Dead Witch Walking (6 page)

A sick feeling drifted through me. Denon couldn’t be serious. He couldn’t.

I glanced over the room, finding no help. Worried, I pulled my vase out of the trash. Some of Mr. Fish’s water went into it. I leveled a portion of salt into the vase, dipped my finger to taste it, then added a bit more. Satisfied the salinity was equal to that of the ocean, I upended the mix over the check. If it had been spelled, the salt would break it.

A whisper of yellow smoke hovered over the envelope. “Aw shhhhoot,” I whispered, suddenly frightened. “Watch your nose, Jenks,” I said, ducking below my desk.

With an abrupt fizz, the black spell dissolutioned. Yellow, sulfuric smoke billowed up to be sucked into the vents. Cries of dismay and disgust rose with it. There was a small stampede as everyone surged for the doors. Even prepared, the stench of rotten eggs stung at my eyes. The spell had been a nasty one, tailored to me since both Denon and Francis had touched the envelope. It hadn’t come cheap.

Shaken, I came out from under my desk and glanced over the deserted floor. “Is it okay now?” I said around a cough. My earring shifted as Jenks nodded. “Thanks, Jenks.”

Stomach churning, I tossed my dripping check into the box and stalked past the empty cubicles. It looked like Denon was serious about his death threat. Absolutely swell.

“R
a-a-a-achel-l-l-l,” sang a tiny, irritating voice. It cut clearly through the shifting gears and choking gurgle of the bus’s diesel engine. Jenks’s voice grated on my inner ear worse than chalk on a blackboard, and my hand trembled in the effort to not make a grab for him. I’d never touch him. The little twit was too fast.

“I’m not asleep,” I said before he could do it again. “I’m resting my eyes.”

“You’re going to rest your eyes right past your stop—
Hot Stuff.
” He nailed the nickname last night’s cabbie had given me hard, and I slit an eyelid.

“Don’t call me that.” The bus went around a corner, and my grip tightened on the box balanced on my lap. “I’ve got two more blocks,” I said through gritted teeth. I’d kicked the nausea, but the headache lingered. And I knew it was two blocks because of the sound of Little League practice in the park just down from my apartment. There’d be another after the sun went down for the nightwalkers.

There was a thrum of wings as Jenks dropped from my earring and into the box. “Sweet mother of Tink! Is that all they pay you?” he exclaimed.

My eyes flashed open. “Get out of my stuff!” I snatched my damp check and crammed it into a jacket pocket. Jenks made a mocking face, and I rubbed my thumb and finger together as if squishing something. He got the idea and moved his purple and yellow silk pantaloons out of my reach, settling on the top of the seat in front of me. “Don’t you have somewhere to be?” I asked. “Like helping your family move?”

Jenks gave a yelp of laughter. “Help them move? No freaking way.” His wings quivered. “Besides, I should sniff around your place and make sure everything is okay before you blow yourself up when you try to use the john.” He laughed hysterically, and several people looked at me. I shrugged as if to say, “Pixies.”

“Thanks,” I said sourly. A pixy bodyguard. Denon would laugh himself to death. I was indebted to Jenks for finding the spell on my check, but the I.S. hadn’t time to rig anything else. I figured I had a few days if he was really serious about this. More likely it was a “don’t let the spell kill you on the way out” kind of a thing.

I stood as the bus came to a halt. Struggling down the steps, I landed in the late afternoon sun. Jenks made more annoying circles around me. He was worse than a mosquito. “Nice place,” he said sarcastically as I waited for traffic to clear before crossing the street to my apartment house. I silently agreed. I lived uptown in Cincinnati in what was a good neighborhood twenty years ago. The building was a four-story brick, originally built for university upperclassmen. It had seen its last finals party years ago and was now reduced to this.

The black letterboxes attached to the porch were dented and ugly, some having obviously been broken into. I got my mail from the landlady. I had a suspicion she was the one who broke the boxes so she could sort through her tenants’ mail at her leisure. There was a thin strip of lawn and two bedraggled shrubs to either side of the wide steps. Last year, I had planted the yarrow seeds I had gotten in a
Spell Weekly
mail promotion, but Mr. Dinky, the landlady’s Chihuahua, had dug them up—along with most of the yard. Little divots were everywhere, making it look like a fairy battlefield.

“And I thought my place was bad,” Jenks whispered as I skipped the step with dry rot.

My keys jingled as I balanced the box and unlocked the door at the same time. A little voice in my head had been saying the same thing for years. The odor of fried food assaulted me as I entered the foyer, and my nose wrinkled. Green indoor/outdoor carpet ran up the stairs, threadbare and fraying. Mrs. Baker had unscrewed the lightbulb in the stairway again, but the sun spilling in the landing window to fall on the rosebud wallpaper was enough to find my way.

“Hey,” Jenks said as I went upstairs. “That stain on the ceiling is in the shape of a pizza.”

I glanced up. He was right. Funny, I never noticed it before.

“And that dent in the wall?” he said as we reached the first floor. “It’s just the right size for someone’s head. Man…if these walls could talk…”

I found I could still smile. Wait until he got to my apartment. There was a dip in the living room floor where someone had burned out a hearth.

My smile faded as I rounded the second landing. All my things were in the hall.

“What the devil?” I whispered. Shocked, I set my box on the floor and looked down the hall to Mrs. Talbu’s door. “I paid my rent!”

“Hey, Rache?” Jenks said from the ceiling. “Where’s your cat?”

Anger growing, I stared at my furniture. It seemed to take up a lot more space when it was jammed into a hallway on her lousy plastic carpeting. “Where does she get off—”

“Rachel!” Jenks shouted. “Where’s your cat?”

“I don’t have a cat,” I all but snarled. It was a sore spot with me.

“I thought all witches had a cat.”

Lips pursed, I strode down the hall. “Cats make Mr. Dinky sneeze.”

Jenks flew alongside my ear. “Who is Mr. Dinky?”

“Him,” I said, pointing to the framed, oversized picture of a white Chihuahua hanging across from my landlady’s door. The butt-ugly, bug-eyed dog wore one of those bows parents put on a baby so you know it’s a girl. I pounded on the door. “Mrs. Talbu? Mrs. Talbu!”

There were the muffled yaps of Mr. Dinky and the sound of nails on the backside of the door, shortly followed by my landlady screeching to try and get the thing to shut up. Mr. Dinky redoubled his noise, scrabbling at the floor to dig his way to me.

“Mrs. Talbu!” I shouted. “Why is my stuff in the hall?”

“Word’s out on you, Hot Stuff,” Jenks said from the ceiling. “You’re damaged goods.”

“I told you not to call me
that!
” I shouted, hitting her door with my last word.

I heard the slamming of a door from inside, and Mr. Dinky’s barking grew muffled and more frenzied. “Go away,” came a thin, reedy voice. “You can’t live here anymore.”

The flat of my hand hurt, and I massaged it. “You think I can’t pay my rent?” I said, not caring that the entire floor could hear me. “I’ve got money, Mrs. Talbu. You can’t kick me out. I’ve got next month’s rent right here.” I pulled out my soggy check and waved it at the door.

“I changed your lock,” Mrs. Talbu quavered. “Go away before you get killed.”

I stared at the door in disbelief. She had found out about the I.S.’s threat? And the old lady act was a sham. She shouted clear enough through my wall when she thought I played my music too loud. “You can’t evict me!” I said desperately. “I’ve got rights.”

“Dead witches have no rights,” Jenks said from the light fixture.

“Damn it, Mrs. Talbu!” I shouted at the door. “I’m not dead yet!”

There was no answer. I stood there, thinking. I didn’t have much recourse, and she knew it. I supposed I could stay at my new office until I found something. Moving back in with my mother was not an option, and I hadn’t talked to my brother since I joined the I.S.

“What about my security deposit?” I asked, and the door remained silent. My temper shifted to a slow, steady burn, one that could last for days. “Mrs. Talbu,” I said quietly. “If you don’t give me the balance of this month’s rent and my security deposit, I’m going to sit right in front of your door.” I paused, listening. “I’m going to sit here until they spell me. I’ll probably explode right here. Make a big bloody stain on your carpet that won’t come out. And you’re going to have to look at that big bloody stain everyday. Hear me, Mrs. Talbu?” I quietly threatened. “Pieces of me will be on your hall ceiling.”

There was a gasp. “Oh my, Dinky,” Mrs. Talbu quavered. “Where’s my checkbook?”

I looked at Jenks and smiled bitterly. He gave me a thumbs-up.

There was a rustle, followed by a moment of silence and the distinctive sound of paper tearing. I wondered why she bothered with the old lady act. Everyone knew she was tougher than petrified dinosaur dung and would probably outlive us all. Even Death didn’t want her.

“I’m putting the word out on you, hussy,” Mrs. Talbu shouted through the door. “You won’t find a place to rent in the entire city.”

Jenks darted down as a slip of white was shoved under the door. After hovering over it for a moment, he nodded it was okay. I picked it up and read the amount. “What about my security deposit?” I asked. “You want to come with me to my apartment and look it over? Make sure there’re no nail holes in the walls or runes under the carpet?”

There was a muffled curse, shortly followed by more scratching, and another white slip appeared. “Get out of my building,” Mrs. Talbu yelled, “before I set Mr. Dinky on you!”

“I love you, too, old bat.” I took my key from my key ring and dropped it. Angry but satisfied, I snatched up the second check.

I went back to my things, slowing at the telltale scent of sulfur emanating from them. My shoulders tightened in worry as I stared at my life heaped against the walls. Everything was spelled. I could touch nothing. God help me. I was under an I.S. death threat.

“I can’t douse everything in salt,” I said as there was a click of a closing door.

“I know this guy who has storage.” Jenks sounded unusually sympathetic, and I looked up as I gripped my elbows. “If I ask him, he’ll come get it, put everything away for you. You can dissolution the spells later.” He hesitated, looking over my music discs carelessly dumped into my largest copper spell bowl.

I nodded, slumping against the wall and sliding down until my rear hit the floor. My clothes, my shoes, my music, my books…
my life
?

“Oh no,” Jenks said softly. “They spelled your disc of
The Best of Takata.
”

“It’s autographed,” I whispered, and the hum from his wings dropped in pitch. The plastic would survive a dip in saltwater, but the paper folder would be ruined. I wondered if I wrote to Takata if he would send me another. He might remember me. We did spend a wild night chasing shadows over the ruins of Cincinnati’s old biolabs. I think he made a song about it. “New moon rising, sight unseen, / Shadows of faith make a risky vaccine.” It hit the top twenty for sixteen weeks straight. My brow furrowed. “Is there anything they didn’t spell?” I asked.

Jenks landed on the phone book and shrugged. It had been left open to coroners.

“Swell.” Stomach knotting, I got to my feet. My thoughts swung to what Ivy had said last night about Leon Bairn. Little bits of witch splattered all over his porch. I swallowed hard. I couldn’t go home.
How the hell was I going to pay Denon off?

My head started hurting again. Jenks alighted on my earring, keeping his big mouth shut as I picked up my cardboard box and went downstairs. First things first. “What’s the name of that guy you know?” I asked when I reached the foyer. “The one with storage? If I give him something extra, will he dissolution my things?”

“If you tell him how. He’s not a witch.”

I thought, struggling to regroup. My cell phone was in my bag, but the battery was dead. The charger was somewhere in my spelled stuff. “I can call him from the office,” I said.

“He doesn’t have a phone.” Jenks slipped off my earring, flying backward at eye level. His wing tape had frayed, and I wondered if I should offer to fix it. “He lives in the Hollows,” Jenks added. “I’ll ask him for you. He’s shy.”

I reached for the doorknob, then hesitated. Putting my back to the wall, I pushed aside the sun-faded, yellow curtain to peek out the window. The tatty yard lay quiet in the afternoon sun, empty and still. The drone of a lawn mower and the whoosh from passing cars was muffled through the glass. Lips pressed tight, I decided I’d wait there until I heard the bus coming.

“He likes cash,” Jenks said, dropping down to stand on the sill. “I’ll bring him by the office after he’s locked up your stuff.”

“You mean everything that hasn’t walked off by itself in the meantime,” I said, but knew everything was reasonably safe. Spells, especially black ones, were supposed to be target specific, but you never know. No one would risk extinction for my cheap stuff. “Thanks, Jenks.” That was twice now he had saved my butt. It made me uneasy. And a little bit guilty.

“Hey, that’s what partners do,” he said, not helping at all.

Smiling thinly at his enthusiasm, I set my box down to wait.

T
he bus was quiet, as most traffic was coming out of the Hollows this time of day. Jenks had left via the window shortly after we crossed the river into Kentucky. It was his opinion the I.S. wouldn’t tag me on a bus with witnesses. I wasn’t ready to believe it, but I wasn’t going to ask him to stay with me, either.

I had told the driver the address, and he agreed to tell me when we were there. The human was skinny, his faded blue uniform hanging loose on him despite the vanilla wafers he was cramming into his mouth like jelly beans.

Most of Cincinnati’s mass-transit drivers were comfortable with Inderlanders, but not all. Humanity’s reactions to us varied widely. Some were afraid, some weren’t. Some wanted to be us, some wanted to kill us. A few took advantage of the lower tax rate and lived in the Hollows, but most didn’t.

Shortly after the Turn, an unexpected migration occurred when almost every human who could afford it moved deep into the cities. The psychologists of the day had called it a “nesting syndrome,” and in hindsight the countrywide phenomenon was understandable. Inderlanders were more than eager to snap up the properties on the outskirts, lured by the prospect of a little more earth to call their own, not to mention the drastically falling home prices.

The population demographics have only recently started to even out, as well-to-do Inderlanders move back into the city and the less fortunate, more informed humans decide they would rather live in a nice Inderland neighborhood than a trashy human one. Generally, though, apart from a small section around the university, humans lived in Cincinnati and Inderlanders lived across the river in the Hollows. We don’t care that most humans shun our neighborhoods like pre-Turn ghettoes.

The Hollows have become a bastion of Inderland life, comfortable and casual on the surface, with its potential problems carefully hidden. Most humans are surprised at how normal the Hollows appear, which, when you stop to think about it, makes sense. Our history is that of humanity’s. We didn’t just drop out of the sky in ’66; we emigrated in through Ellis Island. We fought in the Civil War, World War One, and World War Two—some of us in all three. We suffered in the Depression, and we waited like everyone else to find out who shot JR.

But dangerous differences exist, and any Inderlander over the age of fifty spent the earliest part of his or her life disguising them, a tradition that holds true even to this day.

The homes are modest, painted white, yellow, and occasionally pink. There are no haunted houses except for Loveland Castle in October, when they turn it into the baddest haunted house on either side of the river. There are swing sets, aboveground pools, bikes on the lawns, and cars parked on the curb. It takes a sharp eye to notice that the flowers are arranged in antiblack magic hexes and the basement windows are often cemented over. The savage, dangerous reality blooms only in the depths of the city, where people gather and emotions run rampant: amusement parks, dance clubs, bars, churches.
Never
our homes.

And it’s quiet—even at night when all its denizens are up. It was always the stillness that a human noticed first, setting them on edge and sending their instincts into full swing.

I found my tension easing as I stared out the window and counted the black, light-proof blinds. The quiet of the neighborhood seemed to soak into the bus. Even the few people riding had grown still. There was just something about the Hollows that said “Home.”

My hair swung forward as the bus stopped. On edge, I jerked when the guy behind me bumped my shoulder as he got up. Boots clattering, he hastened down the steps and into the sun. The driver told me my stop was next, and I stood as the nice man trundled down a side street to give me curb service. I stepped down into the patchy shade, standing with my arms wrapped around the box and trying not to breathe the fumes as the bus drove away. It disappeared around a corner, taking its noise and the last vestiges of humanity with it.

Slowly it grew quiet. The sound of birds drifted into existence. Somewhere close there were kids calling—no, kids screaming—and the barking of a dog. Multicolored chalk runes decorated the cracked sidewalk, and a forgotten doll with fangs painted on it smiled blankly at me. There was a small stone church across the street, its steeple rising far above the trees.

I turned on a heel, eyeing what Ivy had rented for us: a one-story house that could easily be converted to an office. The roof looked new, but the chimney mortar was crumbling. There was grass out front, looking like it should have been cut last week. It even had a garage, the door gaping open to show a rusting mower.

It will do,
I thought as I opened the gate to the chain-link fence enclosing the yard. An old black man sat on the porch, rocking the afternoon away.
Landlord?
I mused, smiling. I wondered if he was a vamp, since he wore dark glasses against the late afternoon sun. He was scruffy looking despite being clean-shaven, his tightly curled hair going gray around the temples. There was mud on his shoes and a hint of it on the knees of his blue jeans. He looked worn-out and tired—put away like an unwanted plow horse who was still eager for one more season.

He set a tall glass on the porch railing as I came up the walk. “Don’t want it,” he said as he took off his glasses and tucked them in a shirt pocket. His voice was raspy.

Hesitating, I peered up at him from the bottom of the stairs. “Beg pardon?”

He coughed, clearing his throat. “Whatever you’re selling out of that box. Don’t want it. I’ve got enough curse candles, candy, and magazines. And I don’t have the money for new siding, water purifier, or a sunroom.”

“I’m not selling anything,” I said. “I’m your new tenant.”

He sat up straighter, somehow making himself look even more unkempt. “Tenant? Oh, you mean across the street.”

Confused, I shifted my box to my other hip. “This isn’t 1597 Oakstaff, is it?”

He chuckled. “That’s across the street.”

“Sorry to have bothered you.” I turned to leave, hoisting the box higher.

“Yep,” the man said, and I paused, not wanting to be rude. “The numbers are backward on this street. Odd numbers on the wrong side of the road.” He smiled, creasing the wrinkles around his eyes. “But they didn’t ask me when they put the numbers up.” He extended his hand. “I’m Keasley,” he said, waiting for me to climb the stairs and take his hand.

Neighbors,
I thought, rolling my eyes as I went up the stairs.
Best to be nice.
“Rachel Morgan,” I said, pumping his arm once. He beamed, patting my shoulder in a fatherly fashion. The strength of his grip was surprising, as was the scent of redwood coming from him. He was a witch, or at the very least a warlock. Not comfortable with his show of familiarity, I took a step back as he released me. It was cooler on his porch, and I felt tall under the low ceiling.

“Are you friends with the vamp?” he said, gesturing across the street with his chin.

“Ivy? Yeah.”

He nodded slowly, as if it were important. “Both of you quit together?”

I blinked. “News travels fast.”

He laughed. “Yup. It does at that.”

“Aren’t you afraid I’m going to get spelled on your front porch and take you with me?”

“No.” He leaned back in his rocker and picked up his glass. “I took that one off you.” He held up a tiny self-stick amulet between his finger and thumb. As my lips parted, he dropped it into his glass. What I thought had been lemonade foamed as the spell dissolutioned. Yellow smoke billowed, and he waved his hand dramatically. “Oooh doggies, that’s a nasty one.”

Saltwater?
He grinned at my obvious shock. “That guy on the bus…” I stammered as I backed off the porch. The yellow sulfur eddied down the stairs as if trying to find me.

“Nice meeting you, Ms. Morgan,” the man said I stumbled onto the walk and into the sun. “A vamp and pixy might keep you alive a few days, but not if you aren’t more careful.”

My eyes turned to look down the street at the long gone bus. “The guy on the bus…”

Keasley nodded. “You’re right in that they won’t try anything when there’s a witness, leastwise, not at first, but you have to watch for the amulets that won’t trigger till you’re alone.”

I had forgotten about delayed spells. And were was Denon getting the money? My face scrunched up as I figured it out; Ivy’s bribe money was paying for my death threat. Swell.

“I’m home all day,” Keasley was saying. “Come on over if you want to talk. I don’t get out much anymore. Arthritis.” He slapped his knee.

“Thanks,” I said. “For—finding that charm.”

“My pleasure,” he said, his gaze on the ceiling of the porch and the lazily spinning fan.

My stomach was knotting as I made my way back to the sidewalk. Was the entire city aware I had quit? Maybe Ivy had talked to him.

I felt vulnerable in the empty street. Edgy, I crossed the road looking for house numbers. “Fifteen ninety-three,” I muttered, glancing at the small yellow house with two bikes tangled on the lawn. “Sixteen hundred and one,” I said, looking the other way to the well-kept brick home. My lips pursed. The only thing between them was that stone church. I froze. A church?

A harsh buzzing zipped past my ears, and I instinctively ducked.

“Hi, Rache!” Jenks came to a hovering halt just out of my reach.

“Damn it, Jenks!” I shouted, warming as I heard the old man laugh. “Don’t do that!”

“Got your stuff set,” Jenks said. “I made him put everything up on blocks.”

“It’s a church,” I said.

“No shit, Sherlock. Wait until you see the garden.”

I stood unmoving. “It’s a
church.
”

Jenks hovered, waiting for me. “There’s a huge yard in back. Great for parties.”

“Jenks,” I said through gritted teeth. “It’s a church. The backyard is a
graveyard.
”

“Not all of it.” He began weaving impatiently. “And it’s not a church anymore. It’s been a day care for the last two years. No one’s been buried there since the Turn.”

I stood, staring at him. “Did they move the bodies out?”

His darting ceased and he hung motionless. “ ’Course they moved the bodies out. You think I’m
stupid
? You think I’d live where there were dead
humans
? God help me. The bugs coming off ’em, diseases, viruses, and crap soaking into the soil and getting into everything!”

I adjusted my grip on my stuff, striding across the shady street and up the wide steps of the church. Jenks didn’t have a clue as to whether the bodies had been moved out. The gray stone steps were bowed in the middle from decades of use, and they were slippery. There were twin doors taller than I, made of a reddish wood and bound with metal. One had a plaque screwed into it. “Donna’s Daycare,” I muttered, reading the inscription. I tugged a door open, surprised at the strength needed to shift it. There wasn’t even a lock on it, just a sliding bolt on the inside.

“Of course they moved the bodies out,” Jenks said, then flitted over the church. I’d put a hundred on it that he was going out to the backyard to investigate.

“Ivy?” I shouted, trying to slam the door behind me. “Ivy, are you here?” The echo of my voice came back from the yet unseen sanctuary, a thick, stained-glassed quiet hush of sound. The closest I’d been to a church since my dad died was reading the cutesy catch phrases off those backlit signs they all put on their front lawns. The foyer was dark, having no windows and black wooden panels. It was warm and still, thick with the presence of past liturgy. I set the box on the wooden floor and listened to the green and amber hush slipping in from the sanctuary.

“Be right down!” came Ivy’s distant shout. She sounded almost cheerful, but where on earth was she? Her voice was coming from everywhere and nowhere at all.

There was the soft click of a latch, and Ivy slipped from behind a panel. A narrow spiral stairway went up behind her. “I’ve got my owls up in the belfry,” she said. Her brown eyes were more alive than I’d ever seen them. “It’s perfect for storage. Lots of shelves and drying racks. Someone left their stuff up there, though. Want to go through it with me later?”

“It’s a church, Ivy.”

Ivy stopped. Her arms crossed and she looked at me, her face abruptly empty.

“There are dead people in the backyard,” I added, and she levered herself up and went into the sanctuary. “You can see the tombstones from the road,” I continued as I followed her in.

The pews were gone, as was the altar, leaving only an empty room and a slightly raised stage. That same black wood made a wainscot that ran below the tall stained-glassed windows that wouldn’t open. A faded shadow on the wall remained where an enormous cross once hung over the altar. The ceiling was three stories up, and I sent my gaze to the open woodwork, thinking it would be hard to keep this room warm in winter. It was nothing but a stripped down open space…but the stark emptiness seemed to add to the feeling of peace.

“How much is this going to cost?” I asked, remembering I was supposed to be angry.

“Seven hundred a month, utilities—ah—included,” Ivy said quietly.

“Seven hundred?” I hesitated, surprised. That would be three fifty for my share. I was paying four fifty uptown for my one-room castle. That wasn’t bad. Not bad at all. Especially if it had a yard.
No,
I thought, my bad mood returning.
It was a graveyard.

“Where are you going?” I said as Ivy walked away. “I’m talking to you.”

“To get a cup of coffee. You want one?” She disappeared through the door at the back of the raised stage.

“Okay, so the rent is cheap,” I said. “That’s what I said I wanted, but it’s a church! You can’t run a business from a church!” Fuming, I followed her past the opposing his-andher bathrooms. Farther down was a door on the right. I peeked past it to find a nice-sized empty room, the floor and smooth walls giving back an echo of my breathing. A stained-glass window of saints was propped open with a stick to air the place out, and I could hear the sparrows arguing outside. The room looked as if it had once been an office, having since been modified for toddlers’ nap cots. The floor was dusty, but the wood was sound under the light scratches.