Out, Out, damn spot!

Kala hurled the pot of boiled roots, its contents splashed bright green liquid seemingly everywhere. The pot knocked over a glass statuette shattering it in a brilliant spray of shards. Finally, inertia taking over the pot crashed against the wall, denting the plaster clear to the lath, oozing its contents down the wall, onto the back of the chair, pooling on the floor.

“Again” Kala intoned. “Try it again.”

Cixi did her best Lady McBeth spell “Out Out Damn Spot” Nothing.
She performed a perfect Five Rs “Restore, Replenish, Repair, Regenerate, Refresh.” Nothing.
She stood in the center of the room waving her wand and muttering an incantation made up on the spot. The pot righted itself, but otherwise, nothing.

Cixi analyzed what was needed, to remove the bright green splotches from everything; gather all the shards of glass; undent the wall and mop up the sludge from the wall, the chair and the floor. Was this one spell or four. Was there even a single spell that covered this? She’d studied under Kala and Bekla for over a year. She knew this was a test.

All her life, she’d only ever wanted to be a witch. As a girl, she’d watched the same movies. Her sister was always the princess, they even had their own personal evil stepsisters – who weren’t really evil, just a whole lot older and not interested in tag along little sisters.

It was always the witches in the movies that Cixi was drawn to evil, mean or beautiful and kind, the witches were beholden to no one, they had their own power, their own destiny. And that was what Cixi wanted most of all.

In school, she’d studied hard, she’d become an actuary. She was good at the numbers, and she had a knack for predictions which didn’t hurt the company’s bottom line. It was the predictions that had landed her with Kala and Bekla. Some formal training at last in true witchery.

“Concentrate” Kala ordered.

Cixi cleared her mind, she could see perfectly the arc of the pot, the splashed and splotches, the spray of glass and the oozing sludge. She tried a time reversal but found herself standing in the middle of the room, waiving her wand and muttering.

“I know you can do this” Kala encouraged.

Cixi stood, fists on hips, wand secure in her right hand. Maybe this wasn’t a wand spell. Maybe this wasn’t an incantation, it definitely was not a time reversal. She walked over to the grimoire. She was building a concordance and had, just the night before cross-referenced messes, chaos, clean-up. And there it was, staring right at her, page 93. Simple, easy and effective.

Cixi grabbed rags, a broom, and what she called “The Secret Sauce” cleaning solution, in the spray bottle. When helping someone else clean up their mess, it was often necessary to use elbow grease rather than witchery. Made the neighbors less suspicious also. She started sweeping up the glass.

— Lkai