Different

Chapter 16

Bishaw was sipping coffee while reading news. He wasn't in the mood for his usual egotistic litanies. He sat quietly, flipping through the pages of the paper, while I set his schedule for the following week, sending emails to different people, some his clients, others his colleagues. Halfway through, I glanced at him and caught him glancing back at me, half-smiling.

I couldn't tell him what I saw at the graveyard. One, he probably wouldn't have been interested. Two, he might suspect my participation in what had to be a crime. Three, I wouldn't have been able to explain how I got there and what had happened to his former client.

That was no longer my concern. My erratic powers still bothered me. A week after Amarra poisoned me, I still couldn't cast a spell that worked. I couldn't teleport to the exact place I willed. I tried looking up antidotes. I went to an apothecary. There was actually one in town. The petite saleslady handed me powdered bezoar, mint sprigs, and mistletoe berries. She said brew them for four hours. I didn't think it worked.

"You missed lavender and some prayer," Madam Veronica said. Yes, I went to her house. I desperately needed someone's help. "I should have insisted that you stayed here after the incident." She sounded stern but nonetheless smiled. She mumbled incomprehensible words and made gentle movements with her hands over the pot. I was expecting some smoke or flickering lights, but nothing extraordinary happened. She just spooned the liquid into a mug. "Here." She handed it to me.

"Thank you, Madame."

She stopped me from sipping it right away. "Be careful. It's still hot. You'll burn your throat."

She left me to muse. She said I could do anything -- read any of the books in the room, practice spells as long as I didn't destroy anything, or get some rest on a couch. I wondered where she got all those books. No one ever published them. No one I knew. I forgot how well connected Veronica was. She had lots of stuff on the shelves: books about beauty and witchcraft, health through potions, protection charms, among other things. 

Hexes and defensive spells kept me busy. I lost track of time, left my consciousness to my readings, occasionally trying the spells in that small space in the middle of Veronica's... I didn't know what to call it. It looked like a library and a secret room and a wiccan room at the same time. She didn't have a name for it. She just refers to it as the room.

The old pages of a spell book had a stale smell. I rubbed my eyes and checked my watch, wondering how I had slept for 3 hours with my face on the table without me realizing it. A cup of warm tea rested on a saucer a few inches from the tip of my fingers. It smelled good, like chamomile, and it tasted flowery sweet.

It was already 5 a.m., and reading more no longer made sense. I had to leave, but I really wanted to borrow a few of her books. I remembered Samantha saying Veronica usually left the house early. I gathered my stuff and left the room, holding a few spell books in my forearms.

The living room was empty. There was no sign of Samantha or anyone else. I wondered who else Veronica lived with in her huge house. Although I could leave, I wanted to find her to thank her for allowing me to stay for the night. Besides, I couldn't leave without asking permission from her to borrow her stuff.

It was so quiet that I began to feel queasy. My footsteps became uncomfortably audible. The living room looked like it always looked like, filled with flowers. It smelled like flowers. I saw the family picture of Rebecca and her family. The thought of her losing her parents too early in her life made me wonder how she would grow up. It occurred to me that she and Veronica didn't have that close relationship. She was emotionally distant to her granddaughter as far as I had observed, not that it was any of my business.