”

“That’s selfish…

“I’ve never said I was selfless, and I’ve disliked every person I’ve met, that has ever said that they were so.”

“Well if you can turn me into a girl. Why didn’t you? Why didn’t you change your son and his sons?”

“Let me start with your later questions first, as they are easiest. My son and the two grandsons he gave me, are for the most part between your Mum and your sister in magical talent. They are between virtually none and the barest flicker, so changing them would be close to pointless. You, Tegan though, you, won the lottery on getting the gift. You could be far more powerful than me. You also aren’t lacking in the intelligence department. When it comes to wisdom; well… Hopefully Tegan is a better student.” My grandmother told me how unwise she thought I was.

I was still trying to wrap my hands around it while she continued. “There are now with you, three of us. You recall my Aunt, your Great-Aunt Margaret?” I nodded. “Well she wanted to dress you up in girls’ clothes as soon as we saw your potential at four. Of course, she is more desperate than me. All four of her sons are childless.”

“Couldn’t magic fix that?” I asked.

“Magic isn’t the be all and end all. Everything has a price and two world wars are the main reason our coven is three. I used your Grandfather’s intelligence to get him chosen as an engineer that studied the downed airplanes during world war II. It was critical to the war effort, but safer to keep him alive and uninjured than the poor boys sent to the front lines. Selfish of me and done without my husband’s complete knowledge. I still have costs owed for what I did. Part of the cost Aunt Margaret and her sons paid for the spells to keep them alive during the war was found out later to impact their ability to have children. They’re not all the same costs and it’s not my story to share.

“Grandma, World War II, ended in 1945.”

“I thought I already told you that there was nothing wrong with my memory, Tegan.”

“But, Grandpa was born during the war and you were born after…

“Tegan, your above statement would be correct if you were referring to World War I. We might have encouraged others to think differently.”

“Grandma, Mum was born in the late seventies, Uncle Malcolm in the eighties…

“I’m a witch Tegan, we tend to age well.”

“What ever happened to not lying?” I asked incredulously.

“Remember, I told you a lie that survives, becomes truth’s dagger.” I nodded slowly, I was still trying to wrap my head around what truth’s dagger was. “Well if you want fact to be cut to a different cloth of truth, like, say showing up at a hospital in your twenties pregnant verses in your fifties or sixties, then Tegan, you make sure your lie survives.”

I think my Grandma couldn’t have ever said something that would shock me as much as what she just had. “You, you… you lied, Grandma.”

“Tegan, I am extremely sure I’ve told you that I do not lie. I am very careful in ensuring the truth is what I can live with it being.

“So you could live with Grandpa dying?” I lashed out. I don’t know why, but I was angry with the flippant way she regarded lying when she was in charge of the lie, verses how she would figuratively flay me for lying.

Grandma suddenly looked out the window into our rear garden and I think she was seeing something different than the evening shadows I saw. After sighing she continued. “Your Grandpa lived to ninety-seven. I didn’t shorten his life.I primarily offered initial sacrifices along with my husband’s initial sacrifice only when desiring to keep him safe. An initial sacrifice is paid then, not even a day later, so definitely not payable at the end of one’s life. I’m not sure, but are you accusing me of stealing my own husband’s life like a hag? That is a path I’ve never considered worth the cost to follow.” She starred at me, her eyes holding back tears that I’d caused.

“I didn’t mean that I thought you shortened it. I’m not sure, I guess I just missed him and thought if you could make changes…

“Within mere moments of extra time passing, it wouldn’t be you Grandpa that was alive. There are huge costs that are completely not worth paying for any of the methods I have seen to even parody prolonging life. Tegan, I miss Lesley every day, but I remember the near century we got to share which is more than many others get. Is it enough? No, it never can be. If you have something good you’ll want more of it no matter how much you’ve got, or had.”

I wanted to change the subject. I could apologize and say I didn’t mean it but we would still like now be stuck on it. We were just hurting each other. Instead I barreled into another question. “So, Great-Aunt Margaret who didn’t have that option apparently for her sons, like you’d had for Grandpa to pay upfront. Why did she risk the later cost if she knew paying later it might be too high to pay?”

“We were in a catch twenty-two. Those without a choice to pay initially like your Great-Aunt with four sons had to choose. She could use magic to protect and find the later cost, like she did. The cost caused sterility, impedance, or no apparent cost on the sons that had a lack of interest in girls, to be more specific, a desire as they say to bat for the other team, which meant no grand-children. You Great-Aunt's only other choice would be to not use magic to protect them during the war, and risk having them die and still end up without grand-children, but also loose time with her sons too.”

“One of her sons is gay?”

“Two of them are.”

“Well problem solved turn those two into girls and they can have children.” I said thinking I would be congratulated.

“Tegan, they want to stay boys. Thus, it isn’t problem solved, and both are now in their eighties. Anyway to bring this back to you, it was likely the driving force why a damaged Aunt Margaret said we should dress you up in girls’ clothes at four. ”

I looked at my Grandma glad my Great-Aunt hadn’t gotten her way with me even while feeling sorry for her. “If my Great-Aunt Margaret was willing to change me into a girl why not do so with her four sons?”

“It was likely due to what happened to her sons that influenced her to consider taking away your free will. There is a huge cost to pay for denying a person free will.” My Grandma informed me. “How’s the book's title coming?”

Well I wasn’t going to let my Grandma distract me away from what I planned to tell her. “You took away my free will. You are forcing me to stay as Tegan.”

“No, I didn’t nor haven’t. You have numerous choices that can be boiled down into four groups. Go to school in boys’ clothes with girls’ nails, earrings, navel ring and girls’ haircut, and pretend to be a boy. Refuse to go to school and get expelled and stay with me ‘till your parents can get you home where Anne Marie’s family will still try to meet Tegan. Run away, which I strongly advise is the group of choices you shouldn’t take, as they will likely lead to death or a bad life. Or lastly the one that I strong advise you to take, become Tegan.”

“So I have no choice!”

“I haven’t taken any of the choices away from you. I didn’t cause you to be in a situation where you were left with only one smart choice. I can only be accused in after the fact stacking the deck for the choice I think is best for you to choose. It is still your choice.”

“You have a spell to turn me into a girl?”

“The end result is a few months or years down the road, the group of spells will finally give you that, but initially well it is up to you to drive it forward. It is your own magic that needs to power the change. The catch twenty-two is only girls are witches and able to learn. You need to be a girl to have the magic to turn yourself into a girl.”

“There’s no hope then!”

“Tegan, you nearly have the title of the book. Thomas went to sleep as soon as he was given the book and forgot about it. The more you are Tegan, the more I can teach you. The good news is aside a ritual created by Thomas with no formal training that always delivers and surprisingly only has a debt owed magic of about one pound twenty six pence, Thomas has already cast a high order spell. So, twenty more minutes while I make some calls, then I need to lock the book away, and you need to make our evening tea.”

After taking the two plates to the kitchen table. I hung the apron up in the pantry and brought the butter dish back. I then offered the butter to my Grandma and sat in my place. The chicken breast had come out quite well, if I do say so myself, I self-congratulated. I’d grilled it without drying it out with some butter and thinly sliced aubergine and tomato. The other side of the plate had a summer blend of mixed lettuce with olives, snow peas and a julienne of bell peppers. I’d sliced the left-over third of a baguette earlier and had that on the bread board between the two of us.

“This is nice, Tegan. We need an early night as we need to go into Hull early in the morning to purchase five sets of school uniform. Thankfully now, the uniform store will be opening at seven for us.” Did my Grandma just imply she’d caused the store to open earlier? “You will also need some women’s supplies including casual and dressy clothes for evenings and the weekends. I will be traveling to school with you to smooth out your transfer into Tegan.”

“I was hoping to look at the book some more, I mean I’ve got three letters of the first word and all of the second and third words…

“Tegan, you’ve exceeded what’s safe and need a break. When you told me the third word seemed to be ‘word’, but you knew that was wrong I knew it was safe to let you keep looking…

“It is definitely ‘wood’. So, capital ‘D’ then little ‘o’ several letters ending with an ‘s’, followed by the two words ‘of wood’…

“It is that you aren’t questioning your mistake that lets me know it is dangerous for you to keep forcing it. Remember trying to grab power first has a large often unknown price to be found out later. Tegan tidy up the kitchen and I will see if your sister or Mum left any night clothes for you to use tonight.” Grandma said, and left the kitchen before I could tell her I was planning on sleeping in my pj’s.

“…And protect Melisa’s clothes with an apron.” Were the words drifting down to me as I took the plates to the sink to wash them up. I grumbled but went to the pantry to put the apron on again and proceeded to tidy-up the kitchen. She’d forced me to protect Melisa’s clothes with it when she had made me make our evening tea. It was as if she was finding ways to make me be a girl.

It was after I’d finished and hung up the apron that I worked out what the book’s three words said. Beside the Pantry are some shelves that Grandma has a few fancy ornaments and photos on. There’s a black and white photo of Grandma and Grandpa when they were in their twenties in pride of place. To each side of that are colour photos. One of her son’s family and the second of her daughter’s or our family. But, on the higher shelve there’s another black and white photo with six women in it. The four older I don’t know, and they likely have died, but the youngest two sitting on a wooden garden bench in front of the four standing unknowns are my Grandma and my Great-Aunt Margaret when they were teenagers.

The two family photos have been changed multiple times but the others were the same as when I, a nosey seven year old kid, was pestering my Grandfather on telling me about the top picture. I can clearly hear now my Grandpa saying to me, what he said when I was seven and bothering him to discuss the photos here. “Nay lad, that’s the ‘Daughter’s of Wood’ and ya’ d’na want ‘owt to do with ‘em when they got together like that.” He’d then gone on to distract me with the names of my cousins in the photo of my Uncle’s family.

“Grandma!” I yelled as I charged to the stairs and started to run up them, and wasn’t that a pickle I got myself in. I’d forgotten the tight skirt I was wearing. Yes, I’m still trying to work out how I forgot that. Let’s just say running up the stairs with a skirt down to your knees that clamps both thighs together is not one of my better things to try to do. I think the only way to top it would have been if I'd attempted to run down a flight of stairs. My Grandma was so happy to see I hadn’t torn Melissa skirt. Thanks Grandma.

“What’s the problem, Tegan.”

“Problem?”

“Why did you scream my name, and try to run up the stairs?”

“Oh yes, I know the three word’s of the book…

“Tegan, I said don’t try to read the book…

“I didn’t it’s the picture in the kitchen. I remember Grandpa calling them the ‘Daughter’s of Wood’. I didn’t look at the book, but obviously my mistake was the ‘o’ that’s an ‘a’. But I didn’t look at the book.” As Grandma was just staring at me I couldn’t help but squirm. Was I in trouble, had I incurred debt because I’d exhausted my manna? Hey until she says otherwise I have to come up with words for this stuff and why invent if you already know a pre-built system.

“Tegan, what’s done is done, but let’s leave anything to do with the book ‘till after a good night’s rest. I’ve found a nighty of Helen’s. Carefully go upstairs and take care with removing Melisa’s clothes and hang them in your wardrobe. I’ll show you how to take your make-up off so come to bathroom in your nighty. Oh, and keep your knickers on but take the bra off.”

Well I started to follow all of Grandma’s requests, but I was seriously ticked and would really give her what for. It wasn’t just the acrylics, she was stacking the pile in the ‘choose Tegan’ column, and that was not right. I had my nighty in one hand as I barged into the bathroom in just my knickers.

“Tegan why aren’t you wearing your nighty?”

“Grandma you gave me tits!” I yelled.