Queso de los Muertos (Eastwind Witches Book 4)

by Nova Nelson

  Mr. Tomlinson laughed. “Nope. Never. But then we had children and they set us straight.”

  “What’s your secret?” asked Mrs. Tomlinson.

  I shrugged. “Don’t drink, don’t stay out late, I guess.”

  Mrs. Tomlinson’s mouth fell open like I’d just spewed blasphemy. “But Nora! It was Lunasa. You have to take advantage of it before you no longer can.” She nodded subtly at her children, who played slap hands across the table, totally obvious to the conversation.

  Oh lord. Not another discussion about children. I’d lost count of how many of these I’d had in Medium Rare alone, and I’d only been here six months. It was always, “You’re not getting any younger,” and “You’re not too old to start a family,” and occasionally (most often from Hyacinth Bouquet), “Tanner would be a fantastic father.”

  Never mind that Tanner and I had only gone public with our relationship a couple months before and the M-word hadn’t been mentioned between us once. And who cared if I wanted children or not, or if the thought of being a mother terrified me after what happened to my parents and the fallout of it that was and continued to be my burden to carry.

  I smiled at Mrs. Tomlinson. “Good advice. This time next year, I’ll make sure I’m too hungover to walk or talk.”

  She beamed approvingly, and that seemed a little malicious, but I decided to give her the benefit of the doubt as I went around refilling coffee cups until the pot was empty.

  As I started brewing another, Tanner emerged from the back, one eyelid drooping dangerously. “Finished,” he said, holding a piece of paper in his hand.

  “Wow. That only took you three hours.” I’d nearly forgotten about the task I’d assigned him as a mercy, something he could do to feel like he was contributing that wouldn’t require too much energy or movement.

  He held up the sign. “What do you think?”

  With the amount of time he’d spent on it, I was half expecting an elaborate illustration, but instead, all it said was, Sorry, out of chips and queso. Will begin serving them again Monday.

  The handwriting wasn’t even all that legible.

  “Beautiful,” I said.

  “Thank Gaia.” Then, he braced himself on the countertop and did something I’d never seen him do in the dining room of Medium Rare. He pulled his wand free of his waistband where he always kept it hidden, and used it to float the sign across the room, sticking it to the glass front door.

  Poor guy must really be hurting if he was willing to use witchcraft in front of his diners.

  Or maybe he just realized that most of those who would be offended, the werewolves, weren’t currently around to be offended. Young children or no, the weres in Eastwind must’ve enjoyed themselves a little too much the night before.

  As he continued holding himself up on the counter, head-down, I hurried over to pour him a cup of coffee from the second pot that was still full, and as I did, Officer Stu Manchester lumbered in, looking about as put-together as Tanner. I poured a second cup of coffee.

  He was back in his uniform but not looking especially official. When I slid him his coffee and pie, he grunted, slightly less articulate than Anton (who was also terrifyingly hungover this morning and hadn’t offered me even a single grunt of hello when I’d passed him in the kitchen).

  I passed Tanner his coffee and the two men raised their mugs to each other without a word.

  Since Stu didn’t seem especially verbose, I left him alone and started on my side work. Greta would be in soon to take over and I was in a hurry to get home, catch Ruby up to speed on the recent developments, and hope she didn’t lay into me for it and might offer some useful advice.

  She’d been fast asleep in her comfy chair when I’d made it home the night before, her book open and spread on her lap, marking the page she’d been reading when sleep had finally taken her. It hadn’t been the right time to mention the Guilt Gale in those few minutes between when I woke her to helped her upstairs and when I shut her bedroom door behind me.

  Maybe it was the frailty I glimpsed when she was still in the twilight of sleep and didn’t have her usual pointed guard up. But something had made me take a step back from the situation, and it occurred to me that Ruby had been doing what I did for decades. Like most major realizations, it seemed obvious once I’d hit upon it, but the impact nearly leveled me. I’d only been doing the psychic medium gig for half a year, and I was already exhausted. How had she managed for so long? And also, was it fair to keep bringing my problems to her? All she wanted was to be left alone to read her books.

  What I’d decided, as I tucked her into bed, was that I’d tell her about the Guilt Gale, but I wouldn’t ask for a thing from her insofar as help. She’d like the story—she loved stories, especially ones where I was up to my neck in swirls—but I would make it clear that I could handle it without her, whether or not that was actually true.

  I grabbed a dozen strips of bacon on my way out of work, some for Grim, who had used Lunasa as an excuse to sleep in the next day, some for Clifford, who, apparently, frequently bemoaned the fact that I never brought any scraps home for him while Grim returned each day with his breath smelling like he’d just downed a veritable feast, and then a few pieces for Ruby and me. Because who doesn’t love bacon?

  Yes, okay, vegetarians.

  Well, I bet they would still love it if they ate it.

  I climbed the stairs to Ruby’s house but froze when I noticed someone hovering by the door.

  Literally hovering.

  “We have a visitor,” said Grim from his spot on the porch.

  “Yeah, I see that.”

  “She said she’s—” His head shot up as he scented the air. “Sweet baby jackalope! Is that bacon? Did you actually bring me bacon like I asked?”

  “It’s not all for you, but yes.” I opened the container and tossed a few strips his way, and as he gobbled them up, his eyes wide, I addressed our visitor. “Can I help you?”

  The spirit, who had once been an elf, judging by her height, hair, and ears, adjusted her stiff robe unnecessarily and cleared her throat. “I assume you’re Nora Ashcroft.”

  “What gave it away? The fact that I can see you standing there?”

  Her nostrils quivered slightly at my sass.

  Even in death, elves took themselves way too seriously.

  “I wasn’t informed you had such a developed sense of humor,” she said dryly.

  “Informed by whom?”

  If eyes could smirk, hers did. “The person who requested I come see you, of course. Your presence is required at the Parchment Catacombs, and I suppose it’s a secret. Otherwise my time wouldn’t be wasted running errands like a mere page. I used to be deputy director of the lower northern tunnels, you know.”

  “I … did not know.” Heck, I didn’t even know what that meant.

  “It’s true. And then I died and suddenly half the staff won’t recognize my seniority.”

  “Does that have something to do with the fact that they can’t see or hear you?”

  “Hmph! That’s their excuse, at least. But I can tell some of them sense my presence and ignore it all the same. Anywho, the Catacombs won’t run themselves. We’re terribly behind schedule, as usual. Must be going. You should be, too. He’s eager to speak with you.”

  “Who’s eager to—”

  But she was gone in a puff of ether.

  I looked down at Grim, who licked the grease off his paw like an addict. “Do you know where the Parchment Catacombs are?”

  “Yep.” He continued licking furiously.

  “Can you take me there?”

  “Can you give me the rest of that bacon?”

  I sighed. Clifford would have to wait another day, it seemed. “Once we leave the Catacombs, it’s all yours.”

  He stopped his licking then, his head jerking up so he could properly glare at me. “That could be hours!”

  “Yes, it could. Or it could be never if I don’t give you an incentive to help me find my
way out of there. I don’t know who’s sent for me. And I’ve heard stories about people getting lost and never finding their way out.”

  “Touché.” He lumbered to his paws. “But you gotta leave the bacon behind. You know I won’t be able to focus if I can still smell it.”

  “Deal.”

  I stashed it on a dry bird bath in the front yard, partially obscured by the first regrowth of Ruby’s garden, and then Grim led the way toward a part of town I’d never had occasion to visit.

  12

  The Willow Grove neighborhood was the oldest part of Eastwind—yet another boring and mostly useless factoid I’d picked up from my lessons with Oliver. It was constructed in a time before the witches took over, even before the werewolves ran the place. Just who had constructed the simple stone buildings and carved out the endless catacombs where all official records in Eastwind were stored was anyone’s guess. The consensus in our lessons was that it was an ancient people whose culture and magic were still a mystery to historians. Seemed like an obvious conclusion to draw, but whatever.

  Interspersed with the decrepit structures and ruins were boxy and soulless government buildings with names like Office of the Eastwind Registrar and Eastwind Magical Commission. I wondered if this was where the High Council met. Then I wondered if they were meeting today to swap stories about the ghostly ancestors who’d attached to them the day before.

  I didn’t imagine they would put up with it much longer before they tried to bring down the hammer on someone. And, given the timing and nature of it, there was a good chance I would be the nail for that hammer blow. It was only a matter of time before the noose around my neck tightened.

  “Here we are,” said Grim.

  “That?” I asked. “That’s the Catacombs?” I stared at the small structure. It looked like a tiny stone tomb, ready to tumble over should the slightest wind hit it at an unfavorable angle.

  “That’s the entrance to the Catacombs. Obviously, it’s not the entire thing. The tunnels run underground.”

  The heavy wooden door of the structure hung slightly off its hinges, and I opened it carefully, grabbing the handle with both hands as I pushed forward. The far wall, which was no more than five feet ahead of me, held a small, carved wooden sign lit by the daylight streaming in behind me and a single glowing torch. On it was an arrow pointing down and the words Catacomb Reception Area.

  In the small space between me and the sign was a hole in the ground. A steep set of stairs spiraled down, down, down. I knew immediately that Grim would complain about the incline the entire way, but there wasn’t much I could do about that. At least I didn’t have to go on my own.

  I held the door open for my familiar, and he padded forward. “Holy chupacabra. If I break my neck, you’re never going to hear the end of it.” But he headed down the stairs ahead of me anyway.

  I counted the steps out of curiosity but grew bored once I passed the three hundred mark. Shadows from the torchlight danced across the stone steps, and I kept a hand on the wall to steady myself as the dizziness started to kick in from the tight spirals.

  At last, we reached a more spacious area, lit by floating balls of light rather than flickering torches, and I allowed myself a few seconds for my balance to catch up with me before cutting through the low-ceilinged cavern toward the small wooden desk. Behind the desk sat a gnome, tiny spectacles at the end of his up-turned nose as his head swiveled left and right, looking from one large book to the other as his fingers traced over the lines.

  “Do you need me to pee on his desk?” Grim asked.

  “What? No. Why would you think that?”

  “You had me do it at the sheriff’s department that one time. I was just making sure you didn’t need it again.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You have to pee, don’t you?”

  “So bad.”

  “You should have thought about that before we crawled twenty thousand leagues under Eastwind.”

  “I agree. But that doesn’t help me now.”

  “Please don’t pee on anything down here. The ventilation cannot possibly be up to code, and the last thing we need is a bunch of catacomb workers dying from ammonia fumes.”

  Grim looked around. “I dunno. If I worked down here, I might want to be put out of my misery.”

  “May I help you?” said the gnome.

  “Uh, yes.” I stepped forward. “I was told someone was expecting me here.”

  He stared at me incredulously. “And who might that be?”

  “I don’t actually know. I was hoping you would.”

  He sighed like I’d asked too much of him. But when he asked for my name and I provided it, he simply glanced down at one of the books on the desk, which I presumed was a visitor log, and said, “Right. Nora Ashcroft. Yes, you’re expected.” He opened a drawer and pulled out a folded bit of paper. When he unfolded it, I saw it was a map.

  A complicated and confusing map. The paths resembled a snake pit, with some appearing to defy logic, like an M. C. Escher knock-off.

  Was I going to have to find my way through the catacombs on my own? My sense of direction was iffy enough when I had things like the sun and stars and recognizable landmarks to orient myself. But without those, I didn’t stand a chance, and I doubted Grim’s sense of smell would be much help either.

  I swallowed hard, feeling adrenaline infuse my arms and legs in a fight or flight response.

  “You are here,” the gnome said, pointing to a star on the map that read, unsurprisingly, You are here. “And the office where you need to be is …” He twirled his finger above the map, scanning for it. “Oh, of course. Right here.” His finger came down almost on top of the star. “Just down the hall behind me, fifth door on the left.”

  “Oh.” Relief washed over me. “Okay, I can manage that.”

  “I should hope so,” he replied. Then he returned to his books.

  I counted the doors then knocked on the dense metal of the fifth on the left, but it hardly made a sound. I knocked again harder.

  Was that a muffled voice on the other side? How was I supposed to hear what someone was saying through thick stone walls and a metal door?

  I knocked again, then leaned my ear close to listen for another reply. I heard something but couldn’t make out if it was “go away” or “come in.”

  Annoyance started to seep in.

  Just answer the wand blasted door!

  When I went to knock a third time, the door swung open before I could, and the rosy face of Landon Hawker stared back at me.

  “I said you could come in.”

  “And I was supposed to hear that how?”

  He stepped to the side, holding open the door. “Hi, Grim!” He patted my familiar on the head as we passed.

  The office was about as bleak as one might expect in such a location, despite Landon’s obvious attempts to spruce it up. A bright green chair was pushed back from a large glass L-shaped desk, slightly crooked, indicating Landon had just jumped up from it when I hadn’t heard his orders to let myself in. On the far end of the room was a maroon chaise lounge that made me feel like I should go kick up my feet and tell him about my mother. And dangling from the ceiling above the chaise (and similarly Freudian) was a giant stalactite. How did one decorate around a stalactite?

  I supposed this was how. Just pretend it’s not there.

  “Have a seat,” he said, and I headed toward the chaise, but he stopped me. “No, not there. I have a better one.” He grabbed his wand off his desk and flicked it.

  The chaise disappeared and in its place appeared a forest green armchair. “And I’m pretty sure I also have …” Another flick and an overstuffed mocha-colored dog bed appeared next to it.

  “Must be nice to have a useful witch as a familiar,” Grim said as he trotted over to the bed and flopped down.

  “The room’s a little cramped if I keep it all in here at once,” he said, shrugging.

  “Makes sense.”

  “Go on,” he said, nodding po
litely. “Sit.”

  I did, but he didn’t, standing anxiously in front of us. “I suppose you want to know why I asked you to come.”

  “Yep.”

  He bounced on his toes and a manic excitement gleamed in his eyes. “You’ve hit a dead end, haven’t you?”

  “With what?”

  “With the Guilt Gale.”

  “How do you know about that?”

  “Ted. I knew it was something that blew in, but I wasn’t sure, so I fished a little bit, acted like I already knew, and he mentioned it. Well, I hadn’t heard of it before, so I looked it up. Anyway. The point is that you’re out of suspects, aren’t you? Or else you would have solved it by now.”

  “Yes, Landon, I’m out of suspects.” I don’t know why I was feeling so irked by his presumption, but I was, and I wanted him to get to the point.

  As soon as I’d admitted it, he clenched a hand by his side in the tiniest of victorious fist pumps. “Good.” He shook his head to clear it. “I mean, not good that you’re stumped, but good because that means my work hasn’t gone to waste.”

  I looked down at Grim and he stared right back at me. I didn’t need telepathy to understand that Grim was a little unsure about this kid now, too.

  “What work?” I said, turning back to Landon.

  His grin held shades of derangement, if I’m being honest. “I’m glad you asked.” He flicked his wand, and the long wall opposite the door appeared to flip like a letter tile on Wheel of Fortune. On the other side was a long, flat corkboard with words and images scattered in what appeared at first to be a random spray of information. But then I noticed the red lines connecting sketched portraits of people I recognized to words and location schematics.

  “Are we about to be murdered?” Grim asked.

  When I noticed a drawing of my own face staring back at me from the center of the board, I replied, “Not out of the realm of possibility.”

  I stood from my chair, taking a step closer to the board. “Landon, what the spell am I looking at?”

  He ripped his eyes from it to turn and look at me. “Pretty cool, huh?”

  “I guess. But what is it?”