“By the way you explained it, you’ve spent a good amount of your time with the owner of that trinket shop. It sounds like that was a huge project,” she prodded.
I let out a deep sigh, knowing that it was no use trying to hide things from my Ma. She could read me like a book–she was exceptional at reading folk.
Keeping as much to myself as possible, I admitted that, perhaps, it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the realms if I had to see the vivacious vampire running the trinket shop again. She was loud and obnoxious and achingly lovely, but she was surprisingly pleasant to be around.
Her energy had begun to seep between the cracks in my defenses, and she was slowly crawling under my skin, inch by inch. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to get her out again. She had breached my defenses in a way no other had before.
And, technically, the shop wasn’t finished yet. She could use more of my help.
“Oooooh, Redd’s got a crush!” my brother Ollie chimed in a singsong voice.
“I’m a grown ass man. It’s not acrush,” I defended. “I just think she’s a very impressive and admirable woman. She works hard. She takes no bullshit. She speaks her mind.”
“Impressive and admirable?Forget a crush, Redd’s in love,” my brother Wayde mocked.
“You’ve been with your lady since you were littles, you shouldn’t be offering romantic feedback to anyone,” I grumbled, glaring at him, uncomfortable with the turn the conversation had taken. My family was big on mocking– anything and everything was fair game with us, but for some reason I found myself wanting to protect the idea of Fiella and keep her to myself.
I wanted to wrap her stories up inside myself and shelter them from the realms, where they were mine alone and I didn’t have to share them.
I wanted the bits and pieces of her to be mine.
I wanted her to be mine.
CHAPTER 33
Fiella
Kizzi dragged me into the park to meet with the other local witches–some of whom I knew personally, some of whom I had only met on occasion, and a few of whom I had never seen before. They must have traveled here for the occasion.
I tried to set my sulking aside to focus, but I was struggling. My mind kept trying to wander.
Kizzi cleared her throat to bring the focus onto herself. “Ladies, I know we’ve been working on the hush hush for the past few days, but I think it’s time we finally let Fiella know exactly what has been going on.”
“Wait a second. What is going on?” I asked, confused.
Kizzi patted the back of my hand. “It’s alright Fi, just breathe for a sec, we’ll fill you in. I told you I would get to the bottom of this, and I think I have. Or at least part of it. We’ll explain.”
She gestured to one of the other witches in the group, a strong and imposing woman with fire red hair cropped close to her chin. She introduced herself to me as Gertrude.
“Miss Fiella, as I’m sure you are aware, there has been a string of unfortunate… incidents that have been occurring in Moonvale. Your shop’s beetle infestation. The increased illnesses. Sprites running amok. The damaged buildingsthroughout town. Et cetera. As I’m sure you are also aware, given the circumstances you yourself were in, most of these incidents seem to be magical in nature,” she explained. “Now, magic doesn’t cause mischief on its own. While it isn’t sentient, magic tends to err towards causing peace and order, not mischief and strife. Something dark is at play here.”
My mind was whirling with the overload of information. “Okay,” I said slowly. “Something dark? Like dark magic, dark sorcery? How does that even work?”
Gertrude patiently explained further. “The magic of the Old Gods is naturally light, but with evil intentions and a lot of time and effort, stubborn folk can twist it to become something ugly. We think this is the case here.”
“Who the fuck would do that?” I asked.
Gertrude startled at my use of profanity, but quickly composed herself and delicately cleared her throat. “That’s what we need your help to figure out. We have been following magical trails and tracing magical signatures, and it seems as though your beetles have come from a town called Willowvalley. Have you been there, or do you know anyone from there?” she asked.
“Willowvalley… I haven’t been there in ages. It’s one of the towns my family sources trinkets from. Sure, we travel all over the realm, but I don’t think anything very significant comes to mind. I certainly don’t remember a group of evil folk there…” I drifted off as I sank deeper into thought, trying to pull out any crumbs that could be helpful.
There was that bartender who refused to serve more than one alcoholic drink to any women folk, but I think he was just an asshole, not an evil magic wielder. There were a few littles who attempted to steal my rental horse. Just the usual nonsense, nothing that jumped out as dark magic.
My attention was pulled back to the group when Kizzi’s voice rang out above the chatter of the others. “Well, you all know what that means.”
Ten pairs of eyes stared at her expectantly, clearly not knowing what that meant.
She rolled her eyes dramatically. “We’re going to Willowvalley to dig up this rotten egg! Duh!”
