by Sarina Dorie
Vega removed her wool coat and carried it. Abigail shoved her jacket into a bag.
“Almost there,” Vega said. “You have the vodka, right?”
“Yes,” Abigail said.
Lucifer meowed, the sound pitiful. He darted between Abigail’s legs, making her stumble.
“What was that for?” she asked.
He meowed again.
“What’s he saying?” Abigail asked.
Vega’s eyes remained steady on the path. “How the hell should I know?”
“I thought you could speak to animals.” That was what Vega had implied. “Or do I have to pay you in food to convince you to translate?”
Vega sighed in exasperation. “I can only talk to cats when I’m a cat. I understand people when I’m a person.”
“So you’re a werecat?”
“No, werecats can only change during a full moon. I can transform whenever I want.” She evaded Abigail’s gaze.
“You led me to believe you could understand Lucy. You lied to me.”
“I didn’t lie. I misled.” Vega shrugged. “And he did tell me all that crap about being sorry and how he doesn’t like Jeb.”
Abigail wondered what else Vega had “misled” her about. Lucifer ran circles around them, obviously agitated. He’d been distressed when Abigail had been speaking with the principal too—who had turned out to be inept and possibly untrustworthy.
“Are we in some kind of danger? Are there Fae about?” Abigail asked. If she had her alphabet board with her, she could have placed it in front of him to spell out what he wanted to say—if he didn’t lose his patience and leave the board midway through spelling out a word as sometimes he did.
“We’re perfectly safe.” Vega nudged Lucifer out of the path with her foot. “No Fae would dare mess with my grandmother.”
That meant the woman was powerful. But she accepted gifts of flour, sugar, and vodka?
It was only when they exited the forest that Abigail recognized where she was. Cheerful spring sunshine illuminated the cottage. A gate made of bones closed in the garden, goat, and chickens. The posts were made of skulls. Lace curtains were drawn at the windows.
Abigail halted. Lucifer sat on her feet as if trying to tell her not to take another step.
“I can’t wait to introduce you to my grandmother,” Vega said.
Vega had brought her to Baba Nata’s cottage.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Coldhearted Witch
During the time Abigail had served as Baba Nata’s apprentice after her family had died, the old hedge witch had been wise and cunning, but not always forthcoming. By the time Baba had shown Abigail her fate—or the two most possible paths for her fate—Abigail had been done with her apprenticeship, but Lucifer had years more to go. Baba had warned Lucifer he wasn’t permitted to leave. Instead he’d run away with Abigail.
His punishment for leaving haunted the both of them.
Abigail looked down at Lucifer. He meowed anxiously. He had once vowed he would never return. Not after Abigail had told him the fate that she faced if she stayed in the Faerie Realm. Both possible paths had ended in death and dismemberment. Only in the Morty Realm was she safe.
A creaky voice with an Eastern European accent said from inside, “Come in, my dorogoy. I’ve been expecting you.” Baba Nata cackled.
Abigail didn’t want to go in. Baba Nata represented everything she feared about the world of witches and Fae.
“What is wrong with you?” Vega nudged Abigail. “You wanted me to bring you to a witch who could solve your problems. Are you coming or not?”
Abigail looked to Lucifer. “I know the rules. We aren’t lost. We didn’t come here by accident. That means she can’t keep us, right? We can at least listen to what she has to say.”
He looked from Abigail to the house before giving her a curt nod.
The old woman hadn’t changed since Abigail had last seen her. She sat in her rocking chair knitting an afghan. Her nose was comically long, and her chin jutted out with a wart on it. She hid her snowy-white hair under a red kerchief that mismatched with the paisley pattern of her purple shirt. Her face was so weathered it was difficult to tell how old she was. She didn’t look as though she’d aged. Perhaps she hadn’t.
Time had a strange way of passing—or not passing—with the way Baba kept time, traveling from one spring and summer season to the next in the forest. Abigail had never quite understood how that kind of magic worked.
Her cottage was deceptively large from what the exterior of the shack hinted. The woman’s bed was nearly hidden by a curtained partition. A table was set for three, a steaming pot of tea with mismatched cups and saucers on the table. In the corner a child stared out from a cage.
Abigail’s stomach clenched. She knew what Baba did to lost children. The girl stared out at her through the bars of the cage, though she didn’t speak. The smart ones learned quickly. They didn’t get poked with a knitting needle if they were quiet.
Vega leaned down and kissed the old woman on the cheek. “It’s nice to see you, Baba. We brought you gifts, and I have a guest with me. Her name is—”
Baba squinted. “Abigail MacQuillan.”
“Abigail Lawrence,” Abigail corrected.
Vega laughed. “I suppose you know why we’ve come too?”
“To make deal with devil.” Baba jabbed a knitting needle in Lucifer’s direction. “Ah, and there he is. My favorite apprentice.”
Lucy hid behind Abigail.
“Can I offer you tea?” Baba didn’t leave her chair.
Vega slid the bottle of vodka from the bag Abigail had been carrying. “Look what I brought you, Baba. Your favorite.”
The old woman smiled. “What good granddaughter you are!”
Vega removed the flour and sugar and placed them next to the table. “Look what else I brought you.”
Abigail understood Vega’s self-serving ploy to use her now. “And did you bake the brownies for her too?”
Vega held herself taller. “Of course I did. Why wouldn’t they be from me?” Her eyes narrowed in challenge.
Baba gestured Vega closer. She patted her granddaughter on the cheek. “Because you fail mundane tasks like baking, cleaning, and sewing—so you make someone else do it for you.” She looked to Abigail in the same way she once had when she’d been her apprentice. “You remember why magic doesn’t solve all problems?”
“It’s a waste of magic to use it on mundane tasks,” Abigail recited. “One doesn’t need to sacrifice blood, animals, or plants on tasks that can be accomplished through hard work.”
Vega made a face at Abigail as she poured the vodka into teacups. “Whatever.”
One would think someone who made her apprentices remember such pragmatic ideals would have been less likely to use pain magic for reaching her goals. Abigail glanced at the child in the cage, her hands itching to lift the latch and free the girl. She had never liked using Baba’s preferred methods of magic. It was effective, but the cost was always too high.
“Hard work is sacrifice I ask for.” Baba skewered Lucifer with her gaze. “Has my apprentice learned his lesson?”
“Are you saying you would turn Lucy back if he finishes his apprenticeship?” Abigail asked.
“If he comes willingly, da. He will be my apprentice, and then he will be free.”
“Lucifer was my grandma’s apprentice? Was Baba the one who turned him into a cat in the first place?” Vega smirked at Lucifer. “You didn’t tell me that. You’ve been holding back on me.”
Abigail picked up her familiar and hugged him. “If you finished your apprenticeship, you would be human again. Think how nice that would be. You only had five more years?”
He lifted up his nose at her. Time passed differently here. What took five years in this realm might be longer in the outside world.
“I would be willing to shorten agreement to four,” Baba said.
Abig
ail had known Baba valued Lucifer as an apprentice. She had valued Abigail—back when she’d had considerably more magic. But there was another reason Baba had favored him. He’d been able to use powerful magic with his affinity that even Baba couldn’t perform. Electricity could be dangerous, but it also was useful.
“Do you realize how lucky you are?” Vega turned her gaze to the cat. “Even if you found someone else to change you back permanently, think about how lost you’d be. You would be unskilled at magic and too rusty to protect yourself against Fae who might want to snatch you up. You need a teacher.”
Lucifer looked to Abigail.
“Nyet!” Baba said. “Do not look to her. You drained her. Even if she had plant magic, that isn’t enough to save you.”
He buried his face against Abigail’s neck.
“It’s all right. I don’t blame you,” Abigail said. “It was an accident. And there was good that came out of it. I found a life for myself—the life I had always wanted in the Morty Realm.” Tears filled her eyes at the idea of parting with him. “But my life in the Morty Realm has robbed you of yours. It’s time you turned back into a boy.”
“A man,” Vega said quietly. “He’s an adult now.”
“I’ll wait for you,” Abigail said, though she knew she might be an old woman by the time he finished his apprenticeship.
Baba nodded in approval. “How many years has it been that Lucifer has been cat? Twenty?”
“Closer to thirty,” Abigail said quietly.
“It will take sacrifice to undo what has been done. It will cost someone life.” Baba shifted in her rocking chair and studied the child in the cage.
The girl jerked back from the bars, whimpering.
“No,” Abigail said firmly.
“It isn’t your decision,” Baba said. “This choice belongs to Lucy.”
Lucifer looked from the caged child and back to Baba. His eyes narrowed, and he hissed.
“There you have it. He won’t be tempted to use some child’s life for your sacrifice.” Abigail scratched him behind the ears. “It’s because you’re a good person, Lucy. You have a good heart.”
Vega drummed her fingers against the table, her gaze fixed on her grandmother. “You only need a life because it’s been . . . thirty years. Is that correct?”
Lucifer shook his head.
“What if it hasn’t been thirty years since he’s been a man?” Vega’s lips curled upward into a smile. “What if it’s only been one night?”
Lucifer hissed.
“What do you mean?” Abigail asked.
“He didn’t want you to know. He made me promise not to tell you.” Vega glanced at him.
Lucifer threw himself out of Abigail’s arms, landing on his feet only to lunge at Vega. He was fast, but she was faster. She jumped back from the table, nearly stepping into the hearth. She raised a wand and circled it around herself, a protective purple bubble flashing around her when Lucifer attempted to silence her with his claws.
“Don’t you dare attack me. I’m trying to help,” Vega said. “If Abigail loves you, she’ll forgive you.”
He yowled and batted at the protective bubble before slinking under the table and collapsing in a heap.
“I’ll forgive him for what?” Abigail asked.
“I accidentally broke his curse last night,” Vega said. “I turned him into a man. That’s when he told me about the principal and your plan to turn him back.”
Irritation needled at Abigail’s nerves. “I thought you said you spoke to him when you were a cat.”
Vega crossed her arms. “I embellished the truth.”
Baba leaned forward with interest. “I use strong magic. How did you break curse?”
Vega sighed in exasperation. “I don’t know exactly. It was an accident. It was while we were both cats. I was luring him back to the school.”
Lucifer yowled and hid himself deeper in the shadows.
“Ah,” Baba said, nodding. “I see.”
“What?” Abigail asked.
Baba clucked her tongue. “You remember his affinity, da?”
Abigail did. His affinity was touch magic. Pleasure. When he used incubus magic, there sometimes was an electrical effect that could negate other magics. Abigail looked to Vega again. She sat at the table, daintily drinking her vodka. The protective bubble shimmered around her.
Abigail felt her jaw clenching. “He came back with you to the school when you were a cat because you lured him with sex?”
“What can I say? He’s male.” Vega shrugged. “And I’m resourceful.”
Baba cackled.
Abigail crouched next to the table. “Come out, Lucy. I’m not mad.”
He slunk out, head hanging between his shoulders.
She patted his head. “I know Vega has wounded your pride by tattling on you, but there’s nothing to be ashamed about. I don’t hold it against you. Do you hold it against me that I got married while you were stuck as a cat?”
He huffed.
“That’s a ‘yes’ in case you couldn’t tell,” Vega said. “He told me last night.”
“Shush.” Baba stabbed a knitting needle in her granddaughter’s direction and shook her head. “You made your point. I do not need life. Fingers and toes will do.” She looked to the child in the cage.
“No,” Abigail said, her words drowned out by Lucifer’s yowl. Obviously he didn’t like the idea of mutilating a child any more than she did.
“You will not touch that child,” Abigail said.
“Then I cannot perform magic. I need pain and blood. It doesn’t matter whose.” Baba looked from Abigail to Vega.
Vega shook her head. “Don’t look at me. I’m not giving anyone my fingers or toes.”
Abigail couldn’t regrow her fingers now that her Amni Plandai magic was weak. Even so, Lucifer had sacrificed so much for her. He deserved a happy and ordinary life. She’d had her turn at normal. Now it was his.
It had taken Abigail this long to return to Baba, but it felt as though all the pieces of her fate fell into place. If she were to join Lucifer in the Faerie Realm, she had two paths before her. Both led to dismemberment. Either Abigail could be selfish and seek out magic to make herself powerful so she wouldn’t need to sacrifice herself, though her heart would grow cruel and unloving in the end, or she would sacrifice too much of herself, first doing so to help those she loved, and then later to prevent the deaths of strangers.
Yet Abigail had a daughter to think about. She couldn’t just abandon Clarissa so that she could be with Lucifer. Nor did she want to become cruel and uncaring and lose who she was in order to solve her problems. Clarissa might have been an adult woman, but she still needed a mother.
Abigail glanced at the child in the cage. It was unforgivable to take this child’s fingers—or her life. She could see how the path toward either fate was only steps away.
“I will give myself as a sacrifice,” Abigail said.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Furmidable Sacrifices
Lucifer meowed pitifully.
Abigail held herself taller. “It isn’t your decision. If I want to chop off my fingers and toes for you, that’s up to me.”
“I do not need all fingers. Only . . . seven or eight,” Baba said.
“Well, that makes a huge difference,” Vega muttered.
Lucifer ran circles around Abigail’s feet. He batted at her leg with his paw, but he didn’t claw her. He never did, whether it was out of love or the guilt of being the one who had drained her.
“You said he has to be willing,” Vega waved a hand at him, her gesture lazy. “I can already tell he isn’t going to be.”
Lucifer stilled, his eyes flashing like topaz before returning to green.
“He’s just going to run away again if you try to pressure him,” Vega said.
He pawed the air in Vega’s direction. He was trying to tell Abigail something again. If only she could
understand him.
“Are you agreeing with Vega?” Abigail asked.
He meowed and nodded.
“I will not be part of harming a child.” Abigail removed the foil-wrapped package from the bag she’d brought but left the other offerings under the table. She strode toward the door. “There isn’t anything else to discuss here, then. Is there?” She said the words, yet her gaze flitted toward the child in the cage.
Abigail didn’t like the idea of leaving anyone to suffer, but Baba had always been uncompromising about releasing the lost children she acquired in the forest.
“Where are you going?” Vega’s gaze was fixed on the foil-wrapped brownies. “We haven’t even had brownies and vodka yet.”
“I left you a plate of your own brownies on your desk at school.” Abigail was ready to go, though she suspected she would need Vega’s assistance returning to the school.
She waited at the door for Vega to join her, but the other woman didn’t budge.
“Come. Sit. Let us eat and drink for a spell.” Baba’s eyes glittered.
Abigail couldn’t tell if Baba was making a joke or being literal.
“And bring back the brownies.” Vega patted an empty place at the table.
Lucifer swaggered over to the cage. He stared at the child within. Abigail suspected he didn’t like leaving the girl either.
“Tell me about the child,” Abigail said.
“She was lost. I found her. She is mine,” Baba said simply.
The girl spoke, her words tremulous and high. “I wasn’t lost! I was looking for my brother!”
Those words struck a chord in Abigail’s heart. She once had been searching for her brother lost in the forest. The difference between her and this girl was that she’d come to Baba for help, not stumbled upon her accidentally.
“You were not looking for me, but you found my cottage,” Baba said. “Therefore, you were lost.”
“Did she eat any of your gingerbread cottage?” Abigail asked. That was the illusion children usually saw rather than the ominous bones.
Baba sucked on her teeth. She didn’t answer.
“She isn’t really yours to keep. Is she?” Abigail asked.