The Whimsy Witch Who Wasn't (Tales of Xest Book 1) Page 3
She stopped and snapped her fingers at me when I’d lagged behind for a second. “Hurry up.”
“Where is Xest? I’ve never heard of it.” If I could get my bearings, I could get back home. Right now I didn’t know what direction to take if I did run.
“Xest is Xest. It’s north of North and west of West.”
“Do you know where Massachusetts is?”
She groaned. “Of course I do. It used to be part of my territory before I changed—I know where it is. It’s in Rest, like everything that isn’t in Xest.”
“Where is Xest in regards to Salem?”
“It’s Xest of Salem. It’s Xest of everywhere, that’s why it’s Xest. North, South, East, and West is the Rest. See, this is the thing that’s so annoying about humans, or even fake ones like yourself. They can only go north, south, east, and west. For some reason that is beyond me, they can’t travel to Xest, where all the important things happen.”
I wanted to have that light-bulb aha moment, but as she talked, the lights faded more and more on my understanding. Where the hell was I?
“Is there anyone else I can talk to about leaving? I don’t belong here. I’m not a witch or Whimsy or a whatever it is that lives here. I should be where nothing important happens.”
“The magic mist, although unimpressive from what I saw sitting on the table, would say otherwise.”
She pushed open a wooden door on the bottom landing, and a blast of frigid air shot through my thin clothes. I got a clear view of this place, and it only made things worse. I’d wondered if I’d imagined what I saw upstairs. Now my bare feet were standing on a cobblestone street and I could see the gas lights up close. The few people that passed could’ve been human if it was Halloween and everyone had a costume on. This place looked like someone had taken medieval England, wrapped it up in a steampunk novel, and then sprinkled it with some fairy dust to see what would happen.
“Come on,” Mertie said, walking across the street to a row house. “This is where the Whimsy witches stay. The Whimsy warlocks are a door down, but don’t let me find you in there. We don’t have time for babies. Too much work to be done.”
Mertie opened the door to a large room that hadn’t seen a coat of paint since before I’d been born. Two mismatched couches with stuffing poking out of the arms took up one half of the large room. A long table that would’ve been at home in a military school cafeteria took up the other. There was fire burning in a small stone fireplace that shed a little light into the room and even less heat. From the girls scattered about, some in orange-striped clothing, it had the distinct feeling of a dormitory of sorts.
Could’ve been worse. It could’ve had bars instead of walls. From the lack of beds, and the amount of doors, those must have been bedrooms lining the main room.
“Rabbit!” Mertie yelled, making my ear closest to her ring. Was that screeching a remnant from her previous occupation as well? I could see how it would’ve come in handy.
A girl with full cheeks and blond ringlets popped her head out of a door. She saw me and smiled, as if I were an expected guest she’d been hoping for.
A few more heads popped out of the open doors lining the room, all checking out what was going on. None of them appeared to be as happy about my arrival as Rabbit, who nearly bounced her way over to us.
“This is…”
“Tippi,” I said, when Mertie looked at me like I was milk past its expiration date.
“She’s your new roommate. Show her the ropes and get her a uniform,” Mertie told Rabbit.
“Got it.” Rabbit beamed a smile that would’ve made a supernova turn green.
Mertie scowled, as if the cheeriness grated on her last nerve, before she turned and left the building.
The second she was gone, Rabbit rolled her eyes.
“Not sure you figured this out yet, but that woman is not nice. I’ve been trying to kill her with kindness for years, but it doesn’t seem to be working. I think there’s something wrong with my spell. I can’t figure out if it’s because my magic is too weak or if she’s already dead inside, and therefore can’t be killed.”
I smiled and nodded, pretending I didn’t notice the stares, as I tried to figure out if that was a joke. She wasn’t laughing, though, and neither was I. I needed to get back to Salem.
“Come on, I’ll get you some clothes and show you our room. Don’t mind the stares. Everyone always likes to check out the new witches.”
Most of the other women there eyed me up and then turned away, as if they hadn’t seen me at all. No hello, or who are you, or where are you from. The lack of all those questions made me fairly certain that this happened at least somewhat often.
Rabbit led me to a small room that was twelve by ten at most. The wide-planked wood floors were bare and bunk beds were on either side of me. A chest of four drawers was in the center.
“This is my bed, but the bunk over me is free.” She patted the thin mattress.
“Thank you, but I don’t think I’ll need it. Is there someone I can talk to? The thing is, I’m not a witch. There’s been a huge mistake. I really shouldn’t be here. I need to go back home to where I live.”
“Did you talk to Marvin? The guy with all the white hair? Old dude?”
“Yes, I did, but he wasn’t any help. He doesn’t understand that I can’t stay here. I have a home. They just took me.”
Her head tilted to the side. “That doesn’t sound right. They need a bounty to take you. I’ve dealt with a lot of pop-ups and there’s always something. What happened before you got here?” She tapped a finger to her lip.
“A lot of stuff happened. Some guy yelled at me, and then there was a séance and a ghost came. Then the ghost yelled at me, saying something about not paying. It was a horrible—”
“Wait, the ghost said you didn’t pay?”
“Yes.” It was something that would be crystal-clear in my mind as long as I lived.
“I think I see what happened,” she said, taking a seat. “You called in a service and didn’t pay. You’re probably indentured.”
I took a seat beside her. “What service? I didn’t call in anything.”
She bent her knee, turning toward me. “It was the séance. Your magic summoned someone from here. They probably filed a claim when they showed up but didn’t get paid. It doesn’t matter if you weren’t the one who called. You were the one with the magic, and it wasn’t paid. You owe the debt.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” I looked about the room, the bunk beds, the coarse grey blankets that added to the overall bleakness.
“It means you’re stuck in Xest until the debt is paid. Since it wasn’t negotiated ahead of time, you can’t haggle on the amount.”
How long would I be stuck here? Would I ever get out? This could not be my life. Mom, why didn’t I listen to you?
“You get used to it here. It’s not so bad once you do, and I’ll be your friend.”
The one thing I hadn’t seen in this crazy place was a guard.
“Do you know how I can get back? Do you have a map or something?”
“You’re only a Whimsy witch. You won’t have enough magic to jump puddles back to Rest. You’d need at least a strong Middling witch or warlock to do that, and you’re only a Whimsy witch or you wouldn’t be here.”
“What’s a Middling witch or a Whimsy witch?”
“I’ll try to explain, but coming from Rest—you know, north, south, east, and west—as you are, it’s going to be a hard thing for you to grasp right out of the gate.”
“Just do your best.” Any information beat the big, fat nothing I currently had.
She sat on her bed and patted the spot next to her as she continued. “There’s many levels of magic.” She dropped her hand low. “You’ve got your lowest-level magic, whic
h is called Whimsy, which is what we are. So, you could have a Whimsy witch, Whimsy warlock, a Whimsy variety of another type.”
“What other type?” I had to leave here, like now.
“Well, obviously there aren’t just witches and warlocks, but…” She waved a finger. “Let’s skip that for now. It might be too much all in one night. I’ve talked a lot of pop-ups through their first times, and it’s better to take this in small pieces, chewable morsels that are easily digested. Let’s just leave it that there’s pretty much everything imaginable here but your run-of-the-mill human. Not that we haven’t had a couple accidentals, but they die within hours, having less magic than even a Whimsy.”
Dead in hours? Where had I landed? I was in some sort of magical hell.
Rabbit must have read some of the horror I was feeling, because she continued, “But let’s move on to something else. So a Whimsy witch or warlock has the least amount of magic you’re born with to be considered magical. It’s like a hop, skip, and a jump above a regular old human, or Rester, as they’re sometimes called. If you’re Middling, it’s just how it sounds. You’ve got some magic, but you’re not blowing anyone’s bangs back. Above them, you’ve got Braws. It’s best to steer clear of them altogether, not that a Braw would have anything to do with a Whimsy, but I don’t want you to make the mistake of approaching one. That would be pure foolishness. If they didn’t kill you, you’d never live it down.”
“So Braws are the strongest?” Then a Braw could definitely get me out of here, and probably a Middling too. I was new to this system, but I’d bet there was no way that the two thugs who’d brought me here were more than Middling.
“No, Makers are the strongest, but I’ve never met one of those myself. They’re called Makers because they’re so strong that they can do or make anything they want. They rule the roost, so to speak—if they exist, that is. I’ve only heard of people, who’ve heard of people, who thought someone might’ve met one once a long time ago.”
Okay, some Middling, all Braw, and definitely Makers. There was going to be someone in this place that would get me out.
“You said there were other pop-ups, like me? Are any of them here?” Having an alliance couldn’t hurt. I wasn’t sure anything could hurt right now. All help would be good.
Her mouth opened but she couldn’t seem to get the words out of it. The silence stretched on for a bit as she looked at the floor and her shoes and anywhere but me before she finally said, “No, there aren’t.”
“But I thought you’d said you talked a lot of Whimsy witches through their first days?”
She nodded. “I have, but they don’t tend to last long. Magic usually runs in families, so you don’t get strong magic popping up out of nowhere. Hence, pop-ups, if you haven’t figured out the name. It’s like a blip that occasionally happens. They come but burn out fast.”
Just as I thought this couldn’t get worse.
“How long do they usually live?” I asked, so I knew how long I had to get out of this place.
“Six months, sometimes. This girl, Cassie, she made it to a year. She was the longest, though,” Rabbit said, dropping her head and toying with the laces in her shoes.
The silence stretched out. “You could be different,” she said. “It’s always possible.”
“It’s okay,” I said, letting her off the hook. It didn’t matter because I wouldn’t be here that long. I was getting out of this place and back to Salem way before six months.
She looked up at me through her lashes, as if afraid to look straight at me in case I exploded.
“Really, it’s not your fault. I’m not going to die here.”
She nodded, not believing me for a second.
4
I woke to the sound of a weird rooster alarm clock, only to open my eyes and realize there was an actual rooster sitting on the top railing of the bunk.
I squinted at it. I would’ve sworn it squinted back before it screeched in my direction.
“Get out of bed already!” I heard someone scream down the hall.
Rabbit’s head popped up. “It’s going to keep doing that until you get up.”
The rooster nodded in agreement before it let out a screech.
“I’m up,” I yelled at it, then jumped from the bunk before I lost my hearing.
The second my feet hit the ground, orange-striped clothes were thrust into my hand and I was shuffled into a bathroom by Rabbit.
“We can’t be late,” she said.
I was too afraid to ask what would happen if we were, so I hustled along. There was a line of girls all bustling about in and out of the bathroom, and it seemed we were last in line for everything. Still, not one hello.
A brunette using the sink in front of me looked at the girl at the next sink over and said, “Rabbit finally got another friend.”
“Only one she can get,” the other girl replied, before they both laughed.
Rabbit looked at the other side of the room, as if she hadn’t heard any of it.
I waited until we finally got our turn as the place emptied out before saying, “They’re a mean bunch, huh?”
She shrugged. “It’s not them. It’s just the way it is here. Even for a Whimsy witch, I don’t have much magic. Magic levels stick together.”
That was all the time we had for talking before I was hustled out the door, crossing the street toward the building I’d been in last night, another line of young men joining in as we melded and made our way inside.
I caught some glances from some of the guys, but they were wasting their time. I wasn’t going to have time for anything other than getting out of here. There was only one way I’d be interested in talking to any of them.
“Are they all Whimsy too?” I whispered to Rabbit.
“Yes.”
Yep. Not interested.
“Where are we going?” I asked, as we all filed down a hallway.
“We have to punch in first to find out where we’re working. We do it once a week because Marvin likes to get his money’s worth. There’s an ebb and flow to everyone’s magic. Like, a Whimsy witch might have one week a year where her magic flows stronger and she’s Middling. A Middling might also drop to a Whimsy every so often if she’s sick or whatnot. If we get sick, we might lose all of our magic for days, so you need to take care of yourself. It’s very dangerous to have no magic here. It can kill you if you ever go completely empty.”
“Could a Whimsy ever surge to Maker?”
“Oh no, they never get a surge that strong. Makers are something special. They have more than double the magic anyone else has. You don’t surge into a Maker, not even for a day.”
But I might surge to a Middling, and that would be enough.
Somehow, even though we’d been last for everything else, the crowd parted for us this time. We made it past a single-file line that was fifty people long. Rabbit walked up to a clock on the wall and punched it in its dial. The clock’s mouth opened and said, “Dandelions.”
The line grew quiet as I approached. The people yet to come were breaking ranks and standing on tiptoes to get a better view.
I stood in front of it, taking a deep breath.
“Well? Come on, sissy! Punch me already,” the clock said.
I swung my arm back and punched the thing in the center.
“Dandelions,” the clock said.
There was a general murmur of non-interest. “Eh, just another Whimsy witch,” someone a few people down said.
“I told you so,” another said.
The only one who seemed happy was Rabbit. “Great! We can sit together,” she said, waving me along. We climbed a couple of flights up, and she urged me to one of the long tables, close to the windows and about as far from the heat of the fireplace as you could get.
“Can’t we go sit over there?” I said, rubbing my hands together.
“The stronger Whimsy witches and warlocks sit there.” She sat on the bench in front of a heap of dandelions. “But it doesn’t
matter. Better view from here anyway.”
I sat down beside her but wasn’t sure I was sold on her view. The window was drafty, and I was beginning to fear this place was never sunny, not even during the day.
“So this is what you do.” She picked up a dandelion from the pile in front of us, held it in her hands, and then blew gently on it. The dandelion sparkled for a minute before it vanished.
“What was that?” I asked.
“I gave it some of my magic. That dandelion will replace a dandelion somewhere in the world. Once it goes to seed, if someone blows on it and makes a small wish, it’ll happen. Marvin has the wholesale contract on a lot of these things. You know, dandelions, clovers, blowing on dice, eyelashes. All sorts of odds and ends. That’s why he’s so rich. He got in on the market when no one wanted to bother with the small stuff.” She pointed at the pile. “We’ve got a lot of dandelions to get through, so you better start trying.”
I lifted the flower up and blew. It glittered and disappeared from my hands.
“See? All good,” she said loudly, as Mertie was poking her head into the room and the other tables were filling up. Then Rabbit whispered, “Try to blow as little as you can on each one. You want to conserve your magic. You need to figure out how little to give it.”
“What do you mean, conserve?”
“It’s not endless, or not for most people. The more magic you spend, the faster you burn out. Why do you think pop-ups only make it to a year if they’re lucky? Most aren’t born with much magic. It’s why everyone here is young. Whimsy witches don’t last long. This job has a high burnout rate. Most of us don’t last to forty.”
I looked around the room, realizing no one looked older than maybe mid-thirties. Man, woman, didn’t matter. There wasn’t a lined face in the bunch. “Do all witches die young?”
“No. Some live forever. Just depends on your magic. Some people are lucky enough to have infinite magic, but that’s rarely the case with Whimsy witches. We’re born with whatever we have, and it’s not much.”
Mertie was across the room, scowling.
I turned, going back to blowing on dandelions as the heaviness of this situation settled onto my soul.