Seven Pets for Seven Witches

by Annabel Chase

  Chapter 6

  A long thin stranger stood there. His skin was pale grey and he had black hair and narrow eyes that did not blink.

  This was the man from Edgar’s funeral – and the one who had set the curse on the cat in the graveyard.

  I needed to act fast. I was grateful that I was not far from my own garden, and my ancestral home; this was the place that I could most easily draw power from. It was unfortunate that I was standing in Horatio’s realm but that couldn’t be helped. I planted my feet firmly in the ground and felt the earth, really felt Her below me. The sky was arced above me like a blue bowl. The wind stroked my skin and my blood answered.

  I breathed in, and held it, and summoned the Guardians of the Four Quarters to me, requesting – never demanding, always humbly requesting – their presence and, if they felt so inclined, their protection. I also called for the Spirits of Place and for Her Raven Self, my own particular spirit ally in the Otherworld.

  I would need all the help I could get.

  I did all this in a fraction of a moment, casting a mental circle around me. I don’t go in for ritual paraphernalia but I could have found it a little more comforting if I was able to draw a circle of salt around me. There was no time for such things.

  The thin man slithered forward, oozing like he was on castors.

  He was like a snake.

  But he was not a snake.

  Nor, I thought, was he a man.

  He was sinuous, lean, and moved like he was listening to jazz.

  “You’re a cat!” I blurted out.

  He smiled and showed me his pointed teeth. “I am Tom Tildrum,” he said in a sibilant hiss.

  “So are you the King of the Cats now? Edgar Wrigley was Tom Toldrum, wasn’t he? Tell Tom Tildrum that Tom Toldrum is dead, am I right?”

  The man spat, a hawking sound from deep in the back of his throat. “He might have paraded as some kind of cat but he was no cat, and he was never a cat, and he never should have been king at all.”

  I took that as a yes, Edgar had been Tom Toldrum, the old King of the Cats. “But he was,” I said. “Anyway, he’s dead now, so why did you try to stop his soul from being taken by the cats? It was what he wanted.”

  “It wasn’t what I wanted, and I am King of the Cats now!” Tom Tildrum replied angrily. “I get to decide what happens. He was a travesty, that man. Cats and people should never live together. It makes me sick to see my noble brothers and sisters roll over for humans. Beg for food. Get shut inside and pushed outside, at a human being’s whim. We cannot live together and he made it worse, talking of companionship and mutual sharing. It would benefit humans but cats would lose their real selves! We will not compromise, not any longer. I will call them to me and we will rise up!”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “I am a cat,” he said, smiling again, without any humour. “We are crazy. We are proud. We are aloof. And we don’t need anyone or anything else.”

  “Yet you used the snakes and the dragonflies, their servants.”

  “Used, yes, for my own ends, but no one and nothing shall use us. Never again!”

  “And you have the backing of the rest of the cats, do you?”

  “Of course! I am the King!”

  And he was as mad as a box of frogs. I felt the reassuring presence of my guardians encircle me. They, too, were unimpressed by this – this thing – that was facing me.

  “So you don’t like humans,” I said. “Fair enough. A lot of the time, neither do I. But you don’t need to like something to be able to live with that thing; it’s about respect as much as anything. Mutual understanding, patience, acceptance, that sort of thing, you know?”

  He narrowed his eyes and his lips drew back from his teeth.

  Nope. He clearly did not want to hear anything I had to say.

  I would have loved to have brought out a whole load of inspiring speeches and to have convinced him otherwise. The thing is, though, anyone – or anything – with a set belief, they’ve kinda grown into that belief and they are who they are because of it. You take down their belief, you’re threatening a piece of them. That’s how they see it. It’s scary to them.

  And when people, or indeed cats, are threatened – they react.

  He reacted.

  He rocked back at first, and wriggled his heels slightly. It was a split-second movement that I recognised from Harkin – it was the gesture any cat made before they pounced. He gathered himself, and I threw up my hands, and shouted, “Only one colour but not one size!”

  He stopped, one hand raised like a paw.

  “Stuck at the bottom, yet easily flies,” I continued.

  He hissed.

  “Present in sun but not in rain,” I went on. “Doing no harm and feeling no pain. What is it?”

  He waited.

  I fell to my knees, and pushed my hands against the earth, digging my fingers into the grass and the soil. I was of the earth and I would return to earth. There was ancient power here, and I drew upon it. I began to hum, calling Harkin back to my side, calling for aid from this realm and the others.

  And he came, and he brought his brothers and his sisters. Cats flooded into the graveyard. They came out from behind stones and they popped out of bushes. They jumped the wall and rushed over to us. They emerged from Horatio’s house and they flowed around the edge of the church and they streamed down out of the yew trees and I was pretty sure they hadn’t been there before.

  Still they came, a tidal flood of cats, black and brown and tabby and ginger and white and mottled and patched, ragged and smooth, long and lithe, short and dumpy and fat.

  They encircled Tom Tildrum. He lost his momentum and stumbled, his pounce unresolved, landing awkwardly. He tried to laugh as he swept his gaze around but the advancing circle of cats made his smile die on his thin grey face.

  “I am your King!” he screeched, his voice getting higher and higher.

  The cats were silent. I’d expecting yowling or hissing but this ominous quietness was even worse. They walked on, until they had made a solid circle around him, and they stood shoulder to furry shoulder.

  “Pah!” he spat. “I can kick them away.” He tried to move again.

  I repeated the riddle, infusing each word with meaning and intent. That’s the key to magic, of course – it’s all in the intent. That’s why it’s so dangerous to use when you are not entirely sure what you’re doing. My aunt Dilys banished her aching knees once. She actually only meant to banish her aches but her knees went too, and she spent a few weeks walking around stiff-legged like a plastic doll. Sounds funny now but it caused major problems with stairs, I can tell you.

  So I filled the riddle with the intent to bind and to stop. When you start with magic, you use all sorts of frippery like candles and stuff, but at the heart, it’s just visualisation and sheer will.

  It worked.

  The repetition of the riddle, backed up with the power I was drawing from the guardians and the earth, fixed Tom Tildrum to the ground. He was strong, but he was not strong enough to break a twice-spun spell. He began to foam at the mouth and his skin rippled.

  His lips drew back and his teeth lengthened. He was going to change back into a cat. I wondered if my spell would still hold him then – it had been cast on his human form, not his true cat self.

  But I needn’t have worried. My spell was binding him to this plane of existence and it was enough to keep him there.

  And then the cats struck.

  Something released them, some hidden signal or sound. They surged forward and flowed up him, around him, crawling over him like a rippling sea of fur. He screamed and flung up a hand. All I could see were his pale, thin fingers as they made desperate spasms against the sky.

  And then his arm was drawn into the seething mass of cats and the screaming became a low bubbling crying.

  I turned away.

  I knew what cats did with their prey, after all. They played and tormented, harried and plagued.

&
nbsp; I did not need to see what happened next.

  After all, as I had said to Tom Tildrum himself, I didn’t need to like everything about something to still respect it.

  I quickly undid the circle of protection about me, thanked the guardians for their help, and walked on slow and heavy feet back to my own house.

  Something butted my ankles as I reached the wall, and I bent to scoop Harkin up in my arms.

  Chapter 7

  Dilys and Maddie were waiting for me in the kitchen. Maddie had a book open, but when she saw my face, she closed it.

  Dilys, obviously primed by Maddie who must have told her about Harkin, had made up a soft bed for the cat. She had put it to warm in front of the range, and I laid Harkin in his little nest of fleece blankets.

  Maddie knelt at my side and put out her hand to stroke him.

  “What’s that in his mouth?” she asked.

  I gently pulled a little clump of grey-black fur from his teeth. I shuddered and brushed it from my hands. “I’d rather not think about it,” I said.

  “What happened out there?” she asked. “I just found something out about, uh, cat spirits or something and…”

  “Cat sith,” I said. “Yeah. So Edgar had lived as a cat…” I closed my eyes and told them what had occurred. I couldn’t help but shudder as I spoke about Tom, who was a cat but almost with a snake’s mind: and the dragonflies had done his bidding. He must have been born in May, and brought snakes to the house. He had a strange affinity. I wouldn’t look at those pretty insects in the same way ever again.

  Harkin began to purr and groom himself. I finished my recount and opened my eyes. Everyone was quiet, digesting what I’d said. Dilys had made a fresh pot of tea and as I got up I heard the scrape of her brandy flask being unscrewed. I didn’t get a choice – she just tipped a large tot of it into my cup. Maddie rolled her eyes but I didn’t even complain.

  “So who is King of the Cats now?” Dilys asked.

  We all turned to look at Harkin.

  I probed his cat-mind tentatively. With relief, I found that no, he was still just my same old Harkin.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Not him, though.”

  “Thank goodness,” Dilys said. “He gets his own way quite enough of the time as it is.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “He’s king of this household, at least.”

  “What cat isn’t?” Maddie asked.

  Harkin licked along his back and then stopped to stare at us all.

  We stared back. I resisted the urge to bow or curtsey or something.

  He resumed his personal ablutions. We suddenly found that we were all staring at a cat licking his bottom.

  I laughed. And that was fine. Life was back to normal.

  For now.

  Spellbooks & Spies

  An Ainsley Shaw Paranormal Cozy Mystery

  Gina LaManna

  Chapter 1

  “It’s nothing personal,” I told him, running my fingers lightly down the glass that separated us. “You know I love you, and I’ll only be gone for a few days.”

  I waited in silence, letting the sentiment linger as my fingers grew chilled against the window. I knew my response would never come.

  “I wouldn’t leave if I didn’t have to; you know this,” I said, my voice an apologetic whine as I pleaded with my friend. “But I have urgent business to address on The Isle, and I just can’t take you with me.”

  The sound of a throat clearing startled me to attention, reminding me that I wasn’t alone. I spun around, offering an apologetic smile to the pair of beautiful amber eyes that watched me with care.

  “Ainsley?” Detective Beck prodded gently. “It’s time to go.”

  “Sorry! I’m just saying my goodbyes.”

  “Must you do this every time you leave home?” He worked visibly to suppress a smile. “And if the answer is yes, my question is why.”

  “He’s my friend!” I said, feeling my eyebrows knit together. “He’s going to miss me.”

  “He’s a fish, Ains.”

  “He’s my Harry.” I pouted, finding my fingers still pressed to the cool glass aquarium where my trusty friend and confidant lived in a happy little aquatic world.

  He’d been aptly named for my favorite wizard. Really, the pet I wanted was an owl named Hedwig, but instead, I’d been stuck with a blowfish named Harry.

  “Wrap it up,” Beck murmured. “The Isle is calling.”

  “Please take care of him,” I begged. “Don’t let V eat him. And don’t tell Harry I said that.”

  “I’m swinging by in the mornings, and your mom will visit in the evenings,” Detective Beck said, raising his eyebrows in a way that told me his patience waned. “I think he’ll be fine. Even I don’t get such extravagant goodbyes, and I’m a person.”

  “I’m sorry.” I inched across the room and gave him a peck on the cheek. “Don’t tell me you’re jealous of Harry.”

  “I’m not jealous,” he said, just a little too quickly. “I’m concerned about your sanity.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” I grabbed my duffle bag and hoisted it to my shoulder. With my other hand, I reached for my broom and clasped it tight against my side. “I’ll miss you, too. A lot. But we said our goodbyes before, if you know what I mean.”

  Beck offered me a truce of a smile, like he was remembering our goodbyes, and gave the slightest nod. “Have fun, okay?”

  “It’s a girls’ weekend with Lily and the gang. What could go wrong?”

  Detective Beck groaned. “That’s a jinx if I’ve ever heard one.”

  “We’ll even have supervision,” I assured him. “Lily’s grandmother, Hettie, will be there.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

  I wrinkled my nose. “True. I suppose Lily will probably supervise her, huh?”

  Beck pulled me into a tight hug. “This is your vacation from MAGIC, Inc., Ainsley. Just remember that. Don’t go looking for trouble.”

  “Do I look for trouble?” I asked, staring for a long moment into those beautiful amber eyes. “On second thought, don’t answer that.”

  Detective Beck leaned forward, heeded my advice, and chose a long, leisurely kiss as a response. “See you on Monday.”

  Despite my excitement for the weekend, I had a twinge of sadness at leaving my cozy little apartment behind. “Take care of Harry, will you?”

  “Where’s V?” Beck asked. “Have you seen him lately?”

  I shook my head, glancing around for any sign of the smoke-colored cat that appeared now and again. He’d been aptly named “V”—short for Voldemort—mainly because he always seemed to be plotting Harry’s demise, much like his fictional counterpart.

  “He’ll turn up,” I said, mounting my broomstick next to the French doors that looked out over the streets below. “If he eats Harry, I’ll see to it that he’s Avada Kedavra’d myself.”

  Chapter 2

  “Ainsley! I’m so glad you’re here!”

  I stepped through the doors of the B&B, searching for any sign of the voice who’d spoken. The front reception desk, complete with a stack of old, hardcover books acting like a stepstool up to the counter, had no person behind it.

  Scanning the rest of the space, I noted the squashy couches and cute decor, the framed images of books and libraries, and the all-around quaint atmosphere that had led this place to become the sole successful inn on The Isle. Yet, there was still no sign of the voice.

  “Hello?” I called, inching into the entryway. “Did someone say my name?”

  As always when I visited The Isle, I moved with an extra bounce of caution in my step. Unlike the mainland—the place where my home, my career, and my life existed in a quiet peacefulness—The Isle was one of the last fully enchanted places in the world.

  It’s invisible entirely to humans, a little island tucked into the waters of Lake Superior just off the coast of Minnesota. A place where witches and wizards, vampires and ghosts, creatures and fairies abound.

&n
bsp; The mainland has its fair share of terrifying creatures and evil spell slingers, but due to an overpopulation of humans, we mostly stay hidden in the woodwork. Here on The Isle, a mermaid might live in any pond, a fairy could flit around any tree, and a starved werewolf could lurk around any corner—or so my childhood stories had gone.

  “There you are!” A thump sounded, followed by the huffing breath from a now-familiar voice. “Ainsley!”

  “Midge!” I smiled at the tiny little witch who owned and ran this place. I’d met her while staying here during previous visits to meet with my friend and former co-worker, Lily Locke. “How are you?”

  “Great. And yourself? How’s that cute little fish of yours?”

  “Harry’s alive. Hard to tell if he’s happy or not. Fish don’t really smile, you know?”

  Midge gave a polite laugh before pulling out a ledger that weighed nearly as much as she. “Well, let me find you your room. I’m sure you’re tired from the flight over here.”

  “You’d think they’d make an expressway from the mainland to The Isle,” I complained. “I had to fly to the shore, hop on a bus, eat a gummy bear, find the boat, and then go through that stupid wave.”

  “What happened to the main route?”

  “Closed for construction,” I said with an eyeroll. “I had to take the human version today.”

  Midge tsked sympathetically. “Poor little thing. Let me get you fixed up in a nice room. With any luck, you can squeeze in a nap before the rest of the gang gets here.”

  “That’d be great,” I told her, and meant it. “I’m exhausted.”

  “Then again,” Midge said, “Hettie’s already here. She’s been here for two days.”

  I frowned. “Why?”

  “Wanted to get the party started early.” Midge shrugged. “What do I know? I think she didn’t want to cook, so she stayed here and ordered room service. She’ll be taking her daily nap now, too. Hurry on up before she wakes and gets any ideas about an afternoon pool party. The pool has been closed for maintenance for months, and I’m not opening it for her. I swear, that woman...”