The Little Lies (The Great Hexpectations Series Book 1)

by Marie F. Crow

  Listening to him, my face must show all of my thoughts.

  “You have no idea what a gorgon is, or an energy reader?” Jedrek asks. He’s at least still wearing his amused look to soften the blow. “Tell me about the source you were asking about?”

  There’s a warning bell chiming away in the back of what’s left of my brain. “I thought that was a taboo topic?” I ask him, still unsure why I am even talking to him.

  “You can trust me. After all I did just save your life.”

  “Do those blue eyes work on everyone?” I ask, attempting to change the topic.

  “Yes,” he says without a sense of humility.

  “You didn’t save my life,” I counter, making my way from the bathroom. “I was only in potential danger. Not real.”

  “So, I potentially saved your life.” Jedrek tells me pushing from the wall to follow me. “Still counts.”

  “Potentially, it could count,” I agree.

  “Which means you could potentially tell me about the source.” Jedrek leans against the door.

  A part of me returns to the panic waltz, but another just finds his attempt to block me disgustingly annoying. “Or I could potentially not tell you. Really could go either way.”

  “What does a demon have to do to earn the trust of the littlest witch?” he asks, and I feel all the confusion return, again.

  “Demon, huh?” I ask before I can stop myself.

  Jedrek says nothing. He wears his signature smirk and one lifted eyebrow over my expression.

  “Those other three demons, too?”

  He presses his lips, shrugging with his face.

  “What is this place,” I whisper to him fearing even the walls will hear my complete lack of understanding.

  “What did she tell you it was?” Jedrek leans closer with his question.

  “She didn’t. Just said to speak to someone named Charlotte about –“ I stop myself, fearing saying too much.

  “See?” He asks. “They work on everyone.”

  I had a sharp retort waiting somewhere on my tongue. At least I think I did, but the door being pressed open by team cheer stops it. Once inside, they look to me and back to Jedrek with sly smiles.

  “Slumming it, Jedrek?” The blonde asks, pressing herself completely against his body while staring at me.

  I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be offended or amused over how completely obvious, she is acting. I vote amused since I haven’t had a death threat in a few minutes now.

  “You wear desperation well. It completely covers the natural scent of your two hundred years of insecurity.”

  I knew as soon as it slipped from my mouth, I shouldn’t have said it. It isn’t because I just reminded myself that they are all over two hundred years old; it is due to the fact that their anger is melting their faces into walking corpses.

  It started with the blonde trying to make herself a second shirt for Jedrek, but her friends joined her corpse bride look. I’m forcing my face to hold its unfazed posture, but I’m pretty sure the sound of my heartbeat is ruining my own attempt of a mask.

  “There was a time,” the blonde says with what my mind can only compare to oil running from the corners of her mouth, “when new witches would pay homage to their elders.”

  The glazed, pale eyes of a brunette glances over me before her bloated tongue licks her lips with her thoughts. “But what could she possibly have that we would want?”

  “I have a thought,” the other blonde standing near me pipes up. In her enthusiasm a clump of skin falls from her outstretched arm when reaching for my face. What was once perfect French tipped nails has turned into blackened talons. She cups my face as if trying to pierce my flesh. “We could take the little token she’s so curious about.”

  The blonde pressing against Jedrek smiles, spilling more oil from her mouth. I don’t want to hear her idea of my homage.

  “Sorry, ladies,” I offer, pulling my face free. I’m about to take a huge gamble and I hope it pays off. “I already promised it to Jedrek.”

  All three turn to him. If their flesh wasn’t in such a state of decomposition, I may have been able to read their expressions. As it stands, it’s just a trio of glazed eyes and rotting folds.

  “Guilty,” Jedrek says with his charming smile.

  There’s a moment when I fear the three will challenge him. I shouldn’t have.

  “And what will you do with it?” The brunette asks with sincere curiosity.

  “Oh, don’t you worry, Wens,” he tells her, blessing her with one of his smiles, “I’ll take good care of it.” Slipping free from the blonde, he does his best to not stare at the mess of his shirt. “Ready, littlest witch?”

  I take his outstretched hand without sparing a second of hesitation. My knowledge of demons may be short, but witches, angry rotting witches over two hundred years old who I have angered, seem more of a threat. I don’t fight or struggle from his firm grasp as he leads us from the room, or even as he escorts me down the hall. He takes me right back through the crowded room I entered with all its ear rattling noise to stand in front of drawn door on the only wall without drapes.

  “I bet you also don’t know how to leave, do you?” Jedrek asks me as he pulls me in front of him.

  I can feel his hot breath along my exposed neck. Once again, that annoying girl part of me wants to giggle with the sensation. Not trusting my voice, I shake my head.

  “You really are the littlest witch,” he tells me. “I’ll see you soon, Harper.”

  I don’t have time to turn to him to ask him how he knows my name. I don’t have the chance to question his whole charade if he knew it the whole time. Instead, I’m spinning around in the same empty upstairs room from which I left. The sudden silence has a reverse feeling of suffocation. The twirling dust from my entrance is a poor imitation of the twinkling lights I just left. Hugging myself, I stare into the scrying mirror feeling completely alone in a different way than I have ever felt before. Just like the rest of the afternoon, I don’t understand any of it.

  “Discover anything about your little problem?” GiGi asks the next morning.

  I had spent most of the night tossing and turning, hating every sound from the house, in my debate over whether I should storm up there and wake her up to demand answers or just pretend none of it ever happened and keep our little false life going.

  “You could say that,” my temper, despite all the calming lavender planted around our breakfast nook, is still not sated. “Want to tell me about energy readers? Or why we don’t shake hands? Or what a gorgon is? Or about demons, witches, necroes and the many other things you forgot?”

  GiGi’s face doesn’t change during my whole rant. It might be the pastel purple, smiley face PJs, or my fluffy robe ruining it for me. Then again, it could be the squeaky slippers or the giant looped hairstyle causing my hair to flop back and forth as I stomp towards her. Most likely it is due to her general non-giving of cares over people’s feelings towards her, much less about how I appear, at all.

  “See you found Charlotte,” is what she tells me. Slow sip of coffee and all.

  “That’s all? That’s all you have to say?” My voice is the pitch of a teenager being asked to clean her room. It annoys even me. GiGi keeps right on sipping with her eyes bored and unmoved. “I could have been killed. Potentially killed,” I correct. “How did you not even tell me these things? Even Charlotte is mad with you and that doesn’t seem like a good thing.”

  GiGi scoffs, stirring more sugar into her coffee. “Charlotte is always mad. She runs a bar and is charged with keeping magic from happening in a place packed with magical beings. She runs on anger and caffeine.”

  “Let’s talk about these magical beings.” Sitting at the table, I place myself in front of her. “How many magical beings are there?”

  GiGi lifts an eyebrow with an already exhausted look. “No one really knows. Hybrids are born all the time.”

 
“There’s hybrids? Okay, let’s start with some basic. What are demons?”

  “You act as if you’ve never had the bible quoted to you by frightened Christians?”

  “Fair,” I tell her. “What are they really?”

  Sighing, GiGi places her version of morning salvation down. “Since all beings won’t exactly share their secrets, the general idea is they are from the lower realm which some call Hell. They serve to keep their master happy, and who that is, well that’s always up for debate with the many versions of the underworld. Their main goal is the constant tempting of mortals.”

  “Is there an order to them? Like high to low power-wise?”

  She tilts her head, thinking. “I’ve heard that, but I haven’t really asked one.”

  “And gorgons?”

  Rolling her eyes, she says, “Overrated bitter women. Surely, you’ve heard the story of Medusa?”

  “But I didn’t turn into concrete.”

  “Well, of course not. Nothing is as strong as it once was. Now they are mostly parlor tricks using fundamental mind control. Quite sad really.”

  “Do I even want to know about energy readers or how Botox commercials could become decaying blobs?”

  GiGi chuckles. “The Sinister Trio is still there? Oh, we didn’t name them that,” she tells me seeing my face over their title. “They did. They thought it sounded scary. Who knows? Maybe back then it did.”

  GiGi sips her coffee before speaking again. Maybe it’s my nerves or my own lack of caffeination, but she seems to take forever. When she reaches for more sugar, I have to force my tongue to not move and my lips to press tight to see to the first demand.

  “I probably should have told you about more than I have, but with you, the more I told the more you pressed to go find things out. I was worried what you would do with such information. To answer your question about that, witches have a wide range of abilities. You, for example, call the dead. It’s not spell work. It’s just what you naturally do. Charlotte can read people with a touch. She will know all your secrets, or at least your general truths. The trio are corpse walkers. They can rot on command, and if they want, rot things they touch. That’s just the tip of the candle of what’s out there.”

  She sips her sugar with some coffee without looking at me. I can tell by her deflated frame this isn’t anything she had hoped I would have to know for many years, which makes me wonder my next question.

  “Why send me there if you didn’t want me to know all this? Seems counterproductive. You could have just gone yourself.”

  “It’s time. Charlotte is right when saying you’re in more danger not knowing than if you do know. She’s also right about the danger to both sides should we not find this source.”

  Squinting my eyes, I ask her, “How did you know what she said?”

  GiGi blooms back to her normal self. “Kid, all of us witches have our own secrets,” she says, mocking the name Charlotte had handed out. “Did you sense anything powerful in the Torte’s house?”

  “Nothing. It was amazingly basic.”

  “Too basic?”

  “What do you mean?” I ask her, amused by her constant amount of conspiracy theories.

  “Like someone knew you were coming and cleaned house basic.” GiGi stirs her coffee as if she thinks she’s suddenly blown the case wide open.

  “If a source is so powerful, I don’t think a little sage or cedar would make it undetectable.”

  “No,” GiGi offers, “but if the one who gave it to her were to clean their tracks to cover their own ass it would.”

  “How would one even do that? A house holds energy for years, if not forever.”

  “There are ways. Not for someone like Miranda or the likes, but there are ways.”

  “Let me skip along your logic. You’re thinking when Bella told her parents who she met at work, Miranda panic called who she got the source from, if she has the source, and the owner of the source just shows up on a moment’s notice to not only remove it, but also remove a dead girl and all trace of them both? Seems a stretch.”

  “Not if it was discovered by someone with magic. The owner doesn’t know how powerful or trained you may or may not be. You could have discovered it, reclaimed it and therefore turned it in, leading to the owner’s death warrant.”

  “You do death warrants? Do magical beings in police uniforms show up and arrest them? Put them in little magical cop cars?” I ask, more amused than I should be.

  “No. They show up and kill them.” GiGi informs me of this fact as if it’s just the morning’s weather.

  “No trial? Just dead?”

  GiGi chuckles, “Why need a trial when a simple touch can show the truth? Saves a lot of time.”

  “You’re telling me if I had found this thing, it would have meant instant death to someone?”

  “Most definitely. If not the owner, then to you as others fought to claim it.”

  “Even knowing it’s a death sentence to own it?”

  “Even knowing,” she nods. “Power makes people stupid.”

  “How do I find it then?”

  “You’re looking for the wrong type of magic. When do you go back?” GiGi asks as she collects the morning’s dishes.

  “Today, I suppose. I need to fill them in on what I didn’t find.”

  “Good. When you go back, look past the air fresheners and the too hard of an attempt to look perfect. Don’t feel for your type of pull. Feel for something hiding. The cleaning spell will be cloaked, pushed way down to hide itself among the energy of those living there. It may be a slight tickle, or a hum of something just a little off key, but it will be there.”

  “And when I find it?”

  “Memorize it. The one who casted it will have the same feeling when you find them.”

  “It’s just that simple?” I ask her, watching her clean and return things around the kitchen to their proper place.

  “Wearing that, nothing is simple. No one would ever believe you’re a death witch who wears nothing but pastels,” she teases.

  “I own other colors…” I self-consciously say when placing my cup in the dishwasher. “I just prefer to not highlight the fact of how pale I am, living in the south.”

  GiGi nods with false agreement when I walk past her, saying, “Wouldn’t want anyone to think of a witch as pale and wearing black. The very idea…”

  “You’re such an ass!” I shout over my shoulder when her words trail off, letting me know she’s wearing her trademark smile of sarcasm.

  Her laughter follows me down to my basement apartment and I can’t help but smile. We both know the reasons for my wardrobe. It has nothing to do with my coloring. Long time ago I was convinced if I did everything I could to not look the part then maybe the rumors would stop. Maybe, just maybe, I too would get an invite to the school dances or at least birthday parties. If I wore enough pastels, enough ribbons in my hair, then maybe no one would believe the things whispered when my name was mentioned. It never happened, but I had childhood dreams and teen hopes.

  Despite all my efforts to blend in and be accepted, I never was. GiGi had told a sobbing preteen it was better that way. People are rude and at their core hateful for anything different than themselves. But the truth, the truth is people aren’t always just what they seem. Sometimes people are just slow to embrace their truths and that I should accept mine and embrace them, even be proud of them. I am in my early twenties, and when walking past my bedroom mirror, in all of my attempted camouflage, I know, sadly, I still haven’t fully embraced my truth.

  Standing at the door of the Tortes, I have to softly sigh and if not completely laugh at myself. The conversation with GiGi has put all of my inner demons on full display with my blue shirt and cream-colored pants. We won’t even mention the matching flats. Considering what I was wearing the first time I knocked on this door, I suppose anything is a fashion upgrade.

  Lowering my walls, I push my magic around the
little cement porch with its metal bench and seasonal coordinated colored pillows. At first there is nothing. No little ‘hello’ or small tickle left behind by someone. That’s what gave it away.

  A porch is the main entry way into a house. People stand, gather and travel through here several times a day. There should be something, some feel of life, if not magic, but there’s nothing. If I didn’t know better, I would say this house hasn’t been lived in in years.

  “Find anything?”

  Jedrek’s voice causes me to jump and break my concentration. Still wearing an ensemble of all dark clothing, he leans against one of the wooden pillars. His sunglasses aren’t reflective. They are tinted and behind that darkened glass I can see he is watching me with more interest than his smiling charm wants to display.

  “What are you doing here?” I whisper, figuring any moment the door will open.

  “What are you doing here, littlest witch?” Jedrek is glancing around the proud house as if it’s the last place he’d suspect to stumble upon me.

  “My job!” My voice is still a hiss of aggravation.

  “Wouldn’t be that little thing we are both looking for, would it?” he asks will all mock sincerity and half smiles.

  “Why would I tell you?”

  “Because if it is, you’re going to need me,” he says this with an edge of caution to his mirth. “You see that little bird over there?” Jedrek points to an area of a tree behind my right shoulder.

  Turning I see what he’s pointing at, I just don’t see why I should care.