Chapter 6
Once Scott dropped off the witch at the MEC HQ, and their team of magical medical personnel saw to her, he walked Anna home.
By the time she made it to her street, she was utterly spent.
“Alright you, we’re almost there.” Scott shot her a careful look, no doubt checking to see she wasn’t about to fall headfirst into the ditch.
Anna managed a groan as she pushed her hair from her face.
The medical personnel at HQ had checked her out to ensure she hadn’t been injured. Apart from a chronic flare up with her allergies, and her general weariness, she was fine.
“So which one is your house?” Scott looked around him, peering into the dark.
This street didn’t have any functional street lamps. The evil seeping up from Anna’s house had probably broken them all. Evil, after all, so did love the dark.
“Ah,” she turned her sleepy head around, “that one.” She stabbed a finger at house 666.
Scott spluttered. “You’re joking right?”
“Nope.” She flattened her hand down her face and blinked wearily.
“What on earth are you doing living there? That’s got to be one of the dingiest, darkest, evilest abodes I’ve seen around Marchtown – and that’s saying something.”
“I kind of signed the lease without having seen it first. I’ve already paid the first month’s rent, too, and I don’t have enough to move somewhere else. I’m stuck with it.”
Scott shot her a look, but she couldn’t see it properly in the dark. “You’re not very lucky, are you, Anna?”
“Nope,” she agreed as she opened the gate. It creaked and groaned, exactly like a zombie rising from its grave rather than some hinges that needed a good oiling.
She mooched up to the front door, ignoring the distinctly evil clicking of a cricket. A few moths flew past her nose, and she swore they flapped curses her way with their tiny silver wings.
She hated this place. Still, it had a bed, and she needed her bed more than anything right now.
She walked up the front steps and opened the door.
“You don’t keep it locked?” Scott asked as he trotted up beside her. “That’s brave. A place like this would be a magnet for every evil bozo in the city. You’d return home to find them squatting in your basement.”
“I don’t need to lock it – I have a cat.” Anna massaged her neck as she walked in.
Scott snorted. “Exactly what kind of cat do you own?”
“You’re about to find out.” Anna leaned to her left and flicked on the light switch.
The front door led right into a combined lounge and kitchen.
While this house was most definitely wicked, it was still roomy.
As soon as the light flickered on, it revealed a regal, throne-like chair sitting in the middle of the room, right in line-of-sight of the door. Luminaria was sitting on top of it, Anna’s nicest silk scarf in tattered shreds at her feet.
“Oh really?” She groaned as she walked forward and grabbed the scarf. “And I thought I told you not to move the furniture around. It’s plain dangerous. I could walk into that chair in the dark.”
Luminaria shot her a dark look, her whiskers straightening as she snarled. “You have no right to lecture me, pup – you’re the one who’s been out all night. I am hungry, and you have failed in your sacred duty to attend to my needs.”
Anna blew a breath of air against her fringe, walked into the kitchen, grabbed a can of tuna, and opened it.
“Ah, you have a talking cat.” Scott, who was apparently still in the house, made the fatal mistake of walking up to Luminaria and trying to pat her. “She doesn’t look that bad.”
Luminaria straightened up, pulling her head away like a dragon readying for a lunge. With her green-gold eyes blazing, she hissed. “How dare you, mortal,” her voice rattled and shook, “I don’t look that bad? I am the worst – the worst there has ever been!”
Scott wisely backed off, hiding his hand protectively behind his back. “O-kay,” he said slowly.
“Leave him alone, Luminaria. We’ve both had a hard night.” Anna grabbed a plate from the cupboard and upended the tuna onto it.
“Hurry up, child,” Luminaria snapped. “And don’t you dare think of feeding me without garnishing that dish. There’s some dill in the garden. Go get it.”
Anna groaned. She walked past Scott and back out into the yard.
Scott followed her out.
She hadn’t bothered to turn on the porch light, and nor did she have a torch. Rather than go inside and get one, she just walked around in the dark, heading towards a likely looking bush.
“Ah, do you want a light?” Scott produced a torch from somewhere and handed it to her. “I think you’ll be less likely to trip over a garden demon in the dark if you have this.”
She took it from him. “Thanks. Now where the heck is that dill?”
“I wouldn’t eat anything growing in this garden. Hell, I wouldn’t eat anything left in the house for too long, either – it’s likely to get infected by some rare and exotic magical disease.”
Anna flashed the torch around, following the sporadic weed-infested patches of garden bed, looking for some sodding dill. Dawn would soon break, and she’d spent all night being chased by or chasing evil wizards. And now she was out here looking for garnish.
Life wasn’t fair.
“So how did you come across that … cat?” Scott appeared to control himself. It was clear cat wasn’t the term he wanted to use to describe Luminaria. Curse was probably more like it.
“Ah, she’s a family heirloom.”
“… Sorry?”
Realizing that probably sounded pretty weird, she gave an awkward smile that accentuated her dimples, even in the dark. It could have been cute, if Anna wasn’t the most awkward witch in the world. It made her look like she was trying to escape from her own teeth. “Oh, sorry. Um, she has a magical contract with my family. We’re indebted to look after her.”
“An heirloom contract?” Scott sounded mildly interested. “Are you sure it’s binding?”
She gave another seriously tired but awkward smile. “Oh yeah, pretty sure. If I stop looking after her, terrible things start happening to me. One time when I tried to ah … get rid of her,” she said warily, “I fell down a set of stairs and broke my wrist. Another time when I kind of deliberately lost her, I broke my nose and my leg. It’s a binding contract alright.”
“Amongst us wizards, those kinda contracts are illegal.”
“Yep, well, not amongst witches. Believe me, my grandmother looked into it. The Summersville family is stuck with Luminaria von Tippit until we die out as a bloodline. Which might be sooner rather than later if I don’t find this bloody dill.”
“Hey,” Scott pointed to the fence, “there it is.” He ran over and picked her a few sprigs. “Here you go.”
“Thanks.”
“So, I should probably be going. As much as you owe me a coffee for walking you all the way home, I’m going to pass on account of your seriously crazy cat.”
She managed a subdued laugh.
“Look after yourself, Anna. And I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“… Ah, you will?”
“Hell yes. Tomorrow we have to debrief with the MEC HQ. We gave them the shortened version of events tonight, but tomorrow we’ll have to march back into their offices to give them a proper briefing. We’ll also have to ensure they do the right thing,” Scott’s voice dropped darkly.
She was too tired to ask what he meant. Instead she walked with him back to the front door.
He nodded his head low. “Get some rest. And ah,” he looked down at her clothes and coughed, “you might want to change your clothes.”
Though she’d been smiling, it disappeared as she looked crestfallen. “Oh, yeah, I know they’re not very attractive—”
“They’re ripped, Anna, and they kinda wreak of bad magic.”
“Oh.”
“
See you tomorrow.” Scott waved, turned over his shoulder, smiled, and walked off, hands in his pockets.
She waved at him, her hand hovering in the air for entirely too long.
When she heard her front gate creak closed, she tucked her hair behind her ears and bit her lip.
Before she could pause to think about the curious Scott, Luminaria screamed at her.
Racing back inside, Anna garnished the tuna, set it before her possessed cat, and gave the door one last look.
Closing it, she finally went to bed.
Tomorrow would no doubt be a big day, and if given half a chance, it would be bigger than today.