Chapter 21
Now that they had located all the ingredients needed for the complicated spell, Victoria and Duke only had to find the damned dry cleaner.
Naturally, they headed to Victoria’s Montréal apartment.
Duke shrunk the plants down to miniature size by magic so that he could stuff them all in Victoria’s tote bag and be ready to cast the spell at a moment’s notice
Ancient repositories of forbidden knowledge limit one’s environs, and “urban chaos” was out. So, they landed just outside the city and took a bus in like normal, law-abiding citizens, which felt wrong, somehow.
Victoria sat rigidly during the entire ride, clutching her bag of magical ingredients like it might leak or explode.
A toddler across the aisle stared at her.
She stared back.
The toddler burst into tears.
“Good,” she muttered. “Trust your instincts.”
Duke, infuriatingly calm, watched the city roll by. “You could relax, you know.”
“I could,” she said. “But I have a bleeding tree in my bag and a plant that eats things. I feel like vigilance is appropriate.”
When they reached her building, Victoria didn’t hesitate. She bolted up the stairs, adrenaline spiking, already imagining dragging that imposter out by her stolen hair—as long as she didn’t tear it out of her scalp. Her real scalp.
She flung the door open and was greeted by silence. “She’s gone?” Victoria exclaimed. “You have got to be kidding me.”
The closet door hung open. Half the clothes were missing.
“The good ones, of course,” she added darkly. “May every zipper fail her in public.”
A voice came from the kitchen.
“She packed your favorite red dress.”
“Reginald?”
Her raccoon familiar strolled in like he owned the lease. Tiny bottle cap “medals” were pinned to his aluminum can armor. His expression was unimpressed.
He looked her up and down. “Well. This is new. You look… compact.”
Victoria pointed. “You don’t get to critique my situation until you explain why you let her leave.”
Reginald hopped onto the arm of the couch. “Ah, yes. Because I, a raccoon, am capable of stopping a determined human who is wearing my beloved witch’s body.”
“But you knew she wasn’t me. You could’ve bitten her.”
“I tried,” he said. “She called me ‘emotionally aggressive,’ and packed faster.”
Victoria dragged her nemesis’s hands through her short gray hair. “Where is she?”
Reginald held up one claw. “First, a summary of crimes.”
“Reginald—”
“She cannot speak French,” he said. “She ordered coffee by pointing, and she called croissants ‘crescent bread.’ The barista nearly organized a strike.”
Duke murmured, “Understandable.”
“She also declared the cold weather coming in ‘hostile,’” Reginald continued. “She was heading South. However—”
Victoria sat up. “However?”
“She does not like beaches. Too humid and too much sand. ‘Gets everywhere.’ Her words.”
Duke tilted his head. “That narrows things a little.”
Victoria’s eyes sharpened. “So not Florida.”
“Correct.”
Reginald paused for effect. “She does, however, enjoy country music.”
Victoria slowly sat forward. “Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”
Duke’s brow furrowed. “Tennessee?”
Victoria nodded. “Tennessee.”
Reginald nodded, pleased. “She mentioned boots. And live music. And ‘a place where people understand a good breakup song.’”
Victoria dropped her head back against the couch. “I crossed continents. I nearly died in a jungle. I inhaled something that should count as a war crime—”
“Corpse flower?” Reginald supplied.
“Bingo. And she runs off to reinvent herself as a country music enthusiast?”
“People cope in different ways,” Reginald said.
“This is not coping. This is altering my entire brand.”
Duke smiled faintly. “At least we have a destination.”
“Yes,” Victoria said. “A destination filled with music, boots, and the woman currently living in my body.”
She sat up, energy snapping back into place. “Fine. Tennessee it is.”
Reginald grinned. “Road trip?”
“I’m afraid not, my dear Reginald.” Victoria stood and paced. “We had to take a bus to get here. And with a raccoon on my shoulder, we wouldn’t blend in.”
“Agreed.”
She turned toward Duke, eyes gleaming with renewed purpose.
“We are going to Tennessee,” she said. “We are going to find her—”
“And?” Reginald prompted.
Victoria’s eyes narrowed. “And then we’re having a very serious conversation about dry-cleaning.”
Reginald’s tail flicked. “Damn. I’ve been hoping for violence, and now I’m going to miss whatever happens.”
Victoria and Duke stood in front of the crone’s cottage that seemed to have settled into the woods. It was crooked, mossy, and just a little too quiet.
Victoria took a deep breath before knocking on the door. It opened slowly, revealing the crone. The wizened old woman with long silver hair and dark green eyes stared.
“Why have you come to my door again?” she asked. No greetings or small talk.
Victoria explained. Quickly. Efficiently. She didn’t bother softening the edges.
The crone listened, then gave a slow nod.
“I can help,” she said. “But she won’t come easily. I can draw her to you. But when she arrives, you must be ready to fight her. Are you willing?”
Victoria glanced at Duke.
He gave a small nod.
“So be it,” Victoria said. “But I need to know something. Will she have access to everything I know? My training? My reflexes? I have two black belts.”
The crone’s gaze flicked over her. “She has your body. Not your experience. Not your memories. Those are yours alone. But you are not used to the body you wear now.”
Victoria huffed out a breath. “No argument there.”
“Then you must rely on what you still possess,” the crone said. “Your knowledge and your will.”
Duke stepped in. “We’ll manage. I can assist.”
The crone lifted a hand. “You must remember, any damage done to that body will remain when it is returned.”
Duke grimaced. “Understood.”
“Tomorrow is our Samhain celebration,” Victoria said. “Is there a chance she could arrive tonight?”
“Ah!” The woman nodded, knowingly. “The festival of the last harvest. I would say it’s perfect for your purposes. Goddess willing, she will reap what she has sown. Perhaps I can help her get here quickly. Come into my home. I must prepare you.”
A moment later, Victoria stood in the middle of the dark room with Duke close by her side.
The crone, cloaked in black, stepped forward and said, “I can help you capture the woman who stole your body in the switch. I have the power to manipulate the elements and use them to your advantage. With my help, you can bring her to justice. Are you positive this is what you want?”
Duke looked toward Victoria, and she took a deep breath. Then both said in unison, “Do it!”
The crone began to chant, and the air around them seemed to hum with energy.
Duke grabbed Victoria's hand, and the two of them watched as the crone summoned the wind, water, and earth to do her bidding.
The wind swept through the room, picking up dust and debris and carrying it away.
The water cascaded down from the sky through the chimney, creating a tidal pool in and around the cabin that threatened to wash them away.
Finally, the earth began to tremble and quake, shaking the walls and foundation.
Victoria and Duke clung to each other, feeling the power of the crone's magic.
Finally, the tremors stopped, the water drained through the floorboards into the earth below, and the crone spoke again.
“The woman you seek is located northwest of here. Follow the wind, and it will take you to her sooner. Or you may wait and let her come to you. There will be a fight. You may prefer to reserve your energy. Now go, and may justice be served.”
Victoria and Duke looked at each other. “I vote for taking the fight to her,” Victoria said. Duke nodded, and they set off on their quest to capture the thieving woman.
“Northwest, huh?” Victoria said. “She couldn’t have been more specific?”
“I know what you mean, but if we follow water, wind, and earth’s clues, it should help.”
“Do you really think so?”
“What choice do we have?”
“Well, I have no choice, but you do,” Victoria reminded him. “If you have something else to do…”
“My job is to serve the L.A.W., and even if it wasn’t, I’m curious to see how this plays out.”
“Are you sure? I mean, you’ve already done so much to help me, and…”
“And what?”
“I don’t know. You’ve just been so kind to me. I’m not used to that.”
“You’re not used to people being kind to you?”
She halted and hung her head. “I guess I’m not used to being kind to others, so they don’t feel like being kind to me. That’s what got me into this mess.”
“Oh?”
“I was very unkind to the woman whose body I am in now. It never occurred to me that I was flirting with danger, but I should not have treated her badly, no matter who she was or what she did or didn’t do.”
He patted her shoulder and gave her a sad smile. “Maybe you can apologize to her later.”
“I certainly hope so, and not just because I ‘got caught,’ so to speak. I have been reflecting on my behavior, and I feel ashamed.”
“It sounds as if you’re learning from the experience,” Duke said. “Sometimes that’s the best way something good can come from something bad.”
“True. Other good things have come from all of this.”
“Yeah? Like what?”
“Like our adventures, I just wish we’d had more time in those remote and fascinating places. Well, all except Cuba.”
He chuckled. “After we get through this, nothing is stopping us from going back to those places.” He took her hand, and they resumed their fast walk. “Now, let’s go find your body.”
Victoria laughed. “That sounds so strange. Like I’m the headless horseman or something.”
“The mindless witch?” he teased.
She laughed. It felt good to laugh at her bizarre circumstances instead of railing against this new reality. “Northwest,” Victoria said. “That narrows it down.”
Duke tilted his head. “We follow what we can. The sun, the elements, depending on what they reveal.”
She exhaled. “Right. Because that’s always reliable.”