Putting on the Witch

by Joyce

  “We shall see,” he promised. “There is more to you than appears, Molly Addison Renard. Your magic might be powerful, but I have been gifted by the council with the means to take it from you. It is my ‘gift’ from the council by which to break you and have your confession.”

  Streams of water had begun to flow from cracks in the walls and floor around us. The scent of sea life grew stronger as the water began to flow faster and pool in depressions in the old concrete. Having the water nearby made me stronger and caused the amulet to glow even more fiercely. I didn’t know where the water was coming from, and I couldn’t tell if the witchfinder had noticed it. He seemed so intent on what he was about to do that I thought it might have eluded him.

  I had a feeling that I knew what was happening, and I didn’t give it away. If it was what I suspected, Antonio was in for a big surprise.

  The witchfinder took out a crudely made pair of pliers and came toward me to cut the amulet’s chain from my neck. His booted foot splashed in the pools of water as he moved. He glanced around, watching the water fill the chamber. His quickly worded incantation did nothing to stop the water from spilling into the cell—if anything, it came faster.

  He swore softly in Spanish but kept coming at me with the pliers. “Water will not avail you, madam. I have taken the lives of water witches in the past.”

  I closed my eyes and recited every spell I knew to break bonds and get free. I felt the leather loosening around my wrists, but it wasn’t fast enough. I knew he couldn’t cut the amulet chain, but I was worried about what he might do with those nasty-looking pliers once he found out.

  I could have been home eating pizza with Joe and Mike, I reminded myself, breaking my concentration, when I realized I couldn’t get away fast enough. My heart was pounding in my ears as fear took hold of me and I grasped why even the witches with magic during the Inquisition couldn’t get away. It was difficult to retain control of the necessary concentration to make magic work when you were terrified.

  “My dear Molly,” a familiar voice said. “What are you doing down here?”

  I opened my eyes to the awful—but right now wonderful—face of the Bone Man. He was too tall for the chamber and had to bend his head to stand. His black eyes were normally frightening, but compared to the witchfinder, I was happy to see him.

  “What is this?” the witchfinder demanded. “I said I would be alone with this lady.” He snapped his fingers again and again, thinking he could dismiss the Bone Man from his sight as he had Mr. Brannigan and Elsie.

  The Bone Man laughed, his bloody red mouth stretched to its fullest. “You can’t wish me away. The power of the Grand Council of Witches means nothing to me.”

  “You do not belong here, sir.” The witchfinder was beginning to understand what he was dealing with. “Your magic has no place here.”

  “I belong where that amulet is used.” The Bone Man nodded toward me. “This witch is under my protection.” His neck creaked as though it might fall from his shoulders. A necklace of dried bones clicked together when he moved. It hung above a black suit that had been fashionable in the 1700s.

  “I am Antonio de Santiago.” The witchfinder curtly nodded to him. “Molly Addison Renard is my prisoner.”

  The Bone Man’s laugh still made my skin crawl, even though I knew he was on my side and was there to help me. His black eyes fastened on the witchfinder with deepening fury. “Then you and I have a problem, dead man.”

  “I have everything in good control,” I assured my erstwhile protector as I held up my hands so he could see that I had finally worked them free between the magic and the water. “I was about to get away. I appreciate you coming for me, but I can take care of myself.”

  Water had begun spraying from every direction and was ankle deep on the floor, probably ruining my shoes from Madam Tunis’s. It seemed pressurized, as it started spewing in very quickly, making eddies and ripples across the concrete. I couldn’t see where, if anyplace, it was going back out. Bits of sand and plant matter from the ocean were mixed with it, swirling in the warm salt water.

  The Bone Man shrugged, his eyes appearing much larger than they should have been in his gaunt face. “Very good. But I shall still see you out of this place, Molly. I am prepared to offer you a very good bargain to rid yourself of this council trash. Part of it will be my pleasure.”

  “Council trash?” The witchfinder was obviously offended by the term. “I am the chosen of the Council of Witches, sir. Begone before they realize you are here and come for you.”

  “We both know the council has no power over me, dead man.” The Bone Man smiled slowly. “I’d love to see them come.”

  “No.” I tried to stop the discussion. “He’s here to do a job.” I stared at the witchfinder. “I’d rather you not get rid of him. He may yet be valuable.”

  “Then it seems my work is done.” The Bone Man cracked his prominent joints in his large, bony hands and feet. “Another time.”

  Though he was gone, the water continued filling the chamber. It was up to my knees by then. I was free of the chair restraints but had no idea how to get out of that terrible place.

  “I do not recognize that man.” The witchfinder still pondered the mystery of the Bone Man. “I am not even certain he was a man. Where did he come from? Where has he gone? Why was my magic nothing against him?”

  “Right now, we should think about getting out of here.” I wasn’t a witch who could snap my fingers and be elsewhere. While I loved the water and felt stronger in its embrace, I could also drown. It might be harder for me to die that way, but I didn’t want to find out. “Perhaps we should go back to the brandy room.”

  “Perhaps you are correct.” His curious gaze was steady on mine. “You have powerful friends. But I still know that you are lying to me.”

  With water approaching my thighs, I said, “Let’s leave this place, and I’ll tell you what you want to know.”

  “Simple enough.” He nodded and we were back in the brandy room. Elsie and Mr. Brannigan were gone. It was only me and the witchfinder. I staggered, unsure of my feet and not used to using so much power to get places.

  “Now, the truth.” His eyes were sharp behind the mask.

  “Someone else found Makaleigh,” I confided. “But it was not a witch.”

  I explained about Olivia as I grabbed a hand towel from behind the bar to dry my shoes and legs. I was surprised to find the shoes in good condition, barely wet at all. It had to be part of their magical properties. It would be awesome to have a pair of my own.

  Unfortunately the magic would be over at dawn, but the spell to keep us in the castle would still be in place. Dorothy, Elsie and I wouldn’t be naked, as Madam Tunis had promised, but I was hoping we wouldn’t be the only ones to be de-glammed.

  “This I believe,” the witchfinder said as I finished my story. “No wonder that creature from the sea came to protect you. Not everyone would have walked into a company of witches who hate ghosts knowing she has a ghost pressed into a bracelet. You do not appear to be unintelligent, so I must believe you are brave,” he acknowledged, “but foolhardy.”

  “Thank you.” I didn’t explain that I had no idea Olivia had hidden herself in Dorothy’s bracelet. It felt like a good time to leave without telling the complete story.

  “And so you are exonerated. I move on to interrogate that foolish friend of yours who dared defy me.” His bearing became stiff and rigid again as he took a pinch of snuff and sneezed.

  “I’m afraid that’s a waste of your time too, Antonio. I was in the room with Elsie, Dorothy and Abdon Fuller’s grandson, Brian, when we found Makaleigh. None of us were with her alone. You need to look elsewhere for the killer.”

  He sat slowly on one of the velvet chairs, fingering his pencil-thin mustache. “I am quite confused by this turn of events. But how shall I redeem myself if I do not question your friends?
”

  “Well, you could say you questioned them,” I suggested. “Call them all in here, but then let’s strategize. One of the witches in the castle is still guilty of murder. It would be my honor to help you discover who that is.”

  “And you would do this for me?”

  “Makaleigh was a very special person. I would do it for her.”

  He jumped to his feet and held out his hand. “Then let us begin, madam. The truth awaits.”

  CHAPTER 12

  The witchfinder did as I suggested, grimly summoning my friends into the brandy room one at a time until all of us were together. Brian immediately poured himself a drink when he heard why we were all there.

  “That’s amazing.” Dorothy was surprised when she heard the tale of the Bone Man and the witchfinder. “We have good news too. We found Brian’s cat. She somehow managed to get out of the box and was wandering through the castle. Brian and I did a locator spell and found her.”

  “Great.” I looked around the room. “What did you do with her?”

  “Brian and Dorothy put her back in the carrier and took her upstairs to their room. I guess we all get rooms, since we have to stay here,” Elsie said. “Brian, pour me one of those too, please. I feel a headache coming on, and it needs something stronger than an aspirin.”

  Brian handed her a drink.

  “But as soon as he saw her he knew her name,” Dorothy continued her story. “It was amazing. At least she was okay.”

  “Really? What are you going to call her?” I asked.

  “Kalyna.” Brian laughed. “It sounds crazy, but that’s what I got from her, and Dorothy said that’s how you name them.”

  “I can’t believe you never had a cat,” Elsie added. “Your parents really neglected your childhood. What witch doesn’t have a cat?”

  The witchfinder had been restlessly moving about the room as we spoke. He finally gave up all attempts at keeping still. “While you prattle about your cat, a killer is free in the castle. He or she may kill again. This is no way to run an investigation.”

  We all sobered at the reminder of why we were there. Once he had our attention, Antonio asked us on which witch he should begin his interrogation.

  “I think that’s where you’re missing the point,” Elsie told him. “In this day, people aren’t interrogated so much as those looking for the truth find it with scientific means.”

  “There is no torture?” he demanded indignantly. “No scalding of the feet nor pain?”

  “Definitely not.” Dorothy shuddered. “We just don’t do things that way anymore—well, at least not here. There are some places where torture is still used. It’s usually waterboarding or sleep deprivation. Sometimes they use drugs.”

  “Thank you.” I smiled at her and gave her the finger-slicing-across-my-neck sign of that being too much information. “But what Elsie said is true, Antonio. We use scientific ways of approaching evidence that will lead us to the killer. This is what my husband does every day as a homicide detective.”

  “What are these scientific methods you speak of?” he asked. “How do you utilize them?”

  “Well, as we mentioned before—someone out there should have blood splatter on them from using the ceremonial knife,” I explained. “We’d need some luminol and a black light to see blood where it seems invisible now.”

  “And there would be prints on the knife,” Elsie said. “They would match the killer’s prints.”

  “Prints?” Antonio swore in fluent Spanish. “What are these prints you speak of?”

  “Let me show you.” Dorothy took out a tiny notepad and her makeup brush. “You put some powder on someone’s fingertips and then push them down on the paper.” She showed him her fingerprints on the notepad. “Everyone has different prints. Let’s do yours and we can compare our prints.”

  She carefully dusted the witchfinder’s fingertips and then pushed his fingers on the notepad beside her print. “There. You see? Our prints are completely different. If we did one for everyone in the room, they’d all be different.”

  “And that’s the way we find out who killed Makaleigh,” Elsie added.

  Antonio looked carefully at his fingers and at the marks on the notepad. “Where do we start this scientific examination? Every witch here could be guilty.”

  “We should start with the knife,” I told him. “Where is it?”

  “I do not know, since I could not interrogate the blade.” He looked exasperated with the turn of events he wasn’t expecting. “I shall inquire as to its resting place.” He bowed slightly to us and left the brandy room.

  Olivia’s ghost popped out of Dorothy’s bracelet. Even for Olivia, she looked stressed.

  “What are you doing, Molly? I can’t believe you all are trying to reform the witchfinder. Have you lost your minds? This man is a monster. We all know that. He can’t be bargained with or taught new ways of finding killers. We have to get out of here. He said you were innocent—let him and the council take it from here.”

  “But we may never know who killed Makaleigh that way,” I argued. “It hasn’t been easy getting to this point with him, Olivia. I don’t think he’s a monster—just a man obsessed with his job and finding the truth. We can help him not to have to use enhanced interrogation techniques.”

  “It’s crazy. Dorothy, you should at least get out of here. Brian, get my daughter somewhere safe.”

  “We can’t leave the castle,” he reminded her. “This room is as safe as any other with the killer still wandering around out there. At least he or she is only at half magic. Once the spell wears off, everyone will leave, and Makaleigh’s killer could go free. This is the best shot we have, Olivia. I agree with Molly on this one.”

  “Anyway, I’m not leaving, Mom,” Dorothy said. “We’re going to find the killer, just like we figured out who killed you. We can do this. I wish Joe was helping us, but we’ll have to do it without him.”

  “Don’t wish that too hard,” I disagreed. “I wouldn’t want him here. This is an ugly side of being a witch I hope he never has to know about.”

  The witchfinder returned. He wasn’t alone, accompanied by Abdon. The elder witch and council member was angry. He shook the Spaniard, nearly lifting him off his feet before he tossed him to the Persian carpet as though he was a rag doll. If there had been witches like Abdon during the Inquisition, things would have gone much differently.

  “What game are you playing at, Brian?” Abdon’s voice shook with his fury. “For hundreds of years, the witchfinder has used extreme measures to get to the truth. Now you have him wanting to find fingerprints on the knife that killed Makaleigh. What next—he’ll be asking pretty please for information?”

  “Grandfather, this is a better way. Every study ever done has showed that torture doesn’t work. People say whatever you want them to say just to stop the torture. If you allow us to proceed, with the help of the witchfinder, I think we’ll catch the real killer.”

  Staring at Abdon’s livid face, I wasn’t sure what his response would be. He was used to doing things his own way. The Council of Witches never took rationality into consideration when making their judgments.

  But then his features softened when he gazed on the handsome face of his only grandson. “All right, Brian. On one condition.” He put a hand on Brian’s shoulder. “I want you to take Makaleigh’s place on the council when this is over. I won’t be here forever, you know. But there has always been a member of our family on the council. You should be next in line.”

  I could see that Brian was struggling for words. If he had any political aspirations to follow in Abdon’s footsteps, I’d never heard him mention them. I thought he was as polar opposite from the old man as possible. I wondered why Abdon planned to skip a generation—shouldn’t he be talking to Schadt about replacing Makaleigh?

  Even though the council was political, with membe
rs of the same families coming and going as sitting participants, there were no elections. The council decided who took empty spaces, though to my knowledge, there had never been a place open on the council in my lifetime.

  “Well?” Abdon asked impatiently. “You want to change things, do things your way, don’t you? The only way to do that is to join the council. Make the changes you want to see. How do you think things got to be the way they are now?”

  “That’s not saying much,” Elsie muttered.

  “It’s easy to say that now,” Abdon continued. “During the time of the witchfinder and those like him, witches would have given anything to have an authority like the council. We protect witches, provide ways for them to prosper. I’m sure your girlfriend would approve, right, Debbie?”

  Brian’s jaw tightened. “Dorothy. Not Debbie. And I don’t want to be on the council. If you don’t care whether or not you have the right witch who killed Makaleigh, why should I? What way is that to convince me that I should join a useless organization that I don’t agree with? Excuse me. The air is kind of thick in here for me.”

  He brushed passed Abdon in a disrespectful way, his blue eyes hard on his grandfather. Dorothy followed closely behind him with a subtle glance at me and Elsie.

  Abdon stared at us too. “I suppose you’re pleased with that. You’ve been trying to turn him against me since you forced him into your coven.”

  “I’m not happy about it,” Elsie said plainly. “I think Brian would be great on the council, and I wouldn’t mind being friends with people in high places. But he’s probably right—the stuffiness might kill him. As for forcing him into our coven—that boy never even had a cat! For being such powerful witches, you and his parents have done nothing for him as far as I’m concerned.”

  His mouth opened and closed like a disbelieving fish out of water. He obviously didn’t realize that Elsie always spoke her mind.