White Witch, Black Curse

I thunked the lights on in the kitchen with my elbow, and not knowing what to do with it, I set it on the windowsill. "Didn't see Ivy's last date, huh?" I asked as I turned on the taps and grabbed the soap. The window was black, throwing back a skewed vision of myself and Jenks.

Rex jumped up onto the counter, and I splashed her when she reached for the chrysalis.

"No! Bad kitty!" Jenks shouted to make the cat leap for the floor, and arm dripping, I set one of Mr. Fish's oversize brandy snifters upside down over it. Mr. Fish was still in the ever-after, and if he was dead when I got back there, I was going to be pissed. It had been a week now because of my thin aura. At least that's what Al was saying. Personally, I think he was breaking in Pierce and didn't want me around, mucking things up.

"Jenks, she's just being a cat," I said as the pixy scolded the orange ball of unrepentant fur. She stared lovingly up at her pixy master, licking her chops and twitching the tip of her tail.

"I don't want her to eat it!" he said, rising to be even with me. "She might turn into a frog or something. Tink's knickers, it's probably full of black magic."

"It's just a butterfly," I said, drying my arm and pulling the sleeve back down.

"Yeah, with fangs and a thirst for blood, for all you know," he muttered.

I scooped up the cat and fondled her ears, wanting to be sure that we were still friends. Rex hadn't been watching me from doorways all week, and I kind of missed it. The more I thought about it, the more I believed I had played right into Al's plans. Pierce would want a body, and Al could give it to him. I could easily imagine that the two had come to an agreement, body for servitude. Win-win all the way around. Al got a useful familiar, Pierce got a body and a chance to see me once a week. And knowing Pierce, he thought he'd find a way to slip Al's leash eventually, leaving me in the middle to suffer the fallout. I'd be willing to bet most of Al's bluster and anger at me for snatching Pierce had been an act. I had freaking made the charm that he corrupted to make the curse work.

That Pierce was now in Tom Bansen's body was just squeamy. Even worse, he'd done it to himself. No wonder his plight wasn't hitting any of my rescue impulses. Stupid man. I'd find out what happened come Saturday and my stint with Al.

The faint tingling of Rex's bell caught my interest, and I looked at the pretty thing before letting her slip to the floor. My eyes widened at the pattern of loops and swirls that made up its shape. It looked exactly like the bell Trent had found in the ever-after. I'd never noticed before. "Ah, Jenks?" I questioned, not believing it. "Where did you get this bell?"

He was on top of my dad's box of stuff, trying to wedge it open. "Ceri gave it to me," he said, puffing. "Why?"

I took a breath to tell him where it had come from, then changed my mind. "No reason," I said, letting Rex slip from me. "It's really unique, is all."

"So, what's in the box?" he asked, giving up and putting his hands on his hips.

I smiled and crossed the kitchen. "My dad's charms. You should see some of this stuff."

As Jenks and I talked, I brought out wrapped gadgets and utensils, laying them down for him to unwrap. Jenks buzzed around in the cupboards to find nooks and crannies, his wings slowly losing their red tint to become their normal grayish hue. He was better than a flashlight for seeing what was at the back of a cupboard.

"Hey, Jenks," I said as I set a box of uncharmed ley line amulets and pins at the back of my silverware drawer. "I'm, uh, really sorry about pasting you against my bathroom mirror with sticky silk."

The pixy flashed red, the dust slipping from him mirroring his embarrassed color. "You remember that, huh?" he said. "It sure made the decision easy to down you with that forget charm." He hesitated, then added softly, "Sorry about that. I was only trying to help."

The box was empty, and not seeing Ivy's scissors, I ran my ceremonial knife along the tape lines to collapse the box so the rani of recycling wouldn't yell at me. "It's okay," I said as I wrestled the thing flat. "I've forgotten about it already. See?" I quipped.

Tired, I tucked the box in the pantry and began sorting the remaining charms. Jenks landed beside me, watching. The sound of his kids was nice. "I'm sorry about Kisten," Jenks said, surprising me. "I don't think I said that yet."

"Thanks," I said, grabbing a handful of spent charms. "I still miss him." But the pain was gone, burned to ash under the city, and I could move on.

The old spells went into my dissolution vat of salt water, making a soft splash. I missed Marshal, too. I understood why he'd left. He hadn't been my boyfriend, but something more—my friend, one I'd really messed up with. Doing a power pull with him made the entire situation look worse than it really was.