“You saying Parsnit cards lie?” I said.

“I’m warning you not to use the cards to lie to yourself, Buddy,” she said.

“Miss Arabella,” said Tally. “Can I ask you for a favor?”

“Sure, honey,” she said. “Go right on ahead.”

Tally was looking right bashful, her face down to the floor, wiggling her foot back and forth like she was grinding out a tiny fire.

“You seem like a real powerful witch,” she said, “and I got this problem, with how I was born.”

“You mean with how you were born, being spider-folk and all?”

“You could tell?” said Tally.

“I wouldn’t be much of a witch if I couldn’t,” said Miss Arabella. “But it’s a great gift, being spider-folk. Many would kill—and I mean that literally—to have an ounce of your power.”

“But I don’t want it,” said Tally. “I’ve never wanted it. I hate it. I hate it more than anything in the whole world.”

Miss Arabella rubbed her chin all thoughtful-like.

“I suppose I could repress the spider part of you, yes,” she said. “I could hide it deep in your mind, waiting there, curled up and asleep for all your life. Would you like that, honey?”

“Yes,” said Tally. “I’d like that more than anything.”

“It will be a hard spell,” said Miss Arabella, “and quite painful. Are you sure you want that part of you hidden?”

Tally looked up at Miss Arabella, her eyes soft and unfierce and tearful. “I don’t want to be a monster anymore.”

But Miss Arabella wasn’t listening. Her face had gone blank, like the moon, like someone had up and wiped it clean.

“What’s wrong?” I said.

An explosion sounded on the fourth floor. Folks were screaming.

Through the open doorway I saw a woman dressed in a wedding gown that stretched long and elegant twelve feet behind her like a train of white ghosts running down the hallway, her head thrown back cackling, her eyes red as fire. She had to be a witch, I just knew it. Her hair was black and flowing behind her, her teeth were jagged like fangs, and her fingernails grew out long in front of her like knives.

Miss Arabella whirled toward the door, and her dress seemed to rise and cover both me and Tally, making us small somehow, sweeping us right under her skirts to where we clung to her legs all old and thin and bony.

“Drusilla Fey, honey, is that you?” said Miss Arabella.

“Arabella,” said the other lady. “Looking well, considering.”

“I am under a bit of duress at the moment,” said Miss Arabella. I could feel her legs quaking, I could feel how brave and afraid she was.

“There’s no resistance now, dear,” said Drusilla Fey. “Bow to him, and he will show you mercy.”

“I think not, honey,” said Miss Arabella. “I don’t consider myself one to bow to any living person, and not to borrowed magic such as his.”

“Oh but you will bow,” said Drusilla Fey, “even if he has to break your legs to make you do it.”