‘The Darker Half of The Year’: Local Witches Cast Fall Equinox Ritual

Squirrel heads, alligator skulls and iguana legs dotted the tabletops of Malliway Bros. — stereotypically macabre ingredients for a witch shop. However, for their fall equinox ritual, the recipe in question called for sugar-free juice, salt water and a miniature coffin.

Malliway Bros. Spells, Charms & Potions is a magic and witchcraft shop located at 1407 W Morse Ave., approximately 0.7 miles north of Loyola’s Lake Shore Campus. 

Co-owned by brothers Wycke and Blake Malliway, the store blooms with eccentricity, selling animal bones, tarot card decks, candles shaped like genitalia and make-your-own spell vials.

On the night of the fall equinox Sept. 22, the brothers gathered an intimate crowd of around 20 people for a public ritual. The group circled around a small table draped in white and black cobwebbed lace. Atop the table sat a miniature cauldron, a bowl of small bones, a little wooden coffin and a candle.

The fall equinox ushers in the beginning of autumn, which marks the Northern and Southern Hemispheres receiving equal shares of light and darkness, according to Royal Museums Greenwich.

Beyond its astronomical significance, the equinox also holds metaphorical symbolism in the seasonal harvest, according to Wycke.

“This is the time when the land itself starts to die,” Wycke said. “We’re kind of doing a funeral — we’re laying the Earth down as a corpse so that we can harvest what we need from it and prepare it for when it rises again at Halloween time.”

The ritual is also personally spiritual, Blake said.

“We’re transitioning into the darker half of the year, where themes of death, destruction going inward are a lot more prominent,” Blake said. “Separating this out of the landscape, it’s a time of internal reflection.”

However, the exact processes at play in the ritual were kept private until the ceremony actually began.

“The boys usually keep it pretty much a surprise what they have in store for the actual ritual part,” Dalton Williams, a frequent Malliway Bros. customer, said. “I have plans to be delighted.”

The ritual began with the group grounding themselves — breathing in the “cosmic” fire, kneeling with palms against the floor and connecting with the “telluric,” or earthly, power below.

“Horned father of the wise / Serpent fire of the skies / Let fall to Earth that ancient flame / Azazel, Tubal-cain / By thunderbolt and starry shower / To tend and turn the horse of power,” Blake said, leading the crowd in the chant.

During the ritual, four guests volunteered in the ceremony — one laid the compass and three hallowed the red, white and black chicken bones through incantations. 

As plumes of incense wafted heavenward, the compass-layer worked to create a transient liminal space, circling the table with a two-pronged staff meant to touch the upper, middle and lower planes of existence.

Another audience volunteer, called the Witch of the White Bone, approached the table, repeated an incantation intended to hallow the bone and laid the bone in the coffin alongside the Downy Grim — a bird corpse.

“We gather here: the edge of shadow / When darkness wins the day / We mourn the Earth made to a corpse / And down these bones we lay,” the attendee said, repeating after Wycke.

The Witch of the Red Bone followed, soaking the bone in the juice before laying it in the coffin.

The group passed around a chalice filled with salt water. Each member dipped their fingertips into the water and flicked drops onto the floor.

“We wet the Earth by spill of sorrow / And mourn for what has lost tomorrow,” the crowd chanted.

The Witch of the Black Bone held the final bone over the candle’s flame, symbolizing cremation, mourning and grief, according to Wycke.

To end the ritual, Wycke instructed the group to breathe in the fumes of the fire.

“The energy of life that has been taken from the Earth now is still alive in you,” Wycke said.

Frequent Malliway Bros. customer Fi Smith said she appreciated the community-oriented nature of the ritual. Having a group allows witches to play off each other and build power together, according to Smith.

For Smith, the ritual act of passing around and sprinkling the cup of salt water provoked a tangible reaction.

“It was sort of like flashes of images in my head of different grief feelings, dripping off into the ground,” Smith said, likening the experience to that of stepping out of the shower and still feeling the water running down your body.

Brianne Adelman, a resident of Northwest Indiana, said the most healing part of the ritual was when she channeled her negativity into the ground and let it “die.”

“It was like a black sludge, and the sludge just kind of fell off,” Adelman said. “I felt lighter at the end of it, once I put everything in the ground.”

For those looking to practice witchcraft, Malliway Bros. offers instructional books, workshops and free witchy advice.

“Always cover your tracks if you’re going to curse someone,” Wycke said.

The brothers are hosting a workshop for tarot card reading Sept. 27. Tickets can be purchased on eventbrite for $10.

Malliway Bros. is open 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. during weekends.