Tracking Magic

by Maria E. Schneider

  She flicked long hair over her shoulder. It should have been as luminous black as mine from the usual mix of Spanish and Native American blood in the area, but she had bleached a gray streak across her forehead. Eagerly she gushed, "He's a person and very intelligent. I'm sure that I will be safe now."

  "Nonsense." I shuddered at the thought of dealing with a werewolf in beast form.

  She drew herself up tightly, thrusting out rather over-sized breasts. "Are you saying the protection I'm buying won't work?"

  "Oh, the protection works. But you do realize that the werewolf will sense it, and it will automatically make you an enemy, especially to the wolf."

  "He's human! He'll know that I need to be protected from the wolf. He'll be…attracted to the danger!"

  "No. Animals are not attracted to danger. They run from it or they fight it."

  She smacked away my hand as I reached for the goods. I had decided not to sell it to her.

  "His human part will be wildly attracted to me!"

  "Fool!" I declared. "His human part--"

  She turned away in a swirl of skirts and ran.

  Who in their right mind wore a skirt out in the desert? Some women had no sense.

  Apparently I was one of them, but for different reasons. When Dolores had approached me about protection from a werewolf, I had hoped to keep her away from the animal, not bring her to it. While I worked on the spell, I kept my ear to the ground. Dolores had been keeping her distance from all men. Since I couldn't know who in her community was the actual werewolf, it only stood to reason that if she were interacting with none of them, she was indeed concerned for her safety.

  "Drat your silly hide." I hurtled after her up the side of the arroyo. Catching her should be easy. She gimped along, tripping in the dark. Her legs would be good and scratched and the skirt full of rips before she made it home.

  I lunged at her, but missed. She was too stupid to stay where the path was clear. Worse, her limp made her run and weave like a drunk.

  I dashed forward again, making a flying tackle at her legs. The skirt, with its billowing mass, misled me. I ended up on the ground with a large armful of material. "Stop, you fool! The werewolf is a dangerous animal!"

  She yanked hard, showing desperation that should have been saved for the werewolf. "No!" The skirt was already half shredded from her run through the desert. It gave way with a low rumble of protest. "He'll be mine!"

  I was left in the dirt holding a fistful of brightly colored material while she made it to her truck and peeled away into the darkness.

  Thankfully, in my pocket was the kerchief I had also made her--intending to tell her to wear it on her person at all times. The silver in the kerchief was from the same batch as the shirt. If I worked quickly, I could use the silver to make a witching fork, track the shirt, and steal it back. Maybe without the false sense of security, she'd give up her wildly stupid plans.

  I sighed. It was obvious I could not enlighten her. Mind you, I had nothing against werewolves. I had no problem befriending their human side, but werewolves were werewolves. The animal instincts were there, and so was the animal power. While wolves have been known to fight on the side of humans, it was usually against a common enemy. They were still wild animals, with goals and instincts all their own.

  I grumbled my way to my feet and pushed back the dark strands that had loosened from my ponytail. I had time. The moon would still be nearly full for the next couple of nights. No one would date a werewolf this close to a full moon. It would be even stupider than believing a mere shirt of silver and salt could save someone who jumped into the teeth of a wolf.

  I took myself home to begin work on a witching fork. Since the silver was from the same batch as the shirt, my witching fork would act like a tuning fork. Only instead of music, the closer I got to the shirt, the better I would be able to hear the song of the mother lode.

  My body demanded at least a few hours of sleep before concentrating on the difficult task of wrapping silver threads along a willow-branch fork. Every silver strand had to be exactly the same length and weight on each side of the fork. I didn't want false readings in the middle of the night while breaking into private property.

  * * *

  It took until dusk the next day before I was ready with Dolores' address in hand. A quick check with Lynx, my friend who lurked in the shadows of Santa Fe's streets, assured me that Dolores' parents were in town enjoying dinner. Lynx didn't come out of the shadows, but I could hear him chuckle. "I keep them busy for you," he whispered. "I pick up my pay tomorrow night."

  "Make sure I have at least two extra hours," I whispered back into the darkness.

  He didn't answer, but I knew he would be happy to make sure they were delayed while I visited the Garcia's hacienda on the outskirts of Santa Fe.

  The trip, even after I stashed my dusty blue Civic on an unrelated side road and hiked up the short driveway to the house, took me under an hour.

  The stucco estate was to my liking, mimicking the pueblos from the ancient past, with adobe walls forming a stepped design from the first to the second floor. The stepladder formation was a very good thing because the witching fork was pointing straight up.

  I approached the walled-in garden with trepidation. At only five-five and maybe a half, I couldn't reach the top of the wall, not even on my tiptoes. I hated climbing. It was strenuous work, and I wasn't the most graceful of creatures. Thankfully I wasn't fat or the nearly six-foot barricade would have won.

  The top was rounded, which kept me from piercing various body parts, but it was damned hard to balance on the thing once I straddled it. I wouldn't die if I fell, but as I shimmied toward the window ledge, I cursed the wall for not being high enough to allow me to easily reach the window.

  I was sure of my destination. The fork was singing louder, a subtle vibration along my fingertips.

  I clutched at the side of the house and groped upwards toward the open window. There wasn't going to be an easier entry. I put one foot in front of the other, took a deep breath and jumped.

  Don't get me started about witches, broomsticks and being able to fly. I didn't know how to fly yet, and no witch in her right mind would use a broomstick these days. Why bother when there were more comfortable objects to levitate? If I ever learned to fly, I was going with a nice Arabian rug. Whoever spelled those magic carpets understood comfort.

  I caught the sill with only one hand, flailing desperately. My next mistake was to try to climb with my hiking boots. Planting my feet on the wall pushed me away from the window. My hand scraped painfully across a metal rim before losing what skin was left to the stucco.

  "Aeii!" I couldn't contain a stifled scream. My left foot landed on the wall, but the right kept sliding. A large chunk of adobe broke off under my boot and took me with it. One leg went left, the other right. I sat astride the wall like a drunk on a broomstick. One leg was painfully tangled in a rose bush.

  "Why couldn't they have planted nice, safe, lilac bushes against the house?" Stifling a groan, I got up and used the side of the house to keep from falling again. If I kept sliding down and knocking chunks of the wall away, the Garcia's were going to end up with no wall. I would end up with no legs.

  I jumped again, this time muttering the ingredients used in levitation spells. I didn't have any of the ingredients with me because the only one I was sure about was lodestone, but the list gave me confidence.

  More stucco knocked free as I clutched the sill and dug my boots into the wall. The metal cut into my hands, but I kept climbing until I had a leg over.

  It was then that I smelled him. Had he been in his human form, I might not have caught the strong scent, but wolves have a unique muskiness. A small light, maybe from a night light in the attached bathroom, gave off just enough of a glow to throw shadows.

  "Aztec curses!" I swore in disbelief. "She wouldn't! The moon is practically full…"

  One leg over the sill, I dared not move until I had my bearings. There was
no sound of breathing other than my own, but if the man had turned werewolf, there had been an emergency or danger at the very least.

  By the moonlight and the night light, I saw him. He was in the corner, half-changed to his coyote form. Most werewolves in the area were coyotes; at least the native ones. I hadn't known if I would be dealing with a local or not, but the color of his fur was definitely the dirty-blond of a coyote.

  "It would be easier for you to escape as the wolf," I said softly, showing him that I was all about cooperation. I edged to one side of the window to give him plenty of room.

  He let out a panting groan from the effort and pain of changing. His growl was a feral moan, but still a threat.

  "You'll need to hurry," I advised. If I could talk him into leaving, I stood a better chance of coming out of the experience alive. His face was furry, but not much more than an overgrown, bushy beard. Ears were still poking through, but rapidly disappearing.

  Because he was mostly human, I could see why the situation with Dolores had turned into such a problem. He was young. Very young. Eighteen if she was lucky. The barely grown man probably hadn't known how to deal with a flirtatious woman dabbling where she didn't belong. Perhaps he thought he could live in both worlds. Perhaps he was simply too young to understand she had been after him because he was a unique trophy prize.

  "I would never have sold her the shirt had I realized she sought to control you with it. You have my apologies."

  He was miserably human, shivering uncontrollably in the corner.

  "You need to leave," I urged again. "Quickly." I moved away from the window without touching anything.

  He bolted, buck naked, for freedom. I wasn't going to stop him. More stress might cause him to revert back to full wolf form, and that stupid I was not. Instead, I looked for the shirt.

  It wasn't on Dolores, since she was completely naked. The problem with fabric protection was that it could be taken off and she had, after all, invited the werewolf into her bedroom. Had she somehow thought she could have sex with a werewolf partially clothed?

  The scene in front of me was unpleasant, but for a panicked wolf, surprisingly lacking in blood. He had killed her, but crushed her throat rather than ripped it to shreds. There were more than a few deep scratches, as if the coyote had been trying to scramble away rather than do serious damage. From what was left of the shirt, it looked as though Dolores might have tried to wrap him in it.

  The wolf had not been amused by the protection spell. I had seen at least two burns, one on his arm and another across his chest.

  When it had finally rid itself of the touch of the garment, the coyote had soiled it with urine, destroying any of the spell that hadn't burned itself up when it came in contact with his skin. The silver that was left would have to be purified. Depending on the wolf's abilities…well, it was probably best buried.

  I scanned the room one last time. There were two fancy shopping bags on a chair in front of the dressing table. The plastic one was the easy choice.

  I held my nose as I bagged the shirt. I would have sighed, but didn't want to breathe deeply. Being a witch was a messy job. Being a witch wasn't easy. I had a bad feeling that retrieving the spelled shirt wasn't going to be enough to keep myself out of further trouble.

  *** Here ends the free excerpt for Under Witch Moon. The full novel can be purchased at many fine bookstores.

  Most of my other works are cozy mysteries. Some contain magic, such as the anthologies: Tracking Magic (Max Killian Investigations) and Sage (Tales from a Magical Kingdom). The Sedona O'Hala series (Executive Lunch, Executive Retention, Executive Sick Days--coming in 2011) is a series of contemporary cozy mysteries: Sedona must solve a few crimes while fighting her way up the corporate ladder; mostly she dangles from her fingertips, just trying to survive. Catch an Honest Thief is a stand alone mystery, combining a stealthy caper in the New Mexico desert with high-tech gadgets. Alexia must try to save her career--and her life.

  Acknowledgements

  There are always many people to thank when it comes to a project so large as writing a book. I'd like to say a special thanks to Nancy Fulda at www.AnthologyBuilder.com for her critique of the story "Roadkill." Her suggestions were better than gold. I'd also like to send a shout out to all the women on the Amazon Cozy and Comedy Forums--you know who you are. Thank you for your encouragement, kind words and stories. You are not only hilarious, you are wonderful people! The Town Drunk, the magazine where Haunting Clues was first published, is only an archive now, but I'd like to thank the editor, Brittany Marschalk, for publishing Haunting Clues. I'm happy to be including it here, but nothing quite matches the thrill of that first publication. And to my husband--because he's the thread that holds it all together.

  Author website: BearMountainBooks.com