Spell Booked

by Joyce

  CHAPTER 35

  I call the storms. I summon the rain.

  Hear me: bring the clouds again!

  Lightning flash and thunder rumble.

  Strike my enemies with your trouble!

  “That’s the woman who works with your husband!” Brian pointed.

  I kept my eyes on her. “I know.” She’d been right in front of me the whole time, and I hadn’t realized.

  “Is it all right to kill her?” he asked.

  “Of course not!” Elsie sighed. “The council frowns on that kind of behavior.”

  “She’s the one who killed Olivia.” Brian said in a menacing tone.

  I put my hand on his arm. “You don’t want revenge as much as we do. But for now, we have to let her live if we want to find the witch who really caused all of this.”

  “What do you have in mind?” Brian asked.

  “Let me talk to her. She knows me. I hope she trusts me.”

  “Does she know you’re a witch?” Elsie watched Lisbet, who watched us.

  “I don’t know. It’s possible. I’ll go with the assumption that she does know. The witch she works for has broken every other council rule. Telling her about magic would be the least of what she’s done.”

  “Be careful, Molly.” Elsie grabbed my arm. “I can’t stand the idea that something could happen to you too.”

  “I’ll be careful.” I hugged her. “Keep your sword handy.”

  Brian nodded at me. “I could come with you.”

  “Thanks, but I think I’ll do better on my own. My husband always says it’s good for the bad guy to think she has the upper hand. That way she thinks she’s in control.”

  “So you can pounce and kill.” Brian held his thumbs up. “Sweet!”

  I started walking down from the berm where we’d been hiding. I wasn’t sure what I was going to say to her. I had to swallow hard on my anger, thinking she might have been the one who killed Olivia.

  I’d known Lisbet for ten years. She was involved in every aspect of our lives. I knew she wasn’t a witch. What had happened to make her this way? Had the witch spelled her?

  She looked at me as I reached her. “What are you doing here again, Molly?”

  “You know why I’m here.”

  Lisbet’s inquisitive eyes swept the area. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. You should go on home now. I’m sure Joe is wondering where you are.”

  “I know what you’ve done. I know why you’ve done it. No harm will come to you if you take me to the witch you’re working for.”

  The smile on her thin face faded. “No, Molly. Please don’t get involved with it. I’ll leave town. I don’t want you to get hurt. You and Joe are like family to me. Leave it alone.”

  “I can’t. She took someone dear to me. I want Dorothy back. You know where she is, don’t you?”

  “No.” Lisbet shook her head. There were tears in her dark eyes. “She’ll kill me. She’ll kill you, Molly. I could never face Joe again. You have to leave it alone. She’ll release the girl when she’s done with her. When she’s back up to her full strength from absorbing all the magic, she’ll leave here. It will be over.”

  “We can’t wait that long.” I put my hands on her arms as she sobbed. “You have to help me get her back before it’s too late. Her mother, my best friend in the world, is already dead. Dorothy can’t die too.”

  Lisbet was sobbing, hanging like a rag doll. “No. Please don’t ask me to do this. I’ve done so much already. I didn’t want to kill your friend. She said it was the only way.”

  I swallowed hard. She’d killed Olivia. “There are witches around us who want to kill you, Lisbet. You have to do as I say.”

  “I’m not afraid of witches,” she sneered. “She protects me.”

  “Unless she’s here right now, I suggest you listen carefully. You could be dead long before she could defend you.” I tipped my head toward the berm. “They’re waiting for your answer.”

  A lightning strike came out of the otherwise clear sky. It struck so close to us that the ground shook beneath our feet.

  I wasn’t sure how Elsie and Brian had managed it, but it was a nice touch.

  Lisbet almost jumped out of her skin. The terror in her eyes was enough for me to know that she didn’t believe she was safe anymore.

  “What was that?” She spun in a circle, trying to discover what had happened. “They can’t do anything to me. I’m protected.”

  I looked at the amulet she wore. It was dead. If there had been magic in it, it was gone. What about the witch she worked for? Why didn’t she have Lisbet’s back? Did she realize we were closing in on her?

  That could be dangerous for Dorothy. Panic seized me, but I had to stay calm.

  “I tried to help you because of our past relationship. If you won’t listen, you’ll have to face their revenge.” I started to walk away.

  “Wait.” She squinted, trying to see where her adversaries were. “I’ll take you to her. Maybe you can bargain with her for your friend’s daughter. I can’t make any promises.”

  “Smart girl.” There was no way to guarantee this wasn’t a trick. We had to take a chance for Dorothy’s sake. “Let’s go.”

  I got in my car. She climbed into the passenger side. “Where are the others?”

  “They’re air witches. They have their own means of transportation.”

  I thought a little magic myth was in order here, even if it wasn’t completely true. Of course they wouldn’t get on their brooms and meet us there. I hoped Elsie and Brian got the idea.

  “What in the world is she doing?” Elsie asked as she watched my car pull out of the parking lot.

  “I don’t know. But I’m following her,” Brian said. “Come on!”

  We drove into the old town part of Wilmington, near the river. This wasn’t an area I’d pegged as the lair of a rogue witch. The buildings were in disrepair—windows broken and doors hanging open. It didn’t even look like anyone was living here.

  “She’s lived here for five hundred years,” Lisbet said. “She’s seen the whole world change. She wants to stay alive. I don’t blame her.”

  “How did you get involved with her?”

  “She offered me something no one else could—magic and power. I couldn’t say no. She showed me a whole world that I didn’t know existed. She opened my eyes.”

  “And that was enough to kill my friend?” My voice shook, and my hands trembled on the steering wheel.

  “I didn’t have any choice, Molly. She needed your friend’s magic and your spell book. Your friend wasn’t the only witch I’ve had to kill. I’m sorry for that—but not for what I’ve seen and done. You can’t know the freedom and excitement of real power until you’ve felt it.”

  I wanted to strike her down. I’d never entertained that thought before. We would never even sell items needed for a death spell or potion at Smuggler’s Arcane. This was different. I wanted her to be dead like Olivia—her throat slit in a dark alley.

  I had never used my magic to hurt anyone in my life. I had never even thought about it. But at that moment, if common sense hadn’t prevailed, I would have killed her.

  I quickly pushed those thoughts aside. I didn’t want Lisbet to see me that way. She was trained as a detective to pick up on those signals. Revenge had to wait.

  And there was the witch to deal with. I fingered my amulet, not at all sure I could face such a creature. The only thing that kept me keep going was reminding myself about Dorothy and Olivia. I had to finish this.

  I parked the car outside the sagging redbrick building. All of the windows were painted black. The front door was barely on its hinges. There were runes scratched into the wood at the windows and doors. This close, I knew that a witch protected this place.

  And yet those runes were as useless as t
he amulet Lisbet wore. Was the witch so close to death that she couldn’t maintain her spells?

  I hoped so. It might be the only chance I had to stand up to her.

  “She’s in here.” Lisbet glanced around the deserted alley and then grinned. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Molly. I don’t think she’s going to like that I brought you here.”

  “I’m sure she won’t. On the other hand, she’s infuriated the witches in Wilmington, not to mention the werewolf community.”

  Her eyes were enormous in her sallow face. “There are werewolves in Wilmington?”

  I didn’t answer. “Shall we go upstairs?”

  I could feel Elsie and Brian behind us, even though I couldn’t see them. A witch can have relationships that are strong enough to make her aware when those people are near. I hadn’t known Brian long, but he was already one of those people.

  The door creaked as Lisbet opened it. The foyer of the old building was disgusting with garbage, filth and dead rats. The stench almost made me vomit. I covered my nose with my hand and kept going.

  We walked around the debris, and I set my foot on the groaning stairs. Around me, paint was peeling from the walls, and the ceiling was dripping with moisture. It had been a long time since the witch who lived here had done anything, magic or not, to maintain the place.

  We came to a landing at the top of the stairs. The structure was set up more like an apartment building than a house. There were several doors off the landing. Underfoot, the carpet was threadbare and covered with mold. Where I could see it, there were holes in the wood floor beneath it.

  “Careful where you walk,” Lisbet warned as she danced around the pitfalls. “It’s this way.”

  I saw her open the door that led to the witch’s hidden sanctum. Terror so sharp I could taste it almost stopped me. I could hardly force my feet to move forward. My whole body shook with it.

  Anger had sustained me to this point. Now—alone and about to face a monster—I could scarcely breathe. I wished that I had a staff or some other bulky item to hold on to. Holding the tiny cauldron and the amulet in my hand wasn’t enough.

  I put one foot in front of the other carefully to follow Lisbet’s tracks. I silently urged my friends to be coming up the stairs behind us, even though I knew they weren’t that close. I hoped I could find something to distract the witch until we could face her together. I couldn’t do this alone.

  “What’s taking you so long?” Lisbet called from the doorway. “Not scared, Molly, are you?”

  I set my chin and stared her down. “I’m not afraid of your witch.”

  “Great! Come on inside then. My mother is waiting.”

  Her mother? Lisbet’s mother was the rogue witch. Lisbet had no magic. Her mother had promised her magic if she could keep her alive. It was a lie—a lie that had cost more than one witch her life. Magic couldn’t be gifted. But Lisbet obviously didn’t know that.

  The odor coming from the apartment where Lisbet had disappeared was even worse than the hall and stairs. It was dark in the room, with the windows painted over. The stench of mildew and mold added to the smell of decay. I wanted nothing more than to run in the opposite direction. Every nerve and muscle was trying to pull me away.

  When I was completely inside the apartment, the heavy door slammed closed behind me. I tried not to panic. Running would only make me seem weak at a time when I needed to appear strong, whether I was or not.

  Panic is our great enemy, Elsie had once told me when I was very young.

  Illusion is a witch’s best friend.

  There was a candle burning beside a bed with a huge, moth-eaten canopy over it. I saw a figure pushed up on several large pillows, a black comforter pulled up to her chin.

  I stepped closer to get a better look. I couldn’t feel any life here at all, and no magic. I realized why when I was finally beside the bed.

  The rogue witch was dead. I couldn’t be sure for how long. She’d certainly been alive the night before when we’d cast the mirror spell. Her head was thrown back, mouth open. She looked as though her last act had been screaming at the world. A heavy boline, perhaps the one that had been stolen, was protruding from her chest.

  “Mother is angry,” Lisbet whispered. “She wants you dead too, Molly. I’m sorry.”

  Clearly, Joe’s partner had lost it. The situation was too dangerous to remark on her loss of reason. Even though the witch was dead, Lisbet’s predatory insanity closed around me like a smothering cloak.

  “She doesn’t look angry.” I peered into the dead face. My knees were knocking, teeth chattering. “She looks at peace. She promised you magic?”

  “That’s all I ever wanted,” she said. “I would have done anything to be like her. I wasn’t born a witch, but she said I could be one if I helped her. It should have been my birthright, like you and your friends.”

  The pathetic plea in her voice—not to mention the dead witch before me—rendered me speechless.

  Lisbet came up close to me. “Do you know what she said to me this morning?”

  I swallowed hard. “What?”

  “She told me that she’d lied to me. Can you believe it? She said she couldn’t give me magic. I suppose you already knew that, huh Molly?”

  I nodded. “No one can make you a witch if you aren’t born with magic.”

  “Interesting.” She jerked the boline from her mother’s chest. “She also told me that the amulet you wear is very ancient and powerful. But there’s only one way to remove it once a witch has put it on. You have to die.”

  CHAPTER 36

  Life is fragile.

  Protect mine, all ye elements of the universe.

  I felt the knife at my throat and her arms wrapped around me. She was small and thin, but she was whipcord strong.

  Staying calm wasn’t an option anymore. This was the way she’d killed Olivia. I could feel her hot breath on my cheek. One of her hands was in my hair, pulling my head back for the cut.

  I gagged on fear and the stench around us. I couldn’t even think of a spell that could help, much less form the words for one.

  “Hold it right there, Lisbet.”

  I hadn’t even heard the door open behind us, but suddenly Joe was there. I could barely make out his familiar form.

  I don’t think I’ve ever been so glad to see someone.

  “I’m your partner, Joe.” Lisbet’s voice was normal and pleasant. “You won’t shoot me.”

  “Let Molly go,” he said. “Put the knife down and let her go.”

  “Why are you even here, Joe?” She didn’t move at all. “You’re supposed to be on the other side of town.”

  I could feel her tears flowing onto my face. Her heart was pounding, and she shook all over. Seeing Joe there had changed everything.

  “We’ve been investigating you, Lisbet. You’ve been crazy since we started this case. I was almost too close to it to see what you were doing. I found the mask with Olivia Dunst’s blood on it at your apartment. The fibers matched the ones we found on her. I was waiting to see what your next move was. I didn’t expect this to be it. There are officers waiting downstairs. I wanted to come up alone and face you. You’re my partner. You deserved that much.”

  “Joe.” Her voice was barely audible. She moved her hand from my hair and wiped the tears from her face. “You weren’t supposed to get involved in all this. I didn’t want to hurt Molly. But I need this last kill—for her magic and the amulet. My mother is wrong. I can finally be a witch.”

  “No, Lisbet.” His voice was gentle. “You killed someone. There’s only one thing that’s gonna happen now.”

  “An eye for an eye, right?”

  “No, Lisbet. It doesn’t have to be that way.”

  The knife had gone slack against my throat. Her arms were limp but still clinging to me. I closed my eyes and muttere
d a spell for protection. It was all I could do to keep my thoughts together long enough. I hoped it would work.

  I put my hand on my mother’s amulet and forced my will through it. It created a shock wave effect that shoved air molecules between us. It threw her away from me. I took a step back, prepared to defend myself if I needed to.

  Lisbet made a growling sound in the back of her throat and leapt toward me. A single shot rang out in the dismal apartment. She dropped to the floor.

  “Are you all right?” Joe came quickly across the room. He checked Lisbet first, his gun still in his hand. “She’s dead.”

  He put his arms around me and held me tight.

  “I’m fine.” I put my arms around him and hoped I’d never have to let go. “You really came without backup, didn’t you?”

  “How did you know?”

  “There’s that sound in your voice. I can’t describe it, but I can always tell when you’re lying.”

  Elsie and Brian plunged through the door.

  “Are you okay?” Elsie pinched her nostrils tightly together with her fingers. “What’s that smell?”

  “I think it’s this dead witch.” Brian was staring at the body on the bed.

  “Quiet,” Elsie warned. “There are people without magic in here too.”

  I turned to Joe. “I think Dorothy is here somewhere. We have to find her.”

  We searched the whole disgusting building and finally found Dorothy asleep on a cot in the basement. She was cold, but she still had a pulse.

  “I think Lisbet murdered her mother before it was the right time to perform the ceremony to strip Dorothy of her magic,” I said with a grateful heart.

  “It would have killed her,” Elsie whispered.

  Elsie and I kissed her pretty face and bestowed what blessings we could on her. Brian did the same with a little more gusto than was needed. Olivia wouldn’t have liked it.

  Joe called for backup and an ambulance.

  “There are a few things we need to find before your crime lab gets here,” I explained, careful what I said.

  He nodded. “I’m going outside to wait for backup. It’ll only take a few minutes. Make it quick.”