Witch in Progress Read online

  Apparently my brain had another moment and thought he said merpeople. “I meant in horror movies. You know. Like a creepy cult.”

  “No. I wouldn’t say the Meadowsweet Coven are that bad, but they own everything here.”

  “The what coven?” I said blankly.

  “I wouldn’t say that in front of Madame Grey. In fact, you’re probably best to steer clear of her if you’re not with one of the local covens, and I’m assuming you’re not. I’m also assuming you’re not a shifter, but there are certain designated areas for shifting. It’s considered bad manners to turn into a wolf in the workplace.”

  I blinked at him. Whatever weird lingo he was using, I was completely lost, in more ways than one.

  He was giving me that look again. I didn’t have dirt on my face, did I? I hadn’t checked since my desperate departure from the bus, and my pristine appearance when I’d left the house had long since been replaced by frazzled bewilderment. And he still wasn’t getting out of the way.

  I decided to humour him. “So are you the security guard for the whole town? What do you do, stop these… shifters from wandering in?”

  “Amongst other things. I don’t kill evildoers anymore… I retired from hunting a long time ago.”

  My mouth fell open. “Hunting… what?”

  “Only the bad things. Not witches. You’re safe.”

  Did he imply…?

  Right. The hot security guard might be off his rocker, but I was already here. I had nothing to lose. I’d see how my new co-workers were before I ran screaming for the hills. There was no shortage of hills to run screaming into, given the scenery.

  “Want me to escort you to the office?” he asked.

  “No, thanks. I mean, shouldn’t you be guarding the border? Since you’re the only security guard there…”

  He couldn’t have been standing there waiting for me to arrive, right? It was entirely possible that everyone at Dritch & Co was pranking me by sending me their super-hot security guard before drowning me in the lake or leaving my mutilated body in a nearby field. Except the houses hadn’t disappeared. Neither had the sign. Fairy Falls. It stood beside the lake, leaning at a crooked angle and making me considerably more reluctant to retrace my steps. The only other way to walk was past the houses, towards the centre of the town.

  “I’m sure I’ll see you around, Blair,” he said.

  Only when he’d gone did I realise I hadn’t asked him for directions. I pulled the town map from my pocket with shaking hands. I was positive it hadn’t had buildings on it before, but there it was—the lake, the town, and Dritch & Co’s office, two roads down. I walked past more houses, my suitcase bouncing off the cobblestones. There, on my left. Dritch & Co was a small brick building, unremarkable enough that it blended in with its neighbours—an estate agent and a flower shop. It also seemed to be called Eldritch & Co, which sounded more like something out of a H.P. Lovecraft novel than a nice and normal small town in the north of England. But what had I expected, a towering block like in London? Shaking my head at myself, I peered inside. I might as well ask directions to the nearest bus stop from here. Better than walking so close to the lake…

  A young woman with curly black hair bounded into view. “I wondered if you’d come here first,” she said, beaming. “You must be Blair.”

  I blinked. Then recognition dawned. I’d seen her picture on the email—Alissa, my new flatmate. She looked nice and normal, but then again, so had the security guard before he started speaking gibberish.

  “Hey,” I said. “Nice to meet you.”

  “You too,” she said. “I’ll take your suitcase back with me. You don’t mind cats, right?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Good. Roald is my familiar. He might take a while to warm up to you, but he’s generally friendly with strangers.”

  Did she say… familiar?

  My suitcase wheeled away from me, and I swore it levitated off the ground for a moment—but right then, the door to Eldritch & Co’s office opened.

  “Is that you, Blair?” called the friendly voice who’d spoken to me on the phone. “Come in.”

  One of the people in the building must have an explanation. Hoping I hadn’t got myself into a mess I couldn’t walk away from this time, I entered.

  2

  At the reception desk, a hairy wolf-like face greeted me. I gasped.

  Then I blinked and a blond woman sat in its place, wearing a vaguely puzzled expression. “Is something wrong?”

  Yes. I’m losing my mind. “No. You… did I speak to you on the phone?”

  “Yes, you did. I’m Callie. Nice to meet you, Blair.”

  She reached out to shake my hand. I did so as quickly as possible, unable to rid myself of the weird sensation of fur brushing against my palm. She looked exactly like the image that had popped into my head when I’d answered the phone two days ago, but I’d never seen a picture of her before. And I’d been so certain I’d seen a wolf sitting in her place. If I’d consumed some hallucinogens during my wine-induced haze on Friday night, it’d have worn off by now, right? Also, my dreams generally weren’t this detailed. Or interesting.

  “You’re just what we needed,” she went on. “You’re good at answering phones, right?”

  “Absolutely.” At least in a job that involved making phone calls to potential recruits, there were limited opportunities for breaking things. Or sneezing on polished cutlery, come to that.

  The door to the left of the reception desk opened and another woman strode in. She held a stack of papers in one hand, a half-filled coffee mug in the other, and had her phone balanced on her shoulder as she spoke into it. “…I’ll call you back later. I have a new employee to show around.”

  The phone flipped into her hand. I blinked, certain she’d been holding papers and a coffee mug a second beforehand, but now she held only the phone and a pen. “You’re Blair, right?”

  The woman was around my age, with straight dark hair and a friendly smile. I looked surreptitiously around for wherever she’d put the papers, but the only furniture was Callie’s desk, several feet away from her. I really was losing my grip.

  “Yes, I am,” I said, not sure if I was answering her or the voice in my head. I needed to sit down, but a werewolf occupied the only seat. No. Not a werewolf. Pull yourself together, Blair.

  “I’m Bethan,” she said. “I’ll show you around, okay? This is bound to be overwhelming at first, but I’m sure you’ll get the hang of things quickly.”

  Overwhelming was one way to describe it. I hesitantly peered into the office, and, seeing no werewolves or disappearing files, I followed Bethan inside.

  “This is the main office… you’ll be working here.” She indicated a desk with a computer and phone. The sight of the computers was oddly reassuring. The town might look like a medieval village on the outside, but everyone wore normal clothes and sounded like they came from the twenty-first century. Except for the weird lingo, that is.

  I glanced at my desk. The one beside it—Bethan’s—overflowed with so much paperwork, it was a wonder her computer still fit into the space. Files and papers were stacked haphazardly at all angles with brightly coloured markers between the pages.

  Bethan cleared the papers to the side. “If you’re a neat freak, it’s cool. I’ll move my stuff.”

  The papers jumped into a drawer, which closed itself without her touching it.

  No you don’t. Crack up later. I blinked hard. The papers on my own desk remained static, thank goodness.

  I looked at the computer instead. Most offices came with computers at least a decade out of date. These were sleek and shiny, but I didn’t recognise the model. The logo on the side resembled a face. A human face, with… fangs. Like an illustration of Count Dracula.

  I looked suspiciously at the coffee cup on Bethan’s desk, then gave myself a mental shake. Why did the idea of vampires seem more plausible than, say, monster hunters? I blamed Twilight.

  “That�
�s the interview room,” said Bethan, indicating another door at the back. “We sometimes bring clients here to discuss their specific needs. You know how hard it can be to find stable employment when you’re one of us.”

  I stared at her for a moment. One of… what? I’d walked into job interviews without reading the full description before, but nothing quite like this. And how had she made the papers move like that?

  “Don’t keep the new girl all to yourself, Bethan,” said the occupant of one of the desks opposite ours. A young woman with warm brown skin and braided hair smiled at me. “I’m Lizzie. You’re… Blair, right?”

  Her hesitation made some of the missing pieces snap together. They’d done this routine before. I’d been in offices with a high turnover rate and experienced the same thing. Except this time it might not be down to micromanaging, over-demanding bosses and more to do with the fact that everyone in this town was several cards short of a deck. To say the least.

  I cleared my throat. “So you all know who I am? Do you all work weekends, or…?” The email had said I’d be working Monday-Friday, your standard 9-5 hours, so it was doubly weird that I’d got the call on the weekend. Maybe the boss, or the receptionist, was hugely enthusiastic.

  “No, of course not,” said Bethan. “Why?”

  “I got the call on Saturday, and… I guess you’ve had my details for a while.” From the site I’d forgotten I’d uploaded them to. Along with the photo I didn’t remember taking.

  “No, but everyone knows who you are.”

  Oh…kay. I spotted movement out of the corner of my eye and dropped my gaze to the desk as more papers slid into view. The topmost one was covered in weird-looking symbols. A chill ran down my back. Had I unwittingly walked into a cult of Satanists? Or a parallel reality? It made no sense—not that they knew me, but that they thought I knew them. I didn’t even fit into the reality I’d lived in for most of my life, let alone whatever this was.

  “Don’t freak her out,” Lizzie said disapprovingly. “It was Veronica who told us. The boss. She found your details online and passed them on to Callie and the rest of us.”

  “Yeah, Callie sometimes works weekends,” added Bethan. “She’s a werewolf. She’s making up for lost hours thanks to the full moon.”

  I was supposed to laugh, right? I managed a kind of nervous titter. “Okay.”

  “Yes. It’s hard for people like her to find employment in other towns, but we aren’t like that here. Everything is confidential, including our clients.”

  Smile and nod. Just smile and nod until the universe flips over and makes sense.

  A growling noise from behind Lizzie made me jump.

  “Just the printer,” said Bethan. “I asked it to print out the basic info for you.”

  “Asked it?”

  “It prefers if you ask nicely,” said Lizzie.

  Right.

  The printer emitted another growling noise, and a jet of paper shot across the room, landing neatly on Bethan’s desk.

  I stared at it. She picked it up and put it in my hands. I let her, because I was pretty sure the last piece of my sanity had packed its bags and left. “Thank you.” Next I’d be thanking the printer.

  There was no discreet way to leave this situation. Ninety percent of me was sure that I’d make my excuses at the first opportunity and then make a run for it. Eat the cost of the deposit… I’d have to get another credit card or loan. But that’s what I got for gambling on a too-good-to-be-true scenario. And it beat being murdered and thrown in a lake, right?

  Who was I even kidding? I took a step towards the door, my foot catching on the swivel chair, which knocked against a partly open drawer. A file had got jammed in it, and I glimpsed the title… Mr Bayer, searching for a spell-making assistant. Somehow, I doubted they meant in the national spelling competition sense. I looked at the desk, where a newspaper was folded over, depicting the face of a whiskered man who’d apparently been found dead. I guess crime was as common here in NotNormalsVille as it was anywhere else.

  “Oh.” Bethan grabbed the file from the drawer and moved it to her own desk. “Sorry. That’s from… that’s a client we already dealt with. I mean, found a suitable candidate, so the opening is closed.”

  There came a disparaging noise from behind the desk opposite hers, and the fourth occupant of the office finally looked up. “Nice going, Bethan.”

  “Blythe,” said Bethan, in a warning tone. “Aren’t you going to introduce yourself?”

  The woman, a pale-skinned brunette with gold-rimmed glasses, gave me a brief glance. “What’s this one called?”

  That’s polite. “Blair,” I said. I might be considering climbing out of the window and making a run for it, but I wouldn’t stand for being dismissed, either. “I’m replacing someone, is that right?”

  “You might say that,” said Blythe. “You’re here because we needed a fourth. No other reason.”

  “Blythe,” said Bethan sharply.

  “Needed a fourth?” I asked.

  “We work better with four of us,” said Bethan. “Four witches. But if you decide it’s not for you, it’s not a big deal. Some people don’t adapt well to change.” She gave Blythe another warning look, but it hardly registered. Witches. Plainly they were into some kind of weird New Age stuff. You’d think they’d be a little more professional rather than making wild guesses at my hobbies while at work. On my first day, no less.

  The rational part of my mind said that whether they were part of a cult or just plain batty, the things I’d seen—the papers, and the printer—they couldn’t easily be explained away. But I was a hundred percent certain they’d got me confused with someone else. Someone with the same name, email address, phone number and job history. It could happen, right? I mean… right?

  “So… the last person left? I mean, the person who worked here before me?”

  “Yes, she did.”

  They were scurrying to fill a vacancy. That made sense. But I couldn’t deny what I’d seen. Nor the fact that the previous employee had apparently been helping someone called Mr Bayer find a spell-making assistant. That’s what they did: supply odd clients with equally odd potential employees.

  “She’s a normal, your morons,” said Blythe. “I don’t need to be able to read thoughts to tell she’s never seen one of us before in her life.”

  Bethan hitched on a smile. “Please ignore every single word that comes out of Blythe’s mouth. Everyone else does, including the clients.”

  Blythe’s eyes narrowed, but Lizzie rose to her feet, waving a short wooden stick. Blythe sank into her seat, making… frog noises?

  “I’ll take it off when you stop winding up the new girl.” Lizzie smiled widely. “Carry on, Bethan.”

  “This is… a mistake.” What I actually wanted to say was, did you wave a magic wand and cast a spell on her?

  I wasn’t completely dense. I’d read all the Harry Potter books and grew up reading fantasy tales. This office might look a long way from an ancient castle, but it wasn’t like I had no frame of reference. On the other hand, I might have to toss those preconceptions out the window. Along with my dignity.

  “I know you came from a normal town,” said Bethan. “It might take you a while to get the hang of things, but we’re all willing to help you.”

  “I’m not from a coven,” I blurted. “I’m—not. Whoever you think I am, you’re wrong.”

  Way to go, Blair. Tell all your new colleagues they’re wrong. Why not set the place on fire while you’re at it?

  I ignored the sarcastic voice in my head and put on a contrite expression. “What I meant to say is, I think you might have been misinformed.”

  “I assumed Alissa told you,” Bethan said, her brow creasing. “She’s the granddaughter of Madame Grey—the Madame Grey. So I assumed when she picked you, you were from a coven, too. Not a normal town.”

  “What’s a not normal town?” Well, this place was a start.

  “Most paranormals live in towns like
this one,” said Lizzie. “That’s where we get most of our clients from. They can’t advertise on the regular job market without attracting normals, and we don’t let normals into this world.”

  Er, yeah. I think you just let the normal-est normal to ever normal into your office. They couldn’t often get outsiders in if they’d sent Security McHottie to assess me in person, could they?

  “If you were normal, you’d have been turned around by the wards,” added Bethan. “Even buses can’t come near here without breaking down. The town’s magical shield stops anyone getting inside unless they’re one of us.”

  I took a step backwards, shaking my head. “Magical shield? Seriously?”

  “You’re wearing one yourself,” Bethan commented. “Hmm. Do buses often break down around you? That’d be why. I haven’t been to a normal town or city, but I’ve heard our magical shields have similar effects on technology, too.”

  Wait. My disastrous driving lesson attempts. The fact that I couldn’t stay on a bus or train longer than thirty minutes without it giving up the ghost…

  No. Attempting to rationalise her words was an attempt to wring order from chaos, like trying to find a pocket of quiet at a loud house party. I’d know if I was like them… if I was magical.

  “Most of us find it hard to live amongst humans,” Bethan added. “There are other side effects even before we come into our powers. Technology breaks down around witches. Werewolves fly off the handle at the full moon. Fairies can’t touch metal without sneezing violently.”

  Uneasily, I remembered that disastrous kitchen job. Silverware. No way. I wasn’t going to lose my mind. I was sane, normal, human, and as soon as I found someone who spoke sense, I’d be out of here faster than I could blink.

  Croak. “Nobody said she didn’t know… anything,” rasped Blythe, who’d apparently got her voice back. “Look at her. She wants to leave.”

  Yes. She does. Wait—was she reading my mind?

  “Blythe,” Bethan said. “Kindly stop talking.”

  “Maybe if she doesn’t end up with a dead body, she’ll last longer than the last one,” said Blythe.