by Melanie Rawn
“— and the slivovitz and rice wine and sake kinds, too, I bet. The thing of it is that Bradshaw doesn’t scare, Evan. He can be reckless. I used to think it was because he had something to prove about himself. But it’s not his own pisello he’s screwing them with, it’s the law’s.”
The last thing on Elias Bradshaw’s mind at that moment was anybody’s pisello, even his own. Maria Sbarra, scorning a caterer, had made all manner of gorgeous Brazilian food for her husband’s retirement party, and Bradshaw was happily loading a plate with delicacies.
He had just accepted a glass of red wine when a familiar voice said at his shoulder, “There’s a store in the Village you ought to check out.”
“Good evening to you, too, Ms. McClure,” he retorted.
“I’ll make small talk when Suze gets back from the bathroom.” Holly poured herself a glass of wine and went on, “Anyway, this store —”
“Shopping isn’t a guy thing.”
“I’d noticed,” she said, giving his suit a once-over. “I mean an occult shop. It used to be a mystery bookstore, but the new owner has turned it into—well, go see for yourself. Personally, I think it’s pretty much nothing, but Alec and Nicky asked me to check it out. And I have a feeling Denise shops there for some of her toys.”
“And this concerns me how?”
Her mouth thinned. “Just reporting in, Magistrate, like it says in the rule book,” she snapped, and walked off.
A few minutes later, making the rounds, Elias approached Susannah. “Is there something wrong with my clothes?”
She looked at him as if he had lost his mind, then made one of those mental jumps he could never predict, and grinned. “Well, you have to admit that Evan Lachlan’s wardrobe has improved exponentially since he started dating Holly.”
“Gee, and here I thought he’d had a Queer Eye for the Straight Guy makeover.”
“Oh, hilarious,” Susannah growled. “At least let me buy you a few new ties.”
“No.”
“A shirt or two? Those white button-downs are really boring, Eli.”
“Double no.”
“How about a sweater? Argyle socks? Suspenders with cute little gavels on them?”
Two glasses of wine and another heaping plate of food made Bradshaw’s evening complete — until Maria brought out the desserts. He pounced, and got his hand slapped away from the chocolate-rolled brigadieros for his trouble.
“Only on condition that you perform for my skeptical grandchildren,” Maria scolded. “They’ve heard from their mothers for years and do not believe a word.”
“Oh, God,” Elias moaned.
“Heard about what?” Susannah asked.
“Laranja.” Maria folded her arms and grinned.
Two daughters and a grandson standing nearby had regrettably sharp ears, and the clamor began. Maria vanished into the kitchen and returned a moment later to toss Elias a navel orange the size of a softball. He caught it one-handed; the children recognized this as tacit agreement to Laranja, and cheered. With great ceremony Maria then presented a long-handled fork and a paring knife, which Bradshaw accepted with a courtly bow.
After sticking the fork into the orange, he held knife and fruit aloft as someone dimmed the lights so only the tabletop candles glowed. “Thank you, thank you,” he intoned. “Here we have a common, everyday, completely ordinary orange. Nothing special, nothing extraordinary. Just an orange.” He paused. “Or is it?”
Holly’s Virginia drawl: “Really workin’ it, ain’t he?”
Susannah’s laughter: “You should see him in a courtroom.”
“Out of order!” Bradshaw thundered.
Frank Sbarra called out, “He’ll see you in chambers later, Counselor!”
“I’m counting on it!” Susannah retorted, and everyone laughed.
“Where was I?” Elias complained. “Oh, yes—a common, ordinary orange.” With an artistic flourish he brought knife and fruit together. An impressively narrow spiral of peel began to droop lower and lower. Maria produced a copper saucepan and set it on the floor at his feet. Longer, longer, until the peel nearly reached the lip of the pan and there was only a small circle of untouched orange left at the top. Then the knife was tossed onto the table, and he closed a fist around the orange, squeezing gently so juice ran in delicate rivulets down the peel.
“Now, if my lovely assistant would assist?” he asked, and as he held the orange out on the fork Maria extended a silver candlestick, flame flickering in the darkness—and sudden fire spiraled down the peel to the gasps and applause of the crowd.
Laranja completed, lights and music were restored and Elias happily gorged himself on brigadieros and the nastily named but utterly delicious confection of coconut, prune, vanilla, and clove, olbos de sogra — “mother-in-law’s eyes.”
An hour or so later he was upstairs getting his and Susannah’s coats when the bedroom door slammed behind him. Turning, he beheld Holly McClure.
“I assume you know how incredibly stupid that was.”
“You assume wrongly.” He shrugged into his overcoat, slinging Susannah’s over his elbow.
“Goddammit, Evan’s primed to see Witches wherever he goes with me—never mind that this was a party for one of his friends—no, you had to show up and do your little magic act—”
“It wasn’t magic.”
“—and to think you had the gall to yell at me after that Imbolc thing! How could you be so stupid?”
“It wasn’t magic,” he said again.
That stopped her. At last. “It wasn’t?”
“No. Maria injected liquor into the orange — it takes about a pint to saturate it enough, so I hope she used the cheap vodka. I learned how to do Laranja back in law school. Now, if you’re finished being paranoid, I’m going home.”
“Paranoid!”
“You’re the writer with the million-dollar vocabulary—what would you call it? It’s not explanations you’re into; it’s excuses. Your magic is like a stash of pornography that you shove into a corner when somebody visits. Which reminds me—how do you excuse all the protections on your home to the uninitiated? Quaint old Virginia folk art?” he jeered.
“Back off, Magistrate!”
“What the hell is your problem anyway? That bookstore you mentioned tonight—if you’d used just a little of what you’ve got, you could have discovered all kinds of things, but there’s no doubt that you went in there as an ordinary customer. Too much effort, Holly? Would it put you out to investigate a little for a couple of men you claim to respect and value? Or would that be too close to actually thinking like a Witch?”
“And just how compartmentalized is your life, Your Honor? Doesn’t your Craft get checked at the courtroom door? And what sort of excuses do you make to Susannah?”
“Probably the same ones you’ve made for almost twenty years.”
“At least Evan knows what I am.”
“How’d that happen, by the way? ‘Welcome home, Marshal, pass me the bat’s wings’?”
“At least,” she repeated with vicious sweetness, “he knows.”
Bradshaw stared at the slammed door for a full minute after she left. Susannah did not know—and if he had any powers at all, she never would.
Seven
DENISE CLAUDINE JOSÈPHE WAS SERIOUSLY pissed off.
Her editor—an annoying little man with a beard that clung to his face like a frightened animal — had questioned her latest chapters for the most ridiculous reasons. “It’s too violent—all that blood! That sort of thing is on the way out. And not even your most faithful readers would believe that this kind of sex goes on, even at heathen rituals.”
After pointing out to him that a “heathen” was a person who lived on a “heath,” she’d fumed her way out of the office for a long walk.
It was her own fault. She’d forgotten to bring the gris-gris bag, present from a friend in New Orleans, that guaranteed cooperation and approval. Oddly enough, she’d been forgetting a lot of thing
s lately, all of them to do with magic.
At Yule her special recipe for corn cakes had produced none of the usual raves; it wasn’t until a few days later that she realized she’d left out certain essential ingredients. In March there’d been a man she’d wanted and hadn’t gotten, because although she’d brought the right scents, candles, and herbal sachet, she’d forgotten the words of the right spell. Only last week she’d been shopping for a new carpet for her living room, and the gallery owner had politely but firmly refused to lower the price for her—though he’d done so on other occasions. When she got home she found her luck-and-money amulet still hanging over her bedroom altar.
Or maybe it wasn’t so odd after all.
She still shivered when she recalled the night her Measure had been taken. Who knew what Elias Bradshaw had done with it? Her absentmindedness could be the result of his Work. It would be just like him, too—some puny little spell of overlooking, nothing with any real jizz to it.
The more she considered it, the more certain she was. That self-righteous interfering bastard, with his patronizing New England morality and his useless ethics—how dared he?
She walked faster along the busy noontime street, newly furious, but with a worthier object now than her editor. Anger gave her purpose, and fifteen minutes later she pushed through the double doors of a shop she’d used only once before. Back in November it had barely yielded her needs; now she spent a satisfying half hour gathering information and supplies from a much improved stock.
The owner was helpful, if sketchily educated in the techniques of Voudon. Tall and thin, with a surprisingly lovely voice, he listened to her oblique explanation of her problem with his pale blue eyes fixed intensely on her face. She was used to being looked at, but not with such cool probing.
“Somebody’s hexed you,” he said at last. “Do you have any idea who?”
“Some,” she said, then heard herself continue, “Two people in particular. And they’re protected up one side and down the other.”
“I see.”
She had the most grotesque sensation that he did indeed see. Far too much, with those eyes of chill silvery blue.
“Let me think about it for a while,” he continued, “and you browse the store, see if anything occurs to you.” A slight pause. “You’ve been in here before, right?”
“Last year, for oils and candles. You’ve made some changes.”
“A few,” he agreed, a glitter of amusement in his eyes now. “Some of the new stock took time. Try the display case in the back — there’s some interesting stuff.”
There was. Denise knew with a happy smile that her mail-order days were over. This shop could supply everything she could possibly need, now that it was fully equipped. Her earlier anger vanished as she roamed shelves of books and candles, implements and incense, jewelry and oils and semiprecious stones. True, the more arcane items must still be had from New Orleans, but this store contained quite a bit more than just the basics of spellcraft.
She was contemplating with amusement the effects of bloodstone, black pepper oil, and a seven-knob wishing candle when the owner appeared beside her, so suddenly that she gave a start.
“You need to turn the hex back on the maker and fix it so no more hexes can be sent against you, right? Well, let’s start with a black candle for banishing, a brown for neutralizing, and a silver for protection. As for the scents—”
“Pepper, jasmine, and pine,” she snapped. “Do you think I’m an amateur?”
“I think you’ve probably never run into anyone who’s got it in for you, so you’re not as familiar with this kind of spellcasting. For instance, what phase of the moon would be best?”
The spells she worked were always of her own initiation for her own purposes, not to respond or counteract someone else’s. Which was something else to be angry at Bradshaw for. “Okay, so you know your stuff,” she told him. “How much is this going to cost me?”
“Not as much as you’d think —” All at once he grinned, and became markedly more attractive. “— because you manufacture the main ingredient personally.”
When he’d finished writing down the basics of his recommendations, she understood what he meant. It was drolly appropriate — she’d just as soon piss on Bradshaw as look at him. And as for Ms. Holly-Holy-Goddess McClure …
“Sounds like fun,” she said, chuckling.
“Magic should always be enjoyable,” he replied. “Whatever the intent, we should all take pleasure in our Craft.”
“Some spells are more pleasurable than others.”
“Granted. But those without real gifts, real power, have to take our pleasures where we can find them.” His head tilted slightly to one side. “You’re going for some pretty powerful stuff here. Are your targets believers?”
“Yes,” she replied reluctantly. “I wish it were otherwise.”
“I know what you mean. This kind of thing works better on somebody who doesn’t believe.” His voice lowered to confidential, almost caressing tones. “It’s the so-called ‘enlightened’ person who scoffs at what he sees as superstition who’s easiest to curse. His instinctive fear is deliberately pushed to the back of his mind. It lurks in his subconscious, links up with the curse, and makes it more powerful. But someone who believes will worry about what might be happening, even if he’s not aware of the actual, specific threat. His inner defenses are alerted and he can counteract a spell without even knowing it.”
“I think what we’ve put together here will suffice.”
“Do you want it known that it’s you?”
Denise considered. Then she smiled. When they finally realized what was happening, she wanted them to know who had authored their predicament.
“I thought so,” the man said, comprehending and returning her smile. “It’s a poor excuse for a practitioner who hides the Work. You don’t seem that type at all. And anyway, I don’t think you could even try to hide it in this case, because one of the ingredients is too — um — personal, as it were.”
“So to speak,” she agreed. “Wrap it up and tell me the damages.”
“To your targets?” His smile widened to a grin. “Severe. My name’s Noel, by the way. Yes, like Christmas.”
“Heard it a thousand times, right? I’m Denise.”
His frown puzzled her, until his eyes lit and he exclaimed, “Now I know who you are! It’s been nagging at me since you walked in. You’re Denise Josephs!”
“Josèphe,” she corrected, but not as coldly as she might have done. He had, after all, provided a very interesting new spell.
“It’s an honor to meet you—and I hope I’ll see you in here often.”
“Perhaps.”
Noel bagged her purchases and wished her a good afternoon. On her way out the door she nearly ran into a tall, muscular, windblown man with the most astonishing hazel eyes she’d ever seen. She’d seen them before, she knew it—
“Sorry,” he said with a smile, standing to one side so she could leave.
Denise nodded distractedly, trying to remember where she remembered him from. She was halfway to the Starbucks down the block when she had it.
Holy merde! A launch party for a novel she hadn’t read and didn’t intend to—Holly McClure with a tall, hunky piece of eye-candy on her arm — they’d left early and Denise had heard someone say that he never thought he’d see the Virginia Virgin with some guy who looked like sex on a stick.
At Starbucks, she found a table and sorted through her purchases, mind racing as she adjusted and adapted for a new and different intent. She’d heard that Holly McClure was out of town for a couple of weeks. Perfect. Sipping slowly at her coffee, she held certain items caressingly in her palm, murmuring gently under her breath, and waited for him with perfect confidence that he would come.
“YOU HAVEN’T BEEN IN HERE before,” said the skinny, long-haired proprietor.
“No,” Lachlan replied, getting his first look at the man who’d annoyed Nicholas Orlov so thoroughly
. The promised Knicks game had occurred two nights ago—with Lachlan winking at Alec Singleton when a three-point jump shot came up short and the Knicks won—and spending time with the two men had reminded him that he’d wanted to visit the bookstore and see what the fuss was about. Running down an address on a Federal warrant had taken him to the Village this afternoon. So here he was, spending his lunch hour in a sorcerer’s lair.
Which was exactly what the place looked like. His reading had taught him quite a bit; still, the minute he stepped around the blonde and got a good look at the place, he agreed with Nick: this was excessive. Atmosphere was fine, and helped sell product. But he could have done without the incense smoldering in what looked like a stone birdbath, the mysterious nuances of lighting and paint that made some sections of the walls look as if they were bleeding, the downright spooky array of framed tarot cards, and the featured exhibit of demonic jewelry, including an inverted pentagram necklace on a chain of tiny silver skulls.
“Interesting place,” he commented, fingering an iron candleholder.
“May I help you find anything? Books, candles, incense—?”
“Just browsing, thanks.”
He wandered around the shop, liking it less and less. This was the epitome of public misconceptions about Witchcraft: Satanism, sex, and surgically sharp “ritual” knives. It was as if someone had stocked a Christian shop with flagellation whips, hair shirts, saints’ fingerbone relics, and all the persuasive contraptions of the Spanish Inquisition. Holly had merely been amused by the place: “Kind of creepy, but essentially harmless.” Evan had a different feeling from it altogether. Creepy, yes; harmless—maybe not.
A cluster of high-schoolers sat on the floor near the back door, Goth from their black clothing to their ashen faces. Witchcraft as fashion statement. He stepped around them, noticing a dozen brightly colored flyers taped to the door. The papers advertised piercing and tattoos (“It’s not self-mutilation — we do it for you!”), various covens, tarot readers, Voudon gatherings, classes in Elementary Spellcasting, Advanced Aphrodisiacs, Infernal Hierarchies, and the Annual Beltane Ball.