Curse of the Witching Hour Read online

  All things being considered, he was fortunate he’d lasted as a human for more than a few hours. He yowled to let Gertrude know he was there.

  Lucifer smelled the aroma of starlight and an ocean breeze. The door creaked open. Gertrude peeked in.

  Lucifer covered his eyes with his paws. She’d just used magic again? At least she was inside a building with electricity, so it wasn’t likely she would be able to do much. No Fae would be caught dead inside a Morty building. Their Witchkin spies were another matter.

  Like Antoine. He had to warn her.

  Lucifer’s limbs were shaky after his transformation, but he forced himself to hop up onto the sink. He fell in and scrambled onto the side beside the basin.

  “Do you want me to give you a bath?” Gertrude’s brows drew together.

  He positioned himself toward the window and leapt up to the ledge. He waved a paw toward the window.

  “You want to go?” she asked.

  He shook his head and touched his paw to his ear. There were many voices outside. He listened for Antoine’s.

  His voice was unmistakable. “She’ll be out in a minute. She simply went to check on her lover.”

  “He has been gone too long,” the woman said. “He must suspect.”

  Antoine sounded unconcerned. “No, he was ill. He has trouble shifting. It might take her a moment to retrieve him.”

  Gertrude didn’t react as though she’d heard. Lucifer pointed with his nose and back to her. If only she were like Abigail and knew how to read his body language. Between the bustle of traffic and the other conversations, he didn’t know whether her human ears were sensitive enough to make out their words.

  The woman outside tapped her foot in a rapid staccato. “I grow tired of waiting.”

  “Patience,” Antoine said. “You are always in such a hurry.”

  Lucifer frantically batted at his ear closest to the window, then pointed to Gertrude. If only he could speak.

  Gertrude’s brows drew together, and she stepped closer to the window.

  Antoine went on. “Gertrude must be working some kind of healing magic. If we wait longer, there will be more magic on her skin, no? It will be more evidence to demonstrate she has used magic in the Morty Realm.”

  Lucifer watched Gertrude’s face for a reaction. Her cheeks drained of color. Good. She finally understood the danger she was in.

  “The only reason I don’t go into that restaurant myself is that I don’t want to drain my magic,” the woman outside said. “Not that I don’t have an abundance from draining Witchkin like you, but I would prefer to preserve my strength for something worthy of my time.”

  Antoine chuckled. “I think you might be saving your strength for later tonight. With me.”

  “Save your breath, Casanova. Lycanthropes aren’t my type.”

  Gertrude’s eyes widened with fear. She opened her arms, and Lucifer leapt into her embrace.

  Gertrude rushed out the back of the restaurant, through the kitchen, not stopping when the cook yelled at her. She exited out an alley, practically running to the apartment. Lucifer watched the ravens circle overhead, almost swallowed up by the blackness of the night sky. Their ominous shapes stood out against the stars.

  Soon they would be alerting their other spies that Gertrude had escaped and where she had gone. She was out of breath when she reached the door where she had hidden her flat. She dropped Lucifer to the ground. Her hands shook so violently she dropped her key to get in.

  Footsteps thundered on the steps down the hall.

  They were coming.

  Gertrude drew her wand from her sleeve and aimed it at the door.

  No! Lucifer wanted to shout at her not to use magic. They would catch her. The door flung open. She shoved Lucifer inside with her foot, followed by the key, and slammed the door closed behind her.

  She chanted as she punched her wand in an arc around the door. Blue light glowed from the other side. The air around them wavered, and the light filtering in from the skylight shifted from starlight to sunlight.

  Lucifer had a feeling they weren’t in Kansas anymore—or more accurately—Paris.

  Gertrude didn’t leave the school for any more vacations that summer.

  * * *

  Lucifer remained as a cat through the summer. He worked at fueling his affinity. He found secret exits in the walls glamoured to look like the rest of the stone that were the perfect size for a cat or a sprite to fit through. Several times he encountered brownies, helper sprites who lived in the Unseen Realm. His cat instincts insisted he give chase and pounce on one of them. The human side of him told him that would be wrong.

  Gertrude spent the majority of her time repairing books and reading. She turned into a cat during the full moon and mated with Lucifer. He tried to return to being human, but he hadn’t stored up enough magic, and he wasn’t able to break his curse.

  It was an enjoyable diversion, nonetheless.

  By the time teachers returned to school at the end of summer, he’d stored up enough kinetic energy—if that was what it was—chasing mice, the friction of being petted, and leftover energy from animals rutting in the forest, that he was overflowing with magic ready to be spent. During the first week that teachers were back for inservice, Gertrude invited another teacher back to her bed, and Lucifer transformed into a man again in the bathroom.

  This time he hid in her shower, waiting for the man to leave. He didn’t want to be roped into another threesome.

  The moment Gertrude opened the bathroom door to take a shower, Lucifer said, “I want to go to Abby’s house in the Morty Realm.”

  Gertrude looked at him quizzically.

  “Once I find her, she’ll want her clothes and things.” He needed her things. He wanted one of her old sweaters to smell her fragrance, a photo of her from the wall, anything to help him remember her when he turned into a cat and his brain forgot who he was and why it was important to be a man.

  Gertrude bit her lip, her expression apprehensive. “Of course we can go.”

  Her hesitation troubled him, but he couldn’t place his finger on what it was that worried her. Was it jealousy?

  “I want a photo of her,” he said.

  She stared up at him with wide eyes. “A photo and a lock of hair might help us locate her.” Gertrude sounded doubtful. “It might even help us communicate with her.”

  Lucifer already knew where Abigail was; he didn’t need hair or a photo for a spell to assist him with that. But he did want to speak with her or help her in any way he could.

  “Indeed. We will go and retrieve her things.” It was the closest he could come to being in her presence.

  “I imagine it might be . . . cathartic for you.” She looked him up and down. “But perhaps we should get you something to wear first.”

  His belly grumbled. “And food.”

  She ran a hand over his muscular chest. “And build up your affinity.”

  All roads with Gertrude seemed to lead to sex. Though Lucifer found her attractive, he would have rather refrained from carnal passions if he could have avoided it. He felt too much like he was cheating on Abigail when he didn’t.

  Yet he couldn’t avoid it if he wanted to keep his affinity fueled. He hardened his heart against falling in love with Gertrude, but he feared it was inevitable.

  * * *

  Gertrude dressed Lucifer in attire she found in the school’s lost and found. Magical creatures came in all shapes and sizes, but the limited selection from the lost and found were all either too big or too small. Lucifer settled on a school uniform a smidge too snug in the crotch and a shirt so loose he might have been accused of being a poet in another decade. He would have worn one of the girl’s pleated skirts as a kilt, but Gertrude wouldn’t let him.

  She wagged a finger at him. “The more unusually you dress, the more you’ll stand out.”

  He squirmed in the gray pants. “I bet a skirt is more comfortab
le.” He couldn’t remember whether he’d always hated human clothes. They were as confining as a flea collar.

  Still, he supposed she was right about not wanting to stand out. Abigail had always done her best to appear as a normal human in the Morty Realm. He forced himself not to lick his hand and swipe it against his unruly hair as he would have as a cat.

  Trying on clothes and preparing for the journey seemed to take forever. Lucifer was anxious to go to Abigail’s home in the Morty Realm before he turned back into a cat. He didn’t know how long he had this time. There were things he needed from her house, like the alphabet board in case he returned to being a cat and needed to communicate with Gertrude.

  More importantly, he wanted to go to her home and be reassured by the familiar presence of her furnishings that things would be normal once again. Once he rescued her and brought her home, he wanted everything to be perfect for her. He didn’t want her to come home to a refrigerator full of moldy food and plants that were dead because they hadn’t been watered.

  At dusk, Gertrude used a portal spell to transport herself and Lucifer to the Morty Realm so that their presence would be less likely to be noticed. It was a different kind of magic than he was used to. Not that he was used to much. She held an open library book in one hand, her wand in the other, and she read out loud from Pride and Prejudice. Gertrude said she had selected this book because she knew Abigail had a copy in her house. He held on to her elbow as she had instructed, but once the words of her magic tingled over his skin, he circled an arm around her waist, feeling as if he might be blown away from her. Words from the book wavered in front of him, dancing in the air and caressing his skin. He couldn’t tell whether he liked the magic or not.

  A few seconds later, Gertrude’s room vanished, and they stood in someone’s house. It took Lucifer a moment to realize it was Abby’s house, but it didn’t resemble the place he considered home. All her plants were gone, and boxes and giant garbage bags were piled in the living room. His footsteps thudded through the house, the echo hollow in the emptiness. He didn’t like the odor of bleach and other chemicals Abigail avoided.

  “We should look for some clothes that might fit you better than these,” Gertrude said. “Do you think Abigail has any male clothes around her house?”

  Lucifer didn’t answer. He strode through the house, noticing the framed photos of family was missing from the walls. There wasn’t any food in the refrigerator or freezer. He had hoped to at least taste one of her biscuits once again.

  Someone had cleaned the house of everything that made it Abigail.

  “Someone has been in my Abby’s house and is throwing away all her treasures.” Lucifer’s voice came out a growl.

  She’d taken years to grow those orchids.

  Gertrude remained paces behind him.

  He removed photos of Abigail’s family from a box.

  He stomped from room to room, his temper building as he noticed more of her missing from this house. Her environmentally friendly car was gone from the garage. Where the car should have been, the missing potted plants were stacked up in a heap. Those prized orchids she adored so much were shriveled and dead.

  He couldn’t imagine who would do this to Abigail. Not Clarissa surely. If it had been her, she would have taken greater care of her adopted mother’s plants.

  He turned to Gertrude. “Who did this? Was it Felix?”

  It seemed like Felix to give up on someone before he knew they were dead, to try to remove all traces of their existence.

  “I imagine it might have been a Realtor.” Her voice was quiet. “There’s a sign out front that says the house is for sale.”

  The potted philodendron was surprisingly alive among the graveyard of flowers. He removed that plant from the heap and hugged it to his chest before moving on to the boxes. He dug out her favorite books and movies. In her bedroom, he found her family photo album and her favorite jacket, apron, and sweaters. He heaped Abigail’s favorite things into Gertrude’s arms.

  The alphabet board was still under the bed, unnoticed. He tucked it under his arm and searched for Abigail’s special shoebox of magic items. She’d saved a spell and some good luck charms along the years and hidden them from her husband and children. He couldn’t find it in the closet or the boxes. He was about to start in the garbage bags full of treasures the Morties had deemed uninteresting when his skin started to prickle. Cold sweat broke out on the back of his neck. At first he thought it was a symptom of his anger.

  After the nausea rose in him and the lance of fire began in his limbs, he realized what was happening. He rushed past Gertrude, nearly bowling her over on his way to the restroom to vomit into the toilet. She held his hair back from the bowl as he expelled his earlier dinner.

  “It’s all a little too much for you, isn’t it, pet?” She stroked his back. “It’s terribly romantic how devoted you are to her.”

  His voice was a rasp. “I’m changing back.”

  She frowned. “It didn’t last very long this time. I suppose that means we didn’t have enough sex.” Her brows raised with hope. “We can try again later.”

  Disappointment weighed heavy on his heart. It was difficult to say which pained him worse, fighting the change or his helplessness to solve his problems. “I need to be a man so I can rescue Abby.”

  Gertrude rested her hand on top of his head, her eyes mournful. “I’m afraid no one can rescue Abigail. She’s with the Raven Queen.”

  It was torment enough returning to a cat. Hearing those words added another burden to his soul.

  * * *

  Lucifer spent the next several months refueling his magic. As a cat, he came and went as he pleased, hunting or sneakily visiting Imani and other students who were kind enough to pet him—and avoided the students who were the most likely to set his tail on fire.

  He was pleased to see Imani had returned from summer vacation unscathed after leaving school with her Fae guardian. She appeared just as cheerful and happy as she had been when the school year ended. Lucifer grudgingly acknowledged Prince Elric probably hadn’t done anything unscrupulous. As wicked as Vega Bloodmire could be, if she truly was engaged to Elric, it was possible she wouldn’t allow him to do anything to her students.

  When Lucifer wasn’t cuddled up with teenage girls who passed him around to be fussed over, he wandered through secret passages and went hunting in the forest.

  Fueling his affinity wasn’t his only mission. Being disguised as a cat enabled him to spy on students and staff and eavesdrop on conversations he wouldn’t otherwise have been privy to.

  “Did you know Vega and Prince Elric got married over the summer?” Imani asked her friends.

  “Oh barf!” Greenie said. “I bet she’s going to make us start calling her Princess Vega now.”

  Maddy elbowed her. “You be nice. Ms. Bloodmire is a good person. She wouldn’t be helping me fulfill my bargain with the Fae if she wasn’t.”

  Lucifer didn’t know what this supposed bargain was, but he knew Vega Bloodmire did nothing that didn’t benefit her in some way. Her generosity wasn’t free.

  Occasionally they spoke about Clarissa Lawrence in hushed tones, though they said little more than that she was ill. Lucifer spent hours composing a note to Imani, asking her what had happened to Clarissa and whether she knew where Abigail was, but when he brought her the notes, she was too concerned over the book he had torn the paper from—using magic to erase his ink splattered attempt and mending it into her textbook before she could read it.

  His second attempt she only squinted at and tried to read. Apparently, using his claw as a quill was a skill that had worsened since the time he’d written his note to Gertrude the year before. He worried his soul was turning feral, and he couldn’t even communicate as a human anymore.

  “Is this important?” Imani asked him.

  “Meow,” he said and nodded his head.

  She scratched him behind the ears. “I’ll take it
to Mr. Thatch. He’ll help me read it.”

  He snatched the note out of her hands and shredded it. No way was he involving that traitor brother in his affairs.

  He avoided his brother when he saw him skulking around the school. Felix was as gloomy as always.

  No, it wasn’t his usual gloom. It was worse than usual. Clarissa wasn’t with him. She wasn’t teaching at the school at all. She hadn’t returned at the end of the school year with him. Lucifer had assumed he knew what that meant, but he didn’t want to think about it.

  One of Clarissa’s former troublemaker students was in the art classroom, Hailey Achilles, teaching Clarissa’s lessons—albeit poorly. Hailey had been to Abigail’s house several times during winter holidays. She didn’t seem old enough to teach a class, nor had he ever thought of her as an artist—not like Imani and Greenie.

  Felix constantly checked on Hailey and gave her pointers on teaching, most of which she ignored.

  Lucifer hoped his brother wasn’t trying to groom her like a sexual predator might do. He couldn’t help wondering whether that was how his relationship had started with Clarissa. Lucifer snuck into the art classroom at night. Because his claw writing was apparently illegible, he used the magazines and glue sticks to compose a note to her. It took hours to collage a message to be wary of handsome older men who befriended young women. Several times he lost focus and chased spiders across the classroom before he remembered his mission to warn Hailey.

  His spelling was hardly intelligible, but he thought it was an improvement to Hailey’s handwriting on the chalkboard. He even signed the message with his name so she would know it came from him.

  If Hailey found the note, she ignored it.

  Clarissa was Abigail’s adopted daughter, therefore she was Lucifer’s charge. If she had gone to the Raven Queen to rescue her mother, what exactly had happened to her? Was she dead? A prisoner? Vega Bloodmire also was absent from the school this year.

  That didn’t bode well.

  Lucifer tried to be optimistic. Perhaps Clarissa had simply realized how loathsome his brother was and had left him over the summer. Vega Bloodmire had married a rich noble. He assumed this was Prince Elric. She might not even be a teacher anymore.