The Chariot

We can’t use my car to leave,” Artemis says, decisive. A strange, doomsday calmness considering the car was, likely, their only way to get out of New York City. “It’ll already know what my license plate is. If it can steal everything Quibble owns, it can certainly figure out what numbers are on the back of my car.”

With each it, Wilder’s face tightens more, but they keep their mouth shut. Still, they wonder: how much of gendering the Hex correctly is about respecting the Hex, and how much of it is about self-respect, about what kind of people they themselves would like to be? “I think that means we’re going to have to go on foot. We’re going to have to figure out—”

“We’re not walking out of this crusty-ass city on foot. I’ll ruin my shoes.” Mary Margaret speaks as she stretches her long body over both couch arms, arching her back. She sits up, smirking. All the bird in her gone, all her fear eaten by feline bravado.

Artemis intentionally unclenches her jaw and tries to respond with compassion. “Not sure we have a choice, darling.”

“We absolutely have a choice. It’s like none of you have ever done crimes before, my fucking goodness.”

Artemis’s jaw clenches again and no amount of intentionality can unclench it. “We are not ‘doing crimes,’ Mary Margaret.”

“Needs must,” she singsongs, and she skips up from the couch, is at the front door before anyone else can react. “Be right ba—”

“I swear, Mary Margaret, you are not—”

As though a hissing cat, Mary Margaret whirls around with teeth bared, anger in her young eyes that makes everyone take a step back. “Well, which is it? I’m almost eighteen, I have responsibilities, and I’m a member of the group? Or I’m a kid and I can’t make a fucking decision about when I’m willing to take a risk?” She puts her hands on her hips and squares her shoulders. “You said it yourself, you feel like we’re supposed to be”—she gestures around her, looking into the middle distance—“somewhere. But you don’t know where that is! Sure, we could walk out over any one of these bridges and be there in a day, it’s possible. Or it could take months. And we can see it’s getting smarter. We don’t have months. Your option is stupid, Artemis, and mine isn’t. It’s a manageable risk. I am very, very good at not getting caught.” She doesn’t want to give away her salt trick, but she will if she has to. “You said ‘we use the tools we have.’”

There are two full seconds of silence before Artemis clears her throat. “What is your plan?”

Mary Margaret’s face changes quickly, from a demonic snarl to a proud smile. “We need a jalopy.”

Artemis raises an eyebrow. “A jalopy?”

“I thought you’d like that term better than ‘piece of shit.’ A car that is so dilapidated that we worry about one of the tires falling off on the highway. It won’t have a single scrap of computer in it.” With that, Mary Margaret turns and walks out of the apartment. Everyone stands, stunned, listening to her footsteps march down the stairs.

Artemis turns to Wilder and Quibble. “Does—does that mean she’s going to steal a car?”

And that is how the witches find themselves following a teenager into the mouth of grand larceny.

It is broad daylight outside and the group slinks along the walls as though it were night, doing their best imitations of their own shadows. They look so fucking stupid.

Mary Margaret, meanwhile, strides proudly down the sidewalk, pulling her jacket around her. The others can’t see it but she rolls her eyes; she’s not going to steal it now; she’s just going to find it now. Then she’s going to watch it until dark. And then she’s going to steal it. She’s going to steal it between 11:15 and 11:35 p.m., when the NYPD’s shifts are starting and ending for maximum confusion. Her gaze settles on each and every car, assessing first to see that they have a keyhole on the driver’s side door. No smart keys, nothing keyless. Basic-ass keyholes. Then, supposing it has one, zooming out to see how much a piece of shit the whole thing is.

She rejects several nice cars. She avoids anything with a million parking tickets on it—a sign that someone is rich and doesn’t give a shit about the penalty, considers this their parking fee.

Finally she finds it—the very shittiest-looking bag of ass she can find. It is long and hearse-like, and she steals a glance without moving her head to confirm there’s no casket in the back. It isn’t black, either, so it’s probably repurposed; mostly brown, with huge white chips in the paint, scratches. She doesn’t turn around; she keeps going several more blocks.

The group trails behind her. They look like sneaking cartoons. Finally she stops, turns, walks back to them. “Please don’t—do—whatever it is you think you’re doing.” They all look sheepish. “It’s going to be hours yet, and we need cash for the tolls, when we can’t avoid them. Leave me the fuck alone until like eleven at night.”

She flourishes her hand and pulls from her Space a creased paperback, the cover soft at the corners and wearing thin, torn in places. She crosses the street, walks back to the general jalopy area, and sits on a bench. She only looks like she’s reading if an observer isn’t paying close attention—her eyes don’t move back and forth. She pulls her jacket around her tight.

Quibble throws his hands in the air. “Well, our bank accounts are out of the question and I don’t have money anymore so.”

“We know, Quibble, we know.” Artemis’s eyes are still kind, even when she’s blazing angry and fucking terrified. “I suppose we can steal from some of my bars? The ones with the drop boxes won’t think anything of me grabbing the envelopes.” She winces as people walk by with phones. The lights are so intense now. Artemis Eyes the catch spiral circling on them. She gulps.

“I have a coffee can with a couple hundred in my go bag,” says Wilder, and everyone turns and stares at them.

“Don’t you get paid on the internet?” Artemis asks.

“Yeah, but like, you can’t trust banks for everything. You can’t put all your eggs in one basket. I grew up with a coffee can. It’s in my backpack. It’s in your apartment.”

“Wait, Wilder—why is it in your backpack? Why did you bring your cat? What did he do to you?” Artemis asks.

“I’m not talking about it,” they reply. Because they do not want to think about the invitation to merge or they will cry. And yes, they also think that the coven will like them less if they confess the Hex’s attempted possession, doubly so if they confess their temptation. “The only thing you need to know is no more headphones.” Despite all Quibble’s current feelings-storm, his eyebrows rise. “I came here this morning prepared to convince you that we had to leave,” Wilder continues, and Artemis internally sighs with relief. “Y’all. I’m really sorry—”

“It’s okay,” both Artemis and Quibble say at the same time, and both of them smile.

“You don’t have to,” Quibble continues. He’s still bristly, upset, traumatized—but he cannot imagine beginning to apologize for what just happened in the Space Between. How little control he had, how little he cared for the well-being of those around him. He feels a stomach-crawling shame that he squeezes like a fist ready to punch.

“I’d rather just move on and solve the problem at hand,” Artemis says as the group walks back to the apartment. She is queasy. She wants to get out of sight as quickly as possible. The past—it’s not that it doesn’t matter. But the catch spiral is centered on them like a bull’s-eye.

“Problem?” Wilder says. “I said I have money.”

“Not money. Hush. Hush until we’re home.”

Artemis leads the way into her apartment and starts to gather things—bags, the cat carrier—by the door. She needs to figure out how to change their faces. She chews her nail, smooths her beard. “Cameras,” she says finally. “We’re going to go through tolls. It’ll be easy for Hex to find us.”

Quibble and Wilder sit on the couch where the Lady Anastasia has already made herself comfortable. Wilder scoops up the cat and settles her back in their lap. They feel a squeeze on their elbow. They look up to find Quibble’s hand and Wilder is overwhelmed by a sense of endearment, this small gesture to get their attention. Their body flushes. Then they register the question sitting in his eyes, staring out at them. “My father—when I was young. He was just really paranoid.” They pause and I can see them remembering things they wish they couldn’t. They wonder if there’s a way to forget with magic. I sigh and I Sigh.

Of course there is. There’s a way to do nearly anything with magic that humans can do without it. And humans can make themselves forget real good. I can make people forget easily, have done it to keep my secrets, keep me safe. Reach into the soul of a person and pull knowledge from them. Because that is where it actually lives—not most things, but the big things. The things that change a person. I have made many a mortal forget magic’s existence or mine or both. But to pull such a foundational memory, something as painful as it is momentous? Wilder doesn’t understand that what they’re wishing for would, at best, mean regression. An unlearning of a hard-won lesson, of many such lessons. At worst, it would change them into someone they do not understand. We are all always changing into someone we don’t know, but rarely as quickly as the snap of a finger.

Wilder continues. “Aside from the coffee can, I also have two sets of clothes, three pairs of underwear, toothbrush, toothpaste, bar of soap, box of granola bars—”

“Wow,” Quibble says. “Wow.” He is torn between two emotions. One is compassion, kindness, an overwhelming sense of protectiveness. He has no concept of what Wilder isn’t talking about, but he can tell that there is something haunted about it.

The other is shame. He doesn’t want to reveal what he brought in his bag—his favorite jeans. One single photo album with his parents in it. His childhood teddy bear, named Noodles. Useless. Useless. He jams his hands in his pockets. Averts his eyes. He has nothing on him, really. He can taste his own mouth—he realizes he hasn’t brushed his teeth since yesterday and he doesn’t have anything to do so with.

Wilder can feel the tension between these two feelings come off Quibble like angry lines, and they reach out to squeeze his elbow back. “We’ll figure it out,” they say.

“Will one of you come here?” Artemis asks, and both the boys notice her voice’s light absence. She is far away, thinking. Quibble is staring at nothing, red with embarrassment, so Wilder volunteers. Artemis squints into their face, then puts both her hands on their cheeks. Wilder is used to Artemis’s attention by now, and even her Touch. But not her touch. They nearly gasp with it; they love it. They hadn’t realized how hungry their skin was. They work to keep a straight face while Artemis takes the weight of their head into her hands and turns it this way and that.

“What are you doing?” Wilder finally says, the words as squished as their cheeks between Artemis’s palms.

“Disguising you,” Artemis says. Her specialty is Seeing—can she change the way other people see? She has never done it before, but most people don’t know if they can do something until they really need to do it, magic or not. She presses her thumbs into Wilder’s forehead, where wrinkles would be appearing out of confusion if Wilder wasn’t giddy with the sensation of each individual finger pad, the swoop of slightly bent knuckles, the soft roundness from where Artemis’s thumbs meet her palms. They Feel her Hands as well and Hear the Sound of a raucous gathering in a park, Legs burning from dancing, the sweetness of rum from a paper-bag-concealed-bottle and the heat of early summer sun on the back of their Neck. And then all that is gone and there is only each physical finger, drawing lines down their face. Sometimes so soft as to tickle, sometimes hard enough that Wilder wonders if she will leave a bruise.

“Well,” Artemis finally says, and she takes her hands off Wilder’s face. “What do we think?”

“Of what?” Wilder asks. They don’t feel different, except a little high on touch.

Quibble’s eyes focus on Wilder and he gasps. “Oh!” he says. “You look—” He can’t seem to think of the word.

“Straight?” Artemis says with a wry grin. And it’s true, that is how Wilder looks to the outside observer. It’s not as though Wilder is an entirely different person. It’s as though Artemis proposed an alternate timeline where Wilder had been assigned something very different at birth and then had a fairly low-mileage life. Their hair, still red, sits neatly upon their head, close cropped and combed. They have a faint amount of stubble high on their cheeks and under their chin, just enough to hint at a performative ruggedness. Their chin has a dimple in it, their jaw is squarer. And they are wearing a button-down, a sweater, a tie, a peacoat. They look like they work in an office on the fortieth floor.

“I was going to say boring,” says Quibble. “I hate it. It’s genuinely terrible. Great work.”

“Can I see?” Wilder asks, and Artemis gestures to the bathroom.

Quibble stands to get his face done.

“It’s just an illusion,” Artemis shouts after them. “Don’t get upset or anything. I didn’t change anything about you.”

Wilder looks in the mirror and feels a surge in the space under their ribs, like a tide moving in. Oh, they think. Oh. Not this exact thing—they don’t want to look this bland. But—

Rather than staying with that feeling, they exit hastily. “What do you think?” asks Artemis, her palms cradling Quibble’s cheeks. Now that she’s done it once, she doesn’t need to press or draw for the second try. Wilder doesn’t look too closely at the queasy slight rearrangement, his shoulders broadening, his hair thinning.

“Quibble’s right,” Wilder responds. “It’s weird.”

Quibble hears something strange in Wilder’s voice. He marks it and decides he will come back for it later.

Wilder walks to the window, peering out from behind the curtain, looking for all the world like a scared child. They begin by drawing deep breaths while staring over the rooftops of other buildings, the water towers jutting into the gray expanse like jaunty party hats; the sky is hanging low today. Nothing sun-drenched or blue about it. Wilder cannot afford to entertain that oh. And it’s not as though they’ve never thought it before, really. They’ve already transitioned. There is a certain amount of realization it takes to transition.

Their eyes zip along the zigzags of fire escapes until they reach street level. And there—

“Artemis?”

“Not now, I’m concentrating.” She’s done with Quibble, who, despite his day, is in the bathroom laughing at what she’s done to his face. It feels like a joke, like Wall Street drag.

“Artemis, you’ve really outdone yourself—” Quibble chuckles.

“Quiet,” she says, and then, “Actually, move, I need the mirror.” She bumps him out of the way with her hip.

Wilder swallows hard. “Artemis, I really think—”

“Shush, Wilder, I need a minute. It’s harder to do on yourself. It feels like braiding your own hair.”

Quibble notices the worry in Wilder’s voice and bustles over. He expects the concern is about their reflection, the realization Quibble knows the contours of without needing to ask or even Feel in a working. Wilder holds the pink velvet curtain over their nose and mouth; only their eyes are reflected back in the window as Quibble approaches.

“Man, do you want to—” Wilder interrupts him with their frantic pointing at the street below.

Two cop cars squat like poisonous mushrooms on the side of the road, pulled up in front of a fire hydrant and parked lazily with their back bumpers hung out into traffic, which has slowed to a crawl to get around them. Another car, white and marked with Child Protective Services, spills a frazzled-looking besuited social worker onto the sidewalk. They all converse and consult a clipboard. One of them peers up toward the window and Wilder drops the curtain, backs away. “I think,” they begin, their voice a high whisper. “I think that’s for us. It’s not like he doesn’t know where Artemis lives.” They turn, expecting to see Quibble next to them, not sure how to anticipate his reaction or his face, now that it is strange and new.

Quibble is already by the door loading packs onto his back. They reform into a big suit bag as he slings them on one by one. “Artemis!” he bellows. “Artemis, we have to go. Now.”

She emerges from the bathroom and her face is shocking and terrible. Not because she hasn’t made a good illusion but because she made too good an illusion. Straight hair and pale skin and a tiny perfect nose and no beard. Sensible beige pumps, polished to a mirror shine. No bright lip color; lip gloss instead. Artemis’s imagination for what is respectable and beneath suspicion is both spot-on and horrifying, a gruesome erasure punctuated with cleverness, an acidic burn toward the oppressor. The group could have spent hours talking about what it means to choose an illusion and to what point and purpose. Days, even.

“What the fuck?” she asks, but she doesn’t hustle less. She slings the last two bags onto her shoulders—Mary Margaret’s as well. A tiny meow from Wilder’s person suggests that they hold the Lady Anastasia in the hand that appears to contain a briefcase.

“Out the back, out the back—” Quibble herds everyone toward the door at the end of the kitchen, the one to the utility stairwell with the garbage cans outside it that Artemis disappears down when Rico—but she is not thinking about Rico, not if she can help it.

The string of curse words Artemis spills into the stairwell, bouncing off the bare walls and red-painted pipes and exit signs, would live in infamy if anyone but these three (and I, of course) could hear it. As it stands, no one does, and thank goodness for that. They spill out by the dumpster and walk, as calmly as they can, into the gray day.

They do their best. They vamp for hours. They find nondescript places to sit, parks to walk through. Wilder’s briefcase occasionally meows and they duck into an alleyway to take out the Lady and give her water, let her roam. Artemis thinks about finding Mary Margaret, changing her face, but she wonders if it’s worse to draw attention. And then, finally, dark settles everyone into the appointed time. They reconvene at the bench where they last left Mary Margaret.

Quibble gets there first and finds the bench empty; his stomach roils. He hears a distressed meow and looks up—Wilder isn’t far behind him. Where is she? he Hears. Quibble can’t respond that way, so he just shrugs. I can see the car, I think. That’s the car, right? Wilder is jumpy. All they want is to sit down, to put their cat in their lap. To have a quiet cup of tea and a library book.

Two minutes later, uncanny Artemis shows up, white and sans beard with neutral shoes. Wilder doesn’t waste any time: Where is she? Are we in the right place?

“What are you talking about, are we in the right place.” Artemis’s whisper is a growl, low and feral. “Mary Margaret is right there. She’s crossing the street.”

Wilder blinks. No, she’s not.

Artemis shoots them a look, tries to see if they’re joking. But, as is nearly always the case, the look in their eyes is completely earnest. She turns to Quibble, who shakes his head. Artemis turns back toward Mary Margaret, who is clearly there, flicking her hands deftly. The child is pulling a long, thin piece of metal—where on earth did she get that?—from her Pocket.

Across the street, people walk straight by the kid as she inserts it, far too practiced, between the door and the window. The couple, walking their dog, do not turn to glance or even flinch as the door unlocks with a rusty clunk.

Artemis flutters her eyelashes, blinks rapidly, tries to see what people see when they do not See magic without trying. Her eyes water with the effort, but when they clear, the girl is completely, utterly invisible.

“Motherfucker,” Artemis hisses under her breath. How much more difficult is life as her (Artemis swallows) mother about to get? She can feel the exhaustion weigh on her shoulders already, even with a big bad looming over their lives. She sags where she stands, but bucks up when she remembers that she, herself, is not invisible, that Quibble and Wilder can see what Artemis is doing just fucking fine. She drops her self-imposed normal-sight to watch the Magpie, whose hands flick once again. She pulls a screwdriver out of the air. Then a hammer. The child puts the screwdriver into the ignition and whacks, firmly and precisely, once. Twice. Three times. Then she turns the whole MacGyvered contraption. The car roars to life.

Artemis hasn’t stopped thinking about CPS; she is letting a child steal a car. She is not this child’s legal parent. This child is, in actual fact, in danger with her. More danger than she might be if she were not with Artemis. Was the Hex entirely incorrect to call CPS? It’s an intrusive thought she’s battled all day, alone.

I am starting to understand how competently the Hex is identifying insecurity, fear, and exploiting them. Quibble’s digital detransition, the stability of his home. Mary Margaret’s vulnerable relationship with older men. And everything Artemis has internalized about women like her, queers like her, and how predatory and dangerous they are supposed to be for children. These are lies, but when they’re said over and over, it is hard not to carry some part of them with you. It is traumatizing to have someone (or something, in this case) prove it right. A special cruelty.

Mary Margaret is scanning the street now and Artemis realizes—she would not know them, not like this. She’s about to start driving the car, circle the block, and—surely someone would notice then that the car seems to be driving itself. She nudges Wilder in the ribs. “She’s right there, in the car. It—”

It just turned on, yeah.

“Tell her who we are. In her head, quiet.”

Wilder does and Artemis watches her jump, then grin as her eyes light on them all. As they pile in, the child says, “Y’all look terrible. I love it.”