When a young man tries to get his way with a Witch he gets a little less than he bargained for.

“You’re a witch...” I was floored, in the fifteen or so years since I came into my powers this was the first time anyone had even noticed. And part of the magic was that I couldn’t tell a lie... I don’t mean it would stop working or my spells would back fire on me but that if asked a question I had to either answer truthfully or not answer at all. With the size of the gun the kid was holding I figured walking out on him wasn’t so much of an option.

“What makes you say that?” I tried to think of any spell I could cast that would get him off my back, it wasn’t that hard to think of spells I had been learning to cast I gained my powers but it was another of those silly inconsequential rules that make all the difference in these situations. If he heard me cast it the spell would have no more power over him than he wanted it to.

“I heard some stuff about you, and I read some more. So are you?”

“Yes. But I won’t cast spells for you, no matter how big the gun is.”

“Sure you will.”

“No. Besides what good would it do you, you probably can’t understand the language I cast them in so you wouldn’t know what it was supposed to do.” I may not be able to lie directly but misinformation is fine. The language I cast the spells in was mainly French, though one or two words were much older than humanity, and I didn’t need to tell him that he was safe while he could hear the words.

“So we find something you care for and I threaten that, listen lady I do know about getting things out of people they don’t want to give. From you all I want is some of your power, then I’ll be gone. No problem.”

“Kid I’m a witch don’t you think that you’ll be easy enough to track down. Then I can do whatever I want and you won’t be any the wiser.”

“Oh we’ll come to that Lady, you’ll have to make me an oath... a magical one to say you won’t track me down. I know how this works.”

No you don’t... I thought. Magical oath my foot, too much Buffy for this kid. Anything I did or said against my will only counted for the will of the person forcing me to say it, this little shit would be signing his own death warrant. “So what now?”

“Think we’ll take a drive back to your place, then you can teach me what I want to know and make that oath. Then I’ll leave you.”

“If you say so.”

He followed me out to my aging hatchback the gun vanishing into his jacket before we left the small office where I worked. Bruce my co-worker would be surprised I’d just left but what else could I do?

I drove back to my apartment, and let us both in. The place was a mess looked like I hadn’t spent any time there in months, I didn’t like the place so seldom spent as much time there as maybe I should. The kid didn’t seem to notice it or if he did he didn’t care. He told me to wait in the kitchen and quickly looked into the other three rooms. “Where’s your family?”

“They don’t live here.”

“But you still wear your ring?”

“Why not? I still love them they just don’t live here.”

“Okay so you teach me some stuff and I leave, or I kill you and leave... I guess you have some cash stashed away it’s not what I need but if I have to kill you it’ll have to do.”

“What do you want to learn?” I said with a sigh of resignation.

“Seriously?”

“Kid... I can’t keep calling you that, do you have a name?”

“Sure I do, but I ain’t telling you it... I know that my name will give you power over me.”

“So do you have something I can call you other than young man or Kid?”

“No... whatever you like.”

“How much French can you speak?”

“I can get by. Why?”

“Because that’s the language I use for my spells.” No lie I do, besides being a beautiful language it was the language my own mentor taught me in so the one I find that works best for me... not to say any language won’t do.

“No shitting me?”

“No shitting.”

“Okay I guess.”

“What specifically do you want to be able to do? Or do you want me to compact everything I know into a few hours?”

“Can you do that?”

“No, it’s taken me fifteen years to learn what I know.”

“Okay then, I want to be able to make people like me.”

“Like you? Wash more and stop point guns at people would be a start.”

“Don’t be stupid, I want to walk into banks and have people just give me the money... get it?”

“Won’t work.”

“What do you mean it won’t work?”

“If they hear the spell you cast it won’t work. It’s one of the basic rules of magic.”

“So I just say that everyone in that building will worship me and do anything I ask for. Simple.”

“That would take a huge amount of power, I couldn’t do it with fifteen years of practice.”

“So I’ll practice a lot.” He shrugged.

“What else do you need to know?”

“I want to look great, like a film star.” He stared into space and ticked some things off on his fingers... Money, Looks and I guessed his health. “Oh and I want a long and happy life, you know healthy, no heart attacks and stuff. So I can I have great kids and watch them grow up, you know?”

“I understand. So you want to be able to do all that for yourself or do you just want me to do it for you?”

“I don’t trust you lady if you did it, so you have to teach me how and show me how to get the power.”

“Okay, I’ll teach you. But I get to sit down comfy first and have something to eat. Oh and the gun stays in your pocket, you wave it around in here and I stop talking, okay?”

“Sure lady, just don’t get cute.” How many films had this boy watched?

He let me make him some food too and we retired to the living room to eat, I got the sneezes what with all the dust when we sat down that I couldn’t get my breath and had to run to the loo.

“Okay before we start with the actual spells I have to tell you about the rules.”

“What rules? You just tell me the spells and you let me worry about the rules.”

“Not the way it works junior, you need to know the rules before the spells work, it’s the way it works.”

“Jeez... okay, get on with it.”

“Okay they’re really very simple. Rule number one is that any spell made under duress only works on the person casting it if beneficial otherwise it only works on the person forcing you to cast it. So if you made me cast a spell on myself that would make me forget you, you’d actually forget me. Understand?”

“Yeah...”

“Okay rule number two is that you can cast a spell whenever you want, but if the intended recipient of the spell can hear you and understand the spell the spell won’t work. Worse the power needed to use the spell will still be gone.”

“Is that why you use French?”

“No, it was the language that I learned as a child so I think faster in it, means I don’t get flustered when doing something complicated.”

“Ah... so I could say the spells in English?”

“Yes, but I will only tell you them in French.”

“Okay. But you have to explain what the words mean if I don’t get it.”

“Sure.”

“Rule number three is that once you have the power you may not tell a lie if asked a question. You can volunteer anything you want, but if someone comes up to you and asks you a question you can only not answer or tell the truth.”

“Which is why you didn’t tell me to fuck off in that office?”

“Yes. Well that and your gun.” He smiled. “Those are the three big rules, there are others but you only need to know them if you actually get on and study magic like I have.”

“So you can teach me the spells now?”

“Not quite.”

“Why?”

“To fully understand any spell, apart from the first one, you need to have already come into you power, that is if you have no power a spell will just sound like gibberish, or your mind will try and make sense of it and come up with something that you would expect the caster to say. If you know that the person has the power, like you thinking I’m a witch, then you’ll just hear me say a spell but you won’t understand even if you speak French as well as I do.”

“So... all but the first spell? What is the first spell?”

“Anyone can learn that... it’s got to be taught by someone who has the power, you can’t just read it in a book and say it to gain power. So I have to teach you it. And you will lose something for saying it, you say it and you lose something important and you gain the power, the more important the thing is the more power you gain.”

“What did you lose?”

“My fiancée.”

“Shit you killed someone for power?”

“No, just the relationship with someone I loved more than life.”

“Nice... sorry... so what would I lose?”

“What do you have that is important to you?”

“So I can choose?”

“No. But making the choice might influence what you lose.”

“What if I lose something that I don’t want to lose.”

“Whatever you lose will be something that you no longer need when you have power.”

“Cool.”

“When you have the power I can teach you what you want to know.”

“Oh I have decided... how will I know if it’s enough to give me lots of power?”

“By how important it is to you of course.”

“Okay so I’ve decided, teach me the spell to get power... no wait. Hmm you have to tell me the truth?”

“Yes.”

“So this spell won’t hurt me will it?”

“No, or at least as far as I know it won’t, each of us only ever use it once. But I never heard of anyone being hurt by it.”

“And when I’ve said it I will have power?”

“Yes, at least enough to understand spells and be able to cast them. I have no way of knowing if you will have enough to do what you want.”

“Okay... can I gain more power later?”

“Sure, meditation helps, but you earn it all the time when you don’t cast spells. Especially if you could have cast a spell to help you do something.”

“Huh?”

“Say you need to dig a hole?”

“Yeah.”

“You could do it with a pick and shovel, or cast a spell. Either one will tire you out. But if you dig it by hand... or even with a digger... you’ll get the energy spent digging by hand back as energy for use in spells.”

“Mana?”

“You can call it that if you want most of us just call it energy.”

“And if I use too much doing something I die?”

“No, if you try and do something that you don’t have the energy for it’ll either fail completely or only end up half done. Any more questions, or can I teach you this spell so we can get on with this?”

“One last thing... when I’ve done this spell, will you do anything to weasel out of our deal?”

“No.”

“No?”

“No I won’t do anything to weasel out of our deal, this I swear by all the powers that I have, had or will ever have so help me god. That do you?”

“Yeah... think that should do. So teach me it.”

The actual words I won’t reveal here, you can find them out if you have access to the internet, you might even be able to find someone who will teach them to you. I won’t once is enough for me. Needless to say the boy sharp as he was picked them up quickly. “So that is all I need to say?”

“Yes, that’s all you need to say.”

“So what does it say?”

“I have no idea what the words say, it’s in a language that is older than humans, but I was told by my teacher that it is an oath to whatever wrote it to never harm them or cause them to come to harm, either by spell or anything else.”

“And these things are dead?”

“I assume so.”

“So I just read this out and I gain the power?”

“You need to prick your finger... produce some blood and give it to me.”

“Why?”

“It’s part of the deal with having a teacher and not just learning from a book. If you don’t nothing will happen when you say the spell, because until the spell is cast you have no power and to cast the spell you need power. Get that?”

“So even though I say it you’ll be the one casting it right?”

“Exactly.”

“You have a needle?” I passed him the needle I’d found in the bathroom cupboard... that is a sterile sharp from a hypodermic, which was once intended to help me numb the pain of a toothache. But that was before I became a witch. He pricked his finger and gave me a drop of his blood, knowing the rules in this situation I didn’t do what I’d have liked and made sure it was clean but jabbed myself with the same needle and rubbed his blood into my own. I felt the blood fizz into mine and my whole body feel like an electric current run through me. Last time this had happened to me was fifteen years before, it hadn’t been very nice then.

“What was that?”

“The first part of the spell. You have to say the words now.”

“Okay.”

I didn’t know what he thought he was giving up, but I knew what he thought he was giving up and what he was actually giving up were too different things. Still I hoped that when the spell was complete I could just get him out of my life quickly. My own teacher had told me that I would be responsible for my students until they had learned everything they needed to know from me. With his plans I guessed that it would only take a couple of hours to teach him what he needed to know.

I could see the effects of the spell in front of me, a sort of green-brown tube entirely covering the boy from head to foot. Inside I could hear him groaning slightly, but it didn’t sound like pain more as though he were having a bad dream. My own time spent while the spell hadn’t left any lasting impression on me so I wasn’t worried much about the boy. I’d just have to wait and see.

“You did this to me.”

“I didn’t, you did it to yourself.”

“You should have warned me.”

“Why? You wanted power at any cost, you have the power at a cost. The fact that you didn’t want to pay this price is not my doing.”

“You have to change me back.”

“I can’t, no-one can. You’re going to be like this for the rest of your life.”

“What do you mean... I won’t grow up?”

“Of course you will, but you’ll never be who you were again that’s for sure. You know what is worse?”

“Worse?”

“Yeah... for me at any rate... part of the deal with the teaching thing is I have to look after you until whatever deal was entered into before is done with.”

“So you teach me those spells.”

“That was only part of it, the intention you had was part of it too... besides I can’t really let you just wander off now.”

“You don’t have any choice bitch.”

“Why are you going to shoot me?”

“No you can teach me those spells then I will go.”

“I won’t teach you those spells until you’re old enough to use them.”

“What do you mean, old enough? I’m seventeen how much older do I need to be?”

“Well put it this way you look about twelve and as your legal guardian I get to say when and where you go. Besides you can’t do anything to hurt me or cause me harm, you run away from me and I’ll be in trouble.”

“No way...”

“Yes way, you’re just a little kid now who I am responsible for, and you will do as you’re told or I’ll... I’ll ground you.” I grinned.

While the pretty little girl kneeling in front of me where she had landed when the spell spat her out just started to cry. “Now follow me, we’ll go find out what the world makes of your change.”

“What do you mean?” She asked between sobs.

“Well they way the magic works is that once you say the spell it changes everything in the world to match the new you, it’s the most powerful spell you will ever use, and only then will you use it to help someone else gain the power. Most of us only use it once, but some use it over and over. It’s the only time you can use a spell that takes more power than you’ll ever have.”

“So nobody remembers me?”

“The old you? Nobody but you and I.”

“Where are we going?” She asked, still crying, as I led her through the apartment.

“To my real house.”

“This isn’t...”

“I own it, it was where I lived before I became a witch, when I changed I kept it but went to live in a much nicer house.”

“But I followed you home from your office twice, you always came back here.”

“Listen kid, I’m a witch, I don’t have to use cars and doors like the other people you knew. I come back here, pick up any mail... mostly junk the old me never existed remember. And then do this...” I muttered an incantation under my breath and walked straight onward through the suddenly open door and into the house I shared with my husband and three cats.

“Where is this?”

“This is where I really live, I guess it’s where you will live from now on too, let’s go and look at the guest bedroom shall we?”

“Where is it?”

“Follow me.” I led her upstairs and along the landing stopping outside a door that this morning had been white and unadorned. Tonight it had a sign saying ‘Jennifer’s Room — No Entry’ “Guess this is it Jennifer, your room.”

“Evening Clare, is Jenny alright?”

“Yes she just had a tummy upset, something she ate. I brought her home and put her to bed.”

“Sorry I couldn’t get free I had a rep in showing me some new bar snacks.”

“Important stuff...”

“Honey...”

“Don’t worry Bruce was happy to let me go he knows how it is with kids.”

“I thought, with her being about that age she...”

“Yeah so did I, but she isn’t and we had that talk a few weeks ago so she’ll know what it is... though she doesn’t think much to the idea.”

“I dare say.”

“I’ll just pop in on her before I turn in myself, I have stuff to do tomorrow, hopefully she will be okay for school in the morning.”

“Well if not I can take the day off, let Angus earn his pay for once.”

“Okay, now don’t be long... I think I need some help sleeping tonight...”

“You do? Okay I’ll be up in fifteen minutes...”

“See you soon handsome.”

“Are you awake?”

“Yeah... mum...”

“See I told you it’d work out.”

“What I don’t get is...”

“What?”

“Well, if you gave up your greatest love how come you’re married with two... one kid?”

“Two kids Jenny, two. Back before I got my powers, I wasn’t like you Jenny. I was quite rich and good at my job which I loved. I had some great friends and my future looked great. I even had a fiancée.”

“So?”

“Well Rose... that’s my fiancée...”

“What Rose? You were a boy?”

“Man, yes I was a man. Rose wasn’t that nice a person, I can see that now. She was grasping and wanted me for the life I could give her and not because she loved me. Anyway I got tooth ache, had it for a couple of days and went to see the dentist. But they couldn’t find any rotten teeth, but it got worse and worse and then I found a cure. Magic.

“Only I needed to get the powers to make the pain go away myself, and when I had the power I no-longer had toothache, fiancée or anything apart from my old apartment. Oh and my job.”

“So what did you give up that was so important?”

“I gave up my life as it was. Same as we all do. Why what did you think you’d lost?”

“My masculinity.”

“If you’d given that up you’d be the same person but a woman or gay. You gave up everything you had been, everything you were and everything you might have been. And you gained the power to make the world a better place.”

“What if I don’t though... make the world a better place?”

“You’ve already started, and the magic will lead you onward to it.”

“How have I started already, you haven’t taught me any magic yet.”

“But by becoming you, I’m a mother something I never thought were possible, my husband... your father is a father something that he never thought would happen. And both our lives are better for it.

“And you have stopped being a little thug who thought he could get whatever he wanted by waving a gun around... all that would have happened would have been a swift end to you. We both know that that is true. Don’t we?”

“I guess.”

“Now go to sleep, you have school tomorrow.”

“School?”

“Yeah school, and if you sleep well and get up early I’ll teach you the first spell you need to know.”

“What?”

“The one that will help you remember who you are now. I used to it as soon as you fell asleep this afternoon on myself.”

“Oh... right... goodnight... mum...”

“Night night sweet heart... I’ll see you in the morning.”

Fin

Proofing and stuff by me, hopefully all correct, as ever comments appreciated. The idea popped up at random while reading other stuff, I hope you like it.

Made some minor edits, mainly due to mistakes I missed. Thanks to Puddintane for pointing out the difference between fiancé and fiancée.