by Sarina Dorie
“Come on!” I said. “I made you art. Don’t eat me.”
“No eating, I promise. I have something better for you. I help you become witch.”
I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like her price.
“Please, let me go. Please,” I said.
She wagged a finger at me. “You be good girl, dearie, and be quiet. It is nap time.” She hummed a lullaby and set more water to boil in her cauldron over the hearth. Her hand danced in the air in a gesture that reminded me of an orchestra conductor. It looked as though glitter fell from her fingertips.
I huddled in the corner of the cage, anxious about what she intended to do. She didn’t look like she was getting ready for a nap. She bustled around the kitchen, ignoring me. A wave of drowsiness passed over me. I yawned. I laid my head on my arm. My eyelids grew heavier.
Fatigue weighed down my limbs. I blinked. The cage was large enough to stretch out my legs. I curled up on the floor, too tired to move.
I got it now. She hadn’t meant a nap for her. She meant a nap for me. The world around me grew dark. I didn’t know if I would ever wake up.
The old woman’s creaky squeak of a voice roused me. I sat up in the cage, bonking my head on the low ceiling.
“Ow!” I said.
Baba wasn’t anywhere in sight. I listened. Her voice was muffled, coming from somewhere outside. The cottage was darker than before. There wasn’t any light coming in through the lace curtains now. That probably meant I’d missed the last shuttle. My mom would be so worried when I didn’t call her from Daisy’s house. I would be stuck at the fair all night.
If I got back to the fair.
The little cottage had grown warmer, and the cloying perfume of ginger and cinnamon suffocating me. My head was still thick with sleep, like I had a sleeping pill in my system. I rubbed my eyes, smearing my eyeliner and mascara onto the backs of my knuckles.
“What take you so long?” Baba asked.
The man’s voice was a lazy, British drawl I knew all too well. “I apologize if my tardiness was an … inconvenience. I had to ensure I wasn’t followed.”
“I will give her to you, but I keep her fingers and toes,” Baba said.
I glanced at my hands and feet. Everything was still intact.
“No.” His voice remained calm and indifferent. “That wasn’t our agreement.”
“Then you will pay me in gold.”
I needed to escape before someone ate me. Or drained me. Or tortured me. I pushed at the bars of the cage, first with my hands and then by bracing my back against one wall while I pushed with my feet. I needed a plan. There was nothing useful within reaching distance. Except for that old twig on the floor. I picked it up.
Oh, I knew! I could do what Hansel did. I could stick it out of the cage and pretend it was my finger when she was checking to see if I was fat enough to eat. Actually, that would only delay my end, and she wasn’t blind enough for that trick anyway. I was going to have to push her into the oven. Only this oven wasn’t very big. It was like a pizza oven for a Totino’s frozen pizza—and gingerbread cookies made from human hearts.
I felt around the outside of the cage until I found the lock and stuck the twig in. Because, as everyone knows, twigs work great for picking locks. A minute later I threw it on the floor and pulled a bobby pin out of my hair. An actual hairpin would have worked better. Or a lock pick kit. I had a set at home that I used as part of a magic trick, not that it would do me any good now.
The cottage door creaked open. I palmed the bobby pin and flopped back to the floor of the cage, pretending to be asleep. New plan. I would let them open the door, and I would run out when they least expected it. Not that this was the best plan in the world, but I had to start somewhere.
“You won’t be disappointed you pay full price,” Baba said, her voice louder. “She’s a pretty one, da?”
Each word Thatch spoke came out crisply enunciated. “Yes. Like her mother. And just as much trouble.”
I was going to have a long conversation with Mom when I got home. I would insist she tell me all the secrets she’d been keeping from me. No more potions and erasing my memories. I needed to know the entire truth about what she’d done to make all these Witchkin hate her.
Baba smacked her lips. “I’ll bet she tastes sweet. Her flesh is so young, so tender and juicy.”
“Yes. I’m sure she is.” He sounded bored.
Something cold touched my cheek and it took everything in me not to flinch. It was rough and scratchy, and I hoped it was a stick. The stick pushed a strand of hair out of my face. It traced my cheek and followed the line of my throat and trailed between my breasts. My heart sped up.
“Baba Nata, is that truly necessary?” Thatch asked. “I know you’ve always had a habit of playing with your human food, but this one is Witchkin. She isn’t for you.”
She said something in Russian I couldn’t understand. It sounded like a curse. “You truly intend to take her magic, da? All of it? You make her a Morty? Such a pity. So much potential for this one.”
Is that what he intended to do with me? I had thought he was going to hand me over to those raven harpies. I didn’t want to become their sex slave like Baba Nata told me they wanted to do with me. I wasn’t sure what was worse, being wanted for having magic or not having magic and being doomed to a life of ordinary existence after that first taste of this world.
“Open the door and hand her over,” he said.
Keys rattled. This was it. I would have to plan my moment carefully. Before I could bowl them over and run away, hands reached under my arms and hauled me out. I’d missed my chance to surprise them.
New plan. I would have to wing it. I pretended I was asleep. I focused on relaxing my muscles as Thatch lifted me into his arms. He grunted and readjusted me so my head wasn’t flopped back. My face rested in the crook of his neck. He smelled like oil paint and dusty books, a strange combination.
I still clenched the bobby pin in my palm. It was small and relatively pointed. I could probably use it as a weapon.
The door creaked and a rush of cool air greeted me as Thatch carried me outside. It was refreshing after the warmth of the cottage. The fog of remaining drowsiness lifted from my head. Wind brushed my hair against my face. The perfume of trees and earth greeted my nose.
Thatch’s feet crunched over twigs and dried leaves on the path. The gate creaked, and he kept walking. The coarse fabric of his sleeve tickled against the underside of my knees. His hand was warm on my leg. With my head on his chest, I felt the rise and fall of his breath, each inhalation growing more labored as he continued. He was a big guy, and I was pretty light. I took it he didn’t work out much.
Wind chimes tinkled in the tree boughs, and the breeze rustled the leaves. A bass thumped somewhere in the distance. The smell of marijuana and cigarette smoke wafted through the air and I had to fight the urge not to cough. Did that mean we were going back to the music festival?
With each step he took, I asked myself if this was the moment to stab him with my bobby pin and make a run for it. My heart sped up again at the thought of stabbing him. I didn’t like the idea of hurting someone.
He readjusted his grip, tucking my head under his chin. His arm curved around my back and pinned my wrist to my side.
Craptacular! Now I couldn’t stab him if I needed to. Could my plan have gotten any worse?
“I know you’re awake,” he said.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Sex, Drugs, and Magical Fireworks
I considered pretending I was still asleep. It would have been easier to stab him if he didn’t know I was awake. But my plan for a surprise attack was out of the question now, especially with my arm pinned against my side.
“You may have fooled Baba Nata, but you haven’t fooled me,” he said. “You can dispense with the Sleeping Beauty act.”
“How did you know? Magic?” I asked.
“Your pulse.” He br
ushed his thumb over my wrist.
A jolt of electricity shot across my skin at his touch. I gasped. The sensation wasn’t unpleasant. My skin flushed with warmth where he touched me. I became hyperaware of his fingers on the bare flesh of my leg just below my bloomers. Heat crept into my face. Baba’s words tainted my every thought, and I had to push the idea she’d planted out of my mind.
Felix Thatch was not my true love. Her fortune had been as much of a caricature as my portrait of her. I would not allow her words to persuade me. I had a bobby pin, and I knew how to use it for more than hair styles.
I blinked my eyes open and took in the world around me. Lanterns hung along the path. Techno music played in the distance. Up above the trees, strobe lights flashed into the sky.
He stopped at a gate in the wooden fence. “Unhook that latch for me.” He released my wrist.
“You could set me down and get it yourself.”
“If I set you down, you’ll run. Open the gate.”
“Why should I make it easy for you?” I raised my arm, considering stabbing him, but I hesitated. It would have been smarter to do so on the other side of the fence, because then I would have somewhere to run to. That’s the reason I told myself anyway. It had nothing to do with Baba Nata’s words about him.
“You are your mother’s child, aren’t you?” He readjusted, using the other hand still holding my legs to maneuver the latch.
“What is that supposed to mean?” I asked. “Everyone keeps dissing my mom like she’s a bad person or something.” Sure, she coerced me to do her bidding by cooking great homecooked meals, but she wasn’t evil.
When he didn’t answer, I prompted him. “Well? What did my mom do that was so bad?”
“Besides kill people, torture them, and experiment on them in the name of science? Nothing really.”
“No, she didn’t. She wouldn’t. My mom is a nice person. Plus, she doesn’t even like science.” Unless one considered her love of horticulture, but that didn’t involve people, only plants. All her crazy, overprotective schemes were motivated by love, even when she was being annoying.
More lanterns lit the path. Booth tents were covered with large textiles. Curtains of mismatched fabric stretched across shop structures built into the fair walls. An amber glow caught my attention. An old man sat on top of one of the structures smoking a cigarette. He eyed us in silence.
“Forget everything you’ve been told about your parents. Everything. It was all lies.” His breathing grew more labored. “Perhaps you will allow me to educate you on your true parentage.”
True parentage? Was he implying my mom wasn’t my mom? That couldn’t be. We both had red hair and green eyes and were petite.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
Perspiration dotted his forehead, reflecting the light of the lanterns so that it looked like a thousand stars twinkled across his skin. He swallowed, his throat sounding parched.
“Are you all right?” I asked. “Maybe you need to rest. It’s easy to get dehydrated out here.”
“How kind of you to express such concern,” he said dryly. “It isn’t dehydration. It’s your magic. You’re like the tide—either giving too much or taking. This is why we can’t have you running about in the Morty Realm without supervision.”
The music grew louder, only it wasn’t the techno music I’d heard earlier. It was drumming. From the volume, I guessed it came from one of the bigger stages. That meant there would be people. Lots of people who could help me. I needed a story that would elicit sympathy. I had to do better than I’d done with the bus driver.
A drunk woman staggered out of a booth and passed us. She wasn’t going to be much help.
Thatch stumbled. I grabbed onto his neck with my free hand, expecting him to drop me on my butt if I didn’t hold on. He didn’t drop me, though. He held me tighter. His breath was hot against the side of my face. He smelled of lavender and starlight. Not that I knew what the stars smelled like, but I had the sense that his soul was peppered with constellations. I buried my face against his neck and inhaled again. Pin pricks of light danced before my eyes. My stomach fluttered.
“Where are you taking me?” I asked.
“Nowhere if you don’t stop using your powers on me.” He plopped down on a bench I hadn’t seen in the shadows beside the path.
“Are you really going to take my powers away?” Now that I knew what I was and there were others like me, I didn’t want to be non-magical. I wanted to be a Witchkin. The cowboy wizard said they could help me.
Thatch didn’t answer. His grip around me remained firm. He tried to pry my fingers open with one hand and take the bobby pin, but I twirled it out of his reach and tucked it between my fingers with my sleight of hand. I might not have known much about real magic, but I had a few tricks up my sleeve.
His fingers were hot on my wrist. He closed his eyes, drew in a breath and chanted some kind of spell. It sounded exotic, French perhaps. The words washed over me like cool rain on a hot day. Red and pink lights flashed around his face. His thumb brushed against my wrist, sending a flare of yearning into my core.
Electric tingles danced over my bare arms. I’d never felt more alive in my life. My insides fluttered with tickles, and I laughed out loud at all the energy radiating from me. I was more aware of his hand on my leg than ever. The closeness felt right.
He brought my wrist to his lips, his breath whispering against my skin as he chanted. He inhaled, and the energy inside me started to wick away. Flickers of red and green light swirled into him, and some of the bliss inside me dissipated. I didn’t want the joy and pleasure filling me to stop. I wanted it back.
I circled my arm around his neck and kissed him.
“Merlin’s balls!” he said. “Control yourself before you—”
This wasn’t me. I didn’t want to kiss him. I didn’t know him. I tried to fight the compulsion, but I was no longer in control of myself. It was the same as every other time I’d allowed myself to grow close to a man and I couldn’t make myself stop, even though I knew there would be consequences. My mind and body were at war with each other.
On the plus side, he was a good kisser. I drank in the taste of lavender and starlight. The stiffness of his muscles relaxed. His fingers threaded through my hair. Molten desire burned inside me. Baba had been sneaky and cunning, but in that moment, I believed she might have told the truth about him being my true love. Anyone who could make me melt into his embrace the way he did had to be someone special.
The tattoo of the drums matched the erratic pace of my heartbeat. The music thrummed through me, dancing and wild. Part of me was aware magic was happening. Kissing generally led to dangerous calamities, natural disasters, and near-death experiences. I didn’t want anyone to die. I didn’t want him to die.
That realization jolted through me like a shock of cold water on a winter day. I managed to break away from his lips.
Thatch nibbled at my neck. “I hate you,” he murmured against my skin. “I hated your mother, and I hate you and your magic. I will get back at you for what you’re doing to me right now.”
I didn’t know what I was doing. He was the one with powerful magic. Shouldn’t he have been the one in control at the moment?
“Help me,” I panted. “Teach me.”
I closed my eyes, sinking into the sensation of his lips on my skin, his breath trailing across my neck. A shudder of desire coursed through me. I wanted this closeness. I wanted someone to love me. It didn’t matter if it was with a stranger on a bench at Oregon Country Fair. Twenty-two was too old to be a virgin. There was no reason not to kiss him.
Death, I reminded myself. I was not going to use my sexy-time magic and kill anyone tonight. I needed to stop for everyone’s safety. A stray lightning bolt might kill us and other people too.
My options were limited. The only weapon I possessed was my wits, and I didn’t think that was going to amount to much. It was possible I could d
o magic, accidentally like with the bird and abra-cadaver him dead, but I didn’t want to kill anyone. That was the whole reason those Witchkin thought I was evil in the first place—they thought I might hurt someone on purpose.
I hadn’t wanted to resort to the bobby pin, but I didn’t have any better solutions. I stabbed the bobby pin into his leg. He groaned into my neck. His fingers dug painfully into my back. That broke the spell for me. I suspected it had for him as well from the way he swore. He crushed me to his chest so tightly I could barely breathe. He yanked my head back by my hair. His eyes burned like embers.
He lifted me as he stood, his strength having apparently returned. Hopefully he wasn’t planning on getting revenge on me at this exact moment. Maybe I should have stabbed him harder.
Or kept kissing him and waited for something to explode.
“You’re a menace,” he said. “This is for your own good.”
“What’s for my own good? No, you aren’t going to drain me. Please!”
Voices floated closer through the darkness. Two men dressed as centaurs walked on the path, a flashlight shining across the dirt near their feet. This was my chance!
I started squirming. “Let me go!” I shrieked. “Put me down. I don’t want to go with you.”
They flashed the light over us.
Thatch’s brow furrowed. His eyes were no longer burning. “Stop this childish—”
I screamed. “Help! Please! This man is trying to hurt me!”
The two men rushed forward.
“No,” Thatch said. “She’s the dangerous one. She’s—”
I screamed louder.
He didn’t get to finish his sentence. One of the men thrust a fist sandwich into his face. Thatch dropped me, and I ran toward the music show. I was done hiding in remote places where I might run into witches and storybook-like villains.
I was going to hide in plain sight.