Hex and the City

by Sarina Dorie

  Thatch sighed despondently. “I suppose we might as well get this over with. The sooner we arrive, the sooner you can commence with your fun for the evening and leave me to a dark corner where I can be alone.”

  He held out his hand. Shadows lassoed around Pinky, Josie, and me, drawing us closer together. The gray of his suit blurred and stretched. The twisting motion made me dizzy, and I closed my eyes. When the movement stopped, I found myself holding onto his vest and leaning into him, my body pressed against his side.

  Pinky clung to his other side, his face buried in Thatch’s neck, which was comical to see. Josie had already separated herself. Thatch shook Pinky off him and then me. He glowered at us.

  People walked along a cobblestone street. Torches lit wood and stone restaurants and shops. Muffled music came from the Devil’s Pint. Someone whooped and shouted within.

  Josie turned away and headed toward the warm glow of the candlelit tavern. Pinky closed the distance between them in a few quick strides. Their black silhouettes walked ahead of us.

  “Where is Khaba really?” I asked.

  “It’s exactly as I said. He asked me—ordered me—to go have fun in his stead. As if this would be my idea of enjoyment.” He waved a hand at the cheery glow of the tavern.

  Josie and Pinky disappeared through the door.

  I forced a smile. “You’ll be forced to enjoy my company.”

  “I’m certain that was his plan.”

  I doubted that.

  I hesitated outside the door, not wanting to go inside and be in the public light just yet. “I haven’t seen much of you this month. I’ve missed you. It would be nice if we could still be friends.” I reached out to set a hand on his arm, but he shifted back and opened the door for me.

  The fiddling and the laughter of several dozen people washed over me in a warm wave as I walked inside. I removed the bright yellow-and-maroon scarf in Gryffindor colors that Josie had knitted me for Christmas. If she had really listened to me all the times we had talked about the Harry Potter movies, she would have given me a blue-and-bronze one for Ravenclaw, but I wasn’t about to complain about anything handmade, especially if it even vaguely resembled Harry Potter. I shuffled through the crowd. Pinky waved at me from a table with four chairs. He smiled enthusiastically.

  I removed my coat. Thatch’s gaze flickered to the green necklace around my throat. From his disapproving grimace, I knew he didn’t like seeing Elric’s gift, but it didn’t matter what he thought. I was stuck with that amulet. It had saved me once. If I needed to call on Elric to protect me from the Raven Court, I would have to use it, even if it cost me my soul.

  I couldn’t rely on Thatch to protect me.

  I set my coat on a chair next to Pinky and glanced around. Josie stood at the bar ordering.

  “She’s getting us a pitcher,” Pinky said. “Doesn’t she look lovely? Do you think I have a chance? Any chance at all with her?”

  “Probably not,” Thatch said.

  I glared at him. “Stop being such a grouch. Just because you’re miserable, doesn’t mean you need to make everyone else around you miserable too.”

  “I’m not miserable. I’m just being realistic. Josephine Kimura is only interested in men who aren’t interested in her.” He waved a dismissive hand in her direction. “The only way Mr. Pinky can get Josie’s attention is if he stops paying attention to her.” He looked to Pinky. “Don’t open the door for her. Don’t look so eager to spend time with her. And for god’s sake, don’t make goo-goo eyes at her.”

  “Oh,” Pinky said. “I didn’t realize I did that.”

  I crossed my arms, glaring at Thatch. “Is that how you get dates? By playing hard to get?”

  Thatch sighed in exasperation. “No. That’s how I try to get women to leave me alone.”

  “Is that what you want? To be alone? You don’t want any friends?”

  Thatch looked away. “I don’t need friends.”

  Pinky looked from me to Thatch.

  Thatch made a shooing motion. “I’ll watch your drink if you want to dance.” He seated himself at the table and removed his sketchpad from his pocket. It expanded to the size of a standard drawing book.

  I gazed out at the sea of dancers. There was only one man in the entire room I wanted to dance with, and he didn’t want me. I refused to be like Josie and fixate on the one man I couldn’t have.

  I had agreed to go out and have fun, and that was what I was going to do, dammit, with or without him.

  “Should I. . . ? Do you want to dance, Clarissa?” Pinky asked.

  I smiled at Pinky and took his arm, making a point of not looking at Thatch at all as we danced. At the start of the next song, I asked a cute guy in a kilt if he’d dance with me. He reluctantly agreed. He demurred from another dance after that. I had a strange feeling from the way he looked at me with wide, frightened eyes that he was either skittish, or I’d done something wrong.

  The next man I asked, a man with neon-green hair, made an excuse about a lame leg—even though I’d just seen him dancing. Another man said his girlfriend would get jealous. Men shrank back from me or turned away when I approached.

  I returned to my table. Thatch sat next to the pitcher and drinks, sketching dancers in his book.

  I placed my hands on my hips. “What did you do?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I know you hexed me or something. Everyone is acting weird, and no one will dance with me.”

  “You are perfectly capable of driving men away without my help.”

  Sometimes I didn’t know how it was possible I could have fallen in love with him. I didn’t know who the true Felix Thatch was.

  After a long moment of me standing there fuming, he said, “It’s the amulet. It intimidates people. It’s a recognizable artifact of the Silver Court, and thus, advertises your alliance with a Fae court in a town of Witchkin who despise their oppressors. Tuck it under the collar of you dress.”

  “Oh,” I said. I couldn’t tuck it away. The collar of my green dress was too low. I wrapped the scarf around myself instead.

  When Pinky returned to the table, laughing with Josie, Thatch made eye contact with Pinky. “Would you do me a favor?”

  Josie scowled. “Say no.”

  “Sure thing. What do you need?” Pinky asked in his easygoing way.

  Thatch closed his book. “Prove to Miss Lawrence I haven’t cursed her or the men in the room. Dance with her for me.”

  Pinky looked from Josie to me. “Um, sure, after this one. I promised Josie—”

  “You don’t have to,” I said, already feeling bad.

  “No, it’s fine. Dance with Clarissa,” Josie plopped down across from Thatch. “I thought he was going to ask for your immortal soul or something. I could use a break anyway.”

  Pinky and I joined a long line of dancers. He glanced at Josie guiltily. She was engrossed in a heated conversation with Thatch. She gestured wildly with her hands, and she knocked her hat off her head.

  Pinky leaned toward me. “Do you think she still has a crush on him?”

  “No. Why would you think that?”

  “She talks about him a lot. Most of what she says is unpleasant, but the frequency she brings him up can be, um, excessive.”

  Not being able to get over someone wasn’t the same as loving them. Maybe.

  Fiddling started up, and that drowned out conversation. We followed the lead of the other dancers and took turns dancing with our partners and then waited for the corner partners to dance together. Pinky and I advanced in the line, becoming the corner end couple who danced with our corner partners. As I danced forward with a skip step toward the man diagonally across from me, I took in the man’s spotted skin, resembling a mixture of gray stone and red clay. He was built like a mountain, probably an earth affinity like some of my students. He took my hands in his. His fists felt like boulders crushing my hands as he spun me around.

 
He stared into my face, but his eyes were empty caverns. Each muscle of his face appeared to be made of a pebble or rock, reminding me of a collage. I’d seen plenty of unusual Witchkin and Fae, but there was something off about this man. When he turned his head to the side, I saw his ear was made from a clunky misshapen dinosaur that I had once called a Turdasaurus rex. Alarms went off in my head.

  Thatch had told me not to project my awareness outside of myself in case I had trouble getting back in my body again, but I had to know if what I suspected was true. I projected my awareness beyond my flesh and into the rocky figure.

  The man had no soul. He was empty, rocks stitched together with magic.

  He was a golem.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Fool Me Once, Shame on You

  I tried to pull away. He held me too tightly. I screamed, my voice a shrill note rising over the loud music.

  Before I had a chance to respond, he released me and punched me in the face. Pain exploded in my nose, and I fell backward. Someone screamed. My ears rang, and the high-pitched shrieks in the room grew muffled. I spun above my body, looking down at the heads of everyone. Pinky had a hold of me. Blood spurted from what was supposed to be my face, but it was unrecognizable as me aside from my pink hair and green dress. Thatch parted the crowd with a wave of his wand, Josie right behind him. He strode through the parting sea, gracefully slicing his wand at the boulder man. My attacker dropped to the ground.

  The moment Thatch reached me and placed his hands over my face, I returned to my body, pain gripping me and anchoring me to myself once again. His fingers had to be inches away, but it felt like he was gouging them into my wounds.

  “Help her!” Josie shouted over the chaos of the room.

  “Don’t you think I’m trying?” Thatch snarled. “Healing isn’t instant. I need my potions. Bollocks.”

  I felt my eyes closing again. My consciousness slipped outside my body, and the pain lessened again. Crimson soaked Pinky’s fur.

  “Don’t do that,” Thatch slapped my cheek. “Anchor yourself.”

  The pain revived me again. Only, I didn’t want to anchor myself. My head throbbed. I closed my eyes, and my head dropped back. I choked on my blood and coughed. That made my head hurt worse.

  “Hold her up. Tilt her head forward,” Thatch said. “Don’t let her drown in her own blood.”

  I wasn’t choking anymore. It was too hard to breathe. My chest felt heavy. I couldn’t feel my fingers or toes. My heartbeat slowed.

  I closed my eyes. Drifting above myself felt so much more natural. I didn’t feel pain. All my earlier heartache was gone. I gazed down at my body, convulsing as it died.

  “Merlin’s balls. I’m going to regret this.” Thatch yanked on the necklace around my throat and threw one of the stones to the ground. The pretty green stone shattered into a thousand pieces, the glitter rising and shimmering in a dance.

  Nothing happened. Elric didn’t come.

  Thatch pushed Josie and Pinky back. He placed a hand on my chest and projected electricity into me. Newfound pain jolted through me, momentarily bringing me back into my body. “Stay here with me, Clarissa.”

  I didn’t want to remain here. Before, when my consciousness had left my body, I’d had a reason to live. I had been in love. Thatch had promised me a future of happiness and pleasure. All I felt now was pain.

  I could live with dying.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Fool Me Twice, Shame on Me

  Cool hands touched my face, anchoring me in myself. I flinched, expecting pain, but instead I found the touch soothing, almost pleasant.

  I forced my eyes open, but my vision was hazy. Someone with long silvery hair stood behind Thatch.

  Elric smiled at me. “I told you I’d come if you ever needed me.”

  The shouts and commotion of the room faded away. Pinky’s arms lifted me up. Josie crouched at my other side, holding my hand. I hadn’t realized she’d been there. My hands had been numb before. Josie’s eyebrows drew together. Pinky glanced around.

  In the blink of an eye, everything had shifted. I was no longer on the floor, but on the mattress of a canopy bed in an elaborately decorated room. Everything was rustic and natural, the poles of the bed made of living trees, and the stones in the wall a combination of quartz and granite. I no longer saw Felix Thatch.

  Elric stroked his fingers along my cheeks and nose, examining me. His touch calmed the intensity of heat in my face and made the throbbing melt away.

  “It’s a good thing you called me when you did,” Elric said. “The bridge of your nose had broken off and penetrated your skull. Another few seconds and you might have been dead. I’d wager you must have been jealous of Imani and wanted a matching nasal injury.” He laughed as though getting my face smashed to death was a joke.

  I stared at him uncertainly. This moment felt unreal.

  “You, sasquatch, fetch that basin and cloth for me,” Elric said.

  Pinky’s lips drew back like a dog’s. His high voice was almost a snarl. “I have a name.”

  Elric rolled his eyes. “Well, I don’t have time for introductions, and I’m not a mind reader like some Fae, so do as you’re told.”

  I wanted to tell Elric that he knew Pinky’s name. They’d been introduced before. Maybe he didn’t realize it. I’d heard someone once say all sasquatches looked the same. My head felt spacey. It was too much effort to speak still.

  Josie squirmed away from me and fetched the basin. She handed it to Elric, and he dabbed at my face.

  “There you are, love, almost better. This is healing water from our springs.” His fingers were stained crimson.

  He handed me a delicate embroidered handkerchief. “Blow your nose.”

  I was shaking so hard, I could hardly hold onto it. I blew my nose, blood staining the fabric. He took it from me and tucked it back into the pocket of his Regency-era suit. The cut of the jacket and the simple cravat reminded me of the costumes from Pride and Prejudice, but the pink-and-yellow striped brocade of the fabric was more like the extravagant fops of the earlier eras. As usual, Elric dressed to please himself, which I could respect.

  Elric shook his head. “I’m afraid I don’t have your nose quite right.” He squinted.

  “I almost died.” My voice came out quaking so strongly I was surprised he could understand me.

  “I wouldn’t have let it come to that. And you had enough sense to call me to rescue you.”

  I hadn’t even remembered the necklace. Thatch had, though, but I decided not to mention it. There was always a price for calling a Fae, just as there was a price for their gifts. Elric had healed me, and he would possess a little more of my soul to do with as he willed. So far, the process hadn’t been painful like what Thatch had experienced with the Raven Queen. I suspected it would only hurt if he removed my soul from my body. Or ate it. Or whatever Fae did with Witchkin souls.

  If Elric knew it had been Thatch who had called him, he would require a favor from him instead. He would require his soul. I doubted he would be so gentle with him.

  On the other hand, I had already used the necklace once before. This was the second time. The third time, I would be Elric’s slave.

  Part of me wanted to thank Elric for healing me, but I knew better. I couldn’t allow myself to become even more indebted to him.

  Instead, I sat up and hugged him. “It’s nice to see you.”

  “Likewise, Miss Lawrence.” He stroked my shoulders.

  I drew back. “Where’s Felix Thatch?”

  “That stick-in-the-mud? I left him to do what he does best. He likes to cause others misery. Why would I keep him from his favorite pastime?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Josie asked.

  “I imagine he’s busy punishing Miss Lawrence’s attacker. No doubt he’s having a ball.”

  “He’ll worry,” I said.

  “Let him worry.” He took my hand and kissed it. �
��He might appreciate you more if he does.”

  I wondered whether he meant that as a joke or he truly thought that.

  A tap sounded at the door. A man’s voice asked, “Your Highness? Your guests are asking after you.”

  “You may enter,” Elric said with the stuffiness of a monarch.

  The manservant dressed in silver livery bowed.

  “Tell them I had business to attend to. I’ll be along in a moment. Have the butler set the table for . . . three more.” Elric glanced at us, his smile genial. “Make sure there is a selection of food safe for Witchkin.”

  The man bowed again. “Yes, Your Highness.”

  “We aren’t staying for dinner,” Pinky said.

  I amended that with a more polite refusal. “We don’t want to impose.”

  “Yes, you do.” Elric leaned forward and kissed my nose affectionately.

  The servant waited at the door. Elric dismissed him with a wave of his hand. “Before you go downstairs, have one of my servants bring me a restorative elixir. I’m low on my reserve of magic.” The man bowed and closed the door.

  “We should be getting back,” I said.

  Josie came up beside me, sitting next to me and linking an arm through mine. She stared at the surroundings in awe. “I’ve never been inside a Fae castle before.”

  “And the less you’re here the better,” Pinky said. “We don’t want to be tricked into eating any forbidden fruits and then be bound to this realm. We don’t want to become their slaves and be forced—”

  Elric placed a hand on his heart, taken aback. “I will have you know I don’t employ the service of any slaves in this household. As a matter of fact, we have never used sasquatch labor in my manor, and I do not intend to start now.”

  Pinky’s eyes narrowed. He looked like a wary dog about to bite.

  “It’s really thoughtful of you to offer,” I said. “But—”

  Elric draped an arm over my shoulder. “Clarissa, don’t reject the hospitality of a Fae.” He said it in a kindly enough way, but I could see a warning in his eyes. Perhaps he was trying to tell me without coming out and saying it that I couldn’t refuse. I was allied with him. I was under his rule.