Black Hat, White Witch by Hailey Edwards

16

Afamiliar scent roused me from sleep. Tobacco. And…green apples?

From deeper in the house, Colby barked orders while she battled orcs with her friends. But a rhythmic click, click, click kept steady time at my elbow. That was not part of the game, and they only ever played one.

Cracking my eyes open, I discovered Asa sitting in a chair stolen from the kitchen beside my bed. Rimless glasses perched on his nose, and the beginnings of a scarf poised on a pair of wooden knitting needles.

A tiny part of me wondered if that was what he had been whittling in my yard that day, but I didn’t ask.

“Am I dreaming?” I angled my head to see him better. “You wear glasses? And knit?”

“We all need our hobbies.” He set aside his project. “Stakeouts are boring.” He removed his glasses. “It’s not that I need these to see. I need them to see beyond.” He leaned forward. “Tinkkit is an ancient fae craft my mother taught me. I knit intent into my work, and my daemon half has trouble perceiving the strands of the natural positive energy I channel. The spelled glass helps me block out my daemon sight.”

“You’re a fascinating dae, Asa.” I wiped the crust from my eyes. “Maybe one day you could…”

A gasp caught in my chest as it all rushed back to me, and I bolted upright, my heart racing a mile a minute.

“Shh.” He gripped my upper arms to hold me still. “The girls are alive and well and in the hospital.”

A twist in my middle left me tasting bile. “The hospital?”

“They’re being treated for exposure and shock.” He stroked his thumbs over my arms. “The spell hit the girls hard, and they hadn’t shaken it off when the paramedics arrived. That type of magic isn’t meant for use on humans, so it was in their best interest to be examined by human health professionals.”

Wetting my lips, I screwed up my courage. “What do they remember…?”

“Not much.” He gave me a reassuring squeeze. “They were unconscious for most of it.”

“You interviewed them.”

As much as I wished he hadn’t asked them to relieve their trauma, he had no choice. I had explained him away as a cop, so the girls would have trusted him. They would have answered his questions without the trepidation that came from a formal interrogation. That much, I had done right. I still didn’t like it.

“I had to know what precautions to take.” He flexed his jaw, as if he regretted the necessity. “I gave both of the girls a dose of a mild potion to blur the edges of their memories. That ought to protect them.”

From Black Hat. From the director. From a truth that would wreck and ruin them.

“Thank you,” I rasped, grateful beyond measure for his quick thinking.

Agents kept an emergency tin of potions in their cars, a magical first aid kit, but the pre-mixed spells had a shelf life and required immediate application to be effective. That wasn’t always possible, and humans died because what they had seen or heard couldn’t be blurred, smudged, or faded in time to save them.

“Colby?” Her steady voice assured me she was all right, but I had to know if she was okay. “How is she?”

“Clay was right.” Asa slid his hands down to my elbows. “She was exhausted, but she’s fine.”

His assurance shoved a weight off my shoulders, and I shut my eyes to soak in the fact I hadn’t hurt her.

This time. Next time? I didn’t want to think about it. But I knew Colby was sizing us for matching superhero costumes in her mind.

“We found Taylor’s car.” Asa let me go, and I missed his steadying grip. “This was inside.”

A heavy weight landed on my lap, and I popped my eyes open to find a pale leather grimoire.

“There’s a part, near the back, that might help you put everything into perspective.”

“You read it?” I felt dirty just holding it. “You didn’t read it aloud, right?”

“Black arts don’t bother me much. Daemon, remember?” His smile was tolerant. “And I’m no fool.”

“Sorry.” I touched his shoulder. “I didn’t mean to imply…”

“I understand your caution.” He tilted his head, listening. “I’m going to tell the others you’re awake.”

“Thank you.” I caught his hand as he stood. “I mean it.”

Without another word, he bent and brushed his warm lips across my suddenly hot and tingly cheek.

Shoving handsome agents who knitted out of my mind, I cracked open the grimoire to a marked page.

I read the passage, reread the passage, then well and truly felt like a fool of the highest order.

What I did to Colby wasn’t an accident. It was a conscious decision. For us both. But I never intended her to fulfil her role as my familiar. Therefore, I didn’t study her rare condition, our unique bond, or anything else to do with what happened that night. We both chose to pretend this was how we had always been.

Last night—I assumed it was last night?—proved that ignorance was not bliss.

According to the grimoire, Taylor hypothesized that since I’d bound Colby to me at the height of my power that she would have a greater capacity for storing and channeling magic. But she was a soul given form. An innocent soul. The rarest and most powerful kind. Children of a certain age were often targeted by supernatural predators for that exact reason. In binding Colby, I had caught pure lightning in a bottle.

And, according to the numerous spells outlined in the grimoire, anyone could pop her cap and drink.

All they had to do was kill me first so that our bond would release Colby’s soul.

As I flipped deeper into the book, I discovered the complex spell Taylor used for creating his masque and worse. Far worse. Curses. Enchantments. Soul magic.

The door burst open on cat-size Colby and Clay, and I shoved the grimoire under my pillow.

I took a moth right between the eyes as she smacked into my face and clung tight to my hair.

“You’re awake.” Her furry body jittered as she slid down to stare at me. “You slept a lot longer than me.”

“Go ahead.” I peeled her off and plonked her on my lap. “Mock me with your supreme powers.”

For a moth, she did smug well. “I thought I just did.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” I examined her. “You’re not hurt or feeling puny or anything?”

“I feel like I drank the whole tub of sugar water in one gulp.”

“Um…” I glanced at Clay, our resident familiar expert. “Is that normal?”

“The more power a familiar channels, the more power they’re able to channel.” He shrugged. “Colby is already a powerhouse. She’s only going to grow stronger the more you work with her.” He hesitated. “The cork is out of the bottle, so to speak. Now that Colby has used her powers in conjunction with yours, she has to keep expending the energy her body will naturally begin to retain, or she will be consumed by it.”

Most black witches didn’t keep familiars. We didn’t need them. We gained power through consumption. Of all the lessons I had been taught, the care and keeping of rare familiars hadn’t been a footnote in the margin. That was why I treated Colby like a kid, like a person, instead of as a pet or a conduit.

After I finished reading the grimoire from cover to cover, I would have more research ahead of me.

“Ha! That means we’re a team whether you want to be or not.” She was smug as a bug. “You don’t get a vote.”

“Harsh.” I wiggled my lap to make her dance. “Phenomenal cosmic powers are making your head swell.”

Launching herself off my knee, she zoomed closer. “Do you know what tonight is?”

“I don’t even know what today is.”

“It’s Halloween.” She pirouetted in the air. “Will you take me trick-or-treating?”

“Colby,” Clay chided in a gentle tone. “Rue is exhausted. We need to let her rest.”

“Hollis Apothecary was supposed to have an open house tonight.” I plucked at the covers. “I’m not sure I’m ready to face the store yet. Or the town.”

There would be so many questions about the store, the girls, my ex. And I was tired of the lying.

Clutching her hands under her chin, she begged, “Can Clay take me?”

A moth hair accessory didn’t look odd on me, but on Clay, folks might stare. “I don’t know…”

“Come in costume,” Asa suggested to me. “That way, no one will recognize you.”

“That’s not a terrible idea.” I mulled it over. “That would solve a lot of our problems.”

Namely that if I wore an actual costume, but kept my present company, everyone would recognize me.

But a glamour could reshape us enough to enjoy a stress-free night out incognito.

“I vote we go as Marie Antoinette,” Colby chimed in. “I would look awesome in silver and diamonds.”

We shared a costume every year to make blending in easier for her and to keep her close to me.

The Downtown Samford Halloween Spooktacular, which everyone called the ghost walk for short, was a lot more fun when you showed up and stuffed your face with free goodies versus having to provide free goodies for others to stuff into their faces.

“Done.” I flicked a wrist. “What about you, Clay?”

“Julia Child.”

“Always a classic.” I skipped to Asa. “Well?”

“The devil.”

“Okay.” I didn’t imagine the twitch in his cheek. “Like red-jumpsuit devil?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of this.” The transformation gripped him, and his daemon appeared. “Trick-or-treat.”

A snort blasted out my nose. “You want to trick-or-treat?”

The daemon ducked his head but nodded once before giving himself back over to Asa.

“How about I glamour the daemon into pajama Satan?” I pursed my lips. “Just to take the edge off.”

Plenty of supernaturals let it all hang out in public on Halloween, but the daemon was intense.

Maybe that was the allure. He wanted to blend among normal people and be praised for his appearance rather than feared or shunned for it. Even supernaturals feared Asa and the incredible beast within him.

“That’s fine,” he agreed without complaint, his eyes brightening.

Apparently, Asa and the daemon wanted out for a few hours to celebrate surviving yet another case.

A genuine yawn stretched my jaw, and I shooed them. “Wake me up when it’s time to go.”

Alone in my room, I did try to sleep, but I must have used my weekly allotment while recovering.

Since I had yet to check my phone, I did that, and I immediately regretted it.

Mayor Tate was already in a snit over “the eyesore.”

I assumed she meant my shop.

Her voicemail was one long rant, and I lost interest a few seconds in. The highlights were her blasting me for my poor timing, as if I had planned this to spite her, and her guilting me for ruining the ghost walk for my neighboring stores.

Done with my dose of reality, I tossed my phone, hauled out the grimoire, and began reading.

* * *

Despite my choiceof bedtime story, I must have dozed off, because a cannonballing moth with plenty of junk in her trunk hit me in the gut in a burst of squeeing excitement that emptied my lungs of oxygen.

Wheezing, certain I was seconds away from dying horribly, I rolled onto my side coughing.

“Get up, get up, get up.” She flitted onto my hip. “The ghost walk started ten minutes ago.”

“I’m up, I’m up, I’m up.” I swung my legs over the side of the bed. “I still smell like pond water.”

“If you wanted a shower, you should have gotten up earlier.”

“I’ve created a monster.” I nudged her off me. “Fine. You win. I’ll go smelling like frog butts.”

Good thing we all decided to go in disguise.

“Frog butts.” She snickered. “We’ll meet you in the kitchen.”

Since no one would see the real me, I chose sweats, sneakers, and a baggy tee.

Before I reached the kitchen, I could tell bad news had hit during the few minutes I spent dressing.

With a sob, Colby zipped off to her room and slammed the door behind her.

A long sigh parted Clay’s lips as he watched her go, but he didn’t follow.

Asa stared at the floor, one hand in his pocket, and took shallow breaths as if trying to calm himself.

“What’s wrong?” I thought of the girls and swallowed. “Clay?”

“We’ve been handed a new case,” he explained. “The director wants us on the next flight out of Bama.”

“Oh,” I said softly, surprised when the ache didn’t ease one bit. “I thought you guys would have a day or two to decompress.” Black Hats got two days off a week, sick days, and even three weeks paid vacation. Working for the Bureau was, in a lot of ways, like a regular job. “I didn’t think to warn Colby.”

“We could delay a few hours.” Asa’s voice came out as a coarse growl. “We could leave in the morning.”

“This is why I didn’t want you two getting attached, Ace.” Clay dragged a hand down his face. “Daemons, in case you haven’t noticed, are stage-five clingers.” That part was for me before he pivoted back to Asa. “Rue agreed to consult on cases, not reenter the field. I warned you. Both of you. No one ever listens.”

Asa lifted his head, his eyes a feral burnt crimson, and his knuckles popped down at his side.

This was not good. Not at all. Not even a little bit.

“We’ll work together again,” I told Asa. “You’ve got my number and my address. It’s not like I’ll vanish.”

“You might.” He turned that simmering gaze on me. “You have before.”

He had me there, but that was before I signed a contract with Black Hat to consult.

“This is my home.” I had fought for it and won it. “I’m not leaving.”

Proving he was over the drama, Clay swooped in to hug me. “I’ll be in touch, Dollface.”

“See you later.” I clung a beat too long. “Let’s not wait ten years to do this again.”

Withdrawing, he twitched his lips in a smile. “That depends entirely on you.”

The urge to thwack him with my wand surfaced, but it was more likely to break than him.

Turning on his heel, Clay marched from the house to the SUV and climbed in to wait on Asa.

“Well.” I scuffed the toe of my sneaker. “This is awkward.”

I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say to Asa. I wasn’t sure he had anything good to say to me.

“I would like to give you something.” He withdrew his hand from his pocket. “Will you accept it?”

“It depends,” I hedged, attempting to get a better look at what he held. “What is it?”

“A bracelet.” He held it up for me to see. “I made it while you were sleeping.”

A narrow black strip dangled from his fingers that reminded me of a braided friendship bracelet. I bet he knitted it, given its detail, but the material was peculiar.

“Okay.” I offered him my wrist. “Thank you.”

The silky material wrapped three times before he tied it off with an intricate knot.

His warm fingers lingered on my skin. “Can you make me a promise?”

“It depends,” I repeated myself. “What is it?”

“Wear this until we see one another again.”

That could be yearsalmost popped out of my mouth, but I bit down on the words.

Back on the director’s radar, I would be lucky to go another month before he pinged me again.

“I’ll wear it for six months.” That seemed safe enough. “Deal?”

Challenge gleamed in his eyes. “Deal.”

He drew me against him, his grip on my wrist like iron, and embraced me as if this were goodbye forever instead of a few weeks or months. He rested his chin on top of my head, and his chest expanded against mine as he breathed me in. I couldn’t help it if my arms snaked around him too. I mean, it was rude not to return hugs, right? I was doing the socially correct thing here.

The scent of him filled my head, and I admired the sleek lines of his muscular back with my fingertips.

“I should go,” he breathed, but he didn’t budge. “Clay is waiting.”

“You should go,” I agreed, but I didn’t budge either. “Clay has set a timer on his phone by now.”

An obnoxious series of honks guaranteed to bring a hungover Mrs. Gleason running made me wince and step back.

“I have a question,” I started before I lost my nerve. “What did it mean? You stealing my food?”

For all the concessions I made for him, he could tell me that much.

“Daemons sense potential mates through their saliva.” He started toward the door. “We’re a match.”

“A match?”

“We’re biologically compatible,” he explained, attempting to put me at ease or scare me spitless. One of those. “It’s not a fated-mate connection like wargs share. It’s not set in stone or foretold in the stars. We call the deliberation process fascination.”

“It’s biology?” I touched the bracelet. “Okay.” I rubbed my wrist. “I understand nature happens.”

“And, Rue?” He lingered on the threshold. “When you started playing the game, as a she-daemon would, one who wanted to confirm our compatibility for herself, you granted me permission.”

“To do what?”

“To find you…fascinating.”

All of a sudden, the bracelet made my wrist itch, but try as I might, I couldn’t budge it for love or money.

“You just said…” The blood drained from my cheeks. “Asa, I am not fascinating. At all. Not even a little.”

Asa crossed the porch and took the stairs at a clip. A less charitable person might accuse him of running.

“What does this mean then?” I held up my wrist and pointed at it. “Asa.”

Without glancing back, Asa climbed into the SUV, belted in, and locked the doors.

Locked. The. Doors.

As if that would keep me out if I really wanted in.

Only after the SUV turned off my driveway onto the main road did he text me the answer.

>>The bracelet wards off other males in my absence.

>You slapped a chastity belt on me?

Turning my wrist, searching for the knot he had vanished, I couldn’t help but admire the intricate design.

And that was when I noticed what else he had done.

>This is your hair, isn’t it?

>>Have fun trick-or-treating, Rue.

I was still fuming when Colby emerged from her room with droopy antennae and sniffles.

“They’re not gone forever.” I glared at my wrist. “They’ll be back before you know it.”

“Promise?”

“I swear it.” Asa was going to remove this bracelet, and then I would strangle him with it. “So, Marie?”

“You’ll still take me?” Her expression brightened. “Even though Clay and Asa aren’t here?”

“Now you’ve got me craving chocolate.” I rubbed my stomach. “You only have yourself to blame.”

“I found the perfect dress.” She shot toward her rig. “Let me grab the link.”

While she skimmed open tabs, I sent Arden and Camber flowers and balloons from the hospital gift shop. It was the least I could do since visiting hours were over for the day. I would have to drop in tomorrow.

An unknown number lit up my phone’s screen, and I stepped onto the porch to take the call. “Hello?”

“I understand congratulations are in order.”

Gooseflesh raced down my arms. “How good of you to call, Director Nádasdy.”

“Please,” he said, all jovial good cheer, “call me Grandfather.”

“I would rather not call you anything.”

A tense silence hung between us, in which I heard the layers peeling back to reveal what lay beneath.

“Elspeth, I have been more than generous in my dealings with you.”

“You were very generous with your cane when I was younger.”

More of his façade crumbled in the quiet. I heard it in the uptick in his breathing.

“I sent it,” Colby called out behind me. “Did you see?”

I mashed the mute button, but I was too slow, and the director chuckled into the receiver.

“Colby Timms, I presume.” His laughter reminded me of the rustle of old bones. “Tell her I said hello.”

Fingers trembling to hear her name on his withered lips, I ended the call and blocked the number.

“Are you okay?” Colby lit on my shoulder. “Who was that?”

“Wrong number.” I cleared my throat. “Let me get my kit, and we’ll get glamoured up, okay?”

Butting against my jaw, she rubbed her furry head on me in a comforting gesture. “Okay.”

I dropped her in the kitchen then headed to my room for supplies. I paused when I noticed the grimoire. I had left it under my pillow. Now it sat in the middle of the bed. I doubted Colby would touch it, and we were alone in the house. As I perched on the edge of the mattress, recalling the director’s quiet menace, I was tempted, so tempted, to crack open the book penned in hate to discover answers to my problems.

“I’m not going to use you,” I told it, and myself. “The information on Colby is all that interests me.”

The grimoire sat there, emanating blackest magic, but it gave no outward indication of sentience.

“I’m glad we got that settled.”

The cover left my palms tingling when I lifted it and carried it to my closet to a magically insulated safe.

As I secured the grimoire in with other dark artifacts in my macabre collection of relics too dangerous to entrust into others’ care, I reflected on Asa’s comment about me punishing myself. Maybe he was right. Maybe I had to hurt, to crave, to hunger, in order to keep myself strong enough to resist temptation.

And resist I did.

I might be a Black Hat again, but I was still a white witch.