A Game of No Hands Chapter 22

Steve and Steph followed Auntie Willow into a small storefront, where elegant pedestals displayed small vials of artfully cut glas. The decor kept the square contained within a circle vibe of the house and its roof. Pure passion, declared a glowing sign below one potion lit with flame. Another shadowy display advertised, “A fragrance to be unseen.”

Perfumes, Steve realized, their aunt made magical scents. They stopped to admire the over dozen varieties. Steph reached a paw toward a bottle that contained a pale rainbow, then let it fall with a sigh when her thumb less manipulator entered her vision.

“They’re so pretty.” She said.

“Do they work?” Steve asked, her vision falling on the bottle curiously titled: Book Lust.

“Within legal limits, of course.” Aunt Willow opened a door behind a marble topped sales counter. “Come along. The store is hardly the place for entertaining guests.”

They moved deeper into the house and Steve found herself a little disappointed that the house wasn’t any bigger inside than it had appeared. The store front took up a third of the space and behind it lay a living area akin to a studio apartment with a large kitchen. A queen-sized bed with a comforter adorned with dancing pink and black skunks dominated the living area. With a snap of Isabell’s fingers, it folded up into the wall. A round table rose from the floor in its wake. Four chairs unstacked themselves from the corner of the room and raced up to the table. Isabell frowned at the chairs, jabbed her finger at to them and their backs folded down, making them into stools with nothing to impede wings or tails. Clearly, she dealt with guests that had alternate body plans with some regularity.

“Please have a seat.” She gestured at the table. As Steve claimed one of the still backed chairs, Willow greeted Tina and grasped one of her hands. “Tina! It is so good to see you again. What’s it been? Five years since the wedding?”

“Yes, its been too long Auntie Isabel,” Tina laughed nervously.

“Call me Isabel please. Or even Izzy.” She brought the mega mitt to her nose and inhaled. “Ah my stars. Such a dominant scent. Poor Stevie doesn’t stand much of a chance did he, uh she?”

“Not really.” Tina accented the response with a high-pitched titter.

“Sorry.” Isabell smiled without a hint of apology, dropped the hand and pointed to her nose. “Scent witch. I can’t help it.”

Tina nodded and Isabell nearly pounced on Angelica, snatching up the curvy cat bird’s offered hand with two of hers.

“Welcome Angel! Unless I miss my guess, we haven’t met before.” The purple eyes shined with sheer admiration.

“I don’t believe so. Its Angelica though.” Angelica returned the gaze with a flirtatious smirk that caused Steve to feel a bolt of anxiety down their spine.

“My mistake.” Isabell took a careful sniff at the black furred hand she held. “Oh Stars! What a scent! Wild and rough but with notes of cozy conflictions. Please have a seat and I’ll make us all a pot of tea.”

“Sounds lovely,” Angelica slinked to the table, swaying her hips and sank down onto the stool next to Steve and Steph.

“She’s my Aunt!” Steve whispered at her.

“Cute must run in the family.” Angelica reached over and squeezed their thigh. “Don’t worry, your way more pretty.”

Steph giggled, as Steve blushed hard.

Tina, sitting on Steve’s opposite side, leaned over her back to whisper in Angelica’s ear, “Careful, don’t let her hear that. We still need that Moonsilver.”

Everyone laughed besides Steve, who attempted to pull her head down into her body. Not being part turtle, it didn’t get very far.

“For being cursed, you all seem to be in very high spirits.” Isabell called from behind the small kitchen island.

“We are not cursed.” Tina chuckled. “Merely enmeshed in a game that is more than we thought it was.”

“A game? You three are carrying enough magic to power Disney world for a week. It must be run by a merlin level magus. And I don’t see why a merlin would need you to fetch them moon silver.” She tapped a kettle and it began to whistle with steam.

“No person, Auntie,” Steve said as she poured hot water into large mugs. “Just cards.”

“Cards,” she laughed incredulously. “Now I’m too curious. If you want that moon silver, you’ll have to tell me what this is.”

Steve looked to Tina, who nodded, and Angelica, who shrugged. Then, after Isabell had set a tray containing four mugs of steaming tea and a basket of short bread cookies in the center of the table, Tina summarized the game they had been playing over the last week. The witch nodded along. Her eyes grew distant as she pondered the implications but her far-away gaze went through Angelica’s breasts. Noticing this, Angelica unzipped her jacket to show case her the dark blue bra that supported her soft cleavage. Isabell didn’t appear to notice and continued to stare as Steve shot ocular daggers at Angelica. She winked back and leaned forward.

“Elfford manor, by the stars.” Isabell muttered as Tina finished. Then those purple blinked and refocused directly on the soft downy fur of Angelica’s cleavage. Isabell's eyes stole up to the cat’s gentle leer and bounced back down to the breasts before her cheek blossomed into a rosy flush. “Young lady!” She exclaimed and averted her eyes.

“You were staring so hard,” Angelica’s purr rumbled through the room, “I just want to make sure your eyes landed on something soft.”

“My stars…” Isabell pulled at the collar of her high neck blouse.

“Sorry Auntie,” Steve squeaked, her own cheeks hot on Isabell’s behalf, “The game’s magic makes us… forward.”

“You’re the one who made sure I’m proud of these wonderful pillows.” Angelica hefted a breast without shame. “Although I don’t think I needed that particular push.”

“I know!” Steve whimpered. “It was me or you!”

“Ladies Please!” Isabell pleaded.

Tina, who had been about to leap into the conversation, shut her muzzle and leaned back with a small, “heh.”

After a moment of silence, Isabell met the gaze of everyone in the room. “I have good news and bad news. Good news, Elfford manor isn’t far from here. It was the home of the first Merlin of the United States when magic reappeared in 1960’s, Sigourney Tipper. This game is likely one of their creations. Viewed it as the most wonderful of forces. Developed enchantments that gather magic and concentrate it. They loved games. Back in those days, very few people knew what magically active materials were. Tipper got a hold of orichalcum so pure that his creations have virtually no limit on the amount of magic they can hold. This game of yours has probably been gathering magic for decades and might have developed an intelligence far past its parameters.”

“So it's having us bring it home?” Steve asked.

Isabell laughed softly as she got up from her chair to stand in front of a long decorative mirror to smile at her reflection. “Here’s the bad news. No one’s found Elfford Manor in fifty years. Tipper protested the regulation of magic in the 80s and after the government killed him Elfford Manor disappeared. It's either gone or protected by a glamor so strong that nobody’s been able to pierce it.” She kissed her finger tips and pressed them to the lips of her reflection. The mirror’s image shimmered, the reflection nodded, reached out of frame and retrieved a bundle of five silver rods, wrapped with bands of black fabric. Isabell took it from her mirrorself with a mutter of thanks, then staggered a bit with their weight. It made a heavy clunk when she set it down on the floor. Each of the rods were at least three inches wide and nearly two feet long. “If your cards somehow change that, then this entire area’s going to be crawling with regulators soon and it's probably best to get rid of five rods of unregistered moon silver. You brought cash right?”

“That would have required going to a bank, which would have been difficult, Auntie.” Steve said.

“Stars… You see.” She scanned all of them and winked at Angelica. “That price was before I knew there were four unregistered magical beings who needed the moon silver.”

“We can’t pay much more than that.” Steve protested.

“Oh Stevie, not to worry. You can keep the money, leave it in the bank. You have so much more to offer than mudane resources. With such lovely, powerful scents. I could do so much with a distillation of them.”

Tina let out a barking laugh. “You want to take our scents?”

“She can have yours,” Angelica commented, “it's nothing but trouble.”

“Oh dearies, I’m not looking to clip your very lovely scent glands. Its nothing so simple nor safe. As a scent witch, I need magical scents to work with, concentrated essences. Yes you can get that from harvesting magical creatures but if I were grinding up manticores for their anal glands then both the dragons and SPMC would be offended. Its far more efficient to direct raw mana through a manticore borrowed from a zoo to get it to over produce it odor and harvest that. The paper work is murder and you need a full circle of witches but it works. I’ve never done it with the scent sources being part of the circle but I’m sure it won’t be that difficult.” A snap of her fingers echoed and a rectangle of floor near the wall lowered down into a hidden staircase.

Angelica’s folded her wings around her body protectively. “You want to run raw magic through our bodies? What could that do to us?”

Isabell picked up the moonsilver. “Nothing hopefully, besides increasing the potency of your scent by several magnitudes. It might increase the strength of your enchantments momentarily. The procedure is similar to how they extend the duration of magical augments, but those are specifically constructed to be refueled. Come now, it will only take an hour or so.”

Steve, Tina and Angelica had a brief huddle, discussing options of which their were few. Steph said nothing, but her eyes gleamed with a certain mania. As they concluded they would go through with it, she whispered to Steve, “Don’t worry, the old Stinker will get hers.”

Read Chapter 23