Chapter 37
Accompanied by Smith, Nan made her way to the princess’ quarters.
The door was ajar, and the sound of the tiger’s tongue lapping echoed ominously down the hall.
It was a nightmarish scene that made Nan’s pulse quicken as she stepped back inside.
The witch sat upright, her gloved fingers tapping a steady rhythm on a glass table brought in from another suite after the princess’ violent outburst. Meanwhile, Languidere lay on the bed, brushing her hair, as if she were a cat herself.
The witch bolted to a stand. She snapped to Smith, who held out the newly cast collar in his hands as if presenting it to a queen.
“Give it here!” The witch snatched the collar and inspected it, holding it far from her face, peering down her nose with discriminating eyes.
She was not unattractive, Nan thought. By the looks of her slender nose, she had once been attractive, and, if Nan disregarded the cracks at the woman’s lips, she could see what was once a plain but pretty woman.
The witch turned the stacked lurlicite bands in her hands.
Smith had expertly cast a mold by bending the gold hardware of a purse clasp to create the circular shape and mechanism to fasten the flat bands of the collar together.
There was a small protruding ball-ended lever, no bigger than a hairpin, and, when it was pulled, a row of upholstery teeth protracted, securing the skin on both ends when retracted.
“What is this?” the witch said, pushing the ball pin, which would not move.
“Very careful,” Smith said, reaching toward the object. “May I?” He took the bands and unlatched the purse clasp that held the two together, revealing the inset row of serrated teeth. “If you pull the pin, the teeth push upward…” He gently pulled the pin out, and the teeth raised.
“Skin gets stretched over the teeth. Then you push them back in to lock the skin into the band.” The witch looked down her nose, squinting at the demonstration. She was fascinated but not impressed.
“That is it,” Smith said. “Will that do?”
“What do you want, a medal?” the witch rudely admonished. “How in the realms am I supposed to know if it will do? I didn’t commission the gadget. I’m certainly not here to screw the damn cat’s head on! Go on. Be done the upholstery work, so I can be on my way.”
It pained Nan to see Smith take the brunt of the witch’s annoyance. The witch made no effort to cover her irritation with having to provide services to the princess. Nan wondered why she had come at all.
“She’s almost as good as new!” Languidere sang and twirled as Smith secured the cat’s angry head to its body. Nan would have rolled her eyes at the childish twirling, but she was busy preparing the thread and needle to stitch Hungry Tiger’s fur together to heal over the lurlicite collar.
“She will be. Once the collar is enchanted and she’s sewn up,” Smith said, holding the cat’s limp body down, its paws padding blindly as the head snapped about.
“Do not sew over the collar!” Languidere said, dropping her childish act.
Nan looked at Languidere to see if she had been joking.
Even the witch glared with uncertainty at her.
The princess scoffed at their surprise. “What if I should need to remove her head again? I’d have to cut through the skin.
Can’t the skin be attached to either side of the collar?
” Languidere’s earnestness was terrifying. Smith’s mouth hung open.
“Don’t gawk, cousin! I’ve asked you a question. Are you dim?” Languidere asked in complete disgust. She had a way of making those around her seem mad, though the truth was quite the opposite.
“No. You shouldn’t have to remove your animal’s head, ever.” Smith looked at Nan for affirmation of the princess’ lunacy. She’d have returned the look if looks did not cost lives in the presence of the princess.
“Whatever you decide to do with the damn thing is of no concern to me,” the witch said.
“Just have it done so I needn’t spend another moment over this.
” She reached into her carpet bag and pulled out a small vial of dried powder, then, from a dart in the pleat of her skirt, she drew her wand.
Nan marveled at the cleverly concealed tool.
The witch sprinkled the powder generously around the collar as the cat snapped back, licking at its fur.
The princess made a contrived whimpering sound, as though she worried the tiger was being hurt.
Nan finally did roll her eyes, and the witch scowled, slowly turning away from Languidere’s ridiculous spectacle.
“It’s an herb to reduce swelling so the veins can find each other – like little mating worms.” The witch grinned to taunt Languidere.
“Why?” Languidere whined like a puppy.
“So she doesn’t get an infection!” Smith snapped. “Do you want her skin to be infected?” Smith’s face was blood red. Of everyone in the room, it was clear the princess’ whimpering perturbed him most of all. Languidere kept her pout on, as she knew it was angering him.
“Enough of this! I don’t need to sit around here half the day to see if the lurlicite is pure enough to work.
” The witch tapped the tip of the wand at her hip, and, at the end, a strange stone flickered dimly.
“Metallum, pelle signa, artus refice, Felis reviviscat, virtute et gratia, in hoc incantamento,” she chanted.
The wand flashed, and the collar went from the silver glow to a radiant white like starlight.
It beamed miraculously through the flaps of fur and blood covering it.
Nan gasped and cupped her mouth. It was working!
The gasp was unfounded to Languidere or anyone else present, other than the witch, for only they could see its light. The witch took notice of Nan’s response and, with black eyes reflecting the white light, locked onto Nan.
“Hm,” the witch hummed. Nan wished she’d release her from her stare, for Languidere now shot looks back and forth between them.
“What is it? What are you two seeing? Someone explain what is not being said, at once!” Languidere sounded so juvenile that she might as well have stomped her foot.
The witch glowered at the grate of Languidere’s voice.
“Oh, shut up, you twit. You’ll get nothing more from me,” she said and finally released her wand.
“Stitch now before the limbs start twitching. She’ll be vicious as she reanimates.
And I’m not coming back here to enchant a bracelet when she bites your hand off.
” She slid her wand back into the pleat and tossed her bottle of herbs with a clank upon other bottles in her bag.
“How long will it be?” Languidere lamented.
“I don’t know,” the witch whined dramatically back at her. Languidere’s face fell in shock at the mockery. The witch hoisted her bag from the floor.
“I will collect payment.” Mombi turned slowly, spite simmering in her black eyes, her mouth in a sinister sneer meant to frighten. “From the king.”
“You will not! I will pay you myself,” Languidere said, poorly veiling the fear the witch had successfully stirred.
“Your payment will be that you do not ever summon me, nor ever speak or write my name again. I will collect from the king. There are matters to be discussed.”
“Mombi!” the princess insisted, with balled fists at her sides.
“I demand that you collect what is owed to you, from me!” Nan shuddered, and Smith grabbed her wrist. Mombi was a name spoken only in whispers, a witch exiled from Oz for unspeakable crimes of dark magic.
Her name was synonymous with chaos, and though it was never proven, it was said that she was responsible for the disappearance of an entire royal family in the Northern Quadrant of Oz.
“This is the last time I will say this.” Mombi slowly drew her wand and pointed it directly at Languidere.
“Never speak my name again.” Smith and Nan ducked away as best they could.
“You think I am a fool? Of course Evoldo does not know that you’ve summoned me.
For you should not have! He will know this, and he will pay for your stupidity.
” The wand remained pointed at Languidere’s forehead.
“I am not stupid,” Languidere grumbled.
“Oh, child. You are next to brainless.” Mombi had said all she needed to, and she tucked the wand back into its concealed compartment. “If that weren’t the worst of it. You are madder than a shithouse rat.”
Mombi dismissed her, and, without a care in the world, approached Nan, who instinctively averted her eyes, but the witch came to a stop beside her, their shoulders almost touching.
“When you’re finished hiding, I could use another set of gifted hands,” the witch said in a tone that brooked no argument.
With that, she strode out the doors, leaving Nan to hurry back to her task of stitching up Hungry Tiger.
Languidere plopped on the bed and sulked, though, behind the act, it was rage that burned.
“I want my Hungry Tiger. Make it quick!” she whined.
Nan stitched as quickly as she could, but the thick skin of the tiger paired with the constant jerking of its head made the task difficult.
Then the tiger’s paw stretched, not blindly, but intentionally, toward the pillows it rested upon, and its thick nails protracted, causing Smith to gasp.
“She did it!” Smith said, grabbing Nan’s wrist.
“Careful,” Nan said, as the tiger growled as she pushed the needle too hard into its skin. The powder was fast—the tiger’s throat box now connected with its lungs. “She did,” Nan said, marveling at the healing of the lurlicite and powder.
“She did nothing. Spiteful hag.” The princess sat up abruptly.
“Why did Mombi say you were hiding, Nan? And what does she want your hands for?” The princess’ eyes bore into Nan’s back.
But that was of no mind to Nan in this moment.
It was the name of the witch that struck fear in her heart, and the apparent relationship she held with the royal family.
Hungry Tiger suddenly sprang up with a terrible growl, the needle and thread hanging from the last bit of open skin.
Languidere leapt up clapping and threw out her arms to the cat.
Hungry Tiger’s ears fell flat and it let out a guttural attack growl.
The princess dropped her act to stare dumbfounded at her angry house pet.
Then, to make matters worse, Hungry Tiger came to Nan, hopping up and crouching low on the stool she sat beside, then nudged her head against Nan’s arm to be scratched.
Nan did not scratch the cat and did not dare look at the Princess.
She took the opportunity to finish the last stitch, which the tiger allowed her to do.
As if to further incite Languidere, Hungry Tiger purred as Nan stitched.
Languidere stormed from the room with a violent slam of the doors. Some moments later, perhaps midway down the stairs, she screamed a bloodcurdling scream.