“I was hoping you would stop at Two Wizards,” Ellie said with a smile. “It’s my favorite, even though my waistline always yells at me when I eat there.”
“So the food is good?”
“It has to be here,” Ellie replied. “After all, the population is so small that anybody who opens a less-than-stellar restaurant quickly goes out of business. But yes, Two Wizards is definitely one of the best places to eat. The food is good, and they have a really cool vibe there.”
“I noticed that; it seems to be one of the few places in town where everything seems to be just like in the human world, instead of having magic infused into everything.”
Ellie nodded. “Exactly. I think that’s what made it popular at first; it’s a little bit of a novelty to have something so exotic as a pure human restaurant here.”
I bit back a smile; evidently what Ellie considered exotic, I considered completely normal, and I was happy to have a restaurant like that around for exactly the opposite reason as Ellie was.
Five minutes later we were all seated on the various couches and lounge chairs in the living room. All eyes turned to Sara, just as she took a huge bite into her burger, and we had to wait about forty-five seconds before she finished chewing and swallowing.
“Some witches can’t do that elegantly,” Ellie teased, and Sara stuck her tongue out at her.
“How was I supposed to know you were going to pick that exact second to ask me questions?”
“Well, you probably could have guessed, given as none of us had an acquaintance die on us this morning.”
Sara scowled. “Yeah, I could do without repeating that.”
“At least you haven’t been arrested,” I offered. “I mean, I’m sure Chief Enforcer King knows that you didn’t do it, but I could have understood if she wanted to question you or whatever.”
Sara nodded. “Yes, I’m pretty sure I’m in the clear. Of course, there are no guarantees, and Chief Enforcer King did ask me not to leave town, but I do have my freedom for now. My job, I don’t know about. I don’t even know what to do. Do I show up tomorrow like normal? Will someone just escort me off the premises if I’m not welcome? Is it going to be the most embarrassing moment of my life?”
“It’s a law office, Sara, the last thing they want is negative publicity,” Amy said. “The people there are intelligent; if they’re going to fire you, they’re either going to tell you ahead of time, or when you show up to work tomorrow somebody will kindly and gently get you to leave without making a scene.”
What Amy said definitely made sense, and I found myself nodding along in agreement. Sara evidently felt the same way; she looked a little bit less terrified than she had a moment earlier.
“Anyway, you haven’t given us any of the juicy details yet. Did you find out anything about the murder?” Ellie asked, leaning forward in her chair as she munched on a curly fry.
Sara shrugged. “I did my best, but the enforcers weren’t very into talking to me. It turns out when you’re a murder suspect the police don’t want to tell you everything they know about the victim.”
“You had to have at least overheard something though, right?” I asked.
Sara nodded. “I did, yeah. But not a lot. I do know that Lorondir was poisoned. That actually works well in my favor; in all likelihood he would’ve ingested the poison before getting on my broom, which makes me less likely to be the killer.”
Amy nodded. “We had suspected that was the case. It made the most sense, but it’s good to have it confirmed. I suppose you didn’t overhear what type of poison was used? I imagine they wouldn’t even know yet.”
“That’s right,” Sara said. “Chief Enforcer King used a potion to detect the poison in the first place, and she said it was going to take some more testing with the body before she would know exactly what type.”
“Well, in our travels, we managed to happen across a pretty good suspect,” I said, relaying to Sara and Ellie what Amy and I had discovered about Jordan Black.
“Wow, he’s here?” Ellie said, her eyes widening. “I remember reading all about that case. It was a brutal murder, and everyone thought he was guilty. I don’t think it came as a surprise to anyone when Black was found guilty, and we all thought he was going to go to jail for the rest of his life. Then he fired Lorondir, and his new lawyer got him off on a technicality.”
“Do you know what that technicality was?” Amy asked, looking over at Ellie.
“No, I don’t have a clue. The sites that I read my gossip on aren’t exactly the most in-depth when it comes to specifics of the law. Plus, I think a lot of that information was kept a little bit hush-hush. Probably because the entire magical world thought Black was guilty.”
“And if he was, he might have just committed a second murder,” I said in a quiet voice. Sara, on the other couch, shivered.
“Is there any other opportunity for me to get involved, perhaps you need a martial arts expert to join you in the future?” Mr. Meowgi asked, making an appearance. He took the opportunity to try and nab a curly fry off my plate, but I was too quick for him and he scowled at me like I’d just kicked his best friend.
“I don’t want you getting involved this time, please. After all, I wouldn’t be able to stand it if you got hurt again.”
“Please. Did Bruce Lee ever get hurt while participating in martial arts?”
“Um, I’m pretty sure he hurt his back pretty badly doing weights one time.”
“Well, I don’t do any weight training, mainly because they haven’t invented dumbbells for those of us without opposable thumbs. I’m all about agility, baby.”
I bit back a smile and gave my familiar a pat on the head. “All right, well, I’ll keep you in mind for the future.”
“That’s all I ask,” Mr. Meowgi replied, darting out a paw and grabbing at a curly fry sitting on the edge of my plate, running out of the room with his newfound prey in his mouth. “See? Agility!”
The others giggled as I scowled at my familiar.
“What is our next move, anyway?” I asked.
“Now we have to hunt down and interview someone who almost certainly committed one murder, if not two,” Ellie said.
Great. This didn’t sound dangerous at all.
Chapter 7
“I don’t understand why I can’t just learn this stuff from a book,” I complained to Ellie a couple of hours later as we made our way through the large forest that made up the boundary of Western Woods. It was after seven now, and while there were still almost ninety minutes until sunset, the sun was definitely starting to drop in the sky, and going deep into the forest wasn’t going to help.
Ellie shot me a look. “It’s all good and fine to learn what the different plants look like from a book, but when the day comes that you have to find your own thornweed in the forest, it’s definitely going to look different than the example on your page. Potions, and the herbology that goes with it, our lessons learned from the earth. You have to go to the earth to learn them properly.”
This was my second lesson with Ellie; after we had finished eating I grabbed my notebook that I had chosen to use for potions - I had bought a number of Harry Potter-themed journals on my trip back to the human world before moving here permanently - and pulled out a pen.
“I prefer spells to this; when you’re learning spells you’re not also fighting off mosquitoes.”
“You could always do both,” Ellie said with a wink. “Jupiter, god of thunder, drive away the bloodsucker.”
“Okay, that’s pretty cool,” I said as a mosquito buzzed nearby but didn’t land on me.
“See? The more you study, the more useful spells you learn. Now, come over here and let me show you the main herbs and plants you need to know about. Do you know what the basic cooking herbs look like?”
“I did a Buzzfeed quiz once, and I got, like, six out of twelve on it, so sort of?”
“I don’t know what Buzzfeed is, but I think we can work with that,” Ellie said. “Do y
ou know what herb this is?” she asked, leaning down into the brush and coming back up with the leaf that I’d seen far too many times on Italian pasta sauce labels.
“Basil,” I said confidently with a nod.
“Good.”
“Can you find things like this anywhere?” I asked. “Or are there special parts of the forest where you have to go to find certain herbs?”
“For the most part, the most common herbs grow in most parts of the forest. Over the years, the witches and wizards of Western Woods planted multiple samples of everything all over so that it wouldn’t be difficult for witches and wizards making potions to find the ingredients they needed. However, if you do know where to look, some parts of the forest have more of one herb than another. That’s way more advanced than what you need to know right now, though.”
I watched as Ellie picked up some of the basil and placed it inside a small leather pouch that she had brought with her.
“You’re taking the basil home?”
“Yes,” Ellie nodded. “It’s important that you be able to recognize the fresh herbs, since some recipes call for herbs that are fresh - picked within an hour of being inserted into the potion - but some require herbs that have been dried. So, since we are out here anyway, I figured I might as well grab a few herbs to increase my dried collection.”
I nodded and helped Ellie by finding some more basil as well.
“Do you recognize this one?” Ellie asked a few minutes later, holding up a different leaf. This one was definitely different; the leaves were very long, and shaped like rather thin ovals. The veins are quite visible, and it had almost a fuzzy look to it.
I furrowed my brow in concentration; I knew I had seen it somewhere before, but I couldn’t quite place it.
“It’s sage,” Ellie said when I shook my head. “Here, take it. Learn how it feels in your hands, and learn how it looks.”
Taking out my notebook, I drew a picture of the leaf as I ran it between my fingers.
“What is sage generally used for?”
“While there are no strict rules - I’ve seen sage used in potions for everything from healing salves to potions meant to make someone act crazy - in general sage is used for a lot of healing potions. That’s where you’ll find it most often as an ingredient.”
I nodded as I wrote down what Ellie said, and when she had picked up enough of the sage, we moved on.
“Is it hard to make, the potion that makes people act crazy? I feel like that would be a fun one to play pranks with,” I said with a grin to Ellie as we continued to walk through the forest.
“It’s pretty tough, yeah. Plus, it’s one of the regulated potions. If you don’t have a license to make it, you’re not allowed to do so.”
“Really? That exists?”
“Of course. After all, potions can be used for all sorts of unethical reasons, and so over the centuries witches and wizards determined that they had to be controlled. For example, what would you do if you had a potion that would increase your short-term memory significantly?”
I thought about it for a second. “Well, it would have made high school a lot easier.”
“Exactly. We can’t have witches and wizards at the Academy going around taking potions to increase their intelligence level artificially. So, those sorts of potions are all regulated as well. Although, as with anything else that’s illegal, there are always ways to get around it.”
“Did you ever take some of the memory enhancing potion?” I asked with a grin, and Ellie gave me a sly smile.
“I’ll never admit this in front of Amy, since even though it was ten years ago she’d probably still turn me in for doing it. But yes, a friend of mine had an older brother who wasn’t exactly on the right side of the law a lot of the time, and he managed to procure some for us that originated in a Polynesian paranormal community. He smuggled it back into Western Woods, and sold it to my friend’s brother, who then sold it to us.”
“Did it work?”
“Let’s put it this way: it was the first and last time in my life I’ve ever had a better score than Amy on a test.”
My eyes widened. “Okay, so it does work. That’s pretty cool.”
Before I had a chance to ask anything else about the restricted use potions, a rustling sound came from deeper in the forest. I froze, all too aware that this place was full of shifters, and I didn’t want to find myself face to face with a lion, or a grizzly bear, or whatever.
“What was that?” I asked, gripping Ellie by the arm.
“Probably a deer,” Ellie said, completely relaxed. “Don’t worry, the shifters aren’t allowed to shift until after nightfall, and there’s no reason for anyone to have hired a shifter to scare you right now.”
Great. That made me feel way better.
When, a minute later, I heard the same sound again, only this time much closer, I began to panic for real.
“Well now, what are two witches doing in the forest?” a voice asked from nearby, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. Still, I recognized the voice. It was Kyran, an elf I’d met a couple of times already here in Western Woods, who didn’t seem to have a great reputation with everybody else, but who I thought seemed friendly enough.
He popped out from behind a tree, and I inhaled sharply as I caught sight of him. Dark hair that was just long enough to give him a permanent just-got-out-of-bed look framed his pointed elf ears, and his eyes were so blue it was like looking into a glacial lake. Even though he was dressed casually, wearing khakis and a polo shirt instead of the long robes elves usually wore, the muscular tone of his body still stood out.
“You’re Kyran, aren’t you?” Ellie asked, her eyes narrowing in suspicion.
“Sure am,” Kyran said with a grin.
“We don’t want any trouble, just get out of here,” Ellie said.
“Hey, I don’t want any trouble either,” Kyran replied, opening his hands. “I just don’t usually find witches in the forest here, that’s all.”
“Ellie’s teaching me all about the herbs,” I said. “So I can make potions.”
“Good,” Kyran said, nodding. “Potions wouldn’t be affected by the fact that you don’t know who your true coven is. You’ll be much better at potions than spells until you discover your people.”
I shot him a grin. “You sound a bit like a wizard yourself.”
“Don’t say that in front of everybody else, you’ll get kicked out of the coven,” Kyran told me with a wink. Ellie looked at me like I’d just spouted an extra head. Evidently, she had not been looking forward to a conversation with Kyran.
“Come on, Tina. Let’s get out of here,” Ellie said, grabbing me by the arm and practically dragging me back towards town.
“See you around,” Kyran said, evidently not bothered in the least by the fact that Ellie had practically run away from him. I shot him a wave and a smile as I was dragged away, and as soon as we reached the road once more, Ellie turned on me.
“Do you know who that guy was?” she practically hissed. “He’s so dangerous.”
“Who, Kyran? He seems nice. Everyone seems to hate him, but no one really tells me why.”
“Kyran grew up in Western Woods,” Ellie started. “Mind you, this was before my time. He’s quite young by Elven standards. I think he’s like four hundred years old or something. He’s basically the elf equivalent of our age. His family is one of the original Elven families. We don’t even know where they come from. His father is thousands of years old. Anyway, instead of going into one of the intelligence positions like all the other elves, like becoming a lawyer or an accountant, Kyran had decided he wanted to work security and law enforcement instead.”
“And let me guess, it was decided that he couldn’t do it?” I said with a wry smile. Western Woods had very specific ideas as to which paranormals could perform which jobs.
“Of course not,” Ellie said. “He was an elf. He was supposed to go into a job that elves perform. Anyway, eventually Kyran actually went and tr
ied to apply for a job as an enforcer, and he was basically laughed out of the place. His reputation was ruined, and he decided that if he wasn’t going to get a job as an enforcer, he was going to make his own job.”
“So? Lots of people work for themselves.”
“Yeah, but lots of other people don’t hunt other paranormals.”
My mouth dropped open. “What?”
“Kyran decided that he was going to fill a hole in the law enforcement community. Basically, well we have enforcers to make sure that the laws in the paranormal world are enforced, when it comes to law enforcement in the human world, things get a lot trickier. For one thing, jurisdiction becomes an issue. If Western Woods was to send out an enforcer to make sure paranormals weren’t taking advantage of humans, who was to say where that spot would end? After all, there is a vampire-exclusive community just north of here, called Vampouver. What if our enforcer went into territory that they considered theirs? There would be diplomatic issues involved. So, as a result, most paranormal communities choose to simply ignore the human world.”
“Wait, does that mean that there are paranormals that come in to the human world and like, attack people?”
“It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. You would read them as events where something absolutely extraordinary seemed to happen, and you call them freak accidents. They’re often not freak accidents at all, but rather the work of paranormals.”
“So what does Kyran have to do with this? Does he go into the human world and hurt people?” I had trouble believing that the friendly elf that I knew would do something so horrible.
“No, he goes into the human world and he stops the paranormals himself.”
“So he’s basically elf Batman?”
“What’s a Batman?”
“Never mind. But so, he’s a vigilante that makes sure paranormals who go to the human world to commit crime are punished?”
Ellie nodded. “That’s right,” she said. “Generally, once he catches someone, he brings them back here and they’re prosecuted. After all, there are laws against committing acts of mischief in the human world. They’re just not enforced, normally.”
Two Peas in a Potion Page 4
