A Witch to Remember

by Heather Blake

  Vince smiled. “He tried to get my ripped jeans from me once, and we almost came to blows.”

  “He takes fashion very seriously.”

  “I take those jeans seriously. It took me nearly a year to get them broken in just right.”

  “You’re preaching to the choir, but I’ve learned when to pick my battles.”

  He slid me a look. “I know.”

  He did know. I’d fought like crazy to nurture our friendship. To try to get him to see the light when it came to the Craft. To realize that he was more than he was giving himself credit for.

  I said, “I’ve been looking all over the village for you. You know what would have been an easier way to get in touch with you? A cell phone. I’m just sayin’.”

  “I’ve been running errands all day.”

  “Where?” I asked as innocently as I could. “I really searched for you. No one has seen you around today.”

  “I’ve got one of those faces. I blend in.”

  “Vince.”

  “All right, fine. I went to see Dorothy.”

  My eyes widened. “You did? Did you see Glinda there? She went too.”

  “Must have just missed her. If I knew she was going, we could’ve gone together.”

  “Maybe if you had a cell phone …”

  He rolled his eyes.

  I said, “Well, how is Dorothy? Did she say anything? And by anything, I mean did she confess to this?” I gestured across the road.

  “It was a waste of my time. They didn’t let me see her. Said no outside contact while she’s under emergency evaluation.”

  So it had probably been a wasted trip for Glinda as well.

  “But,” Vince added, “I don’t think Dorothy did this, for what it’s worth.”

  I glanced at Divinitea. Other than the bright plywood covering the doors and windows and the blue tarp on the roof, it was covered in black soot. “But could she have done it? Using black magic?”

  He pushed his glasses up his nose. “It’s possible but not probable. I knew she’d been dabbling, but I didn’t realize how immersed she’d become in the dark arts until yesterday when I heard about Sylar’s attempt to give you and Glinda an exorcism. If I’d known, I would have tried to stop her.”

  “Sylar burned a bunch of sorcery books yesterday—you didn’t give those to Dorothy?”

  “No. I don’t know where she got them. I haven’t used black magic in months, but all my books are accounted for.”

  “So, you didn’t teach her anything about black magic? Nothing? She didn’t come to you looking to learn?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Darcy, you don’t understand. You don’t go looking for black magic. It finds you.”

  I shuddered. “What does that mean?”

  “It’s born of powerlessness, rage, and hatred. It grows stronger in tandem with those emotions. And it doesn’t leave you until those emotions are resolved.”

  I was trying to wrap my head around what he was saying and why, exactly, it sounded like a warning. Finally, I said, “Dorothy’s going to come out of that psychiatric facility with more sorcery power than ever before, isn’t she?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Can she escape if she wanted?” I asked. “Knock out a wall, that kind of thing?”

  “I doubt she has the capabilities yet to do that, but I wouldn’t put it past her to try. She’s not going to sit idly by. Especially not with the Renewal tomorrow night.”

  I didn’t know where to go with that quite yet, so I said, “Why would she turn to black magic now? What pushed her over the edge? Because she’s always been bitter and angry and full of hate.”

  “I’m not sure,” he said. “It’s like a switch was flipped a few months ago, where the rage and hatred started to consume her. Whether it was marriage issues, stress with the Renewal, or her drinking is anyone’s guess.”

  Or all three, I supposed. That was a lot for someone to take on.

  My gaze drifted back to the tea shop. “So, why do you think that Dorothy didn’t kill Leyna?”

  “A few reasons.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “One, Dorothy was hammered Saturday afternoon. I don’t think someone can fake drunk like that, but for the sake of argument, let’s say she did fake it.”

  “Okay.”

  “That leads us to reason two. Strangulation. If, like we suspect, Dorothy was so far down the rabbit hole of black magic, she wouldn’t have strangled Leyna. She would have lit Leyna on fire like some sort of black-magic effigy and watched her burn.”

  Oh dear lord.

  “Three, there would be no need for an accelerant. Dorothy can shoot fire from her fingertips—that whole cottage would have been up in flames with a flick of her wrist. No oil needed.”

  He was sticking fingers in the air like Harper had done on Saturday afternoon, except she had been talking about wedding planning and he was talking about something that was making me break out in a cold sweat.

  “Four, she would have disabled the sprinklers. Five, she wouldn’t have taken the hairpin—and if she did, she wouldn’t have kept it on her person to be found by the police. She’s not stupid. Six, she would have made sure you and Harper were in the building before she lit it up.”

  My heart pounded as I reached over and forced his hands down. “I get it.”

  “That’s all I had, anyway.”

  My heart raced. “Compelling.”

  “I think so too.”

  While my brain raked over all his reasons, one in particular stuck out to me.

  Six, she would have made sure you and Harper were in the building before she lit it up.

  He sounded so sure, as though he’d been expecting it to happen.

  I studied his profile as I suddenly recalled how he’d been insistent on keeping his reservation that day. “Did you suspect Dorothy might try to do something to hurt us at Divinitea on Saturday? Is that why you were there at the time of my bridal luncheon? And why you wouldn’t cancel that reservation?”

  He fidgeted. “Let’s just say I wasn’t comfortable with you, Harper, Amanda, and Leyna all being under Divinitea’s roof at the same time.”

  I bumped him with my shoulder. “You wanted to be there to protect us.” It wasn’t a question. I already knew the answer.

  “Don’t make a big deal about it,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Women. Sheesh.”

  I smiled at him.

  “Stop that smiling right now.”

  I thought about the Craft books on his coffee table, and suddenly I heard Hildie’s voice echoing in my head.

  Out of darkness, there comes light.

  She’d been talking about him. I was sure of it—felt it straight to my soul. Vince had found his way out of the darkness and had come into the light. It made me want to cry with happiness.

  He said, “Oh my god, if you don’t stop smiling at me, I’m going to leave.”

  I pressed my lips together, but I could still feel the corners of my mouth pulling upward.

  He looked my way and shook his head, but I noticed he was holding back a smile as well. I took a minute just to enjoy this moment, because I knew we still had more to talk about regarding Dorothy.

  For now, I wanted to bask in this happiness. I closed my eyes and turned my face to the sun, breathing in deep. When a cloud passed by, casting my face into shadows, I opened my eyes, and the first thing I saw was the blackened exterior of Divinitea.

  “Could you have stopped Dorothy?” I asked. “If she had attacked us on Saturday?”

  “I would have tried.”

  I nodded. “I appreciate that.”

  “You and Harper are pains in my backside, but I’ve kind of grown attached to you both. And don’t you start smiling again, so help me.”

  “Fine.” I waited a few seconds and then said, “Is there a way to stop black magic?”

  “There aren’t ways to stop it, necessarily, but ways to protect yourself from it. There’s one talisman in particular that
will protect a single person. I heard about it years ago while visiting a hole-in-the-wall black-magic shop in New Orleans. It would be of little help if Dorothy goes off on the whole village.”

  “So, what else can we do?” I asked, trying not to think of the whole village on fire.

  “Our best option is to keep her in the treatment facility as long as possible. Maybe she can resolve some anger issues while she’s there.”

  How did one resolve decades of anger in a few days or weeks? Dorothy had always had the anger in her, but something had released it recently. Was it even possible to go back to the way she was?

  I thought about what Stef had said earlier, about Dorothy looking ill. “There’s been some talk that Dorothy might be sick. Leyna apparently gave her a reading and warned her to see a doctor. Did Dorothy say anything to you about it? You picked her up from the Stove on Thursday, right?”

  He swiped hair off his forehead, but it immediately flopped back. His eyebrows were drawn low, and intensity radiated from his eyes. “When I picked Dorothy up at the Stove that day, she was babbling about Leyna and sickness. I thought she had been hallucinating. Leyna really gave her a reading?”

  I explained what Carolyn had told me, and added, “Apparently, despite their feud, Leyna couldn’t walk past Dorothy without saying something about her dark energy.”

  “She shouldn’t have wasted her time. The dark energy can be explained by the black magic.”

  “Except in the world of empaths, dark energy means severe illness or even impending death,” I said as gently as I could.

  His jaw jutted, and I could practically feel the tension coming off his body in pulsating waves. News like that had to be hard to hear. Dorothy was his mother, after all. Not a particularly good mother, but that hardly mattered to a son who loved her, flaws and all.

  After a long minute, he said, “Do you know if Leyna said anything about poison?”

  “Poison? No, not that I know of, but Carolyn admitted she couldn’t hear the whole conversation. Why?”

  “In Dorothy’s ramblings that day, she talked about someone poisoning her. She was angry—because she wasn’t told who was doing it. I thought she was just jabbering—I didn’t take her seriously. She’s been talking crazy and being paranoid for months. Is it possible Leyna told her that she was being poisoned?”

  I thought again about what Ula had told me Dorothy had been muttering at the bar that day.

  If Leyna’s joking, I’ll kill her with my bare hands.

  Had she been talking about learning that someone was poisoning her? I sat up straighter. “If Leyna picked up on the fact that Dorothy was being poisoned, she wouldn’t have been able to say who was doing it. She would only be able to sense the toxin in Dorothy’s system.”

  “If,” he said.

  “If,” I echoed. “But it does have the ring of truth to it, doesn’t it?”

  “I’m not sure.” He shrugged.

  I grabbed his arm. “Oh my gosh, I know how we can find out.”

  “How?”

  “Dorothy’s hair.”

  He wiggled his arm free. “The hospital is not going to give you her hair.”

  I smiled and stood up. “It doesn’t need to. I have another source.”

  “Do I even want to know?”

  “Amanda Goodwin. Long story short, she and Leyna bribed a hairdresser to steal Dorothy’s hair for the spell they needed to protect Divinitea. Amanda has extra. Hair, that is.”

  “You witches are crazy.” He stood up in one fluid motion.

  “Hey, you’re a witch, too.”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  “We need to let Nick know about this right away.” And I’d text Glinda as well.

  “I’ll let you handle that. I’m going to try and find some other ways to protect against black magic. There has to be something mentioned in one of my books.”

  I needed to know what I was up against, so I took a deep breath and said, “Do you think that Dorothy will try to harm Harper and me? When she gets out?”

  He wouldn’t look me in the eye as he said, his voice low, “Rage and hatred.”

  I took that as a yes.

  He started walking away. “Be careful, Darcy. Keep an eye on Harper, too. I’ll check in with you tomorrow.”

  “Hey Vince?”

  He turned back to me. “Yeah?”

  “It didn’t escape my notice earlier when you said you hadn’t practiced black magic in months.”

  “It wasn’t supposed to escape your notice. What kind of investigator would you be if you missed that?”

  I ignored the teasing and said, “So no more rage and powerlessness and hatred?”

  He tipped his head side to side as if weighing the question. “No more rage and powerlessness. I’m working on the hatred.”

  Concern shot through me. “Who is it that you hate, Vince?”

  The breeze ruffled his hair, and the sun brightened sad blue eyes hiding behind his glasses. He gave me a weak smile. “You already know the answer to that question, Darcy.”

  With that, he turned and strode off.

  I took a deep breath and willed my heart not to break in half.

  I had only suspected, but hadn’t known for sure until I’d seen the truth in his eyes just now.

  The person Vince hated was … himself.

  He might have come out of the darkness, but he was still looking for the light.

  * * *

  As I walked into the Sorcerer’s Stove, the soft tones of classical music and the aroma of garlic-tossed french fries and chocolate hung in the air. A large board near the hostess stand proclaimed chocolate torte was today’s special dessert—and the fries were one of the Stove’s best menu items.

  With the way my stomach had been feeling, the combination of aromas should have been nauseating, but suddenly, garlic and chocolate didn’t seem a terrible pairing.

  My stomach was a fickle beast these days.

  Taking a deep breath, I pressed onward, toward the end of the bar where takeout orders were placed. Ula smiled when she spotted me and held up a be-right-there finger as she set a tumbler of golden liquid in front of Sylar Dewitt, who sat at the far end of the counter.

  His head hanging low, he was too busy staring at his napkin to notice me.

  I felt someone sidle up next to me at the counter. Stef.

  She motioned with her chin toward Sylar. “He’s been like that for half an hour. That’s his third drink.”

  I hadn’t seen him in here in months. Probably because he’d been avoiding Dorothy, who’d made the Stove her primary hangout. I couldn’t blame him for dodging her, not really. Especially when he believed her to be a devil woman.

  Do you know if Leyna said anything about poison?

  Vince’s voice suddenly echoed in my head. The more the word poison ricocheted, the more I believed that not only was it possible Dorothy had been poisoned but probable. The fine hairs on the back of my neck rose. I was learning that witchy instincts were often just as reliable as cold, hard facts.

  The sooner the lab tests on Dorothy’s hair could be completed, the better, because the mortal world lived by tried-and-true proof. Instincts weren’t going to cut it in a court of law. Scientific evidence of poison would turn the case in a different direction, making Dorothy a victim rather than a suspect.

  Or, perhaps, both …

  The questions still remained, however, of who had poisoned her and why.

  My gaze slid back to Sylar. He certainly had motive to get rid of her …

  He glanced up, caught me watching him, and blanched. He looked quickly away, intent on studying the liquid in his glass. As sweat popped up on his forehead, he shifted in his seat as though suddenly uncomfortable.

  Stef’s eyebrows arched. “He doesn’t seem too happy to see you.”

  “I get that a lot when I’m asking people questions they don’t want to answer.”

  “You’ve questioned him?”

  Apparently she hadn’t heard a
bout the holy water incident. “A little.”

  Her blue eyes widened. “Do you think he had something to do with what happened to Leyna?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said honestly.

  She leaned an elbow on the counter. “Have you always done investigations through your business? I thought a concierge company would be less … dangerous.”

  Sometimes I forgot she hadn’t lived in the village all that long—she hadn’t been here the first time I’d snooped into a murder. Sylar had been a suspect in that crime. Sometimes, I reflected, life came full circle.

  “It’s a long story.” One I couldn’t fully explain, because she wasn’t a Crafter. “But most of my work is fairly tame. After I get back from my honeymoon, my tasks will include helping a high school senior with college applications, tracking down a rare book, and buying a birthday gift for a client’s picky aunt. Hopefully there won’t be any more investigations for a good, long while.”

  Tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear, she said, “Do you do interior design, by any chance?”

  I sat up straight and smiled as I quoted my business motto. “At As You Wish, no job is too big or too small. Why?”

  “My condo is so blah, and I’m hopeless when it comes to making decisions. I’d love some help. Do you have time soon?”

  “Probably not for another couple of weeks. Do you want to make an appointment?”

  “Definitely,” she said.

  I made a note on my phone with a day and time. I’d transfer it over to my planner when I went home.

  “Are you ready to order, Darcy?” Ula asked as she approached.

  She slid a mug of coffee in front of Stef, who thanked her, took a long sip, and let out a deep breath.

  I tried not to be jealous over a cup of coffee.

  I placed the lunch order, choosing only those garlic fries and my usual banana milk shake—what Godfrey didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him—for myself and two sandwiches, fries, and a soda for Nick.

  “Would you like the shake to sip on while you wait for the rest of the order?” Ula asked.

  I bobbed my head and rubbed my hands together. “Please. And thank you.”

  Stef laughed. “I need to talk management into putting that drink on the menu.”