Witch

by Kirsten Weiss

Blinking, I turned from the window and studied the yellow pad. Brayden and Terry would be having their early Thanksgiving today. The question of whether I should be there or not had been resolved.

  I was out.

  … And feeling sorry for myself again.

  Channeling my inner, disciplined Karin, I finished writing the Go Home spell. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t know if it worked until I tried.

  I tossed the pencil onto the table. It skittered off, startling Picatrix and rolling across the faux-wood floor.

  The cat meowed and bolted for the cat door.

  I needed to keep busy. I needed to stop thinking.

  My supply of coffee hand scrub was running low. Time to get busy and make more.

  I walked down the narrow staircase to the coffeeshop’s kitchen. From beneath the sink, I pulled out the sealed bin of yesterday’s used grounds. I heated the coconut oil in a saucepan over the kitchen’s small burner, watching the white mass melt.

  Someone knocked on the alley door, and I started. “Hello?”

  “Jayce?” a woman's voice called. “It's Terry.”

  Muscles tightening, I edged open the door.

  Terry stood hunched in her red wool coat, hanging loosely on her thin frame. The older woman hugged herself and shivered. “Can I come in?”

  “Okay,” I said and slowly stepped away from the door.

  She hurried inside. I closed the door behind Brayden’s mother-in-law.

  The coconut oil hissed on the stove.

  “Let me take care of this.” In two steps I was at the stove and moving the saucepan to an unlit burner.

  She sniffed and ruffled her short, red hair. “Coconut? What are you making?”

  “Hand scrub from old coffee grounds. I sell it in Ground.”

  Her thin brows rose. “Really? That's so clever. Alicia would have loved that.”

  “She used to buy scrub from me,” I said, sadness washing over my bones. Suddenly, I felt too tired to do this dance. Why was Terry really here? “What can I do for you?”

  She bit her bottom lip. “I heard you were going to join us for early Thanksgiving.”

  “Don't worry.” I folded my arms. “I'm not anymore.”

  “No. I mean, I know. I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way. I'm sorry you're not coming.”

  I raised a brow.

  She colored. “Okay, I wasn't happy about you and Brayden. And yes, I know it's none of my business and basically wrong. He’s a good man. He has the right to move on. But Alicia was my baby.” She looked away, blinking rapidly.

  “It's okay, I get it,” I said. “And it turns out you were right. Brayden and I shouldn't have been together.” My throat closed. If we’d belonged together, we'd be together.

  “I think… I hope I wasn't responsible for what happened.”

  “It's not your fault.” Brayden had broken up with me by text. Text. If our relationship had meant that little to him, our problems ran deeper than Terry. But why hadn't I noticed them before?

  “That woman, Maya, he's like a lovesick teenager around her.”

  Maya? My jaw clenched. Was this the real reason Terry had come? To let me know Brayden had already moved on?

  I turned toward the stove and checked the oil. It was already starting to harden, a white crust forming around the saucepan’s rim. “That's none of my business,” I said, my mouth dry.

  “It's more than that though. He hasn't been going to work,” she said. “At first, I thought he'd taken time off because I was here, even though we'd agreed he wouldn't. But I overheard a phone call with his supervisor. He's been calling in sick and walking around town with that woman. It’s a small town. It can’t have escaped notice that he’s not sick at all.”

  Frowning, I leaned against a narrow table, beside the walk-in storage closet. “That's not like Brayden.” Brayden enjoyed a good time as much as I did, but he was responsible, and he loved his work. He wouldn't blow it off.

  “You two were happy before I got here. He was eager for the two of us to meet. And then I came and kept bringing up Alicia. And now you're apart, and he's thrown himself head over heels into a relationship with a woman he barely knows. This isn't Brayden.” She gnawed the red-orange lipstick off her bottom lip. “I'm worried. I'm worried for him, and I'm worried that my presence has… triggered something.”

  I shook my head. “This isn't your fault.” I glanced at her. But was it?

  “We're having our Thanksgiving at Maya's today.” She blinked rapidly. “I can tell they don’t really want me there. I was a pity invitation—”

  “No, Terry. Brayden loves you like a mother.”

  She made a quick, negating motion. “I was a pity invite. He's been acting like I'm not even here. Frankly, if Maya hadn't suggested we all have dinner at her house tonight, I don't think we’d be having early Thanksgiving at all. It's like Brayden’s lost. Is he… Has he been taking drugs?”

  “Drugs?” I asked, startled. “No, of course not.”

  “Are you sure you'd know if he was?”

  “I ought to. I'm his—” Ex. Pain stabbed my throat. I shook myself. “Brayden hates drugs. He's seen too many overdoses in his line of work.”

  “And I haven't seen him drinking,” she muttered. “Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe my coming here was a mistake.”

  “No.” Impulsively, I grasped her hand. Her bones were dry twigs beneath the loose skin. “He's glad you're here. He was looking forward to your visit. I don't know what's going on, but I'm sure it has nothing to do with you.”

  She didn't look convinced.

  I wasn’t either.

  She eyed me. “So many strange things happening in Doyle.”

  “Strange?” I asked sharply.

  “The animal attacks.” Her smile was bleak. “Murder’s not so strange here, is it?”

  “No,” I said and glanced toward the patterned curtains to the closed café, where her daughter had died. “Terry—”

  “I should go.” She rushed to the door and opened it, hurrying into the alley.

  “Terry, wait—”

  She slammed shut the door.

  I jumped back, avoiding a broken nose by inches.

  Okay, the door slamming thing might have been an accident, but… I locked the heavy door behind her and stared at its blue-painted metal. If what she'd said was true – was it? – Brayden was acting completely out of character.

  My stomach tensed. But could I trust Terry?

  Brayden was acting out of character. Breaking up by text? He hated texting under any circumstances.

  I swore. The Brayden I'd known would never have done something so casually callous as a text breakup. The only reason I hadn’t seen it was I'd been too hurt to be rational.

  I set my jaw. Something was very wrong.

  And I was going to find out what.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  The coconut oil had re-hardened to a white mass when I returned to Ground’s stove. Pensive, I melted it again and mixed it with a wide wooden spoon into the coffee grounds and brown sugar.

  I glanced uneasily at the sky-blue, metal door to the alley.

  Terry had been right – there was more to my breakup with Brayden than met the eye.

  Now, what was I going to do about it?

  Pulling from the earth, I sent healing intent into the mix. A tingle of electricity rippled my skin. I stirred in an essential oil and spoke the words our aunt had taught me.

  The magic clicked inside me, like a lock shooting fast, and this time, I knew the spell was right. Confidence I hadn't realized I'd lost flowed into my chest.

  With a wood-handled spatula, I spooned the mix into four-ounce mason jars.

  I wiped my palms on my apron and hurried upstairs. There were two new women in Brayden’s life – Terry and Maya. I knew Terry disliked me, in spite of her performance today. But what did I know about Maya?

  Picatrix met me at the door to my apartment. The black ca
t meowed and trotted after me to the white-brick alcove.

  I sat on the couch and retrieved my laptop computer, wedged between two pink and orange cushions. A small devil’s ivy plant had fallen to the couch. Shooting Picatrix an accusing look – they weren't jumping onto the couch on their own – I returned the houseplant to its spot on the table between the sofa and the brick wall.

  Picatrix ignored me and washed a black paw.

  I booted up the computer. While it hummed and whirred, I fingered a leaf on one of the small, devil’s ivy plants. Not a single houseplant had survived the fire. What sort of spell would it take to help them grow? My cheeks burned. Maybe Karin was right about me abusing my powers. Nah.

  Picatrix lightly bit my hand.

  “Hey!” I rubbed my hand.

  The cat growled and leapt from the couch. Her tail disappeared around the corner into my guest room.

  “Thanks for nothing,” I muttered.

  I got settled on the couch and did a web search for Maya Croft. She wasn’t hard to find – articles about her rags to riches story were all over the internet.

  FROM FOSTER CARE TO SILICON VALLEY: HOW ONE WOMAN BUILT A TAROT EMPIRE

  Working her way through college, it took Maya Croft five years to graduate from San Jose State University. She took her degree in computer engineering and entered the Silicon Valley start-up scene. Her tarot website could easily have been lost among all the other metaphysical detritus online. But Maya’s site was different.

  “Growing up in foster care,” Maya says, “I turned to tarot to escape. It gave me a sense that there was a future for me out there, even if life seemed bleak at the time. But I couldn’t find a site that provided simple online readings as well as the opportunity to work with a live tarot reader.”

  And her tarot site was born. Maya’s innovation, however, came on the back-end. Her software enabled her website to seamlessly connect with tarot readers around the world, take payments from customers and distribute a cut directly to the psychic readers.

  “Of course,” Maya continues, laughing, “I didn’t realize how big it would get. I thought I was just solving a fun problem.”

  Her “fun problem” was purchased last May for $30 million dollars.

  I whistled. So. Foster care. Engineering smarts. And business smarts. I wanted to dislike Maya, but it was impossible. I admired the woman.

  I scanned more articles, stopping on one about a lawsuit. One of her employees had sued, claiming she’d stolen an algorithm. Hm… Was Maya secretly evil?

  Apparently not, because the lawsuit was dropped.

  OMG, I was stalking my ex’s girlfriend. How pathetic was that? Frustrated, I closed the computer and strode to my guest room. I needed to focus on something else.

  Picatrix looked up from the daybed, where she’d claimed a silky orange throw pillow.

  Rummaging through my media cabinet/supply cupboard, I pulled a piece of folded red silk from behind a row of blue bottles. I unwrapped the silk, exposing my favorite pendulum. Its amethyst pendant glittered. I wrapped the silver chain around my index finger. Lightly, I whisked my hand down the crystal, envisioning any psychic residue wiped off.

  I steadied the dangling crystal. “The creature in the woods, the thing from Fairy. Where is it?”

  The crystal tugged me toward the cabinet, eastward.

  I smiled. My magic was working. Why had I doubted?

  I called Lenore and got her voice mail.

  “Hi,” I said. “I've got an idea for a different sort of tracking. I'm going to see if I can get a bead on whatever this thing is. Call me.”

  I hung up and glanced out the window. A final ray of sunlight slipped past the clouds and gilded a snowcapped peak. It was the tail end of twilight, the outlines of the mountains fading against the cobalt sky. In between times like twilight and sunrise were the most powerful times for spellcasting. I didn't want to miss this opportunity.

  I grabbed a parka and flashlight and hurried downstairs. Pulling roughly at my collar, I strode through the coffee shop, lit only by the new twinkle lights, and out Ground's front door.

  On the sidewalk, I let the pendulum dangle from my finger again and smoothed its movement.

  A tourist couple ambled down the raised, wooden sidewalk on the opposite side of the street. A breeze scattered a drift of snow, whirling like a phantom down the pavement, and I shivered.

  “Where is the visitor from Fairy?” I asked the pendulum.

  It bounced, pulling me in an east-westerly direction, across the street and toward the old stone bridge.

  I stopped at the edge of the bridge. Beside the trailhead down to the trickling creek, I checked my pendulum.

  It tugged me east, where the creek rambled down the mountain toward town. I checked my phone – nothing from Lenore.

  I hesitated, then plunged across the road, walking down the creek trail into the snow-covered gully. In the shade of the gulch, trees arched high overhead, turning dusk to night. The creek splashed, invisible, on my right. Blowing out a quick breath, I flipped on my flashlight. My beam illuminated the narrow trail, gleaming crystalline white.

  In spite of my efforts at stealth, my boots crunched across the thin layer of snow. My gaze flicked to the top of the gully and the homes behind the chain link fence. Their lights glowed comfortingly through square windows.

  I shivered and not from the cold. But I was a witch, dammit. I could handle what was out there.

  Can you? Karin's voice whispered in my ears.

  I shrugged.

  The creature was a scavenger. It went after the dead, not the living. And I was Jayce Bonheim, badass witch. I raised my hands in triumph.

  Wind whipped down the hill, stirring the tree branches, blasting snow from the pines, tossing my hair.

  I leaned into the whirling white, reveling in the wind’s wild power. This was my power too, a power I’d forgotten in my grief over Brayden. The heartache was still there, but its pain had dulled.

  Heavy footed, I hiked upward.

  The pendulum pulled me forward, a steady tug that I could feel in my hand and gut.

  I stepped into a small clearing, where the creek widened, the root-webbed earth covered in a bedsheet of white. This was where I’d lost the creature before, with Karin.

  The pendulum stilled.

  Hairs rose on the back of my neck. I turned, the beam of my flashlight passing over pine trunks and dying ferns. My heart banged against my ribcage. In my head, I reviewed my newly-invented Go Home spell.

  It's a scavenger. Only a scavenger.

  A branch creaked above me, and something thudded softly to the earth.

  I yelped, jumping sideways. A pine cone lay on the snow near my boots. I shined the light upward. A massive crow stared down. It cocked its head and croaked.

  Tucking the flashlight beneath one arm, I ran my hand over the pendulum. “Where is the creature from Fairy?”

  The crystal bounced once and stilled.

  “That's weird,” I muttered. “Where is the visitor from Fairy?” I asked more loudly.

  The air thickened, crackling with power, jagged and discordant.

  Tasting vinegar, I pulled energy from the earth and focused my intent on the crystal. “Show me the creature from Fairy that’s been dining on the people of Doyle.”

  A loud crack. The amethyst shattered.

  I squeaked, starting. The chain slipped halfway through my nerveless fingers before I caught it.

  I breathed hard. A pendulum had never broken on me before. Had I caused the fracture by trying to force my question? But force it against what? There shouldn't have been any forcing.

  A branch snapped.

  The flashlight slipped from beneath my arm, hit the ground and went out. Indistinct forms rose around me.

  “Dammit.” Hands shaking, I scrabbled on the snow until my fingers touched cool metal. I turned on the light, scanned the area.

  Trees and br
acken dusted with snow. The creek carving a path through sparkling alabaster. Dark circles beneath the trees, where the branches had sheltered bare earth.

  Something glittered darkly in the snow. I duck walked toward the shimmer and retrieved two pieces of purple crystal, the remains of my shattered pendulum. A third piece still dangled from the chain. I pocketed the amethyst fragments and stood.

  The branches above rustled. Again, I aimed my beam upward.

  Hundreds of eyes glittered red in the artificial light. A murder of crows.

  One opened its curved beak and made a clicking sound in its throat. The others joined in, the clicks echoing loudly off the stones and water.

  My flashlight beam wavered. “Hey, guys,” I said unevenly.

  Time to go, and the sooner I was out of the woods, the better.

  Backing from the pine, I stumbled, my heel sinking in icy water.

  I jumped a little and scanned the creek with my flashlight. Smooth rocks jutted from the low water. Using them as stepping stones, I scrambled up the slope to the low chain-link fence. I clambered over, the metal rattling in my grip, and dropped into the yard of a tall, pale Victorian.

  And now I was trespassing. “This night keeps getting better and better,” I muttered. But I was glad to put the fence – ineffectual as it was – between me and the woods. I brushed off the front of my silvery parka.

  Darting glances behind me, I jogged toward the street.

  A figure moved in my peripheral vision.

  I skidded to a halt, my breath caught in my throat.

  Brayden walked up the steps of the Victorian. He moved stiffly, unevenly, as if he'd forgotten the motions.

  My heart crashed to earth. This was Maya's house. He was going to Maya's house.

  His shoulder thudded off a wooden post on the porch.

  A hundred yards away, I winced at the dull thump. Was he drunk? Or is it magic?

  Brayden didn't reach for his shoulder or make a sound. He pounded on the Victorian’s front door, his head low, the blows heavy and rhythmic.

  I swallowed hard, unable to move.

  The door opened. Light streamed across the porch and down the wooden steps. She laughed and pulled him, unresisting, inside.