Wolf in Shadow-eARC by John Lambshead Read Free Book Online Page B

outlet.
    “This is where air is piped in from the sky,” Frankie said, licking her finger and holding it up to detect air movements.
    The little oven had an open bowl of the sort used by jewelers. Frankie plugged it in and let it stand until red hot. She took the wooden box off Rhian and sprinkled the plant material into the bowl. The chopped leaves curled up, turned brown and smoldered. White smoke drifted up towards the ceiling. It scattered as it hit the turbulent flow from the air-conditioning outlet.
    Rhian used her hand to waft some of the vapor towards her and cautiously sniffed at it.
    “It smells quite pleasant,” Rhian said. “I suppose it works like an air freshener, but surely it won’t last long.”
    Frankie gave Rhian what her grandmother would have called ‘an old fashioned expression.’ The woman took her glasses off and fiddled with them, wiping the lenses with a piece of felt. Rhian had once had a boss who had the same habit. He used it to pause the conversation while he considered how to phrase a statement he found difficult. Rhian waited patiently.
    “It’s a little more than an air freshener. You see, I’m a pagan,” said Frankie, diffidently.
    Rhian wondered what in the world the woman meant. Arsenal football team were “The Gunners,” Southampton “The Seagulls,” England “The Lions,” but who were “The Pagans”? She had a vague idea that there was a motorcycle gang of that name, but the thought of the intellectual Frankie in a black leather jacket, perched on the back of a bike, with her arms wrapped around a hairy-arsed gang-lord stretched credulity.
    Frankie rushed on, almost garbling her words in an effort to get them out.
    “A pagan, Rhian. You know, a Wicca.”
    A stray memory popped into Rhian’s head of comedienne Jo Brand on a quiz show being asked to define Wicca. “ Wicca—isn’t that Old English for a mental basket case?”
    Rhian’s face had a tendency to reflect her thoughts, something that had got her into trouble before. She did her best to blank her expression, but, as usual, she was not entirely successful.
    “You’re thinking of Jo Brand, aren’t you,” said Frankie, accusingly. “There’s a woman who needs a good slapping. Still, what can one expect from a woman who chose to be educated at a jumped-up poly like Brunel University of Technology? It doesn’t even have a History School.”
    Rhian deduced from this that Frankie had read history at one of England’s more traditional establishments. As Rhian had never got beyond the sixth form of a Welsh comprehensive school, she tended to view graduate academic squabbles with a degree of detachment. She pointedly failed to ask Frankie the name of her old college.
    Frankie mumbled something.
    “What?” Rhian asked.
    “I’m a witch,” Frankie said. “I perform magic spells for people. I’m a consultant in white magic. I don’t touch anything nasty. My previous tenants all left as soon as they found out. I thought that if you could see what I actually did, then you wouldn’t be scared of me. I haven’t spooked you, have I?”
    Rhian stared at Frankie. This nice, silly, bespectacled, middle-class, new-age earth mother actually thought that Rhian might be frightened of her. Frightened because she made a living burning herbs and chanting spells for deluded businessmen! Rhian, frightened of a Wicca?
    Her lip twitched. She tried to keep a straight face but she just couldn’t. Her shoulders shook and an explosive guffaw burst from her lips.
    “What?” asked Frankie, affronted. “I don’t see what’s so funny. One of my ex-tenants organized a candle-lit vigil of Evangelical Christians outside my door.”
    Rhian laughed all the harder until tears ran down her cheeks.
    “There’s nothing funny about a dozen loonies screaming ‘burn the witch’ and ‘you’ll rot in Hell’ all night outside your flat window. You try it some time. The neighbors didn’t speak to me for weeks.”
    Rhian clung to a