Joe was standing at the inn’s doorstep, contemplating his shittiness, when the door opened. Out stepped not WITCHCRAFT, but somebody quite unexpected: Huseby.
He had a good k/d, but was essentially terrible.
He also had an unlit joint sticking out of the corner of his mouth.
He stared at Joe, utterly confused. Then something seemed to go off in his head, because he started trying to pull the joint from his mouth, put away what looked like a pack of matches, and shake Joe’s hand all at the same time. He kind of fucked it up.
They shook hands eventually, exchanging garbled greetings. Joe hadn’t been expecting to see another shitty cav player here, and apparently neither had Huseby.
Huseby fished the matches back out of his pocket, setting one alight with a scratch and snap. He set the match to the joint, the end of which glowed bloody-butthole red. He inhaled deeply, paused, and then exhaled.
He was suddenly calmer. “What’s up, Joe?”
Joe wasn’t sure if he should tell Huseby exactly what was up. He was on a mission and missions were usually super secret. “Oh, you know. Just going for a…stroll.”
Something that sounded like a bobcat screamed in the nearby forest.
“Yeah man,” Huseby said. “I feel you.” He stared at the little burning roll of paper and plant in his hand. “Oh, hey, did ever find your horse? That courser?”
Joe shook his head.
“Sorry to hear that.” Huseby gestured towards the stables with the glowing tip of his joint. “Funny I run into you, of all people. I was just about to go…well you know.” He grabbed his crotch with his free hand. His eyebrows danced up and down and he licked his lips.
Ah, the old fuckeroo. It was a great past time, amongst cav players, to fuck their steeds. Sometimes it was just a sort of courtesy, sometimes it was purely sexual, and other times—as in Joe’s case—a real bond formed. But no matter how it was done, it was always done.
“I’m traveling for business. I gave up leading men to war—not worthwhile in my opinion, with the way things are now. No Bueno. I’m an honest trader now, looking to make an honest buck.”
“What’re you selling?”
Huseby smiled through the joint between his lips. “Goods, man. Really good goods, you know?”
Joe frowned. “Like, exotic concrete? Beaver hides?”
“Hmmm, more like weed. Cocaine. Ecstasy.”
“Oh.”
“It’s much more lucrative than the usual trading. More beneficial to Calradia’s population, too. They’re all uppity nowadays: crime’s soaring. So, I figured maybe I could do something to, you know, mellow people out.”
“That’s very nice of you, Huseby. You’re a good man. Got a nice pair of balls on you.” Joe didn’t care much for drugs. He was, however, curious about WITCHCRAFT. “But on another note: what’s up with FCC’s resident magician?”
“Uh, well…” Huseby was clearly struggling to make words happen. “He, uh...” He gestured at the building. “Well, you know.”
That confirmed it. “He’s rapin’ people in there,” Joe said.
Huseby shook his head. “Not quite.” He dropped his joint onto the porch, ground it out with his heel, and left to go fuck his horse without another word to Joe.
Well, whatever WITCHCRAFT was doing, Joe was certain it wouldn’t be that bad.
Joe pushed the door open and stepped into the bed and breakfast. He was immediately struck by the warmth of the place, which slapped his face like a big, hot dick. Shaking his head, blinking, Joe then looked around to see a perfectly normal bed and breakfast. There was a big, roaring fireplace, with a few reclines and loveseats around it. There was a baby grand piano in the corner, and there were random paintings of quaint landscapes all over the walls. Joe peered at one. It was a guy shooting some ducks, a barking cocker spaniel at his feet.
“Cocker,” Joe mumbled.
Then he noticed the two men sitting together in a loveseat by the fire. They were talking in low voices and drinking beer—one had a dozen empty bottles of Bud Light Lime at his feet, the other was drinking a single glass of the same, wincing with every sip.
They were both wearing footsie pajamas. Pajamas that bore the proud heraldry of the Hounds of Chulainn.
So, Bonesaw was here with one of his men. Probably Zues. Apparently this place attracted guests from all over Calradia.
They were too busy talking to notice Joe, who walked past them on his way to the next room, which he guessed was the kitchen. He smelled cinnamon, which reminded him of a few particularly scrumptious evenings spend with the Gay Knights. Such evenings were how he’d become gay. You just pour a bunch of cinnamon all over a dick with some whipped cream and boom, it’s quite palatable. Eventually you get into unadorned dicks, tasted for their own, unique flavors. Eventually you get into harder stuff. Some people became full-fledged Cockaholics. Like Sandersson, who was usually discovered when he woke up moaning late in the afternoon, his face marred by bloodshot eyes and the old five o’cock shadow—jizz all over his chin from another night of wanton incockication.
Joe stepped into the kitchen.
WITCHCRAFT was pouring apple slices into a little bowl if pie dough on an island countertop amidst a sea of steaming pots and sizzling meats in cast-iron pans. He was whistling a down-home tune.
Instead of the usual dark robes or human skin, dripping fat, WITCHCRAFT wore a poofy, yellow dress. When he turned his dress swirled, his flowing, brown hair swirling too. Seen from above, Joe imagined he would probably look just like piss being flushed down a toilet with a little turd in the middle.
Instead of being covered in blood, he was covered in flour.
Joe cleared his throat. “Erm, WITCHCRAFT!”
WITCHCRAFT jumped, spilling caramelled apples onto the counter.
“Sorry, caps.”
“Joseph?” WITCHCRAFT’s voice was definitely male, but it was high pitched and lilting now, in a way it hadn’t been before. It was like he was really taking the girl-roleplay thing seriously.
Joe thought he heard a southern drawl, too.
“Joseph! Oh lawdy goodness!”
“Oh fuck.”
WITCHCRAFT rushed to Joe and hugged him. He smelled like apples, and perfume.
Joe’s baffled mind struggled to form a greeting, but he was shell-shocked. He, a veteran of many bloody campaigns against all sorts of monsters, like LCO, who fought naked covered in pizza sauce. Seeing this mozzarella fiends in action had been unsettling. But not as bad as this. Joe swallowed. “You, uh, smell nice. WITCHCRAFT!” He bellowed.
“Quit your hollarin’ Joey! You ain’t Kesh, this ain’t TS, and we ain’t playin’ no Strat fight!”
Joe could feel all of WITCHCRAFT’s exclamation points. They dug into his very soul, demanding that he conform to happiness like the pink jack-booted enforcers of some sick, dystopian Happyland.
WITCHCRAFT went back to pouring apples into his pie. “Now, Joey, I’m a busy girl! I got lots of pies to make! So why don’t you tell me what you need, honey?”
“I need to fuck my horse.”
“Pardon?”
“I need your help finding Courser. You must have some kind of magic—some spell or something to help me find my loomed poontang? You, a powerful witch.”
WITCHCRAFT giggled. She flicked her free hand, and on the other side of the room a pot removed its own lid and began pouring into a colander in the sink. The stove opened, revealing a tray of cookies, which hovered out and settled onto the counter beside the cluttered stove. “I got’s magic!” she cried. “But,” her face suddenly got serious. “I can’t help you. Not anymore.”
“What?” Joe gasped. “Why? What happened to you?”
WITCHCRAFT just giggled again. “Joe! I ain’t got time for blood magic! That’s just gonna have to wait a while.”
“Wait for what? How long are we talking about here?”
WITCHCRAFT sighed, she gestured at a cluttered, small table in the corner and all the shit flew off of it. He pulled the chair out for Joe, who duly sat down.
Then the piano flourished in the other room. Was Bonesaw playing?
“I ain’t got time for messing around. It’s not my style.”
He shoved a flier into Joe’s hand. It was a copy of the billboard he’d seen earlier, on the way here—a little advertisement. “This whole town can slow you down, people taking the easy way.”
Joe was trying to read the flier but the piano was really jamming in the other room now.
“But I know exactly where I’m going—getting closer and closer every day. I’m almost there, I’m almost there. People down here think I’m crazy, but I don’t care!” He was singing and dancing around Joe’s table now. “Trials and tribulations, I’ve had my share. There ain’t nothing gonna stop me now ‘cause I’m almost there!”
Joe was scared now. He got up from the table, but tripped and sprawled. WITCHRACT just hovered over him, her face inches from his. She said, “ ‘I remember my Daddy told me: ‘Fairytales can come true. You gotta make ‘em happen, it all depends on you!’ So I work real hard each and every day…”
Joe scrambled on his hands and knees away from WITCHCRAFT, fleeing for his life now. But her Canjun stylings pursued him into the sitting room, where Bonesaw sat alone, passed out on the loveseat.
“…Just doing what I do! Look out boys, I’m coming through!”
This was it. It was time to say goodbye to his butthole—and this, from a person with a girl’s body. She’d defile the gay sanctuary that was his person. “Please!” Joe cried. “No!”
WITCHCRAFT stopped, as did the piano. “What you cryin’ about, silly?”
“N-nothing.” Joe got to his feet. “I just…what the fuck?”
“I turned over a new leaf after we done gave up in Strat. No more blood magic for me—I’m in the bed and breakfast business, now. I’m gonna be big, Joe. Once word gets out and the advertisements start, and once I get to cleaning up this here swamp to make things more accommodating...I’ll have made it. I’ll be fully there, as it were.”
This was disasterous. “You’re busting my balls? So you just…won’t help me?”
“Nope!”
That was it then. He was fucked. Or, rather, he’d never be fucked again (outside of boys). This, because WITCHCRAFT had gone off the deep end on a Disney-esque journey of self-improvement, in search of a statistically unobtainable Calradian dream, given his current income and lack of social support. Plus, there was the fucking doom-swamp. “Please, please reconsider,” Joe pleaded. “If you don’t I’ll cry or something.”
“Oh, don’t be sad Joe! I’m sure you’ll find your doggie!”
“It’s a hor—”
“Tell you what, you can stay the night for free!”
Well. He couldn’t go back to the Fortress of Gayitude tonight, and he had no other leads. Maybe he could change WITCHCRAFT’s mind in the morning—could somehow describe the magic he needed in baking terms. That might do it. She might listen if he sang. “Uh, thanks. Dude.”
“Oh, I’m not a boy!”
“You definitely are a boy. Maybe not up here,” he pointed at WITCHCRAFT’s tits, “but down here.” His finger moved down an inch to where her heart probably was. “And it’s in that same spot that I know the old broom riding, curse-flinging, cat-fucking witch still lives.
WITCHCRAFT gaped.
He left WITCHCRAFT there as he found the stairs and went up to a room to go jerk off and come up with a plan B.