Cooking with Adja Ch. 02

"I'm actually... I think I'm in love." Adja admitted to her old friend, "She might actually be the one for me. Time will tell, but... I'm hearing wedding bells."

"Better book in with M.A., then. Hearing things shouldn't be ignored." Tomas joked lightly.

She shrugged, "I know a gay relationship, in this village, is going to kind of suck. Everyone is up their own ass. But... Iniya's got the mountain, I got the farm. If the village rejects us, we can reject them."

"Paul's dick enough to try and block your access to the airstrip." Tomas cautioned.

Adja gave a small chuckle, "He can try. But if he thinks dealing with my mum when she was pissed off was bad, he ain't got nothing. I'm a thousand times worse, and I'm a vindictive bitch."

Tomas laughed at that, nodding, "Yeah. I still remember when I wrecked your ant's nest. It was just a stupid science homework thing!"

"And your underpants were just a perfect replacement." Adja snickered.

"For months!"

"Don't exaggerate. Six weeks."

Tomas looked at her, and shook his head. "Well, it's good to see you're doing okay. I did actually have some mail for you, too. Came on the Forestry plane, with the fly-ins."

"Oh?" Adja said in surprise. She hadn't ordered anything.

He pointed towards her house, that they were coming up to. Sitting in front of it was a tall box, leaning up against the wood. It was not a small parcel, and getting it out to her farm by hand must have taken more than a little effort.

"Oh, wow." Adja blinked, "Thanks. I should have brought the four-by-four down to pick that one up. How'd you manage it?"

"Afraid I towed it behind my bike." He gave a soft laugh. "Hoping it wasn't delicate...?"

She shrugged, "No idea what it is."

However, as they neared the house, Adja realised she wasn't about to get a chance to solve that mystery. In the shade of the veranda, she could see someone looking a little impatient, and a little annoyed that she hadn't been home.

Which was frankly to be expected, when it came to Ryan. Seemed like she was going to have to deal with the whole island today. Maybe the djinn was already reaching out to try and ruin her day as much as possible. That was a kind of torture.

Tomas slowed down as he saw her guest, and gave a small frown, "I guess... I'll see you around, then."

"Ta." She rolled her eyes.

The mailman shrugged, before heading off towards the path to escape, rather than standing by his friend as she dealt with an unwelcome guest. She glared at him go, before realising how she was dressed, and grinned as she walked up to Ryan as if excited to see him.

She stuck out a hand, and he instinctively grabbed her shit-covered glove. Adja grinned as she shook it heavily, "Well, well. Been a while since you've managed to come out this way, Ry."

"Ryan." He corrected, before pulling his hand back and looking at it in disgust. He went to brush it off against his pants before hesitating and looking around. Unfortunately, she did leave towels around for this sort of thing, so he was soon cleaning himself.

"What brings your round, Ry?"

"Ryan." He repeated with a glare, and then gave a heavy sigh. "We're having problems with water down at the new pine plantation. Seems like you've got a bit of a river running through your property."

"Oh yay. My problems are making your day." She said sarcastically and shrugged, "My bilge pump gave out. The wellspring is flooding fucking everything, Ry. Unless you're here to fix it, get lost."

"You're going to fix it. Today." He stated firmly.

She burst out laughing, "Today? I probably can't fix it for a week! My entire crop is fucking dead. I'd have fixed it yesterday if I was magic, but because no one is actually magic, how about you go and fuck off?"

"You're saying there's nothing doing." Ryan crossed his arms.

She nodded and looked at him firmly.

He gave a heavy sigh and his shoulders dropped, "I... I'm not really trying to give you a hard time about things, Adja. Really. It's just... This mess has killed our new planting, and the bosses are breathing down my neck. They might fire me, if I can't find a miracle."

"Miracles." She winced.

Adja would have been tempted to try and fix the whole damn mess with a spell or six, considering how much pressure she was feeling under. Unfortunately, casting about magic near to a terrifying spirit out of legend, was not the wisest thing to do.

He looked at her with concern, knowing he wasn't the only terrible thing in her day, but really not having any idea what to do.

She sighed heavily, and pointed one of her hands over to a shed. "I've got three portable pumps in there. They won't be nearly enough, but you should be able to use them to try and start the drainage at your end. Keep things alive. I still need to fix my end, priority."

"Thanks." Ryan relaxed a little, but as he did, his skin seemed to ripple. It wasn't a shadow exactly, and might have been dismissed as a shiver. Except she knew that there was something going around the village.

Adja's day wasn't going to get remotely better, until she got around to taking the spirit out of her friend. Everything it touched was being poisoned against her. The thing knew who its enemy was.

She moved by Ryan into the house, leaving him to sort out his end, and dumping her tainted clothing by the entryway. Usually she would have left it outside, but she was distracted.

Trapping a djinn was the kind of spell that got you into all sorts of trouble.

The circle of flowers, with the core of magic, was enough to keep most things in place. But seeing Ryan, and his pressured antagonism towards her, told her that it wasn't enough.

Not nearly enough.

---

Adja didn't actually have a clue what to do. She'd never touched the kind of magic, that this situation called for.

Her mother had tried to teach it to her, of course. She'd taught her all about the strange clearings in the forest, where the Veil was thinner. Taught her how to pace the clearing, find the seam that ran between the two worlds. Showed her, trained her, how to peel back the edge and drift from the here to the... World of Alice in Wonderland.

That shit still gave her nightmares.

She found herself preping to cook, just out of nervous habit. Her hands needed to do something, as her mind imploded at the thought of maybe tip-toeing into the next world, to drag the djinn kicking and screaming behind her.

All it needed really was a few flowers.

Adja skipped out her back door quickly, and knelt knee deep into the mud. Most of her zucchinis weren't allowed to go to flower. She ate them, instead. But she always tried to leave a few, so that she could make this particular thing.

It was a vegetarian snack, the words which would sent most people fleeing. People who had never had a decent chef put together foods people were actually interested in eating.

Adja took all half-dozen flowers back inside with her, washing them briefly to get rid of the mud. She sniffed them almost instinctively, and that knocked her right out of her reverie. It was a foul and musty scent, and not meant for the human appetite.

She put a pan onto the stovetop, adding enough oil for some deep frying. Her cupboards were really starting to look bare, but this was something that almost anybody could pull off. The flowers, though, most people wouldn't have available.

Some more crushed garlic came out, and added to the pan. Gently sizzling and filling the room with the peaceful smell. Fresh would have been better, but she lived on an island. Fresh was done only by your own hand.

As that cooked, she got out a mixing bowl, and spun a little more garlic in, along with some water, and then as she reached for the eggs, she stared in betrayal at her fridge.

"- and then Zurin really got mad. I mean, I thought this was the most mad that I had ever seen her. I swear she was weighing whether killing me was even worth the effort, or if she could come up with -" Dixon rambled onwards, as Adja blinked.

She must be really worried and distracted, not to notice the adorable little goblin popping in. She didn't wait for him to finish his worried statement, because she knew from experience that he would just keep on going.

"This is terrible, but is there any chance you can get me some eggs? For cooking! Eggs for cooking." Adja smiled.

Dixon hesitated, blinked twice, and then vanished with a pop. Adja turned down the pan a little, and whisked the garlic in water idly. He had probably actually come to her for a good reason but...

She really wished that she wasn't a witch.

Right now, all Adja wanted was to be able to spend some meaningful time with Iniya. She usually got to skip out on her witching duties, whenever she felt like. She could even put most of the farming things on halt for a day or two, with only a lot of work following.

She'd fed the animals, and lost most of the fields, so it wasn't fair that she couldn't just snuggle into the arms of a woman who cared about her, and escape all the usual crap that the world tossed back and forth.

She didn't want to have to be the one to deal with this. She wished that Zurin could be less of a bitching faery, and just take over. Step in and make sure that all the magical things didn't try and unravel reality itself.

"Eggs!" Dixon announced as the air popped, proudly holding up two eggs, each of which was the size of his head. It'd probably take a theologian to work out where the hell he'd got those.

Adja took one hesitantly, using a spoon to tap and crack the top, before looking in cautiously. The thing seemed like an egg. Just... Big.

She shrugged and poured it into the water, before whisking thoroughly to combine it all. Then she took one of the zucchini flowers and pushed it down to the bottom of the batter to soak for a moment.

"So, Dixon. Zurin is pulling her hair out, again?"

He nodded enthusiastically, "She's been pulling out threads to run reads on you and everything here, all the time! I think she might be watching us, right now!"

"Nope." Adja sniggered, "I've got a spell or two around my home. No one gets to peek in, without my permission."

She turned back to the bowl, and began plucking the batter soaked leaves off the flower, and dropping each one into the hot oil. They sizzled quickly, hardening and darkening into a luscious brown.

Adja worked quickly, with experience, to finish cooking her zucchini chips. As she did, she asked, "So what would Zurin like me to be doing, then?"

"She's worried about the djinn. She reckons you should just kill the host, and then everything will be done with that. I said that you never kill anything, especially not with magic. That you think using magic for such a horrible thing would be taking us right back to the war and everything!"

She winced, "Ah. Well, the fae needs to be more patient. I think I've got things handled."

She didn't. Neither thinking it, nor actually having it, but she wasn't going to have a nightmare busting down the walls of...

The walls.

Adja smiled slowly, "In fact, I'm pretty sure how I'm going to catch the bugger."

---

She gave a reluctant look to her package on her way out, but Adja was needed elsewhere. She took the chips with her, as a small present to try and ease tensions.

Because... Because she was about to apologise to Astrid, for destroying one of her most prized possessions. The scouting badge from her childhood, and what Adja thought might be one of the last things the woman had to remember her father by.

Adja trudged in her boots over her flooded fields, and to the damp road, before walking in towards the town. She could have taken the quad, and that would been fast and easy... But she really didn't know exactly how she was going to approach that conversation.

Losing the badge hadn't actually fixed anything, either! All it had done was let her know she was dealing with some forces that were above the average, and needed a lot more attention than she was used to giving.

Being born a witch sucked.

Zurin was the one who tried to keep all the faen in line, but she was forbidden from crossing into the living world. A set of rules that had existed before humanity had really evolved. Breaking that would set the kind of precedent that would end the world.

She had no delusions about what horrors magic was capable of. All the little spells that she cast, were little. They were designed to be small and mostly harmless. It didn't mean that she didn't know ones of a bigger scale. It didn't mean that she thought magic was just a fun little thing to play around with.

Unfortunately, thinking about what magic was capable of, ate up the rest of her short journey. She was standing outside the tiny house before she even realised that she was in the town.

Adja winced, took a deep breath, and stepped into the reception.

"Will you just shut the actual fuck up, and let me get a word in edgeways!" Astrid shouted into the phone, slamming a hand down on her table.

The hand managed to catch and break a pen, which immediately leaked and made Astrid go scrambling. Squeezing her head and shoulder together to hold onto the phone as she grabbed for a tissue box.

Adja stepped up instantly, muttering a quick spell under her breath instinctively. Before taking and cleaning the hand, with a smile and roll of her eyes at Astrid. THe ink came free, in the main, thanks to the spell.

The secretary rolled her eyes back, and motioned towards the phone.

Adja guiltily took a seat, looking at her friend have a tiring back and forth with some supplier or another. Someone off island, who didn't see the problem with delaying their products turning up to the shipping yard by a day or two.

Not understanding that when it came to island life... Delays like that might mean that the yarding costs could exceed practicality on getting to the product.

It wasn't worth spending a hundred bucks an hour, to wait the two more days for a flight already coming to the island, to transfer fifty bucks worth of groceries.

If any supplier made a habit of that kind of delay, just turning up late for a plane that was already gone, then you needed to make it clear to them that they either had to shape up, or lose their customer.

This really did not feel like the right moment to come out and say what she had done, especially when she couldn't explain why.

Adja continued to panic, shifting awkwardly in her seat, as she searched for even the right sentence to start the conversation. There was no reasonable way she could have stumbled on the badge, as hidden away with everything else that it was.

But it wasn't right to trick Astrid into thinking she had just lost it, sometime in the future. It was the most meaningful thing that she owned. Had owned.

Astrid suddenly paused mid-sentence, and dropped the phone. Not hanging it up, just letting the handset clatter over the top of the desk.

Adja looked up in surprise, and then buried a squeal in her throat at the shadow looming up behind her friend. A shadow that might be humanoid, but could never be mistaken for being human. The bulging shapes weren't even symmetrical as it reared up, tugging on cords around Astrid.

The woman moved jerkily, hands limp as the wrists pushed her to her feet. Astrid's head swayed limply, but there was actual fear in those eyes.

The witch launched to her feet, throwing out a hand, and shouting, "Step away from my mate, or it'll be too late!"

A howling wind came back the other way, picking up and tossing Adja into the wall. Her feet dangling above the chair, as she was flattened. She gritted her teeth, trying to peer through the air battering at her eyes.

"Kneel down low!" Adja screamed, "Or you'll be forced to face my blow!"

A deep and rumbling sound echoed through the room. The laughter of a chest deep and strong. No words. Just laughing at her efforts, as she formulated the three beat spell.

The witch grimaced, and completed it, "Abandon thy mate, feel the demise of a myriad of ones!"

The wind vanished, and Adja instantly fell, hitting the chair and getting a leg caught before striking her chin against the floor. Her teeth clacked together so hard, she was afraid she'd chipped one, but her watering eyes went looking for her friend.

Astrid was leaning against the desk, somehow upright. She was breathing hard, and seemed utterly confused.

The witch pulled herself out of the chair, and stumbled upright, moving over to her and putting a hand between her shoulders, "Are you okay?"

"I... Wha...?" Astrid said in confusion, blinking and looking around, and then seemed to see her for the first time. "Adja? Did you need something?"

She couldn't tell her. Not now.

The thing would come back.

"You're not looking okay, Astrid." She said slowly, "I think... You ought to head home."

Especially as Adja maintained protective spells on every house, and not just her own.

Astrid winced, and rubbed the back of her neck as she stood up, "Eugh. I think I might have actually overdone it. Can you let Jonathan know? I'm heading home to bed. Taking a sickie."

Adja reassured her, and watched the woman leave glumly, even as her own hands were still shaking from the adrenaline rush.

However, there was one thought plaguing her in the aftermath of it all. She knew she'd have to face it again, and that the people of the island were in actual danger, but...

What if it did that to Iniya?

---

Adja wasn't sure if she was shaking, or crying, by the time she got home. She was flipping between terrified, and her danger sense going off like crazy. One or the other, not both at once.

She didn't notice the porch as she stumbled her way indoors, and she had to pause to take a breath after dumping her jumper onto the ground. Adja fell back against the wall, closing her eyes and focusing on breathing through her nose.

Helped with the breathing, didn't seem to do a thing about her heart slamming away against the confines of her chest.

"Do you even have a working underwear? That is far too pretty."

Her eyes snapped open, and she flung a hand forward, before biting her tongue and staring at the dark-skinned woman looking at her in mild confusion. Thankfully, she didn't appear frightened, but more amused.

Wouldn't have been so amused if Adja had let off that particular spell.

Adja took a deep breath, and then glanced down at her exposed bra, and back up to her girlfriend. "So I like ta feel pretty. Sue me."

"No thankyou." Iniya replied with a grin, "Do you wish to take a shower? Dinner is still in the oven. I may have taken a few liberties, to be able to prepare it for you."

Adja's jaw trembled, and she stumbled forward and hugged the outrageously kind woman. She pressed her chin into Iniya's shoulder and did her best not to burst out howling in pain. This surprise, after her day... It was too much.

Tears slipped down and into the edge of her nose. Making her gross and disgusting, as she wept weakly into the other woman. She was too weak for any of this. She couldn't be a witch.

She didn't deserve to be one.

How was she supposed to save the world, when she could hardly tell someone else what she was feeling? She loved Iniya. They might have only just started dating, but the thought of losing her... It had been more than she could handle.

Iniya patted her back gently, saying nothing. Not a single word, but all the care in the world. That was the beautiful kindness of this woman, she always seemed to know what was best to do.

Adja leaned back and sniffled ugly, "I need some tissues."

"And a shower." Iniya nodded and cupped her cheek.

She laughed, and went back to the door, before kicking off her pants. "Yeah, I must be a bit of a mess. I'll take a quick shower, and then have your amazing dinner."