by Amy Casey
“Hey,” he said, lifting his hands. “At first I figured you were probably just somebody interested in the occult, something like that. The whole ‘Witchy Delights’ thing. I figured it was just a shtick. That’s what I was looking into, anyway.”
“‘Looking into?’” I said.
“Oh yeah,” Daryl said. He stood up. Held out a hand, one eye on Rocky. “My name’s not Daryl. My name’s Pedro. And I’m a journalist from out of town. A writer for Paranormal Monthly. Undercover investigator, actually, exposing real-life paranormal goings-on. I’m basically the paparazzi.”
I felt everything clicking into place all of a sudden. The way “Pedro” had been hanging around Witchy Delights that day. The interest—whether real or feigned—in Mary. Part of it relieved me because I felt that so many questions had been answered.
But another part of me couldn’t help feeling annoyed. Because Mary had been interested in this guy. She might’ve pretended otherwise, but I could see that much.
He’d deceived her. Which meant he’d deceived both of us.
“Get out of my house,” I said.
Pedro lifted his hands. Suddenly he’d taken on a strange new demeanour, like the Daryl character he’d been playing really was just that—a character all along. “I… I was looking into the paranormal. Doing an underground article on witches and how they’re existing amongst us. That’s when the murder happened, and everything changed—”
“Didn’t you hear me the first time?” I said, growing angrier and knowing that if I weren’t careful, my powers would spiral beyond my control. “I told you to get out.”
But Pedro didn’t seem to be listening. “The Ritual of Bathala. It occurs every seventy-seven years. It’s all about a square. A square consisting of four edges. And all of those edges represent people. Krissy Palmer was the first edge of the square. But more will fall. Three more at least. And if you don’t stop it, it will keep on going and it will consume you whole—and more people will die. The killer is among us. It’s someone in this town. Someone blending in, pretending to be normal. Someone—”
I was beyond controlling then. Even if I wanted to stop myself, I couldn’t. My anger was peaking at being deceived. My frustration was taking control.
I lifted a hand.
And Pedro hovered from the ground.
I looked at him, my eyes burning, my body shaking.
“Stella,” Mary said.
But I didn’t hear her. Not truly. I was too caught in the moment. Too focused.
“You’re going to walk out,” I said. “Or I’m going to throw you out.”
Pedro’s eyes were wide with a combination of things. Fear, of course. Fear was natural. But also amazement, too. Like he was actually enjoying this. Like it was the culmination of his life’s work and studies all coming together.
“Yeah,” Rocky muttered. “Calm down, Stella. Seriously. The man’s not so bad. He brought donuts. How bad can he be if he brought donuts?”
But I kept on holding him up by his neck. I couldn’t think about what he’d said. I couldn’t think about anything. Only that this man had deceived me. That he’d deceived Mary.
And that there was more to him than he was letting on.
“You show up here and things start happening,” I said. “Weird things. Supernatural things that you just so happen to know the answers to. And I’m supposed to believe you aren’t involved in this? That’s what you really want me to think?”
“Stella, seriously,” Mary said. “Let him go.”
I saw then that Pedro was going purple. And I realised that unless I wanted a murder on my hands, I’d better loosen my grip.
I let him drop to the floor with a thud.
Rocky wandered up to him, sniffed at him, out of curiosity of whether he had more donuts more than anything, no doubt.
He looked up at me with fear and amazement in his eyes. Then he looked at Rocky, and at Mary.
“You know what?” he said. “Forget it. Forget everything I came here to talk about. Forget everything I wanted to help you with.”
“Good,” I said. “You leave. You walk away.”
He stood up, brushed himself down. “Screw this town. And when you come knocking for help when the next person shows up dead, just remember this moment. Remember the moment you decided you could do this without me.”
“Oh yeah,” I said, sarcastically. “I’ll be sure to bear your expertise in mind.”
I watched as he walked away, stamping the remains of the fallen donuts into my carpet.
I watched as he stepped outside, out into the dark, muttering under his breath, cursing us.
“You’ll regret this,” Pedro said.
“We’ll see about that,” I said.
I watched him get onto his motorbike and disappear into the night.
And as much as I wanted to believe I’d done the right thing, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d gone a step too far.
I turned around, went to go back inside my flat.
Mary had her lips around an iced donut. Look on her face like she’d been caught red-handed.
“Well, it’d be a shame to waste it, right?” she said.
Rocky slurped at the remains of the donuts by the doorway. He looked over his shoulder at me, cream on his nose. “Amen to that.”
Chapter 20
The following day, I found myself in Collette Parkinson’s newsagents, where Mary had told me she sold the concoction that was found to have poisoned Krissy Palmer.
And somehow, the showdown with Daryl or Pedro or whoever the hell he was had slipped out of the forefront of my consciousness and deep into my mind.
Collette’s newsagents was a pretty run of the mill place, really. There were only ever a couple of newspapers, which kind of made a mockery of the fact this place was built on the basis of “news”—not to mention the fact that some of the papers were days old. There was that classic newsagent’s smell; the smell of fresh magazines, the relaxing silence that always pervaded these places. I thought back to my childhood when I’d walk around the sweet sections, eyes widening with every possible sweet.
Better times. Simpler times.
Well. Maybe not simpler. If I wanted any sweets now, I could use my witchy ways to get them.
Or just buy them. Probably easier.
Okay, that analogy just fell apart on me.
Allow it.
I walked over to the counter, where Collette was standing. She was younger than she looked, probably in her mid to late forties. She had long, curly grey hair, and large glasses that looked like they’d come straight out of the eighties. She smiled at me when she saw me approaching. She was always so calm, always so friendly. Probably something to do with all those herbs she had stacked up in the back of her shop that Mary had told me about. Imagine she’d probably be a little less chilled if she weren’t on the “doobies” as Steve had so aptly described them.
“Hello, darling,” she said. I wondered whether she actually recognised me at all or whether “Hello, darling” was what she opened with where everyone was concerned. “What can I do for you?”
I looked over my shoulder as the door closed, the bell ringing. I wasn’t sure why I was so nervous. It wasn’t like I was doing some kind of illegal drug deal. Might as well get straight to the point. “I was wondering whether you had any of the old Valerian cocktail? You know…”
Suddenly, Collette’s face turned from that spaced-out gaze to something different entirely. She looked totally here, totally focused. “What would you know about a Valerian cocktail?” she asked.
I decided to err on the side of truth. “My friend. She told me it really helps her with her nerves. Said she got a little bit of it from you.”
Collette looked like she’d been caught out. “And what makes you think I have any?”
I cleared my throat. “Umm. The fact my friend said she got a little from you.”
“Yeah,” she said. “I suppose that does make sense.”
S
he smiled again with that spaced-out expression, closed the book she was reading and climbed to her feet. “Give me a second, please. I’ll get you what you need.”
As she started to walk away, I figured now was a good time to ask her what I’d come here to find out. And if I didn’t ask her, I could at least use some… well, unconventional measures to get the truth from her.
But those methods were tiring and they weren’t always reliable. It’d be much better if I could just get the answer in good old-fashioned human words.
“Wait,” I said.
Collette stopped. Smile on her face. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I mean… I just… well, I feel like I should tell you something. There’s someone else supplying this Valerian cocktail around here.”
Collette narrowed her eyes. “Someone else is selling Valerian? On my streets?”
“I… I have a feeling they might’ve bought quite a large supply from you,” I said, winging it. “Then replicated it, somehow. But it’s not as good quality. Not as… soothing.”
“Oh, my,” Collette said. “Well, we can’t have anyone selling inferior shit on our streets.”
The way she said it made me smirk. Gangster Collette. I wasn’t sure what to make of this new side to her.
“Can you remember selling a particularly large batch to anyone?” I asked.
“Well, sure,” Collette said. “I mean I keep note of how much I sell to everyone right here in my diary, just in case of situations like this.”
She walked back over to her counter, spring in her step, swagger to her movement. She opened the diary up. Leafed through it. I wanted to lean over and look, see exactly where she was looking, find the identity of the purchaser.
But then when I got close to it, she slammed the diary shut with a force that made me jump.
“That’s funny, dear,” she said.
I frowned. “What is?”
“The pages. The pages where I keep my sales. They’ve gone.”
I looked down as Collette opened the diary again and I saw it. The pages were torn away.
Somebody had been in here.
Somebody had tried to cover their tracks.
“And is there no other way of knowing who it was that bought a rather large supply?”
Collette’s eyes narrowed, like she was thinking deeply, trying to recall.
“I mean I’d have to have a real think,” she said.
“Not to be rude, but how much time generally would a ‘real think’ constitute?”
“Got it,” she said.
“Wait. That’s it? You’re done?”
Collette nodded. She leaned forward on the counter. “I remember him,” she said.
I found myself leaning forward too, growing more intrigued. “You do?”
“Tall, he was. Muscular. Good looking. Long hair. Looked like he’d stepped right out the set of a Hollywood movie, you know?”
My knees started to weaken. And not in a good way.
“He came in here with that beaming smile and I… well, I couldn’t resist. Who could resist a smile like that?”
That smile. I’d seen it. I knew it.
“And when I heard that—”
“Motorbike,” I said.
Collette’s eyes narrowed. “You know the guy?”
I did know the guy. I knew the guy very well.
And I was going to have to make sure my witchy abilities were top notch if I was going to bring him to justice.
Chapter 21
I stood in the middle of my bedroom and wondered if I’d gone completely insane after all.
I’d moved my bed so it was covering the door. Hadn’t bothered lifting the mattress from it, just propped it up against the wall. The curtains were closed. Everything in here was as quiet as could be, even if it was the middle of the day.
The only things lighting the room were the three candles in front of me.
Illuminating the spell book before me.
I felt the hairs stand up on the back of my neck every time I looked at this spell book. I’d been handed it by my dad soon after Mum died. He told me to learn everything in here, but to keep it locked away for when the time came that I had to use it—and not to get too obsessed and caught up in it. I knew his idea of “when the time came” was a little different to mine. He was always rambling on about some future war to come—some mystical, magical conflict—and how that was the only circumstance where I should ever use my abilities. But all this talk of intergalactic war… yeah, I wasn’t totally convinced by any of that.
Besides. It’d be a travesty if I didn’t at least attempt to use some of the abilities that I’d been blessed with, right?
I could hear Rocky outside the door. He wasn’t all that happy with what I was attempting.
“I’m telling you,” he said. “You’re gonna end up getting yourself into real trouble.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
“Did someone say food?”
I shook my head, ignored him. Then I took a few deep breaths, crouched down opposite the spell book. Got myself into a state of presence that was always supposed to be incited before using any of the serious spells.
I could use spells I’d learned pretty much on demand, of course. But they took a lot of energy to just invoke in public. And they weren’t as strong. If I took the formal route, however, like I was doing now, the magic went further, lasted longer.
The best thing I could do though?
Come up with a solid plan. A foolproof plan of how I was going to move forward.
And I thought I had that plan in mind.
I turned the pages to the weightlessness spell. The spell that would allow me to merely drift through a wall without leaving a trace of myself.
I studied the things I’d need to invoke it. A mouldy carrot. The hair of a dog. The poo of a rabbit. Jesus. What was it with rabbits lately?
I kept on studying the spell, really getting it in mind—the mantra, everything. My intention was to chain a few spells together, but I’d have to get the timing absolutely right. Once I’d cast the spells, their energy would be there to invoke, but it would be losing strength by the second.
So if the first stage of my plan was to invoke weightlessness, the next stage was surely a solid form of invisibility. My usual small bouts of invisibility were limited, so I needed something stronger, something more consistent, something that would actually require casting spells beforehand. See, I wanted to get into Daryl, or Pedro’s, house without drawing any attention to myself. Preferably, I wanted to catch him in the act of wrongdoing somehow. I needed something that would find him in the frame. I couldn’t just go to the police station accusing him of being the one because that would draw attention to me. I needed to find the Valerian concoction or something like that.
And by the same extension, I couldn’t just go confronting him about any of this because if he was the murderer, then who was to say he wouldn’t try to kill me?
And if he could speak to Rocky, who was to say he didn’t have some kind of magic abilities too?
I studied the invisibility section. Fox saliva. Badger wee. Chicken & Mushroom Pot Noodle, funnily enough. Really got it all into my head.
Then I got to the piece de resistance of my plan.
I looked closely at the next pages, because this was the important part. The paralyser followed by the truth serum. I was going to temporarily paralyse Pedro. Then I was going to set up a camera and film him admitting to the murder.
It might seem a little bold. It might seem a stretch. But it was the best I had.
Besides. It all added up. Him coming to town to study the paranormal; then a murder occurring with paranormal shades.
It looked to me like he’d done this. He’d caused this to nail himself a story.
Well, he wasn’t going to get away with it.
No chance.
I pieced every stage of the spells together in order. Went through the plan, over and over, in my head. Made sure I knew
everything I needed, every single word of the mantra.
Then I left the room and went out to gather all my ingredients.
When I got back, night had fallen. I had a few slices of pizza to get my energy levels up. It’d been a full-on day. And if I wasn’t mistaken, tonight was going to be pretty eventful too. I needed to have my energy about me.
And… well. Who could turn down a barbecue base pizza?
I gave Rocky my crusts, which he appreciated, and Beatrice some cat food, which she turned her nose up at.
Then I went back into my darkened room and took a few deep breaths.
When I was all done, it had finally gone dark outside.
So I knew what I had to do.
I sat down in front of my cauldron—yes, real witches have cauldrons.
Then I added the first of my ingredients and began to read out the mantras.
The second I stared, a tingling sensation filled my body, spread right from my toes up towards my head.
It had started.
It was time.
Time to go all in.
Time to end this, once and for all.
Chapter 22
When midnight came around, I knew it was time.
I stood opposite Pedro’s house, looked at it from afar, sheltered by the darkness of one of the lights that had gone out. Or maybe I’d put it out. The finer details didn’t particularly matter.
I held my breath and ran through the chain of events I’d carefully planned in my head. First, the weightlessness. Then, the invisibility.
And then as soon as I was able to creep up on Pedro, I’d go over to him and I’d find out the truth.
I was getting to the bottom of this, once and for all.
“Right,” I muttered. “No time like the present.”
I felt a knot in my stomach. I knew what I was attempting had its risks. If something went wrong, I could find myself implicating myself in some way in this whole sorry mess.
But I knew that Pedro was the new arrival.
