—
Your sister was so beautiful, she never had to ask for anything. Food walked in her door. Firewood was piled by their longhouse. Men lifted her into canoes so her dainty feet never had to touch the water. Jwasins combed her long, lustrous hair in firelight, modestly glancing at the visiting chief who was going to make her his fourth wife. The first spell kept her chin from sagging. Her next one lifted her eyes. The one that cost her more than the others tightened her stomach after her first child and kept her breasts firm after her first baby was weaned.
You were banished from your village by then and didn’t see her again for a hundred and fifty years. She had a series of boring husbands who didn’t mind the distorted reality beneath her pretty skin. A placid deer husband was her stooge when you first reconnected. She was so friendly to you, weeping, clinging to you: “My brother, oh, my brother.”
She begged you for a spell to reverse the emerging ogress. You gave her charms and ran.
She borrowed magic at first. Then, when her debts grew too large, she started stealing it. When no respectable, law-abiding beings would help her, she began killing.
By the time she resurrected you in the forest, where you’d been stuck to your grave like a bug to flypaper, the beautiful woman Jwasins had once been wasn’t even a shell. The only way she stayed alive was by eating little worms like Jared, too slow and stupid to avoid her.
—
Jared woke with his wrists stuck behind his back. He wriggled and felt metal. Handcuffs. Back against the wall. Wee’git crouched beside him with his hand on Jared’s chest.
“This is not cool,” Jared said. “This is why you can’t be in my life.”
Wee’git took his hand back. “I’m the least of your worries, and you can’t even handle me.”
“What do you want?”
“You told Chuck your organs were running around.”
“Why do you care?”
“You’re the first Trickster born in generations. That means something.”
Jared turned his head, refusing to look at Wee’git.
“Jared,” Wee’git said. “What you have coiled in one of the chambers of your heart is a hex.”
Jared reluctantly faced Wee’git. “Can you change forms? It’s weird looking at me.”
“Listen, you goof. I’m not here for funsies.”
Jared shifted, his hands tingling. “So why are you here?”
“I can’t dig the hex out. Jwasins has melded it to you. You can remember her, but you can’t tell anyone about her, right? It’s one of her old standbys for infiltrating tasty witch nests. Her first victim becomes her unwitting eyes and ears. I don’t know what she did to the other Tricksters. I suspect she used their organs to make transformational skins for her pack. The skins are still tied to their owners, so when they die, the skins die, and vice versa. I can’t figure out why she doesn’t just grab you.”
Jared felt sick.
“I can’t find her,” Wee’git said. “She’s not normally the hiding type. Especially with her coy goons. They were just everyday nihilists until they met her and got ambitious.”
“What are nihilists?”
Wee’git studied him, twitching. “You need to read more.”
“You need to kidnap less.”
Jared remembered the way Georgina had unhinged her jaw, remembered the glee she took in rampaging through the pocket universe filled with dolphins. Jared looked down at the carpet, hoping he wasn’t broadcasting, embarrassed to have been such a fool. He was normally a better psycho detector.
Wee’git stood. “Nihilists think there’re no gods, that rules and morals are meaningless, so why not fuck things up? The coy wolves I’ve had the misfortune to encounter believe the world is ending, so why not kill and eat anything, anybody, in any way that tickles their fancy?”
“Oh,” Jared said.
“Oh? That’s your total response?”
“That explains some things.”
“Jwasins has gone through a lot of trouble to hex you, which means I can foil her plans by dragging you to Chuck’s cabin—”
“What good would that do?” Jared interrupted. “I’d just put Chuck in danger.”
“Jared, once you see a Wild Man of the Woods angry, you never unsee it. He’s made many friends like Sophia. He’s not someone you cross. You’ll be safe there.”
“What about everyone else? I’m not leaving them when I’m the one who put them in danger,” Jared said.
“Or I can text your mom with your phone and tell her Jwasins put a hex on you. But I need to check out Mave’s apartment and figure out if Jwasin has laid any delightful traps for you there.”
“Fine. I’ll take Mave to Timmy’s or something. Sarah’s trying to sleep off a headache and won’t know you’re there.”
“You stay put. I’ll go as you and she’ll never even know.”
“You’re not being fair,” Jared said.
“Those are your choices.”
“It’s not fair to Mave,” Jared said. “This is why people don’t trust you.”
“Deal or no deal?”
Jared tried to shift, shrink his hands so he could slip through the cuffs, but all that happened was that his organs rumbled.
“You blew too much power,” Wee’git said. “You’re completely drained. It’ll be a hundred years before you can shape-change again. Unless you borrow. Or steal. Or kill.”
“You could just tell Mave who you are. You could walk in and tell her you’re Wade. She has good memories of you.”
Wee’git stared at him. “You’re going to love Chuck’s veggie chili. Well, you’ll get used to it.”
When he reached down to haul him up, Jared said, “Wait.”
Wee’git dropped his hands.
“Make it quick,” Jared said.
“Stay here, stay safe. Got it?”
“Fine.”
Wee’git unlocked the cuffs, pulled Jared’s phone from his pocket and gave it back to him. Then studied Jared’s face. Jared found it deeply creepy as his bio dad made tiny adjustments so they matched.
“Behave,” Wee’git said.
—
Jared righted the tipped rug cleaner. The apartment was empty, so he had nothing to do. No one had sent him any messages. He couldn’t hear Sarah. Or Wee’git. But no one had screamed in horror. His slacks were clammy from sitting on the damp carpet. The apartment reeked of cleaner. He
