by Katie Penryn
Chapter 2
Sam hadn’t noticed the odor, but Jimbo had.
“Penzi, what’s that stink?” he asked me.
“Shush,” I replied. “You mustn’t talk in church.”
Jimbo shuffled about on his seat and gave Felix a nudge. Felix gave me a sideways look and raised his eyebrows.
“Fish?” he whispered to me. “Here in church?”
I shushed him and tucked my head back down on my hands on the back of the pew in front of us.
As I did so, I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye. Instead of closing my eyes in prayer again, I opened them wide and looked about me under the row of chairs.
A scruffy and mottled tabby cat, his large head crisscrossed with scars, was slinking his way forwards under the chairs. At that moment the prayer ended and the congregation as one rose from their hassocks and sat back on their seats. A tentative claw raked down the back of my calf, catching for a moment in the denim of my jeans. I jerked my leg aside and flapped my hand under the chair to shoo the cat away. He changed tactics and squeezed himself out between my legs and Felix’s. He turned round and sat back on his haunches looking up at me from his position beside my feet. Felix nudged me and I gave my shoulders a polite shrug. The cat rubbed himself against my knee and mewed softly.
“Shush,” I said to him, patting his head.
That’s when I recognized him. It was Neptune, the king of the cats down at the fishing port of Darennes. He ran the security patrol for the fish market and the warehouses, keeping the rats away. We hadn’t seen each other for some time which is why I hadn’t known who he was straight away. That and the incongruous context of this meeting — at Midnight Mass several miles away from the harbor.
Felix whispered, “It won’t be much longer. See, everyone’s going up for communion.”
We waited quietly for the service to finish, Neptune watching me all the time through slit eyes as if he wanted to make sure I didn’t escape before he had the chance to make his business known. The good citizens of Beaucoup-sur-Mer poured out of the church sweeping us along with them. The first snow of the winter had fallen during the service. As I stamped my feet and rubbed my hands together, Neptune hooked his claw in the hem of my jeans and gestured with his head round to the side of the church. Once we were out of sight, I picked him up and asked him why he wanted to talk to me. We had to make sure no one was watching or within hearing because only supernatural beings can talk to animals, and no one in Beaucoup-sur-Mer knew I was a white witch, apart from my mother Gwinny and my two brothers.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, Penzi, but you did say that if I ever needed you, I had only to ask,” he began.
I nodded.
“Well, we need you now — urgently — down at the harbor.”
“Can’t it wait? It’s Christmas Eve. The mayor is expecting us for Le Réveillon at his house. We shouldn’t offend him by not turning up or by being late.”
Le Réveillon is what the French call their Christmas dinner. It usually takes place late on Christmas Eve to early Christmas morning. In our case after the Midnight Mass. Being invited to the mayor’s house for such an important family feast was a great honor and it wouldn’t do to disappoint him.
Neptune stroked his whiskers with his paw and shook his head.
“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t a matter of the direst import,” he said. “You could say the happiness of the world depends upon your helping us tonight.”
“Can you tell me what it’s about so I can judge for myself whether tomorrow would do or not?” I asked him.
He pushed himself out of my arms and landed on the ground with a muffled meow of protest.
“Absolutely not. I’m honor bound not to speak of it outside our warehouse down at the harbor. It’s a matter of such secrecy that if the news got out—”
Felix bent down to talk to Neptune at his level. “Will it take long?”
Neptune rolled his front haunches and began to lash his tail from side to side as cats do when put under pressure.
I crouched down beside Neptune and stroked him from head to tail until his fur lay flat again.
“I’m sorry, Penzi. It’s impossible to know how long it will take you to fix this problem… or if you can. It might simply be without a solution and then heaven knows what’s going to happen to us all.”
Felix gave me hand to help me to my feet.
“What do you think, boss?” he asked me.
I looked down at Neptune. “Would you say it’s a matter of good against evil?”
This time Neptune arched his back and hissed at some invisible peril behind him.
“Most definitely,” he said. “Please come with me now.”
“Felix?”
“We have to go. It’s your duty as a white witch to fight evil whenever called upon to do so.”
I sighed. “I know, but I was hoping for a quiet family Christmas with no disruption.”
Felix chuckled. “A witch has to do what a witch has to do, boss.”
“You don’t have to remind me. The situation calls for the obliviscere or forget spell. I’ll have to make everyone forget the passage of time while we attend to Neptune’s emergency. When it’s over we can hurry across to the Bonhomie’s house and join in the dinner with no one being any the wiser.”
“Can you remember the spell?”
I nodded.
“What about me?” Sam called out from behind us.
“And me?” Jimbo asked.
I’d forgotten about Sam and Jimbo. They were both gawping at us as if they couldn’t believe their eyes or ears.
“Shall I ask the Bonhomies for a lift and take Jimbo with me?” Sam asked.
Felix looked down at Neptune. “Do we need an extra man?”
Neptune pussyfooted through the snow to Sam and looked him up and down.
“He’s part of your family, Penzi? He knows you’re a witch and that you can talk to animals?”
“Yes, he’s my brother Sam.”
Neptune’s tail swished while he weighed up the danger of a security breach against the bonus of an additional strong human being.
“He comes with us,” he said and walked back to Felix and me.
“And Jimbo? We can’t leave him here on his own, Neptune,” I said.
Neptune looked back over his shoulder at Jimbo who was doing his best to look tough.
Beckoning my brothers with a claw, the bossy cat said, “I suppose the little one could come in useful.”
Sam and Jimbo hurried across to join us. It was forbidden for them to see me cast a spell so I asked them to close their eyes.
“Cross your fingers, too, both of you. Felix, you know what to do. And pick Neptune up and cross his paws. We don’t want the spell to work on you four as well.”
As soon as they were ready, I summoned up the mental energy to cast the spell, took a deep breath to flood my brain with oxygen. I uttered the magic words and envisioned the magic symbols.
With Felix carrying Neptune we rushed to the car park and jumped into our car. I drove as fast as I dared at that time of night on roads covered with fresh snow.
Chapter 3
When we reached the harbor at Darennes, I switched off the engine. Our car stood alone in the car park at the end of the key, its engine steaming in the cold air. Anyone who didn’t have to work on Christmas Eve was at home with their family. Neptune meowed to be let out of the car. He jumped down into the snow which came up to his elbows as he high stepped over to the wall of the warehouse.
“Come along,” he called back. “Every second counts.”
Jimbo and Sam followed him over to the darkened building.
Felix pulled me out of the car. As he shut my door behind me a sudden gust of wind blew my knitted cap off my head. I struggled to maintain my balance, and my cap flew over to the edge of the key. I chased after it and lost my footing in the fresh snow. I skidded forwards and would have fallen into the icy cold waters of the Atlantic if Feli
x hadn’t caught hold of me in the nick of time. As we stood teetering on the brink gulping in the wintry air, something brushed against my face gusting a foul stench.
Felix drew me away from the edge.
“Did you feel that?” he asked me.
“And the smell. What was it?”
Felix shook his head. “No idea. Something rotten floating in the harbor, perhaps.”
Over against the warehouse twenty yards away, Neptune let out an earsplitting caterwaul and flinched, flattening himself against the wall. With Felix holding my arm to keep me on my feet, we struggled through the snow to join him.
“We must hurry,” Neptune said.
He sidled along the wall towards the giant doors leading into the fish market, shrinking his usual macho posture down to the ground.
“Too slow,” said Felix, letting go of my arm and picking Neptune up. “Phew,” he said. “Now I’ll stink of fish, too.”
Neptune squirmed in Felix’s arms. “This is no time for joking or insults, sir.”
As we made our gingerly approach to the man way cut into the main gates, I imagined all the possible reasons for Neptune’s anxiety and his appeal to us for assistance. Maybe one of the female cats in Neptune’s gang was having difficulty delivering her litter of kittens. Maybe the gang had been badly beaten up by a rival gang. Maybe the rats were back in unmanageable numbers. Maybe someone had attacked and abused one of his team, and he wanted us to help find the culprit. Nothing I imagined prepared me for the strange scene that met my eyes as I stepped through the man way into the warehouse and snapped on my flashlight.
For a few seconds my mind stopped working, and I rocked backwards in shock. Sam and Jimbo gasped. Felix, who was a step behind me, grabbed hold of me to steady me. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Perhaps I was hallucinating after all the incense in the church.
But no. When I opened them again, they were still there. A group of reindeer. Reindeer in the fish market? They stood in defensive formation with two of their number facing outwards to ward off attack, typical herd behavior when threatened. A sleigh with golden runners and scarlet panels, its seats piled high with packages and parcels of all shapes and sizes came next. I blinked and looked further along. An old man sat on an upturned wooden fish crate his head cradled in his hands and bowed low over his knees. Was I dreaming? In his ermine trimmed red coat and hat, he had to be Santa Claus.
So deep was his dejection, he didn’t raise his head until I tapped him gently on the shoulder. He swept his face up to look at me. Gone was his famous twinkle. Unshed tears glistened in his eyes.
Before I had a chance to speak Neptune ran forwards and rubbed himself against Santa’s worn black leather boots.
“Your Lordship, this is the young witch I told you about, Mpenzi Munro. She’s here to help you, sir.”
Santa pushed his hood back and ran his hands through his sparse snowy white hair, shaking his head from side to side as he did so.
“No one can help,” he moaned. “My magic isn’t strong enough this time. I’m defeated.”
Over to the left the reindeer jostled each other, their winter hardened hooves clicking on the concrete floor. Their sentries blew out a harrumphing grunt of warning. The smallest deer bleated and pushed her way into the middle of the group. Our entrance had disturbed them. Were we friend or foe?
Santa caught me watching his reindeer, and he gave a heavy sigh.
“That’s my problem. It’s never happened before. They’re on strike. My reindeer have gone on strike. They refuse to take another step outside this warehouse. How am I going to deliver Christmas presents to the children?”
“Why have they gone on strike, sir?” I asked him.
He ran his hand down his long white beard as he gazed over towards his precious team.
“They’re terrified about what’s been happening to us, but they won’t discuss it with me.”
“Let me see what I can do,” I said standing up from my crouch beside the old man.
Felix began to follow me, but I stopped him. “No, Felix, not this time. Reindeer are prey animals and you’re a carnivorous hunter. You’ll only scare them more.”
Felix shook my hand off his arm. “Boss, I’m only a carnivore when I’m in my leopard mode and even then not a practicing one. I never eat when I’m a leopard. When have you ever seen me chase and hunt down a prey animal?”
I had to admit I hadn’t. Felix the leopard had threatened and even on occasions attacked the murderers we had come across in our investigations, but he had never killed and eaten an animal or a human being to my knowledge.
“That’s as may be, Felix, but this time please hold back. You’d be better off giving your support to Santa. How about some of your Laphroaig?” I asked him and patted his pocket where he kept his trusty silver hunting flask.
Felix went nowhere without his favorite tipple, the peaty single malt from the Isle of Islay.
He turned back to Santa and drew out his flask. I watched him pour a generous tot for Santa who accepted it gratefully and drank it down in a flash. Sam and Jimbo hadn’t left the doorway, too awed to make a move. I waved at them to accompany me and carried on towards the reindeer who were now crowding into the corner of the warehouse fronted by their sentries, one of whom had a large shiny red nose.
Jimbo hurried to catch up with me, brushing snow off his copper hair as he ran. He tugged at my sleeve. “It’s Rudolf. You know Santa’s famous reindeer – from the song.”
“Gently, Jimbo. You’ll startle them all. Stand quietly.”
I walked up to the deer with the red shiny nose. “You must be Rudolf,” I said holding out my hand for him to sniff before I stroked him between his ears and down towards his shoulders. “I’m Mpenzi Munro. I’m a white witch, and I’ve come to see if I can help you all.”
“We can see you’re a witch,” he snorted, “but this may be way beyond your powers.”
“Why don’t you introduce the rest of your team to me and then we can talk things over?”
One by one Rudolf called the others forward, eight in all. Donner, the second sentry, was the leader of the team.
“My mate, Blitzen,” Donner said encouraging one of the shivering females to approach me.
After I’d stroked her nose, four males came up to me and said hello: Dasher, Prancer, Comet and Cupid. That left the last two girls. Vixen skipped up to me, but Dancer hung back. No amount of coaxing from Rudolf would make her leave her corner. She pushed herself back into the walls as if trying to disappear.
“Is it all right for me to approach her?” I asked Rudolf.
He nodded his head and the bells on his antlers tinkled. “You’ll see why she’s so scared when you get up close.”
I gestured to Sam and Jimbo to stay where they were.
Rudolf and Donner kept up their vigil to the front, eyeing the two boys but deciding they posed no threat. The others turned to watch me as I began my oblique approach towards Dancer with my hand held out palm up. For my first couple of steps she followed my progress, but suddenly she took fright, tossing her head making her bells ring. I took a step closer. She snorted, showing me the whites of her eyes in warning. I halted and waited for her to calm down. When she’d settled, I moved slowly forwards and held out my hand to her.
“I’m Mpenzi Munro,” I said. “A white witch called in to help sort out your team’s problems, so you can fulfill your destiny and make the children of the world happy when they wake up tomorrow morning.”
“My name’s Dancer,” she said. “I’m glad you’re here, but there’s nothing you can do. Look,” she said turning her right flank towards me.
Chapter 4
A claw had gouged deep into Dancer’s flesh, all the way down from her spine to her knee joint. An attempt had been made to clean the wound. I guessed Santa was used to doctoring his animals, but what alarmed me was that the striations had to have been made by an animal with nine claws on one foot, a giant foot at that.
I
glanced back at Rudolf who’d turned from his sentry duty to watch Dancer’s reaction to me.
“You see,” he said. “The Snarl did that.”
“And this,” Dasher called out, bobbing his head to show me something had torn away half of one of his antlers. “The Snarl did that when I tried to defend Dancer.”
Cupid pushed through his colleagues and lifted up his hind hoof for me to see. Something had bitten a chunk of flesh away from his leg.
“The Snarl again?” I asked.
They all nodded their heads settings their bells a-jingling, the joyful Christmas carillon at odds with the evidence of the Snarl’s attacks on their team.
“Who or what is the Snarl?” I asked.
At my repeated utterance of the name, they shrank back into their defensive positions muttering and bleating amongst themselves.
“Rudolf?” I asked again as he was the boldest of the team.
He shook his head and rolled his eyes.
“We don’t know. We’ve never come across it before. We call it the Snarl because it prefaces its attacks with a great snarling and growling, but we can’t see anything. It’s all around us enveloping us in a miasma of unbelievable stench.”
Prancer inched forwards to join Rudolf.
“Sometimes we catch a glimpse of black swirling wings as it swoops down on us, then it’s off again tossing us about in the vortex of its passage, blowing us off course.”
“And the attacks are increasing,” added Rudolf. “We’ve lost our faith in Santa’s ability to protect us while we work. Of course, we want to deliver the Christmas presents to the children, but not at the cost of our lives.”
Donner rubbed up against Blitzen.
“We have a new calf this year, our first. He’s back in Lapland with Mrs Claus. We don’t want him to be an orphan. Carrying on with tonight’s delivery while the Snarl dogs our every move is a risk we’re not willing to take.”
Dancer edged out of her corner and bleated for attention.
