Witch out of Time

by Elle Adams

  “He has a point.” Lizzie flashed me a sympathetic look across the desk. “I hope you catch the thief so that awful woman leaves you alone.”

  “Me, too.”

  Once the workday was over, I headed home, bracing myself to find Aveline had upended the place again. Instead, I found the flat looked much the same as it had this morning. Alissa sat on the sofa, stroking Roald. I hope Sky got on okay at Nathan’s house.

  “Hey, Blair,” said Alissa. “The other witches have been with Madame Grey all day, so I fixed things up and moved your suitcase where nobody can touch it. I had to leave the bedroom the same, though.”

  “At least until our uninvited guest leaves,” I said. “Rob the werewolf is coming over in a few minutes. She’s not likely to come home in the middle of it, is she?”

  “I’ll keep an eye out for her,” said Alissa. “It sounded like Madame Grey was giving her a stern talking-to.”

  “Good.” I jumped when the doorbell rang. “There he is. Punctual as always.”

  Sure enough, the blond werewolf stood on the doorstep, wearing his usual grin. “Hey, Blair.”

  “Hey,” I said. “This is Alissa, my flatmate. Don’t worry, the coast is clear.”

  “The Head Witch is terrorising my grandmother instead.” Alissa stepped aside to let him enter the flat. “I assume Blair told you all about her?”

  “She did,” he confirmed, walking into the living room. “Has someone been making potions in here?”

  “I think that’s Grace’s hair dye,” said Alissa.

  He grimaced. “Nasty stuff. Okay, which is the room the sceptre vanished from?”

  “Here.” I indicated my bedroom.

  Rob walked into the room, sniffed a couple of times, then sneezed. “Is there glitter in here?”

  “Ah… yeah, but that’s not to do with the thief.” More like my weird fairy magic. “How many individuals do you smell?”

  “You and Aveline, I assume.” He sniffed again. “And… a cat?”

  “Sky. He’s my familiar. Can you not smell anyone else?”

  “In the living room, yes, but not in the bedroom.” He scanned the room. “Was the sceptre definitely carried out through the door?”

  “The window’s not big enough to climb out of,” Alissa said from the living room.

  He sniffed around the window and frowned. “Could it have been disguised as something else?”

  “Not while I was looking. I can see through most illusions, and it’s a powerful magical object. More powerful than a wand. I’ll have to ask Madame Grey for specifics, but she must have considered the possibility.”

  “Fair enough,” he said. “I like the place. Very ambient.”

  “It was even better before a certain elderly witch upended everything,” added Alissa.

  “I bet,” he said. “You know, there’s a potion we use on new werewolves to make them more docile and friendly at the full moon. It stops them from snapping at everyone they see. It sounds like this Head Witch might be in dire need of a dose, from what you’ve said.”

  I had my doubts that anything could make Aveline the slightest bit docile or friendly. “You mean, a witch potion?”

  “What else?” he said. “My uncle doesn’t like to broadcast that he buys from the covens, but he finds those particular potions are the only way to get any peace when new cubs first shift.”

  “Should you be telling me this?”

  “Probably not.” He gave an easy smile. “It’s up to you, but the Head Witch sounds like a terror. I can drop some off at work tomorrow if you like.”

  “Oh, thanks,” I said. “If she tries anything else tomorrow, I might need it for my own sanity.”

  “Anytime.” He walked back into the living room. “Sorry I wasn’t much help here. And I’d clean up that dye if anyone comes here who has allergies.”

  “Thanks anyway.” I checked my watch. Running late again. “I have to go to a magic lesson, but I appreciate the help.”

  Not for the first time, I had to run to the witches’ headquarters in my work clothes. At least nothing was inside-out this time. I pushed open the doors and collided with Grace coming the other way.

  “Ah, sorry,” I said.

  “Do you ever look where you’re going?” Grace’s pink hair was in disarray and her mouth pressed into an angry line that didn’t suit her. The questioning from Madame Grey hadn’t gone well, then. Before I could say a word, she stormed off, leaving the smell of hair dye behind her. It really was potent. Like oil mixed with carpet cleaner.

  Rita was mid-lecture when I walked into the classroom to join Rebecca. The red-haired witch wore her usual array of bangles on her arms, which clacked together when she turned to me. “There you are, Blair. I thought we’d start familiar training today.”

  “Um… okay.” I glanced at Rebecca. “Rebecca doesn’t have a familiar yet, right?”

  “No. I thought you might help her to choose one.”

  “Oh, sure,” I said. “Um, Sky isn’t exactly conventional, though. He’s a fairy cat, not a witch familiar.”

  “You and he are closely bonded in a similar way,” she said. “I hoped you could help Rebecca get started with some basic lessons once she picks a familiar.”

  “What if I don’t get picked?” Rebecca said.

  “Then it’s no big deal,” said Rita. “But I think you need the companionship. Better hurry—the familiar shop will close soon. Here.”

  She handed Rebecca a handful of notes, which the young witch took from her with a nod of thanks.

  “How’s school?” I asked Rebecca on the way out of the classroom.

  “Horrible.” Her shoulders hunched. “Having a familiar won’t stop the others from teasing me about my mum. I wish I could change my name and move somewhere else.”

  My heart sank. I knew too well what it felt like not to belong, but I was lucky that I hadn’t had to relive my school experience in the magical world. I’d found it easier when I’d hit adulthood and it had no longer been necessary to hide from bullies. Poor Rebecca had a raw deal.

  “They’ll get over it,” I said, hearing the lie in my own words.

  “They won’t,” she said. “You know they won’t.”

  If I were her, I wouldn’t believe me either. “What exactly are they saying to you? Because I’m not supposed to tell you to fight back against the bullies, but I know ignoring them isn’t always the best course of action.” For me, ignoring the bullies had only made them try harder to get a rise out of me.

  She shrugged. “They’re just saying my mum’s a criminal and I’m going to be the same. Whenever anyone tries to be friendly to me, someone always tells them I used my magical powers on them. Then they stop talking to me because they think I’m going to enchant them.”

  “That’s awful,” I said. “Who’s doing this?”

  In my experience, bullies worked in a pack. They were terrified of being caught out alone.

  “Three girls,” she mumbled. “It doesn’t matter. My mum is a criminal. And my sister was a bully when she was at school.”

  “That’s no excuse,” I said. “I think having a familiar will help, but it’s worth talking to your teacher—”

  “Please no,” she said. “They already say I use my magical powers to make the teachers give me top grades.”

  “They know that’s not allowed, right?” I shook my head. “You’re smarter than they are. I bet they don’t like that.” I hoped to get a smile out of her, but Rebecca’s shoulders remained hunched. “Okay, is there a teacher you particularly like? I didn’t have many friends when I was at school, but I had great teachers.”

  “I have nice teachers,” she said. “But won’t telling them make things worse?”

  “Maybe,” I admitted. “But you don’t want to spend your whole time at the academy miserable because of those people, and your teachers might be able to help. In the meantime, let’s get you a familiar.”

  She dipped her head. “Okay.”

  We
made our way down the high street. I’d never had reason to visit the familiar shop before, but it was a small, pleasant little shop staffed by a wererat called Lucas. The shop’s inhabitants were entertaining enough to make it easy to ignore the unpleasant smell of animal droppings. Owls, ravens and other birds flew among the rafters, while cages of fluffy kittens filled one side of the room. Dozens of eyes blinked enquiringly at Rebecca as she approached, a smile breaking out on her face.

  “Hello,” said the shopkeeper. “Can I help you with something?”

  “We’re looking for a familiar for Rebecca,” I said.

  “A cat,” added Rebecca.

  Lucas moved in front of the cage. “Are you sure? Cats might be popular, but rats and mice are easier to train. Cats tend to have strong personalities.”

  He might not have met a fairy cat, but he knows what he’s talking about.

  Rebecca ran her teeth over her lower lip. “Ah. I just, uh, I wanted to fit in at school…”

  I leaned in and whispered, “Wouldn’t the bullies leave you alone if you send a rat up their trouser legs?”

  Rebecca giggled. Then a ginger cat with a face like a squashed tomato padded over and blinked up at her, purring.

  “Oh, that’s Toast,” said Lucas. “He’s a little older than most of the others—his last witch returned him to the shop.”

  Rebecca gave a startled jump when Toast stood on his hind legs to rub his head against her hand. “He wants me to stroke him?”

  “Go ahead.” Lucas looked between the two of them. “The familiar usually makes the first move.”

  “Is he—?" Rebecca broke off, dropping her hand. I tried to give Toast a stroke, but he ducked out of my reach and went for Rebecca again.

  “He likes you,” I said.

  Lucas gave a satisfied nod. “I’m not mistaken, I detect a familiar bond there.”

  Rebecca stopped stroking the cat. “Bond? What do you mean?”

  “The familiar is the first to notice.” Lucas nodded to Toast, who was purring happily. He was cute despite his misshapen face. “Then it’ll grow stronger as you go through training.”

  “But do I have to take him?” she said.

  I inched closer to her and whispered, “He can probably understand every word you say.”

  She flushed and looked down. “My mum would call him a loser.”

  “Your mum called me a loser of a witch. I still got her jailed for life.”

  Her mouth twitched. “The others will laugh at me.”

  “They won’t when you master familiar training at twice their speed while their own familiars won’t even come when their owners call them,” said the shopkeeper.

  “I can do that?” she asked.

  “Sure,” he said. “Toast has had three previous owners. He knows all the basic commands already, so training him should be a breeze.”

  Rebecca bit her lip. “Do you promise?”

  “Of course,” said the shopkeeper kindly. “Trust me, those sleek young familiars over there might look prettier, but what matters is loyalty. Like Bree here.”

  He snapped his fingers, and a large tabby cat padded up to him, rubbing his head against his owner’s leg.

  Five minutes later, we left the shop, pursued by Rebecca’s purring familiar.

  “He likes you,” I said.

  “He’s very trusting for someone who got ditched three times.” She dropped her voice. “I don’t know whether to bring him to school, though. I don’t need to give Sammi another excuse to laugh at me.”

  “Sammi? Is she one of the bullies?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “Sammi and her friends.”

  “Sammi as in Madame Grey’s granddaughter?” She was the school bully? Rebecca’s mother had tried to unseat Madame Grey from the council, but that was no excuse to bully Rebecca. Kids could be unforgiving, though.

  “Yeah.” She dug her hands in her pockets. “And her two friends. They’re in all my classes. I can’t escape them.”

  Maybe I should talk to Madame Grey. I didn’t know much about Sammi. The only time we’d met, I’d accidentally turned her transparent with a botched invisibility potion I’d knocked all over the floor. I wouldn’t have thought the granddaughter of the Meadowsweet Coven’s leader would turn out to be a bully, but then again, Rebecca was nothing like her sister and even less like her mother.

  We reached the witches’ headquarters and re-entered the classroom. Rita’s eyes brightened as she spotted the purring ginger cat. “Good. You did find a familiar.”

  “This is Toast,” said Rebecca, giving him a stroke behind the ears. “I picked him because nobody else wanted him.”

  “And he picked her, too,” I added.

  “The shopkeeper said he’s a fast learner, because he’s already had more than one owner,” said Rebecca.

  “We’ll try the basics first,” she said. “Calling him by name, that sort of thing. Should be simple enough, right, Blair?”

  Toast purred and rubbed his fluffy head against Rebecca’s hand. If nothing else, it would be good for her to have a friend.

  6

  An hour later, Rebecca left the classroom in a much better mood, while I stayed behind to talk to Rita about the bullying situation.

  “The cat will be good for her,” she said. “Having a familiar who’s easy to train will remove a lot of hurdles.”

  “Yes… um, she didn’t happen to mention the names of her school bullies, did she?” This needed to be dealt with, but I didn’t want to make things worse for Rebecca if I could help it.

  Rita waved her wand, returning a stack of textbooks to the cupboard. “Did she tell you?”

  “She did, and one of them is Madame Grey’s youngest granddaughter. Sammi.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Sammi? Are you sure?”

  “Rebecca told me, and I trust her word,” I said. “I know kids can be cruel, but I didn’t want to tell Madame Grey and end up with the other kids being angry with Rebecca for telling tales. It’s been a while since I was at school, so I’m not sure how to approach this.” The magical world wasn’t that different from the normal world, but bullying took on another dimension when the perpetrators carried wands and were several years of magical training ahead of their target.

  Rita paused for a moment. “Madame Grey will be very disappointed to learn about her granddaughter’s behaviour. She practically raised her, after all. But she’d rather know, I think.”

  I turned this over in my mind. “I don’t want to get too involved, but I’ll have a word with her.”

  I remembered begging my foster parents not to call my teacher when the school bullies were taunting me. When you threw magic into the equation, though? I’d rather deal with the matter before it escalated.

  From the quietness of Madame Grey’s office, it sounded like the other witches had headed back home—or rather, to my flat.

  As I raised my hand to knock, the door opened and Shannon walked out. She mumbled a hello and hurried off with her blond head down and a sheaf of papers clutched to her chest.

  I stepped aside to let her pass, and Madame Grey called my name from inside the room. “Blair, is that you?”

  “Madame Grey. I needed to talk to you.” I entered her office, a cosy room filled with bookshelves and dominated by a large wooden desk. “What were you talking to Shannon about? The theft?”

  “Shannon used to be interested in coven magic,” she said. “I hoped to learn more about her interest in the position of Head Witch, and I loaned her some of my notes.”

  “Did you suspect her of stealing the sceptre?”

  “I haven’t ruled anything out, Blair,” she said. “Have you used your lie-sensing power on everyone who was present in the house at the time of the theft?”

  “I have, but nobody admitted to anything,” I said. “I also asked Rob from the werewolf pack to see if he could sniff out any thieves, and he said nobody went into the bedroom except for me, my cat, and the Head Witch.”

  “Your fa
miliar was in the room at the time of the theft?” she asked.

  “Yes, but he would tell me if he’d seen the thief,” I said. “I only saw Aveline.”

  Right now, the Head Witch herself sat atop the suspect list. The sceptre’s owner was the most likely to know how to successfully steal it, after all. Though it didn’t explain why she’d stuck around in Fairy Falls, other than to make us lose our collective minds.

  “I’ve spoken to the others myself,” Madame Grey said. “All of them admitted to wanting to be in with a chance of ascending to the title of Head Witch, but none confessed to the theft.”

  “Is there another reason they might have wanted it, though?” I tried to read her expression, but it was inscrutable. Accusing Aveline might provoke the Head Witch to take it as an insult. Grace Rosemary seemed the second likeliest thief, yet surely if Aveline suspected her, she wouldn’t have happily sat there playing Scrabble with the pink-haired witch and her daughters. Right?

  “Oh, countless reasons,” she said. “Perhaps the thief had a specific spell they needed the sceptre for, or they wanted to restore their coven to its former glory… or to enact a ritual.” Her gaze briefly dropped to the desk, where a book lay open to a double-page spread depicting a collection of unreadable symbols.

  “Ritual?” I echoed. “You mean like the one Peter the wizard wanted to use to make himself as powerful as a vampire?”

  “Yes, but even more potent,” she said. “Peter was working with nothing but his own props. The sceptre is a magical beacon. And at this time of year, it’s even stronger than usual.”

  “Because the veil between worlds is thinner.” A chill skittered down my spine. “Um, would Aveline have been able to use the sceptre to help me speak to my mother’s ghost?”

  I still hadn’t figured out if that’s what my dad had implied in his last message, but if he had, word of the Head Witch being here in Fairy Falls must have reached him even in prison. Perhaps the pixie had told him.

  Madame Grey gave me a stern look. “If we do not return the sceptre to its owner, we will have worse to concern ourselves with than the veils thinning, Blair. We need to find this thief and ensure that they are appropriately punished and the sceptre returned for the ceremony, or else I fear this Samhain will be grim indeed.”