Panic Broom

by Sara Bourgeois

  “They’ll help us,” Remy said. “Amelda will put the word out that they need to direct their energy to protect and assist us. Plus, Brighton has my grandmother’s amulet. She’s got the power of the Skeenbauers behind her, and that’s combined with her power as the only truly active Tuttlesmith witch. My future wife is a force to be reckoned with,” he said and kissed the back of my hand.

  “But I thought she didn’t want anyone to know,” I responded. “How will the rest of your family coven help us if she doesn’t tell anyone what’s going on?”

  “Oh, she won’t tell them why they are doing it,” Remy said. “They’ll do as she says and won’t ask questions.”

  He was right. When we got back to the area, I could still sense the horrible darkness, but it was like it couldn’t quite reach us.

  With the oppressiveness lifted, it was far easier to walk around the scene. Remy walked back over to the body while I circled around the far edge of the larger area of effect.

  I cringed when Remy pulled the athame out of Margery’s back. “The first thing we need to do is figure out who this belongs to,” he said.

  “Did you really have to do that so… abruptly?” I asked.

  “Would you have rather I did it slowly?” Remy countered.

  “Good point,” I said. “Any idea who it might belong to? Any clue at all?”

  “I thought it was just a knife with a black handle but have a look,” he said and beckoned me over.

  There was a carving on one side of the smooth, black handle. It looked like a sigil of some type, but I didn’t recognize it. We’d need to do some research to find out what it meant, but since I didn’t want to carry the knife around, I snapped a quick picture of the symbol and sent a copy to Remy.

  “What are we going to do with her?” I asked. “We can’t just leave her here, and it’s not like we can take her to the funeral home.”

  “I was thinking the crypt,” Remy said.

  “The crypt with the scary dead Skeenbauer witches who come back to life whenever you go inside?” I asked. “I mean, I guess they’re only part-time zombies and they’re not out roaming the streets.”

  “Yeah, that one. That seems like a fitting place, actually,” Remy said.

  “How are we going to get her there? It’s not like we can just drag her through town. Maybe we should just bury her out here. It’s natural and stuff,” I said. “Eco burial. It’s all the rage in California.”

  “We’ll put her in the trunk,” Remy said matter-of-factly. “We’ll wrap her up in a tarp and drive her over. We can use a spell to keep her from rotting, and we’ll take her into the cemetery after dark.”

  “You’re twisted,” I said.

  “Uh oh, am I in trouble with my queen?” Remy teased.

  “No, I don’t mind a little twisted. I’m glad I have you to think of these things. I’d probably have just buried her out here,” I said. “We’d have blisters on our hands from digging. Or I suppose we could just use magic to do the digging.”

  “What’s this?” Meri asked interrupting our body relocation discussion. He was standing a few feet away from us in a spot of taller grass.

  Remy and I walked over to where he was standing. Meri was next to a torn scrap of fabric. It wasn’t black like Margery’s robe.

  “It looks like a piece of fabric. Maybe from the murderer,” I said. “I don’t know, though. Could just be from someone walking around out here. Do you think many people walk around out in these woods? There aren’t any trails or anything.”

  “We can figure that out,” Remy said. “Bring it with you. I seriously doubt someone was just milling around. There are much nicer places in Coventry to take a stroll or commune with nature. You’re right about that part.”

  I put the cloth in my purse wrapped in a napkin. “So do you have a tarp in your car?”

  “Not exactly,” Remy said. “All I’ve got is the standard tire change kit. I don’t usually dispose of dead bodies.”

  “Well, I guess I could run to Nailed It and buy one? You guys could stay here and makes sure no one finds the body. Perhaps look for more clues?”

  “Oh, that sounds like a delightful time,” Meri mused. “I’m so glad you two have gotten us involved in this mess. Being one big happy family with the likes of you guys is going to be so much fun.”

  “We’ll do it. Just hurry, please,” Remy said. He shot Meri a look but didn’t say anything.

  I pulled into the Nailed It parking lot five minutes later. The first thing I observed was a woman off in the distance. She was walking toward the store through a vacant lot behind the building. It was an odd sight to say the least. I wasn’t sure why, but when there was a perfectly good parking lot and sidewalk so close by, why would someone be cutting through a dusty and depressing vacant lot? It would become apparent quickly that it wasn’t what she was doing that was so confounding.

  That was just the first thing my brain went to as it scrambled for reason. I couldn’t wrap my head around what was wrong with her, so my mind decided it was about the scene instead. It wasn’t the scene that was wrong, though. It was her. She looked… dead. Even from the distance I could tell that her skin was the wrong color and there was no life in her eyes.

  The way she walked was off too. Her gait was lopsided and very slow. One of her feet dragged slightly behind the other. When she saw me, the woman reached her arms out. It was exactly like the zombie woman in my yard that morning. I knew then that she hadn’t been the only one. If there were two, there could be dozens. If there were dozens, there could be hundreds. Suddenly, the notion that there could be millions or billions invaded my mind. It was too much.

  I could only deal with one issue at a time. I wasn’t exactly sure how Meri had made the woman walk in circles, but I knew I could improvise. I ran over to her and cast a spell I thought would work. Something simple that I thought I couldn’t mess up too badly.

  The spell worked, thankfully, but it was clear that someone would notice her eventually. I needed to get a tarp and get back to Remy and Meri. Once we had Margery loaded up in the car, we could figure out what to do with the zombie behind Nailed It. If all of this was the universe’s way of saying “congratulations on your engagement”, then it had a funny sense of humor. We’d gone six months in Coventry without anything major happening, and I should have known that it was the calm before a storm.

  The cool air conditioning hit me as I walked into Nailed It. I hadn’t even realized that I was sweating, but the cold air sent a shiver down my spine. I found the aisle with the tarps, grabbed one that was both huge and waterproof, and made a beeline for the registers. Waterproof seemed important more for keeping… fluids… and then I decided to stop thinking about it.

  Fortunately, the owner wasn’t around looking to chat, and the cashier was in a mood. So she checked me out and barely made eye contact. When the clerk did finally look at me, there was a vacancy in her eyes. I chalked it up to a night of fitful sleep and didn’t take it personally when she barely mumbled, “have a good day.”

  Tarp in hand, I checked the zombie woman behind Nailed It, so I could hightail it back to Remy and Meri. She was still walking in her little circles, and I hoped it would hold her.

  I tried not to think about what I would do, what we would do, if we encountered a lot more of them. We only had so much magic, and keeping the zombies walking in circles around the clock was going to tap us out eventually.

  When I got back to where Remy and Meri were waiting, Remy and I rolled Margery up in the tarp. Meri kept lookout while we lugged her body to the trunk of Remy’s car. We managed to load her up without getting caught, and it struck me that it was entirely too easy to get away with stashing a body in a trunk.

  “What should we do until it gets dark?” Remy asked after we were done. “We should probably lay low.”

  “Well, I’ve got bad news,” I said. “I figured I’d wait until we had Margery’s corpse at least partially taken care of before I broke it.”
>
  “What is it?” Remy asked. “Are you all right? You looked a little stricken when you came back, but you didn’t say anything.”

  “There’s another zombie. She’s behind Nailed It in an abandoned lot. I wasn’t sure what to do, so I improvised a spell to make her walk in circles like Meri did. It worked, but we have to do something about her,” I said. “People are going to see her eventually. Someone could get hurt. Panic will spread too.”

  “If there’s one more, there could be dozens,” Meri said. “Like cockroaches.” I swear he started humming “La Cucaracha,” but when I turned to glare at him, he was innocently cleaning his paw. The humming I thought I’d heard had stopped.

  “You guys, there could be billions. We don’t know yet if this is something happening in Coventry or the whole world. Or we don’t know if it’s just happening in Coventry, but it will spread. I’ve seen enough movies to know this isn’t going to be good at all.”

  “I wonder if we’re going to have to have the Skeenbauer elders amp up their peace spell to the point where the humans in Coventry are in a suspended animation.” Remy sounded like he was thinking out loud. “That would buy us some time to clean this mess up.”

  “But we can’t do that. We haven’t seen one of the zombies attack anyone yet, but they sure did act like they wanted to. If we put everyone in a magic coma, they’ll be vulnerable. They won’t be able to protect themselves. It would be a huge risk. We just don’t have enough witches in Coventry to fight the zombies and guard all of the humans.”

  “The first thing we need to do is figure out where the zombies are coming from,” Meri said. “Well, first thing after we deal with the one behind Nailed It.”

  “I will head that way,” Remy said. “We’ll come up with a plan before we take it to the family matriarchs.”

  While he was driving, Meri explained what he was talking about. We knew we were probably dealing with zombies, but we didn’t know what kind. We’d ruled out infected-type runner zombies because Remy and I were almost certain the outbreak had something to do with necromancy.

  So they were dead. But were they risen from the grave dead, or was it only affecting people who had just died? Neither of the two women I’d seen so far were particularly… rotten. If they’d risen after they died, the women couldn’t have been dead for very long. They were unsettling, but they weren’t gross. We hadn’t encountered anything like that yet, and I shivered when I imagined finding a zombie like the ones in the movies. They never seemed to be very… fresh.

  The woman behind Nailed It had been wearing what I thought was a bathrobe. As Remy pulled his car around to the back of the building, I realized it wasn’t just any bathrobe. It was flat, blue, and the not very warm or fluffy kind they give you in a hospital. My mother had worn one just like it after her boob job. Well, she wore it until I got there for a visit. After that, she insisted that I go buy her something fitting a “gorgeous, vivacious, brand new woman.” I rolled my eyes just thinking about it.

  “Look,” I said. “She’s wearing a hospital robe, and I think that’s a gown underneath.”

  “Yeah, and that’s not a bracelet,” Remy added. “Well, it is, but it’s the one they put on you when you’re admitted.”

  “Okay, so she’s a hospital patient,” I said. “Or she was. Obviously, she’s not anymore.”

  “We don’t have a hospital in Coventry,” Remy said, and he swallowed hard. “So, this goes beyond our town. If she made it here from the hospital in the next town, then this has been going on for at least a day. Maybe more. There could be a lot more of them too.”

  “It’s become apparent that we’re not going to be able to just sweep this under the rug,” Meri said.

  “You have got to do something about that.”

  The voice came from the back seat. I whirled around to see the same woman who was in front of us milling around in a circle. Except the version of her in the car was not a zombie. She was partially transparent. I could see some of the back seat through her.

  Meri hissed and jumped into my lap, but he didn’t banish her right away. I absentmindedly stroked his head while I stared dumbfounded at the woman in the back of the car. Meri didn’t usually expel ghosts on sight, but they didn’t normally scare him like that either.

  “Well?” the woman asked.

  “You’re a ghost,” I said as the realization hit me. “You’re the ghost of her,” I pointed at the zombie.

  “I am me. That’s not me. Not anymore,” she said. “So can y’all please do something about that.” Then she pointed at her body. “I just passed peacefully over surrounded by family and friends with love and light and all that schtick only to be stuck here because my body is up walkin’ around.”

  “You just passed?” I asked.

  “Well, it’s probably been a few hours. Maybe a day. I don’t know. It’s kind of hard to tell when you’re a ghost. But that’s not the point. The point is that my family took it hard enough, and they don’t need this.”

  “We certainly don’t.” Suddenly, there was another ghost in the back seat. It was a man.

  “Robert? Oh, dear. What are you doing here?” She sounded upset.

  “Well, my love. After you passed, you kind of came back and bit me.”

  “Oh, Robert. I’m so sorry,” the ghost woman said.

  “It’s okay, Bridgette. I’d rather be here with you anyway. I had no idea what I was going to do with myself once you were gone.”

  “But, the kids…” Bridgette said. “And my grandbaby…”

  “They weren’t there when you came back, Bridge. Little Maddie, that’s our granddaughter,” he said to me, “she was really tired and hungry. They left to get her something to eat and go back to the house for a nap.”

  “So they have a chance,” Bridgette said with a sigh. “Well, they have a chance if these guys can do something about this.”

  Remy and I were still just sitting there staring at them. Meri had calmed down. I believe Bridgette had just startled him. He made no moves to do whatever Meri did to unwanted spirits.

  “I think I know a way we can help,” Remy finally said. “We’ve just got to rip the magic that’s animating her out of her.”

  “That sounds intense,” I countered. “And like something I could really mess up.”

  “It will be a lot more difficult than the spell to keep her walking in circles, and I don’t know how many times we can do it.” Remy’s answer didn’t bring me any relief.

  “Well, we can do it once right now,” I said to Remy. “You guys might not want to be here for this,” I said to Bridgette and Robert.

  “You ready to see what the other side is like?” Bridgette said to her husband.

  He took her hand in his. “I’m ready for anything as long as I’m with you.”

  “You guys just make sure you save my kids and my grandbaby. I’d hate to have to come back and haunt you, but I will,” Bridgette said to me with a wink.

  And then they were gone. The zombie version of Bridgette was still walking in her circles, but she was staring in our direction as she walked. It was as if something inside of her body recognized her spirit, and it was a little creepy. I totally shuddered and tried not to think too deeply of the implications.

  “Let’s do this,” Remy said.

  “How do we reverse the necromancy if we don’t know any ourselves?” I asked.

  “I know a little. I know enough to get the magic out of her,” he said.

  “Remy?”

  “I’ve read about and studied all kinds of different types of magic, Brighton. It’s part of my job. I haven’t been raising the dead or anything like that.”

  I flashed back to the memory of Remy with black hair and black eyes, but I shook it off. I knew him, and I loved him. Most importantly, I trusted him. It was exactly the wrong time to start doubting my fiancé because not only did I need him, but it seemed as though the world did as well.

  “I know. I’m sorry I even thought that…” />
  “Don’t be sorry. I completely understand,” he said with a reassuring smile. “I would be lying if I didn’t say my mind went back there for a moment. I thought that perhaps I’d caused this somehow, but I know that’s not true. That dark Remy wasn’t the real me. I’m here for you, and I’ll do whatever it takes to save Coventry.”

  “What do you want me to do?” I asked. “We can do this together.”

  “I’m going to use my energy to draw the magic out. When I do, I want you to do a binding on it.”

  “That’s so dangerous,” I said. “You’re putting yourself at a huge risk.”

  “I can do this, Brighton. All you have to do is bind it, and the cat can protect us. Right, cat?” Remy asked.

  “I’ll protect her,” Meri said. “I might protect you. I don’t know. What are your views on bacon?”

  “We should get Amelda.” I shot Meri a look but ultimately ignored the fact that he was concerned about Remy’s feelings on bacon during a zombie outbreak. I knew he was probably just trying to keep us as upbeat as possible. “Not because I don’t believe in you, but if there is a hospital full of zombies nearby, and they’ve already wandered all the way here, we’re going to need serious backup.”

  “We will. We’ll get my family,” Remy said. “Let’s take care of this one first. To protect the people of Coventry.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “Let’s do this. I’m ready. Wait, first I’m casting a circle.”

  “I can do this without a circle,” Remy protested. “Plus that could draw more attention.”

  “I know you can, but you’re not. I’ll just throw down some salt around us for protection, okay. Low-key. No one will notice.”

  “All right,” Remy relented. “Low-key.”

  I cast a small circle of salt around us and asked for the Goddess’s blessing and protection. Some candles would have been nice, but that was far less low-key. Most people would know if they saw a circle of black, or white, candles that I was messing around with some witchy stuff.

  Even with the spell that kept the humans in Coventry willfully ignoring the magic around them, it was still considered precarious to openly do big magical things publicly. So, once my low-key salt circle was ready, Remy began.