Poppies, Parchment, and Painted Nails by Em Rowene
3300 words, ~17 minutes reading time
Issue 7 (Spring 2025)
Losing something valuable was the worst thing that could happen to a portal witch. The thing you lost could be literally anywhere: on any planet in any galaxy, in this dimension, or the last. It could be in a lost world, a destroyed world, a world you visited but can no longer recall. It could be in your hometown, or in that shitty motel at the edge of the universe you stayed at for just one night years ago. When a portal witch lost something valuable, her only options were to count it lost or retrace her steps through the wide universe to find it.
Ksenia, stubborn witch that she was, had committed to the latter. What else was she to do, when the thing she lost was her own heart?
When she was young, wanderlust chased her from world to broken world. She would close her eyes and think of a sensation: biting into an orange slice, expecting sweet but getting sour; snow dropping down the back of her coat, stinging and sharp; riding a charter dragon, feeling the lull as it beat its wings. She would hold the sensation close and release her magic like a slingshot, and when the portal appeared, she would see where it took her.
She cursed that impetuousness now as she tried to recall the places she’d been. Even if she could, would she find them? Portal witches moved through worlds but never belonged to them, and as the witches moved on, so too did the worlds they visited. Even if Ksenia returned to a place she’d been, she often found it changed. Farms replaced skyscrapers. Lakes filled valleys. Deserts dried oases. How could she find her heart when nothing stayed the same?
Now she stood on a damp hillside, surrounded by darkened ruins where a once lively village used to be. Aiming a frustrated kick at a nearby stone, she watched it soar into one of the crumbled, broken pillars that stood sentinel. She stared dully at the pillar. Once, it might have made up her parents’ home, a structural support alongside her mother’s poppy beds. It might have made up her neighbor’s. She might have been on the wrong side of town completely, far away from her childhood home. She could no longer tell. Hours of searching, and all she had to show for it were mud-tattered clothes, bloodied fingers from a dozen holes dug in the dirt, and an ache in her hollow chest. She would give anything to see this village as it was.
When she glanced down, she noticed a spot of color amidst the dark, a glittering something her kick had unveiled. Brushing the dirt away and ignoring how her fingers stung, she revealed a mosaic tile with a golden arch painted along its surface. She remembered how it looked when it was one among hundreds arrayed in the village square. With a sigh, she tucked it into her pocket. An interesting find, but still just another broken fragment.
She’d really thought her heart would be here, that she’d gotten it right this time, but there was no point in lingering among these empty ruins. She swept into the nearby woods, thinking only to put distance between herself and her old home. Before long, she had to stop again: torn blisters rubbed raw against her boots, so she toed out of them and carried them in hand, preferring the forest floor and its sharp fallen pine needles to the leather agony.
She wandered until the shapes of the wood were no longer familiar and the pinks of dawn touched the treetops. When she came upon a lonely cabin, she stopped. Though younger than the ruins she’d left behind, this cabin was heading toward its own dilapidation: thistle grew up and around it, in through the broken windows. Using sheer strength to break the rusted lock, Ksenia let herself inside, coughing when her entrance kicked up old dust. She sagged against the wall.
There were only a few places left her heart could be. She knew where to look next; the thought of lavender nails, laughter like church bells, and a gap-toothed smile rose unbidden to her mind. Closing her eyes, she focused on the memory. More details solidified: long eyelashes clumped with mascara and elegant fingers strumming a guitar. As the air shimmered before her, she picked up her boots and stepped through the portal.
The cabin peeled away and Ksenia squinted under sudden lights, her eyes accustomed to the dark. Her mind was too used to the quiet and she dropped her boots to cover her ears; pop music blared, dishes clattered, and voices chattered all around. Ahead of her, a group of polyester-uniformed teenagers sang and clapped around a long table covered in milkshakes, empty plates, and bow-wrapped gifts.
It was a party. Realizing she was interrupting something intimate, Ksenia turned to leave.
“Ksenia?”
Ksenia winced and looked back. The crowd parted from around the table to reveal an old woman at its head, a paper crown perched on her graying curls. She beckoned Ksenia closer and shooed the boy beside her away in the same motion. “Go sit with your sister. Ksenia, you sit here.”
Seeing the uniformed teenagers’ concerned looks, Ksenia hastily stepped into her boots and winced at the pain before taking the boy’s vacated seat. She’d only managed to get the boots on partway, and one of the soles had folded over itself. She fidgeted in her seat, trying to fix it as subtly as she could.
The woman laughed at her, not unkindly. “You haven’t changed at all. It’s like you haven’t even aged,” she marveled, twitching as if to reach out, as if to touch. Ksenia watched the woman’s hand – the nails now red instead of purple, the fingers knobby instead of slim. But the gap-toothed smile was familiar, even surrounded as it was by fine lines.
“I’m sorry to drop in like this,” Ksenia said, “And for waiting so long to visit.”
“Don’t apologize. I know how you get,” the old woman said, and Ksenia wished she could remember why they drifted apart. Despite the dirt and blood caked under her own nails, she took the woman’s hand in hers, felt the steady heartbeat beneath her fingers.
Remembering the gifts and singing, Ksenia said, “At least let me wish you a happy birthday.”
The woman grinned and patted Ksenia’s cheek. “I’m surprised you remembered.”
“You’d also be surprised at how much I still think about you,” Ksenia said.
“Oh, Ksenia…” Pity poured into the woman’s smile, and Ksenia hastily leaned away from her touch, embarrassed.
“How have you been?” Ksenia asked, a change of subject.
“You know me – always busy. I have six grandchildren now. The boy you just saw is one of them.”
Watching the boy at the other end of the table, Ksenia remembered conversations under the stars, remembered big plans and even bigger dreams. She remembered passion and fire, ambition and yearning and scorn for the simple life. She searched the old woman’s face for these things. Disappointed, she asked, “Did you ever go on tour?”
The woman shook her head. “No.”
“Did you play for millions? Did you see the world?”
“I forgot I said all those things,” the woman said with a rueful smile. She patted Ksenia’s hand. Once-perfect nail polish now wobbled around the edges, crossing onto skin. “I didn’t, but that’s okay. I lead the community choir now. I have a wonderful family – they drove for hours to be with me today. I’m very happy, Ksenia.”
“I’m glad,” Ksenia said. And she was, only…this woman was not who Ksenia remembered. And when the woman asked where Ksenia had been, what Ksenia had done, she seemed as surprised by Ksenia’s answer as Ksenia was by hers. Neither were who the other remembered. But when Ksenia said so, the woman shook her head so hard Ksenia worried the paper crown might fall off.
“You’re the same as you’ve always been. Always lost in other worlds, Ksenia. Why did you come here, if not to see me?”
Ksenia winced. Her missing heart was to blame, she knew. Things would be different when she had it back. She withdrew her hands and placed them in her lap. “I’m looking for something. I thought I might’ve left it with you by accident.”
“I have nothing of yours.”
“I see that now,” Ksenia agreed. “I’m sorry for wasting your time.”
Despite herself, she stayed and chatted with the familiar stranger a while longer – long enough to eat cake and rest her feet and miss a friend who no longer existed. As a birthday gift, she gifted a teleportation spell – she had nothing else to give, aside from a worthless tile and a pocket full of forest dirt. Then, with stilted goodbyes, she excused herself to the bleached bathroom.
With a groan, she dropped her forehead against the stall door. She had another idea. She didn’t want to go there, not after all this time, but there was nowhere else her heart could be – nowhere but in kingdoms that exiled her and planets she destroyed, and she couldn’t believe her heart was so lost. She thought of sweet tobacco and tea and the scratch of quill on parchment, of chores with her schoolmate full of laughter and soap bubbles in the time before loneliness. When the next portal opened, she steeled herself before marching through.
Somehow, her teacher’s study hadn’t changed. She froze half-in, half-out of the portal when she had the realization, only stepping through when she felt the magic’s annoyed tug. She took in the shelves of cloth-bound books, the smoke-stained walls, the inkwells and loose parchment and hanging skulls. Even her teacher sat exactly where she’d left him, in his velvet armchair, and Ksenia was relieved until she remembered why she’d stayed away.
He stared at her without recognition, eyes wide, and it made her want to dive back through the disappearing portal.
“I’m…” she started, only to hesitate. “I go by Ksenia now. Some things have changed.”
He blinked, surprised, and then his expression softened into a smile that crinkled the edges of his eyes. “Ksenia,” he repeated. “That’s okay. They do that.”
When Ksenia didn’t move other than to nod, he set his book aside and gestured to the old sofa across from him. “Stay for a while; tell me about it,” he said. “I’ll make tea.”
With that, he puttered away exactly as he used to while Ksenia dropped onto the sofa exactly where she used to. Unconsciously, she left a place for someone who was no longer there. Surrounded by the familiar and comfortable, she clutched a pillow to her chest and thought of her ragged feet and the ruins of her childhood home. Before she could stop it, she’d begun to weep.
She cried for several minutes, her teacher returning at some point and setting her tea wordlessly beside her. He returned to his seat, waiting patiently until Ksenia finally sniffled, wiped her face, and tasted the tea. It was her favorite blend. He still remembered it, still stocked it. She started to cry all over again.
“It’s good to see you,” he said gently, encouragingly. “Where have you been living?”
It was a standard greeting for portal witches: where have you gone? What have you seen? Ksenia wiped her tears and sipped her tea. He’d burned it; that hadn’t changed, either. “In a quiet B&B on a planet so small it doesn’t have a name. Are you really okay with me being here?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” he asked, simply.
“I’ve changed,” she pointed out.
“That’s okay. People do that,” he countered.
“I left you here alone,” she said.
“They do that, too,” he said with a wry smile. “But you came back.”
Ksenia nodded. “I guess I did.”
He claimed that people change, but he himself had not. Like Ksenia, he hadn’t aged throughout their many lifetimes. Ksenia knew him, knew his heart, knew his habits and his home. He told her about his latest research, now as a peer and not as a teacher, and Ksenia was pleased to provide her thoughts on the same. As they talked, she cast her eyes about the room, searching for something – something different, something new, something that would surprise her. Surely, something must be different, otherwise this place wouldn’t feel so off. It wasn’t the decorations. It wasn’t the books or the shelves or the furniture. Her gaze fell to the empty sofa cushion beside her.
“Ksenia,” her teacher said, adopting a stern tone that she also knew well, “If you look over your shoulder while walking through portals, you risk running into walls.”
Ksenia rolled her eyes and wished her old schoolmate was here with them. They had always commiserated over their teacher’s silly axioms together, but he’d been gone from this place longer than she had. “If you’re running into walls, you’re not very good at portal magic.”
“Ksenia,” he repeated, even more seriously. “It’s okay to look back but remember: things can never be as they were.”
Ksenia dropped her gaze. “I know.”
It struck her, then, what had changed: she had changed, in more than just name. It must be her missing heart. If she could just get it back, this study would be as she remembered. It would feel like home again. But without it, she couldn’t stay, so she made her farewells with promises to visit.
When she opened the next portal, it was without a destination in mind. If only she could travel through time, she thought. She felt sure now, that her heart was lost to the past. It was back with her schoolmate, back with the girl with the lavender nails, back buried in her mother’s poppy bed, beside golden tiles in a village square. Unfortunately, she couldn’t travel through time. She could only travel through space. She could think of her old relationships the same way she could look at ghosts of stars in the sky: somewhere, lightyears away, they had already died.
Resigned to a heartless existence, she stepped through her portal.
The lonely cabin must have crept into her thoughts as Ksenia cast her magic, because she found herself unexpectedly standing before it, somehow unchanged from her last visit. Under the pink ribbons of dawn, the thistles still bloomed and sunlight pooled on the thatched roof. Approaching now felt more like a trespass than before, but Ksenia inched closer anyway.
Inside, in the bedroom empty of all but dust, Ksenia opened a portal and dragged the cozy bed from her B&B through. Making a mental note to return and pay for it tomorrow, she dropped onto the worn mattress and stared at the pastel sky through a hole in the roof until sleep took her.
She woke hours later to golden light warming her face, then rose, stretched, and poked around the cabin. It reminded her of her grandmother’s home, long decayed and gone with the rest of her village. Almost without thought, she began to tidy, clearing away weeds and cobwebs. When she grew hungry, she caught a rabbit and cooked it in the great stone oven. When she looked up again and found that dusk had struck, she chose to stay another night. One night turned to three, and three stretched into a week.
She opened portals to collect her things and fill the space with mementos from a million worlds. More often, she turned to the magic of her mother and grandmother, which she’d never allowed herself to practice before. She burned alchemilla in her oven and wore angelica around her neck, and on bad days, she wondered what they’d think, whether they’d be angry with her for claiming a magic she had not been taught. She wondered if they’d even recognize her, after all she’d changed.
On good days, she tried not to dwell. She cleared the thicket, thatched the roof, and planted a garden. She stopped looking for the things she’d lost.
One day, as she sat in her garden and read a newspaper full of happenings that wouldn’t reach this remote planet for months, a hunter stumbled across her. They stared at each other, Ksenia sprawled in a sunny spot and the hunter frozen mid-step, each equally surprised at the other’s existence. Slowly, Ksenia sat up and pointed into the forest. “A herd of deer is passing that way,” she said. “If you hurry, you might catch them.”
He bowed in thanks and didn’t ask how she knew. Watching him hurry off, Ksenia hoped this wasn’t a world prone to witch hunts. She’d be sad to have to leave, after all of her work. But she’d nearly forgotten the hunter when he passed through again the next day, now with a healthy buck draped over his strong shoulders. He greeted her more cheerfully this time, with an enthusiastic, “Ho, stranger!”
“My thanks for before,” he called. His accent was thick and curled, much like Ksenia’s, much like her parents’. Friendly as he was, Ksenia noticed he was careful not to pass over the boundary into her garden. “I would be returning home empty-handed if not for you.”
“Where is your home? Is there a town nearby?”
He nodded toward the forest. “Two hours from here on foot.” If he was surprised by her question, he didn’t show it. “If you visit in the next few days, I’ll have the buck processed by then. I’d like to share some of it with you as thanks. Come find me – mine is the house with the red door, beside the church.”
Ksenia could catch her own deer. She could also portal to any supermarket in the known universe. But she nodded anyway, and the hunter beamed at her before excusing himself and returning to the forest.
Ksenia waited a day before visiting and took a basket of offerings from her garden when she did, still unsure of this world’s currency. Though her calves cramped on the walk and she was limping by the end, she made good time, reaching the bustling town and the hunter’s house just before noon. To an accompaniment of curious looks from passersby, she gave the hunter’s wife the basket and stood on their threshold, chatting for a while. Afterward, she found a secluded place and portaled home to spare her poor feet the misery of walking back.
She started making weekly trips to the village after that.
The hunter’s daughter told her friends about the kind witch in the woods, and they told their parents in turn. News of Ksenia spread. On her visits, she helped around the town, performing small spells teaching the children reading, writing, and mathematics. When she clicked her tongue at their wrong answers, she heard echoes of her old teacher. In time, she came to understand him.
She learned to love the walk, too, and how briskly her heart beat at the exercise. Away from the village, she spent her time visiting her teacher, reading in her garden, or tending to her poppy bed. Under her watch, the village children grew up and had children of their own. On a sunny spring afternoon, she held the hunter’s daughter’s newborn in her arms and listened to his soft, thrumming heartbeat pressed against her own. Later, she harvested vegetables from her garden, and as she prepared dinner in her quiet kitchen, a portal opened beside her.
She only had time to wipe her hands on her apron and turn to face it before her old schoolmate stepped through. He looks tired, was all she thought. For centuries, she’d imagined their reunion. She’d always expected her heart to beat faster upon seeing him again, but as happy as she felt, it didn’t.
“I’ve been looking for you,” he said.
She didn’t tell him how long she’d spent doing the same. She didn’t tell him that she’d thought of him every day since he left – that she thought of everyone, most days, of poppies and parchment and painted nails. In the silence, he passed her a small parcel wrapped in cloth.
“I heard you were looking for this,” he said. “I’m sorry I took it. I thought of returning it every day.”
She carefully peeled away the edges of the cloth to reveal her bloody heart, still beating. Then, she wrapped it back up, set it aside, and pressed a vegetable peeler into her schoolmate’s hand. “That’s okay. I have more,” she said. “I’m glad you’re here, though. Why don’t you stay a while?”
