Have Stakes, Will Travel

by Faith Hunter

  She woke Angie Baby and kept her busy in her room while I finished up the evening meal, and then carried my girl to the table. Angie usually fought being put into the high chair, wanting to sit in a regular chair like a big girl, though the table came only to her nose that way and I didn’t trust a stack of catalogues the way my own mother had. But tonight Jane surprised us all with a bright pink booster seat with Angie’s name painted on the back. It had little suction cups on the bottom and a strap that attached it to the chair; another strap attached around Angie’s waist, with an additional strap that looked special-made for Angie’s current baby doll. Angie squealed and chattered and was enchanted with her big-girl chair. And Jane’s face softened at Angie’s obvious delight.

  Over stew—heavy on the veggies, light on the beef—Jane told us what she had discovered about the strange stethoscope. “It’s called a Kerr Symballophone, and it was designed in 1940 with two diaphragm chest pieces to allow doctors to hear different parts of the chest in both ears so they could differentiate the sounds from either lung, or from the top and bottom of a single lung, or from the heart and a lung. Kinda neat, really.”

  I leaned into my husband and said, “She’s showing off her brand-new emergency medical training.”

  “You took an EMT course?” he said, surprised.

  Jane gave a minuscule shrug and tore off a hunk of bread. “Finished last month. I figured it might come in handy,” she said, her eyes on the bread and a smile tugging at her mouth, “for the day you finally give in to temptation and shoot Evangelina.”

  Evan coughed and turned red. I laughed. I guess it was possible that he didn’t think his feelings about my eldest sister were quite so obvious. “You can’t choose your family,” I said sweetly. “More stew?” Evan nodded and Jane went on as I dipped up another humongous portion for my hubby. The man had to burn ten thousand calories a day.

  “Anyway, I went to the Hainbridge Historical Society and did some research.”

  “I didn’t even know Hainbridge had a history,” I said.

  Evan chuckled, shoveled in a mouthful, and gestured for Jane to go on.

  “There was a doctor by the name of Hainbridge living in the city in 1840.” She went back to the bread and dipped it into her stew, watching as the bread soaked up the thick broth. “And in 1870. And in 1910. And in 1940.”

  “A family of doctors?” Evan asked.

  I remembered the smell of vamp and said, “No way. He wasn’t—”

  “Way,” Jane said. “I’ve seen two small portraits, hand painted, seventy years apart, and except for the beard, it’s the same guy.”

  “I’ll be,” I said. “I know we have a lair in Asheville. Word is that the head vampire wants to start a barbeque joint in town.” When Evan paused with his spoon in midair, I said, “Down boy. So far, it’s just a rumor.” To Jane I said, “Barbequed ribs are his favorite. So. We had a lair here, way back when.”

  She nodded and glanced at Angelina, her look saying there was more to tell but not in front of tender ears. So I had to wait for details, and waiting never sat well with me. I have red hair. Some form of impatience is surely bred into me.

  * * *

  When Angie Baby was finally down again for the night, and Jane and Evan and I were all stretched out in the tiny living room, Jane finally dished. “Hainbridge was a vamp with a human son. The kid came down with what sounds like leukemia, when he was a child in 1845.”

  “Vamps can have kids? I mean, human kids?” Evan said.

  “Sounds like it, but it must be really rare.,” Jane said. “According to the records, the doctor tried everything to cure the kid, and instead of curing him, the kid went crazy. The local newspaper called him a lunatic. He was seven.”

  “The father tried to turn his son to cure him of the leukemia,” I whispered.

  “Yeah. That’s what I got out of it. And from what I’ve read, that’s not permissible, to turn a child. And just as bad, Hainbridge didn’t chain his child up.”

  I looked across the room to Angie’s door. It was half closed and I suddenly couldn’t stand it. I stood and crossed to the opening and looked in. Angie was curled on her side, her thumb in her mouth. She didn’t sleep with her thumb in her mouth often, only when she needed comfort, and I had to wonder if she had heard us talking, even in her sleep, and become distressed. I studied the wards on the room and tightened them here and there where they had grown a bit frayed. And I prayed too. I wasn’t much of a prayer, not like Jane. She was a true believer and she prayed religiously—a small joke we shared. I was less . . . confident, less sanguine, about who and what God was, and about why He would give a rat’s behind about any of us. But I prayed anyway—God keep my baby safe. Just in case. And oddly, when I finished, Angie pulled her thumb out of her mouth, sighed, and rolled over. Coincidence was a strange mistress. When I settled in my chair and picked up my tea, Jane went on.

  “He was accused of having rabies. The kid was,” she clarified. “He bit several people, tried to chew off the arm of a little girl in town. No one got turned, but the kid disappeared and the doctor stopped practicing and went into seclusion. He wasn’t seen by the townspeople often, but when the war started in 1861, he totally disappeared.”

  “The Civil War?” Evan asked.

  “Yeah. And when he reappeared in Hainbridge in 1870, several years after the war ended, there weren’t enough people there to remember him. Sherman did a number on the town.”

  “Is it true that Sherman was a werewolf?” I asked.

  “No such thing as werewolves,” Evan said firmly, raising up the foot of his oversized recliner and pushing back. “No such thing as weres at all.”

  Jane and I looked at each other and said nothing. There were witches and vampires and at least one skinwalker. Who can say about werewolves? “Anyway,” Jane said, “when he came back to town, he was all into treatments for lunatics and research.”

  “His son was still alive,” I guessed.

  Jane shrugged and curled her legs under her. She was long and lean, dressed in a T-shirt and worn-out, skin-tight jeans, her boots left at the door and striped socks on her feet in shades of fuchsia and emerald; the socks were a gift from me. I doubted that she ever wore them unless she came here. Jane Yellowrock didn’t have the most jocular of natures, but she was desperately appreciative of any small gift, which made my heart ache for her.

  I shook my head as I remembered the storm that destroyed the mobile home we had lived in until a few months past when Angie’s power awakened way too early and ripped the place apart. Jane had saved us all that night by turning into a mountain lion and calming Angie long enough for Evan and me to bind Angie’s powers tightly to her. As if she knew what I was thinking Jane met my eyes, glanced at Angie’s room, and shrugged as if it had been nothing. It hadn’t been nothing. If I believed in miracles, I’d say that was one.

  “So, then he involved some witches who had come over from Ireland—a woman by the name of Ester Wilkins, her daughter Lauran, and her sister Ruth. They’d started a coven, under the covers, so to speak, out of sight, but they provided the doctor with herbal tinctures, decoctions, and concoctions.” She tilted her head. “There’s a difference between decoctions and concoctions?”

  “Big difference,” Evan said. I had thought he was asleep, sitting in his big chair, fingers laced over his middle, ankles crossed, and eyes closed. I laughed and he smiled, opened an eye, and blew me a kiss.

  “Yeah, okay,” Jane said. “You two need me to leave?”

  “Nah,” Evan said, his belly moving with silent laughter. “We took care of that before you got here.”

  “Ewwww,” Jane said, shuddering with a breathy laugh.

  I threw a couch pillow and hit him squarely in his beard—which just made him laugh harder. “Back to the vamp and witches,” I said, trying to sound prim, but likely not succeeding.

  “I don’t know what happened next, but I do have hypotheses,” Jane said. “I think the doctor kept on with hi
s research for decades, coming and going to protect his identity. And then he involved the witches in a more personal way. I think he either tried to get witches to create a conjure to cure his son’s lunatic-ism, or tried to get witches to let the kid drink witch blood to cure it, or he was trying to cure the leukemia that made his son sick in the first place. Or something along those lines. I think he went to a witch one night and tried to force her to help. And of course the witch had warded her house. I think the ward transferred to the stethoscope when she tried to stake the vamp or he tried to drain her.”

  “Lots of unknowns in any of those situations,” Evan rumbled.

  “True, but any of those scenarios explain what I remember about the smells—” She stopped dead, still not sure what Evan remembered of the mountain lion who saved the day when Angelina had her awakening. “I have a really good nose. I can smell some magics and some vampires.”

  Big Evan nodded, his expression unchanged, and Jane went on. “Any of those scenarios explain what I remember about the smells in the house, and the odd way the stethoscope protects the house. But, really, none of the specifics matter,” Jane said. Evan widened his eyes in surprise. Jane leaned forward, turning her body directly to his, her elbows on her knees, her clasped hands hanging between her legs, partially mirroring his posture. “All we need to know for sure are the following.” she held up a closed fist and one finger went up. “Did the stethoscope get the ward by accidental—or even by deliberate—transference?” Another finger went up. “Is the witch’s ghost still in the house, which I don’t think, but is important to know?” Followed quickly by a third finger. “Is the vamp still living or did she kill him true dead with her spell? If she killed him then that makes it blood magic, and much stronger and more unpredictable, right? And blood magic changes how you guys get rid of the spell.”

  Big Evan was staring at Jane intently, now. Jane’s lips went up slightly. “What? You didn’t think I was smart enough to figure all that out?” When Evan didn’t reply, Jane said, “The most important thing to figure out, though, is how you guys get paid.”

  “We don’t,” I said automatically.

  “Why not?” Jane asked, still holding Evan’s gaze. “You get rid of the ward and the apparent poltergeist affect, or the house can’t be used. If the house can’t be used, then somebody is out a lot of money spent on renovations so far. Getting rid of the scary stuff sounds like part of the renovations to me.”

  Evan smiled, showing teeth between moustache and beard. “You think the Hainbridge coven is getting paid, but knew that Molly was an easy mark. They planned to let her do the work and they get to pocket the money.”

  Jane sat back, her tiny smile in place.

  “I am not an easy mark,” I said.

  Jane made a snorting sound. Big Evan said, “Sweetheart, you are the biggest mark alive. And that’s why I love you so much. If you weren’t so easy to fool, you’d never have married a big galumph like me.”

  “You’re not a galumph,” I said.

  “See?” To Jane, Evan said, “What’s the name of the construction company and what’s the house going to be used for now?”

  “Hainbridge General Construction. And it’s owned by and is going to become a lawyer’s office.” My husband started to laugh.

  * * *

  The next morning Big Evan called Shadow Blackwell, the Hainbridge coven mistress, and suggested that I take over the job, informing Shadow that her coven could get a finder’s fee, if one could be properly negotiated. Shadow Blackwell was not pleased, but it wasn’t like she had much to fume about. She had tried to get the job done in an underhanded way, and had been caught.

  Once the local coven was out of way, Evan contacted the owner of the construction company, speaking in my name. The contractor had an ironclad agreement with the owner of the property that he would not be responsible for “acts of God” above and beyond what his company’s insurance covered, and that insurance did not cover what amounted to an exorcism. Unfortunately, he had not told the client that his office was haunted.

  Lastly, my wonderful husband called the lawyer, one Chauncey L. Markwhite II, who was not a very cheery-natured man and refused to pay one red cent to me for my services. When it was explained to him that all construction had ceased on his property, and would not be starting again until the little matter of magical flying mallets was resolved, he accused Evan of extortion. Which totally ticked off my hot-tempered husband. Evan suggested that it was possible to prove the problem to Chauncey and a meeting was set up for the next morning before the start of business—meaning we were to meet him at his haunted house promptly at 8 a.m. “Promptly,” was the lawyer’s term, and he expected Evan to abide by that. He clearly did not know my husband, who was not one to take orders.

  I had kept out of the picture while all phone conversations took place, but I needed to be present during this one, as I would be speaking as the “witch expert,” to keep Evan hidden in the witch-closet. Jane wanted to be present too, as an outside witness, but I privately thought it might be more along the lines of wanting to watch Evan play with a lawyer the way a big-cat often plays with its dinner before killing and eating it.

  By prearrangement, Jane was the first to arrive at the haunted house, watching for the lawyer, her cell phone ready. The moment the lawyer’s car got there, she hit SEND and Evan started our car. We were ten minutes out, making Chauncey wait. As Jane had said, “Witches one, Chauncey zip.”

  When we got to the house, the front door was hanging open and neither Jane nor Chauncey was to be seen. We both were out of the car while it was still rocking on its suspension, Evan saying, “Good Golly, Miss Molly. You don’t think she mistook him for a bloodsucker of a different sort and staked him, do you?”

  I sputtered with laughter and was still laughing when we reached the front porch, which I am certain Evan had intended. Inside, Jane was leaning against the stairs, her arms crossed in her own particular stance, and a grin on her face. It was, by far, the ugliest grin I’d ever seen her wear, and she was making little huffing sounds of laughter under her breath, like a cat. The lawyer was six inches inside the parlor, standing as if frozen. His face was white, his eyes were at half-mast, and his skin stood up all over in goose bumps. Jane looked at us in the doorway. “The spell made you afraid that you or your family was going to die. I wonder what fears Li’l Chucky is experiencing.”

  “If we sit and watch until he dies, we don’t make any money,” Big Evan said, sounding totally rational, if unconcerned.

  “Spoil sport,” Jane said. But she leaned in and grabbed Chauncey by his collar and yanked him back into the foyer. He took a breath and started gasping; his lips were blue. I had a bad feeling that he had not taken a single breath while he stood, frozen, inside the parlor. His knees gave out and Jane pivoted him to her, holding him off the floor by collar and belt. She gave him a little shake. “That’s the first part of the spell, Li’l Chucky. You wanna work in this room?” she asked him. “You wanna maybe make clients wait in this room for their appointments?”

  “No,” he wheezed. “No, I . . . Jesus—”

  Jane dropped his belt, slapped his face, and had his pants again, the motion so fast I wasn’t sure what I had seen. “No blasphemy, no swearing, no dirty language. Got it?”

  Chauncey nodded. His color was looking better and Jane sat him on the steps to the upstairs. “So it’s a haint, not a demon?” He asked when he’d caught his breath. Jane nodded. “What’s part two of the spell?” he asked her.

  Jane. Not me.

  I stifled a small smile, watching my friend at work. I had never seen this part of her.

  “You spend too much time in the room, Li’l Chucky,” she said, “and things start flying around. Hammers, ladders, broken furniture from upstairs. And I’d say the flying debris is aimed at anything human, and with fatal intent. Now.” She pointed to me. “This nice woman put her life in danger yesterday to figure out what was wrong with the house. She thinks she can
undo the spell and free the property for development, but it’s dangerous. So here’s the deal. You pay her a flat fee for her efforts. And you pay her another fee, plus expenses, when she’s successful. You draw up the contract today, and as soon as her husband and I are satisfied, she goes to work. You get left with a usable building with a great history and a haunted house tale to delight your clients. Maybe hang a plaque on the wall to tell about it.”

  “How much?” he asked.

  Evan named a price that made me wince.

  “I spoke to the contractor,” Chauncey said. “He had a deal with the Hainbridge coven for a lot less.”

  “They can’t do the work. It’s a complicated spell,” Evan said. “They called in my wife and she can. So you work with her or you can think about it for a few days, while the contractor starts another job somewhere and you get left with an unfinished building.”

  “I have a contract with Hainbridge General Construction,” Chauncey said.

  “With an ‘act of God’ clause in it. Haints fall under that category.”

  “And you can’t negotiate with a haint,” Jane said, amused.

  “Will she do the job for what I was paying the coven?” he hedged.

  “No. And it isn’t extortion,” Evan said, eyes narrowing. “Haints are dangerous. What my wife will give you is a solution to a bigger problem than you knew you had. Let us know when you make a decision.” With that, Evan hustled me out of the house and Jane followed, her boots pattering down the front steps.

  Before we reached the bottom step, Chauncey raced from the house, squealing like a child. A metal bucket barely missed his head. Jane must have been expecting it, because she caught it out of the air and handed it to him, shaking her head. “Bet you had to touch the stove to see if it was hot when you were a kid. Idiot.” But it sounded like good-natured ribbing more than insult. To me she said, “Later, Molly.”