“Son of a bitch!” I said, holding my now throbbing head and trying to ward off subsequent blows, only there weren’t any. Probably because my hassock with the soul of a Doberman had knocked whatever-it-was to the floor and was trying to savage it, only it didn’t have any teeth. It did have a good bit of heft and hard little feet and swinging tassels that kept hitting its prey in the face, however, obscuring its view.
Which is why the batty little thing didn’t see me roll to my feet and snatch away the broom. Of course, I didn’t use it. I didn’t do anything at all except spare myself future head trauma, but you’d never know it. The creature stopped wrestling the furniture and huddled before me in fear, old, age-spotted hands curled over its misshapen noggin.
I stared from it to the broom, which I wasn’t even brandishing menacingly, wondering what the hell, before Augustine jerked it away from me.
And then tossed it aside, booted away my tasseled defender, and gathered up the tiny old whatever-it-was gently into his arms. And stood there glaring at me from over top of its head, like I was the aggressor! I just stood there for a moment, swaying, my head throbbing, and finally reached tilt.
I turned around and started out the door, when a long-fingered hand grabbed my arm. “You don’t want to know what’s going on?”
“No.”
So, of course, he proceeded to tell me.
“They were imprisoning him! I didn’t have a choice!”
I sighed, knowing I’d regret this, and turned back around.
“Who were?”
“The damned witches!”
I swear my heart iced over. “What. Witches?”
“Don’t look at me like that! This is your fault! You wouldn’t tell me, or I wouldn’t have had to eavesdrop—”
Fuck.
“—and follow the girls back to where you bought that dress in the first place—”
Fuck.
“—and find him laboring in some kind of third-world sweatshop—”
FUCK.
“—so, of course, I had to get him out—”
“You stole him from the covens? No wonder they came after me!”
Augustine brushed it away. “They were doing that anyway, that’s how I got him out—in the ruckus your representatives were throwing up. I got away clean,” he assured me, like that made it better. “Nobody saw me—”
“Put. Him. Back!”
“Not. A. Chance!”
“Augustine!”
“You don’t even know who he is yet!”
“I don’t want to know!”
“Well, you’re going to. This is—”
I held up a finger. “First: is it dangerous?”
“He,” Augustine snapped, “and no. You scared him!”
“My apologies.” My head throbbed some more. “Second: is it something I need to deal with?”