Dangerous, Diabolical
Chapter 3 - Things which go bump in the night

My shift at work was almost unbearable. I tried to exit any aisle a human entered and carry the stock about as slowly as possible to drag the work out. Despite my award-winning personality, the main reason I’d been hired was my uncanny ability to lift the really heavy stuff without complaint. I liked to advertise keeping to myself was one of my leading soft skills.

The dead man last night, combined with the SPCC visitor Leofstan Ortwin, and his ‘checking in’ had left me looking out the corner of my eye at every new stranger I saw in the store. Any person could be the cause of what they were inspecting, or worse, a council member themselves.

Not for the first time, my thumb ran over the magicked gems in my pocket, magic thrumming warmly from them. With a clear mind, it felt like I could almost tell them apart, but after curiosity got the better of me, pulling them out revealed that there was only a 70 per cent chance of being right.

The lack of grasp I held on magic was infuriating. Plus, if I found a tutor, then was also the risk they’d discover the true extent of my power, and that would be tremendously bad. A jolt of magic, unbidden, shot down my arm as I thought about it. “Ow,” I cursed, the sting jerking my hand open as my magic brushed over the gems. Sure enough, a few angry red patches threatened blisters on my fingertips. That was a cause to sigh. Year after year, my ability to control it also seemed to be diminishing.

A shiver proceeded a cold draft that slid down the aisle. David and his attached personal ghost could be felt before they were seen or heard. They seemed to have manifested the ability to suck the joy of living out of the normal day, so when a shift was already dragging, it was akin to just going outside and flopping into the first dug grave you could replace.

There was a cough clearing in his throat, which I ignored. He grumbled something under his breath before just coming out with whatever he’d bothered me for; “Andy, this is Joanne.”

David was in the aisle, a young human girl next to him. “Joanne is starting with us today part-time. Could you please run her through the processes?”

She was wearing the standard uniform, her long brown hair tied back into a neat ponytail, sporting a bright blue streak, and she smiled uneasily from David, to then beam at me. She had a curvaceous frame and her cheeks were rosy. Her ears were adorned with piercings which seems to contrast her ‘natural’ makeup. I’d place her as a student, who recently arrived in the area to study as she still smelt of saltwater. No one who worked here had the spare money to holiday anywhere by the sea.

I took a moment to run through the pros and cons of helping her out. As David was my manager and signed the paycheck, and it was him asking, that warranted some consideration.

Regrettably, the list was surprisingly short.

“No.” was the answer, mirroring his sharpness with me yesterday. I leant down to pick up a box, before basically throwing it onto the shelf and tearing the front out, almost spilling the stacked goodies inside. The cardboard split with a satisfying crunch.

David and the human didn’t leave. Of course not. With a sigh, I swivelled my attention to them fully. The Dybbuk was doing his usual floating happy dance as he plunged his phantom claws into David’s head. I must be annoying his host gloriously. Whilst there was no skin damage - the man must have one hell of a headache from the spectre’s touch - me making it worse was a visible source of delight to the creature.

“This isn’t me asking.” David directed.

I stared at him.

He stared back.

When it became obvious this was going to carry on all day, he sighed.

“Peter’s gone home sick. Rachel’s stuck on customer service and Prav’s cleaning a spillage.”

Typical. “And there’s no one else,” I stated, not asking.

Giving her another once over I glared. I could eat her in the warehouse and tell David she had decided to go home. “She could always start tomorrow.” It was a last-ditch attempt, ignored by my very frustrated-looking manager.

Loudly sighing I relented. “Fine, but I’m not happy about it.” Slamming another box onto the shelf, the whole rack rattled. That was all he needed to hear before saddling me with her.

“Great. Joanne, do your best and please know Andy is a reliable employee, but use your initiative when it comes to interacting with customers.” He thought she’d do better? Pfft.

The girl beamed, her cheeks dimpling. “Amazing, thank you, Mr Walters, I look forward to learning the ropes.”

Ugh, what a suck-up. It then became my turn to be the object of her attention. She gave a little fist pump into the air. ”Thank you Andy for agreeing to walk me through the job!”

David was already out of the aisle, he didn’t even offer a glance back.

“It’s Celandine,” I growled. “Grab this box,” I nudged it with my shoe, “and shove it on the right place on the shelf.” I pointed at the gap with my chin.

“No problem, Celandine. I’m grateful to have this job... wait... where are you going?” She asked.

“To get more boxes. The shelves aren’t full yet.” And I was going to take my damn time doing it.

“Oh.” Her smile dropped a little. “See you in a bit, I guess.”

For the rest of the shift, it was like she was my shadow. If I left her to do tasks, she’d just pop back asking what to do next. Her sudden appearance the third time was during a moment so deep in thought staring at one of the gems, that it jolted me into shoving it back into my pocket hard enough the fabric ripped a few stitches. At the pace she was going, my task list would be empty and it would start to make me look bad.

No matter what I was doing, my mind refused to think of anything but the magic in my pocket, and it focused on the startling fact that a council member had been in my house.

By the time the clock hit eight, I was almost running out of the door.

“Bye Celandine! Thanks again for...” Joanne called, hurrying over as she saw me leaving. I gave her a wave over my shoulder, almost walking into the automatic door in the process which moved a lot slower than I did.

If I didn’t catch Willow at her break, I’d have to linger in the club, and tonight she desperately needed to be brought up to speed with what had been going on. Being bogged down with my backpack of steak, and carrier bag of air freshener (I was hoping four packs of diffuser and five spray cans would be enough to purify the house), luck was on my side.

The tree fae was fishing in her pockets for a cigarette outside Members Only. I tried not to break into a run with all my packages. Evidently, I still looked odd enough to draw attention from passer-by’s, and that caused her in turn to glance at the commotion. With a toothy grin, Willow gave me a soft wave as I grew closer.

“Hey girl!” today she was sporting a purple Afro, flawless ends, and a soft glittery hue. Once within earshot, she tilted her head curiously, causing the curls to bounce. “You look like you forgot what you did with your lunch.” She took a puff of her cigarette, eyeballing me, brows raising at the bags. “That better not be a body stuffed in there.”

“Have you seen anything odd about?” I demanded, cutting to the chase. She pursed her lips as if considering, cigarette poised for another inhale.

”Erm, nope.” Then changing her mind, tapped off the residue building. When I said nothing else she paused, her cigarette halfway to her lips. Her eyes flicked to the plastic bags in my hands. “What happened?”

Glancing around I leant in, confiding softly, “he died.” Her other eyebrow quirked up to create a quizzical look, and then her eyes grew wide as she realised who I was talking about. She lunged towards the bags, the cigarette fell from her fingers.

“Shit! You killed him?” Her voice was part laughter, part surprise as she tried to see inside. I wafted them out of her reach.

“Of course not,” I retorted adamantly. “This is just steak.”

Disappointedly she pouted, eyeing up the half-used roll on the floor. “Here was me thinking you’d brought me something nice.” For a moment it looked like she was going to pick it up, but then decided better and stomped it out instead.

“People saw me with him, you know I wouldn’t dare attract the attention of the SPCC!” There was no need to mention that killing him was my aim at the time he’d expired. She relaxed, resuming her usual slouched pose, fishing her pockets to get another cigarette.

Clarifying, I explained; “I just watched him whilst he died.” She froze again, taking on that eerie forest stillness as her brain tried to string together what I was saying. Sometimes, when things weren’t planned in advance, she tended to overthink the little details. Willow had a lot more to risk than I did when it came to being discovered, considering she wasn’t registered at all.

“Where’s the body?” She asked suspiciously. “Please tell me you didn’t eat that mess of meat.” She was completely flabbergasted.

“Gods no!” It didn’t seem the time to mention I almost considered it. “I left him in the street.”

“WHAT!” With a giant twitch, she scanned around as if the SPCC was going to jump out. “Are you insane? The minute they get your magic signature they’ll be on you like a pack of dogs!” Her hands shook as she tried to take a drag from the unlit cigarette. “Jesus girl, I can hide you in one of my trees for a while but I couldn’t bring you meat forever!”

I felt warmth bloom in my chest. She’d do that for me?

“Stop panicking! No magic was used.” I protested. Willow, the friend of little faith. “He had a heart attack. The human was all like...” I clutched my chest and staggered to show her. She grew very still again.

I regained my composure. ”It’s not like there was a phone about, otherwise I would’ve called for help.”

With a blank stare at the sky, she held out the cigarette for me to light. I obliged. The smell of burning tobacco warmed the air.

She took a deep breath. “Let me get this straight. You waited for Creepyson to have a heart attack, considered calling an ambulance for one of the greasiest, cringeworthy humans known to man and now you feel bad about it. Are you a vegetarian suddenly?”

Did I feel bad about it?

“Or have you forgotten that you eat at least one human a month and show me your favourite teeth from each one?”

I rolled my eyes. “But I wanted to chase him, and he just kind of keeled over. When the SPCC turned up this morning I swear there was no way I was being arrested for the death of a human where I didn’t even cause the death.”

In a blink Willow’s skin shifted, she lost a second cigarette to the floor and her breath stopped, with my other sight I saw trailing leaves peeling into the wind.

Urgently I muttered, “Humans, humans!” flapping my hands, the plastic carriers protesting, gesturing for her to turn down the mojo before it became visible in the real world.

With some considerable straining on her part, she regained control, ebbing mostly back into a passable form.

“The SPCC are here?” She squeaked. This time she blatantly retrieved the second lost fag and cradled it between her fingers like gold. Her pallor was still grey, and she was still breathing too quickly to be healthy.

“They’re investigating it already?” Her hands were looking less like fingers and more... twiggy. I pushed my magic out a little bit, just enough to glamour any passing humans to be considerably more interested in their shoelaces than the half tree growing in the car park.

“Oh no, he was here for something else. The inspector said something about several deaths in the area. I’m only a category 37 you know, so super vulnerable, needed checking in on.”

At this, she regained controlled and snorted. “If you’re vulnerable then I must have imagined you ripping out that heart last month.” I looked up recalling the memory. It had still beaten for quite a few runs before realising it wasn’t attached to anything else. That human had been a looker too, sturdy, well trained with guns. He barely flinched at the crumbling of his chest cavity and his fear had smelt like bacon. My libido purred as I remembered the fear and disbelief in his eyes as I sucked the blood from his removed appendage.

That night I’d spent very entertained, lying in his blood, watching the stars.

“Earth to Andy!”

I gave her my best toothy smile in response.

“If it wasn’t for how slow you are I’d think you were some kind of vampire off-shoot.”

I considered it, ” That would be pretty cool,” avoiding confirming and denying her millionth guess about my true self. Used to being deflected, she changed the subject back to the previous.

“I’d heard about a couple of deaths down the vine, now that I think about it, the odd sort of rumours you don’t pay attention to.”

“And you didn’t tell me?” I pouted in mock sadness. She rolled her eyes.

“No, because folk from the community being killed before magically standing up and walking away doesn’t sound ridiculous at all, regardless of who is telling the story.” Her tone was dry.

“Are you sure they were dead?”

“Jessie Chamber’s family sure as hell thought so, right before she got out of her coffin mid-service and went for a stroll.”

“Where did she go?” Willow was right. The whole zombie thing was ridiculous.

“Into a white van waiting outside the crematorium.” Then she shrugged. “That was three weeks ago.”

We both met each other’s gaze with dubious smirks.

“Well, that’s one way to start life fresh,” I admitted. “Fake your death and run out on your family into a random van travelling off into the sunset.”

Willow stubbed out the last of her cigarette.

“So, what was she? Do you know the heritage?”

She didn’t answer, seeming to think over the question. “Some kind of shifter, Wolf maybe with human thrown in.” So deadly with claws, but little in the way of magical ability besides shape-changing. Unless one of her parents had sorcerer blood she would have had next to no protection. I eyed Willow. I’d never seen her manifest a shield, or an offensive attack either. What could she do apart from luring humans around to their deaths and turning into a tree?

Maybe some of the amulets from Leofstan were going to be more useful than I thought.

“Listen,” taking out the blue stone necklace, and showing it to her, “the SPCC Council man made me this.” Willow whistled appreciatively. “Will you keep it with you for me?”

“Yikes!” She exclaimed as it entered her grip, “That’s some strong stuff.”

I nodded. “It’ll defend you against a magical attack, or several small attacks.” Her eyes were as round as saucers, she latched it around her neck. Without any council registration, she wouldn’t be receiving any support from them like this.

“Holy crap I’d never afford one of these, not even after a year of blow jobs.” Her hand gripped the stone on her chest.

“Enjoy! If the council are spooked enough to dish out free mojo that strong, somethings going on.”

“What about you?” Her voice was wary, she began to lift the necklace off, and I pushed her hands back down with a toothy grin.

“I’m not quite a low category 37, you know. Plus he left me with others.” I winked.

Her eyes nearly bugged out of her sockets.

“Thanks, Andy, I owe you. I’ll ask around and see if anyone knows more.” With a little wave, she went back to work, and I headed home, thumbing the last two gems and keeping closer attention to anything behind me.

Luckily the dead creepy Joe had found some poor schmuck to remove him from the sidewalk, and that meant one less dead body to worry about.

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