by Joyce
“It’s the only way she can tell who’s right.” Muriel took the last cream puff. “A girl has to shop around. The sea witch is no different.”
“What is she looking for?” I asked.
“What we’re all looking for. The perfect mate.”
I knew there were other questions we should have asked. As usual, Muriel had appeared, eaten and disappeared beneath the water before I could understand what she was saying. When the cream puffs were gone, so was she.
“Looks like you could’ve used a few dozen more cream puffs,” Larry observed.
“I know.” I sat in the chaise lounge again. “What does she mean by ‘sea witch’?” Larry asked as he started the engine again. “Don’t you each have an element that’s special to you? Would that be the same as a water witch?”
“I don’t know.” Elsie shrugged her shoulders. “I’ve never heard anyone use that term before. Have you, Molly?”
“No. I’ve never heard there was a difference between water witches. That would be like having dirt and sand witches.”
Elsie started laughing. “Sandwiches! I could go for one of those about now. Maybe with some fresh tuna on it.”
“Too fishy for my tastes,” Larry said. “Maybe some hummus. That sounds good.”
“Oh, sorry. I forgot you don’t eat fish.” Elsie smiled at him.
I thought she’d never looked happier.
While Elsie and Larry flirted and laughed on the way back to Wilmington, I thought about what Muriel had said. The sea witch—whatever that meant—was looking for a mate and, apparently, the mating process was killing the unworthy candidates. She sounded a lot like a spider’s mating process.
When she found the right man . . . what? She mated with him? Was that to produce offspring? Was that what the whole process was about?
I could see why Brian would be on her radar. He was young, handsome, a powerful witch and a good catch.
But to find him, she had to have a human form, as Muriel had hinted. She had to stay close to the water. I understood that part. Being near the water made me feel better and stronger. It probably helped her disguise herself too.
But why use a disguise? Did she look like Muriel and would find it hard to trap a witch mate that way?
Her having magic from the sea went along with Joe’s autopsy reports. I’d read once that water magic could cause a form of death that mimicked drowning, even when there was no water close at hand. I’d never gone further than the preliminary information. So there were some answers for our time and cream puffs, but almost as many new questions.
The one thing I felt safe about was that the witch was looking for young men with magic. She probably wouldn’t come after Joe unless she felt threatened by him. If her magic was as strong as it sounded, she could elude the police forever.
We got back to the docks and waited for Larry to dock his boat so he could leave it. Driving the two of them made me feel like I had Mike in the backseat with a girlfriend. Elsie and Larry laughed, flirted and whispered. I saw a few kisses exchanged in the rearview mirror.
We stopped to get hoagies for lunch. When we got back to Smuggler’s Arcane, there were several cars in the parking lot. I knew having customers would have made it more difficult for Olivia and Dorothy to come up with a way to return Brian to his normal form. Elsie and I hurried inside to give them a hand.
But it seemed something else was happening. A witch who’d lost her son to the sea witch was there to mourn him with her friends and family. Many times, our shop was the only public place witches felt safe gathering.
There were hundreds of lighted candles around the shop. The smell of burning sage hung in the air. I hadn’t realized that Belinda, a witch we knew well from Southport, was the one who’d lost her son.
I’d been so busy thinking about the Bone Man and Joe, Brian and the sea witch, I hadn’t stopped to think that the two witches who’d been killed locally had families grieving for them.
“Molly.” Belinda hugged me tearfully. “I was hoping you’d get back in time. What’s wrong with everyone? Sam is gone now and no one can explain why. The council doesn’t have any answers. I know Joe is with the police. Has he told you anything?”
I glanced at Brian’s figure in the window. Dorothy shrugged when she saw me and kept pouring tea for our guests. There hadn’t been time to figure out how to undo the spell.
Everyone glanced at Larry strangely, but he went to read at the back of the shop. He really was the most unobtrusive werewolf ever.
Olivia was happily mingling with a few of the witches. We’d known them forever and they seemed to accept her. Strangers were more likely to give Olivia a hard time.
“Come with me so we can talk,” I said to Belinda.
We found a quiet nook in one corner. I told her what I knew about the killer from both a mundane and a magical sense.
“I understand about sea witches,” she said. “I’ve lived on the ocean all my life. My father and grandfather were fishermen. Neither one of them had magic. They both married witches. I’ve heard stories about sea witches. My grandfather said they were the spirits of dead witches who had drowned and were trapped in the water. They could never come on land again for long, and missing the land made them crazy. Both men insisted that a sea witch could attack a large boat in the water and kill everyone aboard. They said they’d seen it happen.”
“I’m sorry this happened to Sam.” I held her hands in mine. “Was he dating someone who might be the sea witch? Muriel said she’s using a disguise. He might not have realized who he was with.”
Belinda wiped her eyes. “No. Sam was dating a nice young witch from Charleston. They were talking about getting married. She’s from a good family too. Her parents were giving them some static about her being too good for Sam, but it was starting to look like the parents were going to give in.”
“So you don’t think it could’ve been her?”
“No. She wasn’t even here. Sam had been dating her over a year, way before these killings started.”
“Was there a witness to his death?”
“Yes.” She sniffed and rubbed a tissue across her red nose. “There was a witness who said she saw the whole thing. She said it was a man who strangled Sam. But from what you’re saying, it would’ve been the sea witch in disguise as a man. She’s got strong magic. She can look however she chooses.”
“We know from the practice of glamour that any of us can look different with very little magic expenditure. It’s going to make it hard to catch the killer if she can look different every time she kills.”
We talked about Sam. It seemed that he had experienced the same personality changes that Brian had exhibited recently. He’d also left home one night, and hadn’t come back for three days.
“He was like another person,” Belinda said. “I tried to talk to him, reason with him. Sam was always the calm, easygoing kind. You know. Suddenly he had temper tantrums and he couldn’t sleep or eat. I knew something was wrong. I thought he’d snap out of it. Guys go through things sometimes.”
It was beginning to sound more and more like it was a good thing that we’d brought Brian back with us. Maybe if he was gone for a short time, the witch would look for someone else. But we still had to turn him back into a human.
Belinda and I had some tea and burned some herbs in memory of her son. I couldn’t imagine anything more devastating than losing a child. Thinking about her loss, I hugged Mike closely in my heart.
I noticed a change in the flow of muted conversation between the witches in the shop and looked up to see that we had a new arrival. The rune on my hand itched and burned as I got to my feet. Dorothy was making all kinds of pointing and head motions.
Abdon Fuller was there with his son, Schadt, and his daughter-in-law, Yuriza.
CHAPTER 27
Imagine the morning,
Imagine the day,
Imagine your troubles
Melting away.
I studied the three of them. The rune seemed to be saying that one of them was the Bone Man’s wife. Was it Yuriza? Or was it one of the other witches in the shop? I hadn’t noticed the feeling until she’d come in, but in all fairness, a few more witches had also come in since I’d started talking with Belinda.
“Where is my son?” Schadt’s voice boomed over the sound of the memorial service. “What have you done with him?”
Dorothy was trembling so badly that I wasn’t sure if she was going to continue standing. I immediately went to her side, and Elsie joined us.
“There’s a memorial here now,” I told Brian’s family. “Your tone is out of line. Please come back later and we can discuss your son.”
Abdon stepped in front of Schadt. His twisted mouth snarled as he looked at me. “We’ll stay right here until you tell us what you’ve done with Brian.”
By now Elsie was shaking almost as much as Dorothy. I put my hand on my amulet and stood my ground. “You can stay if you stop bellowing, light a candle and commiserate with our dead witch’s mother. Considering that the Grand Council did nothing to keep this from happening, it’s the least you can do.”
Abdon opened his mouth to retaliate. Schadt and Yuriza began to look a little uncomfortable. I felt my friends come in closer until the thirty or so witches had formed a knot in the middle of the shop. I knew they felt the same and were ready to stand up to these three outsiders.
Schadt muttered something to his father.
Abdon stood down. “We’ll leave for now—but you’d better have some answers for us when we return.”
The family was gone from the shop as quickly as they’d arrived. There was a general sigh of relief from the witches around me. No one wanted a confrontation with the powerful Fuller family.
But that’s where Dorothy, Elsie and I were headed if we couldn’t change Brian back to himself.
The memorial lasted another hour. I was nervous and worried about someone discovering Brian, but I hated to ruin the celebration of Sam’s life. There was also the problem with the rune on my hand. Even though the Fullers were gone, my palm was still itching and burning. Did that mean the Bone Man’s wife was there with us? Or was it still reacting to the Fullers’ presence?
“You look like you just ate a sour pickle,” Elsie observed. “What’s wrong besides the obvious?”
“The rune has been bothering me. I’ve talked to almost everyone here and it hasn’t started bleeding, but I get the feeling the Bone Man’s wife is either here or she’s been here.”
“Runes aren’t an exact science,” Elsie said. “You might have to shake hands with all the witches to make it bleed. I’m not sure you really want to do that.”
“It’s the only way Joe is going to remain invisible to Cassandra’s radar. I can shake hands and handle some bleeding. I’ll stand at the door as everyone is leaving.”
As the group began to break up, I stood there like a party host wishing bright blessings to everyone as they left and touching them physically in some way. The rune continued as it had earlier without any significant change.
What had happened? Was the rune telling me that Yuriza was the Bone Man’s wife? She was the only witch I’d seen who had left early. Everything had changed when the Fuller family had shown up.
I hoped that wasn’t true. I didn’t want to confront Yuriza about having another husband or trying to get her to visit the Bone Man. But what else could it mean?
After all our friends had departed, the three of us sank down on chairs around the table.
“Any bleeding, Molly?” Elsie asked with a yawn.
“No.” I studied the rune on my hand, which was slowly going back to normal. “If the Bone Man wants his wife back, he’s going to have to tell me who she is. This is stupid. I felt a presence—or at least my hand did. But I touched every witch as they were leaving. Nothing else happened.”
“Not every witch.” Dorothy pointed out. “You didn’t touch Brian’s mother—or the witches who were here when the Fullers arrived.”
“Which witches?” Elsie asked.
“I saw them,” Olivia said. “They were at the full moon celebration too.”
“Since I’d rather confront anyone but Brian’s mother, who were they, Olivia?”
“I don’t know all of them. I mean, I’m only dead a few months, and there are new witches in the area already.”
“Which ones did you know?” I asked.
“Well, there was Nora. I think she’s from around here. And Adrian. She’s from Kure Beach. And that new one with the long white hair who’s here on behalf of the council. I saw her. And a couple of other new ones I didn’t know.”
“You mean Portia de Winter,” Dorothy said. “She was here for a while. I think she left right before Brian’s family got here.”
“Yeah. Brian’s family was a party buzzkill.” Elsie started collecting dirty teacups.
“We know Nora,” I summed up. “And Adrian. I don’t know how we’ll get the names of the other unknowns.”
“Belinda had a memorial book.” Dorothy snapped her fingers. “We could ask to take a look at it.”
“Good idea.” I got up to help Elsie collect the napkins and dirty dishes. “It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out where Portia is staying.”
“We have to antagonize the council from as many different directions as possible, don’t we?” Elsie asked. “Portia is here on their behalf, you know.”
“I don’t want to antagonize anyone. I just want the Bone Man’s wife to go back to him.”
“Let’s talk to Belinda,” Dorothy said.
“I think we’re getting ahead of ourselves,” Elsie said. “There’s the matter of a certain heavy cardboard cutout that has to be taken care of.”
“I can’t believe I forgot about him.” Dorothy went to his side. “We have to change him back. There wasn’t time when Belinda and everyone else got here.”
“We should be okay as long as we locate the spell and change him,” I said. “Find the spell, Dorothy. We’ll clean up.”
As Dorothy went through the transformation book, Elsie and I picked up after our guests. Olivia was trying hard to move objects with her ghostly powers, but it wasn’t working well yet. Napkins and plastic forks were good to practice on—they weren’t breakable. I smiled as she kept trying to lift objects.
“This is stupid,” she declared. “I can’t do witchcraft and I can’t do things people without magic can do. There has to be some way to make this work.”
“Practice makes perfect,” Elsie sang out. “Keep trying.”
“I found the spell!” Dorothy said. “Let’s change Brian back.”
“Has anyone considered how we’re going to protect him if the killer witch is really stalking him?” Elsie asked.
“Which I believe is true after my conversation with Belinda.” I told them about the changes Sam underwent before his death. “I don’t know how we can protect him.”
“I’ll say,” Olivia added. “First of all, we changed him into a poster person. He’s gonna be angry about that. Maybe his grandfather will take him somewhere that he’ll be safe.”
“What about tagging him?” I suggested. “If we use a tracer spell, we should be able to keep an eye on him. We can spell the old binoculars to look for him if the tracer is activated.”
“Good idea,” Dorothy said. “How do we do that?”
“And what are our parameters?” Olivia asked. “Do we trace him when he uses magic? Do we use the tracer to tell us when he’s having sex with the sea witch?”
“Olivia!” Elsie called out. “We are not voyeurs.”
“I’m just asking.” Olivia defended her words. “We’ll need to be very specific to make a tracer work.”
“We’ll set that up later.” I smiled at Dorothy’s bewildered face. “Right now, we have the spell. Let’s get Brian back to himself.”
Larry was snoring in the back of the shop. He was probably exhausted from his change. It took a lot out of a man to become a werewolf and then change back—at least that’s what he always told us.
“Don’t mind him,” Elsie said. “He won’t even know.”
Dorothy recited the spell from the book. After hearing it, we recited it with her. Elsie took out her sword. Dorothy held her emerald cull. I closed my eyes and held my amulet.
Nothing happened.
“I don’t understand it,” Elsie said. “I felt the vibe. Why didn’t he change back?”
“You need to move him to the center of the room and join hands around him,” Olivia said. “Concentrate, girls. Brian doesn’t want to be a poster boy forever.”
We did as she suggested. It was tough pulling the heavy cutout into the center of Smuggler’s Arcane.
“If you think this is hard,” Elsie said, “dragging him into the cave will be even harder. Let’s make this work up here, shall we?”
We joined hands around Brian and recited the spell again. This time there was movement in the cardboard, a slight rippling effect.
“Look!” Olivia yelled. “It’s working.”
We stared at her, only slightly irritated at the interruption.
“Oh. Sorry. I’ll just go back to trying to lift one of these napkins.”
“Again, ladies.” I closed my eyes.
We kept reciting the spell to turn Brian back into a man until he stood between us with only his skin an odd color of gray. He was stark naked, but he was there.
Not sure why he’d lost his clothes—but at least he was safe.
“What’s going on?” His teeth were chattering from the transformation. “I smell paper. What am I doing here at the shop? We were at my apartment, right?”
“Brian.” Dorothy smiled. “We brought you here for safekeeping. You’ll be fine as soon as the shock wears off. Right, Molly?”
“That’s right.” I grabbed the robe that he’d been wearing as a poster and draped it around his shoulders. “Elsie, make Brian some tea, please.”