by Martha Carr
“What?” She peered at her sisters, but Nickie and Emily were just as clueless.
“That sounds like a straight answer,” Emily said. “But that doesn’t make any sense. It’s been our family’s job to keep that thing inside the prison. And our ancestors put it there in the first place. So…Gilroy, can the Gorafrex be captured and locked up again?”
“Abso-freakin-lutely.”
“I feel like we’re going in circles.” Laura shook her head. “The only new thing we’ve learned is that we have to pull the Gorafrex out of the human I saw it possessing before we can use the iron. And then what? We just compel it back into the stone? March it through Austin to the Greenbelt? Can’t exactly put the thing in chains and carry it away if it doesn’t have a body.”
“Like walking a cat on a leash,” Gilroy quipped.
Laura spun and jabbed a finger at him. “You’re not helping.”
“Well, I think I know where we can find the iron, at least.” Emily spread her arms and smiled, like she was revealing some grand prize. “Gilroy, did you mean we could find pure iron pretty much everywhere?”
“Bingo!”
“Bingo.” Emily shot the bust a conspiratorial wink.
“So how do we go out looking for iron?” Nickie frowned.
“What about wrought iron?” Emily raised her eyebrows.
“Oh…”
“Emily.” Laura turned toward her sister with wide eyes. “You’re way ahead of the game today.”
“Thank you.”
“I’m seeing some dismantling of property in our near future.” Nickie laughed. “Better get to it, then.”
“We’ll come back when new questions pop up, Gilroy.” Emily pointed at the man’s stone head and shoulders and nodded. “You’ve been slightly helpful.”
The bust offered a thin-lipped smile, then rotated on the growling pedestal to face Laura.
She folded her arms and squinted at him. “What’s got you looking so smug?”
“Just your bitchy-resting face.”
“You’re a stupid rock.” Laura grunted and turned away.
“Almost hurt my feelings, witch,” Gilroy called after her. “Good thing you’re not a geologist, huh?”
She took a deep breath and forced herself to ignore him as she followed her sisters out of the mirror room.
18
When they stepped back into the foyer, the house shifted to take on a new shape. The stairs returned to their proper place, the dining room off the kitchen stopped spinning in circles, and the wall on their right opened up from the floor to reveal the entryway into the living room. Speed lounged just inside the living room, tail wagging at a snail’s pace. He barked once, but even that was too much for him, so he flopped over onto his side.
“Aw, Speed.” Nickie knelt in front of him and rubbed the top of his chubby head. “Who’s never gonna be the most terrifying guard dog? You, buddy. Good work.” Right on cue, the bulldog let out a burst of noxious gas, and Nickie leapt to her feet. “Well, maybe I spoke too soon.”
“Oh, dude.” Emily lifted a hand to wave it in front of her face, then glanced at the copper ring on her thumb and decided against it. “Hey, the back fence is wrought iron, isn’t it?”
Nickie eyed her in surprise. “Inspired by the stink, huh?”
“Yeah, inspired to get as far away from that as possible. Or at least outside. We should try the fence.”
“Right behind you.” Nickie and Emily took off through the dining room and kitchen toward the back door off the mudroom.
Laura stayed behind for a few seconds to stare down at their immortally reeking family pet. Speed looked at her with droopy brown eyes but didn’t move an inch. “You should probably come outside too. Just in case.” She nodded toward the kitchen, and Speed’s nails clicked against the hardwood as he scrambled to his feet and waddled after her.
In the kitchen she filled three plastic tumblers with ice water. Balancing them in her hands, she kicked open the back door and held it while Speed took his sweet time trotting into the yard.
“Hey, good thinking.” Emily took two of the tumblers and handed one to Nickie.
“Yeah, Grandma Eloise knew what she was doing always having a cold one on her.” Nickie took a few long gulps and sighed.
“I’m not making you guys Arnold Palmers, with or without whiskey.” Laura raised her tumbler. “Water’s better for you, anyway.”
“Hey, thanks, Mom.”
Laura raised an eyebrow at Emily.
“Kidding. Jeez, I’m kidding. So.” The youngest sister turned and aimed her tumbler at the fence surrounding their backyard. “Pretty sure that’s wrought iron.”
“Too bad we don’t have professional tools for welding or cutting,” Laura muttered. Both sisters stared at her, then all three burst out laughing.
“You know, having a project to focus on really brings out your sense of humor,” Nickie said as they walked across the yard. Their house was built on the top of a small hill, but the yard sloped near the black metal fence.
“Well, we’re witches.” Laura shrugged and stopped to study the fence. “There’s not a lot we can’t do with magic, right? It’s all the other… non-magical stuff that trips me up.”
“Oh, yeah? Like what?”
Laura chuckled. “We definitely do not need to get into that right now. If you want my sense of humor to stick around, let’s focus on the project, right? The potentially life-threatening project, where we’re responsible for the safety of all the witches and wizards on this ship and a whole handful of humans, most likely.”
“Wow.” Nickie nodded. “Yeah, no pressure or anything. That part doesn’t bother you?”
“Absolutely not.” Laura glanced at her sister and couldn’t understand why any of this was surprising. “If there’s a solution to whatever problem we have, what’s there to worry about? We just do it.”
“Hey, Nike’s next magical spokesperson.” Emily grinned and stepped next to the fence.
“That doesn’t fit the situation on so many levels.” Laura pulled her wand from her back pocket and joined Emily by the fence. Nickie appeared on the other side of her, the middle sister’s wand drawn.
“What, you don’t wanna be on TV?”
“Not lifting weight and running and sweating all over the place.”
“We’re all gonna be covered in sweat soon anyway if we don’t hurry.” Emily slipped her wand out of her side pocket and flourished it at the intricate wrought iron fence that had been there as long as their old Victorian house. “Have at it.”
Laura snorted. “Secare.” The tip of her wand flashed. A thin scratch appeared in the surface of the iron post in front of her. “Huh.”
“Something a little stronger, then.” Nickie brandished her wand and tilted her head. “Trunco.” The post buckled a little under her spell, letting out a short squeal like someone had rammed it with a car. The rest of the fence trembled, but that was it.
“Either of you ever cast spells on pure iron before?” Laura asked.
“Nope.”
Emily shrugged. “Makes a little more sense now that iron would be the Gorafrex’s weakness. Normally, this thing would’ve been in pieces by now.”
“Looks like we need some intense spellwork to break this thing up,” Laura added.
“It’s pretty amazing, though, right?” Nickie turned to look at her older sister. “Humans have been building stuff with iron for a long time. Forging stuff, like this fence. Weapons. Doors. Chains. I don’t know. Tools. All they need is a lot of fire and skill.”
“We have a forge too.” Laura tilted her head. “I guess magic’s just not enough for this. Yeah, then this would make the perfect—”
“What are you doing?” Nickie stared past Laura with wide eyes.
Emily had taken a few steps back from the fence. She pulled her arm back and positioned herself like a pitcher about to throw a strike.
“Em—”
“Exscindo!” A fiery-red streak
launched from the tip of her wand, hit the wrought-iron fence with a deafening crack, and burst along a three-foot span of the intricate design. The fence groaned, then the entire section fell to the grass in dozens of metal pieces. Emily pulled herself fully upright, brought her feet together, and grinned.
“Emily!” Laura shouted, then ducked and lowered her voice, glancing along the rows of backyards behind their house. “Where did you learn that?”
Her sister shrugged. “Just picked it up.”
“You don’t just pick up a major destruction spell like that.” Nickie laughed. “That takes…I mean, a lot more practice than I’ve ever put in.”
“Well, yeah. I practiced. Small stuff at first. But, obviously, I worked my way up.”
“Practiced on what?”
Emily smirked. “You guys remember that kid Billy Ambrose in elementary school?”
“Please don’t tell me you practiced spells on a kid who bullied you in sixth grade.” Laura folded her arms and tapped the end of her wand against her hip.
“Are you kidding? Of course not.” She rolled her eyes. “Wanted to, though.”
“Wait, isn’t that the kid whose treehouse got struck by lightning? Tore the whole thing down and split the tree right down the middle?”
Emily tipped her head back for one long, slow, exaggerated nod. “Yup.”
Nickie laughed.
“Why’s that funny?” Laura glanced between her sisters. “And what does that have to do with Emily practicing a—oh. Wait, that was you?”
The youngest Hadstrom sister grinned and offered a half shrug. “I plead the fifth.”
A sharp laugh burst out of Laura’s mouth, then she clamped it shut and narrowed her eyes. “You said you just talked him out of bullying you.”
“I did that too. At least, I told him the next time he picked on me, his new clubhouse was gonna get blown up. He didn’t believe me at first. Never really saw him again after that.”
“Oh, my god.” Laura fully laughed and shook her head. “You know, you should’ve asked us for help before playing with a spell that powerful.”
“You would’ve just told me to keep my head down, focus on school, and keep being nice no matter what. Nickie would’ve beat him up. I wanted to take care of it myself.”
“Looks like you covered that one,” Nickie said.
Laura snorted and nodded at the pile of wrought-iron rails lying in a heap like split logs. “Yeah, and this one too. That seems like enough to start with, right?”
“Hey, if it’s not, I’ll blow up more of our fence.” Emily grinned and swished her wand around.
“Don’t get cocky.” Laura knelt in front of the iron pieces, and her sisters joined her to pile it all into their arms.
“‘Afternoon!” The man who lived in the house directly behind them stood on his back porch under the awning, sipping on a glass of iced something.
The sisters froze. “Hey,” Laura called back. When she raised her hand for a little wave, a few pieces of iron toppled out of her arm. She hastily picked them back up.
“What happened over there?”
“Oh…” Laura glanced at Nickie.
“Probably just some kids trying to be funny,” Nickie said. “Break a few things and make us clean up after them.”
“Yeah, I heard a bunch of noise last night,” Emily added. “Thought it was just late-night construction on West 6th. Now I’m thinking it was a…chainsaw or something. On our fence.” She shook her head and offered an apathetic little shrug.
“Huh. Must’ve slept right through it.” The man stared at them for a few uncomfortable seconds, then lifted his glass. “It’s too damn hot out here. Sorry y’all have to deal with that right now. If I see anyone out here, don’t worry. I’ll take care of it for you.”
“Uh, thanks.” Laura waved again but kept her hand on the iron pieces.
Their neighbor nodded and lifted his glass again.
19
“A chainsaw?” Laura shot Emily a disapproving glance.
“Hey, at least I didn’t freeze and make us all look super suspicious by not having an answer.”
Nickie snorted. “Can a chainsaw even cut through iron?”
“No idea.”
“Great.” Laura stood and balanced the metal pieces in her arms. “So our friendly neighbor’s either gonna be on the lookout for a bunch of kids working really hard to vandalize a metal fence, or he thinks we’re completely insane.”
“Does it matter?” Emily followed her.
“See, this is what I was talking about. The non-magical things that just make me super uncomfortable.”
“We all have to deal with it, Laura.” Nickie whistled, and Speed got up from where he’d slumped in the browning grass. The bulldog panted as he followed them back inside.
Laura pressed on the backdoor’s handle with her elbow, stuck her foot through the dog door, and pushed it enough to slip through and pull it open for her sisters. “Humans don’t have to navigate any of this stuff.”
“Oh, right.” Emily stepped through the door. “They’ve just forgotten their entire race is actually more powerful than any of us on this huge ship, and when one of them wakes up their peabrain, they have to deal with learning how magic’s real and they’ve been lied to through thousands of years of false history. Yeah, that sounds much better than just having to be a little bit careful so someone doesn’t spy on us in action.”
“Okay.” Laura waited for Speed to, as always, take his sweet time when someone was waiting on him, then let the back door close once he’d waddled inside. “Putting it that way makes me sound like I’m complaining for no reason.” She got no response as they headed through the kitchen and into the foyer. “Hey, I’m not complaining.”
“Okay.” Emily nodded and smiled.
“Really.”
“Nobody said you were.” Nickie nudged Emily with her elbow. “This one just went a little heavy on the sarcasm.”
“If I took it too far, my bad.”
The walls of their house rumbled and transformed again; the staircase folded in on itself like an accordion and slid backward. Another wall descended in front of them from the shifting ceiling. Speed panted at Laura’s feet, unaffected by the chaotic whir of various walls spinning and dropping and folding all around the foyer.
Where the wide staircase to the second floor had once been, a much narrower, darker staircase led toward a basement that hadn’t been there for the house’s previous owners.
“You guys don’t ever wonder what it would be like to not have magic? Or at least to not remember it anymore, like humans?” Laura walked down the stairs first, light bulbs flickering on in front of her with each step.
“All the time.” Emily came down right behind her.
“It’d be kinda weird if we never wondered,” Nickie added, then turned to raise her eyebrows at Speed. “You comin’?” He grunted and trotted after her. “I’m always thinking about how easier things would be if I wasn’t a witch. You know, like, with Chuck.”
“That’s what I mean.” Laura stopped and turned toward Nickie. “How do you handle knowing you can’t ever tell him?”
“Honestly? I just don’t think about it.” Nickie shrugged and joined them at the bottom of the stairs. “With some things, it’s hard to enjoy being where you are if you’re constantly trying to figure things out and predict what’s gonna happen next. Just my take.”
“Huh.”
The Hadstrom sisters walked into their concert hall of a basement, which would have stretched underground into all their neighbors’ properties if physical space mattered. It did have a large stage at the far end with six rows of auditorium seating in front of it, but the rest of the tall, airy room was lined with shelves, workbenches, book cases, trunks, boxes, tools, a ping pong table, and the various oddities of being a witch that all three of them thought best to keep hidden away. “When was the last time you came down here to make something?” Emily asked.
“Me?” Laur
a shook her head. “I can’t remember.”
“I tried making a pair of earrings a few summers ago.” Nickie chuckled and set her armload of iron pieces onto the workbench. “A soldering iron is a lot harder to use than a wand.”
“That’s kind of a given, though, isn’t it?” Emily scrunched up her nose and dumped her pieces onto the pile.
Laura did the same. “I think we’re gonna need something bigger than a soldering iron.”
“Like a blowtorch?” Nickie wiggled her eyebrows and grinned.
Emily leaned toward her oldest sister. “A flamethrower.”
“Uh…I was thinking more like a really big fire, you guys. Hot enough to work with iron so we don’t blow the house apart repeating Emily’s major destruction spell.”
Nickie frowned. “Oh. Yeah, I guess that’ll work.”
“Still not time for the flamethrower, huh?”
“Not yet, Em.”
Together, they stepped back from the workbench, and Laura pulled her wand out. “Caminus.” The wand flashed yellow, and the huge table trembled. It dropped lower to the ground, elongated a little, and the wooden surface became a stone hearth. All the broken pieces of iron clinked around against each other as they toppled into the new forge sticking up out of the basement floor.
Nickie pointed her wand at the hearth.
“Wait.” Emily held up her hand. “Is wrought iron considered pure iron?”
“Oh, good question.” Nickie lowered her wand and pulled her phone from her back pocket with the other hand. Her thumbs flew over the screen as she Googled the purity of wrought iron. “Good things magical basements don’t interfere with WiFi or cell service.”
“There you go, Laura.” Emily nudged her oldest sister with an elbow. “That’s one non-magical issue you can cross off your list of inconveniences.”
Laura rolled her eyes. “Yeah, okay…”
“Nope.” Nickie stuck the phone back in her pocket. “Wrought iron is not a-hundred-percent pure. It’s got carbon and slag in it.”
“Slag?”
“I dunno. Want me to look that up too?”
