by Emery Belle
Cordelia shrieked as she and Hunter jumped out of the way just in time for the entire chandelier to come unscrewed from the ceiling and land on the dais with a crash that shook the entire auditorium. The chandelier came to rest at Lord Macon’s feet as my wand floated serenely back into my hand. I hastily stuffed it into my pocket as he raised his head slowly, deliberately, his face livid, his eyes burning into mine.
“Sorry,” I squeaked out as Hunter shot me a dirty look and Cordelia guided the chandelier back to the ceiling with her own wand. It screwed itself back into place with several loud squeaks, and I shrank down into my chair as Sebastian’s shoulders shook with laughter and Cordelia, regaining her composure with remarkable speed, resumed Hunter’s wand selection. I could feel the wand humming in my pocket as I tried to pay attention while Hunter, and then Garnet, received their wands. Garnet’s entire face lit up with pride as the ghostly hands presented her with a stunning white wand made of birch wood.
“And now,” Cordelia announced, vanishing the table with a sweep of her wand, “if our three newly wanded witches and wizards would join me once more on the dais, we will perform the ceremonial first spell…” She hesitated, glancing my way with twinkling eyes. “Or second spell, for one of our more enthusiastic witches.” Glenn chuckled and patted my arm, and I smiled sheepishly as I followed Hunter and Garnet back onto the dais.
“Since it will take some time for you to become accustomed to your new wands, we’ll start with a very simple fire spell,” Cordelia said, conjuring three large brass torches that floated into place before each of us on the dais. “Pick your favorite color, and on the count of three, say ‘Luce.’ Once the torches are lit, the wand selection ceremony will officially be complete.”
She stepped back, positioning herself behind Lord Macon and Lady Amabelle, and Hunter, Garnet, and I glanced at each other, grinning, before raising our wands in unison and saying, “Luce” in loud, clear voices.
As one, our wands erupted with light, and streams of colored fire shot from their tips—green for Hunter, gold for Garnet, and purple for me. Hunter’s and Garnet’s fire arced perfectly toward two of the torches, illuminating them in dancing flames that lit up the auditorium. My fire lit up the auditorium in an entirely different way… in the form of a wall of purple flames that grazed my forearm painfully before shooting over our guests’ heads and heading for the back row of chairs, immediately consuming them in a blaze of fire and smoke.
Ignoring the throbbing pain in my arm, I cried out in alarm and headed toward the chairs, my wand outstretched, ready to fix the mess I’d created. I was just about to shout out a water spell when the flames evaporated, leaving nothing in their wake but a row of blackened, twisted chair stumps.
Turning back to the dais, I saw that Lord Macon was on his feet, his pewter and gold wand arcing through the air as he restored order, and when he aimed it at me, I recoiled. He murmured a spell, and the pain in my arm morphed into a pleasant warming sensation as the burn began healing itself, a new patch of pink skin appearing in its place.
“T-thank you,” I stuttered, shocked by his unexpected act of kindness. But Lord Macon didn’t respond; instead, he studied me for a few beats, his face inscrutable, before turning and sweeping from the auditorium, the sound of his footsteps echoing in my ears long after they’d faded away.
Chapter 7
The next morning, I decided to leave my new wand behind before heading to the hospital for another day of housekeeping duty. I’d had several more mishaps after the wand selection ceremony, including a nasty little incident where I’d accidentally strung poor Pierre up by his ankles in the middle of my dorm room like a Christmas ham on display at the butcher shop—much to the delight of Monty, who spent the next few hours salivating and asking for a carving knife.
After being whizzed up to the twelfth floor and greeted by the same security guard, then traversing the same endless rows of corridors while being trapped in the same bubble, I arrived at the doors to the highly infectious diseases ward to find Dale with his blowtorch. “Isn’t there an easier way to go about protecting everyone?” I asked as my skin glowed purple once more. “This seems like an awful lot of steps.”
“Probably,” he said with a shrug, leading me into the ward, “but we’re all so busy up here that none of us have time to come up with a better plan.” He led me to the utility closet and unlocked it with a wave of his wand before stepping aside to allow me room to gather my cleaning supplies. “I’m afraid I have a bit of an unpleasant task for you,” he said as I dumped a generous amount of cleaning potion into the bucket, careful not to spill any this time.
I winced, wondering what horrors awaited me today, and tried to block out the awful wailing sound coming from the room next door. When I glanced up at Dale, his face was grave. “We need someone to clean out and pack up Orion’s room. After a death, we don’t allow any of the family members into the room until it’s been cleaned to spare them from getting upset at the sight of their loved one’s belongings. His wife and daughter will be arriving tomorrow morning to collect his things, and I don’t want to keep them waiting.”
I nodded, swallowing hard as I stared down the hall toward the hospital room where the kind old centaur had taken his last breath. As a renowned seer, I wondered, was Orion able to foretell his fate? It seemed an awful way to live, counting down to the number on the calendar that you knew would be your last. If I knew that today would be the last time I’d walk this earth, what would I do? Who would I talk to? What secrets would I divulge? The man in black’s face flashed through my mind, but I immediately tamped down on it, forcing myself to replace his dark, brooding good looks with an image of Sebastian’s easy smile and honey-brown eyes.
A speaker above our heads crackled to life, and an official-sounding voice said, “Incoming, incoming, six-hundred-pound ogre male with laughing hyena fever. All hands on deck, wands at the ready, brace for attack. Over and out.”
“That’s my cue,” Dale said, brandishing his wand like a superhero before racing off down the hallway to join the rest of the nurses and doctors clustered around the ward’s double doors, looking nervous. A scream of laughter that chilled me to the bones floated through the air, and the hospital staff lined up before the doors, wands outstretched. When I saw that a few of the doctors were visibly trembling, I took that as my cue to slip into Orion’s room and lock the door behind me.
A wave of sadness washed over me as I took in the rumpled bedsheets, the cover his flailing hooves had sent flying into the far corner of the room, and the shattered glass of water and broken lamp on his nightstand that were the result of the chaos surrounding the old centaur as the nurses and doctors tried in vain to save him.
“I’m sorry, Orion,” I murmured as I set to work sweeping up the pieces of glass and dumping them into the trashcan. After tidying the area around the bed, I moved on to the closet, sifting through the neat row of colorful loincloths and the large pile of hoof covers, most of them plated in gold. One magnificent pair that looked to be made entirely of platinum had sparkling sapphires encrusted in the sides. Orion was obviously wealthy, I thought, remembering what Dale had said about people traveling from around the world to receive a reading from him. It must have cost them an arm and a fang, and here I was, a lowly member of the housekeeping department, hearing his sage words for free. Of course, it would have been nice if those words were a little more useful and a little less insulting.
You are not what you appear to be… an imposter.
Frankly, I thought, yanking the loincloths off their hangers with a little more force than was necessary, Orion’s seer must have been broken. He was dying, after all, so didn’t that allow someone a little leeway in the accuracy department? I wasn’t hiding anything from anyone… as far as I was concerned, Wren Winters was an open book.
Mostly.
Yeah, sure, I was hiding a few minor details from my loved ones, like Cole’s entire existence and the fact that Lord Macon both had it in f
or me and wanted to save my life, but everyone was entitled to a little privacy, right?
My head still buzzing with self-righteous anger, I finished stuffing Orion’s clothes into the suitcase I found lying at the bottom of the closet and moved on to the many gifts and tokens he’d received from well-wishers, all still neatly lining his bedside tables. Glancing toward the door, and hearing another burst of maniacal laughter followed by a flurry of screams, I checked to make sure it was firmly locked. Then I perched on the edge of the bed and began perusing a few of Orion’s get-well-soon cards, feeling only slightly ashamed of myself for nosing into a dead centaur’s private business.
Orion, the first card said in loopy feminine handwriting, thank you so much for warning me about my husband’s extracurricular activities. Since finding out about the goblin, I’ve dumped him and become a new woman. Wishing you a comfortable and speedy recovery.
Intrigued, I reached for a second one, this time written in a barely-legible scrawl. Dearest Orion, my family’s visit to you was worth its weight in gold. We’ve recovered the lost treasure from my thieving uncle and returned it to its rightful place in our home. We ask the Goddess Luna daily to heal you and return you to your former glory. The world would be a better place with more seers like you.
As I flipped through the rest of the cards, noting that the other messages were more of the same, it occurred to me that while Orion had plenty of admirers in the worldwide magical community, he also must have accrued an equal number of enemies. I had a nasty feeling that more than a few people were waiting for their turn to dance on his grave…
“Wren?” The door opened and Dale poked his head into the room, his face red and sweaty, his hair disheveled, and a long claw mark trailing the length of his cheek. He raised an eyebrow at the sight of me lounging on Orion’s bed—without realizing it, I had made myself comfortable against the pillows for easier reading—and I hurriedly shoved the card I’d been holding behind my back.
Dale raised his second eyebrow, then said, “Are you about finished up in here? We need you to clean five more rooms before your lunch break, and the new ogre patient left a trail of slime that needs to be mopped up.”
“Of course.” I jumped off the bed and ripped a plastic garbage bag off the roll stuffed in my pocket. “Let me just finish gathering up the rest of Orion’s belongings; it’ll only take a few minutes.”
“Great, thanks… oh, and this might make things easier for you.” Dale jabbed his wand into the room and conjured up a cart on wheels, then told me he’d be back in five minutes to collect it.
Once he left, I swept the rest of the cards into a neat pile and set them on the cart, followed by a few potted plants, a suncatcher, three stuffed bears, and several trinkets I couldn’t immediately identify, and I finished by tying together enough balloons to practically lift me off my feet. Then, I crouched down on the floor to search for the beautiful silver filigree pen Orion had been using just before he died—it looked like a treasured keepsake, something his wife and daughter would surely want as a remembrance. My search for the pen came up empty, but I did find Orion’s crossword puzzle book.
Leaning back against the bed, I flipped the book open and began perusing its contents. Every puzzle except for the last one was completely filled in, indicating that the centaur had been working his way through the book for quite some time. As I began reading the last few clues, the letters started to blur slightly, and though I looked away to try and refocus my eyes, when I returned my gaze to the puzzle every word was dancing and jumping around the page.
I blinked rapidly and tried shifting away from the bucket of cleaning potion beside me, worried that the fumes were beginning to addle my brain, but my limbs refused to budge. I felt so heavy, heavy, hea…
“So we meet again. I can’t say I’m surprised.”
I blinked once, twice, three times, trying to clear the fog swirling around my mind, then struggled to a sitting position before immediately falling backward with a groan. Every inch of my body was aching, as if I’d just been stomped on by a rampaging dragon, and my head felt like it was going to split in half. Rubbing my forehead, I tried to recall the last thing that had happened to me—I’d been cleaning out Orion’s hospital room, snooping through his cards, reaching under the bed for his crossword puzzle, and then… nothing.
“Water?” A broad hand appeared out of nowhere and pressed a cool glass into my aching hand, and I drank greedily, trying to clear the unpleasant sensation of cotton balls from my mouth. I squinted at the hand, which was still blurring in and out of focus. Who did it belong to? That voice sounded familiar… a little too familiar, in fact.
Oh no.
I shot up, yelping in pain and spilling the water all over myself as the man in the chair beside my bed—how did I get in a bed?—pushed himself backward to avoid getting splashed. He chuckled, low and slightly ominous, and I met his blood-red eyes for the first time in many weeks.
“What are you doing here?” I asked Kellen, the Magic Island police chief, who also happened to be my arch-nemesis, and have I mentioned that he was an enormous minotaur who could easily squash me like a bug under his shoe? Right now, thankfully, he was in human form, although that was only a smidge less intimidating.
“I could ask you the same thing,” he said, sweeping his arm around to indicate our location, which I now realized was a hospital room. Exhausted from the effort of sitting up, I let myself fall back against the pillows again, eyeing Kellen warily, hoping for some sort of non-sarcastic explanation to what had just happened to me. But rather than speak, he swept his eerie gaze over my face and ran his fingers along his trusty baton, which he always kept strapped to his waistband.
“I didn’t do anything wrong,” I said stubbornly when I could stand the silence no longer. “Don’t you dare try to arrest me again, or I’ll… I’ll…” I hesitated, then balled my hand into a fist and shook it at him, curling my lip into a threatening snarl for good measure. Maybe leaving my new wand at home wasn’t a wise decision after all.
The minotaur burst into laughter, doubling over and slapping his powerful thigh. “You know something?” he said when he finally straightened up again, wiping tears of hilarity out of his eyes. “You’re actually starting to grow on me.” Then he erased the smile from his face and settled his features into a severe, businesslike expression. “Sadly, I’m not here to arrest you. Today, it seems that you’re the victim.”
“The victim?” I squinted at him in confusion. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Maybe this will jog your memory.” He tugged on a pair of latex gloves, then leaned over and plucked a clear plastic bag from a box lying at his feet. Inside the bag was Orion’s crossword puzzle book. Kellen stared at me, still holding the bag, one eyebrow cocked meaningfully.
I stared back at him. “What?” I asked, nonplussed. “That belongs to Orion the centaur. Or…” I frowned. “I guess I should say belonged.”
“Yes, I’m aware who it belonged to.” Kellen dropped the book back into the box and peeled off his gloves. “I’m also aware, thanks to your little episode in Orion’s hospital room, that it is imbued with a very rare, very powerful poison—just enough to kill a centaur very slowly and very deliberately over a stretch of several months, so as not to arouse suspicion, but more than enough to knock out a level one witch for three days.”
“Three days?” I gawked at him, then began struggling to get out of bed, ignoring the throbbing pain in every limb. “I can’t just disappear from my life for three days. What about my classes? Has someone been feeding Pierre?” Terror shot through my heart. “Oh my God, what if Monty managed to get his teeth on my wand?” The havoc the shrunken head could wreak in a matter of seconds with such a powerful magical object was unfathomable. Was my dorm even standing anymore?
I climbed unsteadily to my feet and began hunting around for my shoes, bending over clumsily to search beneath the bed when I felt a strange breeze on my backside. Only then did
I realize that I was wearing nothing but a flimsy, practically see-through hospital gown that was open in the back from neck to ankles. I whipped around, cheeks burning, to see Kellen looking away politely and whistling a tune between his teeth, and to his credit, when I launched myself into bed again and yanked the covers up to my nose, he had the decency to pretend like nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
“As I was saying.” He cleared his throat and nudged the box containing the crossword puzzle with his massive booted foot. “One of the nurses found you on the floor sometime after you blacked out, and when she picked up the puzzle book, she immediately began to feel woozy. Recognizing that something was amiss, she called for help, and the doctors began performing lifesaving measures on you. It’s my understanding that an antidote was flown in by dragon with only minutes to spare before your heart stopped beating.”
He paused, looking grave. “Unfortunately for Orion, no one recognized the subtle signs before it was too late. But if it makes you feel any better”—the minotaur reached out, as if intending to cup my shoulder reassuringly, before thinking better of it and dropping his hand back to his baton—“I don’t believe you were the intended target.”
That did make me feel better, but only marginally. After facing several brushes with death since arriving on the island mere months ago, it was nice to know that my life wasn’t actively in danger… but that didn’t change the fact that a centaur was dead, and I had almost followed him into the grave. The last thing I wanted was to become embroiled in another murder mystery, but this time—especially considering how I was moments away from becoming his killer’s second victim—I felt like I had no choice.
