Wilma
“I’m pretty sure she can hold her own, babe. She’s a witch.”
I hated to interrupt their intimate moment, but I raised my hand again. Bad habit. My grandfather had been headmaster at our magic school in Germany, and he demanded obedience all the time, both in school and out.
“A witch?” Gus asked with a puzzled expression.
I held up my finger to him and turned to Zelda. “Excuse me, but I’m not what you think.”
Zelda frowned at me and moved closer. “What do you mean? I can feel it across the room. You’ve got a shit ton of magic.” She closed her eyes and reached out a hand toward me.
Then her eyes flew open.
“Oh, my. You’ve been—”
“Can I talk to you? In the other room?”
I didn’t feel right ordering my superior around in her own home, but I didn’t need our new friends to know of my disability. Thankfully, she nodded, and I followed her into the back room. Where we found two children. Or beings I assumed were children. They were currently an odd assortment of animal parts and were laughing hysterically.
“Goddess with a purple Kool-Aid mustache!” Zelda shrieked a few curse words, which brought Mac running.
“What the hell are you two up to now?”
“We’re trying to see who can mix and match the most animal parts at the same time!”
It was true. The girl had giraffe ears, a horse nose, beady feline eyes, two sets of wings like a dragonfly, armadillo arms, bear torso, an aardvark’s tale, and some sort of cloven hooves for feet. The boy had an owl face complete with a beak, an Orca body with rhinoceros legs, pig ears, peacock wings and a tail. It was horrifying and fascinating at the same time.
“Nice touch with the peacock. Don’t leave feathers on the furniture.”
“Yes, Daddy!” the kids shouted in unison, their voices morphed by their mixed-up biology.
“This is what having magical children is like, then?” I asked, charmed by their childhood hijinks. “I was an only child in Germany. There was no fooling around.”
Zelda shook her head and snapped her fingers, sending them back to their normal forms. Oh, they were precious. Each of them the spitting image of their mother and father in their own ways, and I imagined they were a handful. Zelda sent them off to bed and then turned to face me.
“You’ve got wonky magic.”
I was taken aback. How did she know?
“I know because I’ve been there. I was broken and I got fixed. You’re broken. We need to fix you. Do you know what happened?”
I sighed and followed her to sit in the massive window seat that was stuffed with decorative pillows and throw blankets. I would have loved to sit there and read for hours. Her house was lovely, and not at all what I would have expected from a fashionista with a quick wit and a sharp tongue. This house was softer. More feminine. There were doilies.
“My Aunt Hildy’s decorating style rubbed off on me and when I moved into Mac’s, this place needed a feminine touch. I took over for my aunt as the Shifter Wanker—”
“Wanker? What do you mean?”
“Well, it’s supposed to be Whisperer, see? A healer? But I sucked at it at first and so I gave myself a sucky name. Then I became a head honcho witch and had an apprentice. Then my apprentice went and got mated to an alpha— Ahhh, that’s a story for another time. Point is, I know what it’s like. Now, tell me what’s your wonk and let’s work it out, got it?”
“It’s a family affair. My family was cursed, and I was chosen to receive the curse at birth.”
She frowned and chewed on her bottom lip. “Hmmm curses are a thing, man. My dad was hexed and turned into a cat, but having your whole magic locked up? That’s not good. Any idea what will break it?”
“The witch who laid it claims there is no breaking it.”
“Then you’re one wonked-up witch, huh? Okay, but then what’s the story with lover boy out there? You sure you didn’t know him before?”
“No, Zelda. I swear. I know I’m new to town, and you don’t have any reason to trust me, but Jules will tell you, we came across them in the woods while shooting film of the lunar eclipse. What was Mac saying about putting out fires?”
“Oh, well, Shifters get a little shifty whenever there’s a lunar eclipse. More so than a normal full moon. He and his stepson were out getting Shifters out of jams all over town. But back to you and this curse. I think I can help you, and I know you can help me.”
She seemed so together. What could she possibly need help with?
“You ask a lot of questions in your head. Are you sure you’re not a reporter?”
I shook my head. “I just do the weather.”
“Right. Because you’re a weather witch who can’t control the weather.”
I wanted to shrink into the pillows so plentifully placed in the deep window seat. I wished I could shrink from her sight and sneak away, never having to hear how messed up I was ever again. But instead, I did what any good Wetter woman would do.
“I know everything there is to know about the weather and meteorology. I may not be able to influence the atmosphere, but my reports are accurate and precise and they help people. I fully intend to build W-ASS into a successful local station with top ratings—”
“Alright, enough. But if you think you’re going to get people to watch ASS TV, you’re fooling yourself.”
I folded my hands in my lap. “I’ll do my best. That’s all I can do.”
“No, I already told you that you can help me. Here’s what I need: Mac and his brother, if you couldn’t tell, have some major issues. If Jacob is going to be here, he and Mac will fight and they’ll destroy my house. Again. I need you to…I don’t know. Run interference between them. Keep the vampire lessons on track, keep everyone happy, and keep my husband and his brother from killing each other. Not that they’d really kill each other. But there will be blood, and I hate blood and bodily fluids and I don’t want them in my house, got it?
“Got it,” I answered before I really considered what I’d signed on for.
“Good. You’ll stay here. We’ve got plenty of room.
“But Zelda. My broadcasts. I just got W-ASS off the ground. I can’t just leave.”
“Good point. What if we found a substitute for you? Someone you could feed the info to about the weather and then they could report it?”
“I suppose that would work. The forecast is clear skies and perfect weather this week anyway—”
“Perfect. And I will do what I can on my end to find out what this family curse is and get you back to making it rain, catching lightning bolts, or whatever it is you weather witches do. I’ve never met one before.”
“That’s because we’re all from Germany. I am the last of my family. My parents only had me and, well, we know how that went.”
“Uh-huh,” she said, looking me up and down. “We’ll see about that. I like a good challenge. Now, here,” she said, flicking her fingers at me. My dirty clothes disappeared and instead I was dressed in the softest yoga pants and top I could have imagined and a pair of furry slippers.
“Gets cold in here at night,” she said and winked at me. “Now, let’s go see that our fangy guests have what they need before my husband and I retire and resume our nocturnal activities.”
“Wait! What will I do if there’s trouble?”
I wasn’t exactly uncomfortable with the idea of spending time with the guys. I hadn’t had a group of friends since school, and all of my friends had been boys. The girls made fun of me. The boys didn’t care whether or not I could do magic. And I’d been missing Gus the whole time I’d been out of the room. I’d also been working so hard on the news broadcasts that I hadn’t had time to relax or have fun since coming to Assjacket. In fact, wasn’t I just thinking about an adventure?
“I’ll try to put a little dampening spell on their hunger as well,” Zelda was saying, “although I don’t think I need to do anything about the situation between you and that Gus guy. He’s pretty cute, huh?”
“He’s—what situation?” Am I that obvious?
Zelda sighed. “You do know about the birds and the bees for witches, don’t you?”
This was definitely not a conversation I wanted to get into with a stranger. How embarrassing.
“It’s not embarrassing. It’s how we all got here.”
“I know that, it’s just—”
“The curse.”
“The curse,” I repeated. “I gave up on ever finding my mate because of this bloody curse. I’m a hundred and thirteen years old. What warlock would ever want to mate with a spinster broken witch?”
“Maybe not a warlock, but a vampire? I believe there are other things in motion, however, that remain to be seen. There’s something a bit coincidental about how this all played out. Look, bottom line is, our boy Gus out there has taken a liking to you, whether it’s magic-influenced or not. What could it hurt to get to know the guy?”
“Um, he could bite me and infect me with his venom. That could hurt.”
Zelda waved a hand at her. “Satanics.”
“You mean, semantics?”
Zelda gave me a pointed look, and I figured I probably shouldn’t be questioning the queen witch bitch in her own house.
“Whatever. So you’ll do it? You’ll run interference? Ever since Layla left with her mate and my best friend Sassy started boning my stepson—”
“Your stepson?”
“It’s a long story. He’s older than me. It’s fine. But I really need a witch I can count on. I’ve got my hands full with healing Shifters and these crazy kids and Mac and—”
“Of course I’ll help. I just don’t know if I’ll be able to do much.”
Zelda grinned. “Keep your guy occupied and let me do the rest.”