Murderous Matrimony(65)

He nodded. “Surely. If she gives her word on that today, I shall enforce it.”

I faced Wanda’s pathetic ghost face. “Okay. This is it. You can’t ever come in here again, no matter what.”

“Done,” she agreed. “It wasn’t all that much anyway.”

“And you can’t do anything to hurt animals or people in the Village.”

“Define hurt?” she quizzed.

“I think you know what I mean.”

“Oh, all right.” She stared at the sorcerer. “Does this mean I can stay?”

“If Lady Jessie wills it.”

She turned to me. “Jessie?”

“All right.”

Wanda was gone with a loud cackle.

“I hope I don’t regret that,” I said with a sigh.

“You have a good heart.” He smiled. “And I wish to give you and Chase a wedding gift.”

“Thanks, but we don’t have enough room for what we have right now. Just getting Wanda out of our bedroom is a huge wedding gift.”

“Allow me to honor you and your union    .”

He barely blinked, and everything changed. Our tiny, one-room apartment was suddenly large and spacious. There were three bedrooms, two baths—one with a tub, and a nice living room and den.

“My gift to you.”

I ran through the rooms like one of the crazy people Chase and I had been talking about earlier. Suddenly, I wasn’t tired or sore at all.

There was no furniture, but it had become a house. There was even a kitchen where we could microwave our meals. It was amazing, and impossible.

“You can’t do this here.” I calmed down by taking deep breaths. “We can’t take this from you.” It suddenly struck me what it must look like outside.

“There is no change to the outside of the Dungeon, or to the downstairs jail.” He said as though he’d read my mind. “Only you and Chase will see this inner space. It will be your secret for as long as you live here.”

Was that even possible?

“Just a minute.” I ran outside and looked around. The old building that was the Dungeon looked exactly the same. It wasn’t any larger at all.

I ran back inside. “How is that possible?”

“Magic.” He smiled. “And now I must leave. I wish I could stay for your wedding, but I must be elsewhere.”

“I don’t know how to thank you. It’s incredible.”

“There is only one thing I must ask of you, Jessie.”

“Okay.”

“Someday, I may need to take sanctuary here. I have enemies. This would be a place they would never search for me.”

I thought about it, but it was very brief. “Sure. That’s fine. Our house is your house.”

Before I could finish speaking, he was gone.

I ran through our house again, laughing and singing. We had a real place to live!

*

Chase got back about an hour later. I had already put some things into the other rooms. I picked out one room for the baby basket that Mary had made for us.

“Jessie!” he called out in strangled-sounding voice. “What the—?”

I ran into the room that had once been our only room. “You aren’t gonna believe what happened!”





Chapter Twenty-one



The day of the wedding dawned bright and clear. It had turned cold, and there was frost on the ground. It had created a white sheen that sparkled in the sunlight on roofs, cobblestones, and grass.

Needless to say, Chase and I had gone on a monumental shopping spree. If anyone wondered where we were putting all that furniture, no one asked. Maybe that was part of the spell.

The house was shaping up. There was a wonderful red velvet sofa in the living room, and a huge, overstuffed chair that matched it. We bought a super-size new refrigerator, and our own washer and dryer.

The bedroom was to-die-for. We’d made the whole thing deep blue (Chase’s favorite color), and purple (my favorite color). I’d woken up in a king-sized bed that morning and padded to the new bathroom across some wonderful rugs we’d found. Chase had put in a few nice Tiffany-style lamps on the dressers and bedside tables.

“Hey,” he called sleepily. “Where are you going so early? I thought we were sleeping in today?”

“I have to take a bath.”

“You just took a bath last night!”

“You can’t have too many! Come on!”

We fooled around in the tub for an hour and then went to find breakfast. Yes, we could have cooked, but old habits die hard.

It was good that we didn’t stay home, because the Monastery Bakery had a special wedding feast for us for breakfast that morning. We’d wondered why there was a young monk waiting outside the Dungeon door who’d scuttled off as soon as he saw us.