A Handful of Hexes Page 9

  I went down into the dungeon before school when I knew he would be alone.

  He sat at his desk in his office, writing in his journal.

  I cleared my throat. “You assigned Vega as my mentor because you said she’s professional and competent. So far, I haven’t learned anything from her other than cleaning her chalkboard.”

  Thatch folded his hands on his desk. “Patience is a virtue needed when learning magic. If nothing else, I hope she will at least teach you that.” He lifted an eyebrow.

  He could be so infuriating!

  There was no way I could do all this translating without additional assistance. It looked like I needed that Ruby of Divine Wisdom after all.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The Brad Pitt of Horrors

  On Friday, I studied in the dorm room, eagerly awaiting Vega’s return. She didn’t come back until late on Saturday. Some babysitter she was.

  The moment Vega strode in the door, I blurted, “So, V, what’s the Chamber of Horrors?”

  “Do you mean the Pit of Horrors?” She looked me up and down. “Why do you want to know?”

  “No reason. I just heard the students talking about it. What is it?”

  The Pit of Horrors sounded more like a bad Brad Pitt movie than a secret chamber containing a basilisk. Maybe that was good.

  Vega unpacked a load of fringed dresses from a bag and dumped it on the ground in front of the oval frame of the large mirror. Immediately the room filled with the stench of stale cigarettes, stinky perfume, and alcohol.

  Vega removed a dead bird from a takeout box and hand-fed it to her oversized Venus flytrap hanging in the corner. “Did Hailey Achilles blackmail you again? She’s dying to learn how to get past the pit. It wouldn’t surprise me if she convinced you to find out for her.”

  “No. I’m not under any spells or oaths. I just heard about it from the kids and wanted to know.” I was sooo not good at lying.

  Vega leaned in, a malicious smile on her face. “Far below the dungeon, in the cold of the school’s most secret depths there lies a pit full of severed limbs. Rumor has it, they’re the hands of murderers and criminals, Witchkin who used black magic.” She closed her eyes and shivered, her smile still in place. That was a little creepy. “This is no pit full of ordinary severed hands. These hands have been reanimated to perform one goal and one goal only: to guard the secrets of their masters by any means necessary.”

  “What kind of secrets?” I asked. The Ruby of Divine Wisdom? Demons my mother had summoned?

  “That, I don’t know. I do know they thrive on fear. Emotions fuel their magic.” She leaned in so close I had to scoot back to make enough room to keep my personal space bubble. “The more terror one feels, the easier it is for them to rip you apart. Anything you project, they multiply threefold.”

  I edged back, bumping into my bed.

  “One whiff of your fear, and they will disembowel you in seconds. They’ll rip off your hands and add them to their collection.” She leaned in close again.

  I fell back onto my bed. She cackled with sinister delight.

  “They can’t whiff fear,” I said. “Hands don’t have noses.”

  “It’s an expression.” She lifted a finger in a stern gesture. “Don’t even think about going down there. Not unless you want to die. Understand?”

  I nodded. “So you’ve never heard of someone going down there and making it out alive?”

  She snorted. “I pass through the chamber all the time on my way to the crypt. I just don’t go into the pit. That would be foolish.”

  There was a crypt under our school? Of course, this would be the kind of place Vega happened to frequent.

  “How do you make it to the crypt and pass the pit without being torn apart?” I added a little flattery because I figured it wouldn’t hurt. “Is it because you’re so fearless?”

  “Probably. Also, I walk on the little ledge at the perimeter of the chamber instead of walking straight into the pit.”

  Great! Now I just had to figure out how to get through all the booby traps along the way. Fortunately, I had a plan.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Chamber of Secret Horrors

  After our Sunday afternoon study group, I asked Hailey to hang back.

  She groaned. “What now? Isn’t it enough torture I have to study with you? Please don’t make me do even more learning for the day.”

  “I promise. No more learning today.” I walked over to the door and closed it. “You told me you were able to make it through all the booby traps under the school.”

  She crossed her arms. “Yeah? So?”

  “I want you to show me where the booby traps are and how to make it through them.”

  “What will I get out of it?”

  I had planned for this. No one did anything for free. Luckily, Hailey’s deepest desires were more transparent than Vega’s. “I will give you a broom.”

  Her eyes went wide. “Really?”

  “If you can successfully draw me a map and explain how I can get down there without anything bad happening to me, I will buy you a broom.”

  Hailey bit her lip. “Really? That’s all I have to do?”

  “I have to make it out alive. I’m not going to give it to you if you lead me into a trap.”

  “Why do you want me to help you go down there anyway? You’re a teacher. Don’t you already know all the secrets of the school?” Her eyes narrowed. “Wait a minute. Is this because you want that ruby?”

  “No,” I said quickly.

  “That is so unfair! What do you need it for? It isn’t like you’re going to graduate in less than a year and have nowhere to go. You don’t need it for anything.”

  “That’s right. I don’t need it for anything. I’m not going down there for knowledge or any other reason.”

  She shook her head at me. “Whatever.”

  Hailey drew me a map, and I took notes. It didn’t actually sound that difficult. I prayed she wasn’t punking me. I could only hope she wanted a broom as much as she claimed.

  “I’ve never gotten past the Chamber of Horrors. I heard it’s a bottomless pit full of poisonous snakes,” she said.

  “I think it’s called the Pit of Horrors. It can’t be bottomless and be full of snakes at the same time,” I said. I thought of the painting of my mother in the hallway with the two green snakes in it. My mother hadn’t been afraid of snakes.

  I’d never actually held a snake in real life, only been restrained by them in my fear chair meditations. I really hoped Hailey was wrong and there were no snakes.

  “All the booby traps are in the dungeon before the chamber.” Hailey listed off the places to find booby traps. “The hard part—the hardest part—before the Chamber of Horrors or the booby traps is getting past Thatch.”

  Shoot. That put a dent in my plans.

  There was a good possibility I was going to get caught. If I did and Thatch found out, not only would he take the book away, but he’d probably also refuse to give me any kind of lesson in Red magic in the future. I didn’t want to risk that.

  I had to learn magic—and know how to use it. I needed to become a powerful witch like my mother … but not like my mother.

  Which was why I had to return to the secret passage with the hallway of mirrors and spy on Thatch. At eleven p.m. the corridor was as silent and gloomy as a graveyard. Theoretically all students were asleep because they had classes the next day. In the hallway on the second floor, I found the tapestry of the knight battling a dragon that hid the servant entrance. I ducked underneath, resorting to my sputtering Elementia fire spell to light my way.

  I had the plan worked out. If I spied on Thatch through the magic mirrors the brownies used as cleaning portals, I could wait until he went to sleep before I ventured past his room.

  I found the suit of armor, tugged on the arm, and heard stone grating on stone. Around the corner I found another tapestry, ducked undernea
th, and found the hallway of glowing portals. Each showed a view of a mirror somewhere in the school. Jackie Frost’s room was empty. Professor Bluehorse lay in her bed asleep.

  Thatch was still awake in his room. I caught sight of him in a snug T-shirt, the white tattoos on his pale skin resembling a lattice of lace. The midnight of his eyes and hair contrasted sharply with his fair complexion, making me imagine him as a male Snow White. As he dressed, I looked away, not wanting to be the pervey teacher who fulfilled her voyeuristic fantasies of seeing the dungeon master naked. I sat on the stone floor, turned away enough he wasn’t in my direct line of sight. All I needed to do was wait until the light of the mirror dimmed, and then I would know he’d gone to bed. I would peek again then.

  The wait was absolute torture. When I heard a woman’s voice, muffled through the window of the mirror, I looked up.

  Thatch had stepped out of sight, but I heard his voice. When he came back into view, I was surprised to find he wasn’t wearing his usual, old-fashioned suit or frock coat. Instead of late Victorian attire, his outfit looked more like it came from the roaring twenties. He wore suspenders and a flat cap. His hair had been pulled back into a ponytail. I’d never seen him dressed this way before. He was adorable.

  It was unfair he had to be so handsome, a talented artist and witch, and grouchy. Couldn’t he have been grouchy and ugly or not grouchy and handsome? I hated liking him so much. Every time a romantic feeling crept over me, my thoughts wandered back to Derrick, and I felt guilty.

  “You shouldn’t be in here. It isn’t professional,” he said. From the frown, I took it he was grumpier than ever. “I told you to wait for me upstairs.”

  Vega stepped into view. She wore one of her sequined gowns, looking elegant and classy.

  “I told you not to make me wait this time, but here you are. It takes you as long to primp and powder as a teenage girl.”

  I covered my mouth, trying not to laugh at them. I didn’t know if sound traveled through the mirror portals both ways.

  Thatch shoved his arms into the sleeves of a jacket. “There’s no powder involved.”

  It looked like they were going out. On a date? Was that her condition to agreeing to watch me? It couldn’t be. Thatch had said he didn’t want a relationship with one of his subordinates.

  Thatch grabbed his journal and pushed on it, the size diminishing. He crammed it into the breast pocket of his coat.

  “Do you have to bring that thing with you?” Vega groaned, sounding like a teenager.

  Thatch checked the time on his silver pocket watch. “I like to take notes.”

  Vega strode toward the stack of paintings next to his art trunk, sliding out the largest canvas to see it better. “You’re so peculiar. Can’t you behave like a normal person?”

  The painting was unfinished. Or at least I thought it was unfinished. The woman wasn’t wearing any skin. Bone and muscle was exposed in several places.

  Thatch removed his wand from his pocket, flicked it at Vega, and the painting slid back into place. “I’m not normal.”

  “Obviously.”

  He took her by the elbow, escorting her away from his art. “I’m above average.”

  Vega glanced at his crotch and snorted. “You wish.”

  Were they dating? Were they sleeping together? No, I couldn’t imagine Thatch would put up with someone talking to him that way if he was sleeping with her. But there was something mysterious going on between them. I was so put off, I almost forgot about my mission.

  Thatch locked up the dungeon when he was out, so my journey started with the flight of stairs at the back of my classroom that led past my closet. I used a yardstick to swipe at the spiderwebs to clear my path. I’d never gone past my storage room and found a door on the next floor that led to another closet. Below that was a door to a classroom, Vega’s by the looks of it. The stairs wound all the way down to the dungeon.

  I had wrestled with the idea of using my phone for its flashlight app. It might come in handy as a weapon against demons or in the Pit of Horrors. On the other hand, electronics were taboo, and I’d almost lost my phone multiple times already. Plus, I was pretty sure the more I used my affinity and did my electrical thing, the more difficult it was for me to do the Elementia magic I needed to learn to hide my affinity.

  I lit my way in the passage using the flame spell I’d learned in Jackie Frost’s class. It only lasted for thirty seconds at a time, and I had to stop and chant the magic Latin words every time I wanted it to relight, but I was doing real magic.

  I tiptoed down the hallway that led to Thatch’s private room and kept going. The shadows of the passage pressed in on me ominously, even with the light spell I’d learned. I tripped several times. Something rustled behind me. I turned. My light went out.

  My heart started to palpitate. No one was there. I prayed Hailey hadn’t conveniently forgotten to tell me about the monster under the dungeon. She wouldn’t do that to spite me. She wanted a broom. I waited in silence.

  Finally, I incanted the spell, and fire sparked to life in my palm. A breath of wind funneled down the passage and blew it out. I tried again. As I spoke, whispers echoed from somewhere behind me. Was that my own voice or someone else’s spell? My light went out again.

  It took several more tries. A moment later, the elemental magic in my palm illuminated another descending stairwell. I consulted the map. The thirteenth step was supposed to be booby-trapped. I leaned a hand against the wall as I skipped the thirteenth step.

  If Hailey’s map was accurate, there were only two more traps.

  My light went out again. A warm breath brushed against my neck. I held in the scream that wanted to erupt from my throat, and ran down the stairs, falling the last two steps onto the landing. I panted with fear, unsuccessfully trying to calm myself. Even in the dark I would give away where I was with how loudly my heart pounded and how frantically I gulped in air. I pressed myself against the wall, trying to make myself as small as possible.

  Footsteps scraped on the stone stairs. I held my breath. A shoe scuffed on the floor. Had Thatch returned? The only person who had known about me going to the pit was Hailey. She might have followed me down. Vega had probably suspected, but she and Thatch had left together.

  The footsteps passed me and kept going. A door thudded far below.

  I didn’t dare turn on the light spell or consult the map. I shoved it into my bra. Hopefully I remembered where the booby traps were.

  The stairway descended for what felt like three floors. The air smelled of decaying leaves and the cloying metallic fragrance of blood. It was so cold I was glad I’d dressed warmly in leg warmers over my striped leggings and a sweater over a long-sleeved shirt. I wished I’d brought a hat and scarf too.

  At the bottom, I avoided another step that I remembered Hailey had marked on her map and edged around a place on the landing after the stairs. I felt my way along a hallway, pausing when I came to a door. My fingers detected cool wood decorated with intricate designs made of metal. I was at the Pit of Horrors. I would need light so I could see the ledge along the perimeter that Vega used.

  I held out my palm and chanted. Golden light blazed in my hand.

  Ornate Celtic knotwork covered the door. I found it curious the door was covered in what looked like iron. Fae and many Witchkin were allergic to cold iron. Maybe the door needed to be made from a Fae-resistant material in case we were overcome by a zombie apocalypse and that was all that would protect us from the dead.

  I tried the handle, not expecting it to open. I had come prepared with a spell Hailey had given me. Not that I knew if it would work. To my surprise, the door was already unlocked. It swung open with ease.

  The room was immense, with a vaulted ceiling. I could vaguely see movement in the pit below, but I couldn’t see any severed hands or snakes. It was too dark to make out any gruesome details. I waved my hand left and right, searching for the ledge Vega had told me about.


  There it was, just wide enough for someone small to edge across.

  Something crunched behind me. A rough set of hands pushed me through the doorway. I twisted, trying to see my attacker, but my light went out. I flailed my arms, trying to grab hold of something. My hands only found air. Then I was falling, my heart leaping into my throat in fear.

  I screamed. The door above me closed with finality.

  When I landed, the air whooshed out of me. The floor underneath me wasn’t hard or made of stone. It was springy and warm. The floor shifted and undulated.

  “Please don’t be a pit of snakes,” I prayed.

  Something grabbed my ponytail and yanked my head back. A hand grabbed my wrist, another dug into my knee. Hands tugged at my clothes and pulled me one direction and then the other. They were everywhere, swarming over me, burying me in body parts.

  One covered my mouth, muffling my scream. I was going to die. The Brad Pitt of Horrors was no longer a laughing matter. I had no idea how I would get myself out of this mess.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Don’t Try This at Home, Morties

  Why had I wanted to come here for some stupid Ruby of Divine Wisdom? What good was the Fae Fertility Paradox if it got me killed before I solved it?

  Hands tugged at my limbs and dug their bony fingers into my back. They were everywhere, tugging me this way and that. Vega had been right when she’d said they would tear their victim apart.

  I stifled the scream that wanted to erupt from my throat.

  “Keep calm,” I told myself.

  Vega had told me they fed on fear. I fought the instinct to kick and fight them. That would only lead to me being pulled under like a flailing man in quicksand. Every emotion I projected, they would reproduce threefold.