A Witch's Trial (Witch's Path Series: Book 3) (5 page)

One of these days I was going to have to find a better tool for my police friends. Magical handcuffs designed to neutralize magic and strong enough to hold a dragon were all good and well, but you had to cuff the beastie first.

"Where are the rest of the officers?"

Queen shrugged and motioned in the direction of the back corner. "The other two guys are over there."

I grabbed a bottle of tequila off the shelf and tossed it toward the center of the building. The sound of the bottle shattering broke the unnatural silence. A second later, a few more crashes followed.

"I found you now," a rough voice cackled. The clurichaun swooped down from the ceiling, a half-empty bottle of vodka in one hand and Kahlúa in the other. He took a swig of vodka, followed immediately by a mouthful of Kahlúa.

"You didn't say he could fly," I hissed at Queen.

"Oops."

The clurichaun wasn't going to be winning any beauty contests. Not only was he short—four feet at best—but he was rather squat. Not brawny, but of a study build with shorter-than-average legs and overly long arms. His face, which could best be described as having been sculpted by a young child, didn't improve upon his unusual proportions. His nose was bulbous and lumpy, his ears stuck out from his head, and his short hair shot out from his head in uneven spikes.

His clothes were another matter entirely. The stained and ripped jeans were held up by a twine belt, and the faded plaid shirt was half untucked, missing buttons, and one arm was holding on to the body of the shirt by a thread.

"Oh, you were a smart one. Ran off when you knocked 'em over, did ya? Roy will find ya, yes I will." He started scouring the area in uneven circles.
 

I'd gotten a look at him, but I still didn't have a plan. The hope that an idea would come to me after I found him was fading, and I was running out of time. I needed to take action before he discovered the other officers, who had suffered enough.

"When I move, find a new hiding place," I whispered to Queen.
 

She nodded, but the expression on her face didn't give me any good feelings.
 

Moving quietly to avoid attracting his attention, I walked around the shelf and into a relatively clear part of the floor. Soft scraping and squishing sounds reassured me that Queen was getting out of the way.
 

"Hey… hey, you," I yelled, waving my arms in the air.
 

The clurichaun did an about-face and skidded to a stop, a big grin on his face. "Well, who's this pretty thing?" He took a swig from each bottle, wiping his mouth on the back of a hand. "Matters not at all."
 

He dove at me, lobbing the vodka bottle in my direction. I ducked, and it somersaulted over my head, dousing my hair and shoulders with its contents. Thanking my lucky stars that the alcohol wasn't in my eyes, I stood up, pointed my wand at him, and yelled, "
Fehu
!"

For a moment he slowed, but light rippled around him, and he tossed off the spell like I'd sprayed him with water.
 

"Narzel fart," I swore. He should have stopped or frozen in a block of ice, not continued charging at me like a short, angry ram.
 

"Hey, leprechaun, over here," a male voice shouted.
 

Roy halfheartedly chunked the Kahlúa at me, but it went wide as he turned around to hunt for the man slinging insults.

I couldn't see where that man was, but Roy seemed to have an idea because he was scooping up liquor bottles on the way to a stack of boxes. Muttering under my breath about foolish males, I raced after the clurichaun. In this case, racing was more of a barely controlled dash around bottles, puddles, and shelves.
 

Roy pulled back his arm, a bottle of rum at the ready, and I knew I couldn't get there in time. Raising my wand, I said, "
Sowil
." The containment bubble popped up around Roy, and the bottle bounced harmlessly off the inside to land at the bottom of the sphere.
 

"Why you… you," Roy sputtered.
 

"Yes, me." I continued picking my way over broken bottles, keeping an eye on him. After the way he threw off the last spell, I didn't trust that this one would hold him.
 

A man stepped out from behind the boxes. "Is it safe?"

"I think so." From the claws tipping his fingers, I guessed he was a shifter, but I needed more than pointy nails to identify his species.
 

"You must be the witch."

"Michelle Oaks, at your service."
 

Roy had opened the rum and was busy draining the bottle when he wasn't hurling insults.
 

"O'Neil, werebadger," he said, introducing himself. "I'd shake your hand, but—"

I looked at O'Neil, who had his arms loosely cross over his chest and his shoulders hunched. "Now isn't the best time. After we deal with this guy, we can make proper introductions."

I couldn't hear Roy; he wasn't swearing or drinking. The hair on the back of my neck stood up, and I swung around.

"Look out," O'Neil yelled, leaping forward.

I looked just in time to see Roy's squished face smirking at me as he plucked the wand out of my hand and raced for the ceiling. O'Neil hit me and we went down in a tangle of arms and legs.
 

Pain burst from every part of my back and left side, and shards of glass dug through my clothes to pierce my body. Somehow—it must've been luck, because it certainly wasn't due to any skill on my part—I didn't crack my head, and O'Neil didn't cut me with his claws.

"Oh," O'Neil moaned. "I've had better ideas." He rolled off me, gaining a few more cuts in the process.
 

"Considering the clurichaun's track record, I won't complain." I sat up, digging the glass farther into my rump, and looked around. "He's gone."

"I'm not surprised. He's been doing stuff like this since we got here. It's why the human officers are outside."

I'd wondered about that, but it hadn't been the most important question. After brushing most of the glass off my arms, I stood up and tried to get the rest of it off my lower body. My hand brushed over a few tender spots where glass was embedded in my skin. It was going to be great fun when the remaining fragments were plucked out.
 

"What does he usually do at this point?" I asked. So far I was useless. My empty containment bubble was still floating overhead. I dismissed it with a thought. Maybe I could keep Roy occupied until we could get another fey out here. If I was clever, I might get my wand back.

"Drinks and comes back to torment whoever catches his fancy." O'Neil sounded discouraged, and I couldn't blame him. "What are you going to do now?"

I hadn't survived a sorceress, trolls, and a werewolf to be bested by the bad apple of the leprechaun tree. "Put that Narzel-blessed clurichaun in handcuffs."
 

O'Neil looked at me and blinked.
 

It sounded crazy to me too. "Can I borrow your cuffs?" I slid them in my back pocket after he dropped them in my hand. "Stay back. I don't want you to get hurt."
 

Marching to the middle of the room, I yelled, "I want my wand back, you misshapen dwarf."
 

Standing there, I focused as much on sound as I did on sight. Given his penchant for trickery, odds were he'd show up behind me.

Just to prove how good I am at predicting the enemy, he descended from the ceiling to hover in front of me. His face was beet red, but that could've been the alcohol as much as the anger.
 

"What did you call me?"

"You heard me. You're a disgrace to the hardworking leprechauns of the world, and you look like a distorted dwarf."

Roy's face turned an even darker color, and he vibrated in the air. I held my breath, not sure what he would do. Freezing, he looked at me and flashed a twisted smile. There was just enough time for me to panic and worry that I'd overplayed my hand.
 

He grabbed my wand with both hands and brought it down across his knee, snapping it like a twig. Laughing, he tossed the pieces aside.
 

"What are you going to do now? Poor witch doesn't have her wand." Roy batted his eyes at me.

I bared my teeth and snarled, "Witches don't need wands."
 

His smile faded.
 

Throwing out my right hand, I hit him with raw power, throwing him back and driving him to the floor. He struggled, shimmered, and tried to throw off my power. I forced my power to flow around him, preventing his movement. Roy thrashed and shivered and then stopped moving. Walking closer, I took grim pleasure at the disbelief in his eyes.
 

With a twirl of my finger, he was rolled onto his stomach. Leaning over, I fished the cuffs out of my pocket and snapped them on his wrists. It was extremely satisfying to see Roy in handcuffs.
 

Taking a deep breath, I slowly cut off the flow of power and dispersed the energy that was swirling around Roy, sending it into the earth. A headache sprang to life in my temples. I knew better than to throw around raw power. As effective as it was, I always felt empty and tired afterward. The wand, which was now evidence, helped focus power, allowing the caster to use less energy for a spell. Runes gave the magic shape and form, reducing the mental strain of holding all the parts of a spell in your brain as you willed it into being.
 

Queen walked over, eyes wide. "Michelle, what did you do?"

I rubbed my head, not wanting to answer her question. "My job."

"So I see." She paused and surveyed the disaster of a room and my bloody clothes. "I'm sorry about your wand."

"Easily replaced." I shrugged. "Besides, it's evidence now." For a moment she looked like she was going to question me, but she let it go. I breathed a sigh of relief. Sure, the wand was easy to replace, but it had been a gift from Dad when he was teaching me magic.

O'Neil came over, followed by a man I hadn't met yet. From the fur and whiskers, I gathered he turned into something feline. O'Neil opened his mouth as if to say something, but quickly snapped it closed. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Queen shaking her head. If I had more energy, I would've thanked her.
 

The feline officer clucked his tongue, reached down, and hauled Roy up by the back of his neck.
 

"Hey, what are you doing?" Roy demanded.

The officer switched his grip to both arms and carried the swearing clurichaun out of the building.

After a moment I followed them out. Later today I could curl up and sleep, but I needed to be functional now, and that required a restorative brew.
 

"Michelle, where are you going?" Queen asked.

"To get an energy drink from my car. I'll be back in a minute." As soon as I got to the car, I found one of my more potent brews and chugged it. I grabbed a bottle of water and tried to wash the bitter taste out of my mouth as I went back over to the group of cops huddled around the front of the liquor store.
 

"There you are," O'Neil said. He had bandages covering part of his face and both arms. "The paramedics want to look at you."
 

I didn't even argue when the paramedic started looking at my visible cuts. The kindly middle-aged man, whose name I couldn't remember, pulled glass from a few of the slices on my arms. After rubbing an ointment over them, he covered me with bandages.
 

"Do you want to go to the hospital?"

"What?" My eyes lifted from the pavement, which I'd been studying to distract myself from the tweezers in my arm, to his face.
 

"Normally, we would take you to the hospital for X-rays and to tend to the rest of those cuts. I was only able to remove a couple of obvious pieces of glass since I'm not set up to do a more in-depth exam. Do you want to go or not?" He said it like he knew what my answer would be and didn't approve.

"I'd rather go home. If I can't tend them, a friend will."

He sighed. "I thought as much. If you find more glass or if a cut bothers you, go to the doctor. You don't want to wait for it to fester."
 

"Festering is bad. I'll clean them properly." I smiled and thanked him for working on my arms before working my way back into the group of police. In theory, there was safety in numbers, or at least enough injured people that it would take the paramedics a while to circle back to me.
 

"Michelle, how are you?" Queen asked.
 

"A little cut up, but I'll be good as new in a few days," I said, leaving off the part about being completely exhausted and ready to go home.
 

She nodded. "Briggs is going to be fine. He's got a long list of injuries, but werebears are tough."

I glanced at the dent in the wall and shuddered. If I'd been thrown into a metal wall with enough force to leave a body impression, I'd be in the morgue.
 

Queen continued talking. "Michelle and I will examine the building for magical trouble, and then it's evidence collection and paperwork."

I nodded absentmindedly. Maybe if I asked nicely, Dad would give me a new wand. However, explaining how the last one died had its own issues. Considering they'd told me to keep a low profile, admitting to flaunting my power was going to be a less than fun conversation. Granted, it was a conversation that would happen at some point. The first time Dad saw my new wand, he'd want to know what happened to the old one.
 

"Are you ready?" Queen looked at me expectantly.
 

Snapping out of my reflections, I realized the rest of the group had dispersed. "Sure."
 

She smiled, and we walked into the building. If anything, the smell of alcohol had gotten stronger in the interim. The air burned my nose, and I switch to breathing through my mouth, hoping to reduce the uncomfortable sensation. The thick air stung even more that way, so I shut my mouth to reduce further exposure.