move it. If it worked, write something.”
The pen glowed as Maryann worked her spell, but now it looked normal. Isabella tried to pick it up anyway and found it was difficult but less so than before, so she decided she'd probably better keep what she wrote simple so she didn't continue to tire herself. She wrote out, 'laptop?'
“It's working! Laptop? Oh, you mean, why didn't I use the computer? This is easier for me to work magic on. But we can talk now!”
Leah and Nora returned with breakfast, although it was much closer to lunchtime than breakfast time
“So?” Leah asked.
Isabella picked up the pen and wrote, 'hi.'
Leah and Nora stared. “You saw that, right?”
“Yeah, I saw that,” Nora said.
“That's Isabella. Her astral form is stuck outside her body so I'm helping her communicate with us.”
“I don't know what that means,” Leah said.
“It means we're out our fourth band member,” Nora replied. “Is this dangerous? I mean, do we need to take her body to a hospital?”
“Well, it could be dangerous, but I think right now it's just inconvenient. Isabella?” Maryann asked.
She wrote, 'OK 4 now.'
“Why the quasi-text-speak?” Leah asked.
She wrote, 'write ≠ easy; keep short.'
“Oh, I get it. So, did you figure out who did this?”
Maryann sighed. “You were right.”
“I knew it!”
“Does this help us break the spell on Isabella?” Nora asked.
“I don't know,” Maryann said.
Isabella wrote, 'what would u do?'
“I wouldn't use dark magic like this,” she replied.
“Damn it!” Isabella said, then she wrote, 'L - u no what I mean.'
“Oh, I get it! This Red Queen is your evil doppelganger. Now, we know you'd never ever do something nasty like this,” Leah said, “but if you were going to, how would you do it? Would you use a curse? A hex? Which god would you ask to give you power?”
“Is this really the best way to be thinking?” Nora asked. “I mean, what makes us think this Red Queen thinks like Maryann?”
“It's best we can think of right now,” Maryann said. “Anyway, it's not a bad place to start. Like you said earlier, this kind of magic isn't easy and not anyone can do it.” She jotted down some notes.
Isabella wrote, 'why me.'
They thought about this.
“You mean, did she pick you at random or did she happen to know you were a natural medium and that if she did this to anyone else we'd have a lot easier time talking to her?” Leah asked.
'Yes.'
“Well, you said you thought her aura looked odd. But I can't see auras, so if we assume she can't either, then it must have been random and unlucky for us,” Maryann answered.
“Or she did some kind of divination thing to pick which one of us would be the worst to be stuck outside her body,” Leah offered.
“Or she just picked the one she thought was the leader,” Nora said.
“But we told her we didn't have a leader.”
“No, Isabella told her that, right after she asked which one of us was the leader. So maybe she assumed because Isabella answered, she was the leader after all.”
“That actually makes a lot of sense,” Isabella said, then wrote, 'or all the above.'
“That's true. Maybe she picked Isabella to begin with because she thought she was the leader and then did some divination to confirm how much trouble this would be,” Maryann said.
“Can't you just dispel magic or dispel the curse or something?” Leah asked.
“This isn't some table-top role-playing game thingy,” the redhead retorted. “I've told you that. Real magic just isn't so simple. If it was, you can bet the Red Queen would have just hit us with some kind of forget spell or something. We need to know how she did this. I mean, I can just try some stuff, but it probably won't work and I'll just get tired. And we'll waste a lot of time and we don't have that if we want to get to the show on time.”
“Okay, how can we help to try to speed this process up?” Nora said. “You can do divination; we can't.”
Isabella wrote, 'research.'
“Research what?” Leah asked.
“Everything,” she said. “Damn it!” She wrote out, 'egoist; check social media; mayb clues.'
“Oh, of course,” Nora replied. “If she really does real magic, she's going to brag about it somewhere, even if people don't believe her.”
“And maybe she'll talk about how she does her magic and what gods she works with,” Maryann said. “That's a great idea, Isabella!”
She wrote, 'astral form = side-effect?'
“Oh, so maybe the spell wasn't supposed to kick you out of your body but it did anyway? That's an interesting idea too. Isabella, please write down everything that you remember about waking up outside your body.”
Leah and Nora pulled out their favorite electronics and started research. Maryann took Isabella's notes and shuffled her tarot cards again.
“I really wish I could help more,” Isabella sighed. “I guess I'd better focus on what I know about this kind of magic so I can help Maryann with the counter-spell. Of course, that assumes this is even spirit magic.”
The time ticked away as they worked and therefore could not rehearse, work on costumes, or any of the other tasks they wanted to take care of prior to the show. Since Isabella was the most limited in what she could do to help, she was the most irritated at the loss of time. She also noticed that she was starting to feel oddly tired and each time Maryann asked her a question it was a little more difficult to pick up the pen. She started to see blinking lights at the edge of her vision and hear things just at the threshold of hearing. Lunch came and went and finally Leah went out and picked up some food. When she returned the band sat down to discuss results, and by this time Isabella was worried.
“Isabella, are you there?” Maryann asked.
'Yes.'
“Well, my best guess is that Isabella is actually under a kind of sleep spell. I think her connection to the spirit world caused her to wake up, in spirit in anyway, even though she didn't actually get up.”
“Huh, that actually might make some sense,” Leah said. “The Red Queen posted a weird little message today on her fan page. Hold on.” She checked her notes. “Here we go. 'Poor Briar Rose found a spindle and will miss the show today. Too, too bad.'”
“Oh, 'Sleeping Beauty!'” Maryann said. “Well, at least she thinks you're pretty.”
Isabella frowned and wrote, 'NOT flattered.'
“But if she's just asleep, why can't we wake her up?” Nora asked.
“It's a magic spell, that's why. Now, there's really only a few ways to wake someone up from magical slumber...”
“Maryann, no one ever says ‘magical slumber,’” Leah interrupted. “Except in fairy tales. And I'll tell you if smelling salts won't wake up her up, neither will 'true love's first kiss.'”
Nora and the ethereal Isabella nodded in agreement.
Maryann pouted. “Fine, fine. You guys just don't understand romance.”
“Don't get me started on that,” Nora said. “So, how do we wake her up?”
“Wait for whatever spell is on her to wear off...”
“So we miss the show. Next option.”
“That also assumes the spell will wear off,” Leah said.
“Oh, it should,” Maryann said. “It's pretty much impossible to sustain something like this forever. So we have to break the spell with another spell. But that's hard, so you two tell me what you found out about the Red Queen and her magic.”
Isabella wrote down, 'Dark gods?'
“How did you know?” Nora answered sarcastically. “She seems to like working with Loki, Set, and Erebus.”
“That's a mythologically mixed bag,” Leah commented.
Maryann sighed. “It's really
not correct to call them dark gods. Well, except for Erebus, but he's the god of darkness, which isn't exactly the same either. I mean, they aren't nice gods, but still.”
“Okay, let's not get into that now. You have to admit, there are certain types of people who seem to like those types of gods,” Nora replied.
“Yeah, I know, and it's so annoying. Gods are not fashion accessories. Anyway, any clue about this spell?”
“'Thank you father of serpent, wolf, and keeper of the dead.'” Leah said.
The other three stared at her.
“What? That was on her personal page today.”
Isabella wrote, 'Loki.'
“Is that really Loki's thing?” Nora asked.
“I guess it could be. People deal with gods differently than I do. I'll tell you this, though; there are some gods I wouldn't work with. Not because I think they're bad, necessarily, although some really aren't good,” Maryann said, “I just think it's too dangerous. Gods don't play by our rules and they don't share our values.”
“Oh, so don't worship something that's aligned with evil or chaos,” Leah said.
“Um, yes?”
“Okay, so she asked Loki to help her sabotage her competition,” Nora said. “How do we fix this?”
“I'm going to have to ask for help,” Maryann answered. “Which I really don't like doing, but we're running out of time if we're going to make the show.”
“But you work with gods all the time,” Leah countered.
The redhead sighed. “I told you, there's always a price when dealing with gods. I don't mind asking my pantheon for help because we've got a good relationship.”
“You know the price,” Nora said.
“Yes. But this is going to be tricky if another god is already involved, and I might have to ask for help from someone new to me.”
“Well, then, we'll