Sit a Spell

by Stacey Alabaster

  “Bruce . . . what did you really call me over to talk to me about then? If Candace was such a great employee, I’m not sure why you needed me to drive all the way over here. I feel like I am missing part of the story here.”

  He tapped his fingers on the desk, and it seemed to take forever for him to finally speak. “I always wondered if Candace was doing something illegal on the side.”

  I leaned forward. “And what made you wonder something like that?”

  Bruce stared down at his paperwork. “I have her old pay slips here. So, I know how much I was paying her. And she never told me about any other part-time job she had. And yet, she drove a Corvette. She bought it not long before she quit here. Maybe two or three months ago.”

  I frowned. Akiro had never mentioned Candace driving an expensive car. “Could her parents have bought it for her?”

  Bruce shook his head. “She always told me that she came from a poor family. I guess that might have been a lie. But either way, things with her didn’t add up. She was really secretive when I asked her about it, so I never got to the bottom of it.”

  “I see,” I said slowly.

  Bruce looked earnest. “Does this help you at all?”

  He looked genuinely concerned. Like he really wanted to help. But I wasn’t sure this was a man that I could trust.

  Part of me wanted to tell him that I was a witch as well. To just blurt it out right there and then in his office. To tell him that I knew and understood the stuff that he must go through. Hiding. Keeping secrets. I wanted to ask him how he lived and how he managed to juggle a normal job with the witch world.

  I wanted to ask him for advice.

  But instead, I just stood up and thanked him for his time. “Your information helps a lot. Thanks, Bruce.”

  He handed me his card.

  “I already have your number. From when you called me,” I stated as I pulled my baseball cap back on.

  “But this one also has my cell phone number on it,” he said and then looked a little embarrassed when the meaning behind it became too obvious.

  He wanted me to call him.

  Oh.

  I nodded and slipped it into my pocket.

  “Ruby!” he called as I was heading out the front door. “Here is your quadruple shot latte.”

  I couldn’t have been more grateful than if he was handing out the elixir for eternal youth.

  Maybe he wasn’t so bad after all. I mean, it was really amazing coffee. I didn’t want to claim it was better than the coffee at the Onyx, necessarily. But it was a very close call.

  I climbed back into my car and stared at the empty spot where the dumpster had been.

  I knew what I had seen with my own two eyes. But was there any chance that Bruce was actually a witch? Well, I supposed he would be a warlock, wouldn’t he, if he was anything. I really wanted to tell Geri what I had seen, to get advice about what I should do. But I had already told her I was dropping the case.

  She’d probably just use it as an opportunity to get me to choose between being a witch and being a detective. Proof that it was too difficult to mix the two.

  I knew Vicky was leaving town that evening. But she’d told me that the tour bus didn’t pull out of town until five p.m. I gave her a call just to ask her for advice. She was the only witch in the coven that I completely trusted. I could tell her my suspicions about Bruce being a witch, or a warlock, without her jumping to massive conclusions—like Geri would, for instance.

  And she might be able to give me advice on the dating front as well. I mean, it would be crazy to call Bruce’s number, right?

  I needed a second opinion. Just to make sure it was definitely crazy.

  I sent out the psychic vibes before I picked up my phone. Come on, Vicky, pick up.

  But she wasn’t picking up. Assuming that she was just busy with last minute rehearsal, I left a message saying that I really needed to ask her something, so if she could give me a quick ring back before she left, that would be super appreciated.

  I went back to the office and did some paperwork, making sure that I kept the volume on my phone turned up so that I could grab it as soon as I got the call from Vicky.

  But five o’clock came and went, and I hadn’t even had a text from Vicky, let alone a call back. I phoned again, and there was still no response.

  “Maybe she is too important to take your calls, now that she has a job in a touring band,” Indy suggested.

  I shook my head. “Vicky is not like that.” But Indy’s words did get into my head.

  When I had a change the next morning, I went around to Vicky’s house to pick up a record that she had promised I could borrow. She’d told her roommate Shu ahead of time to expect me to drop around, so I didn’t feel like I was intruding as I knocked on the door.

  I had to knock several times to get Shu to answer the door. When she finally appeared, it looked like I had woken her. I glanced at the clock on the wall behind her. It was almost eleven thirty in the morning.

  “What?” she asked, a little dazed and grumpy, her eyelids puffy. Oh yeah, I had definitely woken her up

  “Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to disturb you. Looks like you weren’t expecting me. I must be intruding.”

  “Sorry,” she said. “It’s just that I am having trouble staying awake with no coffee in this town.”

  I told her not to worry about it. That I understood the pain all too well. I was about to suggest that she make the short drive over to Mayfield to visit the Turtle and Hare but stopped when I remembered where my loyalties still lay.

  I flipped through the record rack until I found the record and pulled it out. “I will return it before Vicky comes back,” I said, then added, “Are you keeping her room free until then or are you sub-letting it?”

  Shu raised an eyebrow. “I am keeping it free for her. But that’s if she even comes back.”

  I frowned. “What do you mean by that? Surely, she isn’t going to be on the road forever. The band only have a few months of tour dates.” I’d already looked it up on their website. They were going overseas after that, and they would hire the touring musicians locally when they got to each country. They wouldn’t take Vicky with them.

  Shu shrugged. “She didn’t even say goodbye this time. Just took off two days ago without even checking in with me, so who knows. I reckon she already thinks she has gotten too big for this town.”

  I shook my head. “No, that’s not right. Vicky left last night. The bus picked her up at five.”

  Shu gazed at me slowly. “Well, either way. She didn’t come home the night before.”

  “Is that . . . usual?” I asked, though I already felt like I knew the answer. Vicky went to bed early each night, and if she had a secret boyfriend or double life, she had been doing a good job of keeping it from me. I certainly hadn’t suspected a thing.

  Shu shook her head, and she suddenly looked worried. “No, not at all. She is here every night. Goes to bed before ten. I just assumed that the tour bus left early or that I had gotten the day wrong, maybe . . .”

  By that stage, I was fairly certain that Vicky was missing. But I had to check.

  “I don’t think you should just go into her room like that,” Shu said, chasing after me. “If it was the other way around, I wouldn’t like Vicky to let people barge into my room.”

  “I’m not intruding on her privacy. This is an emergency,” I said, entering the bedroom.

  Her bags sat there, packed and on her bed. But not taken.

  I turned around and stared at Shu. “Vicky never got on that tour bus yesterday.”

  “Well, where is she?” Shu asked in a frightened voice.

  One best friend missing. The other under a witch’s spell. What was I going to do?

  6

  I’d come up with a plan to get Akiro back. But it was going to take some maneuvering.

  “Just here for some more records!” I announced in a cheery tone as I politely pushed past Shu to enter Vicky’s
house the following afternoon.

  “You listened to all of those already?” Shu didn’t seem so sure as she glanced down at the pile of music that I was carrying. She clearly didn’t expect to see me back so soon. She’d almost guarded the door, and for a moment, I didn’t think she was going to let me in.

  But for my plan to work, I needed to get in.

  “Oh yes, I am a big country music fan,” I said. “I devour them. Need to replenish my supply, stat.”

  Shu was still frowning as she followed me down the hallway, and I hoped that she wasn’t going to watch me the enter time.

  “I actually have some news about Vicky,” Shu said.

  I almost dropped the records I was carrying as my cover to get back inside Vicky’s bedroom. She’d heard news. Really?

  “What news?”

  “I received a text message from her,” Shu said and dug through her pocket for her phone, so she could deliver me proof of this text message. I was having a hard time believing this had happened. Why would Vicky text Shu but not me? I was her best friend, wasn’t I?

  Or maybe I wasn’t.

  Maybe Shu was.

  Shu pulled up a text and then showed me the scream. It certainly seemed to have come from Vicky. The name “Vicky” was on the top of the screen. Although I couldn’t see the number.

  I grabbed it from her, and she went “Hey!” but I just apologized and explained that I was worried about Vicky.

  It read “Just arrived in Dubbo for the festival! Having a great time!”

  Hmm. It seemed like something Vicky could have written. She was a big fan of using exclamation points.

  “Did you text back?” I asked Shu. I couldn’t see any outgoing message. “Ask her why she didn’t take her bags with her.”

  Shu shrugged. “I guess she just forgot.”

  “Seems like a pretty big thing to forget when you are going on tour.” I passed the phone back, somewhat reluctantly. I wanted to investigate more, but I couldn’t exactly start going through Shu’s phone right in front of her.

  “Yeah, well, that’s Vicky for you. You haven’t heard anything?” Shu asked me as she put her phone away again.

  I shook my head. “No. And I have texted her several times.”

  She didn’t seem to think this was surprising at all. “Like I said. Now that she is on the road with Ribeye Bandits, she isn’t going to care about us little folk back in Swift Valley any longer.”

  I still didn’t think that Vicky would act like that, but why else hadn’t she texted me? “Well, it’s good news that she isn’t missing,” I said, and Shu finally left me alone. She told me not to take too long in Vicky’s room, though, and she would be down the hall giving herself a manicure if I needed anything.

  Indy had already warned me. Everyone had warned me. This wasn’t something I could take care of on my own.

  But did I take that advice? No. Would I live to regret this? Well, I didn’t know the answer to that yet. I was going to have to wait and see.

  All I knew was that the risk was worth it.

  I crept over to the bookshelf that Vicky kept in the back of her bedroom on the far side away from the door. The spines were turned around the wrong way with the paper sides sticking out. That wasn’t her absentmindedness, though. That was on purpose.

  These weren’t plain old novels I was looking at. These were spellbooks.

  I riffled through the books, trying not to make too much noise even though I was rushing. I pulled a thick one out to look at the spine and accidentally knocked a bunch of the heavy books to the floor. They had hardwood floors, too, so it wasn’t exactly quiet. Shu called out and asked me what I was up to in there, but I told her I was just checking through the records, and that I would only be another minute or two.

  I never knew how Vicky managed it, but Shu did not know that she was a witch. So, I could hardly yell back, “Just looking through Vicky’s books of magic spells!”

  I was breaking more than one rule by being there.

  Geri had told me that I needed to stop investigating the case. I was breaking that rule, first of all. Because my entire purpose was to restore Akiro’s memory so that he could help me out on the case again. I know, I know—be careful what you wish for. I had wished for Akiro to leave me alone and let me handle the case on my own.

  But now I needed him back.

  There was another big rule that I was breaking.

  It was a very bad thing to take another witch’s spellbooks. Maybe not exactly forbidden, but it was very much looked down on, especially when you were still a witch in training. I was expected to learn how to do magic the hard way. It was considered cheating to look in another witch’s books, especially as even being allowed to own the books was a right only for a full witch.

  And on top of all that, I wasn’t supposed to just go casting magic spells willy-nilly. Only spells that had been approved and even then, only under supervision when I was in public.

  But it wasn’t like I could just go and ask Geri for a book of my own. Or for her help on how to cast a remembrance spell.

  And Vicky was who knows where. Dubbo, apparently. Though I had my doubts about that.

  Shu was knocking on the door now and telling me that she thought I needed to hurry up and get out of there or show her what I was up to.

  “That doesn’t sound like you are just looking at records!” she called out.

  Argh, did she have to be so annoying? To be fair, she was acting like a good and loyal housemate, and I was kinda acting shady. So, she was in the right. I hoped that if I ever went away for a few days that my housemate Taylor would act with the same level of loyalty and stand guard over my door if any strange witches turned up and went inside. A bit of a moot point, seeing as Taylor was away himself at that moment, helping Vicky’s dad out with his dairy farm up in the mountains and taking care of Vicky’s dog, Red. I would guard his room, though, if anyone turned up and asked to go inside and look through his record collection. Not that he had one.

  “Got it!”

  I finally found the book I needed and stood up, straightening the rest of the books before I raced back to the door.

  I opened up the door with the spellbook tucked firmly under my arm, mostly obscured by the cloth from the oversized jacket that I was wearing.

  “Found what I wanted!” I said and pushed past Shu, who was standing guard. She glanced down at the thing tucked under my arm and frowned. “That looks awfully thick for a record . . .”

  “It’s a box set,” I said quickly and shuffled past her down the hall before she could ask any more questions.

  I couldn’t take the book home to pour over. Indy would guess what I was up to and try to stop me. So, I hurried back to my car and studied it in there as the sun went down, and the moon took its place. Not quite a full moon but almost. It was a good time to perform a spell. The ideal time was during full moon but a day or two on either side was almost as good.

  There was no time to waste. I needed Akiro—and his memory—back.

  I just needed to get up the courage to do it.

  Flipping through the pages, I was starting to gain that courage. Maybe too much of it. The book made it seem simple enough, or at least, that’s what I told myself. This spell said I could retrieve Akiro’s missing memory. So, what could go wrong?

  The instructions were that I needed to say the words to the spell, but that I also needed to do a process known as “feeding,” where I had to feed some of Akiro’s memories back to him. This, apparently, stopped anyone from performing the spell on a person unless they really knew that person well. It made it impossible to give a false memory to control a person’s mind.

  I knew Akiro well. Better than anyone. I was the best person to perform this spell.

  All I needed to do was to get him in my sights. The spell didn’t need any sort of potion or elixir. That was lucky, considering the fact that Akiro wouldn’t even open the door to me. I didn’t think it was very likely that I was going to c
onvince him to drink a glass of random black liquid that I handed him.

  I had to go back to his house, though.

  It was super creepy being back there at night with the overgrown lawn that looked downright scary in the moonlight. As I walked over the lawn, the grass hit against my bare ankles. Man, it was scratchy. It really looked like no one lived on the property. But I could see a light on inside the house. I crept up closer until I was on the patio, trying to get a good look inside so I could see where Akiro was.

  I didn’t actually need to speak to him for the spell to work, and he didn’t need to see me. In fact, it was better, in this case, if he didn’t see me. I just needed to have him in my sights when I performed it. The book told me that the spell was most effective if I could see the back of his skull while I performed it.

  The house wasn’t particularly big, but it was long, and I had no idea of the inside layout. I spotted what appeared to be the back of a head sitting on a sofa seat. So, I assumed it was Akiro and not a random mannequin.

  I crept along the path, trying to be as quiet as possible, and concentrating on the back of Akiro’s head. I ducked down and opened the spellbook that I had been lugging with me. I went over the words silently as I prepared to say them out loud, trying to calm my nerves. This spell required total concentration. I was in the zone, focusing on which memories I wanted to feed to Akiro when my phone began ringing.

  Loudly.

  “Oh, shoot!” I quickly pulled it out of my pocket to quiet it. I glimpsed the name that was calling.

  Great timing, Bruce.

  The only person I would have picked up for was Vicky.

  I switched my phone off and tried to focus again, hoping that the interruption wouldn’t make any different to the spell.

  Now, where was I?

  I opened my eyes and stared at the back of Akiro’s head and started the feeding process. I told him who I was to him, and immediately got a little flustered. A friend. Sort of. Maybe more. We were working together, right before you lost your memory. Surely, that little memory would jog a few others into place. It was kind of hard to forget our fight.