The Witch's Key (30 page)

“Whenever you’re ready,” I said.

She held her teacup to her lips, suspending her sip,
her nose concealed within the bell of the cup, her glistening ebony
eyes peering over the rim in a squinted tease. “Ready for what?”
she asked, her muted words nearly lost in her drink.

“Ready to tell me everything. You’re not going to
make me ask, are you?”

She rolled the cup off her lips, revealing a
paper-thin smile. “Ah-huh.”

“Fine.” I shook my head and then checked my watch. “I
guess I didn’t expect to get any sleep tonight anyway.” She seemed
to like that idea. “The first thing I want to know is, are you
okay?”

“Sure. Why not?”

“Well, I’m talking specifically about your state of
mind. What with Gypsy being—”

“A wicked evil woman,” she snapped. “And that’s all
she was. End of story. Period.”

I feathered back a bit. “Fair enough. Okay, secondly,
why did you let us go on thinking that you were Gypsy.”

“I never said I was.”

“But you let us think it.”

“It’s a conclusion you drew on your own with no
insinuations from me.”

“What were we supposed to think? You looked just like
her. You said you had a tattoo of a scorpion on your butt.”

“No. You asked me if I had a tattoo, but I never said
I did.”

“You didn’t deny it.”

“That’s because I do.”

“Have a tattoo?”

“Yes.”

“Is it a scorpion?”

She smiled coyly. “Ah-ah, patience now.”

“All right. Forget it. Let’s start with the obvious.
When did you first realize that Gypsy was the one killing those
transients?”

She set her teacup down on the table and folded her
hands neatly behind it. “Since the first one,” she said. “At least
I had my suspicions then. Once I got out to the site and found the
first witch’s key, I pretty much knew for sure.”

“What do you mean the first key? Did you find one for
all the victims?”

She nodded. “All but the ones you and Carlos found.
After number seven, you guys moved in quicker and found the last
ones.”

“Lilith, those keys were evidence.”

“No, those sites were treated like suicide
investigations. They were sealed off, inspected and returned to
private use. I found nothing that wasn’t available for
investigators to find first. Besides, your men could have found a
hundred keys and wouldn’t have thought anything of them.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do,” she answered. “And you know it, too.”

She picked up her teacup and sipped it slowly,
allowing me ample time to deny what she knew I would not. The truth
of the matter begged neither defense nor denial. If not for Carlos
and Spinelli suspecting something paranormal at work, then events
would have played out to an alternate conclusion, one that would
likely have resulted in Gypsy getting away with many more
murders.

I waited until Lilith finished her tea and watched
her pour another, before pressing her for more answers. I got the
feeling she enjoyed this part of the program. Her clever lines and
quick responses seemed almost rehearsed. But then, in some ways, I
supposed they were.

“Why didn’t you fess up when we confronted you with
the photos and the Incubus ring? You knew we had you dead to rights
on the trespassing issue.”

“You weren’t interested in my trespassing. You wanted
to know why I kept going out at nights to the yard.”

“And?”

“And I didn’t want to tell you.”

“Then tell me about the will kill spell that you
downloaded off the Internet. Did you plan on using it on Gypsy, or
was that for someone else?”

“By someone else, do you mean, you?”

“I mean anyone.”

What she did next, took me utterly by surprise, which
is hard to do these days since I have learned to expect the
unexpected from Lilith. But nothing I had experienced with her
before could prepare me for this. She pushed her chair from the
table, and without so much as a smile or a wink, rose and started
toward me. Her nightshirt had ridden up on her hips, showing more
of her bare smooth legs than she might otherwise have intended. As
she neared, I scooted my seat out and started to stand, but she
pressed her hands to my shoulders and guided me back into my
seat.

“Lilith,” I said, or started to, but she pressed her
fingers to my lips to stop me. Next, she ran her hand along my
cheek and then around the back of my neck, cradling my head within
her palm. I felt her knee wedge between my legs, and as they
parted, she slipped in between them.

“Are you ready?” she asked.

I rocked my head back and looked up into her eyes.
They seemed unusually warm and inviting. “Ready for what?”

She leaned into me gently, allowing her breasts to
brush my chin ever softly. “Ready to see my tattoo?” She took my
hand, guided it up the back of her thigh and placed it over her
cheek.

I pulled back immediately. “Lilith! Please, this is
wrong. I know it’s been a difficult time for you, but we can’t do
this.”

“Tony, it’s okay.”

I scooted my chair back, nearly falling over it
trying to get up. “Lilith. No! I don’t know what you put in that
tea, or what’s in those scented candles, but we can’t do this.”

“Why not?”

“I think you know why not.”

She looked at me puzzled at first, but after it hit
her, I could see the light bulb going on in her head. “Oh, no. I
see what this is about. You think that we—”

“Please, Lilith, don’t say another word.”

“But you and I—”

“Uh-ah. No. Trust me. You will regret this. If we
stop now, you’ll thank me in the morning.”

I turned and walked away, and as I headed down the
hall toward the bath to take a cold shower, I heard her say,
“You’re the one who’s going to regret it.”

The next morning I burst into Lilith’s room and shook
her awake. “Lilith, get up,” I said, excited, but containing it to
a hushed shout. “I just thought of something.”

She rolled onto her back, partially covering her eyes
from the light I had let into the room. “Forget it, Tony. You had
your chance.”

“No, Lilith, you don’t understand. I woke up with it
this morning.”

“What? Wood?”

“No! An idea. I got this great idea.”

She turned back onto her side, pulling the blankets
up over her shoulder and face. “Let me sleep.”

“Lilith!” I shook her until she could ignore me no
longer. “Seriously. I thought of a way that we might help Pops
out.”

At last she turned back and seemed interested. “How
do you mean?”

“The witch’s key, it holds the power we need to beat
back Pops’ cancer.”

“Explain.”

“All right, it’s like this. I was looking around on
Witchit dot com the other day, and—”

“Wait. You were on Witchit?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I was checking something out.”

“What?”

“That’s not important. Listen, what I found was this
recipe for a potion that is supposed to purge all malignancies from
infected human organs.”

“Does it work?”

“No.”

She made a face like one I had never seen before, and
I have to say that in the morning’s bright light, it was not very
flattering at all. She started to turn away again, but I cupped her
shoulder and pulled her back. “Lilith. The web site said the recipe
didn’t work because without a way to deliver a concentrated dosage
to the infected parts of the body, it could prove lethal.”

“So, what do you propose?”

“The witch’s key. I felt its effects, how it tugged
and pulled at every morsel of my body. I think that if you were
close enough, and if you did it just right, then you could focus
the key’s energy exactly where you wanted it, channeling the
potion’s effervescence straight to his malignancies.”

I could see her thinking about it, but her hesitation
told me that I still did not have her convinced. So I took her hand
and squeezed it gently, and though it was mostly a shameless ploy,
I even bit down on my lower lip to make it quiver. I do not know if
that’s what did it, but soon she softened her expression,
relinquished a sigh and checked a little smile.

“You really think that will work?” she asked.

“We have nothing to lose.”

She slapped the back of my hand and pushed it to my
chest. “Okay, but you’re making the potion. You’re a witch now.
It’s time you start acting like one.”

“Then let’s go. Time’s a wasting.”

After coffee, we sat down at the kitchen table and
took inventory of the various ingredients we would need for the
potion. I must admit, I was amused when I first read the list,
assuming that moss curds, spider legs and powered goat’s horn were
really code words for more mundane foodstuffs that every kitchen
probably had. Apparently, I was wrong.

“You have to take this seriously,” said Lilith.
“These recipes are passed down through generations of witches. You
can’t make arbitrary assumptions about what’s in them.”

I almost laughed, but stopped myself when I realized
she meant it. “But Lilith,” I said, “Surely some of these
ingredients are superfluous. I mean, come on, cat whiskers? Dried
pine sap?”

“No. A lot of my favorite potions call for whiskers
and sap.”

I shook the wrinkled paper in front of her and
pointed to item number seven. “What about this? Bat phlegm?”

She winced slightly. “Yeah…that’s a little hard to
get sometimes. I usually substitute bat phlegm with high glucose
corn syrup. It works just as well.”

“But you just said—”

“I said you couldn’t make assumptions. When you see
that a potion call for bat phlegm, unless specified, it always
means fruit bat phlegm. Because fruit bats eat fruit, their phlegm
is generally sweet. Therefor, corn syrup is an acceptable
substitute.”

“So it is okay to change some things.”

“You’re not listening to me, are you?”

“Lilith, you….”

“Forget it. I have everything else on this list that
we need. Grab a small pot out of the cupboard and I’ll get you
going.”

Having been a bachelor my entire life, I thought I
knew my way around a kitchen well enough. But once I got the base
of the potion started, I realized that the rest of it seemed as
alien to me as space ice and moon rocks. Traditional methods of
measurements flew right out the window. Without Lilith, I would
never have known that a turtle shell of moss curd equaled about
four tablespoons. A finger dip of powered goat’s horn was literally
just that: a wet finger dipped in a tin of powered horn and swished
into the potion before it started to boil. I did well figuring out
how to measure a thumbnail of beetle back, a dash of dust mites and
a splash of soured possum milk, but when it came to the whisper of
dart frog, once again I needed Lilith’s help.

“That’s the tricky one,” she said, breaking out a
tiny jar filled with a grayish blue powder. “This is some strong
stuff.”

“What is it?” I asked, my interest definitely
tweaked.

“The grayish powder is pumpkin ash, but the active
ingredient is a neurotoxin secreted by the South American dart
frog. Just one hundred and forty micrograms can kill a man in
seconds.”

“Is that a lot?”

“Hardly. It’s about equal to three grains of table
salt. That’s why it’s mixed with ash, so you can measure out tiny
amounts.”

“Wow! No wonder they only call for a whisper of the
stuff.”

“You got that right.”

I looked at her with a little more respect,
understanding why she wasn’t such a great cook in the conventional
sense. She had spent a lifetime (several, actually) perfecting her
knowledge in the art of culinary poisons, antidotes and other
curative elixirs. But what struck me was her ability to acquire
such mystic ingredients in a post medieval world. I asked her,
naively, “Where did you get all this stuff?”

Her answer seemed obvious after the fact. “Witchit
dot com, of course.”

I smiled at her. “Of course.”

She handed me the bottle of ash and dart frog, along
with a matchstick. “You want to wet the matchstick in your mouth
and dip it in the bottle,” she said.

“Okay. Then what?”

“Then recite your incantation and toss it into the
pot.”

“Recite what incantation?”

She gave me the most serious-looking scowl. “You
don’t have an incantation?”

“No. The recipe didn’t call for one.”

“You have to have one, or else the potion won’t
work.”

“How am I supposed to know that if it doesn’t say so
in the directions?”

“Tony, you’re a witch. That’s how you’re supposed to
know. You can’t expect anyone to post a witch’s potion on the web
for just any idiot to download and try. Real witch’s know these
things.”

“It’s my first day. Cut me some slack!”

She grabbed the bottle and matchstick and elbowed me
to one side. “Never mind. I’ll finish it. Don’t worry. You did well
for your first time.”

“No!” I reached over and snatched the bottle back. “I
want to try it. I heard how you did the incantation for the rite of
passage ceremony. I think I can do this.”

She gave in surprisingly easy. “Okay, but just know
that you used the last of the moss curds. If this doesn’t
work….”

“It’ll work,” I said. “I know what to say.”

She stepped back to give me room. I took the
matchstick, wet it in my mouth and dipped it in the ash. Then, as I
held it over the potion, I recited this: “
Bubbling syrup rolling
hot, seal thy juices in this pot. Thicken fast like molten mud,
that it may fuse with human blood. Banish dark unhealthy cells and
leave what keeps thy body well
.”

From the corner of my eye, I saw Lilith nodding
approvingly. “Not bad,” she said. I cannot swear, but I think I
heard a stitch of pride in her voice.

“Thanks,” I told her, and then I dropped the
matchstick into the pot. I stepped back, expecting a puff or a
bang, or maybe a whisk of spiraling wind like the kind Lilith
usually gets whenever she casts a spell. Instead, I got nothing. I
bellied up to the stove and looked into the pot. “Huh. It didn’t
work.”