Shifters and Sabotage

by Lily Webb

  I lowered myself down in the chair and watched as Katelyn massaged her temples. “How are you holding up with all of this?”

  “Are you kidding me? It’s a nightmare. Between Beau bailing out on the show and then turning into a dog twenty-four seven, we can’t get ahead. Last night should’ve been his farewell show. We’ve been planning it for months, but I had to put Olivia on instead. You should’ve seen her. She looked like a cat in the headlights as soon as the cameras started rolling.”

  “But she has a show, doesn’t she? What made her so nervous?”

  “Anchoring your own show is one thing, but stepping in for someone as popular as Beau is another entirely. He and Moon Grove Tonight are cultural institutions around here. Even if people don’t agree with what’s going on around them politically, they still tune in to hear him break down the news. He’s like a security blanket.”

  “I know exactly what you mean. He’s a real everyman.”

  “Right, I guess you’d know better than anyone. He’s living with you now, isn’t he?”

  “You know about that?” I asked, concern slipping down my throat like a cube of ice.

  “Oh, come on, you don’t have to worry about that with me. We’re a big family here, there’s no such thing as secrets — and let’s be honest, it was bound to happen.”

  I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.”

  “Anyway, I’m sure you didn’t come to the studio to listen to me blab about work drama.”

  “Well, yes, and no. I’m trying to figure out what happened to Beau, who’s behind it, and how to reverse all this.”

  Katelyn eyed me suspiciously. She sat up on the couch and leaned forward to rest her elbows on her knees. “Hey, whatever I can do to put this nightmare to rest, let me know. I’m drowning here.”

  “I’m glad you brought that up, because I’ve heard you have a reputation for pushing people.”

  She shook her head and laughed. “I do. That’s kind of what a producer does. Someone has to keep the train on the tracks.”

  “Right, but that’s not what I meant. Someone told me you and Beau haven’t been seeing eye-to-eye for a while now.”

  Her face fell. “What do you mean?”

  “I know the announcement of Beau’s transition caught everyone by surprise, and I wouldn’t blame you for being frustrated by the move.”

  “Wait a second, are you saying you think I’m the one who did this to him?” she asked, jabbing a thumb over her shoulder toward the set.

  “No. I’m just talking to everyone in the office who’s close to Beau, because we’re pretty sure that whoever did this is someone who knows him. Have you heard about the letter we found in his office, and all the other letters he’s gotten?”

  “Yeah, they’ve been coming for a while. I mean, most of the anchors get fan mail, but his has gone through the roof lately.”

  “Exactly, and the contents of those letters are very personal. We think whoever wrote them had an ax to grind.”

  “So what ax would I have?”

  I hesitated and looked her square in the eye. “Losing Moon Grove Tonight.”

  Katelyn threw her head back and laughed. “Seriously? You think I’m so petty I’d curse my star anchor for daring to move on? If something happens to him, I’m going down too, so why in Lilith’s name would I want to hurt him? That doesn’t make a lick of sense.”

  “Then why all the fighting with him?”

  She rolled her eyes. “It’s not fighting; it’s a push and pull. Ever since Sam announced Beau would move into management, Beau’s focus has slipped, and who could blame him? I mean, anchoring Moon Grove Tonight is a demanding job, even for him. Channel 666 is a huge company, so when you pile the responsibility and unfamiliarity of that on top of his normal load with the show, it’s a lot.”

  “But you pushed him.”

  “Of course I did! Why wouldn’t I? This is probably the swan song for Moon Grove Tonight, so I wanted Beau’s farewell show to be great and something people would remember positively. We couldn’t pull that off if his brain was elsewhere.”

  “What makes you so sure the network will end the show after Beau leaves?”

  “Like I said, there’s no replacement for him, not really. The big wigs have offered Olivia the job, but she wasn’t interested — and that was before she tried to stand in for him, so I highly doubt she’d take it now. Besides, she doesn’t need it, she’s doing just fine with The Jump.”

  “Then where will you end up if the show gets canceled?”

  Katelyn threw her hands in the air. “That’s the big question, isn’t it? I’m sure they’ll move me somewhere. Maybe to The Jump, or maybe they’ll want me to head up a replacement show for Moon Grove Tonight. I don’t have a clue. I guess it’s up to Beau to decide, since he’ll be running the show, no pun intended.”

  “So why are you worried? You and Beau have worked together for a long time. He wouldn’t leave you out to dry.”

  “I know that rationally, but I still worry.” She glanced at the watch on her wrist. “Anyway, I don’t mean to cut this short, but we’re going on air soon so I need to find Olivia and get this show on the road. You’re welcome to hang around and watch it live.”

  “I appreciate the offer, but I need to get back to the town hall. Duty calls.”

  “Now that’s a job I really don’t envy,” Katelyn said as she stood from the couch and went to the door. She waited for me and we walked back to the set together, but I didn’t see Olivia anywhere.

  “Ugh, don’t tell me she’s late again,” Katelyn muttered as she checked her watch again. She stopped a passing tech by his arm. “Where’s Olivia? She’d better be in one of those dressing rooms.”

  “I don’t think she’s here, Ms. Anderson,” the tech said.

  “Then where is she?!”

  “I don’t know. I can go to her office to check if you want, I—”

  “Don’t bother,” Katelyn interrupted, her face flushed. “I’ll make sure this doesn’t happen again.” She turned to me. “Looks like we aren’t parting ways just yet.”

  I retrieved Beau from his desk, which he seemed reluctant to leave, and we went to the elevator together. Katelyn pressed both the up and down buttons, but as we waited, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something wasn’t right. As much of a diva as Olivia was, I doubted she’d show up late to a taping of her own show. It didn’t seem like her.

  “You know what, I think we’ll come with you.”

  “Good. Maybe seeing the two of you will put the fear of Lilith in Olivia not to pull this again.”

  The elevator going up arrived, so we piled in and Katelyn smashed her fist into the button for the twentieth floor and hammered the button to close the doors. All the way up, she mumbled to herself and the shade of red on her face intensified. No wonder people were afraid of her.

  When we reached Olivia’s floor, Katelyn pushed through the elevator doors before they finished opening and power walked down the hall to Olivia’s office. I could barely keep up, and neither could Beau — even with four legs.

  “Olivia Starr, I swear to Lilith, if you think—” Katelyn started, but her own scream cut her off as she entered the office.

  Terrified, I bolted down the hallway into the office behind her. A fluffy, snow white cat with piercing green eyes sat on Olivia’s desk swishing its tail. An overturned paper coffee cup rolled from side to side nearby. Its contents had stained the cat’s front paws a dark brown, and a matching stream of liquid dripped down the side of the desk to join the pool that had already spread across the carpet.

  The cat meowed and stretched lazily.

  “What the…?” Katelyn trailed, but I realized exactly what’d happened — even before I saw a coffee-stained piece of paper jutting out from under the cat.

  I reached for it and the cat hissed and darted under the desk. Beau whimpered and began to shake as I read:

  They say all cats have nine lives

  And we waste youth on the young,r />
  But not even this feline can thrive

  While something has her tongue.

  “Oh no, not you too!” Katelyn shouted as she rounded the desk and dropped to her knees to pull Olivia out from under it. Her claws ripped at the carpet as Katelyn dragged her. She stood and dangled Olivia’s fluffy body between her hands. Olivia howled her embarrassment.

  “Now what am I supposed to do?!” Katelyn wailed.

  “Give her to me,” I ordered as I stuffed the letter into my robe pocket.

  “What? Why? Where are you taking her?”

  “Something connects these events, no doubt about it, and there’s only one person I trust to help put the pieces together. Give me the coffee cup too,” I said, my arms out.

  Befuddled, Katelyn picked the cup off the desk and handed it to me along with Olivia, who squirmed and squealed in my arms, but eventually stopped fighting.

  “Come on, Beau, we’re going back to Raina’s.”

  Chapter Nine

  Carrying a cat across Moon Grove proved much harder than it should have been. No matter how many sweet words I whispered into Olivia’s ear or how much I pet her, she wouldn’t sit still — and I paid the price.

  By the time we reached Moonbeam Avenue and Raina’s house at number three, Olivia had shredded my arms to ribbons and blood had seeped through the sleeves of my robes. Thankfully, they were black so not much showed. With difficulty, I kicked Raina’s door three times while trying to keep Olivia from bolting out of my grip.

  Raina opened the door in a fluster. “Zoe? What in Lilith’s name is going on?” she asked, staring in horror at the cat in my arms and the scratch marks that lined them.

  “It’s not what it looks like. Although, now that I say that, I don’t have a clue what it looks like,” I said. With a growl, Raina’s cat Tierney came waddling out from behind her, but as soon as he laid eyes on Olivia, all his aggressiveness vanished.

  “Looks like Tierney wants to be friends with you, Olivia,” I said as I pushed past Raina and practically threw Olivia inside. Raina hurried to close the door behind me before Olivia could dart out.

  “Zoe, dear, while I’ll never object to a visit from you, are you going to explain what this is all about?”

  “It’s a long story, but I think we have another curse on our hands.”

  Raina looked from Olivia to me and back again. “Wait, is this cat Olivia Starr?”

  “Sure is.”

  A howling sound tore through the house as Olivia swatted Tierney across the face for getting too close. Tierney didn’t seem to mind, though. In fact, it only seemed to encourage him. He brushed his side against Olivia’s and purred.

  “Well, look at the bright side, Olivia: if you end up stuck as a cat, at least you’ve got your first date taken care of,” I joked and Olivia growled her disapproval before running to hide under one of Raina’s rocking chairs in the living room. Much to her dismay, Tierney followed.

  “How did this happen?” Raina asked.

  “I wish I knew. I was at the Channel 666 offices talking to Katelyn, Beau’s producer, about what happened to him. Olivia didn’t show up to tape her show, so I went with Katelyn to Olivia’s office and when we got there, we found her like this.”

  “And nothing else? No signs or clues about what happened?”

  “Well, there was this,” I said and dug out the now thoroughly crushed coffee cup from my bag, which had left a trail of sticky brown goo. I passed it to her, and she scowled like I’d handed her a piece of garbage from the street. Her nose crinkled and she pulled away. “It’s not trash, as much as it looks like it. I think Olivia was drinking from it, and there was something in the coffee that caused her to get stuck like this.”

  “I see,” Raina said as she pinched the coffee cup between two fingers and held it in the air in front of her. “Sounds similar to the chocolates you found in Beau's office.”

  “Right. It’s too similar to be a coincidence.”

  “Did this just happen?”

  “Yeah, I think I arrived on the scene minutes after she drank the coffee. It’d spilled all over her desk and on the carpet nearby, so I’m sure she dropped it — probably after whatever magic was in it took effect.”

  “I see. Fetch Olivia, I’d like to run some quick tests on her.”

  “Easier said than done,” I groaned as I looked in Olivia’s direction and tried to ignore the stinging all along my arms from her handiwork.

  “Then leave it to me,” Raina said and pulled her wand from her robes. She muttered a spell I didn’t hear, and Olivia shot out from underneath the chair to float in front of Raina’s face like she’d lassoed her. Raina gently lowered her down on the table and tossed the crushed coffee cup beside her. Tierney let out a long, high-pitched meow and leaped up to join Olivia, who didn’t seem pleased by his company.

  Raina waved her wand in Olivia’s face. “Be still now, or I’ll make you.” Olivia meowed but stayed put. “Good girl. Ostendo.”

  I held my breath as I waited to see what, if anything, would happen. Amazingly, golden tendrils of light appeared, radiating off Olivia and dancing across the walls and ceiling. Raina gasped. “There is magic involved!”

  “Yeah, clearly. But what kind of magic is it?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never seen traces like this before. Typically, if a witch or warlock cast magic on the subject, the traces would appear either red or blue, and if it was a potion, they would appear as either purple or green.”

  “So what does a golden color mean?”

  “I don’t know, I really don’t. This must be some arcane magic, which might explain why when we ran the same test on Beau and the letters, nothing happened.”

  “Then why did it show up now? What’s the difference?”

  “My best guess is timing. You said you found Olivia like this minutes after she consumed the coffee, unlike with Beau. He spent the entire day in his office before you found him, right?”

  “Yeah, exactly. So do you think because the magic was still so ‘fresh’ that’s why it’s showing up with the test when it didn’t for Beau?”

  “I can’t give any other explanation, but it’s clear we need help to understand this. We need someone with the research chops to dig through all kinds of ancient magic. I think you know just the person.”

  “Mallory!”

  “That’s the one. I’m sure she’d jump at the chance to research something like this.”

  “Absolutely. Let me text her now and see what she’s up to. Something tells me she’ll drop everything for this, and that’s why I love her,” I said, thinking of my mousy best friend with the untamable brown hair who I’d barely seen in the last couple of months. I didn’t have a lot of time between my duties on the Council and building a home life with Beau.

  I rummaged in my bag for my phone and clumsily tapped through to start a new conversation from my contacts with Mallory.

  Me: Hey, sorry I’ve gone MIA again, but I need your help.

  Mallory responded almost instantly, as always.

  Mallory: You only seem to text when you need something from me. :P

  Me: Normally, I’d push back against that, but that’s exactly what’s going on here. Listen, we’ve got a weird case of ancient magic going on, and I’m at Raina’s house now trying to figure it out. She wants your help. You interested?

  Mallory: Are you kidding me? I’m already on my way.

  Me: Don’t you have classes?

  Mallory: They’re beneath me, anyway. Be there in five minutes or less.

  I dropped my phone back in my bag and relayed the news to Raina.

  “Excellent. I knew she wouldn’t let us down. Is there anything else you noticed on the scene that might be of interest? Anything else left behind?”

  “Yes. There was another letter. Here,” I said and reached back into my bag for the coffee-stained piece of paper. Unfortunately, in the trip over to Raina’s house, some words had smudged, but it was still mostly legible. I handed
it to her and she read over it in record time.

  “Dear Lilith, if I had any doubt before, it’s gone now. This is absolutely a personal attack.”

  “I leaned that direction too, but I don’t understand. Who would want to attack both Beau and Olivia? Other than working at the same network, they have next to nothing in common.”

  Raina side eyed me. “Zoe, that’s the only connection they need. It’s possible that whoever is behind this did it to damage the network or get back at them for something.”

  “Yeah, maybe, but I don’t want to write off the idea that it could have been someone who wanted to harm the two of them individually.”

  A knock on the door interrupted our discussion, and I charged over to throw it open. Mallory threw her arms around my neck, assaulting me in a whirl of curly brown hair and blue robes.

  “I take it this means you aren’t mad at me?”

  “I’ve never been one to hold a grudge,” Mallory said as she released me and pushed her coke-bottle glasses up her nose. “So, what’s the sitch, ladies?”

  “Well, we’ve got two shifters trapped in their animal forms. The cases happened back to back and there seems to be some ancient magic behind both. Any ideas?”

  Mallory chuckled. “You never disappoint. But what makes you think it’s ancient magic?”

  “This,” Raina interrupted. She waved her wand and cast the revealing spell again, and once more golden tendrils of light danced across the walls and ceiling away from Olivia.

  “Whoa,” Mallory breathed as she drew closer. “Golden light from Ostendo? I didn’t know that was possible.”

  “Neither did I,” Raina said. “That’s why we called you over. I was hoping you could help me figure this out.”

  “If anyone can dig up information on obscure magic, it’s you,” I said.

  Mallory smirked. “I have a knack for the odd. What can I say? Anyway, is there anything else I should know about all this?”

  “Food and drink were nearby in both cases. For Beau, it was a box of chocolates. For Olivia, it was a cup of coffee.”

  “Do you have samples from both?”

  Raina frowned at the crumpled coffee cup where she’d thrown it down on the table by Olivia. “For better or worse.”