Magic and Loss

Chapter 15

For the next couple of weeks Hexe dedicated himself to making up for lost time, cranking out potions and charms for all his regular clients who relied on him, as well as working hard to bring in new ones. For the first time in months it seemed as if we were finally starting to dig our way out of the financial hole we had found ourselves in. With both of us bringing in money on a regular basis, I was able to start setting aside part of my pay for the baby and other maternity-related expenses in a decorative cookie tin I kept on the dresser.

One evening, as I returned home from work, I spotted a woman standing on the sidewalk outside the boardinghouse, frowning at a piece of paper she held in her hand. She had red-gold shoulder-length hair that shone like a burnished shield. As I headed up the front steps, she stepped forward, casting her brilliant green eyes about nervously. She looked to be slightly older than myself and was easily one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen outside of a movie theater, although the Aéropostale dress she was wearing was way too young for her.

“Excuse me, ma’am?” she asked. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Of course,” I replied, trying to hide my bemusement at being addressed as “ma’am” by someone at least four years older than myself. Although I was three months pregnant, I wasn’t in that big a hurry to be mistaken for someone’s mom.

“Does someone called Hexy live here?” she asked anxiously, gesturing to the boardinghouse.

“Why, yes, Hex lives here,” I answered politely. “He’s my boyfriend. Are you looking to become a client?”

“I dunno,” the beautiful redhead said. “I guess so. This guy with a green mustache in Witches Alley said he’s the person I needed to talk to if I wanted to get a curse lifted. All I know is that I’m in a lot of trouble and I’m scared.”

Her lower lip suddenly began to quiver and she started to cry. And not the way a grown woman breaks down, either, by choking back tears and trying to keep it together—she was just straight-up boohooing. Maybe it was my hormones kicking in, but I felt instantly protective of her. I put my arm around her shoulders, trying my best to comfort her as I escorted her up the front stairs and into the house.

“Don’t worry; it’s going to be okay,” I said soothingly. “By the way—what’s your name?”

“Ashley,” the redhead snuffled, wiping at her eyes.

“Hello, Ashley. My name’s Tate, and I can tell you that you’ve come to the right place. Hexe is one of the best lifters in all of Golgotham. And I’m not saying that simply because he’s my boyfriend,” I assured her as I unlocked the front door.

Once we were inside, I ushered her into the front parlor and had her take a seat while I went in search of Hexe. He was in the kitchen, dressed in an apron and a half-mask respirator, decanting a freshly brewed potion into a row of smaller bottles.

“Honey—you’ve got a new client! I found her on the front steps, trying to work up the nerve to knock on the door. Her name’s Ashley and she thinks she’s been cursed.”

“Good! I haven’t had a chance to do any real spell-lifting yet. I’m curious to find out just what the gauntlet can do,” he exclaimed as he stripped off the respirator. “Welcome to my home.” Hexe smiled as he entered the room. “Tate informs me that you are in need of my services, Ms. Ashley. What exactly is the problem?”

“Ashley’s my first name,” she said with a nervous giggle. “My last name is Lattimer.”

“I see. How may I be of assistance, Ms. Lattimer—or is it Mrs.?”

Again with the nervous giggle. “Mrs. Lattimer’s my mom.” Ashley’s eyes suddenly widened upon catching sight of Scratch as he emerged, yawning, from under the skirt of the couch and hopped onto the back of one of the chairs. “Hello, kitty cat!” she said with a laugh, reaching out to stroke the familiar’s sleek skull. “What happened to your hair?”

Scratch recoiled from her touch, fanning out his batlike wings in warning. “Are you drunk or are you just stupid?”

Ashley’s eyes widened even further. “You can talk—and you’ve got wings!” she exclaimed in delight. “That is so cool!”

“Glad you approve,” Scratch grunted, his ego mollified by her display of awe.

“Do you mind? I have business to conduct,” Hexe scolded, shooing the familiar off the furniture. “Where were we? Ah, yes! Tate informed me that you believe you have been cursed. May I ask the nature of the infliction, Ms. Lattimer?”

“Can’t you see? Just look at me!” she said in exasperation, gesturing to her outwardly perfect body. If there was anything physically wrong with Ashley Lattimer, I certainly couldn’t see it.

“Could you perhaps be a bit more specific?” Hexe suggested.

Ashley sighed and opened her purse, fishing out an official-looking piece of paper bearing the seal of the state of New York, which she then handed to him. “This is a New York State learner’s permit,” Hexe said, still baffled. “Wait a minute—!” His golden eyes widened in surprise. “You’re sixteen?”

“I was when I went to bed last night,” Ashley replied, her voice beginning to tremble again. “But when I got up this morning I was like—this!”

“I see,” Hexe said sympathetically, handing her back her learner’s permit. “Please step into my office, Miss Lattimer.”

Now that I was fully aware of the situation, it wasn’t hard to see the teenaged girl trapped within the body of the grown woman standing before me. As she entered Hexe’s office she stared in openmouthed amazement at the taxidermied crocodile hanging suspended from the ceiling. Hexe took one of his scrying stones from his rolltop desk and passed it over her body like it was a magnifying glass.

“It’s as I suspected—you’ve been inflicted with progeria,a supernatural form of accelerated aging.”

“Am I going to keep getting older?” she asked nervously.

“No,” he assured her. “It doesn’t appear to be an ongoing curse. Do you have any idea why anyone would have done something like this to you?”

Ashley nodded, an unhappy look on her face. “I go to this fancy prep school called Pridehurst. My parents aren’t rich or anything like that—I got in on an academic scholarship. I really like it there, and I’ve made a lot of friends. Then last week I found out I’m on the Homecoming Queen ballot.”

“I get it,” I said knowingly. “So someone decided to cut down on the competition by turning you from prom queen to chaperone. Sounds like a really lovely school.”

“Not everyone at Pridehurst is like that,” Ashley insisted. “But the ones that are like that are really rich, and they’re very mean.”

“They’d have to be rich; progeria is a pricey curse,” Hexe said in a serious voice. “It’s considered a petit mal infliction—straddling the line between Greater and Lesser curses.”

“Can you help me, Mr. Hexe?” Ashley asked plaintively.

“Yes, but I need the permission of one of your parents to go forward,” he explained. “Despite your current physical condition, you’re still legally underage.”

“Please don’t make me call my mom and dad!” Ashley pleaded, sounding very much like the sixteen-year-old she truly was. “I don’t want them knowing about this! I snuck out of the house before they could see me this morning. If they find out what happened, they’ll yank me out of Pridehurst and sue the school! I really like it there—I don’t want the school and the rest of the student body to get a bad name, because it’s not really their fault.”

“I understand your position, Ashley. Truly, I do. And it’s commendable that you don’t want to drag anyone else into this. But, like I said, progeria curses are pricey. That also holds true for lifting them. It’s going to cost a thousand dollars to reverse the spell cast over you.”

“I’ve got my own money!” she exclaimed, frantically scrambling inside her purse. “I’ve been babysitting to save up for an iPad. I’ve got almost five hundred dollars—I’m good for the rest. My neighbor, Mrs. Moretti, has twins. . . .” She pulled out an envelope filled with five, ten, and twenty dollar bills and handed it to him.

“Very well,” Hexe sighed. “I’ll do it. But only because I’m going to be in the market for a babysitter pretty soon.”

“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you, Mr. Hexe! And you, too, Mrs. Hexe.”

I opened my mouth to correct her, then shrugged my shoulders. What the hell. I was having his baby—might as well get used to it.

Hexe walked over to one of the glass-fronted barrister cases that lined the walls of his office and removed what looked like an old-fashioned windup alarm clock, save that it was made of brass and the face was set with Kymeran numerals. He spoke an incantation in his native tongue under his breath while winding the clock with his right hand, then handed it to Ashley.

“Miss Lattimer, I need you to sit on that sofa over there,” he said, pointing to the fainting couch, “and hold this clock in your hands while pointing its face away from you. Is that understood?”

Ashley nodded her head and took her place on the couch, tightly clutching the magic clock as if it might leap from her hands and go running out the door. Although she looked like a woman in her early thirties, her face was as open as that of the young girl she really was.

Hexe raised his silver-clad hand over his head and began to chant in a loud voice. As he did so, the Gauntlet of Nydd became bathed in witchfire, the spiritual luminescence all Kymerans possess. The phosphorescent glow grew in intensity until, with an earsplitting crackle, a jagged finger of supernatural energy shot from his palm like the spark from a Tesla coil and struck the face of the clock. Ashley flinched and gave voice to a mouse-sized squeal but, to her credit, she did not let go.

As I watched in amazement, the hands on the clock began to turn backward, and Ashley’s adult features began to soften and grow younger. Then, all of a sudden, there was a weird noise, as if the gears of some great, invisible machine had been thrown into reverse, causing the entire room to vibrate, as the color of the witchfire shrouding Hexe’s hand changed from bluish white to purple-black. At the same time, the hands on the clock began turning forward, and I gasped in horror as Ashley’s reclaimed youth melted away and her brilliant red hair rapidly faded as traceries of white sprouted from her temples.

Hexe shouted something in Kymeran and grabbed his upraised right hand by the wrist with his left, abruptly forcing it against his side, severing the feed to the magic clock. His face was drawn and pale, and his golden eyes shone with barely controlled panic as he stared at his handiwork. Instead of reversing the progeria, his spell had aged Ashley twenty years further. Crows feet and laugh lines—evidence of a life yet to be lived—marked the corner of her eyes and mouth, and her throat and cleavage both had sagging skin.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, her voice sounding huskier than before. She let go of the clock and reached up to touch her face, only to freeze upon seeing the wrinkled skin and bulging veins on the backs of her hands. “Oh my God—what did you do?”

“I’m dreadfully sorry, Ashley,” Hexe said. “Whoever cast the progeria spell over you protected it with a stinger—a magical booby trap. That means anyone who tries to reverse it will, instead, age you even further. I had no way of knowing the stinger was there until it was too late.”

“What can we do?” Ashley asked, her voice wavering on the verge of tears.

“There’s nothing I can do,” Hexe replied solemnly. “However, most progeria spells will reverse themselves after a month or two.”

“But what about Homecoming? I can’t show up looking like my Aunt Lorraine! Please, can’t you try something else to fix this?”

“I’m not willing to take that risk, no matter how much I’m paid,” Hexe replied. “I could accidentally kill you, Ashley. Here, take your money,” he said, handing back the stack of bills. “I’ve done nothing to deserve it.”

My heart went out to Ashley as the poor girl began to weep in despair. High school is bad enough already without adding menopause on top of it. I slipped an arm about her shoulders as she sobbed, doing my best to comfort her. “Don’t worry, we’ll figure something out—isn’t that right, honey?” I said, overloudly.

“Of course! I just need time to consult my spell books. Leave your contact information with Tate, and the moment I find the proper counterspell, I’ll remove the curse free of charge—it’s the least I can do, given the, um, circumstances.”

“Thank you, Mr. Hexe,” Ashley sniffled.

“Thank me once the curse is lifted, not before.”

“I don’t know how I’m going to explain this when I get home,” Ashley groaned as I walked her to the front door.

“Just tell your mom and dad you’ve been cursed,” I said gently. “I’m sure they’ll understand.”

“No, not my parents,” she sighed. “I mean my boyfriend, Justin. I love him, and he says he loves me. But the last time he saw me I was me. What if he doesn’t love me anymore now that I’m like, you know—?” She hesitated, afraid to speak the word aloud.

I turned her by her shoulders so that we were facing each other. Despite the crow’s feet, her eyes were still those of a young girl. “Ashley, if your boyfriend doesn’t love you now, he didn’t love you then,” I said in a kind but firm voice. “Because you’re still the same person, no matter how different you appear to be. And if this Justin kid won’t stand by you, simply because of how you look—? Well, I may have only just met you, but I think you deserve something better than that.”

“You sound just like my mom,” Ashley said, smiling with her fifty-year-old mouth.

“Good. I need the practice.”

Once I had seen Ashley safely to the door, I returned to Hexe’s office to find him seated at his desk, peering intently at his gauntleted hand through one of his many scrying stones. He looked like a scientist trying to identify a particularly malignant strain of bacteria.

“Something’s wrong with the gauntlet,” he announced in a worried voice. “There was no ‘stinger’ on that child’s progeria curse. When I was in the middle of lifting it, the spell I was working began to reverse itself without me willing it. It was as if my Right Hand was being used to work Left Hand magic.”

“You mean you’re the one responsible for aging that poor girl even further?”

Hexe nodded his head, a heartsick look on his face. “I’m sorry I lied, Tate, but things are bad enough already without being sued by her parents!”

“Are you sure the problem is with the gauntlet?”

“There’s no doubt in my mind,” he replied, returning his attention to the scrying stone. “The spell-signature has mutated. There seems to be a second signature emerging from beneath the original—like a message written in invisible ink that’s finally becoming detectable.”

“You mean this isn’t the real Gauntlet of Nydd?”

“No, it’s authentic all right. But it appears that the original charm has been used as a Trojan horse for another spell—not unlike a computer virus.”

“What do we do?”

“The same thing you do whenever a microwave or television starts malfunctioning: take it back to the store it came from.”

The first thing I noticed as we approached Madam Erys’ shop was the FOR LEASE sign posted in the front window. Hexe rattled the door, but it was tightly locked. Although the interior of the shop was dim and dusty, there was still enough light to see that the pair of silk opera gloves still lay draped over the counter, apparently untouched since the last time I’d seen them, more than two weeks ago.

“Excuse me, sir,” Hexe said, addressing an older Kymeran with thinning, puce-colored hair, who was sweeping the stoop in front of the millinery next door. “Do you know when Madam Erys closed her shop?”

“I couldn’t give you an exact date, Serenity,” the hatter replied, pausing to lean on his broom. “It’s been at least a couple weeks since I last saw her. Not that she was one for ‘how-you-dos’. I thought it passing strange when I saw the FOR LET sign in the window, since she had just opened for business a day or two before.”

“How could I be such a fool?” Hexe groaned as we headed back down the street. “I was so desperate to reclaim my magic, I waltzed right into a trap!” He banged his gauntleted fist against his thigh in frustration. “I was stupid! Stupid! Stupid!”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” I said, placing a hand on his arm. “You had no way of knowing what she was up to.”

“Yes, but part of me knew it was all too good to be true, even for magic!” he replied bitterly. “But I was so desperate to make myself whole, I ignored my instincts! And that bitch Erys played me like a hurdy-gurdy.”

“What now?”

“We go find Moot,” Hexe said grimly. “It was obvious from the way they talked there’s plenty of history between those two. If anyone might know where to find Madam Erys, it’ll be the good doctor. And even if he doesn’t have a clue as to where she is, he’s the one who bonded the gauntlet to my hand. If he can put it on, the bastard can sure as hell take it off again.”

The Stagger Inn was little changed from the first time I saw it, except maybe even smokier and more vomit-drenched, if possible. The odor was sickening, and I had to clench my jaw in order to keep from adding to the establishment’s already impressive collection of puke puddles.

Dr. Moot was seated in the same booth as last time, although, like the rest of the Stagger Inn, considerably worse for wear, with his chin resting on his breastbone and his hands curled limply about a glass of absinthe.

“Where is she, Moot?” Hexe barked, causing the more alert patrons of the bar to turn and stare in his direction. “Where’s Erys?” When the disgraced psychic surgeon did not even twitch in reply, Hexe grabbed him by the shoulder and gave him a rough shake. “Wake up, you miserable old tosspot! Tell me where I can find Erys!”

As if in response, Dr. Moot toppled out of the booth and onto the sawdust-strewn floor, staring up at us with the cold, cloudy eyes of the dead.