Ice by Charlene Hartnady

3

Penelope

The next day…

“I’ve never seenanything like this.” The oldest weather witch in our district, Brunhilda, touches my hair. Then she sniffs it and wrinkles her nose. “It doesn’t scent of winter.”

“It doesn’t scent of summer, either,” my mother says before she goes back to chewing her bottom lip.

“I can’t believe you, Penny!” Tilly’s eyes are blazing. “What have you done?” she shouts.

“I didn’t do anything.” I want to shout back, but I don’t. I hold back my emotions.

“You’re not helping, Tilly.” My mom wags a finger at my older sister like she’s a child again. She is acting like a child.

“It’s not the hair of a weather witch.” Dottie shakes her head.

My mother turns towards the others. “Is there a spell or a—?”

“No, no!” Brunhilda shakes her head, dropping my hair like it is burning her fingers.

“What are we going to do?” my mother asks as she starts to pace again.

“This is a disaster.” Tilly shakes her head. “An absolute disaster.” My sister is very proud of the fact that she works as a summer witch. There are so many of them that The Gray – the oldest and wisest of our kind – pick the best for the job. Tilly is excellent at her work and a busy-body know-it-all to boot.

“Mom, please, can you sit down? You’re making me nervous. You too, Tilly,” I tell them both.

“You should be nervous, Penelope.” My mom keeps up the pacing. “This is a disaster. An absolute and utter disaster.”

“It really is,” Tilly agrees, worry in her eyes.

“I know that,” I say. “But wearing a hole in the rug isn’t going to fix it. And looking at me like I had something to do with it certainly won’t fix it,” I tell Tilly.

“What if—?” Olive, another of The Gray, starts to say. “No, that won’t work either,” she mutters to herself, shaking her head.

“There has to be a way to solve this.” My mother drops onto one of her overstuffed floral sofas as if she has lost all of her energy. She picks up her mint tea; the cup vibrates on the saucer, so she puts it back down again. Tilly sits next to our mother, still glaring at me.

“We need a witch,” Brunhilda announces.

“We’re all witches.” Dottie widens her eyes. She’s another of The Gray.

“I’m not talking about a weather witch. We need a regular, garden variety witch. Someone who can—”

“Do you hear yourself?” my mother asks, standing back up. “A regular witch? They are tricky…not to be trusted.” She’s shaking her head so hard that her graying hair is flapping about her shoulders. She’s a summer witch, so her hair used to be a beautiful golden blonde, like caramel kissed by the sun. My three sisters take after our mother with their golden hair and hazel eyes. I was…well… I was a surprise, to say the least.

This is a surprise, too. Weather witches don’t have red hair. Fall witches have hair with coppery tones but not red. Not like this. We don’t change after Mother Earth has decided what gifts to bestow upon us.

“What choice do we have? We need to take this dilemma to the rest of The Gray and put it to a vote. I can’t see any other way. This needs to be fixed and fast. The rest of the winter witches will not be able to keep up. Temperatures will rise globally. It would—”

The front door flies open, and my other sister walks in. She was born after Tilly. She’s almost six feet tall and instantly fills the room with her bubbly personality.

“You won’t believe what’s going on. It’s crazy! Completely insane.” She uses elaborate hand gestures as she talks. “We have a weather situation. It might be related to what’s going on with you,” she tells me. “There’s…it’s…”

“Spit it out, girl!” Brunhilda says.

Instead of saying anything, Ivy walks over to the television and turns it on. The thing is huge. The screen takes up the whole wall. My dad enjoys watching sports and those arty type movies that make no sense. The ones where the guy dies, and then it ends. Or the lady never finds her long-lost child and kills herself out of sadness. I don’t get them at all. I’ve tried to find the deeper meaning and failed every time.

“This is not the time for television,” my mother tells Ivy. “We’re in the middle of a crisis. We’re trying to come up with something to put forward to the rest of The Gray. A meeting has been scheduled for noon. We need a plan. A solution.” My mother uses the same hand gestures. She’s quite short, like me; otherwise, she and Ivy are carbon copies of one another.

Ivy ignores our mother and starts to change the channel until she finally stops on a weather station.

A pretty lady in a tight, conservative navy-blue suit is pointing at a map of the country. Ivy turns up the volume.

“…as you can see over here,” the lady on the television points her hand over a cloudy section on the map behind her, “residents of Stoney Heath were blown away by the weather that hit them yesterday evening. A blizzard ransacked their little town, coming right out of nowhere. We’re going to cross over to Jim now, who is in Stoney Heath. Jim, can you hear me?” She raises her voice.

The screen splits in two. It’s the pretty lady on the left and a guy in a knitted beanie on the right. He’s also wearing a thick coat, a scarf, and gloves. His nose is red.

“Yes, Samantha, I can.” White plumes from his mouth. The town behind him is covered in white powder. It’s not too soon for snow in the north of the country, but this is too far south for weather like this. Especially since I am out of action.

I frown.

“You look like you’re dressed for winter, Jim. It’s still fall in Stoney Heath, though, isn’t it?” She lifts her brows.

“It certainly is, Samantha, and if you speak to the locals, they’ll tell you that it was warm earlier yesterday for this time of year. In fact, I have a local right here. Her name is Conny.” The screen widens to include a middle-aged lady. She’s bundled in a coat as well. Her hands are deep in her pockets.

She smiles at the camera, looking a little nervous.

“Have you lived in Stoney Heath long, Conny?” Jim asks.

“All my life. I’m a born and raised Heathy.” Her smile widens. “That’s what we like to call ourselves.” She winks at Jim.

“Heathy. I like it.” Jim doesn’t look like he particularly cares either way. “So, does Stoney Heath often get snow this time of year?”

“No. In fact, we rarely get snow at all. The last time we had snow was at least ten years ago. Make that eleven…or twelve. Yes, twelve years ago.” She scratches her chin absently.

“Would you say it’s unusual, then?”

“Holy cow…yes!” She nods. “It was warm yesterday evening. I was wearing a t-shirt. The temps had gone up during the day, and then, boom!” She widens her eyes and throws her hands up in the air. “It started with an icy wind that damn near blew our cherry tree over. Oh, oops!” She puts her hand over her mouth. “Can I say damn on television? I probably shouldn’t, right?”

Jim smiles. “That’s okay, Conny. What happened after the wind picked up?”

“That darned wind.” She shakes her head. “It blew the Pinkerson’s oak tree right over, knocking down their wall. They can be glad it didn’t fall over onto their house. Especially since they just repainted.”

Everyone in the room has turned to the television, and we’re watching with full concentration. From warm to a blizzard. A wind strong enough to blow down trees. It makes no sense. Not for that section of the country at this time of year.

“Then the storm hit, and boy, did it hit hard,” Conny goes on. “Just look.” She gestures around them, and the camera pans out, slowly sweeping across the street and sidewalk. There is a blanket of thick snow on the ground, and a group of kids start throwing snowballs as if on cue.

“It sure is something, Jim,” the lady back at the studio remarks. “They got two inches in less than an hour.”

“They certainly did, Samantha,” Jim remarks.

The lady in the suit turns back to the camera. “Well, there—”

Ivy presses the mute button. “Your winter power is gone, and they have a snowstorm in some little town in—”

“We don’t know for sure that Penny’s power is gone,” my mom says.

“I don’t think she has a scrap of power left.” Tilly glares at me. I’m tempted to stick out my tongue at her like I used to when we were kids, but I don’t. This is serious.

“Unfortunately, I have to agree with Tilly. I think we can safely conclude that Penelope does not have her powers,” Dottie states matter-of-factly. She lifts her chin and folds her arms.

“I tend to—” Olive starts to say, but Brunhilda cuts her off.

“You’re right, Margot,” she tells my mother. “We don’t know for sure.”

They all turn and look at me like I’m a bug under a microscope. I’m tempted to react, but I don’t. “What?” I finally say. “You can’t get the answer just by looking at me.”

“I think you look amazing with red hair,” Ivy says. “And your eyes are—”

“Ivy!” my mom warns. “Don’t!” She shakes her head. “Not now. This is serious business.”

“I think it looks cheap,” Tilly grumbles.

“You don’t have to be such a bitch.” Ivy narrows her eyes at Tilly.

“Girls!” our mother says. “Now is not the time.”

“You said you feel…different?” Olive keeps scrutinizing me. They all do, except for Ivy, who keeps trying to make me feel better. Thank goodness for her, or I would be going insane right now.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Brunhilda growls. “There is only one way to find out for sure. We need to check, Penelope. You need to use your power.”

“I can’t believe you haven’t tried once since your hair turned red,” Ivy states. “I would have done it right away.”

“What if—?” I stop there. What if my powers are gone? What if they’re changed? I get a knot in my stomach. I almost don’t want to find out. I dread the answers to those questions.

“We need a bowl of water,” Brunhilda says.

I look over at my mother, who looks petrified. Her face has gone pale. I clutch my hands together over my lap. It’s the moment of truth.

My mom slowly gets up and disappears into the kitchen. We all sit in silence while we wait for her return.

A minute or two later, she’s back with a bowl of water, which she places on the coffee table. Her face is pinched and pallid. Her shoulders are slightly slumped. She looks down at her feet instead of at me.

I feel sick to my stomach. My hands are still clenched in my lap.

“What are you waiting for?” Ivy says. “You can do it, Pee. Turn the water into ice, and we can go home.” She makes it sound so simple when it is anything but simple.

I nod once as I hold the bowl, pulling it a little closer. This is easy. It’s one of the first things they taught me after my powers came in. I can do this. I have to believe in myself. I feel my power swirling inside me. I hold on to it for just a moment because it doesn’t feel right. I’m tempted to run away and hide. I look up at all the faces. All the looks of anticipation. My mother is holding her breath. I have to try again. I touch my power. I feel it expand inside my chest. It grows and grows and...

No!

This is wrong.

I stop again, taking deep breaths.

“What?” Brunhilda says. “Are your powers gone?”

“They’re still there,” I say in a soft voice that doesn’t sound like me.

“It’s not going to work,” Tilly says.

“Shut it!” Ivy spits out at our sister.

“What are you waiting for, child?” Olive says, ignoring the bickering.

I shrug. “It feels different. Wrong!” I shake my head. It’s hard to put into words.

“You have to do it,” Brunhilda says. “Push your fears aside and do it.” Her voice has taken a hard edge.

I nod again. I suck in a deep breath and try again. The same thing happens. This time I keep pushing and pushing.

I feel heat in my chest and throat. It’s burning me. Singeing me. I scream, and the room is engulfed in flames. It happens in an instant.

I hear the screams of the women in the room with me. I hear pain and anguish. I can’t stop the heat, the flames, the smoke, and the fire. They’re coming out of me. Out of my mouth. The table is on fire, but I still can’t stop.