I’ve begun a new story featuring Agnes, set about 20 years later from the original story. I’ll post the original short story in it’s entirety at some point if there’s any interest in it.

Agnes sighed, rubbing the flat of her palm along her right thigh, easing the aching that never seemed to fade.

“You realize, of course, that you have to pay for that,” She said to the woman standing over the scattering of what was once a fairly ornate hand mirror.

“I’m sorry! I thought I saw something and it startled me. How much was it?”

“Just forget it,” Agnes bent to begin cleaning up the shards, “Not your fault. Just be more careful next time.”

The woman apologized again and walked away, out of the store, Agnes hoped. The mirror in question was nearly 300 years old. It had come to Agnes via a sketchy individual named Shank, whom she occasionally dealt with. She examined the tarnished silver frame for damage and found none. “Good,” Agnes thought, “The mirror’s just glass, it’s the frame that’s important.” She ran her fingers across the small symbols carved into the back of the frame. Runes. It differed from the ones Agnes grew up learning; these were from a language she didn’t know. But she knew what the runes meant all the same.

Agnes was a Runic witch, one of the very last. She had only met two others in her life; her mother was one who had just enough power to get a good parking spot if the mall wasn’t too busy. The other was… Well, Agnes didn’t like to think of him.

She continued cleaning up the small pile of glass and decided to close her little shop early. It had been a long day, and the public-facing aspect of her business wasn’t her primary source of income anyway. She dealt in the buying and selling magical items and specialized in runic items. Runic witches had begun to die out in the 1500s. By the late 1800s, they represented only 5 percent of the magical community. By the time Agnes was born, almost everyone had virtually forgotten they existed. Runic items were rare, and ones made in the last 300 years even moreso. She was glad her mirror’s frame was unharmed, and she didn’t care to see any more of her precious artifacts damaged by the clumsy hands of tourists. She wasn’t sure how the mirror got out there, to begin with. The damn thing had a way of finding itself in the storefront, regardless of how many times Agnes locked it away.

“See what happens when you take it upon yourself to get out there,” Agnes said to the mirror’s frame, “You get broken.”

Besides, she was seeing Billie tonight. Her old friend had been gone from her life for twenty years, and when she called last night, Agnes jumped at the chance to see her again. She was nervous, though. The last time she’d seen Billie was when she was expelled from college. Agnes returned to their room and collected her things while Billie was still in class. She had gathered up her clothes and her broomstick, technically the school’s property, but fuck them. It was hers. She emptied her dresser and closet and left a tear-stained note on Billie’s bed. “Expelled. I’ll write.”

But she never had. She never wrote to Billie or replied to Billie’s letters. A few years later Billie had shown up at the dingy trailer that Agnes lived in, the same trailer she had gone to school with hopes of eventually being able to help her and her mother escape. Agnes was in the backyard when she saw Billie walking to the door. She hid behind the shed and waited for her to stop knocking. She had been ashamed and worried to find out if Billie had taken any of the blame for what had happened. Billie had left a letter at the door, just a phone number and her name. Agnes never called. That had been many years ago, though, and she was ready now. She was prepared to face her friend. Billie had said she needed help, and she had sounded desperate.

A few hours later, Agnes was standing in nearly the same spot as the woman from earlier, waiting for Billie to arrive. She could feel the pain in her leg and collarbone more profoundly now, with the memories of the old injury so close to mind. Lost in thought, she heard the tinkle of the bell above the door, and her attention snapped back to the present.

“Billie?”

“Hey, Ag, long time,” came Billie’s raspy and oddly deep voice. The nervousness was gone for a moment, and she was an 18-year-old girl again, looking at her best friend.

“Oh my God you haven’t changed. How in God’s name do you look the same, Bill?” Agnes moved to hug her friend.

“Earth magic, it’s good for the skin I guess,” Billie laughed and hugged Agnes back.

“Ag,” Billie continued, “There’s some stuff going on High Mount, and I think you’re the only one who can help.”

“You still keep in touch with the people at the school?”

“I’m the head of Earth Magic now. Have been for a few years. I never really left, to be honest. Got hired on right after graduation.”

“That’s amazing! I’m glad it worked out for you that way. I was always worried that what I did would come back on you.”

“I-” Billie began, and Agnes cut her off.

“Bill, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have gotten you wrapped up in my drama, and I shouldn’t have left like I did.”

“What I did I did knowing the consequences, and I dealt with them. You don’t have to be sorry about that. Leaving with a three word note, and never writing back? That I’m still fairly pissed about, but we’ll deal with it later. For now, I need your help, Ag. There’s been a murder at High Mount.”

“A murder?!”

“Officially, it was an accidental death, a flyer lost control of his broom and hit a stone wall. But we found three runes carved into his broom. I looked them up in that old runic manual from the 1800s, the same one you used at school. But they weren’t in it, and by the time we found another, older manual the broom had gone missing. I drew them from memory, but I’m not sure how accurate they are. No one got a picture of them.”

“Let me see,” Agnes said, guiding her friend through the curtain behind the counter and into the small apartment beyond it.

Agnes’ apartment was brightly lit and colorful, with hanging plants and patterned wallpaper. It was mostly just a kitchen and bedroom. Her bathroom was in the storefront.

“Is… Is that a shower?” Billie was looking to the back of the kitchen, where a standing shower had been installed.

“It was either there or in the bathroom the customers use. So, yes. That’s a shower.”

“Shower in the kitchen, I love it. It’s nicer than my place at High Mount. I love the plants.”

“Those are because of you. Ever since we shared that room, I’ve never been able to live without the plants in the house.”

Billie sat down at the round kitchen table opposite Agnes, pulled a piece of notebook paper from her pocket, and showed it to Agnes.

“This is the best I could do from memory.”

The runes drawn on the paper were all wrong, Agnes could tell, but the familiar orange lines of light in her vision showed her what they were meant to be. She took out a pen and corrected the runes, adding staves and branches as they appeared. Three runes, two base runes, and a bindrune. She fixed the base runes in short order. The rune for speed and the rune for flight. The bindrune took awhile, but Billie remembered not to disturb Agnes while she was in this state.

“The first two are speed and flight,” Agnes said after some time, “the last one is a bindrune, but I’m not sure what it means exactly. I’ve never come across a rune I just couldn’t read before. At least one of the base runes it’s made from is sleep, but I can’t get the rest of it. Do you mind if I keep this and do a little research?”

“Of course. But there’s more, Ag. According to Professor Housely, there’s been three other incidents like this in the last few years. One in Quebec, two in New York. All four victims have been earth witches.”

“You think earths are being targeted by a runic witch?”

“I think there’s something going on, and I’m hoping you’re going to be able to help. And there’s one more thing, Ag. We have a runic witch at the school again. A boy named Elim.”