Views from the Tower (8 page)

I was so surprised by his statement that I almost dropped the gun. “The O.N.O. aren’t oppressors!”

Phillips took advantage of my momentary lapse. He darted forward, dropping the bunny head, and wrested my gun from my hand. Fear flooded through me. I was wearing a vest, but he was smart enough to know that and shoot me somewhere else.

“Don’t look so scared,” he laughed quietly as he opened the chamber. The bullets clinked together as they fell into the costume’s large paw. “You say they’re not oppressive because you work for them. You are them. Maybe if you spent a little time in a tale or two you’d have a different opinion.” He handed my now empty gun back with a flourish. “And now, my lady, I must away.” He took a few steps down the alley before turning back and piercing me with a sharp stare. “I could show you. Right now. You’ve got a look about you, like you don’t quite belong to them yet.”

I shook my head, mutely. Something flashed across his face, and I had the oddest sense that I’d disappointed him.

“Don’t follow the white rabbit, Alice.” He shot me a grin before placing the costume head firmly back on and running away.

I holstered my gun with shaking hands. I wasn’t sure how I was going to explain my missing bullets. But that was the least of my worries. I was more concerned with my sudden, inexplicable desire to go running after a criminal Charming in a bunny suit.

I turned and made my way slowly back out of the maze of alleyways. My vehicle was parked on the main road and it took a good ten minutes of walking to make my way back.

There was a small white box sitting on the hood of my vehicle. It had a tag attached to it, like a gift. I glared at it suspiciously for a moment before flipping the tag over.

- Special Agent Alice Harrison -

I glanced up and down the street, a chill running through me. I had the sudden, horrifying thought that I hadn’t been tailing Erick Phillips so much as he’d been letting me follow him.

I cautiously opened up the white box. Inside was a small glass bottle filled with a red liquid. It looked a bit like wine, but I knew better. There was a tag attached to the bottle as well; heavy cream colored paper tied to the bottle with a piece of twine.

For when you finally are ready to face the truth. I’m sure you know what to do.

-E.P.

My fist closed around the bottle, clutching it so hard that the ridges bit into my hand. I felt faint and a bit dizzy, like I’d stepped onto a carousel that was moving way too fast. I looked up and down the street again. No one.

I should have broken the bottle. Should have smashed it against the pavement and let it splinter into a million pieces; let that blood red liquid leak out all over the concrete and run away.

Instead I put it in my pocket, got into my vehicle and put the key in the ignition. I was tired and I wanted to go home, take a hot shower, and go to bed. There was no reason for me to go into the office again tonight. I had nothing to report.

Magical Spell Support

I’d rigged the tower with a security system. I’d placed gems at various points throughout the large, circular room that the princess slept in, as well as down the winding staircase and around the front door. They were linked together, and through them I could see into the tower, monitoring it for signs of spell tampering. I could also keep track of the occasional knight who got the bright idea to hack his way through my forest of thorns in a vain attempt to wake the princess. It was always the same—they were out looking for a quest and the tower with its beautiful captive was too much for their little adventure-seeking hearts to resist.

They almost always died in the thorn forest. In the last fifty years only two had made it through to the tower. Neither had made it past the front door, thanks to my little network of gems that acted like remote spies. Each gem’s view was reflected on my wall of mirrors so I never even had to leave my throne room.

Some might call it obsessive. I thought of it as keeping tabs on my investment. A death spell was one thing, but when that meddling fairy godmother altered the enchantment, she’d cost me quite a bit. Her modification had made the original spell stretch, adding the weight of her magic. It pushed against my own power, fighting and clawing its way into my enchantment. A death spell was easy; set it up, put a timer on it, send it out. A sleeping spell was an altogether different beast. Especially one that hadn’t been designed as a sleeping spell.

Why she’d made it so long I would never figure out. A hundred years? What was wrong with her? Was that the first number that popped into her addled little brain? Fairy godmothers. Stars above, they were a waste of time. Only one step above pixies. Dust-snuffing vermin in puffy dresses.

So I’d spent way too much time in front of my wall of mirrors, watching the annoying little princess snoring her way through half a century. I suppose I could have just given up, let her wake, or let one of the knights make it through the door. Defeat didn’t look good on me though. Triumph—dark, evil, and flashy—was really more my style.

At the moment, half of my mirrors were black and the other half were flashing an error message.

There was nothing I hated more than wasting time with the morons at MSS, but I’d run out of options. A face flickered onto the largest mirror. “Thank you for contacting Magical Spell Support, this is Bill speaking. What is the nature of your magical malfunction?”

I gaped at the screen. “They’ve outsourced MSS to trolls now? ‘Cause I don’t need an actual magical being to help me? I suppose you’re just going to read from a manual or something?”

“Magical Spell Support has not been outsourced; we provide localized support,” the troll replied as if reading from a cue card. “How may I assist you today.”

“You can’t claim to be localized support!” I was gobsmacked by his gall. “I recognize a troll when I see one. If your name is actually Bill, I’ll eat my hat.”

“You’re not wearing a hat, Ma’am”

I snorted. “I will conjure a hat and then eat it, Bill-Which-Is-Not-Really-Your-Name.”

“I am more than qualified to assist you with any magical support issue. Please describe the nature of the malfunction.” The troll really was reading off a script! I considered pitching a fit and demanding to speak to a supervisor, but with my luck the supervisor would be a troll too. There was only one thing worse than a troll: a troll with power.

“I have a monitoring spell running as an add-on to a previous spell, and for some reason I’m getting error messages.”

“And you’re running on a mirror interface?”

“Yes.”

The mirrors on my wall began to flicker. I could briefly see images of the interior of the tower, followed by the MSS center—definitely outsourced; the troll could claim localized support all he wanted, but that many flat noses and broad foreheads didn’t reassure me—followed by multicolored bands that indicated a dead feed.

“What spell system are you currently working out of?”

I closed my eyes in frustration, knowing what was coming next. “8.3.1”

The troll made a
tsking
noise. “That grimoire is at least a decade out of date. You should be in 10.1 at least for the kind of power you’re trying to run.”

“My spell is over fifty years old; the newer grimoire text isn’t compatible. I can’t make all of the appropriate modifications because I’m not the only contributor.”

“Do you have the permission of the other contributor? If so, we could get you upgraded.”

“Bill, try using some critical thinking skills. If I had the permission of the other contributor, don’t you think I would have upgraded at some point?”

Bill didn’t say anything, just raised one ugly troll eyebrow higher on his ugly troll forehead.

“So what are my options?” I finally prompted him, trying to hide the fact that I was impatiently taping my foot.

“Let’s reboot the whole spell; you’ll need to power down, wait thirty seconds, and then power back up.”

I almost passed out from frustration right then. Really I did. “I already tried that before I called you. This is not the first time I’ve had to deal with you people. Although last time you weren’t trolls.”

“I understand, Ma’am; let’s go ahead and power it down one more time, just to see what it does.”

That was the second time he’d called me “ma’am.” This day was getting crappier by the minute. I realize that I’d just admitted to being significantly over fifty years old, but for a fairy that was a mere nothing. It certainly didn’t put me in “ma’am” status.

“Fine,” I snapped. Powering down the spell didn’t take much; a few muttered incantations and all of my mirrors, except the one with Bill’s flat, greenish-grey face swimming in the middle of it, went black. After the requisite thirty seconds, I chanted again and the mirrors slowly began to power up. Bill leaned forward, staring at something in front of him intently, as my spell flashed across the mirrors.

“Hmm, eye of newt? No one uses eye of newt anymore. It’s all about fire salamanders; they’ve got a bit more pop, you get a few more jolts out of them.”

“I can’t just go back and replace the eye of newt with fire salamander at this point.” I pointed out.

“True, especially without upgrading your grimoire. I’ve just never seen such an archaic mirror system.”

“Thank you, Bill.” The sarcasm was most likely lost on him. Trolls were a bit slow on the uptake when it came to sarcasm. They also always completely missed out on irony.

“Wait,” Bill almost shouted. His eyes were still flicking back and forth as he watched the spell scroll. “You’re running the monitoring spell as a periphery?”

I gritted my teeth as the mirrors came back online. Several were showing views of the interior of the tower, a few still had the rainbow reflection of death blinking on and off. “Yes, I believe I mentioned that at the beginning of this conversation.”

“That’s really a misuse of the mirror interface; the original spell could be what’s causing such problems. I’ll just separate them out for you.”

“No!” I yelled, jumping up from my chair. “You don’t understand, they’re linked—”

But it was too late. I watched in helpless horror as the mirrors flashed brightly and then settled into murkiness. I could still see the interior of the tower—see the princess lying on her opulent bed—on at least two mirrors, but the rest had gone completely dark.

“You’ve crashed the whole bloody spell!” I screamed at Bill’s repulsive, flat face. I could tell by his expression that he realized what he’d done. And that he didn’t give the hair-feather of a griffin.

“We can have a tech visit you to help restore your spell. Our next available appointment is next Tuesday between the hours of 9 and 3. Would you like me to schedule you in Ma’am? Ma’am, can you hear me?”

I could hear him, but I wasn’t listening. I was watching the last fifty years of work—my one shot at that dark, evil, flashy triumph—disintegrate right before my eyes.

I could see it all in the two mirrors that were still working. That whiny, annoying princess stopped snoring, sat up in bed, and looked around her as if confused. Confused, but horribly, horrifically, undeniably awake.

All of the king’s magicians, and even that stupid fairy godmother, hadn’t been able to best me. But Magical Spell Support and their overreaching troll had destroyed everything in just a few moments of sheer stupidity.

I screamed in frustration, sending out a bigger, even more powerful spell. I watched the princess’s tower shake on its foundations. Then the large stones began to crumble. I shook the tower apart until nothing was left but a pile of dusty rubble.

It didn’t matter though; the royal spawn had already walked down the stairs and out of the enchanted tower, the forest of thorns falling at her feet as they had no spell to support them.

I heard Bill clear his throat. “If there’s nothing else I can help you with, please hold for a brief customer satisfaction survey.”

Red

No sunlight filtered down through the thick canopy this far into the forest. I listened for sounds of movement, pulling the hood of my mottled green cloak tighter. My red hair would attract attention even in the gloom.

There. The soft sounds of wolves moving through the forest. They drew closer, their panting now louder than the furious pounding of my heart. They weren’t hunting, but patrolling, guarding the Coven. Protecting the dark-haired, blue-eyed women who looked as if angels had bent down and molded their forms. But they were anything but holy. We lived in fear of their black magic. Fear and hate.

Every so often men from our village disappeared forever. Sometimes, years later, when the Coven came to trade with the village, you might notice that the children hiding near their skirts seemed familiar. A tilt of their eyes, or a dimple, or chin. You could notice, but you couldn’t say anything.

My father vanished when I was young. My mother never spoke of him. But I remembered.

Now it was Liam, my intended. He’d been gone for days. After the first night I knew he wasn’t returning. I couldn’t just stand quietly and wait for a black-haired witch to have a babe that looked like my love.