The Witch's Will

by Raven Snow

“All right. Let’s go there then. Onward!” Lady pointed straight ahead just in time for Crispin to make a U-turn. “Or onward in this direction. Wherever. I don’t know my way around town yet.”

  ***

  Otsuya seemed let down by the choice made to go to the graveyard rather than the mansion. It wasn’t as exciting as breaking into a mansion, but few things were. “Can you see ghosts?” Lady asked as they all climbed out of the car.

  It seemed to take Crispin a moment to realize he was the one Lady was addressing. Even after he did a double-take at her, he put a hand to his breast. “Me?”

  “Either of you, I guess,” she said with a shrug. There wasn’t a parking lot in the graveyard so much as there was just a gravel back road leading away from the church. Crispin had parked on the side of the road, at the top of the hill. Lady hadn’t really noticed until now, but there looked to be a storm rolling in. The sky was too dark for midday and she could feel the occasional droplet. It sure did rain a lot in Dark Lake. Oh, well. At least it made the day cooler.

  “I… Kind of?” Crispin was struggling for an answer. “Not really,” he said finally. “No,” he added after another couple seconds, paring his original answer down even further.

  Lady waited to see if he had anything else to add on to that statement. “Okaaay.” She looked to Otsuya when nothing else seemed to be forthcoming from Crispin. “And you?”

  Most of Otsuya’s attention appeared to be elsewhere. She had her hands on her hips and was surveying the whole of the graveyard from the top of the hill. “Yeah, sure. Whatever.” Lady couldn’t be sure if she hadn’t heard and was just throwing out an answer or if she genuinely possessed some magical talent. She knew surprisingly little about her friend’s past. She knew she lived at the inn and worked with Doyle. Not that she knew much about Doyle. She knew he was aloof and a sharp dresser. He kept to himself. Lady wasn’t sure what Otsuya did for a living or who her parents were or anything like that. For all Lady knew, Otsuya was a witch.

  Lady was about to ask again when Otsuya took off down the hill, moving at a brisk jog. “Hey!” she called after her. “What are you-” She looked to Crispin when Otsuya didn’t look back. “What’s she doing?”

  Crispin shrugged helplessly. “I don’t get why she does half the things she does. It— Oh.”

  “Oh?”

  Crispin raised a hand and pointed in the direction Otsuya had run. “There’s an SUV down there.”

  Lady squinted into the distance. There was an SUV. It was parked a ways down the hill but was a bright and violent yellow. How had she missed that? “Is that…”

  “Destiny’s? I think so.”

  “It has to be, right? Who else would willingly drive that thing?” Lady turned to Crispin. “Otsuya is checking it out, but I doubt Destiny’s there. I bet you anything she’s in the Antonie part of the cemetery.”

  “That’s what I assume,” said Crispin with a nod.

  “Otsuya, we’re headed to Lucette’s grave!” Lady yelled down the hill. “C’mon, let’s see if we can catch her.”

  “Otsuya?”

  “No, Destiny. Otsuya knows where we’re going.”

  “All right. It should be this way.” Crispin led the way. It wasn’t long until the fenced in area came into view. It was especially easy to pick out with all the yellow caution tape around it.

  Lady paused outside of the tape and the fence. There was some heavy equipment nearby. They had probably left it there, assuming they would be putting Lucette right back in the ground soon after. Lady wondered if they would be back to get it out of the rain. She didn’t really know how heavy equipment worked. She just hoped they didn’t come back while she was there. They would have to duck under the tape, and from the looks of it, they would be climbing over a fence as well. The gate to the Antonie graves was shut. A heavy padlock hung from the front. Lady imagined that was shut as well. Curiously, there was no sign of Destiny. Maybe she was at the SUV after all.

  “Well, that’s unfortunate,” said Crispin.

  “What is?”

  “That we can’t get much closer than this.” Crispin motioned to the police tape and to the fence. “We established that breaking and entering—”

  Lady could hear a hopeful lilt in Crispin’s voice. He didn’t expect her to stay out of the off limits area, but he sure was hoping. “But we’re not breaking. We’re just entering.”

  “Hey! Hey, Lady is that you?”

  Both Lady and Crispin jumped as someone yelled out. It sounded like they were near, and the voice sounded familiar. “Destiny?” Lady ventured, looking left and right and still not seeing her.

  “Yeah! It’s me! Do you think you could come over here and help me out?!”

  “Where are you?!” Lady looked straight ahead. Her voice seemed to be coming from the Antonie graveyard, but she didn’t see her.

  “You’ll have to come over the fence if you’re not already! I’m at Lucette’s grave!”

  Lady took a few steps sideways. She could see Lucette’s grave and the mound of earth piled beside it. “I can see the grave, but I don’t see you!” Lady looked to Crispin without speaking. She widened her eyes, trying to communicate that this was all making her very nervous. “Can ghosts pretend to be other people?” she whispered. “Could that be the ghost?”

  Crispin wasn’t looking at Lady. He was frowning in the direction of the grave. “I don’t think that’s it.”

  “Just come here!” Destiny yelled.

  Lady caught on. “She didn’t,” she said to Crispin. “You didn’t,” she said louder so that Destiny could hear. Destiny only grumbled something unintelligible in response. “Okay, well now we have to go over.”

  Crispin sighed but nodded. He ducked under the tape and went to the main gate first. He tried to open it, but of course it was locked. He sighed again, louder this time. “I’m not sure I can get over this.” The fence was black wrought iron with spikes at the top.

  “Sure you can! I used to climb over them all the time in high school.” Lady had also climbed over them as an adult more than once, but she didn’t bother to mention that bit of trivia. “The trick is to get a running go and avoid the spikes.”

  Crispin was looking at Lady like she had just commanded him to fly. “This may come as a surprise to you, but I’m not really a fence hopping kind of guy.”

  “Sure you are,” Lady said, trying to encourage him even though she had her own doubts. “I’ve seen you at the library. You get up and down those ladders better than I ever could.”

  “I do that every day. Plus, there aren’t spikes on the rungs.”

  Lady cocked her head and considered the fence for a few seconds. She tried to ignore Destiny’s continued grumbling over whether or not they were coming. “How about this? I give you a leg up, and you climb over the rest of the way.”

  Crispin looked Lady up and down. “No offense, but I think I’m too heavy for you.”

  “Nonsense! You just gain some momentum and—”

  “I think momentum will just make it worse.”

  “All right. Then I’ll be like a ladder rung. I’ll get down on my hands and knees and you just…” Lady gave a little hop, trying to mimic what he did at the library and failing miserably.

  “You’re going to hurt your back. I’m going to hurt your back.”

  “Then hurt her back!” Destiny shouted. “She’s telling you to do it, and I need both of you over here!”

  “I’m sturdy,” Lady promised before Crispin could object again, she dropped down onto her knees. “Trust me.” She sat her tote bag aside. Lion popped his head up out of it and regarded her with narrow eyes. It felt like he was doubting her too. She ignored him and put her hand on the ground, straightening her back out as well as she could. “Just grab on to the top, put your toe between two spikes, and hop over.”

  “Hop,” Crispin repeated, sounding doubtful. It did sound alien when paired with him. “All right. You ready?”

  “Yep, go any time.”
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  Crispin stepped up as soon as Lady had finished speaking. The breath was forced from her lungs and her arms buckled. Crispin took a quick step down and backward. “Are you all right?”

  “Just go; just go; just go.” Lady wasn’t going to back down now. She gritted her teeth and forced her arms to cooperate.

  Thankfully, Crispin didn’t argue with her this time. His shoe touched on her back and was gone the next second. Lady heard him land on the other side. “Are you okay?” he asked. There was genuine concern in his voice and when Lady rose, she saw that his face was pink in embarrassment.

  “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” That didn’t sound too convincing. Her back and arms hurt. It felt like she had pulled something, but she didn’t give him time to ask any more questions. “Here. Take Lion.” She picked up the tote bag and stood on her toes to pass it over the top of the fence. Crispin received the bag carefully.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Crispin was still wearing a concerned frown and was still quite pink.

  “I’m fine,” Lady assured him again. She decided that was mostly true. The soreness would pass. She turned and started to walk away, intending to get that running start she had talked about.

  “Um,” began Crispin.

  Lady had turned. Crispin had put the bag down. She noted that Lion had already hopped out. He was already walking to the edge of the empty grave. “What?” she called back to Crispin. She didn’t mean to sound slightly exasperated, but she heard the notes of it in her own voice anyway.

  He cleared his throat and tapped his shoulder. “There’s, ah, a footprint or two on your back.”

  Lady tried to crane her neck to see what he was talking about, but that would be impossible. She reached for it instead, trying to dust herself off. “Am I getting it?”

  Crispin sucked at his teeth. That likely meant she wasn’t. “It’s red mud.”

  Lady took a deep breath. That was okay. All of this was okay. “Forget about it,” she said, as much to herself as anyone else. It was then that she took her running start. Even sore, the fence wasn’t too hard to hop. She hadn’t lost her touch, and it wasn’t like it had been constructed with a serious and pressing need to keep people out. The spikes were wide enough for her to fit a whole foot between them. She hopped to the ground with relative ease, save for the pain that radiated from her back. “See? Not a problem.”

  Crispin ventured a smile, though it was forced. The guilt over what had happened only a little while ago was still plain on his face. “You make it look easy.”

  Lady could feel warmth spreading across her own cheeks. Anything she might have said was abruptly interrupted by Destiny, however. “If you two are over the fence, can you stop flirting and give me a hand?”

  Now Lady was sure she was blushing. She didn’t even dare look up at Crispin. “Shut up,” she said, trying to sound more annoyed than flustered. Lady hurried to where Lion stood instead. What she had suspected was indeed the case. “What are you even doing down there?”

  Destiny was standing at the bottom of the grave, her arms folded over her chest. From the looks of it, she had attempted to dig herself little handholds in the wall. It didn’t look like that had gone so well. Was she afraid the walls would cave in on her? Fair enough. Lady supposed she would be scared too.

  “It didn’t look that deep, okay?”

  That was true enough. If Lady hadn’t been looking at Destiny, she would guess it was a hole shallow enough to easily climb out of. Evidently, that was not the case. “Why did you go down there though?”

  “I thought maybe I could get a better feel for things down here,” Destiny said with a huff. “When I tried to get out, I realized I couldn’t. Now it feels like it’s about to rain and—Look, are you going to help me out of here or not?”

  Crispin was already rolling up his sleeves to help, but Lady made a long and indecisive, “Hmm.” She tapped her index finger against her lips. “Before we do that…”

  “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding.” Destiny groaned.

  “I think I’d like to know if you saw anything… or heard anything.”

  “Oh, come on!” Destiny kicked at the wall of packed dirt. She stopped, shuddering when some tumbled down.

  “You come on. Do you want to get out of there or not?” Lady squatted down beside the edge of the hole.

  “I know for a fact that Crispin isn’t going to leave me down here.”

  Lady gave Crispin a warning look. She knew he wasn’t going to leave her in the grave. Truth be told, Lady wasn’t going to either. She tried to communicate her bluff to Crispin through a stern look. It was difficult to tell whether he got it or not. He remained silent, though. That was probably the most Lady could ask for.

  “It’s not like you’re my only way out, you know.” Destiny held up her hand. There was a cell phone in it.

  “Then why haven’t you called anyone yet?”

  Destiny shoved the phone back into her pocket, suddenly defensive. “I have! I just… Everyone is busy, so… It’ll be a little while. Look, I don’t want to get rained on in here. Just help me.”

  “I don’t think I’m asking for too much.” Lady propped her chin on her hand. “Give me just a bite. It can be a little one. Tell me what you’ve found out. What angle are you working here? It’s not like you’re interested in the money, right? Weren’t you the one insisting this was all for show?”

  “I still think that!” Destiny insisted. Lady must have looked doubtful, because she continued. “My boss is paying me to look for part of my work day. We’ll split the money if I find something. I get paid time and a half either way. It’s win-win in my book. I don’t believe the old woman was murdered, but I figure I better give this my all anyway.”

  “So, you definitely didn’t see anything here?”

  “Not a thing.”

  Lady threw a look around. She didn’t see anything either, sadly. Something gave her the feeling that coming here had been a dead end. She decided to work things from a more normal angle. “So, what about this then? If someone murdered Lucette, who would it be? We’re assuming that the murder stuff wasn’t all a bunch of lies.”

  “Crispin, will you please get me out of here?” Destiny looked away from Lady, appealing directly to Crispin instead.

  “Not so fast.” Lady held up a hand to keep everyone from moving. “You try to help her out of there and I’ll shove you in too.”

  “Geez,” said Destiny. Even Crispin looked taken aback. He stepped away from the open grave, his eyes on Lady, like he wasn’t sure if she was still bluffing or not.

  “Fine. Like I said, I don’t really think she was murdered.” The rain had started falling a little more steadily. It was a mist, and the clouds rolling in promised that it would soon get heavier. “If I had to put money on who I thought murdered Lucette—not that she was murdered, mind you—”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  “I’d put money on the daughters.”

  “Shannon?”

  “No! Daughters, with an ‘s.’ I probably should have said granddaughters. You know, Adora and Fabia.”

  Lady thought back. She recalled the two girls easily. They didn’t seem a lot like their mother. Lady doubted they worked. More likely they had taken a fake job from their father. Not that she knew that for certain. Lady was, perhaps, a little too quick to judge those much wealthier than she was. Maybe that was why she couldn’t help but like the idea of them being murderers a little. It certainly would be satisfying to put a couple of girls like that behind bars. “Why do you think it’s them?”

  Destiny raised her shoulders in a shrug. “I don’t really think it’s anyone. So, I mean, I guess I don’t really think it’s them. You said if I had to guess. I dunno. They really hate being tied to Dark Lake. They don’t get any of the money from the estate unless it’s willed to them. Their mother would probably give them enough money to go live elsewhere. If they sold the estate, they’d definitely have the money and motivation to move. I’m not sure they�
��re bright enough to plan the latter. I’d sooner guess they were abusive toward Lucette. You see that sometimes with old people, right? Mostly in nursing homes, but I’m sure it happens in rich families too. Maybe they failed to give her some medicine she needed. Maybe Lucette had suspected for a long time they would be the death of her, and she planted something spiteful in her will because of it.”

  “That’s a pretty depressing theory,” said Crispin.

  As much as Lady instinctively disliked the sisters, she hadn’t imagined that they might be that cruel. “Are they capable of that sort of thing? I mean, how well do you know them?”

  “We didn’t go to school together or anything, if that’s what you’re asking.” Destiny had her arms crossed irritably again. “We used to have dance together.”

  Lady grinned. She couldn’t help it. “You’re a dancer? Do you still dance? Was it ballet? I can’t imagine those two doing anything but ballet.”

  Destiny was glaring so hard at Lady that the smile immediately fell from her face. “Yes, it was ballet and no, I don’t do it anymore. Adora and Fabia bullied me until I quit. They said I stood out too much, that I didn’t have the right build for it. They got a lot of other girls on their side.”

  “Gross.” Lady felt a shudder of dislike run through her body. At least now she had a more valid reason for disliking the sisters. “People say kids are stupid and only know better once they’re grown up, but I’m not sure you ever grow out of that kind of cruelness. I think, maybe, they just learn it’s impolite to do it.”

  “I don’t know,” Crispin said. Of course, he would be the one to chime in with some optimism. “I think there are a lot of reasons someone might be cruel. Sometimes it’s all they know. I think they can be kind people once their world broadens a little.”

  “That’s a very sweet sentiment. I truly feel a little better about myself thanks to the both of you.” It was plain from Destiny’s tone that she meant none of that. “Now, are you going to get me out of here or not?!”

  “Okay, okay.” Lady gave in. “Give me a minute, I just—Hang on.” She froze. Something had moved in the corner of her eye. The rain was coming down as a steady mist, and something was cutting a hole in that mist.