“Hey, can I borrow your phone?” The witch girl asked the middle aged man whose hand she was holding.

He coughed in surprise, “I… I guess?”

“Cool,” Sabrina smiled in a way she hoped was reassuring. It wasn't.

To the pale young woman in lacy Victorian cosplay taking notes with unsettling intent, she said “check his pockets. I gotta keep holding his hand. He's right handed—check the way his shoes were tied, but in general it's just a safe bet.”

Josette—Jinxy—was thrilled to be taking part in this. The man was a little uncomfortable to have the wide eyed goth digging around in his jeans, but he was probably more uncomfortable with the metal rod through his chest.

Sabrina could relate.

“Am I dying…?” He asked, somehow still among the living in spite of it.

“Nah, nah. You're good,” Sabrina said with a wave of her left hand and a squeeze of her right. “Just keep holding my hand and you'll be fine.” To her companion she added. “You got it? Good, hand it here.”

“Don't you have one?” Jinxy wondered, voice a soft whisper as she handed over the phone. She had her moleskin back out and the rapid scratching of a fountain pen filled the space between the man’s gasps and moans. That thing had been only a few pages filled at the start of the night, but she’d need a second one if things went much longer.

“Needs to be his,” Sabrina whispered back.

“What…” the man wasn't sure he wanted to know. “What happens if I let go?”

“Well,” Sabrina rocked her head left and right. “Well, then you will die.” She gave him a big smile. His grip tightened and so did hers, though their hands were bound together by a shoelace covered in his blood. It was tight, and digging into the skin. “So don't let go, yeah?”

“Why his?” Jinx asked, looking at the dying man with a disturbing interest.

Sabrina put the phone down on the ground.

“I don't want to do this with mine,” the witch explained. She raised her arm high. A broom appeared in her hand. It was about six feet long, with bristles of twine wrapped straw that seemed like they’d been just rescued from the fire, tips still glowing. Charms of pierced coins and wire wrapped crystals jingled as she slammed the end of the handle into the screen, hard enough to splinter glass and dent the internals.

The man flinched, but his injury pulled. He let out a hiss and whimpered, hand tightening. “It hurts…”

The broom was gone when Sabrina started gently poking at the blood, getting it all over her finger. “You got a girlfriend? Boyfriend?” The man shook his head. “Jinxy, how does Juste spell his name? I know it's French or something.”

“French would be J U S T E.” Helpful little freak Jinxy was. There were burrs, but she'd fit in with the coven in no time. As long as she didn’t try to kill anyone again.

Sabrina scrawled the letters across the phone screen. Then she started blowing on it.

There were three of them were out on the back lawn, in the material at least. Sabrina and her most recent apprentice were quite the pair. Jinxy wore haut couture, black and lacy. Gothic Lolita style straight from Shibuya or Akihabara. She was ready for a photo shoot.

Sabrina Granger, Witch of Ashcroft, was in the wide brimmed black pointed cap that was her trademark. Tattoos and scarification peaked out from beneath her handmade silk blouse, stretching across broad shoulders and strong biceps. She was ready for Halloween, and had been since she was sixteen.

The man between them was the stand out. Besides the iron in his chest, he was normal. That’s what made him so strange. Just a man in his late thirties wearing business casual. Short hair and five o’clock shadow, he could be anyone.

The three of them were on the lawn in the back yard of a suburban home. There was a really nice picture window in the living room that looked out onto the yard, which further looked out onto the woods down the way behind them. Beautiful place.

Or at least, the picture window had been really nice. It was now shattered. The railing for the deck was also broken, from where the homeowner had been thrown out of the window. After having a fireplace poker flung through his chest. Thankfully, the ghost of his mother—or maybe it was the previous owner’s mother? someone’s mother—didn’t seem inclined to come out onto the lawn.

That was probably because Sabrina had started the night by emptying three large cylinders of Morton’s around the house, pricking her thumb with a sewing needle, and pressed it into the salt lines on each side. That tends to keep ghosts where you want them. Painful, though. Itchy, too.

“Either of you seen any good movies lately?” Sabrina asked, making casual conversation, as if they weren't dealing with a man lying on his back with a piece of iron through his chest.

The man coughed again, and furrowed his brows.

“It’s gotta dry,” she explained.

“My dear departed aunt had the reels for The Haunting. Black Veil Bride enjoyed it.” Jinxy’s voice was soft and willowy, like the wind creaking through Hill House itself. “I read her the book the other week, and she enjoyed seeing the film. ‘No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality’”

Hearing her own name, the dark form of the waterlogged bride faded into view beside Jinxy. Thankfully the dying man could see neither the Black Veil Bride, nor the Wicked Witch and her sickly burned skin. Both of the ghosts, and the one of the woman in the house, were invisible to him. He didn’t seem to take notice of the fact that Jinxy was now holding hands with open air, either.

Sabrina continued the quote. “’Even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream.’ Ah, good. Bonding.” She turned to the man, who looked from one girl to the other. “What about you?”

“I…” He looked up at the sky and tried to think. “Repeat was showing The Matrix a few weeks ago.”

“Ah, yeah,” Sabrina said with a smile, “Love those movies.”

“Of course you do.” Jinxy rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “Joy says that’s one of your memes.”

Sabrina’s smile grew, and she gave Jinxy a finger gun and a wink. “Damn right.”

“Wha…?”

Sabrina waved her hand again, like she was dismissing smoke, “trans joke, don’t worry about it.”

“Why did you need to break my phone?” the man asked. His voice was breaking.

Sabrina gave his head a few gentle strokes. There was no magic to it, but it calmed down wounded animals at least. Sometimes. Or made them bite you. “Because I need to make a phone call.”

“Why not use your phone,” Jinxy asked, head tilted. “You have one, don’t you? Even I have one.” She hesitated a moment. “The coven are the only ones I call.”

“Because Frank got too paranoid to keep the same number.”

Jinxy let out a groan. “Ugh. Frank.”

“He grows on you.”

“Much like mildew,” Jinxy grumbled.

Sabrina laughed. “Yup.”

“Not to…” the man started, but then was crying too much to continue. “Please, it hurts…”

“Oh, trust me, I know” Sabrina said, pulling down her puffy white shirt to reveal her chest. They were faint, but white scars could be seen in the light of the moon, and the back porch. One of them was right where the heart would be. “But hey, your mom missed your heart. Unless yours is also on the wrong side. But we’re gonna fix you up anyway.”

She picked up the phone and held it sideways. The blood didn’t drip. Too much.

“My mom…?”

“Oh, was it not your mom?” Sabrina asked.

Jinx took a few steps back towards the house, and looked towards the broken window. The ghost was actually still there. Not manifested, but they could see her standing there in Twilight. She flipped back a few pages in her notes, and made a thoughtful noise.

“I’m just the real estate agent…”

“Oh, oh, right, previous owner.” Sabrina shook the phone and pressed the power button. Despite the damage, the screen flickered on. “Hold on, gotta make a phone call.” In as clear a voice as she could, she said, “Aphrodite,”—she pronounced it Ah-fro-dee-tay—”Ishtar, Shelyn…” She held the phone back as if she was trying to keep someone on the other end from hearing her, whistled for her attention, then with the same hand she held up two fingers and mouthed the number to Jinxy.

“Hathor, Freyja.” No hesitation. Good job.

“Hathor, Freyja. I would like to make a collect call.” Even that last bit was said in the clear tone of a sermon. She still nodded her head left and right as she waited. The phone started ringing. “Ah, good.”

“Interesting,” was all Jinxy had to say. She had come back and was watching The Witch of Ashcroft work her magic, notepad half forgotten.

It took longer than it needed to, but someone picked up. Sabrina pressed her thumb to the phone screen. There wasn’t any button there, since the phone screen was shattered and just displaying disjointed lights and hearts. But it still switched over to speaker phone.

“Hello?” a man’s voice answered. He sounded pleasantly bemused, which meant it couldn’t have been Frank, who hadn’t done anything ‘pleasantly’ in decades. “Why did it just ask if I wanted to accept a collect call from beyond the grave?”

“Ahoy. Is there a Frank Rook nearby? He’s about five-eight, salt and pepper hair, usually scowling? Dresses like Columbo.”

“Oh, is this Sabrina?”

She started smiling. “Aww, Juste, are you the nearest phone?”

“Ah, it is Sabrina! I was wondering when we’d talk,” the man on the other end said, voice perking up. “Yeah, we were just having date night, I thought this was for me, since you called my pho—” He was cut off by the phone being taken from him.

“Damnit, Granger, what the fuck!” someone with a (formerly) pack a day voice came on the line. Juste was still laughing in the background. “This better be important.”

Sabrina had a catlike grin. “Heya, Frank. You’re on speaker, so try not to say fuck too much. Jinxy’s a high schooler or something.”

“I’m twenty four,” she interjected.

Sabrina looked down at the realtor. She expected an answer.

“I’m thirty seven.”

Sabrina shrugged, “Okay, you can say fuck.”

“Granger, what the fuck,” Frank repeated. “I’m… I’m busy. Doing something important.” Juste snorted somewhere in the room. Frank didn’t quite cover the receiver as he snapped back, “Don’t you start!”

“I’ll bet. Anyway, my first aid kit is in the back of your car, could you bring it to me?”

“First aid k…” Frank sighed, “Oh. Fuck me. Okay, I’ll be there. Where?”

Sabrina passed Jinxy the phone. She took it, and looked down at the screen. “Go tell Frank the address.”

Jinx started walking around to the front of the house, as if there wasn’t a threat.

“I would prefer it if you were a little faster,” Sabrina called after her. She picked up the pace. A little. “Good help, amirite?”

“I don’t know what’s going on,” the man sobbed. “I don’t want to die.”

“Neither did I,” Sabrina said, voice gentle. She stroked his head again, “that’s why I’m going to keep it from happening to you.”

“How am I still alive?”

Sabrina held up their bound hands. “Well, this magic thread.”

The man blinked.

“Okay, it’s a shoelace.” She shrugged, “I had expected this to be a milk run. Had to use what was on hand.”

“You’re really a witch?”

“I mean,” Sabrina laughed, “they don’t tell you this but they let anyone wear the hat.”

The man lifted his head and looked at the bound hand, which was clutching Sabrina’s so tight that the knuckles were white. Beneath the red bloodstains.

“Oh, yeah, I can do magic.” She confirmed. “Got a coven and everything.”

“Is that creepy one a witch?”

“Trainee.” Sabrina gave an exaggerated roll of her eyes. “Acolyte? Nah. Hm. Apprentice? Yeah, I like apprentice. Anyway, how was the movie? I was out of town, but some friends were there. I haven’t seen it in ages.”

Ten minutes later, two men got out of an unmarked and nondescript Crown Vic. They both wore trench coats. The driver’s was shabby and rumpled. His shirt wasn’t even half tucked in, and he wasn’t wearing his usual tie, not that he ever tightened it right. Seeing him made Jinx blanche. The passenger was freakishly tall, and his coat was black and had a wide mantle collar. He ruined the cowboy look with a tee shirt with a trout and the phrase Women Fear Me Fish Fear Me Men Turn Their Eyes Away From Me As I Walk No Beast Dares Make A Sound In My Presence I Am Alone On This Barren Earth. It was also untucked.

But The Detective On Leather Wings did seem to like him. Frank’s ghost had taken the form of an oversized bat and clung to the Juste’s shoulder as if it were some sort of hideously cute parrot. So that was at least something.

“Frank,” Jinxy said with a curtsy that the Black Veil Bride mimicked. “The other one.”

“Where are they?” Frank asked as he went to the trunk to pull out a small valise. It was worn leather, and had two pieces of red duck tape crossed over each other.

Juste had his hand up to the Detective, and Frank’s ghost was sniffing it. He nodded politely to both Jinxy and her ghost. So he could see them. “Juste,” he offered the young lady.

“The one without a ghost.” She turned to walk away.

Juste let out a chuckle. “Friendly, isn’t she?”

“She’s new,” Frank said, hurrying around back ahead of Jinxy. Juste wasn’t as necessary to the process, so he didn’t rush, but he also had very long legs, so he didn’t need to.

“Ah, there you are,” Sabrina said, lifting up the bound hands. “I was starting to get tired. He’s holding pretty tight.”

“Horseman’s tits,” Frank said, when he saw the wound. Then he looked towards where the man had been flung from. The ghostly woman was still standing there. “You just left her there?”

Sabrina waved the hand again, “kinda busy. She’s trapped in salt, it’s fine. Got my kit?” She smiled at the newcomer. “And you must be Juste. You’re taller than I expected.”

Juste inclined his head to her as well, also smiling. Always nice to meet the boyfriend’s family. “I get that a lot.”

“Focus,” Frank said, kneeling down next to Sabrina and opening the case. “What do we need here. Should we take that out first?”

“That’s a violation of the Geneva Convention,” Jinxy said, finally joining the group. Everyone looked where she was pointing, at the valise’s front.

“Only for commercial purposes,” Juste murmured to her while the other two worked. “They actually started using a Red Crystal a few decades back.”

Jinx narrowed her eyes, but a whisper of wind stirred the Black Veil Bride’s black veil. “That is interesting,” Jinxy said.

Juste smiled, as if he was bonding. He probably wasn’t.

“Anything you can do,” Sabrina asked the boyfriend. “Some wizard stuff?”

“Not that kind of wizard,” Juste said. “I mean, I could probably heal something smaller, but my hands are tied around the straights anyway.”

“Well that blows,” Sabrina huffed. She handed her broom to Frank, whose hand went through it at first. Then she tapped the tip on the valise a few times and passed it over again.

He shrugged, “Sorry. I’d end up doing more harm than good.”

Sabrina muttered instructions to Frank, and he went to work grinding herbs in an actual mortar and pestle. “How about her?” Sabrina asked, gesturing to the window.

“Ghost?” Juste asked, looking over to the ghost that was glowering at them. “I don’t have quite as light a touch as you, but I can probably take a look.”

Frank glanced up at him, and Juste went over to him first. He held out a hand, and Frank cut his eyes over to Sabrina, who looked away, trying to hide a smile. Frank reached up and took Juste’s hand. Not a firm palm handshake, just gently holding his fingers. Glum as Frank was, the ghost of a smile formed on his face. Juste’s as well. Then they let go, Frank went back to waving the brooms bristles over some burning incense, and Juste went around to go inside the house.

As he did, a little piece of Juste’s shadow broke off. The shade of a little bat fluttered along the ground until it joined back with Frank.

“Shut up, Granger,” Frank said.

Sabrina snorted, and tried to hide her own smile. “What, I said nothing!” She waved a hand in front of the man on the ground, who seemed like he was dissociating. Then she pat the fire poker, just enough to draw attention to it. “Gonna pull this out now.”

“No, wait!” the man said, eyes going wide with shock. “Will I die?”

“No, no,” Sabrina reassured him, patting his shoulder. “But it might hurt. Jinxy? Hand over the mouth, please.”

“Wh—” Jinxy crouched down above the man’s head and put both hands over his mouth. Sabrina didn’t worry about his question and just jerked the poker out. He was still very loud, but at least the rest of the neighborhood wouldn’t just outright call the cops.

The resulting wound wasn’t even bleeding.

“Good girl,” Sabrina said, and Jinx gave her a look. “Oh, right, that works better with Joy.”

“Is that another trans thing?” Jinxy asked.

“Bingo.”

“I don't think I mind.”

“Nice, still got it.”

Frank cleared his throat in the most obnoxious manner he could manage. “Think you could pay attention instead of flirting, Granger? Is this done? What’s next.”

“Oh, right.” Sabrina said. “alright, just smear that all up in the wound, wave the incense around it.”

He did as he was told, taking big fingerfuls of the ointment he’d made and daubing them around the wound. The man cried against Jinxy’s hand, but then started to go slack. The broom was nowhere to be found once it left Frank’s hand.

“You can let go now,” Frank said. Jinx did as soon as she could. She looked at her hands and grimaced, then rubbed the saliva off on Frank’s coat. “Wha—Goddamnit, Jordan!”

The wounds started to smoke, wisps of white coming off the wound like plasmic healing. The injury had started to ghost over just like one of the krewe’s.

“What was in that?” Jinx asked, standing back up and watching it. “It smells disgusting.”

It did have a strong, skunky scent, with petrichor beneath that. The sandalwood and rose incense mixing in didn’t help much. The scents clashed.

“Pot, mostly,” Sabrina said. “That’s why it smells like shit.”

Jinxy looked in her tiny, mostly decorative little coffin shaped purse.

“I used some of the holy water this time,” Frank added, scratching his stubble. “I think it helps the healing.”

The Black Veil Bride pointed to the ground where she’d left her notes, and Jinxy picked it up and added more.

“Oh, damn, I’ll need to get more.”

“Just bless it yourself.”

Jinxy looked up from the notebook. “You can do that?”

“I mean, sure, I’m the ghost pope.”

Frank let out an exaggerated sigh.

“But I’m not exactly a priest of an Abrahamic faith.” Sabrina ignored Frank. “Where am I going to get some on a Wednesday night?”

Frank looked at his watch. “It’s Thursday, now.”

“Where am I going to get holy water on a Thursday morning?”

“I don’t want to get another lecture from Father Riley,” Frank muttered.

“I’d combust if I went in a church,” Sabrina joked. Then at Jinxy’s excited she added, “I’m just kidding.”

“Are you?” Frank asked, closing the valise and latching it. Sabrina smacked him with the broom. “Ow!”

“You think you and your beau can handle this?” Sabrina asked with a yawn. “I want some sleep.”

“He’s not my…” Frank closed his eyes and sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Yeah. Get some sleep, Granger.”

“Thanks,” she said, untying the shoestring. She tossed it down on the client’s chest. “You kids make sure to get some sleep yourself.”

Frank snorted. “Oh, Granger?” he said, getting up from the ground.

“Hm?”

He drew in a deep breath. He went in front of Sabrina, his back to Jinxy, and leaned down. “Granger, I’m new to this…” he dropped his voice, “this gay shit. Please try not to have emergencies when I’m on a… you know.”

“Date?” she offered with a smile. Frank winced, but nodded. “I’ll be extra careful.”

“Oh,” Jinxy said, unamused. “Are they gay?”

Frank groaned, and hung his head.

Sabrina pulled herself off the ground with the broom, and Frank’s help. She put an arm around Jinxy and lead her back to the house, “go wait for me out front,” she said, then went up to the deck and stepped through the shattered back window.

In the living room, Juste had the ghost held tight with a large black fist around its waist, pinning its arms to the side. He was speaking in a language Sabrina didn’t understand, and neither did her personal phantom. He nodded to Sabrina.

“Huh, neat.” She said, looking over the hand. “Are those shadows?”

“Yeah. They’re sort of a specialty.” He kept his own fist bound tight as he walked widdershins around the ghost, which thrashed. “It was nice meeting you, Sabrina.”

“Sorry to ruin date night,” she yawned, “didn’t expect the client to get thrown through a window.”

Juste smiled, “we were watching Princess Bride. I don’t think he was as into it as I was, especially when I quoted the whole thing. Only mostly verbatim.”

“Mm. I know you’re paraphrasing a quote but I’m too tired to figure out a reply.”

The mage laughed, “it’s fine.”

“Anyway, you boys can handle things.” She looked back at the ghost, who was swearing and cursing. “That’s not very polite. You better let him help you or you’ll end up in the Underworld. Passing on is a lot nicer.”

After dealing with a few invectives, Sabrina used the front door to meet up with Jinxy.

“Are we ready to go yet?” she asked, impatient as always.

Sabrina lead the way to the bus stop, yawning as she did.

“So, what did you learn?” Sabrina asked.

Jinxy thought for a moment, looking over her notes and leaning in to the Black Veil Bride as they walked. No words were exchanged, but they were conferring. “You pretend to be an idiot, but you aren’t.” She tapped the overpriced fountain pen to her lips and thought about it. “You knew that it wasn’t the man’s mother, you told me he was the realtor when you got me this afternoon. You lie to people.”

Sabrina didn’t hide her smile, though it was a sour one. Not how she would have put it, but not wrong. “You’re more observant than you get credit for. What else?”

Jinxy closed the notebook, and put it away. “The living are a liability. We should just keep them out of the way or they’ll break.”

“Eh, good enough,” Sabrina said. The bus was a ways away, and her damned leg hurt. She needed to get off of it after kneeling on the ground for so long. “I was thinking more the ceremonies I used.”

“Oh, yes,” Jinx said, lighting up. “Those were fun. I think they’ll be very useful.”

“No, you can’t ward the area with salt to find a date.”

Jinx grumbled. “You’re no fun. Is that what Frank did?”

“Something like that,” Sabrina joked. Even with the Witch’s Staff, she had to rest, and sat down on the decorative wall in front of a house. “Damned suburbs,” she muttered. “Damned hills.”

Jinx looked her over, and saw where she was rubbing her thigh. “You got injured?”

Sabrina shook her head. “No, I’m fine.”

Jinxy tilted her head.

“Okay, I’m not fine. But I’ll be fine.”

Jinxy raised an eyebrow.

“Okay, fine, it won’t be,” Sabrina snorted. “But we’re not too far from the bus. Should be coming soon.”

She got up with a wince, and hissed. She was about to bitch, but then her phone chimed. She looked at it. There were only six people that particular chime could be.

R U OK honey?

Yeah, why?

There was the bubble that said she was typing. It stopped. Then she sent an image.

In blood on the wall of her last childhood home were the words DARYL KILLED ME. Her own blood, used to the chill of the grave, went cold.

Jinx turned back around when she realized that Sabrina had stopped.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Sabrina snapped, then clenched her eyes shut and grimaced. She repeated herself in a more reasonable tone of voice. “Nothing. Go home without me, I need to do something.”

“Okay.” It didn’t take Jinxy that much prompting.

Sabrina gave a little chuckle at that. Then she burned away her fatigue with plasm. It was more effective than double shot espresso. She leaned against another decorative wall in front of a hill-cursed house and started texting a different member of their krewe. The sun was coming up and that meant there was a good chance she could count on Fatima to be awake.

She would need backup. Jinxy… well, Jinxy couldn’t be trusted with this. She was too new and too much of a danger still. She wouldn’t stalk Sabrina’s family or anything, they’d been making progress at helping her understand why that was wrong, but it was best to keep her isolated from this. Even Frank should be kept away. Fatima could be trusted to be discreet, and more than that, she was the only other member of the krewe that had a car. Sabrina hoped she would be able to pull her away from her important job looking at fossilized pieces of shit, or whatever it was that paleontologists do.

Sabrina would need backup.

Because Daryl had been her.