Down on the Charm

by E L Wilder

  She made a face. “Because that doesn’t sound perverted. Good thing the car has aged better than the slogan.”

  He seemed oblivious to her now, moving around the car, ducking here to peek at one part, walking on tiptoe there to check another. He had been like that when they were younger. Oftentimes he played the dispassionate observer, but if something were in his wheelhouse, he could geek out with the best of them. And if she was being honest with herself, it was as adorable now as it was then.

  “This is a car of the Gilded Age,” he went on. “Wealthy industrialists, beer barons, and suffragettes.”

  “Would you two like to be alone?” she asked. “I had no idea you were such a motorhead.”

  He shrugged. “A writer needs to dabble in a little bit of everything. How did I never know this was here?!”

  It was her turn to shrug. “I think as teenagers we were ruled more by driving hormones than driving classics,” she said, gesturing to the entombed fleet around them.

  “The two are a timeless pairing,” he said. “Peanut butter and jelly. Peas and carrots. Teenagers and automobiles.”

  “Maybe we can use this in the parade,” she said.

  He turned to her suddenly and planted his hands on her shoulders. “Do you have any idea how much this thing is worth?”

  “Not in the slightest.”

  “A million easy,” he said. “Maybe two. I don’t know—I’ve never really been in the market for one. And does it really say ‘farm’?”

  “Does a carriage?” she countered

  “Good point. But at least it would be horse-drawn.”

  “Also a good point.”

  He carefully pulled the cloth back over the top of the Duesenberg. “Let’s keep moving.”

  “What about the other cars?” she asked, pointing to the other two vehicles.

  “Maybe we can come back later,” he responded. “When we aren’t running out the clock.”

  “We’ll make a date of it,” she said. It was careless phrasing at best, positively catastrophic at worst.

  Tyler flashed her a strained smile.

  They moved on, closing in on the place where the carriages were stored. Tyler checked a series of side doors. Most of the rooms beyond were empty or loaded with supplies, but the last in the line was stuck fast.

  “Door won’t budge,” he said. “What’s back here?”

  “More storage, I think. If you break it, Ronnie will wring your neck.”

  “Noted.”

  They rounded the corner into the final wing of the barn. She thought she heard something behind them and she peeked over her shoulder just in time to see a mouse scurry from the shadows and cross a patch of sunlight cast from a high window. Hazel shivered and was about to comment on it being a harbinger of plague and disease when a streak of color plummeted from the rafters and dropped onto the mouse.

  She yipped in surprise.

  A tortoiseshell cat crouched there, pinning the mouse under its paws and flicking its tail gleefully. No, not its tail, its tails—two of them, thin and writhing like snakes.

  She took a step toward the cat and it looked up. It wasn’t only tails it had in abundance, but ears, too—a double set layered one behind the other like feathers.

  An interloper.

  “Isn’t there a two-tailed mouse somewhere in Quark that needs catching?” she asked it pointedly. Quark. The town on the other side of the Postern.

  The cat’s tails stopped flicking and instead curled together, forming a heart. In that moment of distraction, the mouse wriggled free and bolted for safety. The cat scrambled to recapture its prey, but the mouse slipped into a crack in the wall.

  The cat turned its attention to Hazel and then hissed, a horrible sound that bounced like bullets in the small space.

  “Don’t blame me,” she said. “You were showing off.”

  The cat whipped its tail and then howled again, this time unleashing a banshee’s scream so loud that Hazel had to cover her ears. A lantern hanging from a nearby hook shattered, raining glass around her feet. Hazel jumped out of the way. When she looked back, the cat had disappeared.

  Tyler appeared almost instantly. “What the heck was that?” He eyed the broken glass.

  “Just being a complete klutz.”

  “What the hell was that noise?”

  “Saw a mouse and I screamed. I must have hit the lantern. I’m fine.”

  He looked at her in disbelief but said nothing.

  “Now why don’t we find this miracle carriage and get out of here?”

  “Your wish is my command. Right over here.”

  She cast one last glance into the shadows before following his lead. They had entered another vehicle storage, this one housing wagons and sleds.

  “Thar she blows, captain,” he said, his zeal bubbling back up again as he made a sweeping gesture toward a grand carriage, shimmering black with silver detailing.

  She oohed. “That’s one heck of a carriage.”

  “Actually, it’s a coach.”

  She raised her eyebrows and elbowed his ribs. “Thanks for the mansplaining.” He looked taken aback, so she added, “I kid! I kid!”

  She couldn’t help but feel some of his giddiness this time. She imagined the carriage being drawn at the head of the parade, Juniper leaning out one window and her out the other, waving to everyone that had turned out. It would happen. She swore it to herself.

  “It’s dusty as hell,” he said. “And it probably needs a bit restoration, but like everything else in here, it seems to have held up surprisingly well. I have a buddy in town who is great with this kind of thing—if we could transport it to his shop, he could probably make it good as new.”

  “I’ll cover the cost,” she said.

  “I wasn’t asking you to.”

  “But I want to. It’s only right and I have the money.”

  “Right,” he said flatly. “Of course you do.”

  There was an awkward moment of silence, and then he cleared his throat and said, “We should probably take it for a test drive.”

  She looked at him like he were crazy. “Great idea. It’s a beautiful day for a carriage ride. Though, I’m not sure the yoke will fit your neck.”

  “We’ll have to use our imaginations then,” he said, opening the carriage door, unfolding the step—both of which screeched in protest—and then bowing theatrically as he motioned her inside.

  “Ever the gentleman,” she intoned melodramatically, gathering the voluminous folds of an invisible gown and daintily climbing inside. She seated herself on the velvet bench, sending up a mushroom cloud of dust. Tyler followed in regal step, closing the door behind him, and took the seat opposite her, their knees almost touching in the confines of the carriage.

  “I wish we had known this was here years ago,” he said wistfully. “It sure would have beat making out on an old burlap sack.”

  She giggled.

  He stared at her, and for the first time she was looking into the face she had expected to see—one that was churning with emotion, slashed with sadness and pain.

  “You left so suddenly,” he said.

  She nodded.

  “I thought you might come back—for your Gammy’s funeral—but when you were a no-show, I knew that you were gone. Really gone.”

  “I was just running scared. Once I started, I didn’t know how to stop.”

  “Scared or not, I’d say you did pretty well for yourself. I don’t read about too many of our classmates while I wait at the checkout line at the Genny.”

  She blushed. “It’s an occupational hazard . . .”

  There was no smooth way to ask the question, so she just blurted it out. “Did you ever go to New York?”

  He averted his gaze and stared out the window of the carriage for a moment before shaking his head.

  “Why not?” she asked.

  He shrugged. She could see tears were glazing his eyes now.

  “I would have gone,” he said. “But without
you, it just seemed pointless. I could write anywhere, and yet there was nowhere I wanted to be anymore.” He kept his gaze steady, staring out into the barn. “So I stayed.” He sighed suddenly, almost violently, and pawed at his eyes in a not-so-subtle attempt to wipe away the tears before they could fall.

  “You wanted to be a writer.”

  “I told you. I’m living every young boy’s dream writing about municipal budgets and school-board votes.”

  “What about your other writing. You wanted to be an author.”

  “Who says I’m not?” The corners of his mouth turned up, and he turned back to her, a playful spark flashing in his eyes. “Maybe I keep the flame of democracy burning by day and, by night, write bodice-rippers under my nom de plume.”

  “Nom de plume?”

  “Chet Morgan.”

  She groaned. “So you’ve read about all of it,” she said. “Me. My oh-so-public love life.”

  “No. But if I had, I’d definitely think that guy was a complete jerk.” He scrunched his face up in mock pain. “And that he can’t act his way out of a paper bag.”

  Hazel snorted with laughter, then clapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh that was lovely.” She shifted in her seat, leaning forward and resting her head on her hands. “That all seemed so important a few days ago, but with everything that’s happened here, it’s all so trivial. Stupid.”

  “Nah,” he said. “The things we go through are never stupid. They make us who we are. And I like who we are.”

  She blushed again. She suddenly felt intensely uncomfortable under his gaze, not because it was unwelcomed, but because, if she was being honest with herself, it stirred feelings in her that were most . . . untimely.

  He opened his mouth to say something else when a deafening crack split the air. The entire carriage lurched hard, tossing them both sideways.

  “Maybe everyone is right,” he said. “I do break everything I touch.”

  He opened the door and jumped out.

  Hazel lingered for a moment for both the quaking carriage and her quaking heart to settle.

  One of the wheels had shattered, the metal hoop bending under the weight of the carriage. “Fixable,” Tyler said as he took out his phone and snapped pictures. “It’s no tractor, but maybe it’ll do.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “For taking the time.”

  He shifted on his feet and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I should get back before Jess Tully shows up and finds me missing. I need this job.”

  “Let me walk you back,” she said.

  “No need. I think I can get at least that far by myself.” There was no mistaking the implication—or the sting that it inflicted on her.

  “I’ll talk to my buddy and make arrangements for transportation,” said Tyler.

  Hazel thanked him again and he disappeared between the carriages. She listened to his boots beating a retreat back through the Carriage House.

  A flurry of motion caught her eye, and she looked up to see the tortoiseshell cat sitting atop the carriage, presenting its profile, flicking its abundance of ears and tails. The pose was unnatural.

  Sejant Guardant.

  Because people needed fancy words for sitting and looking at the camera.

  All she had to do was draw a black roundel around the cat and it was a living recreation of the crest in the Bennett mausoleum.

  “What are you looking at?” she asked.

  The cat curved its tails into question marks. Then it flicked its ears and relaxed, setting to work licking its forepaw.

  “Don’t play dumb with me. I know you can understand me.”

  The cat continued to ignore her as it groomed itself, but then a voice lilted into her head like a wind-touched curtain through an open window: You’ve finally come.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Hazel wasn’t entirely sure how to talk to a cat, never mind one that broke all the rules of cat assembly. So she just dumbly asked, “What do you mean I’ve finally come?”

  The cat stopped licking its paw and turned its head to consider her. The voice came to her again, not something she heard so much as felt, like the beginning pangs of a headache. I’ve been waiting for you for years, Hazel. Though if I’m being honest, and I’m always being honest, I’d expected something less primped and more primed.

  “You’re the cat on the crest.”

  Guilty. Kind of. That crest represents more than just your family heritage. My history is wrapped up with the history of the Bennett Family. You could say we are inextricably linked.

  “You’re a familiar!”

  That’s presumptuous, the cat said. We hardly know each other, never mind being familiar.

  “Well you seem to know a lot about me,” she said. “Who are you?”

  Clancy.

  “Clancy?” she repeated, incredulous.

  It’s a pet name, he said, his eyes glinting wickedly. After my favorite author of the mundane world.

  “What’s your real name?” she asked.

  To pronounce it correctly, you would need a second larynx.

  “Got just the one, sorry,” she said. “But let’s hear you say it. Or do I need two sets of ears to hear it?”

  Clancy cocked his head in a sort of shrug, opened his mouth, and unleashed a piercing shriek that ended with one of the carriage windows shattering.

  “Clancy it is,” she said when he finally stopped. This cat was all kinds of wrong. Including his coloring—the black fur with flashes of desert sand. “Aren’t most torties female?”

  Maybe, he said, genuinely unsure, cocking his head to the side. But I’m not really a cat. Or maybe you hadn’t noticed. He flicked his tails for emphasis.

  “If I had to describe you to a police sketch artist, I’d definitely have them start with a cat. A smudged cat.”

  You’ll see. Every Bennett has struggled with this simple truth. But why should you be the one to believe?

  “How far back do our families go?”

  We’ve had a pact that originates when the first stone at Bennett manor was set. You’ve skipped out on your side of the bargain.

  “My side of it?” she said dumbly, but then it struck her. “You’re supposed to be my familiar?”

  My is a strong word. There are no owners here. This is a partnership. If I’m your familiar, then you’re my familiar too.

  “What do we get out of this partnership?”

  Focus, he said. That word again. Familiars boost each other’s powers, like a feedback loop.

  “How many focuses does one witch need?” A phone booth, a hairpin—why not add a cat?

  As many as she can get her hands on, he said. Assuming she wants to work real magic. It would be helpful if you already knew this.

  “There was a lapse in my education.”

  A lapse or a malaise?

  “I’m trying to learn,” she said. “But I can’t find the right textbooks.”

  What can you cast? he asked, an unmistakable disdain creeping into his tone.

  Hazel sucked air through her teeth and tried to think of how to respond. Did saving a plated sandwich and placing a staticky call on a knicked-knack count for anything? “What do you mean by casting . . .”

  Clancy thumped the carriage roof with his tail, and when his voice came to her again it hit her with a gale force. You can’t cast? He got up and turned a few circles, growling and biting at the air. Unbelievable. This is just my luck. I’ve wasted years waiting for you to show up, and you can’t do a lick of magic.

  After everything that had happened to her since she’d fled LA, she was feeling more than a little touchy. She wasn’t about to get dressed down by a fur-licking feline. “I can too!” she shouted, not pleased at the note of desperation that had snuck into her tone. She punched an open palm out in front of her, showering the carriage with a fan of sparks and smoke. A meager glamour at best. When the haze cleared, she saw that Clancy was crouched, whining pitifully as his body shook.

  Oh no. She had overreacted
again . . .

  She rushed forward, stopping when a soft guffaw drifted into her head.

  “Are . . . are you laughing?”

  He flopped onto his side, his frame shaking violently and his tails drumming the carriage roof. So . . . you can . . . rage-cast. That he was also laughing at her telepathically just added insult to injury. Good for you. And sometimes I cough up hairballs.

  She was fuming. “You are very unpleasant!”

  And you’re like that carriage. Just lying around, collecting dust.

  “Well that’s mean!”

  It’s not mean. It’s tragic. He was serious now. He sprang to his feet and stepped to the edge of the carriage roof so he could stare down at her. You’re wasting your potential. And even worse, you’re wasting mine.

  “Excuse you? Yours?” She could feel her anger building behind her eyes, but nothing would come from antagonizing him. She took a deep breath and started again. “Perhaps you can catch me up to speed. I could use some tutoring.”

  I’m looking for a partner, not a student.

  “I don’t see how you’re going to get one without the other.”

  Clancy made a noise that might have been a grumble but sounded more like an earthquake.

  “I could really use some help,” she said. “There’s been a murder.”

  Anyone important?

  “Jeez. Have a heart.”

  I already have two, thank you very much.

  “Well,” she said, “If you’re serious about getting me up to speed, I’m going to need to find the murderer. So how about it?”

  Clancy whipped his tails and grumbled. It’s hardly news that strange things have been going on around here lately. And it’s not just influx of interlopers through the Postern either. There’s something in the air . . .

  “What do you mean?”

  I’m not sure. But I’m not really equipped to investigate without raising some suspicions of my own. He curled his tails and flicked his ears. Lucky for you, I came prepared. Here’s something to get you started. Clancy turned a few circles and then batted something on the carriage roof. A wadded-up piece of paper sailed onto the floor.