Bad Luck Girl

by Sarah Zettel

  “Stay back!” I shouted to Major, and yanked Papa’s wish out of my pocket.

  “Oh, no, you don’t!” Magic lashed out, fast and strong, and the wish was gone from my hand. The middle man of the three held it up in his thick fingers. Then he popped it into his mouth and swallowed it whole.

  “Mmm.” He licked his pale pink lips slowly. “Tasty.”

  His two friends snickered and stepped out into the light. Before I could take another breath, Major had ducked around in front of me and he had his black cane held up high.

  “No further,” he whispered, soft and dangerous. “No further or I will make an end of you all, I so swear.”

  “Now, brother,” said the middle of the three. “What is this? We’ve just come to bring you news of the peace.”

  “Peace?” Major sneered.

  “Peace,” repeated the middle man. “And victory. The Midnight Throne calls you back to your service, brother,” he said to the Major. “You hear it now.”

  Magic filled those words, thick and smothering and honey-sweet. I jumped back like I thought I could dodge it. But this wasn’t for me. This was for the major domo. The light flickered in his eyes, and his anger melted like ice in July. He lowered his black cane to the floor, and he smiled. I could feel the relief in him as he bent into one of his crisp bows.

  “That’s it, brother.” The middle man stepped forward, hand out.

  Quick as thinking, Major whipped that diamond-handled cane around and brought it down hard on the middle man’s wrist. His scream ended in a harsh gurgle as Major jabbed the tip into his throat.

  “Run!” Major shouted to me. “Run, Highness!”

  I didn’t bother answering that one. I snatched up the feeling swirling through the shop around me, and I shoved back hard. Hard enough to rattle the shelves. The left-hand man looked up and raised his arm and his magic. And I grabbed up the Webster’s Dictionary off the desk and threw it at him.

  Lefty ducked and swore. I grabbed up another book, and the right-hand man tackled me, hard.

  We rolled over, with me screaming and kicking and jabbing my fingers at his eyes and twisting on his ears and him screaming too. My magic lashed out on its own, looking for something it could grab and twist, because I was wishing for help too. Any kind of help.

  What it found was the papers and books on the desk, the ones where Major’s blood had spilled and smeared. They twitched and jerked upright and flapped open, bills and receipts and books, and even that dictionary. They rose up, flapping like giant paper birds in a high wind. While I was distracted, Right Hand got hold of my arm and tried to twist it up behind me. I screamed, and those flying books dropped down, right on his head. He let go to bat them away. I shinnied out from under him and shoved my foot hard in his stomach on the way out. Or near his stomach, anyway.

  Major was dancing like a prizefighter in front of the desk, beating back both Lefty and Middle Man with his diamond cane and hollering curses at the top of his lungs. The papers must have noticed too, because they swooped down to plaster themselves against the bad guys’ faces, blinding them. Smothering them. Major flipped his cane around in his hand, so he was swinging with that huge diamond at their knees and their skulls.

  I had time to let out one whoop before my feet shot out from under me. I slammed hard against the floor and all the breath left me like it wasn’t ever coming back. Right Hand reared up over me, his fist bunched up tight and his magic pinning me down hard. The Webster’s Dictionary jumped at his head and bounced back a good six inches away. He laughed and swung down, but instead of my head, he hit a big pillow of paper that had balled itself in front of me. I shouted, and rolled, and kicked, and scrambled away. The dictionary fell to the floor and flapped open, releasing a cloud of words. They swarmed around Right Hand’s head like big black wasps, diving for his eyes, and getting into his ears and up his nose, and right down his throat when he tried to scream. He fell back coughing, spitting, and swatting. I levered myself to my feet, a whole swarm of loose paper scrunched up around my ankles.

  But while my books and my papers had rescued me, they’d left Major alone. One of the fairy toughs had Major’s arm twisted around behind him. The other had his cane, and he swung the diamond handle down with a sick, wet crunch.

  Run, I heard Major’s voice pleading in my head. Run, Highness.

  Middle Man raised the cane again. The next blow snapped Major’s head back and his voice went suddenly, horribly silent. Lefty turned on me and held up his hand. Fire spurted from each finger and Lefty grinned.

  I ran. I slammed out the door and into the alley. I pelted away from the main street and into the shadows. It was a twisting maze back there. I turned left and right without any kind of plan. I glanced back. Two fairy men ran behind me, and they were gaining. My papers swirled at my feet and my back. They flopped into the fairy men’s faces, then jammed under their shoes and made them skid. Words buzzed and clouded around their heads. But papers tore and crumpled, and the wind blew the words aside. My magic tried to keep them together, and I had to save most of my concentration for running, but they kept on trying, and they did slow those murderers down.

  Why had I ever liked this city? There were too many holes and cubbies and dead ends. I didn’t know where to go. There were too many places for people and things to hide and spring out. At least in Kansas, if something bad was going to roll down over you, you could see it coming. Here, there was nothing but alleys and doorways and traffic and fences, and with all my magic senses, I couldn’t tell what was behind any of them. I couldn’t think clearly, my head was so full of the sight of Major going limp and still. It brought back the sight of Ivy lying dead on the white marble deck and Shimmy falling dead in the mud. I’d done it again, again, again. Another person tried to help me; another person wound up dead.

  The difference was, last time there’d been a fairy court, and a king, and my family to get out of the way. This time there were just two murderers following me. Just two, and I had nobody else to get out of the way now.

  That thought opened up a kind of grim determination inside me. I dodged around the next corner and came face to face with a wooden fence. A little group of words buzzed straight past me and down, showing me where one board had been broken off at the bottom. I fell flat on my belly and shinnied through it and came up in the dusty backyard of a tenement neighborhood, kind of like Jack’s, with the crowded clapboard houses, all three stories high with peaked roofs and porches out back.

  One porch, a dug-out, concrete-lined patch, led to a basement door. I sent a strong thought to my following flock and all the words and pages dropped to the ground, scattering themselves among the other trash just lying there. I jumped down onto the dug-out porch, crouched by the wall, and waited, gathering a little knot of magic tight inside me.

  “Come on, come on, you big dummies,” I muttered. “You saw which way I went. Get in here.”

  A wind whirled hard through that little yard. The fence rocked, and creaked, and fell, puffing up a big cloud of dust. The murderers stepped through. And I saw how I’d made another huge mistake. Because they weren’t alone anymore.

  I wasn’t the only one who could gather up the bits and pieces around me. I’d thought it was my words and pages that had slowed them down, but now I saw they’d been taking the time to work a little magic of their own. They’d made friends with the trash from the alley, and the junk and the rags and the rotted garbage rolled and roiled around them as they stepped over the fallen fence. The stink was unbelievable, and so was the noise. My papers out there cringed backward, and so did I.

  “Well, well,” said Middle Man. “Better go get her, boys.”

  Lefty called out some words I didn’t understand and the trash piled itself up, folding and fitting and tucking together until that restless pile took on the form of a bear, rearing up on its hind legs. My words tried to swarm around it, but they just made it angry, so it roared and galloped forward, heading straight for me.

 
But as I scrambled backward, that bear was reeling back, like it had slammed into a wall. I straightened up and blinked. Lefty was shouting again. The trash bear slammed forward again, snarling and clawing at thin air, and the words buzzed furiously. But none of them—not the fairy men, not the bear, not my words—could get any closer. I pushed myself up against the building wall, so I was in plain view, and still not one of them could reach me.

  Relief bubbled up and made me stupid. I stuck my tongue out at the murderers.

  Right Hand and Lefty snarled and stormed forward. The bear and the wasps fell back. The fairy toughs linked hands and magic, and shoved their free hands right up to whatever barrier filled the space between the porch timbers. I grabbed at what little feeling and magic I had in there with me and got ready to fight for my life.

  Turned out I needn’t have bothered.

  Both fairy men stood there for one split second. I could see them plain. Then the whole space outlined by the porch timbers filled with something thick and white, like a fog rising up from the ground. Except this fog had weight, and it wrapped around them, winding tight around their heads and limbs. They screamed and howled, but that fog filled their mouths to smother their cries and drag them both down to the ground.

  I watched them kicking and struggling under that foggy white binding. But not for long. The lumps that had been the murderers slumped against the ground, growing smaller and smaller under that thick white blanket, until there was nothing left of them at all.

  The trash bear wavered for a moment, and then burst apart. Junk and rot and refuse tumbled away across the dusty yard. My words buzzed aimlessly for a moment, and then dropped onto the ground, clattering like pebbles. Just more trash to fill up that dusty yard.

  My throat tightened up. Slowly, I pushed myself to my feet. I wiped my hands on my skirt. I had no idea what just happened, but I had a very clear idea that I should not stay here on this little sunken porch. The coast looked clear. I couldn’t feel any magic hanging around this porch space with me. Time to get good and gone.

  But as soon as I reached the steps that led up to the yard, I tripped and fell. Dirty concrete bit my knees and I gasped in pain. I shoved myself back to my feet and tried again to run up the steps, and tripped again, fell again, and banged my knees again.

  Fear crawled onto my back and I forced myself to stay calm. I tried to vault over the cement wall into the yard, but my hands slipped right off the edge and I was back on my knees. This time the concrete drew blood and I bit my tongue hard.

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood up before I even heard the creak of the hinges. The cellar door was opening behind me.

  “Come in, Callie LeRoux.” The voice from inside the cellar creaked as badly as the rusty hinges. “Let’s get a look at you.”

  Not on your life.

  I stood up, and anger rallied my magic. I swung out with it, feeling for edges and cracks in whatever magic wall was holding me in. But there was nothing I could get hold of. I could still feel the world out there, with all its motion and jigsaw puzzle pieces, but I couldn’t get to it. I was stuck.

  The whole time, somebody in the dark beyond that open door at my back laughed at me. They chuckled and cackled and they wouldn’t quit.

  I tried again. I ran and I jumped up the steps. I pushed and shoved with my magic and my bare hands in every direction as hard as I knew how. Nothing happened, except I skinned my knees and my palms up real good and got myself all out of breath.

  “Oh, get in here, gal,” said the voice at last. “I ain’t gonna eat you. Yet.”

  My heart was in my mouth. Sweat dripped in my eyes and stung. I was breathing so hard it blotted out the traffic noise. The weathered door was open onto a threshold so dark I couldn’t see anything except the cobwebs in the splintery corners of the door frame.

  I didn’t want to go in there. Every door I walked through just made things worse.

  But there was nothing else I could do. I wiped my upper lip with the back of my hand, straightened my shoulders, and remembered I was my mother’s daughter. I lifted my chin high and stepped inside.

  16

  Up Jumped Aunt Hagar

  The smell of damp, dirt, and old sewer surrounded me like the dark. A spider scuttled across my shoe and I jumped back, banging against the cellar wall and sending a shower of dirt down on my own head. I shrieked and swatted the air around me and got hands full of cobwebs. A spider scampered up my arm and I shrieked again and swatted at it.

  And the cackling laughter rose up again. Anger and shame burned away my fear. How could a couple spiders and a little dirt be getting to me like this? I was not gonna make myself any more ridiculous in front of … of … whatever it was in here with me.

  The dim light drifting in through the open door showed where there was a naked lightbulb overhead and a cob-webbed chain hanging down. I lifted up my scraped hand and pulled the chain. There was a chink, and the light came on.

  I saw the ruined basement around me, its floor littered with trash, leaves, and scraps of rotted wood. But in the back corner, there was another room altogether, almost another world. It was a tidy place, with a fire in a fieldstone hearth and a clean rag rug on the floor. There was a handmade rocking chair and a carved table. The white-haired woman in the rocking chair was stick thin with skin a color somewhere between umber and bronze. Her long, knobby fingers worked a set of knitting needles as delicate as tree twigs. A huge spill of pure white spread across her lap and around her shoulders like a snowy shawl, except she was still knitting it. Instead of the yarn coming up from a ball like it should, it was coming down to her from a hundred different directions.

  It was coming from each and every one of the spiderwebs that hung in the old beams over her tidy space of a room.

  This was wrong, very wrong. This neat, petite old woman sat here drawing cobwebs onto herself to knit into a blanket. I wanted to back away. In fact, I did, until I bumped into the door that had shut behind me without making a sound.

  “So much for the famous Callie LeRoux.” Her sunken lips pursed. A quick hand darted out from under the white blanket and caught the slack spider thread up for her busy needles. At first her eyes were rich brown human eyes, but as they narrowed, I caught a shift, and for one second, I was looking into the stars. I felt a strange twist of nerves and a rush of relief at the same time. Whoever this was, she wasn’t the fairy kind. I’d seen eyes like this before.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said, trying to remember my manners. Once I’d started dealing in magic, I learned pretty quick there were people around you that you had better be polite to. I would have bet everything I owned she was one of them. “Um, you wouldn’t by any chance know an old Indian called Baya, would you?” I asked. “Or a porter named Daddy Joe?”

  “Ah. Now, they did say you was a sharp one. I guess they might be right at that.” She held up the bit of white she was working on and ran her thumb over it. The pattern shimmered silkily in the light of her fire. It was beautiful, like the stars or flowing water is beautiful. All at once, I felt sure it held all the mysteries of the city around us. I wanted more than anything to move closer, to see it more clearly. When I did, maybe I’d finally understand.

  I shut my eyes fast and the old woman chuckled again. “Sharp enough, anyhow. Not terrible quick, but you do get there.”

  The needles started clacking again. I took a risk and cracked my eyelids. She’d lowered her knitting and was busy casting on while the needles worked back and forth. “Um, I don’t know what I should call you, ma’am.” That was something else I’d learned. You never asked somebody like this their name directly. It might make them mad.

  The old woman considered. “You can call me Aunt Nancy for the purposes of our conversing here.”

  “Yes, ma’am. And … and I guess I should thank you for helping me out with … them.” I gestured toward the door.

  Aunt Nancy sniffed. “Didn’t do it for you, gal. They didn’t ask my permission to go stomping through
my city, did they? No more did you,” she added, each word as pointed as her needles.

  “Uh, I … uh … I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t know …”

  “Ha! Didn’t think to ask. Don’t worry. Your daddy was here this morning, all smiles and pretty words and if you please.”

  “Oh. Ah. Um. Good.”

  “Good enough for working days, anyhow. But I wanted a look at you for my own self, as you’re the one who seems to be causing all this fuss.”

  I didn’t want her looking at me. Her kind could see way too much. The last couple of times had gone pretty well, but then I’d been helping out some. This time … this time I was nothing but a problem. I shifted my weight and tried to think what I could do to get myself out of here. I wondered what Papa would say. “To what do I owe the honor of being invited here today?”

  “Hee. That’s right, Bad Luck Girl, you pay attention to your papa’s pretty talk. He’ll show you all the tricks. Train you up to be just like him.”

  One of these days I was going to learn to think quietly. I just wished that day would come soon. Aunt Nancy nodded with satisfaction. Her needles clacked fast and light, a sound like claws scrabbling inside the walls. Above and around us the spiders spun their webs for her to draw down. I swallowed fear and impatience. “Ma’am, I don’t mean any disrespect, but if you’ve got something you want to say to me, I’d be glad to hear it.”

  “Got someplace to be, have you?” She jutted out her sharp jaw in disapproval. Her hand waved toward the distant door and her needles trembled as she worked. “All this comin’ and goin’. I got kinfolk need looking after here. Can’t have your people just trampling all over them, now can I?”

  “We’re just passing through, ma’am.”

  “Are you, now? ’Cause to these eyes it sure looks like you’re fixin’ to stay put.”

  So she’d been spying on me, on us. That touched the last dying spark of my patience. I walked up to the edge of that rag rug. A spider climbed out of the braids and moved, slow and long-legged, toward my shoe. My toes curled up and I had to fight the urge to stomp on it.