by DC Thome
Dot’s smile returned. “Naw. Just an overzealous sophomore with a mosquito for a stinger—if yer hep to my allusion. Itsy-bitsy bumbledinger, if ya will. Anyhoo, to what do I owe the honor of this visitation from”—her head whirled around—“unholy Beelzebubba in tiger-stripe Spanx!” Dot dashed up close to Ashley. “What in the Goddess’s dirty laundry hamper happened to you, greenie girl?”
Ashley punctuated her answer—“AIIIIIIIIIIYEEEEEEGHHHH!”—with a chomping sound.
Dot shook her head. “Yer trolls has got to be the least blessed of all the Goddess’s creatures.”
Ashley screeched again.
“Of course, I meant exceptin’ yer husband,” Dot said. “What’d ya say yer name was?”
“AIIIIIIIIIIYEEEEEEGHHHH!”
“Ashley Banshee.” Dot smiled. “Purty. But, Ashley, that troll bite’s gonna fester if someone don’t attend to it.”
A festering nose wound is a problem for a banshee?
“And, hellfire and sodee pop, just so happens I’m a healer. Guess it’s yer lucky day.” Dot grabbed a spider web from the eaves, spat on it and smeared most of the resulting ghastly salve on Ashley’s nose. The wound closed and disappeared.
Dot inspected it. “That worked damn goodly, if I say so myself.” She rubbed the rest of the spider-and-spit goo on her shoulder—no more bite marks.
The only time I tried that trick I unleashed an army of pumpkin-size spiders that took over an entire dorm floor. “Great work, Dot,” I said. “Can you could do something about Ashley’s voice?”
“Such as?”
“Tone it down a hundred decibels?”
“That’s how she talks. She’s a Goddessdamn banshee. It’s right there in her name!”
“Right,” I said, “can we move on to why we’re here?”
“By all frackazeein’ means,” Dot said. “Didn’t I ask that very question about an hour and a half ago?”
Sure seems like it. “Dot,” I said, “Megyyn, Camille, Ashley and I would like to know what you know about what happened at the Cozy Coven last night.”
“Nothin’ happened there, fer Venus’ sake. I already told ya I brought the boys here.”
“But according to…witnesses,” Megyyn said, with a sidelong glance at Ashley, “right after you left, so did all the men.”
“The caboose of my mind is havin’ a hard time hitchin’ onto the locomotive of what yer sayin’.”
I stepped up. “Every man in Douchecanoe disappeared just after midnight.”
“Every man?”
“Well, Megyyn’s and Camille’s and Ashley’s—and mine, to name a few.”
“Oh, I ain’t got none of them. They’re all took by you ladies, an’ I got a hard-and-fast rule about took men—hands off.” She held up a hand as though taking an oath. “I swear upon an economy-size box of Tampax on sale at the Witch-Mart—the hunnert-percent leak-free kind.”
Megyyn put her hands on her hips. Camille’s lip quivered. A tear—or something viscous—rolled down Ashley’s cheek. Worry about Hunter made me sick to my stomach. Clearly, though, these ladies—and all the ladies of Douchecanoe—fancied me a leader. Bless their poor, deluded hearts. Still, I stood tall in my boots.
“Listen up, ladies,” I said. “Our men are out there somewhere. It’s not like they can just disappear into thin air.” Actually, that is exactly what happened. C’mon, Pru, pull it together. Wait—that’s it! “We have to pull together and…and get our ass in gear. By which I mean our collective ass—it’s not like we have just one ass among us that we have to pull together. Although, I don’t even know how you’do—”
Dot nudged me. “Quit ramblin’ and bamblin’ and get to the point.”
I sucked in a deep breath. “We have our work cut out for us,” I said, “but together, we will get our missing men back!”
Chapter 4
We decided to meet at my place—in the living room.
“Here’s the plan,” I said. “Abigail will bring you refreshments while I zap upstairs to put on different clothes.”
Camille raised a finger. “And then what?”
“I’ll come back down and we can make a plan.”
Megyyn harrumphed. “You just said the plan was for you to go change your dress.”
I held up the ragged fabric. “It’s torn.”
“We can see that,” Megyyn said. “What’s your plan for making a plan?”
“Trust me,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”
Again I was half-undressed by the time I transported to my bedroom—only to find that, again, someone was there waiting for me.
When did my bedroom become The Place to Be in Douchecanoe?
Zelda, the Shifter-Whisperer from Assjacket, was standing silhouetted against the backlight of the window. I’d met her once before, during the Orgasmism imbroglio. Slim and tall, she looked magically delicious in cropped Prada jeans, a striped Prada T-shirt and cute shoes that had to be Prada, too. For all I knew, even her full head of true shifter-whisperer red hair, glowing in the morning light, was Prada.
And here I was, my mostly black hair hiding the odd strand of red, wearing a spandex dress on my head like a scarf, with a thong—I mean a pair of fucking lacy hipsters—that should have been thrown in the wash hours ago. I pulled the dress back down, slowly, as though that would make her not notice. “Zelda! Welcome to Doucheca—um, Deau de Chenieux.”
“I hope I didn’t surprise you.” She glanced politely away as I smoothed my dress into place. “The little—um, animal thing—that lives with you said I should wait for you here.”
“This is the most comfortable room in the house. Sooner or later, everybody ends up in my bedroom.” Did I just say that?
Zelda moved gorgeously to the bed and patted the pillow that Abigail had marked in Goddess knows what horrible ways. “These shams are must-have. Where did you get them?”
I “borrowed” them from the funeral home where I worked during high school. Just before it went broke. “Thank you,” I said. “They were…a gift.” And I hope you wash your hands often. “So, what’s up?”
“Some of Assjacket’s men went missing last night. I heard it happened in Douchecanoe, too.”
She said Douchecanoe! “It’s true! Right at midnight. Do you know what’s going on?”
She paced between the bed and the window. “If they were warlocks, I’d say they were just being typically dickish.”
She thinks warlocks are dicks!
“But I know these guys,” she continued. “They’re not the type to vanish into thin air.”
I thought about what Dot had told us. “I’m pretty sure that only devoted types disappeared.” Hunter sure seems like the devoted type. “The noodle dippers got left behind.”
Zelda stopped pacing. “Noodle dippers?”
“The junior college broomsy team.”
A slight smile poked through her serious demeanor. “‘Noodle dippers’ is exactly the right term for that gaggle of idiots. And a few other people I know. I’ll have to use that sometime.” She quickly got serious again. “Have you checked your crystal ball for signs of a disturbance?”
The last time I tried that, I blew up my not-fully-accredited school of witchery’s faculty bathroom. “I was just about to do that,” I lied. “It’s downstairs, in the living room.”
***
Zelda cut a stunning figure in the presence of my ragtag group. Camille with her bugged-out eyes and delicate body. Megyyn with her button nose and bowling-alley-broad personality. Ashley with her translucent mint-green skin and jagged teeth. Abigail, looking like a badly abused floor mop.
And Dot.
“Zelda…Zelda…name rings a bell,” Dot said. “Ya do time up at Alakazamatraz?”
“It was a misunderstanding. I accidentally ran over my familiar.”
Abigail’s ears shot up.
“He lived, so the murder rap was bogus.”
Abigail slunk from the room.
Dot put an arm around Zeld
a and said, “Don’t care a whit about the Perry Masonry of it. More interested in whatcha done to keep the ol’ Delta Street happy—if ya can decipher the dooblie in tondura I’m alludin’ to.”
Little blue sparks crackled over the skin on Zelda’s arms, making it clear she was not pleased about this line of questioning.
I stepped between the two witches and whispered into Zelda’s ear, “She’s a little touched.” Grabbing the crystal ball off the end table, I said to everyone else, “Zelda’s a war hero. She saved Assjacket during the honey badger rebellion—and now she’s going to help us find out what happened to our men.”
I held the crystal ball up. After a few seconds of silence, I glanced around and realized that everyone was waiting for me to do something. “Here’s the plan.” I handed the ball to Zelda.
She handed it back to me. “I couldn’t. It’s your crystal ball.”
“I know, but”—if you leave it to me, I might conjure a literal shitstorm right here in the living room—“you have such a great reputation—and much cuter shoes.”
The other ladies—even Dot—nodded in agreement.
I motioned for Zelda to sit on the couch and placed the ball on the coffee table. She waved her hands over and around the ball, and said:
Goddess, to us you won’t tell lies
Or hold back truth as a surprise
Make this crystal be our eyes
To learn what’s happened to our guys.
Every eye in the room was glued to the orb. Bands of smoke swirled and danced in multicolored waves, coalescing into an image I couldn’t make out. But Camille, Megyyn and Ashley recognized it immediately—and recoiled in horror.
I gazed at their contorted faces. “What?”
Ashley trembled. “AIIIIIIIIIIYEEEEEEGHHHH!”
Staring into the crystal ball, Megyyn said, “You’re right, Ashley. That’s exactly what it is.”
Megyyn understands Ashley?
Zelda looked at me. “Don’t you recognize it?”
“I just moved here a few months ago.”
Camille gulped. “It’s what Ashley said.” Oh, for fuck’s sake—Camille, too? “It’s The Forbidden Cave. In the middle of the forest.”
Of course Douchecanoe has a forbidden cave. And I’ll have to go into the forest to get there.
But if that’s what I have to do to find Hunter… “We have to go there.”
Megyyn, Camille and Ashley gasped.
Megyyn squinted. “You understand what ‘forbidden’ means, right?”
“It can’t be that bad.”
Camille wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. “There are stories of people—”
“Mostly men,” Megyyn interjected.
“Yes,” Camille continued, “mostly men—pretty much only men—disappearing into The Forbidden Cave, never to be seen again.”
“Okay…it’s that bad,” I said. “All the more reason to go there. And now!”
Camille said, “What about your dress?”
I felt the torn fabric. I could try to mend it—but the last time I tried doing that, I ended up wrapping myself like a mummy and had to be cut out. “Um…I’ll be right back. Then we’ll go.”
***
I returned in a mid-thigh red dress held together in front by stretchy bands that curved around my pontooni—as good as a sports bra, I figured. Plus, the long sleeves would be handy in a forest. Zelda had already gone back to Assjacket in case any of her missing men showed up and needed help. Dot was scarfing down Abigail’s snacks, but Ashley was pacing and Megyyn and Camille were fidgeting. I knew exactly what they were feeling.
“Abigail, would you like to join us?”
“No thanks.”
“Because you’re averse to nature, mud, exercise, water, bugs, work, danger, being more than a few feet from your food dish, and anyplace with the words ‘forbidden,’ ‘cave’ or ‘the’ in its name?”
“No. Because someone needs to guard the house.”
“From accounts receivable clerks?”
She leapt onto the windowsill. “Have you seen any?”
“No. They’re not indigenous to the area.” I stroked her back. “I appreciate you volunteering. But try not to let your butt get anywhere near any pillow.”
“In the whole house?”
“Yes. I already have enough to worry about.”
“You don’t have to worry.”
“About my pillows?”
“About Hunter. He’ll be all right.”
I picked her up, hugged her, then put her back on the windowsill. I turned to the ladies, held out my hands and said, “Circle up.”
We clasped hands and, with a twitch of my nose, I transported us to The Forbidden Cave.
We didn’t get there. We came to a jarring halt on the main road just outside Douchecanoe, at the head of a muddy, bramble-infested path into the woods. Oh, come on—transporting is one of the few things I can do! “I don’t get it.”
“I do,” Dot said. “Seems yer Ferbidden Cave has a force field-type situation goin’ on. A no-transport zone, if ya will.”
My heart sank. “Will we be able to use magic?”
“Could be such a thing as,” Dot said, “but we can torch that bridge when we cross it.”
Or maybe not. We headed into the woods on foot.
The path was overgrown in places, pitted or littered with sticks in others. I had to push tree branches and eye-high weeds out of the way and constantly dig leaves and twigs out of the stretchy pontooni bands. A truly horrible place to be.
That Hunter would love.
Moving single file, we took turns getting stuck in mud. Good thing I wore my over-the-knee boots with the chunky heels. Floating a few inches off the ground, Ashley had it easier—until her billowing gown got caught on a dead tree branch. No one died, but I believe I speak for everyone when I say our ears—and the ears of a zillion other helpless creatures lurking in the underbrush—took a beating. I know because their chatter went from deafening to non-existent, leaving the sucking and schlurping of our feet—and Dot’s constant cursing—the only sounds other than the whisper of the breeze in the canopy.
Until we were met with the sound of rushing water.
I heard a gasp from behind me and glanced back. Camille, Megyyn and Ashley had stopped cold, which made Dot crash into them from behind.
“Heiligen bejabbers and a gunnysack o’worms,” she said, “give a gal a little hoop-de-doo afore ya stomp on the brakes.”
“Are you all right, Dot?”
“Ya kiddin’? It’d take a whole lot more than a triflin’ bump like that to dent in this crusty old broad.”
“All right, then,” I said. “Let’s move on.”
Megyyn ahemmed. “Are you sure this is the right way?”
“As far as I can tell, it’s the only way.”
Camille shivered. “It really is hard to tell.”
Can’t blame them for being scared. But—Hunter! “How ’bout Dot and I go ahead and check things out. You three wait here until we report back.”
Camille stared into the brush, her big round eyes bigger and rounder than usual. “What if you don’t come back?”
“Why wouldn’t we?”
Megyyn threw up her arms. “Again—‘forbidden’ and ‘cave.’”
“But, you said only men go in and never come out.”
“Good point.” Megyyn nodded to Camille and Ashley. “All right, then. Sounds like a plan.”
***
Dot and I continued up the path. I’d taken no more than a dozen steps before the forest opened up. The ground and everything around was damp, so I stepped carefully onto a flat rock and peered into a gaping chasm. It was filled with rose-colored mist that shimmered in the sunlight, making shapes that resembled rainbows, unicorns and chubby-cheeked cherubs. I don’t like rainbows, unicorns or cherubs. Has to be a bad sign.
When I looked up, my jaw dropped. What the fuck?
Dot edged onto the ledge and, like me, st
ood transfixed. “What the fuck?”
Looming above us in shreds of mist was a high cliff split by a vertical cleft of smooth pink rock, ringed by an unruly growth of lichens and vines. Massive formations of sunbaked salmon-colored rock extended in a V from both sides of the cleft, from which water poured into a turbulent pool before disappearing into the mist in the chasm below.
“Is it just me,” I said, “or is the water pink?”
“That there water,” Dot said, “is definitely pink.”
“And is there an overwhelming stench of strawberries?”
Dot inhaled and gagged. “Of all the beautiful smells on the Goddess’s green earth, why fukkenschtinken strawberries?”
I feared the answer. Because the answer might be “Brigid.” Lavender was Brigid’s signature color, but she smelled like a gaggle of sixth-grade girls who’d slathered their mouths with whole tubes of Bonne Bell Strawberry Lip Smackers.
I was still plumbing the depths of this new mystery when Ashley belted out one of her signature shrieks. From right behind where Dot and I were standing. Except that Dot was no longer standing there. Ashley and Camille were.
“When did you guys—”
“When it got too scary,” Camille said.
“Where’s Megyyn?”
Camille pointed to the edge of the rock. “Right there, with Dot.”
Megyyn was struggling to hold on to the ledge with one hand and Dot’s ankle with the other.
“What are you two doing down there?”
“Just hangin’ around,” Dot snapped. Being upside-down brought to light her decision to go commando on our commando mission. “Not that it was my crappensblastin’ idee, if yer attuned to my way of lookin’ at the situation.”
Megyyn grunted. “Not a super woman here.”
What to do? First things first. “Hold on, Megyyn,” I said. “And don’t look down.”
“Because it’ll make me dizzy?”
“Um…yeah.”
I hesitantly wrapped a tractor beam around Megyyn. The last time I tried doing that, I wound the beam too tight and made a giant watermelon explode. Which made for a hilarious WitchTube video—but I now was hoping for a completely different result. Holding my breath, I jerked my arm up and lifted the pair into view. It’s working!