“It’ll come back.” He spoke with his usual effortless confidence. “I’m in training.”
We studied until the light died through the dim windows, and eventually Nick excused himself. As soon as he had, I leaned over the table and spoke to Prudence in an urgent voice.
“Meet me at the tea shop and let’s try to banish this demon first thing tomorrow.” I hesitated. “There’s no need to tell Nick.”
Prudence arched a brow. “Why not? It’s better for witches to be three. Nick seems very eager … to help.”
I ignored her significant pause. “He’s very kind.”
“Oh, Sabrina.” Prudence laughed. “A real witch doesn’t know how to be kind. And Nick’s a man. Whenever a man is helpful, he expects you to return it tenfold.”
“I don’t think Nick’s like that, but if—if he is hoping for something more than friendship from me, I don’t know whether I can give it to him. I still love Harvey.”
“That must be painful.”
For a moment I thought Prudence was being a sympathetic friend.
Then she added: “And embarrassing. Like a lingering rash.”
I accepted Prudence was going to Prudence, and leaned forward across the table toward her. “Can we go, you and me?”
Prudence rose from her chair and stretched. “I could use some mayhem in the morning. Why not? For now, you must excuse me.” She wiggled her fingers. “I have dark suspicions to explore and vengeance to take.”
“So a pretty average evening for you, then.”
Prudence grinned nastily and departed.
We would banish the dark spirit at dawn, but that still left me some time. Ms. Wardwell always gave me good advice.
Last time the mortals of Greendale were under threat, I’d signed away my soul. I’d signed away my name, and now I didn’t know who Sabrina Spellman was anymore. I was full of doubts these days.
I would protect my friends whenever they needed me, but I hoped this time was easier than the last. I didn’t have another soul to sell.
Prudence tracked Nick Scratch from the library, flew into the witch-hunter’s home, and wrenched her brother out of the witch-hunter’s arms. The witch-hunter didn’t fight her, so she let him live. She clutched Judas tight to her chest for a moment, hearing his startled whimper in her ear. She palmed the fuzz of black hair on his head, then whirled and dumped him on Nick so she could range herself between her little brother and danger. Nick gave a dismayed exclamation. She fixed him with a glare that promised death and torments even beyond the grave.
“Nicholas Scratch, you dumb slut,” Prudence hissed. “In a lifetime of dumb-slut decisions, this one takes the cauldron. What in Satan’s name made you think it was a good idea to hand over babies to witch-hunters?”
Nick opened his mouth, but the witch-hunter got there first.
“Um,” he said. “It’s not okay to slut-shame people.”
Prudence looked at him over her shoulder. “Is it okay to rip out your tongue?”
The witch-hunter continued quietly: “And I didn’t hurt the baby.”
The fury that passed through Prudence felt like a lightning strike. She whirled on the witch-hunter, who blinked down at her with his stupid cow’s eyes and his total lack of a survival instinct and parted his lips to no doubt say more fool things. She launched herself at him, uncapping a vial, and forced the liquid between his teeth as she held his scruffy hair in one clawed hand, yanking his head back and holding him even though he tried to struggle.
It wasn’t Hilda Spellman’s truth cake, but even the most unsophisticated truth potions would do in a pinch.
“What was that?” demanded the witch-hunter, white-faced. “It tastes terrible!”
He looked terrified, and she was glad. He should know the consequences if he messed with what was hers.
“Now you have no choice but to tell me the truth,” she snarled. “What did you do to my brother?”
“My neighbor advised me how to look after babies,” said the witch-hunter. “Then I gave him a bottle, rattled things to amuse him, and walked the floor with him, and I sang him a song. Which Nick caught me doing, so I stopped.”
“Why?” Nick asked.
“Because I was very embarrassed, Nick,” the witch-hunter snapped. “God.”
Prudence gave a shriek of rage. “Do not use language like that in front of the baby!”
“Oh, right,” said the witch-hunter. “Sorry.”
He’d probably been talking like that in front of Judas all day. It was as if Nick had delivered the baby to hellhounds who’d given him hellfleas. She had to admit Judas seemed unharmed, but that didn’t allay Prudence’s suspicions for an instant.
“What were you planning to do with him?”
“I was hoping to get him down for a second nap?” the witch-hunter offered.
Even through the blood roaring in her ears, he sounded helpless. Nick gave a pointed cough. Prudence threw a menacing look over her shoulder. Nick was holding the baby very awkwardly. Judas was crying, and Prudence didn’t blame him one bit.
“Did you say he was your brother?” the witch-hunter asked unexpectedly.
Prudence bristled. “So what if I did?”
When she faced him again, the witch-hunter’s eyes had gone soft in a hideous way, like someone was melting feelings right there on his face. He still looked frightened, but as though he’d found a reason to ignore fear.
“I understand,” he told her.
“You don’t understand anything about me, witch-hunter, and you never will.”
“The baby liked being with him,” Nick contributed.
Prudence spat in Nick’s direction: “If one of his witch-hunter relatives walked through this door and decided to drown a warlock baby, who’d stop them?”
Nick looked chastened for the first time. Nick Scratch always did think he could get away with doing whatever he wanted. He never expected real consequences.
The witch-hunter said, “I would stop them.”
She’d noticed the first time they’d met that the witch-hunter tried to make himself look smaller than he was, hunching his shoulders and ducking his head. He wasn’t doing that now. There were weapons of cold iron in the room, and the witch-hunter looked ready to fight. This wasn’t a bunny rabbit. This was a snake in the grass. Even if he didn’t know it himself, Prudence knew. He was dangerous.
“You have to believe me,” the witch-hunter told her, with a slight crooked smile. “Because of the truth spell.”
“Oh, I don’t have to do what any man tells me, mortal,” she sneered, but she felt her anger slipping away.
He was doing it on purpose, she realized, saying words to calm her, in the same soothing the way he’d rocked the baby. She couldn’t work out his game, but she wouldn’t be lulled into a false sense of security. There was no security to be found in the world, and least of all in a hunter’s house.
Prudence held on to anger. That felt safer.
“I didn’t mean to upset you, Prudence.” Nick winked at her, a little conciliatory and a lot flirty. “I didn’t actually plan for you to find out about this.”
Anger suddenly came very easy.
“Oh, I will kill you, Nick Scratch!”
“I thought it would be a good thing to do,” Nick continued, suicidally. “I figured the mortal would be kind to the baby. Babies need kindness.”
The witch-hunter gave Nick a strange look. “Everyone needs kindness, Nick.”
There was a horrible, lost silence. Nick gazed at Prudence beseechingly, as if she knew how to respond to such a bizarre statement any more than he did. Nick gave up, bit his lip, and stared at the floor.
“So, scary nose ring Prudence is a witch too?” the witch-hunter asked, like what he’d said before was normal. “That makes sense, I guess.”
Nick laughed.
“Stay out of this, Nicholas!” The force of Prudence’s glare sent Nick retreating discreetly to the porch.
He didn’t go far. P
rudence could still see him in the doorway with the whimpering baby bundled in his arms. Hesitantly, and very softly, Nick attempted a howl for the baby. Prudence suspected it was the closest thing to a lullaby Nick knew. Judas kept whining.
“Don’t try to sweet-talk me,” Prudence ordered the witch-hunter. “I know what you are. I remember visiting your stupid mortal school, and hearing you talk about your family’s history of murdering my people as ‘kind of messed up.’ ”
She sneered. The witch-hunter’s face flushed. It made Prudence sick to look at him, fumbling for words as he blazed out his terrible emotions for anyone to see.
“I didn’t—I didn’t know how else to talk about it. Reading about it made me feel—uncomfortable, and guilty, even though I didn’t do anything. I’m not great with words. Maybe I didn’t put it the right way.”
“Imagine how I feel about witch-hunters. Imagine how I feel about you,” hissed Prudence. “Imagine how my sisters felt, when they saw you and your brother in the grove of familiars, with guns in your hands.”
“My brother?” The soft voice and soft eyes were gone. The witch-hunter’s voice went sharp. “Did you have something to do with what happened to my brother?”
He caught Prudence’s arm and shook her. She recognized the storm passing over his face, darkness with a glint of fire. Lightning, born in a black cloud. This was wrath. She knew how to deal with wrath.
She grabbed his absurd flannel shirt in both fists, pulling him in threateningly close. “No,” she said between her teeth. “I didn’t.”
The witch-hunter’s voice was cold as well as sharp, like the blades of his ancestors.
“But witches killed him. Imagine how I feel about witches. Imagine how I feel about you.”
Prudence didn’t flinch. He might have weapons in the room, but she had magic in her. She could kill him and paint the walls with his blood.
“Hey,” said Nick from the doorway. “If you guys are going to make out, could I put down the baby and join in?”
Prudence and the witch-hunter let go of each other abruptly. Prudence gave him a shove across the room for good measure.
“I find you physically repulsive,” Prudence informed the witch-hunter.
“Well, you terrify me to the point where I’m pretty sure I couldn’t, uh, perform,” he said, then added hastily: “Truth spell! Remember I’m under a truth spell. I wouldn’t normally talk this way in front of a baby.”
“I’m just saying,” said Prudence. “It’s probably what you expect of witches at this point, but I won’t fall tragically in love with you.”
The witch-hunter swallowed a laugh. “Sabrina’s over me. Every other witch I meet hates my guts, except maybe her aunt Hilda. Zelda never liked me. Ambrose always looked down on me.”
This information was distracting.
“Did he?”
“Uh, yeah. He constantly made fun of me.”
“Oh,” Prudence breathed.
Ambrose Spellman. Such a dreamboat.
“Now you understand,” said the witch-hunter. “I’m pathetic. Everybody knows. There’s no need to be afraid.”
He spoke easily, not fighting the truth spell, as though he was only telling her the bare facts. She hadn’t realized mortals could be as lonely as that.
The witch-hunter’s name was Harvey, Prudence recalled. She didn’t have any special reason to remember it. She wished she could forget his stupid name, actually, but Sabrina said it so often that was impossible: Harvey, Harvey, Harvey, I love him, his feelings matter, blah, blah, blah, Harvey.
“Stop saying I’m afraid,” she bit out. “I’m not afraid of anything.”
“I can see you’re not under a truth spell.” When Prudence snarled, Harvey put his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “But I am. Don’t kill me.”
“I might kill you,” said Prudence. “I might kill anybody.”
Her gaze traveled from the hideous sight of Harvey the witch-hunter, all flannel shirts and feelings, to Nick Scratch being smug in a black sweater. Prudence despaired, she truly did. Men were the false god’s worst mistake.
She sighed and leaned against the kitchen cabinets. “I’ll get you, Nick Scratch. You won’t know when, and you won’t know where. Sometime when you least expect it, you will pay for this.”
“You shouldn’t have given the baby to me without telling her,” Harvey told Nick earnestly.
“Don’t be on my side,” Prudence grumbled. “I don’t like you.”
“I don’t like you either,” said Harvey. “You’re very beautiful, but I hate magic, you horrify me to the marrow of my bones, and I’ve never seen you be nice to anyone. Your only redeeming quality is your cool eye makeup.”
Prudence and Nick both stared at him. Harvey appeared to be trying to stare at his own mouth.
“Unholy hell, I like truth spells,” Nick murmured.
“But that doesn’t change what’s right and wrong,” Harvey said. “You also shouldn’t have hit on Prudence when she was clearly upset.”
Nick exchanged a baffled look with Prudence, but Prudence shook her head. She had no idea what the witch-hunter was talking about either.
“Didn’t mean anything by it, Prudence. Just a reflex. I used to date her and the rest of the Weird Sisters,” Nick explained helpfully.
It was the witch-hunter’s turn to seem staggered.
“At the same time?”
Nick nodded in a cautious fashion, as though he feared this might go wrong for him but he couldn’t yet see how.
“How many girlfriends do you have at once?” Harvey demanded.
“Well.” Nick frowned. “It varies.”
The witch-hunter was getting agitated. “How many girlfriends do you currently have? Are you planning to add Sabrina to your girlfriend stable?”
“I don’t have any girlfriends right now,” said Nick. “Would Sabrina want it to be just us?”
Surely not, thought Prudence.
“Of course!” said the witch-hunter.
Nick shrugged. “Then that’s fine.”
“Does Sabrina know about the girlfriend stable?” Harvey asked.
Nick nodded. Harvey shook his head with conviction. Slowly, Nick began to copy the head shaking. Prudence thought they both appeared ridiculous. Baby Judas wailed judgmentally at them.
“You might want to clarify this issue for Sabrina,” advised the witch-hunter. “She might think—I don’t know what she would think.”
Prudence had no idea what was going on, or why Nick believed any of it was a good idea. Possibly Nick had been dropped on his head as a child. Possibly he’d been dropped right off a mountain as a child.
To cover her uncertainty, she strode menacingly over to Nick and snatched her brother away from him. Nick seemed pleased to be relieved of the burden. Prudence shot him a venomous glance and whisked away from the door.
This brought her into unfortunate proximity with the witch-hunter, at which point Prudence was cruelly betrayed by her own flesh and blood. Baby Judas cooed and made grabby hands in the witch-hunter’s direction.
Prudence recoiled. “Is he brainwashed? What have you done with him?”
“Nothing! God, you are so weird,” said the witch-hunter. “You’re almost as weird as Nick.”
“Language!” thundered Prudence.
The witch-hunter, with reckless disregard for his own safety, actually dared to lean against Prudence’s shoulder and curl his fingers around Baby Judas’s tiny hand.
“Hey, Jude.” He smiled a little smile and gave the baby’s hand a little shake.
His voice had gone stupid and soft again, and his unkempt hair fell into his eyes as he stooped over the baby. Prudence wished to visit extreme violence upon him, but she had her hands full.
Harvey glanced up at her through his awful hair. “He looks like you.”
“Does he?” Prudence studied her baby brother’s small face. “Well. Perhaps he does.”
Her father didn’t look like her. Nobody who belo
nged to Prudence had ever looked like her before.
“Doesn’t have the cool eye makeup,” Nick contributed sardonically. “But give him time.”
The witch-hunter laughed. Surprising herself, Prudence laughed too. She and the witch-hunter gave each other a mutually disconcerted look.
“The Weird Sisters,” the witch-hunter said, after a pause. “Is that a band?”
They were a band of sinners. Prudence nodded.
“Cool,” said the witch-hunter shyly. “Are you the singer?”
“I do sing,” Prudence admitted.
The witch-hunter seemed to be weighing something. “Do you guys … want to stay for dinner?”
“Yes,” said Nick instantly.
“Aha!” exclaimed Prudence. “You were the lasagna dealer!”
“Um,” said Harvey. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Prudence shoved him. “Weren’t you ever taught not to feed strays!”
She’d heard of a honey trap. Possibly the mortals did lasagna traps too. Possibly they used many foods to trap people.
Prudence could see how that might work. At the Academy of Unseen Arts, they kept the students’ rations low, to make sure the students stayed keen and sharp. Witches were born hungry, ravenous for power, for sustenance, for immortality and dark glory. Prudence sometimes thought Satan forbade witches to love because if witches loved at all, they would love with the same consuming ferocity that they hungered.
Satan’s command saved them from the weakness that destroyed mortals. Imagine the shame, groveling for scraps of affection like a beggar at a feast. Better to turn away from love forever.
Witches were meant to be starving creatures. She found herself wondering what they might have for dinner if they stayed, and grew even more furious because she’d actually considered it.
“What are you trying to do?” Prudence demanded of the witch-hunter. “You want to make friends with witches? Don’t make me laugh. You must hate witches. I’m sure you hate Nick.”
Both of their gazes went to Nick. He had his hands in his pockets and an unreadable look on his face.
The mortal swallowed. “Sometimes.”
Prudence threw a triumphant smile at Nick. “Of course you do. He’s better-looking and more sexually charismatic than you—though it wouldn’t be hard to be more sexually charismatic than you—”
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