Deadly Forest: A Green Witch Mystery, page 12
“She’s under the weather,” Louise said a beat before Rhianne could craft her version of the story. So, Rhianne nodded along, sealing the deal on the fib. “So Rhianne is helping out today.”
“A city slicker, huh?” Tom chuckled.
Rhianne gave her outfit a once-over, half expecting to find a ‘Sydneysider’ label stuck on her somewhere.
Tom pointed at the card reader before opening some of the testing jam jars. “Good on you for showing Rhianne the machine. Elvira might be in a standoff with modern tech, but Asher goes ahead and uses it anyway. We keep telling her she is missing out on sales, but she’s stubborn.”
Louise chuckled. “She makes amazing jams, but only half the people use cash nowadays. I suppose you know she doesn’t like anything modern. Don’t even mention supermarkets around her; she’ll give you an earful. Yet, for someone supposedly off the grid, she’s the local news network.”
“You mean she wa — is a bit of a gossip?” Rhianne said. She hoped they’d miss her slip.
“Is she ever!” Louise said. “In these parts, she’s the go-to for who’s splitting up or going bankrupt.”
“I bet people are not happy about that,” Rhianne said.
Louise shrugged, and Tom chuckled. “You’re in the country now. Everyone knows everybody’s business around here. But Elvira… she also kept us in the loop about community stuff.”
Tom danced around the word ‘community,’ his eyes darting to Rhianne as if expecting her to react. Maybe he was fishing for something, or perhaps it was the local way — curiosity mixed with a dash of caution?
“Anyhow, she’s always diagnosing people and swearing by her herb collection. Thinks she can fix everything from zits to heart trouble with a sprinkle of this and a pinch of that,” Tom said.
Louise, her earlier grin slipping away, dug out some brochures from a box. “I kept telling her she’s playing with fire, marketing her concoctions like they’re magic spells. Look at this.” She flourished a brochure featuring an artistic rendition of the human anatomy, each ailment lovingly paired with a herb like a fine wine with cheese.
Rhianne took the brochure, her eyebrows climbing up her forehead. She recognised every herb listed, including elderberries and echinacea, but a couple of them made her stomach do a nervous flip.
“Next time you see her, could you talk some sense into her? We’ve got health inspectors popping in more often than you’d think, and something like this could land her in hot water.”
Customers began to stream in, and Tom and Louise hustled back to their stalls. Rhianne sold a few jams to an eclectic mix of people, from elderly gentlemen with worn tweed caps who savoured the nostalgia in each jar to young mothers with toddlers in tow, eagerly looking for wholesome, homemade treats.
Rhianne lingered for a few more hours, hoping for more insights, but the market quieted down without further revelations. Toto had wandered off earlier, attempting to glean anything about Elvira from the chatter among the crowd, but returned with nothing to report.
When she chatted with the other people running stalls, it turned out that while they all got along with Elvira at the market, nobody hung out with her outside of it. Most of them didn’t even know where she lived, just that it was somewhere inland.
Rhianne let Tom and Louise know she had some other stuff to take care of and started packing up. She loaded up what was left into the van and figured she’d give the hairdresser a shot next. She was hoping it wouldn’t be too packed since it was a Wednesday.
“I shall conduct another reconnaissance from the air and see what else I can glean of the whereabouts of Asher,” Toto said.
A pang of guilt hit Rhianne hard. Here she was, all caught up in figuring out stuff about Elvira, when she should be all in on finding Asher. Their only leads were as clear as mud, courtesy of the local trees’ rather abstract memory art.
Whoever took out Elvira probably had Asher, so tracking down the killer seemed like the best shot at finding him. But if the trip to the hairdresser’s turned up empty, then what?
Meanwhile, Grandpa had set up a few search parties. The dryads knew the land like the back of their hands. Rhianne figured she wouldn’t be much help out there in the woods anyway. Yet a niggling sensation persisted.
She drove the van into the town centre and found parking around the corner from Maggie’s. Ah! The joys of country living!
Rhianne strolled past a bunch of shops, soaking in the relaxed atmosphere of the place.
First up was a café whose walls boasted a riot of vibrant colours — a hipster haven, complete with quirky paintings that danced playfully across its animated interior. Its glass counter showcased a spread of cakes that reminded her stomach that breakfast was a distant memory and lunch was long overdue.
Next, she breezed past a clothing store where the dresses danced in the wind, plotting their great escape from the hangers. The most intriguing was an old bookshop, door half-open, inviting her in with that old book smell leaking out.
Finally, she arrived at her destination. Inside, a few stylists snipped away at their clients’ hair, chatting away. The decor was a quirky mix of vintage mirrors and potted plants. The sound of hairdryers, chatter, and soft music filled the air.
Rhianne made her way to the small counter at the front.
“Can I help you?” A young woman with pink hair and eyeliner sharp enough to rival a Cleopatra sculpture looked up. Her flat voice revealed her boredom.
“I’m looking for Antonia,” she said.
The woman, whose name tag read ‘Maria’, opened a notebook with the speed of a koala and plucked a pen from an assortment of them in a mug.
“Do you have an appointment?”
It hadn’t even crossed Rhianne’s mind she might need to fabricate a reason to see Antonia, but faced with the prospect of being turned away, she blurted out, “No, I just want a wash and styling. With Antonia.”
Maria gave a half-hearted glance towards the back, where the stylists were busy. She sighed. “She’ll be available in twenty if you want to wait.”
Rhianne nodded, gave her name, and ducked out to the café she’d passed earlier. Back at her new favourite brainstorming spot, she ordered a Thai curry pie and a chai tea — the real deal, not the powder kind.
A few minutes later, her food arrived, with the tea promising warmth and possibly wisdom. Taking a bite of the pie, she winced as the spices launched an enthusiastic assault on her taste buds, sparking not just her appetite but also a new line of thought: Where exactly do you hide a teen boy so the world turns a blind eye? The burning sensation was oddly inspiring, turning each chew into a brainstorming session fuelled by capsaicin and curiosity.
The first obvious place would be in the forest. But if that was the case, wouldn’t the dryads already have got the trees to cough up his location? She bit her lip, thinking this over, and realised she was jumping to conclusions.
Grandpa had been pretty amazed when the trees ‘talked’ to her, even though their idea of talking was more like sending vague vibes than actual words.
From what Rhianne had experienced, trees were big on feelings and blurry pictures, not the daily news. Plus, Grandpa had said trees didn’t get the whole time thing, considering they were long-lived. So, to a tree, yesterday might as well be five years ago. And with more than two thousand hectares of forest to search, even the most enthusiastic dryad would feel as if they were trying to find a whisper in a whirlwind.
The second possible place was the town itself. All the concrete and buildings were like static on the tree network, likely jamming any natural signals.
It was simpler to hide someone where the hustle and bustle of daily life kept everyone too busy to notice. While Coffs Harbour was a country town, it wasn’t exactly small fry — as one of the largest towns in the state, it boasted a population well into the tens of thousands.
Sure, neighbours might be nosier than in a sprawling metropolis like Sydney, but even here, a person could find pockets of anonymity to disappear into.
The third possibility was that he was hidden in plain sight. Maybe tucked away in one of the local cabins or cooped up in a shed? She wasn’t sure if the properties around here had basements, but it was possible.
Hiding him in plain sight was risky but had a certain ‘hide-the-chocolate-in-the-vegetable-drawer’ cleverness to it. Whoever snatched him wouldn’t need to travel far, cutting down on the breadcrumb trail of clues. Asher’s scent would mingle with the everyday smells of the community, potentially throwing off even a keen sniffer like Toto.
It was like playing hide-and-seek by standing behind a curtain — obvious yet somehow invisible.
Another puzzle piece Rhianne chewed on was whether Asher had been nabbed or had decided to run away. That train of thought left her with minor indigestion and led her straight to the possibility of Asher being mixed up in the murder. And honestly, she couldn’t — or rather, didn’t want to — picture him being involved.
Objectivity was key, though. It was entirely feasible that he had his own reasons for lying low, completely oblivious to his grandmother’s demise.
The more time Asher spent off the radar, the more it painted him in a suspicious light. Adding weight to the “voluntary disappearance” theory was the fact he might have left under his own steam.
Either way, if Asher hadn’t been kidnapped, Rhianne was putting her money on him being closer to civilisation. It made sense, and someone who knew the ins and outs of town life could lend him a hand with staying under the radar.
Someone like Antonia. She would be the logical choice for being Asher’s urban survival guide. Rhianne made a mental note to weave in some probing questions when she met Antonia.
If a dryad had kidnapped him, on the other hand, then keeping him hidden in town seemed less likely.
Rhianne’s mind drifted to the forest as a prime spot. But the logistics of keeping a teen boy hidden (and alive — ouch, that thought hurt) without turning into a local legend of mysterious supply runs puzzled her.
Surely someone would notice if there was suddenly more foot or vehicle traffic than usual? Based on her chats yesterday, everyone was either tending to their farms or crafting something in their workshops.
According to the chats she’d had last night at Elvira’s memorial, only a few of the dryads ventured beyond the hinterland for work. That made the town-hiding scenario as unlikely as stumbling upon a surfboard in the middle of the forest.
Yet the world had its share of wild stories, like the Fritzl case in Austria, which made basements synonymous with horror movies. Rhianne shuddered.
Lost in her grim thoughts, she realised her cup was as empty as her plate, save for a few pie crumbs staging a final stand.
It was time to talk to Antonia.
CHAPTER 14
Back at the hairdresser’s, Maria glanced up from a glossy magazine as Rhianne stepped in. “Oh, look who’s back,” she said.
“Maria!” A voice called out from the back. An older woman appeared and looked at Rhianne, her demeanour warming at the sight of a potential customer. “What can we do for you today?”
“Rhianne’s here to see Antonia,” Maria said before Rhianne could respond.
The woman offered Rhianne a friendly smile. “Antonia is one of our newer talents. Are you sure you wouldn’t prefer someone with a bit more experience?”
This confirmed Rhianne’s suspicion that Antonia hadn’t been part of the team for very long. “No, that’s okay. I’m here for a wash and a style, thanks.”
If the woman was disappointed, she didn’t show it. “Of course. Antonia shows great promise; she’s studying at the local college to get her diploma.”
Rhianne leaned forward to read her tag — Angela. Judging by the tilt of her head, the older woman expected some kind of answer.
“That’s great. A friend recommended her to me.”
Angela’s face lit up like a Christmas tree. “Oh, that’s wonderful! We love to hear that. Word-of-mouth is our bread and butter. Out of curiosity, which friend was it?”
As Rhianne was about to conjure a name from thin air, a customer emerged from the styling area, coming to her rescue.
The woman fluffed up her newly styled hair, which fell in soft, short waves around her face. “Angela, darling, is it a masterpiece or what?” She beamed.
Angela didn’t miss a beat, her head nodding in enthusiastic approval. “Absolutely stunning! It’s incredibly flattering. John’s going to think he walked into the wrong house!”
Rhianne suspected Angela would’ve lavished the same praise even if the woman had opted for a fluorescent green dye job.
Trailing behind the ecstatic customer, a stylist in a battle-scarred apron appeared, pride written all over her face. “Told her the same. It frames the shape of her face and accentuates her delicate features.”
The stylist’s dark hair fell to her shoulders, jazzed up with green streaks. As she got closer, Rhianne felt that now-familiar buzz of magic zip down her spine — her magic’s response to spotting other supernaturals.
Cutting through the usual salon smells of hair products and dye was a hint of fresh pine — out of place among the chemical scents.
Rhianne had been getting better at identifying magical beings by their unique scents, which her magic translated for her. She’d first caught this piney whiff last night with the elders and then at the memorial.
It was weird; she’d never felt this buzz around her mother or Grandpa, but then again, maybe her magic didn’t bother signalling family members as ‘supernatural.’
“Your next appointment is here,” Maria said, nodding towards Rhianne.
Antonia’s smile bloomed as her gaze swept over Rhianne, lingering on her face. “So, what are we thinking today? Haircut?” Her eyes sparkled.
Ugh! Was it some kind of hairdresser’s instinct to want to chop off hair? There was a reason Rhianne didn’t like setting foot in salons.
“No, just a wash and style.” Rhianne felt like a broken record.
Antonia’s eyebrows pulled together in confusion before she masked it with a polite smile. “Oh, that’s too bad. You’ve got great hair, though. I’ll throw in a few suggestions for the future.”
Not on your life.
Antonia gestured towards the back of the salon, maintaining her welcoming smile. “This way, please. How did you hear about me?”
Rhianne was ready this time. “A friend of Elvira, Louise, pointed me your way,” she tossed over her shoulder, sliding into the topic she was here for.
For a split second, Antonia’s smile wobbled, her lips pinching together like she’d bitten into a lemon slice. It happened so fast, Rhianne almost missed it. Was it because Elvira was dead or something else?
“So you knew Elvira?” Antonia had recovered, and her tone was friendly. She guided Rhianne to a chair in front of a basin, draping a plastic cape over her shoulders. “Tilt your head back here. And let me know if the water is okay.”
Interesting that Antonia had used the past tense. Even if she hadn’t been home last night, news had a way of travelling fast. With any luck, she wasn’t yet aware of Rhianne’s identity. Hopefully, her cover as just another curious customer hadn’t been blown yet. Diving into espionage mode wasn’t exactly on her list of comfortable activities, but desperate times called for desperate measures — or so she told herself to ease the guilt. “Not particularly well. Did you?”
“Up at the village, we all know each other. Were you one of her customers?” Antonia asked as she fiddled with the tap, eventually unleashing a cascade of water that was neither too hot nor too cold, but just right — Goldilocks would’ve approved.
“You mean her medicinal herbs?” Rhianne played along, enjoying the perfect temperature. It made her want to purr like a contented cat.
“Oh yes.” Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “Her oil mixture is fabulous for shiny hair.”
Had Elvira found an admirer in Antonia? The scent of rose shampoo filled the air, adding to the relaxing atmosphere as Antonia’s skilled fingers massaged Rhianne’s head.
“Indeed,” Rhianne said. She was getting good at this skirting-the-truth business. Her elf father would be proud. “Do you use it yourself? Your hair looks fabulous!” A little flattery could go a long way in prying open the doors of information.
Antonia glanced around before leaning in closer. “I do, but let’s keep that between us. Officially, we’re all about promoting some big-name brands here.”
“Mum’s the word,” Rhianne said, struggling to keep her eyes open under the spell of Antonia’s scalp massage.
“Ooh, you’ve got slightly pointy ears,” Antonia whispered. “What is that, some distant goblin ancestry?”
Rhianne chuckled, a bit surprised by Antonia’s directness, but not offended. In the country, it seemed, people were more curious and less guarded about openly engaging with other supernaturals.
Besides, Elf was never the first guess for her unusual ears, mainly because elves so seldom made their way to Earth. Queen Elara had strict rules about such visits, insisting her subjects get direct approval before making the trip.
That bureaucratic maze was why Rhianne’s elf dad was more of a myth than a reality in her childhood. Of course, his sporadic visits weren’t only because of red tape — there were whispers of more mysterious reasons. But since their father-daughter bonding was still at the “awkward first steps” stage, Rhianne wasn’t about to start grilling him for the details. Yet.
But diving into her quirky family tree (forest?) wasn’t on today’s agenda — time for a bit of strategic sidestepping.
“And what about Asher? You know him too?”
Antonia’s hands paused mid-scalp massage, and Rhianne was sure she heard a gasp over the sound of running water. Antonia resumed the massage. “Asher has done a runner. Everyone’s been on a wild goose chase, trying to pin him down.”
She sounded genuine. Of course, she could also be a skilled actress. And let’s face it, she was already halfway there from what Rhianne had seen and heard so far with her previous customer. The haircut had been fine, but the over-the-top reaction to how good it looked was a bit much.
