Black Hat, White Witch by Hailey Edwards

7

The bulk of my prep work was done as far as Colby was concerned, for which I was grateful. I kept her six months’ worth of pollen in the pantry, along with enough sugar to put the whole town in a sugar coma. I wasn’t a fan of her mixing sugar water herself, so I filled a bathtub with scalding water and created a huge batch in there. After sterilizing it. Magically. Colby might be a moth, but she had standards.

The go bag I kept ready would do me in a pinch, but it had become a comfort object of sorts. I decided to leave it and pack a suitcase for a week. I refused to be apart from Colby longer than that. If I had to drop in to grab fresh clothes and a hug, then go, I was fine with that.

“The wards are dialed up to the max.” I checked to be sure I had everything. “There’s food in the pantry. Sugar water’s in the tub. There are snacks in the cabinet.” I opened my arms and let her fly to me. “Be a good girl, and don’t spend the next seven days with your nose pressed to the screen. Get some fresh air.”

Left to her own devices, she might never take off her headset or vacate her custom chair.

“I will,” she said dutifully, but I don’t think either of us believed her.

After she fluttered off with an extra shake in her butt I didn’t trust, I wheeled my suitcase onto the porch.

I didn’t have to wait long for Clay and Asa to arrive in a different, but identical, SUV.

The rear passenger door swung open before the vehicle stopped rolling, and Clay popped out with a bounce in his step and a swing in his chin-length red hair.

“There she is,” he boomed, slapping his hands together. “Good to have you back, partner.” He winced. “I mean, former partner and current teammate.” He eyed my bag. “Still packing light, huh? Good deal.”

Less luggage gave him more room to play Tetris with his wig boxes.

“You’re good to go?” He jerked his chin toward the house. “I don’t want to rush you.”

But he ought to, given the stakes of the game I was once again playing.

“Colby is set.” I lifted my bag. “Can you open the back?”

Asa, who had been sitting behind the wheel seconds earlier, opened it for me. “I’ll take it.”

“Okay.” I handed it over, not caring who hefted it in there. The spell kit was what mattered, and I was wearing it. “Thanks.”

When I stepped back, I bumped into Clay, who locked gazes with Asa over my head. He waited until the daemon was in the SUV, with the doors shut, to frown down at me. There was nothing he could say that Asa wouldn’t overhear, which meant he kept his mouth shut, but his eyes said plenty.

Granted, I didn’t have the metric Clay did, but I wasn’t the only one noticing Asa’s peculiar behavior.

Ever the gentleman, Clay escorted me to the front passenger side and opened the door. I hopped in with a reassuring smile for him. He was such a softy and fretted worse than a mother hen for those he loved.

Pretty sure he broke speed records climbing in behind me, the angle better to keep an eye on Asa.

To keep tensions to a minimum until we found our equilibrium as a unit, I settled in to read the files. We had a long drive and a longer flight ahead of us. I wanted to be current when we hit the ground. I was in this now, fully committed, and—with Colby safe at home—I could throw myself headlong into the case.

As much as I wished Megara was wrong about how the hunt got my blood pumping, I couldn’t deny part of me had missed this camaraderie with those who understood, or at least appreciated, my struggle. The life I built for Colby and me was uncomplicated, downright wholesome, and everything my battered soul had craved for so long. But this…this felt right too.

Maybe I was wrong.

Maybe black and white weren’t the only options.

Maybe, just maybe, gray areas did exist for people like me.

* * *

We touched down in Asheville,claimed our new company ride, and drove to the scene of the crime.

Case details churned through my head, mixing with memories of the Silver Stag Slayings.

I had yet to see the bodies, but I already didn’t like this.

“Hold on.” Asa took a narrow road that led straight up, forcing our SUV to work for it. “Almost there.”

The oh crap handle was cutting grooves into my palm by the time we leveled off, high above the trees.

Four identical black SUVs crowded a patch of raw earth exposed from a clearcutting in progress.

“We’ve got company.” Clay whistled from the back. “Four teams.” He leaned forward. “Plus us.”

That was excessive, even by Black Hat standards. Yet it sent relief cascading through me. The director was in a bind if he was allocating these types of resources to a single case. That made my reclassification less a personal matter and more a professional decision. That I could handle better than the alternative.

“Marty’s been lead on this, but that changes now that you’re here.” Clay clasped my shoulder. “We’re about to relieve him of his command.” He squeezed. “Just like old times.”

Not half as excited as him to butt heads with former coworkers, I cringed from his enthusiasm. “He’s going to love that.”

Marty Talbot hated me. He used to call me the director’s pet. I had been more like a caged animal.

He probably threw an office party the day I vanished and invited all his favorite haters to attend.

Asa wedged the SUV in the only open space available, and we piled out into the muck to wade in.

The woods began again less than a dozen yards from our makeshift parking lot, the trees mostly pines. It was beautiful up here, peaceful, and part of me understood why the killer had chosen it as his hunting ground.

That predatory sense was the reason why I was here, just as much as my experience with the Silver Stag.

Four or five agents had gathered around a small stream. The rest stood as far away as they could get.

“Clay.” One of the queasier agents, a warg from the looks of him, had spotted a lifeline. “Good to see you, man.”

“Hey, Billy.” He shook hands with him. “How’d you end up here?”

“I go where I’m told.” He jerked his chin toward a man standing near the water. “You know how it is.”

“I do.” He waved to one of what must be the senior agents. “We better get in there.”

While I had been kept isolated from other agents, for the most part, Clay had been a Black Hat forever. He knew everyone, and everyone knew him. He was a walking Bureau roster, which came in handy.

“Sure thing.” He leaned around Clay to better see me. “I’m Billy Kidd, by the way.”

“Rue Hollis.” I declined the hand he offered me. “The bodies are over there?”

“Yeah.” To save face, he raked that same hand through his hair. “It’s brutal.”

“I can handle it.”

Eager as a puppy to please, he kept chatting. “What do you think they’ll call this guy?”

“Copycat.” I watched his face fall. “He doesn’t deserve more recognition than that.”

No serial killers deserved glorified monikers that praised and popularized their depravity.

Clay hung back to check on the other guys, who were all green around the gills, but Asa followed me.

“You two didn’t exchange pleasantries.” I cut him a look. “You’re not a team player?”

“The others are afraid of me,” he said matter-of-factly. “It’s easier if they pretend they can’t see me.”

“Those sweet, sweet children,” I crooned in my best wicked witch voice. “Raised to believe if they ignore the monster under their bed, it won’t get them.” I smiled at him. “I don’t care if their eyes are shut when I grab their ankles, do you?”

Lumping us together smoothed a subtle tension from his shoulders I hadn’t noticed he carried until now.

“I thought you were dead.” My old nemesis swept his gaze over me. “What are you doing here?”

“Same as you, Marty.” I kept a pleasant expression on my face. “I’m working this case.”

“I thought the only way out of Black Hat was in a pine box.”

“That’s what you get for thinking,” I said sweetly. “Do you mind? I’m here to do a job.”

The other senior agents struck me as vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t put a name to them. They took their cues from Marty and gave me dead-eye stares that dared me to get in their way.

Asa they ignored as if he weren’t standing at my elbow, which blew my mind.

Just because I was a girl, I was less scary? Really? I mean, I wasn’t all that scary now, but I used to be.

“Báthory,” one of the guys breathed as his eyes rounded to the size of softballs.

The others flinched at the name and took a healthy step back, reminding me of the good old days when I struck terror into the hearts of my coworkers. Except those days weren’t all that great. It felt that way at the time, but the true high came from using black magic. I had to admit, I didn’t miss people being afraid of me.

Much.

“I would prefer you never speak that name within my hearing again,” I said coolly. “Step aside, please.”

Between Mr. Big Mouth blabbing my surname, and the bomb Clay would drop on their heads about who was now in charge, I doubted we’d hear another peep from the agents for the duration of the case. They would open the emails from us as lead team, file their paperwork to look good for the director, but sit in their hotel rooms watching porn or sports, eating pizza, and waiting for their free ride to be over.

The agents scattered before I got within touching distance, and I got my first look at the crime scene.

A narrow but deep creek ran through its center, and the victims had been posed on a rocky outcropping. I was glad for Clay’s suggestion I pack waders. They had saved me on the muddy hike down and would keep me dry while I conducted my examination.

The single similarity, as far as I could tell, between this killer and the Silver Stag was right in front of me.

The Stag had chosen fae girls between the ages of ten and eighteen, with healthy amounts of magic. The transformative spell was easier for him to cast and more likely to stick that way. He preferred his victims on four legs rather than two, and he had a thing for deer. Each time he completed a herd of four, he let them go. That is to say, he unpenned them. Then he hunted them down with a crossbow.

The Stag had been a black witch, but he practiced a type of magic even my ancestors found distasteful.

Rather than eating hearts to increase his power, he consumed souls.

To transform the girls, he drew their essence to the surface and fashioned the shape he wanted from it. The end result was a silvery-white spectral animal of his choosing. And when he pierced its heart with a silver-tipped arrow, the spirit parted from the flesh, allowing him to inhale it using a thrice-cursed spell.

These girls were still deer, their fur still white, and magic had frozen a tableau straight out of a painting.

A Spring Creek, the artist might name it, to highlight the vitality of the flowers on the shore and the rush of water that lent the arrangement a sense of movement. Even their eyes gleamed, bright and alert.

There were no wounds, defensive or otherwise, on the deer. They appeared well-fed, with sleek coats. It occurred to me he might have brushed them postmortem. He had taken care of the herd, but I wasn’t as convinced he had hunted them. In addition to the cleanliness of their fur, no mud caked their hooves. The creek explained how the killer washed them but not how he got them here.

The average whitetail doe weighed about a hundred pounds, and that was the nearest comparison here.

“The killer had to lift each deer individually and pose them,” I murmured. “That was after the hunt.”

“Yes,” Asa said, startling me.

Lost in deciphering the grim scene, I hadn’t noticed him follow me into the creek. “He’s strong.”

Even if he carried them in versus flushed them out, what he had done required great physical strength.

“Powerful too.” I curled my fingers into my palm to keep from touching the nearest lifelike deer to taste the dark magic trapped like dander in her fur. “The MO is different, flashier—the copycat wants us to find his work and admire it—but the manner of death…” I could see why they wanted my opinion. “These girls were transformed using the same magic, if not the same spell the Silver Stag used, and their souls were consumed as well.”

Four girls had been taken, according to the report, but I only counted three deer.

“Where’s number four?” I raised my voice to include Asa. “The file didn’t indicate one was missing.”

“You won’t get a word out of Agent Montenegro.” Billy had worked up the nerve to approach me without Clay. “He’s the strong, silent type.”

Asa wasn’t the only one who got protective of his teammates. “What does that make you?”

“The opposite?” He ruffled his short hair. “I heard you ask about the fourth girl.”

Most everyone here came with supernatural hearing, so it came as no surprise they were listening in.

Still annoyed for the slight to Asa, I stared a hole through the warg. “And?”

“Her remains were found in a meat processing plant down the road.” He swallowed hard. “Ma’am.”

“That’s not part of his ritual.” I would have remembered that gory detail. “This is the first time.”

And the killer was male, that much I could tell from his magical signature.

“This is a heavily hunted area,” Kidd ventured. “A hunter might have just taken a statue.”

“They’re not statues.” I smoothed the bite in my voice. “They’re victims. Not lawn art.”

“Cut him some slack.” Clay’s wide hands landed on my shoulders. “He’s still learning to cope.”

Humor did it for some people. Dissociation worked for others. This guy had chosen door number two.

As young as he looked, he had been with Black Hat longer than Asa’s seven years to not be the newbie.

“If you figure it out,” I told Kidd, “you let me know.”

The agent, braver with Clay present, spilled the rest of the details.

“The owner came in to work this morning and found a mound of ground meat left half in the grinder. He was pissed off thinking his son got drunk and went hunting with his ‘crazy ass wife.’ But when he started cleaning up the mess, he noticed bone showing through. He went to scoop it in the trash and ended up palming a human skull packed in ground meat like one of those giant burgers with melting cheese centers.”

“The killer involved humans.” A story like that would grow legs. “That explains the number of agents.”

The director wanted this killer stopped before he made a public exhibition of his art.

“He’s escalating,” Clay agreed. “The director won’t let this stand.”

“He consumes their souls.” Asa watched water run over his boots. “Do you think he’s eating their flesh too?”

“I doubt it.” I studied the deer again. “There’s no artistry in how those remains were found.”

Steaks cut with the precision of a master butcher then wrapped in paper and tied with twine. I could see that. Neat stacks in the fridge, fresh and ready for pickup, a name in bold, black marker. That fit the theme too.

With a slap on the back, Clay sent the agent away. “Black witches don’t practice both disciplines, right?”

“You’re either cridhe or anam.” A heart eater or a soul eater. “Eat the heart at its freshest and most powerful, and the soul ascends before you contain it. Consume the entire soul, and the heart is cold when you’re done. Most, if not all, of its magic has dissipated by then.” Aware it cast a spotlight on me, I told them the rest. “That’s not to say a witch can’t supplement his or her diet for a power boost outside their norm. Some do, some don’t. Some flip back and forth, like vegetarians to veganism.”

“I never thought I would hear eating hearts compared to eating hearts of romaine.”

Knowledge of the black arts was a reason, not the reason, I had been hunted down and bribed to return. I had an inkling of what the other or others might be, but I had a contract to protect me from the worst of my suspicions.

“The processor was for show,” I decided. “A human skull, right? The fourth girl wasn’t transformed.”

“We won’t know until we receive the autopsy results.” Asa lifted his head. “Dr. Lennon has to determine if the remains were fae, then crosscheck the skull DNA against the ground meat. If it’s a match, she has to run tests to compare those results with the samples we have on file for the fourth girl.”

“This part of the job hasn’t changed while I was away, huh? It’s waiting, waiting, and more waiting.”

“The results come quicker now.” Clay chided my impatience. “There have been several breakthroughs in the last ten years on the magic side that allows faster processing and guarantees more accurate results.”

“I look forward to being amazed.”

One of the first skills a novice witch learned was how to sew. The talent lent itself to medical, ritual, and practical applications. I had taken to sewing a long, slender pocket into all my pants to store my wand on trips. The access point was no larger than a standard buttonhole, barely noticeable, and I learned how to sit just so in order to conceal the hard length running down my thigh. I reached for my wand now.

“I need three volunteers good for holding a hundred pounds on the hike back to the SUVs.”

“As if you had to ask,” Clay muttered then elbowed Asa. “We’ve got two covered.”

“Yes,” Asa said quietly. “We can transport two of the girls.”

Kidd splashed back to us when no one else budged to lend a hand.

“I can’t do it alone,” he said, eyeing my first two volunteers, “but Taylor over there can help me.”

Clay singled out the other junior agent. “Taylor looks ready to faint.”

“You sure he’s up for it?” He did seem pukey to me. “I don’t want her dropped when we hit the incline.”

“I’ll do it.”

Everyone on the shore turned to gawk at Asa.

“The girls will be safe with me.”

“Thanks.” I touched his arm then singled out the brave junior agent who had shown more backbone, or maybe more heart, than his peers combined. “When I break the spell, the girls will go limp. I don’t want the third one to fall in the water. Can you and your friend hold her steady until Asa can lift her?”

The crestfallen agent waved over his friend. “Absolutely.”

“You two brace the girl on the lowest rock.” It was the easiest job, but I didn’t want to ding their pride. “I worry about her sliding into the water the most.”

On his way to brace the middlest girl, Clay whispered in my ear, “Softie.”

For that, I briefly considered turning him into a frog, but I needed every ounce of magic at my disposal.

The final girl, the one placed at the highest and most difficult spot, fell to Asa due to his shifted height.

I joined the girls on the rocky outcropping since magic and running water didn’t play nice. Wand in hand, I began the counterspell to unravel the gossamer filaments holding them in place. Each word cost me to speak, a reminder I was not what I used to be, but I finished without faltering and felt the cords break.

I didn’t remember closing my eyes, but I opened them to find a familiar daemon across from me with his limp burden on one shoulder. I didn’t notice I was staring until Clay cleared his throat. I pretended not to catch his meaning and checked on the two junior agents. They were holding steady, but poor Taylor was pale as bleached bone. An oddly high-pitched noise escaped Taylor’s throat when Asa crouched next to us to make transferring the girl onto his empty shoulder easier.

A whine, I realized, making me wonder if he was a warg too. No wonder those two stuck together.

“You guys head on up.” I studied the empty rock. “I need to cleanse this place before we go.”

“You heard her.” Clay set out. “Come on, Ace.”

The daemon watched me until he was forced to break eye contact, but he showed his duty the respect it deserved. I was left alone with Kidd and… “What was your name again?”

The junior agent swayed on his feet. “David Taylor.”

“Rue Hollis.” I gave him a short nod then faced Kidd. “You better help your friend here to your ride.”

“Are you sure you want to be alone?” He scanned the bank. “I doubt the killer stuck around but…”

The killer was an exhibitionist. His audience gave him the thrill. His art meant nothing without patrons.

There was no doubt in my mind he had been here, somewhere, when the Black Hats first arrived to soak up their reactions. He would view them as a critique on his work, which could make him that much more dangerous if he felt we failed to show proper appreciation.

“I can take care of myself,” I assured him, though it was a lie. “I’ll be up in a minute.”

The longer the others believed I was a black witch, the safer I would be from those with a score to settle.

Once I was alone, I took a vial from my kit, unstoppered it, and sprinkled its contents on the rocks while I hummed a low song of mourning to cleanse the residual negative energies of the space. The running water would help the process along, but I didn’t want to risk another dryad incident from contaminating the area.

The whole process took maybe fifteen minutes, and it left me winded from the effort. Sweat ran into my eyes and glued my shirt to my spine. The others might think I had decided to go for a swim at this rate. It was one thing to go into this knowing I was less than I once was, but another to experience the shortfall.

“Are you finished?”

I didn’t startle at the voice. I was too tired for that. I think, maybe, I had expected to hear it.

“Yes,” I panted, sloshing toward Asa where he stood on the shore. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Ask,” he said, which guaranteed he would listen but didn’t promise me an answer.

How very fae of him.

“The junior agents were huddled together as far from the scene as they could get.” I hated to show what I considered weakness in that I had been clueless about the problem. “The scene was picturesque, if you didn’t know what you were looking at, so why the revulsion?”

A softening in his expression warned me I wouldn’t like what he had to say, but I needed to hear it.

“The black magic made them ill, mentally and physically.” He hesitated. “You didn’t notice?”

“No.” It sucked having my suspicions confirmed. “Not until I began the counterspell.”

The strands clung to my skin, tacky like cobwebs, rather than sliding off as they had back when I radiated the same negative energy. Then I had repelled black magic. Now it appeared I was vulnerable, to a degree, but not precisely sensitive to it. I had spent too long mired in darkness for it to register, and that was a dangerous liability to discover on my first day back.

The dryad must have been right about me. I still reeked of black magic. I should have known when Marty minded his manners instead of calling me out in front of everyone on my change in diet, and in power.

“How good is your poker face?” I watched for his reaction. “Did it bother you?”

“I was aware of it.” He helped me up onto the bank. “It reminds me of home.”

“You were raised…?” I checked behind us once more. “Or is that too personal?”

“I was raised by my fae mother.” He started walking. “After my daemon father raped her.”

The taste of foot soured my mouth as I fell in step with him. “I’m sorry.”

“That he abused her or that she kept me?”

This conversation had taken a nosedive, and I lacked the skills to right its trajectory.

“That was rude of me,” he said softly. “You’ve never treated me…”

…like a monster.

“I get it.” I pushed out a sigh as we started to climb up to the SUV. “I didn’t know how to act today. Aloof and all-powerful or polite and reasonably sure I wouldn’t blow us all up unraveling that spell.”

He made a thoughtful sound low in his throat.

“I’m safer if the others think I’m still a badass, but I’m not.”

Though my actions would out me eventually, I considered cultivating my stink by wearing a few charms.

“You chose a path few witches in your position would have dared. Fewer still would be walking it ten or more years later with no signs of withdrawal.” He used a sapling to haul himself up the last few feet. “Be proud of who you’ve chosen to be. Not many people embrace change even after they acknowledge their wrongdoing.”

“Change is hard,” I confessed. “I almost caved, with the dryad.”

“I shouldn’t have tempted you.” He hesitated. “The daemon form you’ve seen is me at my most primal.” He helped me up to level ground. “We’re not separate, exactly, but we’re not the same either.”

“I wondered.”

I almost mentioned the smoothies, but he had confided things of a deeply personal nature just now. The last thing I wanted to do was draw attention to what might be instinctive behavior and step in it again so soon after my earlier faux pas. Working alongside a variety of different species required making concessions.

As much as I loved my smoothies, I was willing to share them now and then if it helped put him at ease.

“I was about to send out a search team,” Clay boomed as he strode over to us. “What took so long?”

“I’m out of practice.” I rubbed my arms, recalling the tacky sensation of webs. “Or out of juice.”

“You’ll get the hang of it.” He swung a heavy arm around my shoulders. “I’m proud of you.”

We walked to our SUV, the last one remaining, and I was grateful when Clay held the door open for me.

“I’m beat.” I slid down in my seat and shut my eyes. “I need to nap off that counterspell.”

Food worked best to replenish my power, but a raw steak on the hotel tab would raise eyebrows. Sleep was the next best cure. Weary as I was from the spells I had cast, I could face-plant in my pillows and not twitch until morning. Lunch on the flight was an eternity ago, but I wasn’t hungry. For food.

“We’ll head to the hotel,” Clay announced from the back, “eat dinner, and rest up for tomorrow.”

“I’m down for part one and three. I’m going to beg off dinner. I’m too tired to be good company.”

“We requested a connecting room.” Asa flicked his gaze toward me. “To make it easier for us to come and go for meetings in your room.” He smiled, just a little. “We gave you the suite.”

“Nice.” I settled in. “I haven’t had a good soak in ages.”

The tub and shower combo at my house barely covered my navel when I filled it to the top.

“Looks like it’s you and me, Ace.” Clay patted his partner on the shoulder. “Where do you want to eat?”

“I noticed a steakhouse past the airport,” he suggested. “Or a twenty-four-hour diner near the hotel.”

“The diner works for me.” Clay sat back and rubbed his stomach. “I love all-you-can-eat pancakes.”

Pretty sure he could eat them out of ingredients if he set his mind to it. Goddess knows he had plenty of times in the past. Once the free refills began to raise eyebrows, though, he tended to pay the bill, tip the waitress, and make his exit before management got involved while also hanging on to the receipt to remind himself not to hit the same place twice in one trip.

While the guys cemented their plans for the night, I let my thoughts drift and my power slumber.

I dreamed of counting sheep that leapt over stones and splashed down into a creek.

Somewhere along the line, the fluffy white sheep became sleek does with glossy eyes that didn’t blink.