1. The Girl in Blood
As Melvin licked the creamy chocolate frosting from his fingers, he had to admit that marriage to a witch had its perks. He laughed. Marriage? The closest thing to a ceremony they'd had involved dumping a bucket of sheep's blood on Melvin's head, some kind of sing-song chant that sounded suspiciously like 'Row, row, row your boat' and a moonlit nude dance by Morgan at the end of which she collapsed on top of him and simply stated, "We're married now!"
"Ok, sweet cheeks, what do you think of the cake?" Morgan asked. She raised her eyebrows over a pair of slightly slanted sparkling blue eyes as she waited for Melvin to reply. He smiled at her. A smatter of flour and chocolate sprinkles covered her face, and she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
Melvin opened his mouth to answer, thought better of it and again closed it. He didn't know why she ever bothered asking questions, she always knew his answers before he could get them out of his mouth.
"I ask them because there's the chance you might one day surprise me," Morgan said, reading his thoughts as though it were the most natural thing in the world. Melvin stuck his tongue out at her for a moment before speaking.
"It's delicious, of course. Even if you weren't psychic, you'd have been able to figure that one out by the 'mmm' sounds," Melvin said and kissed her on the cheek. Her dark blue eyes regarded Melvin for a moment in silence; both of them soaking up the sight of the other with warm, admiring looks.
"You're so adorable," Morgan said. She returned his kiss with a lingering one on the lips. He held her face with her hands, cherishing her smooth, cool feel.
Everything is perfect, Melvin thought.
Then the door to the shop flew open, and a girl stumbled in, screaming and dripping fresh red blood all over the polished wood floors.
***
Some time later, the girl sat at their kitchen table, calmer, all of the blood gone and rinsed safely down the drain after a hot shower. A cup of hot chocolate sat before her, and the girl held the mug between two trembling hands. Her eyes followed the wispy drifts of steam that billowed from the churning, brownish liquid. Without blood adorning her, she was quite attractive: long blonde hair pulled back into a pony-tail, her soft features somewhat pale in the sunlight.
"I didn't know who else to turn to," the girl said in a soft voice.
"It's ok, Lizzie," Morgan said. "Just tell us what happened to you."
While the girl showered, Morgan had explained a few things in hopes of keeping Melvin up to speed. Morgan had recognized the girl right away, even through a scarlet layer of blood; her name was Elizabeth Smoke. Lizzie and Morgan had gone to school together, learning the arts of witchcraft and sorcery in many of the same classes and often in competition for the same boys. While the whole concept of a witch school seemed a little too Harry Potter for Melvin, he had learned to keep an open mind since marrying Morgan. He accepted such new information without smart remarks and with as few questions possible. Morgan had trained him well.
"I don't even know where to start," Lizzie said, her lip trembling. A glimmer leaked from the corner of one hazel eye and slid down her cheek like a wet caterpillar. She flicked away the unwanted tear. Morgan placed a steady hand over Lizzie's wrists.
"Try and start from the beginning," Morgan replied, meeting Lizzie's glance with encouraging eyes.
2. Amy and Elizabeth Meet Arthur
Everything happened because Amy was horny. Not just a little horny, but a whole 'lotta horny, the kind of horny that showed up screaming in the dead of night like a hungry infant who won't stop until you feed it. Amy decided to feed it and feed it some of the good stuff, preferably the best grade of man meat she could get her catty little paws on.
Lizzie got caught up in the entire affair only because she was Amy's roommate, and Amy insisted on having a good wingman, or in this case, wing-woman. Amy more or less dragged Liz out of the apartment, a smirk on her face.
"We're going on safari, Lizzie. Tonight we hunt penis!" she said and laughed. Her voice echoed throughout the entire apartment complex. Amy had one of those laughs, the ones you can hear across the room no matter how loud things get. Amy was also a witch, just not a very good one. However, she made a hell of a hash brown casserole. Amy liked to claim it was because she used the best homemade 'hash' in town, grown on her windowsill.
Amy and Elizabeth found him on their very first stop.
"Penis, three o'clock," Amy said as soon as they walked through the door, out of the cool breeze of the night and into the pulsing disco beat of the club. "I'm going to shoot that hunk with a tranquilizer dart and tag the shit out of him."
Elizabeth had to admit that Amy picked up the scent of a looker. His jet black hair was slightly long but fashionable, his curly bangs stopped just short of his dark eyes, and he kept having to swipe his hair out of his face in a way that was somehow becoming. He was tall and muscular; a tight black t-shirt barely contained a wealth of bulging muscles. Amy decided she was going to fuck him before the night was over and told Elizabeth exactly that. She took almost no time at all to come to this decision.
Amy made her way over to him, and they danced while Elizabeth made herself comfortable at the bar, downing vodka tonics and flirting some with a hunky bartender. She wasn't too interested in the bartender, but it helped pass the time until Amy returned with her prize hunk in tow.
"Lizzie, meet Art. Art, Lizzie," Amy said. The man, Art, held out his hand, took Elizabeth's in his own and gave it a perfunctory shake. Lizzie gave him a slight smile. He smiled back, and Elizabeth did her best not to jump. His teeth. So damned sharp! They gleamed like blades in the red-green pulse of the floor lights. She blinked; they were normal. Elizabeth steadied herself. She thought she had maybe too much to drink. Her eyes wanted to play tricks on her.
"Nice to meet you," Art said.
"You, too."
