Black Hat, White Witch by Hailey Edwards

6

After Colby fell asleep in her faux-forest bedroom, I retreated into mine to scry for legal help.

Cross-legged on the bed, I sat with a mixing bowl cradled between my thighs. A drop of blood got the party started, and I dialed, for lack of a better word, an old friend from beyond the veil. With Halloween around the corner, the connection ought to be crystal clear.

“Megara, I summon thee.” More blood, more intent. “Megara, I summon thee.”

The stubborn wench refused to show until I jumped through all the hoops, which probably explained why she was aces with contracts.

“Thrice I bid thee.” Even more blood, even more intent. “And thrice I tithe thee.”

I ran a fingertip along the edge of the bowl, and the water rippled, darkened, swirled in a mini whirlpool.

“Hear me,” I called in a resonate voice. “Arise.”

A face appeared wreathed in smoke, not from theatrics, but from the cigarette hanging from her bottom lip. I had baked bread pudding with raisins that had fewer wrinkles than Meg, but I wouldn’t accept legal advice from a dessert, no matter how delicious it might be. Meg, on the other hand, had practiced law in one form or another for a good three hundred years before she took a silver bullet to the heart.

“Your form is rusty, darling,” she chided in a deep rasp. “How long has it been?”

“Eight years.” I squirmed under her disapproval. “Time flies when you’re having fun.”

“Fun?” Her eyes, hidden beneath folds of papery skin, narrowed on me. “You’re having fun?”

“Not particularly?”

“Oh, but you are.” She sat back. “Your cheeks are flush, your eyes are bright, and your heart is racing.”

“You can’t tell that last part.”

“Let’s call it an educated guess.” She glanced at the bed behind me. “Where is he?”

“Who?”

“The man who put that glow about you.”

“There is no man.” I hesitated. “Actually, there is a man. Sort of.”

“Mmm-hmm.” Her lips spread, lipstick spiking the creases. “Tell me all about him.”

“It’s Clay.”

“Darling, no.” She shook her cigarette at me. “He’s a good boy, don’t get me wrong, but he’s…”

“Not anatomically correct?”

“Precisely.”

I could have educated her on how that didn’t slow him down from pursuing his interests, but I was afraid tiny ears might overhear. I did not want to explain the battery-operated birds and the bees to a moth.

“Black Hat found me.” I redirected her. “They want me back.”

“They never let you go,” she said sadly. “Albert would rather die than part with you.”

The director’s name wasn’t spoken, to avoid drawing his attention, but the veil was beyond even his reach.

“I negotiated the terms of my return with the agents they sent after me. I have a contract.”

“I will have to charge my standard fee, you understand, but I can look over it now if you like.”

“That’s more than fair.”

The transfer of one thousand dollars to her former pack’s alpha went through in seconds, and I held the screen up as proof. That she chose to help the loved ones she left behind made me happy to contribute.

“Okay.” She settled in on her side of the divide. “Get your pen and paper ready then start reading.”

The biggest downside with using a deceased lawyer was the time commitment.

Meg couldn’t very well reach through the ether and accept a printed copy, so I had to read and notate. I got a discount for having to play paralegal for her, for which I was grateful, but it meant I wouldn’t sleep much tonight. Not that sleep and I were on a first-name basis these days. Or ever, really.

There was a soothing rhythm to the collaborative process, but that came from years of working together anytime I got twitchy about papers I was asked to sign.

I hadn’t met Meg while she was alive, though she had been friends with my mother. We met when she executed my parents’ wills from the beyond, and it hurt too much to surrender that link when I would never see them again.

Black witches have no afterlife. We simply stop. Here one day, gone forever the next.

I had been taught that we consumed so much life on this side of the veil we ate through our afterlives.

I wasn’t sure what I believed. If I believed anything at all. It hadn’t bothered me, none of it, until Colby.

Not even when Mom, a powerful white witch, failed to appear no matter how often I scried for her.

Six hours later, I squinted at words as they swam across the page, ready to sign anything to get sleep.

“That ought to do it.” Megara took a puff. “Let me know if you need more assistance.”

“I will.” I yawned. “Thanks.”

“I wasn’t wrong about your glow.” She blew smoke against her side of the barrier. “I mistook its origin.”

The safest response I could manage was, “Oh?”

“The thrill of the hunt.” Her eyes gleamed with approval. “Your predatory nature is awakening.”

“That’s the last thing I want.” I studied the notes spread around me. “I don’t want to regress.”

“Your mother ran with our pack on the full moon.” She laughed at the memory. “Naked as a jaybird.”

That woke me up with a cringe. “What did Dad think of that?”

“This was before your father tamed some of her wildness.” She curled her lip. “The point is, you are your mother’s daughter. You’ll always have her fierce spirit. Your father was a good man.” She rolled a hand. “As far as black witches go.” She shook her head. “I can’t blame him for falling in love with her. What she saw in him? That, I’ll never know, but God as my witness, she loved him more than anything. Until you.”

“I have to walk a path that doesn’t haunt me for the rest of my life.”

Curling smoke cast shadows onto her features. “I know, darling.”

“This contract is as good as it gets for people like me.”

“It’s a breadcrumb.” Her mouth pinched. “Follow that path, and you know where it leads.”

Right back to the loaf. Or maybe the bakery? One or the other.

“Clay says they’ve got a Silver Stag copycat. He—or she—is taking young girls in groups of four.”

“Albert couldn’t have baited his hook better if he cut them to chum the waters himself.”

That painted a vivid mental picture I wouldn’t soon forget. “Do you think he’s involved?”

“No,” she sighed her disappointment. “Black Hat’s reputation for training monsters to hunt their own is his legacy. He would never tarnish the Bureau’s reputation and would kill to keep its record spotless.”

“I’m going to finish this counteroffer then crash.” I rubbed itchy eyes. “Thanks for your help.”

“Next time, dial me up for a chat.” She flicked ash off her cigarette. “It doesn’t have to be all business.”

“I will,” I promised, and I meant it. “Night, Megara.”

“Good night, darling.”

Careful not to spill water on my bed, I carried the mixing bowl to the bathroom to pour down the drain.

Leave a metaphysical doorway open and who knew what might drift through it. The same rules applied to scrying. People who wielded black magic didn’t live long if they got sloppy with it.

With the bowl drained, washed, and set on the sink to dry, I climbed back into bed to organize my notes.

An hour later, I was happy to scan the pages with my phone and email them to Asa to hand up the chain.

So close to dawn, I didn’t expect an immediate response from him, but I got one.

A text.

>>I apologize for my behavior.

As much as I would love to claim I fired off a quip about how he always seemed to be apologizing to me, I debated how to answer until I fell asleep.

* * *

Morning cameseconds after my head hit the pillow. That was how it felt, anyway. I strangled my phone, which was bleating its usual time for work alarm, until it shut up and left me alone.

“Hey.”

The tiny whisper almost brought tears to my eyes. I did not want to get out of bed yet.

“Hey, Rue.”

Maybe if I ignored it, it would go away.

“The daemon from last night is on our porch.”

That did it.

My eyes flew open, my heart lodged in my throat, and my feet swung over the edge of the bed.

“Wards?” I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. “Breach?”

Soft feet tickled up my leg until a guilty-looking moth sat on my lap. “I lied about the daemon.”

The starch went out of me, and I fell back, but the adrenaline churning in my veins refused to quit.

“He’s not on the porch,” she continued, climbing up my stomach to sit on my chest. “He’s in the yard.”

“Why?” I wasn’t sure if I was asking her about Asa, or the universe about why I was awake, or why she was attempting to give me a heart attack.

“He was there when I woke up this morning. Not daemon-Asa. Just regular Asa.” She stared down at me. “And before you fuss, I’ve been calling your name forever, and I really need to get back to my game.”

The downside of my brand of insomnia was when I finally did fall sleep, I was dead to the world. That explained why I didn’t rouse when she called my name. It had nothing to do with my subconscious perking up at learning Asa was right outside.

None of which sounded great for my peace of mind. “Clay?”

“I haven’t seen him.”

Eyes sliding closed, I mumbled, “I’ll handle it.”

Colby pounced on my gut, knocking the wind out of me, then zipped out the door in a blur.

“That was cruel,” I wheezed after her, “and horrible and plain mean.”

“I had to make sure you didn’t roll over and go back to sleep.”

“For that, no high-speed internet for a month. It’s dial-up for you.”

Popping her head around the doorframe, she quivered her antennae. “What’s dial-up?”

“Leave.” I flicked my hand at her. “Your youth disgusts me.”

A quick check confirmed that nope, I hadn’t taken off yesterday’s clothes.

Grit in my eyes and tangles in my hair, I padded through the house until I stood on the front porch.

Asa leaned against a tree, whittling a stick he no doubt found in my yard.

For no good reason, that irked me. “Can I help you?”

He wore his standard Bureau-issued suit that made me hot looking at him.

Not like hot-hot, I meant sweaty. Not like good-sex sweaty, just regular sweaty.

And gods above, could I see him once and not have dirty thoughts?

“I came for your signature.” He straightened from his lean. “We got a phone call.”

That first day, Clay told me the copycat killer phoned in his crimes after he committed them.

A heavy weight pressed on my chest, a question of whether I could have made a difference to these girls if I had been less invested in protecting Colby, and myself. But one thing life had taught me was that you had to take care of you. No one else would do it for you.

This was not my fault. These deaths were not on my head.

But the next time, and there would be a next time and a next until we stopped him, it might be.

IfI didn’t sign away my soul, I might cost someone else theirs.

Foursomeones.

There was only one response I could live with, assuming the amendments held. “Do you have a pen?”

“Yes.” He exchanged his knife for a pen and stuck his carving in the dirt. “I’ll get the papers.”

A faded blanket was spread across the ground behind him, its earth tones too muted for me to notice at first.

The file holding the contract rested in the center, along with a thermos I bet was filled with black coffee.

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask if he had spent the night out here, but he was too fresh for that. He had returned his hair to its usual long braids and traded his oval earrings for dainty silver hoops to match the one in his nose. Dainty wasn’t the right word, but I was staring again, and I couldn’t get my brain or vocabulary to function.

“Where’s Clay?” I scanned the driveway, but there was no sign of him. “How did you get here?”

Last night, I waited until after the tow truck left with its passengers before summoning Megara.

Between then and now, Clay would have secured them transportation. Either a rental or a company SUV could have been delivered, even this far out in the sticks.

“I went hunting last night.” He retrieved the folder. “I shouldn’t have left it so long. It caused me to…”

“…get territorial?”

“Yes.” He held out the papers with the pen on top. “I apologize for my behavior.”

Last night came back to me in a rush, and I let myself out of the gate. “Your text.”

“It was cowardly of me not to apologize in person.”

The reason I got rolled out of bed came back too. “Is that why you felt the need to stake out my yard?”

“Yes,” he said with enough hesitation I doubted it was his only reason.

“I got your text, but I was up late working on the contract. I fell asleep before I could respond.”

The contract was the exact version Megara and I drafted, and it was already signed by the director at the bottom.

“I’ll run in and sign this at the table.” I nudged open the gate. “Can I get you anything?”

“No.” He crouched, retrieved his stick, and resumed his whittling. “Thank you.”

No surprise, Colby met me at the door and trailed me to the kitchen table.

Palms spreading over the stack, I murmured a soft chant that would verify my assumption.

“The contract is identical.” Not so much as a punctuation mark had been corrected. “That’s good.”

“Then why are you scowling at it?” Colby sat on the papers. “You don’t have to do this, you know.”

For me.

She left that part unspoken.

“Life is about compromise.” I scratched her head. “I do this, and we get to keep our life here.”

“We could run again.” She patted my hand with a foot. “We could buy another house, right?”

“I’ve spent a stupid amount of money Colby-sizing your game room. I’m not leaving it behind.”

That was only part of the truth, and she knew it, but she didn’t want to make this about her.

How much she recalled of her ordeal, I couldn’t say, and she wouldn’t tell me. She preferred to pretend I found her wild and tamed her. It hurt less than remembering she had been a little girl once, with parents and a family and a dog.

I collected pictures of them off social media and printed them to hang on her walls when she first came to live with me, but I found them balled up in the garbage. I tried again each time we moved, but I was starting to believe my need to fix unfixable things where she was concerned was more for me than her.

“I heard Megara.” She rolled the pen back and forth. “You do seem happier.”

“I missed Clay.” I couldn’t say his name without smiling. “I didn’t realize how much.”

“It’s hard hiding who and what you are from your friends.” Her antennae swiveled. “It’s like, okay, they’re your friends, but would they still be your friends if they knew the real you?”

This wasn’t about me, not really, but that was the safest way to address the answer.

“Sometimes the face you show one person might not be what another one sees. Our friends share our interests, but not all our interests. It’s okay to have different ones for different things. That a person only knows one side of you doesn’t make them any less your friend.”

“No one here knows you’re a witch,” she said thoughtfully, “so Clay is your witch-stuff friend.”

“Exactly.” I let her mull over that. “The relationship I have with him isn’t like the one I have with Arden and Camber. They have different hobbies than he does.” I poked her side. “Like viral food videos and cute boys.”

Antennae quivering, she stared up at me with big, round eyes. “What’s our thing?”

“Everything.” I kissed the top her head. “It’s hard hiding secrets from your roomie.”

Happiness twitching in her wings, she scooted off the contract. “You going to sign or what?”

After I signed my life away, I sat back, half expecting my soul to be contractually ripped from my body.

Nothing happened.

Either because I was overly dramatic or had no soul or maybe both.

The stack of papers shimmered under my hand. It was the only warning I got before they disappeared.

“Whoa.” Colby walked a circle where they had been. “Where did they go?”

A sour taste hit the back of my throat. “Straight to the director’s desk.”

Much like the mythical Satan, he was the final word on all binding contracts.

“That’s so cool.” A shiver worked through her. “You’re a witch and all, but you never do witchy stuff.”

“You’re just mad because I refused to enchant the kitchen to bake for you on command.”

Rainbows and kittens might as well have burst from her eyes as she rounded them for full effect.

“I would blow things up less if you did…”

“Are you trying to tell me you blow things up on purpose, so I’ll cave to your demands?”

A heartbeat passed as I watched the calculations run behind her eyes. “Gotta go.”

Quick as a flash, she kicked off the table and zoomed back into her game room.

“Spoiled brat,” I grumbled loud enough for her to hear. “No respect for your elders.”

The weight of the pen in my hand brought my attention back to who waited for me.

I had done the deed. Signed my name. Accepted my fate. And maybe, I would do some good.

I was a willing employee, as willing as any Black Hat, and it was time to pay the piper.

“I’m going to talk to Asa,” I called, figuring she was already plugged in. “Stay inside the wards.”

He met me at the gate, and it was silly to be more comfortable with the ward between us when I just did the unthinkable by returning to Black Hat, which entailed a formal agreement to work with Clay and Asa.

“It’s done.” I worried one of the claw marks I would have to repair later. “I’m official.”

The peridot of his eyes was eclipsed by burnt crimson for a split second. “I’ll send the case files then.”

“Clay’s still not here?” I checked the road, but I could see it was clear for miles. “Where is he?”

“At the hotel.” He examined the claw marks too, or maybe the tips of my fingers. “I put him in stasis last night while the enchantment repaired the damage from the dryad.”

“He hates that.” I couldn’t blame him. “How much longer does he have?”

For Clay, he could still hear and see what happened around him. He was paralyzed, not sleeping.

“I’m going to head back now.” He backed up a step. “You have my number if you have any questions.”

“You’re going to walk back?” The sun was up now, and so were my neighbors. “The whole way?”

“Yes?” He canted his head. “I walked out here. Ran, actually.”

Groggy from my wakeup, I missed the big picture earlier. “You hunted in my backyard?”

“Your yard is warded.” He smiled the tiniest bit. “I hunted in your neighbor’s yard.”

“This isn’t going to be a problem, is it?” I gestured between us. “Whatever this is.”

Without answering me, he turned on his heel to go, with that pleased-as-pie look on his face.

He made it to the end of my driveway before I caved to my better nature.

“Wait,” I called to him. “I’ll drive you.”

Rushing inside, I changed clothes and pulled up my hair. “Colby, I’m heading to work.”

No answer.

No surprise there.

I scribbled a note that said the same and stuck it to the pantry where I kept her pollen.

Asa waited for me with one hand in his pocket. When I rolled to a stop beside him, he made no move to get in. I stared at him. He stared right back. I considered driving over his foot. He only widened his smile.

Giving in to him, a dangerous habit to start, I leaned across the seat and shoved open his door.

“You are one weird dude.” I strapped on my seat belt. “Why did you stand there?”

“You had to invite me in.”

A laugh burst out of me. “Are you serious?”

“No.” He laughed too, softer. “I was teasing.”

After the drama from yesterday, he was trying to make amends. I appreciated that, and I decided I might not want to beat him to death with his own shoe after all. Daemon culture wasn’t a subject I had studied with my parents or later, with Black Hat, though some witches specialized in summoning the nastier ones.

From my general studies, I couldn’t peg Asa’s caste. He didn’t behave like any daemon mentioned in the darker texts that had been my focus. Maybe his fae blood was to blame. I wasn’t sure, and it was rude to ask. Worse, it would open me up to questions like So, were you born evil, or did you choose to be?

For a black witch, there was only one answer. For me? I wasn’t so sure anymore.

The radio kept us entertained on the way to town, and I dropped Asa off at his hotel to free Clay.

As much as I hated to abandon my store, I didn’t have much choice. I couldn’t balance both jobs without dropping one or the other, and the case had to be my priority. I had my speech planned out when Arden glanced up from the counter and pointed to voices coming from the back room.

I followed the conversation to Miss Dotha, who sat behind my desk. Hunched over my desktop, Camber beside her, she had started filling online orders that needed to go out on our next mail drop. Her glasses had slid to the end of her nose, which almost touched the screen, but her cheeks were flush with purpose.

Miss Dotha, being farsighted, had no trouble spotting me across the room. “What are you doing here?”

“I work here?”

Camber snorted then straightened when Miss Dotha gave her side-eye. “Why aren’t you on vacation?”

While the girls believed I was helping the police put my abusive ex behind bars, Miss Dotha, and the rest of the town, got the much more vanilla excuse of me taking a trip to the mountains.

“I came to break the news to the girls.” I smoothed an eyebrow. “I see you have things under control.”

“Gran told me you called her to set things up,” Camber confessed, “and I told Arden.”

The phone tree was a real thing in this town. Probably everyone and their momma knew I was leaving.

“Was there something else?” Miss Dotha resumed her hunch. “I’m on the clock here.”

“No, ma’am.” I meekly backed out of the office—my office—and bumped into the counter. “Have fun.”

“She’s not so bad.” Arden straightened the flyers I knocked askew. “But also, please, come back soon.”

Laughing at her darted glances toward the back room, I left her to fend for herself. Miss Dotha might as well be a blood relative, as much time as the girls spent together. Arden loved her, even if Miss Dotha could be prickly.

The store hadn’t taken any time at all, so I popped into the smoothie shop to get my breakfast of choice. I hesitated but then decided to get Asa the same thing. I chose the daily specials for Clay, who would eat or drink anything you set in front of him. One of each. Both large.

When my order came up, I scratched an R in the foam near the bottom of my cup with a thumbnail. I felt ten kinds of stupid but also eaten up with curiosity. I had to know if I was off my rocker, and this was an eight-dollar sanity check. Not that it explained why he may or may not be playing switcheroo with me.

Armed with breakfast, I returned to the hotel for a debriefing and to dig into the files in person.

Negotiations had cost us time, but I couldn’t regret the precautions I had taken for Colby and me.

Clay met me at the door with a scowl I recognized as him shaking off the sedative effect of self-repair.

“Maybe this will help.” I passed him the first of his drinks. “Blueberry banana with granola.”

“Thanks.” He gestured me into their suite. “Don’t mind if I do.”

Asa sat at the table that was the reason for the suite, in my experience, with papers strewn about him.

“I got you my usual.” I presented him with the cup. “You seemed to like it well enough yesterday.”

“Thank you.” He accepted the offering then kicked the leg of the chair across from him to push it out for me. “I didn’t expect you to finish your errands so soon.”

“The problem with hiring good people and training them well is they don’t need you.” I placed my cup five or six inches from his, on my side of the table, then did my level best to ignore it. “I have a few things for Colby to do, but nothing major. I can be ready to leave from home within an hour.”

“You’re leaving Colby?” Clay traded out for his second drink. “Will she be okay with that?”

The alternative, parading her around in front of my fellow Black Hats, wasn’t happening.

Humans might mistake her for a hair bow, but other paranormals would sense her magic and salivate.

“Colby is safer at home than she would be with me on the road.”

Before we moved in, I warded the house like a fortress in case Black Hat caught up to us at home. Colby knew her way around our property. There were thirteen moth-sized emergency shelters, each six-inches square and protected by individual wards, in case the worst happened.

The target was on my back, which gave Colby an excellent chance of escaping while in her smallest form.

“She’s your ward.” Asa spread his hands. “You know best.”

Until he mentioned it, I hadn’t noticed how hard I was silently daring him to claim it was a bad idea. But that was my insecurities talking. I had done my best. I had planned for the worst. Now we tested it.

“I’m worried.” I sipped my smoothie. “I can’t put her in my pocket and carry her everywhere I go.”

Life would be simpler for me, but she wouldn’t really be living, and that was the whole point of all this.

Clay sat on the bed, a safer bet than the spindly chairs. “How much does she remember?”

“All of it.” I took another sip to wet my parched throat. “She won’t talk about it, but it’s in there.”

The burnt-black eyes of Asa’s daemon stared out at me. “Only a true monster preys on children.”

Monsterhad so many definitions. I didn’t disagree with his, but mine must be broader.

“Talk to me about the phone calls.” I accepted the bulky file from him. “You heard from the killer this morning?”

“The lead team did, yes.” Clay shifted his weight on the bed, much to the unhappiness of its springs. “He dialed up Marty at eight this morning, same time as usual, and gave him the coordinates for the herd.”

The herd.

A shiver tripped down my spine at the familiar nickname for the Silver Stag victims.

“That’s new.” I skimmed the first page. A more in-depth read would have to wait. “The Silver Stag left his victims where they fell. He lost interest after he killed them. They ceased to exist for him.”

I had met cold eyes in the mirror every morning back then, but his had been arctic. Barren. Empty.

“The copycat is making a production of their deaths.” I reached the first picture and fully grasped how much I had changed since leaving Black Hat. “He’s arranging the bodies.” I flipped to the next. “This scene is staged.” And then the next. “He cares more about the death than the hunt.”

“That’s what our profiler says too.” Asa leaned forward, elbows on the table. “What else?”

“I’m not sure this is a copycat.” I smoothed a thumb over the last photo. “What made the director so sure?”

“We’ll have to fly to Asheville if you want to see for yourself.”

The last thing I wanted to see was another set of victims like the previous ones. Those still haunted me.

“All right.” I shut the file. “Pick me up in an hour.” I got to my feet. “I’ll read on the plane.”

Memorization was a cornerstone of teaching for witches. A dud spell often equaled a dead witch. I was a dab hand at cramming relevant information into my brain, where it lingered until my head hit the pillow.

Smoothie in hand, I exited the hotel, got in my car, and drove home.

Only when I sat in the safety of my own driveway did I check the cup for my initial.

There was no R to be found.

Now I had proof of shenanigans, but what did it mean? And why did it make me want to pay him back? With interest?