The New Improved Sorceress

by Sara Hanover

  “And Scout saved me.”

  “Looks like. It would have been very, very ugly, if he’d tried taking you through the arch.” The off-side cleft in his chin deepened as he frowned. “I would have stopped him however I could.”

  “Good thing you didn’t have to try. He had the stone muffled, mostly, don’t know how since he didn’t seem to be aware of it, but I broke through in time to put up a little bit of a fight.” I hated lying to him, but I didn’t want to mention Malender, and I still had some thinking to do about what I’d seen and what he’d said. My fingers went to my hairline behind my right temple and rubbed gently. A patch of skin tingled in answer. Against the curve of my ear, a whisper sounded. “Tell the professor I am his Fire!” I jumped but saw no one. I needed a mirror and privacy.

  “Muffled?” Brian straightened up. “But you don’t think Devian was aware of it?”

  “I have no idea. None. He stunned and levitated me, and then—”

  “Levitated?”

  I put my hand out, illustrating. “As in, horizontal and floating about three feet or so off the floor.” I winced. “Hope casino cameras didn’t catch that.”

  “According to security, they weren’t able to catch any of it.”

  “Oh, really? Convenient. Anyway, the stun wore off when the stone woke up.” I lifted my hand and looked at it. “From the palm outward. I was just drifting out of the levitation when Scout attacked.” Also, both Devian and Malender had treated that envelope of ooze about him as something meant to imprison him. That stood out crystal clear in my slightly befuddled thoughts. Every time I saw him that I could, the shroud got liberally doused in salt. Was I freeing him, bit by bit? No wonder he seemed to refer to me fondly as Tessa of the Salt. That reminded me of the other stuff, and I turned abruptly to drop the drawstring pouch I’d retrieved into Brian’s hand, which he had raised to make a vigorous point, and the gift surprised him instead. His mouth opened and shut a few times.

  “What is this?”

  “That,” Carter said tightly, “is pixie dust, unless I am greatly mistaken. If you let Tessa set herself up as bait just to obtain that—”

  “I did no such thing although I did suggest it might be helpful to find out where it could be obtained.”

  Their argument was interrupted by my mother and Aunt April joining us in the parking lot.

  “Are you all right?” My mom hugged me tightly.

  “I am. Not sure about everyone else.”

  “They robbed the casino?”

  “Seems like. Smashed the jewelry cases and took off. Stampeded right past me.” I frowned at Carter, Brian, and Hiram to tell no more. Hiram cleared his throat and said he’d retrieve the SUV.

  The other two stared at each other, nose to nose, and I realized that the professor stood nearly as tall as Carter. Or, at least his new body did. Brian took a step back as if realizing this was no place to start another fight.

  I just stood, my mom on one side and my Aunt April on the other, my mom knowing a little of what went on and my great-aunt a little stunned though listening closely. When all was said and done, and a local constabulary came out the exit door one last time, he told Carter we could go home.

  Aunt April dusted herself off and said, “Oh, my.”

  I hugged myself.

  “Are you all right?”

  I looked at all of them as I realized the one true loss of the evening, and my eyes misted up. “No. They took my dog.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  HUSH PUPPY BLUES

  THE DRIVE HOME seemed a little too quiet until Aunt April finally spoke up. “I can’t blame you for not telling me much, I would have thought you both batshit crazy, but what happened this evening? And don’t tell me it’s complicated because I sure as hell can tell that.” She swiveled around in the front seat to peer at me, but I didn’t know what to tell her. She stared at the side of my mom’s head as she attempted to drive. “I’m no bump on a log. Talk, the two of you.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” I cleared my throat. “Well, it seems there is a little bit of magic in the world—”

  “Are you going to pussyfoot about that? Of course there is! Do you think I won thousands of dollars gambling—and lost it, too, for that matter—because I had a pretty face and a sharp nose once? No. I had a few good luck tokens about me, and however they got charmed, they worked. Your daddy now, before he disappeared and cell phones got all popular, he always knew when the phone was going to ring and who’d be calling. The mind and the senses are powerful things.”

  “It’s a little stronger than that, Aunt April,” my mom noted. “We’re talking actual magic and things we can’t explain. Like, for instance, John’s ghost lives in our basement.”

  “John? Our John?”

  My mother nodded. My great-aunt went as pale as a sheet of writing paper. “Ghost? Oh, no.”

  I leaned forward and put my hand on her shoulder. “He’s not dead. Just not here in the traditional sense, and I plan to get him back.”

  “What’s he doing as a ghost? How could that happen? And what do you mean, get him back?”

  “We don’t exactly know, which is why we haven’t been able to undo it, but that’s how he disappeared without a trace. He slipped into a kind of twilight zone.”

  She inhaled sharply as if she’d just remembered how to breathe again. “So that’s why that old house makes all those strange noises. He’s a haint.”

  “Yup.” My mother skillfully took a curve in the night-cloaked road. “We didn’t find him until a while back, ourselves.”

  “After the new cellar went in.”

  “Pretty much.”

  I swallowed. “And that’s not all.”

  “There’s more?” Her voice went a bit higher, as if she really couldn’t take more, but I forged ahead.

  “Professor Brandard didn’t die in that house fire.”

  “Oh, glory be. I couldn’t bear to think of him dying that way. Where’s he gone, then? It’s been months. You tell him to get in touch with me. We’re old friends. Used to play cards at the club all the time, and I miss his irascible old self. Not that he could beat me, that is, but we made good partners.”

  “That’s a little more complicated.”

  Her mouth tensed into a thin line, and before she could tell me that she’d told me not to bring that up as an excuse, I said, “Our house guest is the professor, reincarnated. We think. It looks like it.” I left off the wizardly part of it. Great-Aunt April may be a trooper, but I didn’t want to give her more than she could handle.

  “Reincarnated?” She let out a long exhale. “Well. Well, well.” She gave a sniff. “Isn’t that special.”

  Her words fell like a large rock into a still pond, and then I began to laugh. She followed and then my mother. When we could finally draw our breaths, she gave a little snort. “Leave it to a man to get a new body. Usually, he goes for a trophy wife instead of trading himself in, but the professor always thought high and mighty of himself.” She drew a lace-edged handkerchief out of her purse and dabbed at the laughter tear in the corner of her eyes. “I take it he doesn’t remember much. He’s not a good enough actor to pretend he’s forgotten me.”

  “Not much, but he’s working on that. There’s a magic ritual involved.”

  Her purse snapped shut after she’d folded her handkerchief and put it back where it belonged. “So what happened at the casino? You were quite taken by the jewelry, Tessa. Something of note there? A cursed amulet or such? Something the professor needs?”

  “Something like that. A diadem caught my eye, but I didn’t plan on getting caught in a heist! I was just playing tourist.”

  A very, very long moment of silence followed. I didn’t break it as my mother concentrated on keeping us in a smooth flow of highway traffic and my aunt settled back against the car seat. She turned her head to watch
the roadway go by and after another long pause said, “Live and learn, ladies. That’s what it’s all about. Live and learn.”

  She folded her blue-veined hands in her lap and that was it until we pulled into our driveway.

  A caramel-iced sheet cake awaited us, my aunt having learned that there would be more than three people digging in, but we’d had ours and Hiram’s SUV still hadn’t parked out front, when Aunt April took me by the hand.

  “Come to the basement with me.”

  “I will, but you won’t see him. He’s very weak.”

  “Ah.” An expression I couldn’t identify passed through her eyes. “Still, I’d like to go down there.”

  “Of course.”

  The new lighting system flooded the room, and it didn’t look a bit like the creepy old place Hiram had fallen into. Walls, floor, and ceiling all gleamed brightly. She shook her head as we stood in the center, the professor’s boxes piled off to the side and the only familiar thing the old wooden cabinet where the maelstrom stone had been waiting for me. She crossed to it.

  “This old thing. I’m glad you all didn’t haul it out and get rid of it. Belonged to my grandmother.” She stroked the paint-faded wood. “Now there was a lady who probably had a touch. She lived back in the days when people made their own medicines because a good doctor was often a few days away, or more, by carriage. She was known for it, she was—Potion Polly, they used to call her. She could cure you of melancholy or a cough or even most cases of arthritis, but then she knew all about willow bark before aspirin got compounded.” Aunt April smiled softly in memory before dropping her hand. She drew herself up. “All right now, John Graham Andrews. I’m talking to you. I’m sorry, mighty sorry, for sending you into my sea of troubles, but I’m fine now and this family of yours survives and thrives. So you hang on, you hear, until this outstanding daughter of yours comes and gets you!”

  No one answered. I hadn’t expected them to, although I could feel a cool mist swirl about us. I nudged her. “Feel that?”

  “A draft? I do, though I can’t tell where it’s coming from.” Aunt April looked about.

  “It’s him.”

  She made a sound. Then, “Good. I hope he heard and does what’s needful.”

  She didn’t hear it, but I did as we turned about and began climbing up the stairs. A voice at the back of my neck, hollow but recognizable, murmured, “Yes, ma’am.”

  The guys piled in the door after we’d settled back in the kitchen and decided that the evening had settled cool enough for hot tea instead of sweet iced tea. I’d changed clothes and hung my gown on my closet door, as a reminder to get it to the cleaners sometime Monday. Since that was a game day, it might have to wait until Tuesday. As I came downstairs, I saw Mom had put the coffeepot on, anticipating, with a stack of paper plates and nice but decidedly plastic forks to the side. She’d finally gotten tired of doing dishes, I noted.

  Aunt April dipped her head at each of them as they pulled up kitchen chairs, and then Steptoe drifted in from the backyard as well. He doffed his bowler. “Madam.”

  “Indeed,” she answered. “It seems cake calls to everyone. Pull up a seat.”

  “No doubt o’ that and it smells scrumptious. Mary, did you concoct this?”

  “No, it’s one of Aunt April’s specialties. Made-from-scratch yellow cake with caramel icing.”

  “I can barely wait.” He sat down next to Hiram.

  Because Mom was brewing, I got up and started slicing the rectangle into neat squares. I knew they’d give me disappointed looks when they saw the size, but I figured they wouldn’t hesitate to ask for seconds, anyway. I stopped midway, cake knife in my hand. I missed Scout nudging and begging at my knees and my breath caught in my throat.

  “Where’s th’ pup?” Steptoe asked, even as Carter shot him a look across the kitchen and I let out a small sniffle.

  “We’re getting him back.”

  Simon considered Carter for a moment before looking down and retrieving his paper napkin. “A-course you are. No tears now, Tessa. What this man promises, he means, and we’ll all help. Any success in the rest of the evening?”

  Aunt April tilted her head thoughtfully. “A regular mob you’ve got here, Mary, and I was no more the wiser. Well,” and she scanned all of them. “I’ve been let in on the secret.”

  Voices broke out then, all round, noisily, and I managed to quiet them a bit as I passed out cake squares perched neatly on their little plates and said, “Not quite everything.” The din died back a little. “We may have trouble with elves.”

  “Elves?” she repeated. “Nasty little tiny pisks or high elves?”

  “High and mightily arrogant.” Steptoe reached for his dessert with a beaming smile and set the cake down in front of him, coal eyes gleaming. He rubbed his hands together eagerly.

  “Aunt April,” my mother interrupted, “is a bit new to all of this. And, you all must admit, it’s a lot to take in.”

  “Certainly, certainly,” Hiram’s deep tones rumbled. “I don’t think I’ve seen a finer cake.” He held his fork in anticipation, and his waiting stopped Steptoe just before he dug in.

  They all paused, albeit a tad impatiently, while my mother got drinks poured around and put cream and sugar on the table. As soon as she took a chair, they dug in.

  I would have, too, but I sat on my phone. I didn’t butt-dial anyone though I dug it out of my rear pocket and stared at it a moment before remembering the pictures I’d taken at the art show auction. I thumbed them up and sent them to the printer in Mom’s study before putting my phone down and listening to the talk around me as they discussed why the security system at the casino had failed to capture the robbery (or me floating through the air). They said more than my Great-Aunt April seemed prepared for, but she took it in, adding a salient point about the community in general when necessary, and it seemed she knew more about casinos and security than most people. Even Carter gave her an appraising look as she shared. Of course, she’d spent enough time in them, both private and public, than was healthy for just about anybody.

  But she also knew how to make a fine cake. Moist and tasty, with the icing melting in my mouth like a rich, decadent fudge, I was definitely right that everybody would demand seconds. And we had enough to provide that, with a couple of extra slices for me and Mom tomorrow. Hiram could have inhaled them, but he tightened his belt and made do with just the two pieces. An ant couldn’t have found a crumb on his plate, though. Mom swept to her feet and gathered up the debris while I made a beeline to the printer, determined to see a big picture of the snap I’d taken of the sheet on the Eye, with that strange-looking writing. I’d managed to take five pictures in quick succession without knowing. My phone has a hair trigger, evidently.

  I brought in the five pages and dropped them in the middle of the table. “Whoever sent the Eye of Nimora to the casino to be sold left us a little bit of a trail.”

  Hands reached out to grab them. Carter caught the main printout first.

  He frowned. “Elven. Probably.”

  The professor said, “Let me see that.”

  Steptoe huffed a little. “As if you remembered enough to read that.”

  The professor started to draw Brian’s hand back but countered with, “I might.”

  Carter passed it to him. Shoulder to shoulder, they both considered it. Carter looked up briefly, “We know who took it. Information came to them from Germanigold’s nest, and they acted on it and passed it to the casino for resale. They are aware of some of its value but not all. They thought the gem might be an attractor for other jewels, the Broadstone propensity for mineral wealth considered.”

  The professor interrupted. “But there is no direct connection to Devian although it is speculated that he might be interested in a private purchase if it didn’t sell at auction. In so many words. The Eye of Nimora has not been seen in centuries out
side of the Broadstone clan. Few know what it looks like or how it is presented. Devian wanted to bid for it, but it could have been anything as far he knew. Hence the massive jewelry grab.” He stabbed at the paper. “We put word out that the ruby is a dwarven talisman to locate gems, and they want it back.”

  “What’s the plan, then?”

  “We tell Germanigold and her nest of the informant—”

  “She already knows and has dealt with the problem,” I interrupted. I got several side eyes on that and waved a hand. “I’ll fill y’all in.”

  “All right then. We give her names and let her deal with that fallout. And tomorrow, Sunday, we try to entice Devian to make a deal.”

  I stared at Carter. “A deal?”

  He lifted one shoulder and let it drop. “He doesn’t know what he has. Yet.”

  “He thinks he has a magical Geiger counter for precious gems?”

  “That about sums it up. If we explain that it’s running low on charge and will shortly be totally useless to him, he’s likely to give it up.”

  “And what would you all trade to him for it?”

  Hiram stood with a clearing of his throat. “Me.”

  We all turned to stare at the Iron Dwarf. He put his chin up a little defiantly. “I could be his hound for a fortnight, in exchange for the woefully inadequate ruby and the pup.”

  “You’d invite him to test the Eye to prove to him its prowess greatly depleted.” Carter grinned at him.

  “Naturally. He should accept the word of a Broadstone, but elves, being duplicitous themselves, are a suspicious lot.”

  “Damned tricksters,” Brian muttered.

  “A bit of flash and no substance,” Aunt April agreed. Mom and I both stared wide-eyed at her. She pulled a bit of a face. “Well, they are. I’ve met one or two. At least, as I look back on my years of experience, I suspect they were elves.”

  “No doubt.” Carter stood up next to Hiram. “If you’re up for it, I’ll back your idea, but we’ll need to have a failsafe.”

  “Naturally, neither I nor the gem will work on the other side of that arch.” Hiram arched an eyebrow at him.