A Modern Witch

CHAPTER 4



Who the hell traveled to Chicago in February? Especially when they lived in sunny California. As Jamie walked out of the airport in search of a taxi, he wished he’d packed something a lot warmer than his leather jacket.

He loved Nell, but it would have been really nice if her latest project had sent him somewhere about eighty degrees warmer. What crazy person lived in a place like this? The cold was mean, and the wind was just plain cruel.

Putting his hands in his pockets, Jamie muttered under his breath and lit a couple of small fire globes. They didn’t help his face, which felt like the skin might be freezing off, but maybe his fingers would survive long enough to text a few choice curses.

Nell was going to owe him big for this one. Only his big sister would dream up an Internet spell to troll for witches, and then manage to hijack some poor, unsuspecting soul who probably wasn’t a witch at all.

As co-crafters of the gaming code for Enchanter’s Realm, Jamie had plenty of reason to respect Nell’s talent for complex coding and tricky spells. However, both could get out of control occasionally. The unfortunate recent episode where three beta testers were turned into actual frogs came to mind. They’d both been up all night reversing that particular misfire.

So unlike Moira and Sophie, he wasn’t going to be surprised if Lauren was just a nice girl without an ounce of witching talent, latent or otherwise. Non-hereditary witches weren’t very common. In all likelihood, she’d just been in the wrong place at the wrong time and been grabbed by Nell’s spell. He gave her props for tolerance. Not everyone dragged into an online chat and called a witch would be so easygoing about it.

Normally he’d have admired Nell’s creativity, but right now he was pretty sure his own creativity was frozen. Where were all the taxis in this blasted city? He was hungry, cranky, cold, and had a possible witch to track down. She’d more than likely be a dud as far as power went, but Nell was unfortunately right. They needed to be sure.

…

It was only a matter of time before the little boy tried to climb onto the food conveyor belt at Sushi Station. Lauren watched the toddler in the next booth and waited for him to make his move. She saw it in his eyes first, and then his little body moved with shocking speed.

His dad caught him in midflight without even looking up. Lauren shook her head, amused. Parents must get secret special-ops training. The little boy shot her a mile-wide grin and sat down, at least temporarily, to eat his edamame beans.

Lauren picked a tempura roll off the conveyor belt, and then couldn’t resist helping herself to some edamame beans, too.

“If those are all you eat, you’re a cheap date,” said an amused male voice over her shoulder. Lauren swiveled around and took a good look at the man sliding into the booth across from her. “I’m Jamie. I’m totally famished, so I hope you don’t mind if I grab some food while I introduce myself.” He grabbed a couple of plates and popped a roll into his mouth.

Lauren stared open-mouthed. This was the kind of guy you’d definitely remember meeting. She had a client later this afternoon, but—oh, crap. Her realtor-trained name recall clicked in. The witch from last night. Her brother was a Jamie. Oh, holy God. They’d really sent her a guy.

Jamie looked up and must have read the astonishment on her face. He swallowed, grinned, and held out his hand. “Sorry, let me try again. I’m Jamie—Nell’s brother. You’re Lauren, no? Excuse my table manners. Growing up the youngest of seven, you learn how to grab food fast. This is a lot better than the stale pretzels we got on the plane.”

“I’m sorry,” Lauren said. “I had no idea they were serious. About sending you, I mean. Well, about all the other stuff too.” This was more than a little weird.

Jamie held up his hands. “Don’t shoot until you hear me out, okay? The women you chatted with last night are all great people, but they had no idea they’d find someone who didn’t know she was a witch.”

Getting weirder. “I’m not a witch. How did you find me, anyhow?”

“Nothing spooky. Nell had your name, and she Googled you. Chloe at your office said I’d probably find you here. I was hoping you’d be willing to talk with me for a few minutes.”

Chloe would do that. Lauren sat back. Her brain might have shut off there for a moment, but no realtor worth her license stayed that way for long. Jamie was definitely prime guy material. He had a strong and mobile face, with laughing green eyes and a mop of curly black hair.

She tended to trust her first impressions, and her initial sense of Jamie said a heaping dose of charm layered on bad-boy good looks. Nothing said creepy or dangerous enough to leave a perfectly good lunch uneaten. What the heck. Witches 2.0 part two. It couldn’t be any worse than the speed-dating thing she’d been talked into last week, and she was hungry.

She cast around for a reasonably normal topic of conversation. “Seven kids? Your mom must be a saint.”

“They had four, decided to have one more, and had triplets.”

“So, how are you the youngest, then?”

“I was born seven minutes after the first two landed. Makes me the youngest.”

Lauren grinned. Definitely bad-boy charm. “And you milk it for all it’s worth. Nell has triplets too, doesn’t she? I can’t even imagine. I’ve heard that multiple births run in families, though.”

“They’re pretty common in hereditary witching families.”

End of normal, meet-cute-guy interlude, Lauren thought. Switch to meet-cute-guy-who-thinks-he’s-a-witch part of the program. She sighed. “So, Nell was serious; you guys believe you’re witches?”

“I am a witch.”

Lauren wasn’t sure whether to laugh or leave. “And yet you look so normal.”

“I’m a pretty normal guy. I like to eat, play baseball, geek around on the computer, ride motorcycles.”

“Normal guys don’t think they’re witches.”

Jamie watched Lauren steadily. “Your beans are cold.”

Lauren looked down at her edamame beans and choked back a shriek as small tongues of flame danced over the surface of the plate. A few seconds later, they disappeared.

“Go ahead, try them. They’re warm now.”

She reached out a finger. Sure enough. Holy shit. “Handy trick.”

“Tough audience.” Jamie shrugged his shoulders and gestured toward the conveyor belt. This time he spoke just loud enough for her to hear.

“Rise above your landed place, float on air,

Stay in line and hover there.

As I will, so mote it be.”

All the plates on the conveyor belt slowly levitated. Lauren looked incredulously around the restaurant. Was she seriously the only person noticing two hundred floating plates?

“People generally see what they expect to see,” Jamie said. He turned to grin at the little boy behind him, who was watching the plates with glee. “Little kids are sometimes the exception.”

The plates quietly settled back down, except for one plate of edamame beans that floated over to the delighted toddler.

For the second time in less than ten minutes, Lauren felt her brain come to a dead stop. This time she wasn’t entirely sure it would start back up again. The man had levitated plates. Hundreds of plates, with what had sounded a little too much like “double, double, toil and trouble”.

Lauren grabbed a plate of tiny pastries off the conveyor belt. When in doubt, reach for chocolate. She considered herself a pretty rational person, but those plates had definitely been airborne. “Is this like telekinesis or something? How did you do that?”

“It’s a form of telekinetics. There are lots of ways to think about power. Scientists tend to focus on the outcome, so if you move something with your mind, they give it a fancy name and call it telekinesis. In the witching world, we work more with the ‘how’. I called on air as the conduit of power. I could just as easily have called on the air to create a nice breeze in here, or blow out all the candles, but I was trying not to attract a lot of attention.”

Floating plates was subtle magic? Lauren gave a mighty effort to wrap her head around the impossible. “The words you said—that was some kind of spell?”

“Yeah. Some witches work without any words and rhymes, but for most of us, it turns up the wattage on a spell. Don’t need to say it out loud, though; that was just to get your attention.”

“And you learn this stuff how, exactly?”

Jamie grinned. “Witch school.”

Lauren pictured a line of kids on broomsticks and laughed. The kid at the front of the line carried a steaming cauldron and looked suspiciously like Jamie.

“I thought Nell said you don’t do cauldrons anymore.” Lauren stopped dead, suddenly totally unamused. “Wait, I wasn’t thinking that. You didn’t say it. How am I seeing it? Get the hell out of my head!”

Jamie held up his hands. “Don’t shoot. I’m not in your head. I just added some power to projecting my thoughts. You read them. Not everyone can, even with me boosting the volume some.”

“You’re telling me I read your mind?”

“Close enough. You read an idea I pushed out, which is a little different. You’re welcome to try grabbing something else if you want.”

Lauren had never been able to hang onto a good mad when she was amused. She couldn’t stop the snicker. “I bet you use that line on all the girls.”

Jamie looked puzzled, and then laughed. “Didn’t mean it that way, but I’ll have to remember that line; it’s a good one.”

She saw Jamie surrounded by swimsuit models. Her temper fought a losing battle with her sense of humor. “Hey. Cut that out.”

“Sorry, that was probably overkill.” Jamie looked down at her hands, and Lauren realized she was holding her chopsticks like a weapon. Against a witch sending visions of Playboy bunnies. Yeah, that would work—good job, Lauren.

Jamie grabbed another plate of cream puffs and handed it over. Apparently she’d demolished the first one. Well, at least he hadn’t floated it over. Then he just sat and watched her.

“What?”

Jamie shrugged. “Waiting to see how freaked out you are.”

Oh, pretty freaked. “I don’t meet guys who can float plates every day.”

“There’s that. But I meant about maybe being a witch yourself. I guess you have no good reason to believe me, but you clearly have at least some mind magic.”

She might, after a good night’s sleep and a lot of ice cream, wrap her head around Jamie being an actual witch. But she was damn sure she’d never levitated plates, and she warmed her food up in a freaking microwave.

“I don’t know what mind magic is exactly, but you’re the first person I know who can put thoughts in my head. If you’re the witch, it seems like that’s on you, not me.”

Jamie stayed in the line of fire. Brave man. “I’m intentionally making those thoughts easy for you to read, but with training, you could do that without help. Mind magics can be subtle. You might experience them as really good intuition, or something like that.”

Lauren shook her head. Sorry, Jamie, not buying it. “Intuition isn’t magic.”

“No. Not always. But someone with unusually good intuition might have some mind powers. You’re a realtor—are you good at what you do? Ever have a sense for what a client might do before they do it?”

Lauren’s automatic denial died halfway out. Twenty-four hours ago, she’d had lunch with Nat and predicted the Greenleys would buy the brownstone they’d never seen.

Dammit, those were just good realtor instincts. Weren’t they?

She shook her head. “Floating plates, maybe that’s magic. Good instincts—I say those are just good instincts.”

Jamie looked at her for a long moment, and then started stacking their plates. “I don’t think talking’s likely to convince you. We can do more to test where your talents might lie, but here’s not a great spot. Is there a nearby park or something where we might have a few less people in the immediate vicinity?”

She could still laugh after all. “It’s the middle of winter out there. The parks are totally empty. Feel free to go for a walk in one, if you want. I’m heading home. Sorry, this has gotten a little too weird for me.”

She knew Jamie was watching her as she walked out of Sushi Station. Why did she get the kind of blind dates where the guy levitated plates? Seriously, what were the odds?

…

Moira: Hello, girls.

Sophie: Hello, Aunt Moira. Nell, have you heard from Jamie yet?

Nell: No, but his plane was running late, so he hasn’t had much ground time in Chicago yet. He’s crashing with his friend Nash from college. He promised to check in when he got to Nash’s place. Oh, hang on, he’s instant messaging me now. I’ll tell him to join us in here.

Jamie: This is Jamie, here to report on ‘first contact’ as ordered.

Nell: Smart ass… how are you? Did you find Lauren?

Jamie: Yep.

Sophie: AND…?

Jamie: She’s got nice legs.

Nell: I’m sure that was worth the plane flight for you, but the grown-ups here want to know if you had a chance to assess her before you hit on her.

Jamie: Sort of.

Nell: Grrrr!!

Jamie: Sorry, sorry. I’m eating pizza and typing one-handed. Long answers interfere with my pizza consumption.

Moira: That’s what levitation spells are for, dear one. As I recall, you’re quite a skilled levitator. Surely you can lift the pizza, and then you’d have two hands to type, now, wouldn’t you?

Sophie: Aunt Moira, you’re hysterical. Jamie, you heard her—be a multitasking witch. What happened when you met Lauren?

Jamie: Fine, I put down the pizza. I hope you all appreciate the sacrifices I’m making here. First off, Nell, I don’t hit on trainee witches. All kinds of issues with that. Wasn’t that kind of spark between us, but even if there was, I’d have waited until I handed her over to someone else to train.

Moira: Ah. She has power then.

Jamie: She does. I did a basic probe when we first shook hands. Got a plenty high-enough read on the voltage meter.

Nell: Duh. My spells don’t go that wrong.

Jamie: Really? I seem to remember some of our beta testers turning into cute little hoppy frogs a couple weeks ago.

Nell: And who ‘forgot’ to proofread that code?

Moira: Children, squabble later. Jamie, you say Lauren has power. Were you able to refine your reading any more than that?

Jamie: Not a lot, sorry. How strong her power is, or in what areas, I can’t be sure. She’s not very happy with the message. She’s pretty damn sure she’s not a witch. Didn’t think I was either, and a crowded restaurant limited my options for showing her.

Nell: Oh, God. What did you do?

Jamie: Relax, nothing big. Levitated some plates for a few seconds. The only person who noticed besides Lauren was the toddler in the next booth, and he’s not talking.

Moira: People see what they want to see.

Jamie: That’s what I told Lauren.

Sophie: So when the plates floated—nice trick, by the way—did that convince her?

Jamie: That I was a witch, or at least had some telekinetic powers—I think so. I damn well hope so. It took some effort to pull off a levitation spell when all I’d had to eat all day was a few pretzels.

Nell: Way to take one for the team, brother mine.

Jamie: That’s a freebie. You owe me for the rest. I think it’s still legal to shoot the messenger here in Chicago.

Nell: Oh, shit. What rest?

Jamie: Well, I ran a couple of really basic tests while we talked. She didn’t notice anything when I grabbed power before the levitation spell, and I did it fairly loudly, on purpose. So her elemental talents are likely weak at best, but she can read broadcasted mind images, and the volume doesn’t have to be all that high.

Moira: A mind witch, then.

Jamie: I think so, but you know as well as I do how tricky mind-witch powers can be to evaluate in a crowd.

Moira: Indeed, I do. I also know that it’s a little easier for that talent to fly under the radar. Mind witches don’t set things on fire, but she may well be unintentionally manipulating the minds around her.

Jamie: I understand the risks well enough. The problem will be convincing Lauren.

Sophie: How did she react to the mind broadcasting? I presume she read what you sent, so surely she’s aware that’s not typical?

Jamie: If a strange guy showed up, did a few magic tricks, and then you got some images from his mind, what would you think?

Nell: Crap. She thinks you did it.

Jamie: Bingo. She might believe I’m a witch, but it’s going to be a whole different can of worms to convince her that she is. I can’t do that without at least some cooperation on her part.

Nell: Dang. I was hoping this might resonate for her at some level—most of our trainees have at least some sense that they have unusual talents.

Jamie: I’m pretty sure she was telling you the truth when she believes she doesn’t have any. Empathy’s not one of my stronger skills, but I didn’t get any sense she was hedging. I might have made a little headway asking about intuition right at the end of our conversation. She’s the top realtor in her office.

Nell: I wondered about that. Mind powers would be pretty useful for a realtor.

Jamie: Hopefully I planted a seed, but mostly I think she was just backpedaling from the weird guy who can levitate plates.

Sophie: Well, maybe first contact was a little rough, but this is one of the reasons we started Witches’ Chat. We may not have intended to reach an untrained witch this quickly, but we did.

Moira: Aye, we have a responsibility here. An untrained witch is a dangerous witch.

Sophie: Not that I don’t believe you, Aunt Moira, but what are the possible dangers here?

Jamie: The biggest is what Moira already mentioned. Lauren could be manipulating minds around her without realizing it. Pushing people into homes they don’t really want, manipulating negotiations, that kind of thing.

Sophie: That’s not good.

Moira: Also, like other talents, mind powers can amplify in times of great emotion or stress. There was a woman back when my grandmother was a girl. No one knew she was a mind witch until she went into labor. It was a particularly difficult birth. No one in the room with her was ever right in the head again, including the babe.

Sophie: That’s awful. How tragic.

Jamie: Now I know why you all sent me to surprise her. Thanks a lot, guys.

Nell: Be brave, brother mine. She’s not likely to come up with anything a trainee hasn’t done to you before.

Jamie: That’s not exactly comforting.

Moira: It isn’t meant to be. Untrained witches should always be handled with care. Jamie, you need to speak with her again.

Jamie: I don’t think I’m exactly her favorite person right now. Anyone else want to come to Chicago? Weather’s lovely.

Moira: Perhaps she just needs some time to think. It must have come as a bit of a shock to her.

Jamie: Even if she steadies a bunch, it’s still a pretty sticky situation. I really need to be alone with her to do a decent assessment of her mind power. Other people send out too much mental interference.

Nell: Try a park or something.

Jamie: It’s as cold as the North Pole here.

Nell: Nuts. Well, why don’t you hang with Nash tonight and go visit her in the morning. Maybe a good night’s sleep will change her perspective some.

Jamie: It’s a little weird to show up on her doorstep. She probably already thinks I’m stalking her.

Moira: You haven’t a choice, Jamie. You can hardly test her for mind powers in the middle of a crowded restaurant. Hopefully you’ve established enough trust today that she’ll let you in. If not, we’ll keep trying.


Moira stood up from her computer and went to fetch a cup of tea.

It was a delicate business, an untrained witch. No one wanted to invade Lauren’s privacy, but if she was a mind witch, a stranger in her home was only the first of many intimacies they would request.

And she couldn’t shake the feeling that this particular turn of events had been meant. Fate could be a very tricky thing.

…

It might be a two-pint night, Lauren thought as she considered the mostly empty container of ice cream. Lunch with a witch seemed like it ought to qualify.

She nestled deeper into her beloved couch. She’d worked the entire interior design of her downtown loft around the couch, and it had been worth it. It was her nest—a squishy, earth-toned mass of deep pillows and interesting textures.

Cuddling her feet under the handmade throw that had been Nat’s housewarming gift, Lauren leaned her head back into a pillow and exhaled deeply. When you’d had a really weird day, there was no better place to hide from the world.

If it weren’t for the matter of a couple hundred plates floating in the air, she could just slide Jamie into the ranks of her more offbeat acquaintances. However, the plates were hard to ignore. She supposed that had been his point. If you were trying to convince someone you were really a witch, fancy tricks were probably pretty handy.

And that wasn’t really the crux of the problem. Lauren sighed. If you couldn’t be honest with a pint of Ben and Jerry’s, you were in serious trouble.

She liked quirky people. Heck, she kind of collected them. Telekinesis was a little quirkier than most, but if that’s all this was, she’d probably just add Jamie to her collection of interesting friends. See what other cool tricks he could do.

But why in all that was holy did he have to think she was a witch too? That was kind of a deal breaker on the relaxed-but-quirky friendship front.

She sighed again. It was also hard to dismiss. The man floated plates. Maybe witchy powers could sense other witchy powers. Nell’s fetching spell had seemed to think it had grabbed a witch. And pretty much everyone who knew her could vouch for her uncanny instincts.

God, was she seriously sitting here wondering if she had some mysterious powers tucked away under her kidney, or something? Lauren unfolded her legs and dug out of the couch. Definitely time for a second pint.