Gigi, The Incompetent Witch

Chapter 2: Unpaid Rent and the Lolita Contract

"Gigi's house was, if anything, unconventional. Other than the foyer, it lacked all the proper aspects of a Witch's lair. The gardens were tidy and trimmed. Little fairies and gnomes were zipping about and attending to all manner of plants. The rooms were kept in a confused order, still disorganized but lacking the murky, dank character of a customary cobwebbed home. 

All in all, Gigi was more than content with it. To her, it was her little kingdom. No other part of the forest matched up to this foreign monarchy. In fact, the forest avoided her cottage. She never had to fight back the creeping vines from the clearing. They more than happily grew around the border.

At the moment, the young witch was in the laboratory, bending over a small cage. She had cast aside her black robes and hat. The cut of one being rather inhibiting for such work; the balance of the other being rather disreputable when nervous. Instead, she wore a loose black blouse; the balloon sleeves rolled up, and a long burgundy skirt that reached her ankles, with a pair of sturdy black boots. 

Her two hands were poised ready, as she watched an ugly amphista claw at a dead rat. Its emaciated chicken-like body was a mottled green and black; there were small portions though covered by scales rather than feathers. It's two snake heads were identical, about a foot long each, with beady yellow eyes and three feathers shooting out from the top. Gigi waited for a prime moment to snatch the monster up, the thought of fangs sinking through her hand throwing her an extra dose of caution. 

The amphista suddenly launched at the corpse, the two heads fighting over the rat. Gigi shot her hand out and firmly grasped each neck, lifting the squirming monster out of the cage.

"Hold still, you constellating beast," Gigi yelled, wrestling the writhing heads. The amphista clawed at her side, reveling in the sharp gasp from the witch.  Anger sparked, she pressed with her thumb on the amphista's left head, forcing a spray of venom to land on a glass sheet on the table. Quickly dropping the monster back in the cage, Gigi slammed the door shut. 

"Stars, do I hate snakes," she muttered, pulling back her ripped shirt to take a look at the gash. "You stupid, stupid animal! Why can't you just accept a contract like any other normal monster!"

The amphista hissed in reply, glaring at her through four pairs of yellow eyes.

Gigi walked over to a large table cluttered with vials and jars of every size. Browsing through them, she finally selected an orange pot. Uncorking it, she let a drop of white gel plop onto a rag. She took a deep breath and pressed the cloth to her side. The gel sizzled and popped at the touch of exposed flesh, and Gigi let her tears fall free as the gash was sown back together through heat. 

Applying a salve for the pain, she shot the amphista one last glare and got back to work. She scraped the venom of the monster into a small cauldron along with sprigs of Thief's Glory. With a click of her fingers, the wooden spoon began to stir furiously at the mixture, slowly turning it into a foam. 

Meanwhile, Gigi started working on the antidote. Using a rag, she soaked up the remaining venom and dropped the rag in a pot of boiling water. Pouring in the nectar of a Sovereign Nostrum and powder from a phoenix egg shell, she slowly stirred it, the mixture turning into thick red syrup. 

The door elf suddenly zipped in and spouted out a series of colors, tugging at Gigi's catastrophic hair. 

"What is it this time, Bovo?" Gigi sighed, trying to steady her hand carefully tilting a vial of dragon saliva. She glanced up at him and watched as he flashed a pattern of colors. "What?" Gigi yelled, pulling back the flask. 

The door elf repeated the pattern frantically, wringing his fingers together. 

"He isn't supposed to be here until the end of Dorda's season," she cried, corking the liquid.