Single Witch's Survival Guide (12 page)

I was getting ahead of myself. “Raven, what else do you know about honeysuckle?”

“You can place it around a green candle to enhance spells for prosperity. It’s an herb of devotion and fidelity. If you dream while wearing a sachet over your heart, you’ll see your one true love. The flower is associated with Mercury, and it’s grounded in the element of Earth.”

I gaped. She
was
good at this. Really, really good. I’d spent the past week misled by all her games—the sex-kitten ploys, the wannabe film-maker, and the Goth pagan play-acting. But it wasn’t fair to reduce her to any of those roles. I attempted a quick recovery. “Let’s go through the other herbs. What was next? Chives?”

We spent the rest of the morning going over the properties of every plant in the field. Emma did her best to recall facts, but it was Raven who had all the information at her fingertips. She recited details effortlessly—not only culinary and healing properties, but magical uses as well. Her vast store of data included the elements most associated with every plant, along with planetary associations. I didn’t put a lot of stock in that last tidbit—astrology remained more my mother’s witchy area of supposed expertise than my own—but the rest of Raven’s knowledge pretty much floored me.

It was almost time to head back to the house for lunch, but first I sent my students out to collect samples of milkweed. As they prowled through the meadow, Neko leaned close. “You are going to wrap things up early today, aren’t you?”

“Why should I?”

“Fourth of July? Marching bands? Sparklers and Roman candles and boom?” He added jazz hands to emphasize his point.

Of course I knew it was Independence Day, but I had a deadline. Norville Pitt had left me no time for frivolities like Souza marches and parades.

Neko read my mind in his usual uncanny way. “Your students can’t work nonstop until Samhain. You’ll get more out of them if they don’t burn out in their first full week of classes.”

He was right, of course. The Fourth of July would have been a holiday at any other magicarium. “Fine,” I said, abashed. “We’ll head back now. Let me guess—you and Jacques are going down to D.C. for fireworks on the Mall?”

“Of course not!”

I squinted at him in disbelief. “But you love fireworks! And Parkersville canceled theirs, because of the fire ban.”

Neko sighed as if he were talking to a very young child. Or a very stupid witch. Same difference. “The Parkersville Fire Department is hosting an ice cream social. I thought you and David would treat us all!”

My first response was to pity the fire department. They couldn’t have any idea what they were up against—Neko had a nearly insatiable appetite for ice cream.

Oh well. Maybe David could make a sizable donation to the fireman’s Widow and Orphans Fund in recompense.

When Emma and Raven returned with the milkweed, I congratulated them on their harvest and explained that we would carry the plants back to the house. We’d take a few days to drain all the milky sap into a silver ewer. Once it was harvested, we could mix it with rainwater collected on the night of a full moon, and the resulting potion would both calm the intractable and cultivate patience in the rashest soul.

I could have used a little calming tincture myself, especially when I saw how thrilled my students were about getting the afternoon off. They were positively overjoyed at getting Friday free as well. But their excitement didn’t hold a candle to Neko’s enthusiasm as he pranced off to the garage. I could only imagine the Independence Day outfits he and Jacques would throw together on such relatively short notice.

Back in the kitchen, I tossed a couple of dog biscuits to Spot. I was too hot to think about lunch, though. Instead, I decided to take a long, cool shower. Ice cream would make the perfect dinner.

* * *

We barely squeezed into the burgundy minivan for the short ride into town. It would have been a tight fit under any circumstances—three witches, their warders, and their familiars. But when one familiar insisted on dressing like the Statue of Liberty (complete with a six-inch tiara, and a foot-long torch), and he dragged along his French-swearing boyfriend who was dressed like Uncle Sam (yep, top hat, swallowtail coat, spats, and a full fake beard), the trip became downright unpleasant.

At least Tony sat behind the wheel. I wasn’t surprised to discover that the pugnacious warder had a lead foot. I was grateful, in fact.

When we arrived in Parkersville, alas, the streets were filled with enough mundane citizens that Tony couldn’t employ his warder’s skills to make a parking space appear. He made two valiant attempts at parallel parking on Main Street, but the minivan wasn’t as mini as the laws of physics required, at least for those tight spaces.

Muttering under his breath, Tony pulled into a loading zone across the street from the police station.

“You’ll get a ticket,” I warned, before we could all tumble out of purgatory.

“We’ve got out-of-state plates. And it’s a holiday.”

And you really don’t want to screw up another try at parallel parking
, I almost said. But I was only the magistrix, not the parking police. And Lady Liberty’s torch was gouging a hole in my side.

I shrugged and led the way to the ice cream social. Not surprisingly, Parkersville Fire Station Number One (and, um, only) was packed. Neko immediately picked up a bowl and cut through the crowd, homing in on the whipped cream like a heat-seeking missile. Jacques squawked and clapped his hat to his head, trying to follow suit.

The rest of our party split up. I chose one of the shortest lines—there just weren’t enough people who understood the decadent glory that was coffee ice cream. The rugged fireman scooping out the heavenly stuff apparently agreed; he loaded three scoops into my bowl and was going for a fourth when I held up a hand in laughing protest.

Hot fudge ladled from an aluminum vat. A sprinkle of salted peanuts. A single maraschino cherry. No whipped cream for me—Neko had surely taken any portion that was rightly mine. Just as I added a spoon, David came up to my side.

“What flavor did you get?” I asked.

“Praline pecan.”

“You hate praline pecan!”

“I seem to remember some bewitching woman who says coffee and praline pecan make the perfect combination.”

I laughed. By the time we escaped into the open air, I needed to apply some emergency confection management, rapidly spooning up melting ice cream before it cascaded over the side of my bowl. When I had vanquished the immediate danger, I glanced back over my shoulder.

“Shouldn’t we wait for the others?”

“Raven and Tony already left with Hani in tow—she wanted to film the locals. Neko isn’t going to budge until the last molecule of whipped cream is gone. And Emma seems just about as stubborn.”

I followed his gaze past the long line of customers waiting for their chance at dairy carnage. My student witch was standing off to one side, chatting with the handsome fireman who had been so generous with my coffee ice cream. Even as I watched, he laughed at something she said and shifted closer, brushing his fingertips against her arm. A quick glance confirmed that Caleb was keeping watch from a discreet distance, a dejected-looking Kopek at his side. Emma was chaperoned, whether she wanted to be or not.

I could empathize with my fellow witch. I turned back to David, a smile on my lips. “Time for us to escape,” I said.

He led the way past laughing crowds. Some people held bowls of ice cream while others indulged in hot dogs or burgers fresh from the Rotary’s grill. Norman Rockwell couldn’t have painted a better Independence Day.

We ducked around the corner of the building and headed toward the relative seclusion of the car wash, which was shut down for the night. There was a bench there, meant for customers waiting for their cars. I took a seat and automatically shifted to make room for David before attending to another looming ice cream disaster.

“I feel like I’ve barely seen you this week,” I said, between bites of coffee praline bliss.

“We’re making good progress down at the barn. We decided to build out four rooms, instead of two. Not much more work, and they’ll be useful down the road.”

“I didn’t realize you knew how to do all that.”

He shrugged. “I’ve taken care of basic repairs around the farm since I was a kid. It turns out Caleb put himself through school working as a handyman.”

“And Tony?”

“Caleb’s a good partner on projects like this.” David’s observation was dry. I suspected Raven’s bellicose warder would wear thin after a couple of hours.

“At least Tony hasn’t pulled a sword on you. Again.”

“Thank Hecate for small favors.”

I laughed and started paying serious attention to my ice cream. David and I chatted easily enough while I ate, but as soon as I dropped my spoon into my empty bowl, he said, “Finished? Let’s find everyone else and get back home.”

“What’s the rush?”

“I have some paperwork to finish up.”

I laughed, thinking he was kidding, but he didn’t join in. “What possible paperwork could you have to finish on a federal holiday?”

“Hecate’s Court isn’t bound by federal holidays,” he pointed out.

I put a little space between us, so I could better see his face. “This is about Pitt, isn’t it?”

“It’s warders’ business.”

I bristled at his dismissive tone. He’d tried that before, when I’d asked about the Court documents in his office. I’d let him get away with it then, but enough was enough. “Fine. You’re my warder. Your business is mine. What’s going on?”

“You’re not a warder. You wouldn’t understand.” His voice was laden with cool confidence, with the absolute certainty that he knew what was best for me.

My temper flared with a corresponding heat, and I poured that sudden rage into two concise words. “Try me.”

“Stay out of this, Jane. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

“I’ve already
been
hurt! My entire magicarium is on the line because of you!”

Ouch. Up until that instant, I hadn’t realized that I blamed David for the Charter, for the requirement of a Major Working. He couldn’t have looked more shocked if I’d slapped his face.

“Wait,” I said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

He stared at me, his eyes solid black in the moonlight. “Yes. You did.”

He was right. “Okay,” I said. “I meant it. But I really blame Pitt. So tell me what happened between you two. It can’t be as bad as everything I’m imagining.” And there were
lots
of things I was imagining. Blackmail. Seduction. Sex scandals involving the most senior members of the Court.

David set his jaw, clearly intending to carry his secret to his grave.

His stubbornness goaded me like iron spurs. I snapped out a reply before I’d fully considered the words. “I command you, as your witch.
Tell me what happened between you and Pitt.
”

He froze.

In all the years we’d worked together, I’d never played the witch card. I’d thought about it a few times. Even threatened to do it once or twice. But I had never actually spoken the words, never made my power over him so absolutely, explicitly clear.

I could take back my command. Tell him I was joking. I could release him from my order. But somehow, in a matter of seconds, the secret he was hiding had become a referendum on everything—on the viability of the Academy, on our entire relationship. I bit my lip, but I didn’t take back my words.

David swallowed hard and stared into the darkness. “Pitt made an example of me for five full years. He was sending a message to all the other warders—if I could be broken, any of them could. When I couldn’t take it any more, I forged documents to make it look like Pitt was stealing. I planted them in the Court’s records. He found them before I could make them public.”

David Montrose, champion of rules and regulations and every law I could think of, had framed Norville Pitt. He was a hypocrite. A liar.

“And the documents you were reading the other night?”

His eyes flashed fire. “You don’t want to know about those.”

He was right. I didn’t. But I’d pushed things this far, and I wasn’t going to back down now. “
Tell me,
” I said.

Again, he complied with the letter of my witchy command, but he refused to meet my eyes. “I know he’s dirty. And I’m going to prove it to the Court, if it’s the last action I take as a warder.”

Last action. He accepted that his hounding Pitt might strip him of his rank forever. And he was willing to take that risk. He was willing to chance abandoning me so he could have his satisfaction against Pitt, paid in full.

I closed my eyes. My head was suddenly pounding, and my stomach was reminding me that ice cream made a spectacularly lousy dinner. Especially after a skipped lunch, and a morning spent running a magicarium that was failing to meet my dreams.

This was all too much to handle. I couldn’t sort out the tornado of my feelings, here in idyllic Parkersville, surrounded by people who didn’t have the first idea that witches or warders or Hecate’s Court even existed.

I felt guilty that I’d pushed David as his witch. I felt angry that he was putting his own revenge ahead of me. I felt trapped that Pitt had made all of this happen in the first place.

There was too much at stake. Too much to handle, without having a clear mind. I should sleep on it. We both should. We could figure out a path forward in the morning.

“Come on,” I finally said. “Let’s go home.”

David stepped away, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Go on back to the car. I’ll get another ride.”

And that was when I realized the truth. I’d broken something.

By ordering David to act, by wielding my power as his witch, I had shattered a link between us. Not the magical bond we shared—that could never be so easily severed. But the other ties, the worldly ones. The ones that made him my boyfriend. My lover. Whatever.

“David—

He shook his head and turned away, disappearing into the shadows without another word.

This couldn’t be happening. Everything had been
fine
just a few minutes ago. He couldn’t have… I couldn’t have… We…