Ground Cinnamon

She lifted the window open an inch or two to let in some of the fresh winter air; the candles flickered in the breeze creating a fiery effect against the leafy wallpaper. The result caused the pattern of trees and leaves to appear to be burning from the warm glow. The full moon poured a pool of light onto the wooden floor, creating illusionary puddles around the room.

She threw her velvet shawl over her shoulders from the chill and returned to the center of the room. Wiping the tears from her eyes, she knelt on the scratchy oval rug that Dido was always jerking around on upside down to scratch her back. But presently, Dido sat upright next to her heartbroken master on the floor, aware of the seriousness of the occasion. She sniffed the air as the cauldron started to bubble, and funny scents wafted over the little dog’s nose. 

Kneeling with both her feet folded underneath her legs, Cirie took the bundle of sage in her right hand and gracefully dipped the end into a candle’s flame until the smoke began to billow from it. She moved her arms in figure eights letting the smoke envelope the room, as well as her and Dido. The tiny white terrier leaned back on her haunches and raised her front paws in the air, swatting at the smoke that encircled her. 

The cauldron in front of them began to bubble, momentarily distracting Dido from clouds of sage smoke and drawing a subtle smile to Cirie’s mouth. 

“Now that is just what we want, isn’t it, girl?” She grabbed a wooden ladle to stir the mixture, and Dido wagged her tail in agreement. Cirie gently balanced the sage bundle on the lip of the cauldron so that the smoke rose perfectly above the pot. Opening her ingredients basket, she maneuvered her hand back and forth over the herbs, rocks, and miscellaneous items, searching for the correct one. She grabbed an orange peel and tore it in half, plopping it into the cauldron, followed by several sprigs of fresh spearmint from her garden. 

“The orange is for luck, and the spearmint is for healing…” her voice caught in her throat, and she took a deep inhale. Dido stood up and nuzzled her head into Cirie’s shoulder, “Thanks, girl,” she scratched the top of Dido’s head, “I’ll be just fine. His loss, right?” The terrier excitedly began licking her face until she pulled away and refocused on her ingredients. 

“Okay, a pinch of paprika to make sure it really works, and a spoonful of ground cloves to drive away negativity,” she nodded in satisfaction after adding these to the pot and began to slowly stir with the ladle. Both Dido and Cirie eagerly eyed the pot as the bubbles intensified and began to furiously foam upwards, turning a strange red hue.

Dido whimpered and moved back away from the cauldron and off of the rug. Furrowing her brow, Cirie leaned over the top of the cauldron for a better look, “Wait, it should be yellow why is it re-” she looked down at her basket, jumped to her feet, and backed away in horror.

“Shit!” The contents of the cauldron were spilling out onto the floor now and pooling onto the ground, “That was cinnamon, not cloves oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no!” The fizzy red liquid began to thicken and stretch itself across the floor. Dido began barking at the goop heading towards her while Cirie was looking wildly around for some sort of solution. She scooped her basket out of the way of the encroaching red river and desperately rummaged through it. In a last-ditch effort, she hurled handfuls of sea salt and parsley onto the goop, she grabbed any sage near her and threw it on top of the lit candles, but it was too late. Whatever she had made was making its way towards her. Dido jumped from a window ledge to the top of a tall armoire safe from the foaming mixture. The liquid was still violently bubbling out of the cauldron, seeping towards Cirie’s slippers. She froze and held her breath, bracing for what was about to happen as the scarlet liquid crept over her shoes. Suddenly the cauldron hurled itself over, dumping all of the contents in Cirie’s direction. It began running up her legs, engulfing her body.

The liquid was scalding, and she screamed out in pain, causing Dido to go into a frenzy of yelping and barking from her high perch. It worked its way over her dress and over her shawl, turning her into a red statue. She frantically tried to wriggle away, but the goop was unapologetic and eventually came over the top of her head and seeped into her eyes, nose, and mouth, completely covering her face. 

And then it was over. The red, foaming mixture had vanished completely. The cauldron was bone-dry, and so was the floor. It felt as though all of the air had gone out of the room. 

“What the hell,” Cirie whispered under her breath, panting from fear and adrenaline, “just happened?” Dido remained on the armoire, eyeing Cirie. Still breathing heavily, she walked over to the armoire to help Dido down. The terrier began pacing back and forth on her ledge, refusing to come down. Confused, Cirie grabbed her stool and climbed up to grab the frightened dog, but Dido growled at her and retreated against the wall as far as she could. “What’s your problem?” She scolded the dog and climbed off the stool, pausing to process what just happened. 

“Please,” a weepy voice seemed to echo from behind her and she whipped around to see who had entered her home. No one was there. Her forehead began to sweat, and she could feel something wasn’t right. “Please, I’m sorry,” this time, it came from the window; it sounded like a girl on the verge of crying. 

Fed up with frustration and fear, Cirie sternly demanded to know who was there, no response came. “Tell me who you are!” she screamed in rage.

“I’m so sorry, please. Let me stay, let me stay, let me stay.” the girl was now hysterically crying, and every word seemed to come from a different corner of the room; some seemed to ring from down the hallway. Dido began gnashing her teeth and pacing even faster. 

“What the hell, who are you?” Cirie’s thoughts were racing as she considered bolting out of her house. 

“Please. Please, don’t send me back there. I won’t bother you, just let me stay here; it’s so cool and pleasant, please, please.” The voice pinged around the room and echoed throughout the house. 

“Send you where?”

“HELL! You just said it; please keep me with you.”

Cirie froze in her frantic pacing around the room. She realized who, or what, she had been speaking to was a demon out of Hell. She flung herself at her bookshelf and ripped down books one by one until she found it: The Dangers of Contacting the Underworld: The Do’s and Don’t’s of Summoning Evil Spirits. Sure enough, right there in the table of contents, Cirie read: Chapter 6: The Power of Cinnamon. She violently flipped through the pages, searching for a solution, something to send this hellish creature back down to where she belongs. 

“I can feel the cracks,” the demon whispered right into Cirie’s ear. The room felt hotter all of a sudden, and Cirie’s stomach twisted as she placed the book onto the table. “That’s how I got in here.”

“Where are you, exactly?”

“I’m inside your heart.” The little voice croaked through tears, “Please, I can help fill these little cracks, don’t send me back. I don’t deserve to be there. I’m just like you, I’ve just been splintered, I’m not evil, please Enchantress, keep me, I will help you.”

The tears began to flow from Cirie’s eyes, and she buried her face in her hands for a moment. Finally, Dido leaped down from her perch and balled up by her master’s feet. 

“I was just trying to heal my heart; how could this have happened?” Her words were muffled in her hands, and her back heaved up and down in giant sobs. The man, or perhaps more appropriately called the boy, she had loved devoutly for nine years, left her for a blood-sucking seductress. 

“I’ve been hurt too. I was broken by a lover too.” The demon’s teary voice began to grow more confident and alluring. “I was promised eternal love by the man I would’ve died for. He changed his mind, decided to explore what the world had. But he did die for me like he promised he would. I made certain.” Cirie lifted her head to listen to the voice. “We can break his heart if you want. We can split his soul, the one that did this to you.”

“No!” Cirie shook her head and yelled with all the air in her lungs, “you are evil. I don’t want your help!” She returned to the book she was flipping through and rushed to the page on exorcisms. 

“Please listen to me! I broke the heart of a liar; he deserved it! Please don’t send me back, it’s so hot, and you need me. You need my help.”

Cirie lifted the tipped-over cauldron with all her might and threw the rest of the parsley from her basket into it. She began to chant, “Ab hoc mundo, derelinquas me! Ab hoc mundo: derelinquas me!” as she sprinkled sea salt into the cauldron in a circular motion.

“I can make you strong. I can make you whole.”

“Ab hoc mundo, derelinquas me!”

“I can make you powerful.”

“AB HOC MUNDO, DERELINQUAS ME! AB HOC MUNDO, DERELINQUAS—”

“Cirie.” The demon whispered, and Cirie stopped her chanting for a moment. She could feel the room growing hotter and hotter, her forehead and back now drenched in sweat. It seemed her shawl was tightening and twisting around her torso as the cauldron began to bubble again, this time the colors of a fly’s eye, constantly shimmering and changing. “I want to help make things right.” Slowly, Cirie closed her mouth, stopping the next syllable of the chant from escaping. Then, she closed the book. She thought of how selfish the men she knew were, how she knew women who cried every night over the same imbecile. 

“What would we do?” Cirie began to think about how lonely she was. She didn’t want to be lonely anymore.

“We would rectify the broken hearts of our sisters, and we would strike down the liars and the cheats that seem to rule this world as well as the next one. We will have our moment of power, even if it is not forever.” The voice boomed from all around Cirie; Dido cowered underneath the desk that Cirie read the book from. 

“Can you heal my heart?”

“I can make it as tough as iron.”

Cirie turned away from the book and looked down at the cauldron. The bubbling mixture was beginning to fizzle down as Cirie’s chanting had. The room was sweltering with heat despite the cold air rushing in through the window. She thought of how betrayed and broken she felt earlier, and slowly she was beginning to feel stronger. Her skin was hot to the touch, and her eyes were watering, but the tears evaporated off of her cheeks as they tried to roll down. 

“Iron?” Cirie whispered to the demon as she strolled over to her ingredients basket. 

“Iron.” the demon whispered back. Dido whimpered under the desk, scratching at the wooden floor, trying to push herself as far against the wall as she could. Cirie picked up her basket and walked back over to the cauldron. 

“What’s your name?” she asked as she sprinkled a fistful of cinnamon over the pot, causing a vicious explosion of red bubbles that caused Dido to yelp in fear. 

The demon cackled and replied, “Vindicta.”