First Destroy All Giant Monsters (The World Wide Witches Research Association) (19 page)

“Help you?” called a voice behind him.

Karl turned. A small, square, dark-haired man stood alertly at the bottom of the stairs. Karl started toward him and glanced past the new speaker to his car … his …

“What happened to my car?” Karl pounded down the stairs and across the forecourt followed closely by the smaller man.

“What’s wrong with it? Looks a perfectly decent little rollerskate to me.” The small man stopped and laughed. “If you feed it and water it properly it should grow up to be a nice little skateboard.”

Karl ran his hands over the smooth skin of his beloved convertible. The shape, the size was perfect. The wear pattern on the driver’s side leather seat was right, but the color …
red.

“It was white. My car. I swear. My car, it was white when I got out of it just now. What happened to it?”

The other man laughed quietly. “Well, that may have been, but now it’s red. Good color for a sports car, red. Don’t you think?”

“But it was
white.
I wanted it to be white. I didn’t want to be stopped all the time by the cops. They go for red sports cars. How did this happen? What did you do to my car?”

Hearing the panicked tone in his own voice, Karl took a breath and held it. There was no reason to be worried. There had to be a perfectly reasonable explanation for how the car was suddenly red. His pounding heart disagreed. Since that damned woman had kissed him in the hospital he’d had the strength to move, to walk, but not much more.

“Well, now you’ll just have to obey the speed limits, won’cha?” said the small guy.

“No, look, see,” Karl pulled out his wallet and shuffled through, pulling out a small, much abused photo of two young men standing beside a white car. “See. It was red when I got it, rusted through almost and we spent the summer repairing it, painting it. I wanted it to be white. Mike …” Karl closed his eyes for a moment, grief choking his throat, and he leaned against the warm metal. “We painted it ourselves,” he finished weakly.

The small man took the photo from his hand and examined it.

“Yes, that’s a white car, sure enough.”

Karl turned, ready with a scathing reply and stared into laughing black eyes. The smaller man handed back the photo and held out a surprisingly large hand.

“Hi, I’m Smoke. Amber’s cousin.”

“Smoke?” repeated Karl distractedly, barely noticing that his hand was being squashed and shaken firmly.

“Yes. Don’t laugh. It’s short for ‘smoke rising straight and true into the clear night sky.’” Smoke grinned and winked. “Mom fancies herself one hundred and sixty seventh Blackfoot or some such. It’s not so bad, for a name, I mean. However, if you want to live a long and happy life, don’t ask my brother Manny what his name is short for. He might answer and you’ll never be able to achieve happiness with a woman again.”

Karl absorbed that comment, pulling his attention with difficulty from his car’s sudden transformation. “Okay?”

“We’ve been waiting for you. Amber said you’d be along when you got some sleep.”

Karl barely noticed that his hand was still resting in the other’s grip.

“I almost didn’t come.”

“Almost doesn’t pay the rent. When it came down to it you’re too intelligent to go on this way. You want to know what’s happening. Sensible. Now Amber’s out back in the Great Circle setting up. I’m supposed to be taking her a big old mirror, but you can take it down. Come on, it’s on the back porch.”

Karl stared down at his car and struggled to regain a grip on reality. His life had been nice and ordinary for a few years. Exhausting, granted, but normal. Now he had a witch claiming his ill health was due to giant spider’s web and his car was changing color. He checked to make sure the ground was still under his feet, still dirty and not fairy dust.

“Can you fix this?” he asked, pointing to the car.

Smoke considered the problem with care, walking back and forth in front of the low grill.

“Dunno,” he said, holding his chin in his hands. “Wasn’t me that did this. Have to take it up with the house.”

“The who?” Karl decided not to ask any more questions until he found someone sensible to submit them to. In the meantime he had to speak to Amber. “Where is Amber?”

“Just follow the path around,” said Smoke waving toward the side of the house. “You’ll see a hedge maze. The hedges are higher than your head, so you can’t miss it. Once you go in walk straight ahead no matter how the maze seems to want to turn. If you are expected the path will come clear to you.”

“Are you kidding me?” demanded Karl.

“In this house? No, I am not kidding.” Smoke gave him a smile, or rather showed his teeth in a manner that chilled Karl all the way to his bones. “Following the path that is laid before you is safer here.”

The hedge maze was just where Smoke had said it was, visible from the back steps of the house. Leaning against a tree just a few feet from the entrance was an ornate, antique standing mirror. Karl heaved the mirror into his arms and found hugging it was the easiest way to manage the thing. After a few steps he glanced down and found the grass beneath his feet changed and under his cowboy boots was a stepping stone.

He glanced back toward the house, but Smoke had vanished. There was nothing, no one in sight. He grunted, tightened his grip on the mirror, and closed his mind to the possibility of magic. He wanted to ask the damned woman sensible questions. That was all. If she was involved somehow with his illness, if she knew anything about what was happening to him, then he was going to ask scientific questions and demand sensible, logical, and practical answers.

Yes. That was the plan.

He kept his mind focused on scientific matters as he lugged, humped, and dragged the heavy mirror down a stone path that changed briefly to yellow brick. At that point he’d stopped, dropped the mirror to the ground, and walked back toward his car. The bricks vanished immediately replaced with ordinary – ordinary? – stepping stones. He nodded to himself to acknowledge his victory over … over … he returned to his burden and picked it up with a sigh.

As promised there were the expected branchings and twists in the maze, but whenever he was offered the option of a left or right turn there was also a straight ahead narrow path just wide enough to pass through if he turned sideways.

Finally he walked through a gap in the hedges and almost tripped over the edge of a carved stone set into the ground. He dropped one end of the heavy mirror to the soft grass, groaning in relief. He worked his tight shoulders in a vain attempt to loosen the ache. Carrying the mirror a hundred yards from the house had left him breathless.

He bent over gasping for air for a few moments as grey spots danced before his eyes and his body trembled. Finally he dragged himself upright and looked around.

The Great Circle deserved its name all right.

The carefully maintained box hedges ended in a square that had to be a hundred feet across. There were stone cairns raised in what he assumed were the important compass points. A few stone and wrought iron chairs were arranged near the box hedges for what, he didn’t know, witnesses to the magic? Was he supposed to sit there? Centered neatly in the square was a circle of stone set into the ground, much like the stepping stones he’d followed, with a wrought iron arch set near the south cairn. In the middle of the circle was an asymmetrical altar, two uncut stones with a somewhat flat one laid over them. A wrought iron brazier, hip height and already burning, was set to one side of the altar.

Amber was standing in the center of the circle and didn’t seem to have noticed his arrival.

“Hey, where do you want this?” shouted Karl, pointing at the mirror.

Amber flicked a glance in Karl’s direction and continued spreading out the glowing coals until they covered the base of the wide bowl. She didn’t seem surprised to see him. Maybe she could see the future, which begged the question how she’d been caught by that web she kept talking about if she could.

“There will do,” she said, pointing, “as long as you stand where you can see your reflection.”

Karl dragged the huge mirror across the lawn and set it upright, twisting its support leg into the thick grass. He glared at Amber’s bent head and gritted his teeth. This morning he’d been in the cardiac intensive care ward of a hospital and this evening he was moving furniture around for a witch.

He couldn’t remember actually agreeing to this circus. She’d bulldozed him into coming out here. Nothing was going to happen; it was a complete and utter waste of his time. There were a hundred logical reasons for him to run right now. If he had any sense or strength he would just get in his car and go. In his Mustang – currently fire engine red when only this morning it had been white.

His hand clenched and unclenched as his throat tightened. He forced air in and out of his lungs. He hated magic. Hated being here. Hated …

Damn it, there hadn’t been enough time for her cousin to do that paint job. That thought was enough to shake him out of his panic. His back hadn’t been turned for more than a few seconds and it was dry to the touch. If this was a con, these guys were definitely in the wrong business. The car’s new paint job was perfect. Not a bubble or brush mark. Smooth. Shining.

The only possible explanation – well, there were two. One, he’d gone unconscious long enough for someone to spray paint his car without him noticing, him being unconscious and … waking standing up … or … magic.

Sighing he released the mirror. “Do you need to see it as well?”

“No, I don’t need it.”

“Then why did I drag it out here? Physical therapy?”

She laughed softly. A warm, friendly sound.

All of her attention appeared caught up in carefully placing small white leaves and twigs into the bowl. Karl watched the tendrils of smoke rise to gently stroke her face. Pale ivory skin, soft brown curls. Just tall enough to face him eye to eye. If she’d been a sensible, practical girl, instead of caught up in magic – and he’d been well enough to try – he wouldn’t mind making an attempt to seduce her.

But she was a witch, and that was too much trouble for him to consider.

“That mirror is entirely for your benefit,” said Amber, ignoring his examination. “I’m going to work some magic to show you things that aren’t normally visible to you.” She scowled at him and threw another handful of leaves into the bowl. “Otherwise you won’t believe me and I need your fully conscious and informed consent to do any more magic on you.”

“Uh huh. What drugs are you planning on using on me?”

“This is magic, Karl, not hallucinogens.”

Karl wandered over to the stone table in the center of the circle and picked up a pottery goblet. Turning it idly in his hands he started walking around the circle, watching where he put his feet. Someone had put a lot of effort into making this a private place. The area was quiet. Peaceful. Karl snorted and shook himself free of the sedating mood that pervaded the place.
A perfect hiding place for any crime you choose
, he thought. Now he was angry again. Anger helped keep his mind clear.

“And what are we doing here?” he asked.

“I’m going to perform the Spell of True Seeing.”

“Uh huh.” As if that explained anything.

Karl moved around the circle until he could watch her work. The flickering light of Tiki lamps and candles reflected off her gold brown hair, throwing shadows that shouldn’t be there across her face, emphasizing the intensity of her concentration as she placed each item on the table before her. She rose smoothly to her bare feet and brushed off the front of her shapeless linen dress. The fire pit behind her glowed through the thin fabric outlining her curves and slender legs.

“I’ll need that goblet back, if you’ve finished with it,” she said.

He stared at her. He suspected, given the way her body moved under the thin fabric that she wasn’t wearing any underwear. The idea was … repulsive. Yes. Remember, witches were not to be trusted.

“I thought magic was performed naked,” he said, wondering why he was driven to bait this woman, “or in dramatic black gowns with long lace gloves and floppy sleeves.”

Amber sniffed, ignoring his sarcasm, picking a long sandalwood fan off the altar and tapping it smartly down on his hands.

“Put down the goblet,” she ordered. “Magic, as with science, requires everything in its proper time and place. This spell does not require sky-clad, nor does it require drums, men dressed as skeletons in top hats, or trance dancing with snakes. But it does require a circle of power and protection, so be quiet for a minute while I build it.”

She walked until she was under the wrought iron arch that marked the entrance through the high flowering banks of bushes and faced the center of the circle.

“Besides … lace makes me itch,” she said and closed her eyes.

For several heartbeats all she did was breathe. Then eyes still closed she started walking the perimeter of the circle of stone, the hand holding her wooden fan pointed at the ground, her empty hand raised to the sky. At each of the four Tiki lamps she paused and chanted, moving her hands gracefully through the air. Karl bit his tongue to stop the disparaging remarks that leapt to mind. In his previous experience witches had insisted magic had to be done naked. Each event had required the aforementioned sweaty, naked men with drums, girls wearing only silver beads and fur dancing themselves into a stupor, and vast quantities, he suspected, of illegal herbals. He glanced at the smoldering stone dish. He’d have to be careful how much of this shit he breathed in. He shivered as she raised her arms then pointed forcefully to the ground. All the tiny hairs were standing up on his arms. The night was not particularly cold, but he rubbed his arms and watched Amber moving around the circle.

Amber returned to the altar and stood hands raised to the sky and hummed for several long breaths. Then she shook herself and picked up the bowl of stiff white leaves.

“Ready?” she asked.

“Whatever.” He barely glanced in her direction.

Her sigh ruffled the flames of the altar candles.

“Your enthusiasm is underwhelming.” Amber turned to face the smoldering coals. “Stand in front of the mirror, but face me. When I tell you to move I want you to start turning, turn in place.”