I could feel guests looking at me. I was sure they were curious to know what all the shouting and running was about, but I didn’t pause to fill them in. I kept heading for the door.
I heard Asti’s voice rise up above the piano music. “Marley, is everything okay?” she asked.
I reached the double doors and pushed one of them open.
“Everything’s fine,” I said over my shoulder. “I’ve got it under con—” I stopped short.
I was about to say “under control,” but suddenly I knew that was not the truth. I didn’t have the situation under control. Not at all. Before me, I saw Penny lying face first on the dirt lot.
She let out an agonized wail, and flailed one of her arms.
“Ah! Help me! Help me!” she shouted. “I’ve been stabbed!”
A little glint of the fading light reflected from the hilt of a metallic blade, which was lodged in her right butt cheek.
I started to run toward her. I wanted to help—if I could. I also wanted to know just who had the nerve to stab by best friend in the freaking front lot of my healing center.
It seemed that the more the nightmarish weekend went on, the farther from healing we got.
Chapter Eleven
I reached Penny’s side. “What do you want me to do?” I asked her quickly as I knelt down. “Should I pull it out?”
“Don’t touch it!” she shrieked. She was breathing fast and shallow.
I placed a hand on the back of her shoulder. “You’re okay,” I said, trying to sound calm. “We’re going to fix this.”
“I have a knife sticking out of me!” she yelled. “I am not okay! Someone threw that knife at me! They were trying to kill me!”
Now, my friend Penny is a vampire. She was “changed” by her man, Max, before they got married. I knew Penny couldn’t die. Penny knew it. But it was possible that her attacker did not. Murder really could have been the intention. Was I in danger? How about my guests?
My heart started pounding, and I got goosebumps.
I looked up at my surroundings. A transparent layer of early evening, golden light blanketed the gravel lot. The pine and aspen trees at the edge of the lot, led into the woods. Little white piles of not-yet-melted snow gathered in shadowy nooks between the trees, and behind them the forest looked dark and foreboding.
As I looked into the darkness of the forest, I thought I saw a flash of movement. It was so subtle, and so instantly gone, that I thought maybe I’d just imagined it. I blinked a few times and looked at the darkness again, but this time it was still.
Then I looked across the lot to the parking lot’s exit. The shimmery, pinkish-purple barrier was intact. It looked like a see-through curtain that hung between the lot’s exit and the road beyond. It extended in either direction, stretching around the parking lot and then disappearing into the woods. It curved up at the top and created a very tall dome over the entire center and its grounds. It was designed to keep non-magical beings from town away from the center. To an outsider looking in, the barrier made the center look empty and quiet. I didn’t see any movement anywhere along the barrier.
I looked to Skili. “Go get Azure,” I transmitted.
It was my hope that Azure, being the one witch in our group with decades of magical experience, would know how to help Penny. I had a few ideas, but extracting a knife didn’t seem to be a spell that was worth experimenting with.
I didn’t take my hand off of Penny. I felt warmth in my palm, and energy coursing from me and out into my friend. I also noticed that my dreamcatcher necklace felt warm. I caught sight of it in my peripheral vision, and I saw that it was glowing.
Penny’s breathing was beginning to even out and become deeper. “Whew...” she said “I think some of the shock is starting to wear off. The pain’s fading a little bit, too. How far is it in there? A couple inches?”
I looked at the knife. All I could see was the hilt—the blade was completely embedded in her flesh. I had no idea how long the blade was. “Uh...” I said. “Yeah, an inch or two,” I said. I figured it was more, but I didn’t want her to panic.
I moved my hands down, and placed them where I felt guided to. One went to her hip, and one went to the back of her right leg, above her knee. As soon as my palms were on her, I felt my necklace become even warmer.
Does it have something to do with healing? I wondered. Is my charm magical? I made a note to ask Skili, when I had a chance. Then I returned my focus to my friend and her needs. I let the warmth flow from my hands again. I wasn't sure what I was doing, but she continued to calm down. “Ahhh...” she let out an audible sigh. “The stinging feeling is going away. Maybe I can get up...”
She started to move around a little and then gasped with pain. “Nope! Nope, just gonna stay here like this!” she said, as she went still.
I looked up at the edge of the woods again. I couldn’t get that flash of movement from my mind. Was someone out there, watching us? Did they have another knife to throw? Were they going to attack again?
“What happened?” I asked Penny.
“I was following Justin,” she said. “I didn’t want him to see me. I ran out through the doors, and straight over to that big rock... you know, the one that looks like a buffalo.”
I knew the one she meant. It was off to the side of the walkway that led to the center’s front doors.
“I crouched down behind it,” Penny went on. “I watched Justin jog across the lot. He seemed really eager to get out of here. Then his phone rang. He slowed down, and picked it up. I wanted to hear what he was saying, but I didn’t want him to see me.”
“Makes sense,” I said.
“So I dropped down and did this really cool army crawl thing,” she said. “I was down on my belly, and I used my arms and legs to shuffle along.” She started moving her arms and legs, but as soon as she moved her right leg she cried out with pain.
I focused on my hands and let the warmth flow from my palms into her until she settled down. “Girl, you’d better just tell the story and not act it out,” I said.
Movement at the center doors caught my eye, and I saw Azure emerge, with Skili close behind her.
Azure hurried toward us as Penny continued her story. “Anyway, I army crawled out to him. I even did this cool little camouflage spell on my clothes, to make them blend in with the gravel lot. Is it still working?”
She moved one arm carefully and looked at her sweatshirt sleeve, which was black with purple stripes. “Nope,” she said. “Mar, you should have seen it. My hoodie turned the exact same color gray as this gravel, even with the same texture. I mean, this spell would be great for sleuthing. Imagine if we used it to sneak up on bad guys all the time! It would be great because—”
Azure reached us. She was out of breath. “What happened?” she asked between gasps, interrupting Penny mid-sentence.
“Penny was stabbed,” I said.
Azure eyed Penny. “Yet she’s still as chatty as ever,” she said.
“I’m easing the pain with some energy work,” I said.
Penny turned her head slightly so she could look at me sideways. “Is that what you’re doing back there?” she said. “Wow, you’re good at that, Mar. I’m actually feeling great. Maybe you guys should just yank it out or something.”
Azure put up her hand, as if to stop that train of thought right in its tracks. “We’re not just going to yank it out,” she said. “That’s barbaric. We’re going to work some civilized magic. Like I said before, you girls have to start thinking like witches.”
She lifted a finger and tapped her lip. “Let’s see; maybe a Banishing Spell would do the trick, but we don't want to banish her butt cheek and the knife, that’d really be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”
“Do not banish my butt cheeks!” Penny said. “I need both butt cheeks! I don’t want to be lopsided. And I like my right one the most! It’s my favorite one.”
“You seriously have a favorite butt cheek?” I said.
<
br /> “Okay, better not use the Banishing Spell,” Azure said. “We do have to be careful. This is the unique place where magic meets human anatomy through trauma, and we don’t want to do a spell with unwanted side effects. Your nerves and veins and tissues and whatnot have to be considered.”
“Yes, yes, consider all of that! I’d like my tissues to keep on tissuing, thank you very much,” Penny said.
She moved a little bit as she spoke, and grimaced. “Can we just get on with it, though? I mean, I like that you’re being thoughtful about this Azure, but I kind of have a knife sticking out of me and the sooner you get it out, the better. Marley’s helping the pain, but when I move it hurts.”
“Don’t move,” I suggested.
Azure ignored all this, and continued tapping her lip thoughtfully. “Let’s see... if we do a Drawing Forth Spell on the knife, and then a Repair and Rejuvenate spell on her bottom, that could do the trick... yes, yes, I think that’s what we’ll do.”
She focused on the knife.
I kept my hands where they were. If Azure’s magic caused Penny pain, I wanted to be able to counteract it with my healing energy. I closed my eyes and concentrated on the feeling in my palms, laid on Penny’s body.
Azure spoke. “Penny, stay just where you are,” she said. “I’m going to walk circles around you for a minute.”
“I’m not about to get up and start dancing,” Penny promised.
I heard Azure’s footsteps crunch on the gravel as she walked in a clockwise circle around Penny and I. As she walked, she spoke.
“That which I
Am focusing on
I now pull toward me
With my magnetic will.”
She repeated this slowly several times. At first her voice was quiet, but then it became louder. By the third repetition, her voice reached a crescendo at the end, and she shouted, “Now!”
I heard Penny shriek. A river of warm, healing energy flowed from my palms, into her. She settled down. I opened my eyes.
Azure approached. She had the little twig that she used as a wand out, and she pointed it at Penny’s bottom. A cone of white light emanated from the tip of the twig, and shone down over Penny. Then she spoke with authority.
“Restore and repair!
Each nerve and each cell,
let them be mended,
let Penny be well.”
She wiggled her wand a few times. The light became brighter.
I felt the urge to lift my hands up off of my friend, so I did. Then Azure’s wand stopped glowing, and at the same time, the sun disappeared down below the mountain peak it had been hovering over. The last golden pools of light that had been shining on the lot faded away, and I knew that Azure’s spell had been a success.
Penny pushed herself up to her knees. Then she got to her feet, and did a few line dancing moves. “Now I can dance!” she said. “I feel like a million bucks!”
“That Restore and Repair Spell is pretty strong,” Azure said. She sounded drained. I wrapped my arm around her shoulder. I knew what it was like to feel depleted after working a particularly powerful spell.
“Thank you, Azure,” I said softly.
“Yeah, thanks so much, Azure,” Penny said. “I’m all better! That was so crazy.”
“How on earth did you get a knife lodged in your butt cheek?” Azure asked.
“It wasn’t my fault,” Penny said. “It’s not like I fell on it or something. I was just doing my thing and someone threw it at me.”
I felt a creepy sensation, almost as if there was a presence watching us from the dark shadows of the woods. Was someone out there, hiding, waiting to strike again? And where was Justin?
I looked at Penny. “Can you finish your story?” I asked her. “You said you were army crawling across the lot, trying to overhear what Justin was saying without being seen.”
“Right, right,” Penny said. She dropped down to her belly, and began reenacting the scene. “There I was... army crawling along in my super-cool camouflage hoodie and leggings. Justin was yapping away. I was getting closer. I heard him say something about California, and monkeys or something like that. Sorry, the details are escaping me.”
She moved forward, dragging her knees and elbows along as she kept talking. “Anyway, Justin started walking again and I followed him in this stealthy way. He reached the very edge of the magical barrier.”
She lifted one hand and pointed to the lot’s exit. “ Right over there,” she said. “I wanted to stop him before he passed through the barrier, so I could ask him a few questions. So I sort of jumped up to my feet—like this,” she scrambled up to her feet. “ I was going to tackle him, you know? And that’s when I felt it.”
“The knife?” I said.
“Yep! Right in the tuchus,” she said, slapping her behind. . “It was like a bee sting, only about a thousand-billion times worse. Wow, that hurt.”
Azure chimed in. “But you didn’t see who threw it?”
Penny shook her head. “Nope. My eyes were laser-focused on Justin, because I was getting ready to take him down.”
I doubted Penny’s “laser focus,” but I kept that to myself. “Someone must have been behind you,” I said. “And he or she threw it right as you got to your feet.”
“I guess,” Penny said.
I spoke again. “What happened to Justin?”
“He was right at the magical barrier, like I said,” Penny said. “The knife hit me and I sort of fell forward. Probably because I was so surprised. Who expects to be stabbed in the butt like that? Not this girl. As I was going down, Justin stepped through the barrier. He didn’t even see me falling. He was still on his phone and everything.”
“Hmm...” I said. “So he left, and didn’t know you were hurt?”
“Yep, I’m pretty sure he had no clue,” Penny said. “I didn’t scream when the knife hit me, so he passed through the barrier without even realizing I was hurt. I guess I was in too much shock. I saved the screams for when I saw you, Mar.”
“You sure did,” I said. I placed my hands on my hips, and surveyed the lot again. “You guys,” I said, “I’m not entirely sure, but I think I saw some movement in the woods, over there.” I motioned to the woods.
“Think the perp is hiding behind some of those trees?” Penny asked.
“Maybe,” I said. I narrowed my eyes, and let my gaze travel over the woods again. They seemed still. I also noticed that I didn’t have that same feeling of being watched. “Whoever it was, I don’t sense that they’re around any more,” I said.
“Good,” Penny said. “I don’t feel like a target for someone’s knife throwing practice. If that blade had landed up on my back, it could have pierced my heart and killed me! I mean, if I wasn’t a vampire... And if that blade happened to be a wooden stake, it very well could have done the job. Who would want to kill me?”
Azure held out her hand. I saw a glint of metal as the knife flashed. She was still holding the knife that had emerged from Penny’s flesh during her Drawing Forth Spell. “It’s definitely not wooden; looks more like carbon steel to me,” she said. “Hey, maybe the weapon could give us a clue.”
Penny rolled her eyes. “Oh, if only it was that simple, Azure,” she said. “If all weapons had clues all over them, everyone would be detectives.”
“Hang on, Penny,” I said. “She has a point. Let’s just look at the knife.”
We both crowded around Azure, who held the knife in her flat extended palm.
The light was fading fast. I saw that the weapon was about eight inches in length, and dull silver in color. On the hilt, it seemed there was some kind of engraving.
I leaned in, to get a better look. Penny leaned in at the same time, and our heads bonked together. I pulled back, “You first,” I said. “You’re the licensed PI after all.”
“No, you go ahead,” Penny said. “This is your case. “
“But you were the one who was stabbed,” I said.
“On your property,”
Penny said. “While chasing your boyfriend.”
“Just someone look at it already!” Azure cried out.
I looked at Penny and nodded. “I’ll do it,” I said.
She gave me a thumbs up.
I bent over, and studied the engraving. There were some symbols that looked like maybe words in a different language, maybe Hebrew or Arabic. I had no idea. I have very little knowledge of other languages. Beneath the symbols there was a bit of English.
Klahan Thai Boxing Gym, Thailand
I gasped aloud as I read the words.
“What is it?” Penny asked.
“A clue?” said Azure hopefully.
I straightened up. “It’s a clue alright,” I said. “And it leads straight to a being that I really, really don’t want to suspect of murder.”
My shoulders slumped with sadness.
“Who?” Penny and Azure asked together.
“My fairy godmother, that's who,” I said. “I’m pretty sure this knife belongs to Margie.”
Chapter Twelve
My friends were as shocked that the knife belonged to my sweet fairy godmother as I was.
“No way!” said Penny. “Why would Margie try to kill me?”
“She seems so kind,” Azure said. “Always fluttering around, tidying up the center and looking out for Geoffrey so he doesn’t get mud everywhere. I think those two make such a great team. She can’t be a killer!”
“I really like her, too,” I said. I pointed to the knife. “But the facts are the facts, and if she really tried to hurt Penny, she’s got to go.”
“To jail?” Penny asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But she can’t stay here. I can’t put my guests in danger like that, or my friends.”
“We should probably find her, right?” Penny asked.
“I could do a Location Spell,” Azure offered. “They’re quite handy.”
“Man, it’s nice having you around,” I said. “How come I never think of these things?”
“It takes practice, Marley,” Azure said. “You need to get in the habit of casting spells instead of using the non-magical tools.”
The Artist's Alchemy Page 11