Mag shook her head. “You’re as bad as Hagatha, with her crusade against the mosquitoes and black flies. Why don’t you just whip out that blasted cellular phone of yours and call, instead of wasting gas driving all the way over there.” She mumbled something unintelligible and unexpected about carbon footprints.
Clara duly ignored Mag’s rant, particularly since her sister had made some good points. “The bus runs on magic, as you well know. It doesn’t even have an engine, but okay.”
After a brief conversation with a woman who, Clara could only assume, was probably another of the brunette clones, she hung up the phone and turned back to Mag. “There’s good news and bad news. Which do you want first?”
“Depends on whether you’re about to gloat about something.”
“I hardly think it’s gloating to say I’m right when I’m right.” Clara shot back. “The Sondheim titanium 1-wood is sold at the pro shop as part of a twelve-piece set, but you can’t get a replacement on site. It gets lost or broken, and you’re stuck waiting two weeks for a special order.”
“And the bad news?”
“The bad news is, it’s their best seller, and half the country club owns a set. Figuring out who owned this one is going to be a challenge.” Clara shook her head.
“We could always—” Mag waggled fingers to indicate working magic, “take a peek into the pro shop receipts.”
“No. No more breaking and entering. The murderer happened upon Taylor, and presumably had some sort of confrontation, killed him, and then put the club back in the golf bag and drove away. At some point over the last two weeks, he or she caught wind of our involvement and left the club here to cast shade on us.” Restless, Clara walked over and mimed putting the club into the umbrella stand.
“Or,” she continued, “they figured this would be a great place to get rid of evidence, considering we specialize in used wares. It had to have been during business hours, so one of us has had contact with the murderer. Unfortunately, it could have been just about anyone.”
Mag and Clara both searched their memories for anyone suspicious, or anyone who lingered near the umbrella stand, but came up blank. “Maybe Pye or Jinx saw something. They’ve been manning the store while we’ve been out on deliveries or investigating.”
With worry etching grooves alongside her mouth, Clara called for Pyewacket.
“Can’t a cat catch a nap around here?” The warmth pumping off her skin suggested the familiar had been curled up in her favorites spot on the fireplace hearth. “This was supposed to be my day off.”
Sloe-eyed and sleepy, she arched her back in that sinuous way cats do.
“I know, dear. But this is important.” Clara pointed to the murder weapon. “Have you seen this before? Did someone come in with it?”
Something of the gravity of the situation appeared to reach Pye’s sleep-addled brain, and her eyes widened. “I don’t think so. Maybe Jinx would know. I’ll get him.”
In a blur of tawny fur, Pyewacket turned into the cat she was and sped toward the stairs. Moments later she returned alone. “He’s not there.”
Mag grumbled as she stomped out toward the backyard where she knew Jinx enjoyed sunning himself on a stretch of warm cedar planking that divided Clara’s gardens into manageable sections. She caught sight of his fluffy white tail as it flicked with each shake of his hind end.
When he dove into the grass at top speed, Mag assumed he had a field mouse in his sights, but when he trotted back in her direction, she realized he’d been playing with a scrap of crocheted yarn.
“Where did you get that?” she demanded. “If Clara finds out you’ve ruined one of her projects, she’s going to make you eat kitty kibble for a week.”
Jinx winked back into human form, spit out the piece of red, yellow, and black striped crochet still in his mouth, and glared at Mag. “This came from the golf course. It’s not even Clara’s. I figured it was fair game.”
Mag plucked the drawstring sack from Jinx’s paw-like hand and marched back inside with him on her tail. When the four of them were together, she turned to Jinx, “When did you find this at the golf course? The day Taylor Dean died? That’s the only time you’ve been there as far as I know.” She passed it to Clara and watched realization dawn on her sister’s face.
Jinx looked between Mag and Clara, his nose twitching from the heat of their gazes, “Yes, that day. I found it on the ground by the mail truck. Why, did I do something wrong?”
“Well, considering it’s evidence in a murder investigation—evidence that might have helped us before the cops came knocking on our door—it wasn’t your finest feline moment,” Clara minced no words.
“This is a golf club cozy—and I know exactly where it came from. Crocheting for Charity makes these by the batch and sells them at the club to raise money for—something I can’t remember, or maybe no one ever said.” Mag explained.
“Now, I need you to both think back very carefully over the last couple of weeks. Whoever murdered our mailman left this golf club in the umbrella stand sometime during business hours. Have either of you seen anything suspicious, or specifically, did you see who did it? Keep in mind that we’ve had to take steps to stop the cops breathing down our necks, so please try hard to remember.”
Pyewacket shrugged since she’d already answered the question and daintily sniffed the golf club before switching back to cat form and scouring the shop.
Jinx’s already pale skin lost another shade, making his eyes stand out bluer than ever. “I don’t remember seeing anyone carrying anything that looked like that, but it’s busy in here sometimes.” Eager to help, he mimicked Pye’s thorough sniffing of the club before joining her in the whatever it was the two of them were doing.
After a few minutes only briefly interrupted by the spotting of—and furious attempt to kill—a particularly large dust bunny, the familiars returned to human form and reported to their masters.
“Based on the scent coming off the grip of this club, I’d say it was a woman. I’m getting hand cream—cheap, full of chemicals, nothing like yours, Clara—and something else. An herb, lavender I think. But it’s muddled with all the others, like it’s been there for a while.”
“And lemongrass,” Jinx interrupted, not willing to be upstaged. “I smelled it on that floozy or whatever-you-called-it when I picked it up off the ground that day.” He had the decency to look ashamed of himself, and Clara wondered once again whether her sister’s familiar had lost his touch.
Once a boon companion to the rogue Raythe hunter, Jinx had spent the last forty-odd years in a tuna coma. And he was developing the waistline to prove it.
“This is the key to it all,” Mag declared as she waved the brightly striped cozy in the air. “The only clue we have left, and we need to talk to someone who might have more information.”
Quickly, Mag and Clara decided the only person they could trust with their newfound question was Babette Dean, and while Mag sent Pye and Jinx scurrying off with their tails between their legs, Clara called Babette and asked her to stop by as soon as possible.
Babette arrived sooner than expected, and Clara led her out to the gardens where she settled into a chair beside the fire pit where Balefire flickered even though the outside thermometer read near on ninety degrees. Babette said she was always cold because of her anemia and didn’t seem to mind the gentle heat emanating from the grate.
“We think we might have found a clue to your husband’s murder.” Clara spoke gently while Mag passed the golf club cozy to Babette. “Do you have any idea who this belongs to? It looks just like the ones we’ve been making at crochet group.”
Babette examined the cozy, taking careful note of the stitching, and shook her head, “It looks like Maude Prescott’s handiwork, but we made dozens of these for last's year's sale.”
Under her breath, Mag spat a few curse words that came out sounding like a garbled mess, and muttered something about being back where they started. Again.
“Maude usually mans the sales table at the country club.” Babette supplied.
“Do you think she might remember who she sold this particular set to?”
Babette shrugged, “Maybe, I’m not sure. We’re not really friends, and I don’t know enough about her to be able to say. She’s sort of an odd duck, if you know what I mean.”
Taking offense, Mag sputtered, “She strikes me as a sharp one, so maybe there’s hope. Let’s ask her about it at crochet group tomorrow.”
Chapter Seventeen
“Clara Balefire! Clara! Clara!”
Jarred out of the dream state by the sound of her name screeching through the house, Clara’s heart galloped in her chest and stole her breath.
“What on earth is going on?” It was no use asking Pyewacket because, upon the heels of the first shriek, she’d attempted to jump and arch her back at the same time. Now she was cowering under the shade and peeking through the fringe of a frou-frou lampshade, her tail puffed out to three times its normal size.
“Make it stop,” Clara begged no one in particular, and tried to pull her scattered wits together.
Penelope Starr’s voice roared out of the balefire at an even higher decibel than before.
“Penelope, is that you? What happened?” Must be important if Penelope thought using the magic flames as a communication device a good idea.
Only the pink beginnings of daylight peeked through the curtains as Clara pressed a hand to her forehead and wished for blessed darkness and peace. But it was not to be.
The next sentence Penelope uttered came out garbled, but the few words Clara could make out shouldn’t have come as a surprise. Hagatha. Pixies. Up to something.
It couldn’t have been anything else.
“Where is she?” Without paying much attention, Clara pointed vaguely at her closet and snapped her fingers. She felt the change between nighttime and daytime wear just as Penelope confirmed Hagatha’s location.
“Dawkin’s woods. At the circle. Hurry.”
“You can bet your broomstick no one else is rushing over there to help. Glorified babysitters are all we are.” While Mag took her time getting ready to go, she gave voice to the sentiments both sisters were feeling.
Pitching her tone to match Penelope’s shrillness, Clara mocked, “The coven in Harmony needs the Balefire influence. Strong witches make for strong leaders in these changing times. Come to Harmony; you won’t be sorry.” She fell back into her own voice, “Utter hogwash.”
“What she really meant was, come to Harmony, do all the dirty work. I’ve half a mind to go back to bed. You ask me, Hagatha’s got the right of it.” Mag agreed, yet she still readied herself for what was to come. Potion bottles, packets of herbs, and crystals went into her pockets while Clara chose her most powerful wand and a handful of charmed items.
“At least she doesn’t have access to combustion powder. Romilda said she removed every grain from her place.” Grateful for small mercies, Clara knew the worst case scenario was off the table.
Mag, of course, knew it was not.
Ready and armed for battle, Mag and Clara took the fastest route to Dawkin’s woods, skimming to a secluded spot behind some bushes near the edge of the circle, or, as Clara called it later, the edge of chaos.
There was just enough time to register a few impressions—acrid smoke smearing humid air, mingled scents of burning rock and overly-sweet tropical flowers—before a band of excited pixies arrowed toward the Balefire sisters.
“Ow!” Tiny hands pinched skin, pulled at hair, and poked with sharp toenails as they drove the witches toward the center of the circle.
“Been expecting the pair of you. Can’t do nothing these days without the Balefire sisters coming along to muck up the works.” At Hagatha’s pronouncement, a hint of her magic rippled over Clara’s skin, bringing every hair on her body to tingling attention. This was not good.
“Come on, Haggie. You know we’re not a threat. Lay off, would you?” Mag chose to cajole rather than lecture and the level of power dropped from the edge of pain to something closer to an itch. “What’s going on?”
Now that she wasn’t worried about being turned into a black fly or mosquito and chased by hungry honey pixies, she could see for herself what Hagatha was up to.
In the oasis ringed by towering pines sat a miniature volcano. On its sloped sides, female honey pixies lounged suggestively on beds of Faeland flowers. Heat teased the heady scent of tropical perfumes from the tender petals while male pixies darted into and out of the smoke.
Hagatha had set herself up a pixie mating ritual right there in the coven’s sacred circle. It might be the worst thing she had done so far. Or, Mag thought, the coolest.
“Where did she get enough combustion powder to do all this?” Resigned to providing little more than enough containment to keep the entire town from feeling the effects, Clara wanted to put Hagatha’s dealer on her list for later.
“Um.” Slapping on her best innocent face a beat too late, Mag shrugged.
“You didn’t? Honestly, Mag, you’re almost as bad as she is.”
“Well, I didn’t know what she was going to do with it, now did I? And it’s too late now; we’ll just have to let it all play out. What harm can it do, anyway? Way out here, no one will ever know.” The toe of Mag’s shoe traced an arc in the layer of ash that coated the coating of pine needles littering the circle.
“No one will know?” Clara’s voice went up an octave. “Pixies emit powerful pheromones when they mate. Magically powerful, if you get my drift. If we don’t contain this now, half the town will be overcome with lust. There will be orgies in the streets. Don’t you ever read?”
“Do ’em some good, won’t it?” As usual, Hagatha remained unrepentant. “Especially that Penelope Starr. She’s due for a good—”
“Don’t say another word. Not one.” Before any hideous mental images settled behind Clara’s eyes, she pulled out her wand and nodded toward Mag’s pockets. “Give me those crystals, and I’ll spread them outside the circle.”
She traded her best wand with Mag for a handful of rainbow-colored stones. “Take this and be ready on my signal. Lock it down before we end up on the national news.” As an afterthought, she dug out the charms from her pocket and handed those over, too.
“There’s a taunt-repelling charm in there. Pink, rubberized paper clip. I assume your skills run to duplication and we’ll need one for each of us. I’ll adapt them to repel the pheromones when I get back. Honestly, Mag. This goes beyond the pale.”
The glare she cast at her sister hinted there would be more to come on the subject of giving Hagatha the combustion powder, but Clara jogged off to take care of business first.
“Penelope’s not the only one,” Mag mumbled while she worked up an incantation to create an isolating dome over the circle. It had to be heat proof but still breathable, able to catch the tiniest iota of magic and render everything inside it invisible to passersby.
Not that there should be passersby, but you never knew. None of the coven would deign to show up since they’d dropped their problems into Balefire hands, washing Hagatha clean from their own. Still, better to be prepared.
Hagatha tossed another grain of combustion powder into the mouth of the volcano, and the resulting explosion sent the pixies into a frenzy. Hormones Mag thought long dead flared to life, and for a fleeting moment, she felt young again. Vital.
Until the sensation ended and age settled into her bones again. She mourned the loss for only a few seconds but filed away the experience to think about later.
Clara felt the effects, but not so keenly that she couldn’t ignore the flare of heat or the wave of desire as she dropped a carnelian, the final stone, into place and debated whether to remain inside or outside of the circle.
Outside meant she could go home and crawl back into bed, but it also meant leaving Mag alone in an enchanted space with Hagatha.
Raising her left hand, Clara sent a shower of Balefire-infused
witchlight into the air, and without waiting for Mag to activate the spell, began making her way back to the center of the circle.
The ground shook once as the dome touched down, nearly knocking Clara off her feet as she made her way back to Mag’s side. With the danger of spreading magical lustiness contained, and the paper clip charms protecting the three witches, there was nothing left but to observe the pixie mating spectacle.
“How long is this going to take?” Through the shifting plumes of smoke, Clara scanned the sky for the sun’s position and estimated not more than an hour had passed since her rude awakening.
Today was crochet club day, and she didn’t want to miss the chance to speak to Maude about the golf club cozy.
“No idea.” Cheerful despite the sweat-inducing temperatures, Hagatha looked as daisy-fresh as a witch of her age could look. She tapped her walker with the palms of both hands, turned it into a deck chair complete with side table and umbrella-laden drink, and settled in for the duration.
“This was not how I planned to spend my day.” Watching pixies mate wouldn’t have hit Clara’s list if it were a thousand pages long. Still, there was nothing left to do, so she set about making herself comfortable by turning a convenient bush into a lounger and a pair of pine branches into a fan.
While Mag followed suit and opened up a conversation with Hagatha about the care and feeding of honey pixies, Clara let herself drift off to continue the dream from which she’d been so rudely awakened.
Sleep didn’t come easy, what with Hagatha’s occasional use of combustion powder to ramp up the action, and the constant chatter between the old witch and Mag over the stamina and prowess exhibited by the males.
It was a lot like being in the middle of one of those documentaries where the announcer speaks with great portent about the fleeting nature of a species. Once or twice, their voices raised to shouts when a male either managed to get the job done or burned up trying.
Murder on the Backswing Page 12
