October Tails V: The Witch of Tricks

October Tails Series:
I | II | III | IV | V

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I had a pretty hard time getting this written in time, but I'm still very happy with the results. And...I had barely even gotten halfway through the conversation at the start before realizing this was definitely going to end up as a story, so yeah. Happy Halloween!

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It was already Halloween, and still no witch. Sure, Thana thought, it was probably foolish to expect more than one person to respond to that strange ad run in just one day's newspaper, but if she was really being honest she'd sort of hoped to just...run into the right person. Maka thought that notion was foolish: For one thing, how would she even tell who would make a good witch on just meeting them? And more importantly, the demon-girl was sensible enough to note she shouldn't commit herself to being someone's “pet or whatever” (a phrase which suggested she only sort of understood what the nekomata wanted, but Thana appreciated that she was trying to help nonetheless) without really getting to know them first.

Maybe she was in too much of a rush, she thought. It had just seemed so...right to find a witch during this magical month, and perhaps to bring her along to that party Frenella kept pushing. Before the afternoon was half-finished, the catgirl made the firm decision that she would go to the party anyway, to enjoy herself and maybe take her mind off things. Putting this much pressure on a deadline like this really couldn't be good for her, especially when she knew full well that nekomata don't even get old over time.

So when it came close to sunset, she reorganized her clothes into some sturdy, close-fitting “mummy wraps” for a costume, and poofed herself over to the front door of the house the party was at. It was amazing how easy some things were to do on a whim, when others had to be carefully guided and directed to do quite the thing she wanted them to. Well, perhaps it was just that another person was far too complex to leave up to her newfound 'magical instincts'. That made a kind of sense in the part of her head that had come with these powers, that always seemed to understand what was going on as far as magic went.

Someone literally, physically jumped inside when she rang the doorbell. A little later, the door swung open to reveal a very tall, red-eyed werewolf woman—evidently electing to use her full werewolf form as a “costume”, but still wearing a t-shirt and shorts that appeared better sized for a smaller “mostly-human” form over it anyway. “Um, hi, welcome,” she said a little nervously, the massive height difference making it difficult for either of them to find the other's face (or...muzzle). “You're um..wait I think I recognize you!”

“We haven't really been introduced,” the nekomata said with a winning smile. “I'm Thana. Fren wanted me to come.”

“Oh, of course! My name's Reiko. Uh, come on in.” She moved out of the way, waving inward. The catgirl nodded, accepting the invitation.

The party turned out to be just the thing. The candy-witch and her catgirl came with loads of delicious treats, with added enchantments to prevent them from making people sick and even making the chocolates safe for animal-folk who would have otherwise found them poisonous. There was a wide, energetic variety of guests, the party spilling out of the space Reiko had planned and all throughout the backyard; Thana offered at one point to 'expand the space' herself but the werewolf politely declined, something about wanting to be able to find her way around in the morning.

Maka was there too; they hung out for a while, but eventually the catgirl got distracted and wandered off, as cats do. That was how she found herself in the backyard, watching some of the party-goers. After wandering around a bit, a man dressed up like a stage magician—suit, top hat and all—caught her attention. He was showing off a few not-actual-magic tricks with cards and a stuffed rabbit and so on.

...And here she'd come to the party to take her mind off this stuff. But it was just too good an opportunity to pass up; at least she could give it a shot, right?

Thana slid up next to him as a few mildly-impressed partygoers wandered away, still arguing with each other over how he'd known which one was their card. “Heyyy there,” she said. “Are you a real magician?”

“Heh, well, just for tonight,” he said nervously, visibly eyeing her ears and tail. “To be honest I only learned three or four tricks from a book in a rush over the last week.”

“Well, I'm impressed you can learn that much so fast,” she said. And tried offering him a handshake. “My name's Thana, I really am a nekomata for the record.”

“Oh, cool. Cassius,” he said. His handshake was confident yet gentle..very nice, she thought. “I gotta say, I didn't even know there were this many uh, magic folks around this town.” The way he said it suggested he wasn't sure whether that was an offensive term or not, but strongly hoped it wasn't. “But maybe you're just all in the same place tonight?”

“Maybe! There's also more of us than there were at the start of the month,” she added with an air of mystery. And leaned in slightly for the kill: “How would you like to join us, hmmn?”

“Uh..how do you mean?” said Cassius, raising an eyebrow. Ohh, he was at least a little interested.

“Well, I've been working on spells that should draw out and amplify someone's natural talent for magic, provided there is any,” she said. “The method's not perfect yet, but that's what tests are for, right? I'm in the market for good guinea pigs, is all.”

“When you put it that way..I have to wonder what the risks are if it doesn't work as intended,” he said.

“It's perfectly safe,” she said, “there are just, y'know, unexpected results sometimes. I don't know if anyone's let you in on this, but magic is super complicated and not always easy to predict.”

“Heh, I think you could say the same thing about science," he said. “We've just gotten really good at that difficult prediction part in a lot of fields.”

“Oh, are you a scientist?” she asked, tilting her head slightly.

“Mmhm. I do research and teach at the uni, you know. A few years ago I wouldn't have believed, well...any of this stuff could be real. The world just changed so fast. I mean, for the better for sure, but..”

“Yeah, I get the feeling," she said. "It was the same for me at the time.”

Thana had started walking while they talked, and Cassius had followed. In this way she subtly guided him over to a less crowded part of the yard, near a fence. He hadn't accepted her offer yet, per se, but she could almost see it in him...

“Really? Is, that what you meant about 'more of you'?” he said.

“Mm-hm! Someone helped me awaken these powers I didn't even know I had back on the first of the month,” she said. “I highly recommend it to anyone it's available to. Though I'll admit it doesn't look like you have any hidden powers quite like this.”

“That..spell of yours doesn't care, though, right? Just that there's potential?”

“Yep!” she nodded cheerfully once again. Her tails flicked back and forth eagerly; there was a bit of a feeling like having a fish firmly on the hook, ready to be reeled in.

“What kind of, 'unexpected results' could it have, anyway?”

“Well, the last person I tried it on had a strong potential for dark-magic and became a demon as a result,” she said. “It came with some physical alterations, which I actually am powerful enough to undo, but she didn't particularly want me to. On the other hand it would be a bad idea to try to 'undo' someone turning into a demon, for example.” Thana quietly prided herself on the agility with which she danced around the arguably most major of those alterations. “So..a fundamental change of nature like that is the biggest risk. But it wouldn't bring out anything that's not sorta in you already, anyway.”

“Do you...know what's 'in me', then?” he said, sounding curious.

“Uhm...some potential for sure,” she said. “I wouldn't offer to try the spell on you if I didn't think it would work. I don't have enough experience identifying the kind of potential someone has, though! The only way I know to tell is to cast it and see what happens.”

“Well...okay, what the heck,” Cassius said, nervously adjusting his hat. “I..to be honest I was sorta invited here by a stranger. I decided to come because this one part of what she said while giving me that invitation that kept coming back was how it could be an adventure. I thought...something unexpected might happen for once, and maybe I'd really enjoy it.” He shrugged. “So, I dunno, if I wanted to turn down an uncertain surprise I should've just stayed home. Right?”

“Yeah...” Thana said, a little dreamily. She was practically mesmerized by that speech. After all, a wonderful surprise had been sent to her, sneaking its way in through an unassuming package. Someone willing to take the dive all on their own deserved quite a bit of respect in her eyes.

She snapped out of the amazed stare after a moment and drew herself up as much as she could, knowing there was something serious to be done now.

Seeing her posture, Cassius said, “Should I, brace myself or something?”

“You can if you want to. It won't hurt but I'm told it's at least a very exciting feeling,” she said. He nodded and stood a little straighter too, before making a small gesture with a hand to indicate he was ready. Finally, it was time to test out her new version of the spell...!

Thana carefully channeled her magic, making use of the several mental notes she'd made during Maka's change. Her body gained a blue, fiery glow, and some of the mummy wraps burst off of her arms and legs as they grew fur from the elbows and knees down respectively, her feet turning to more catlike hindpaws and lending an extra inch or so of height. She did this sometimes to bring out her animal side a little more, which somehow made her magic a little easier to control, but the fur and paws were sort of unwieldy in everyday life. At any rate, it was some nice special effects for Cassius to enjoy. Then she cast her hands forward, slowly sending some of that fire toward him. It went in through his stomach and spread outward, gradually making his entire body glow.

With that, the spell was cast. The glow slowly faded from view, but Thana could see the magic doing its work now, and Cassius could clearly feel something, as he was looking at one of his hands with a kind of uncertain expression. The glow remained in his eyes, and their color shifted along with the glow to a bright pink shade. But that...! Seemed to be it?

Thana could feel the pulse of magic through him. Spells were probably entering his head, and he was beginning to smile as the power settled into his body. It seemed she had succeeded in making a magic-potential-amplifying spell with no side effects...including the ones she really wanted. She kept a positive smile on her face, knowing this should be a happy occasion for him at least, but couldn't prevent her ears from lowering a little bit. It was fine, she tried to tell herself, plenty more people to try this on.

“What...wait, wait...I know!” Cassius said, with a tone that suggested he had just realized...something. What it was, Thana wasn't sure. But no sooner had he said that than he spread his arms out, closed his eyes, and began chanting a spell. A magic circle glowed into view on the ground beneath him, splitting into two smaller circles to either side of him, and then two little translucent white ghosts spun up from them, summoned by whatever spell he was casting. Each one had a...witch's hat on?

Thana wasn't actually sure what was going on, aside from her senses informing her of powerful magic happening over there. Cassius dropped his arms to the side once the ghosts had risen to float in the air next to him, and took a deep breath that suggested he was finished casting the spell. The ghosts seemed to take this as a cue to float closer to him, up to the hat, and begin their mysterious work.

First they swirled around the hat, slowly at first but accelerating into a mostly-white blur. The hat's brim grew wider, and it poked upward, like it was being squeezed into a steadily narrower shape the farther up it went. Soon it came to a point up at the top, and as the ghosts slowed and made their way down from it, its shape was quite clear: A huge brim and a tall cone. An orange ribbon with a huge bow depicting a candy in its center had appeared just above the brim, and now that it didn't have ghosts swirling around it, gravity took over and the hat folded itself down to one side. Thana could hardly believe what she was seeing—it was unmistakably a witch's hat!

One of the ghosts went to Cassius's face next and began patting it with its cute little hands; the other one produced a brush from thin air and started running it through his hair. “Aaahhh..” He closed his glowing pink eyes, giving a relaxed sigh, as the facial hair drained from his skin, his face turning smaller, rounder, and cuter, and his hair flowed out, trailing along next to his cheeks before falling down to his shoulders, and then continuing its way on down along his back. While this happened, he started to shrink ever so slightly, his entire body getting subtly shorter and smaller.

The nekomata was completely transfixed by what she was seeing; she felt certain she already knew what the end result would be, and yet dared not celebrate yet for fear her guess would be proven wrong. Her ears did pick up the sound of others turning to watch, moving closer, murmuring to each other...

The ghosts moved down, running all around Cassius's clothes next. The dark vest gained bright orange accents here and there, while the slacks developed a pattern of horizontal orange and black stripes all the way down its leggings. Then they reconvened to either side of his waist, and began doing the same trick as with the hat, swirling around it slowly at first before rapidly picking up speed. His suit pulled tighter onto his body, and his waist responded to the swirling by shrinking inward, growing slimmer and flatter; his height sank down a little faster now, and the tightening suit made visible a narrowing of his shoulders and a slimming of his arms that were coming along with it.

Cassius had reopened his eyes by now, and looked around with a bright smile on what was now an adorably cute face framed by silky brown hair, enjoying the attention of the gathering audience to his change. When those eyes turned on Thana, she could swear he gave her a little nod...!

The ghosts suddenly split off away from his waist, one of them swirling figure-eights on down his legs while the other went up past his chest to run from one hand across his arms and shoulders to the other, and back again. With them out of the way, the sharp inward curve of his waist was quite visible, along with his belt, which was now placed higher than before, far thinner in a bright orange shade with a jack-o-lantern buckle.

The ghosts' motion seemed to encourage the shrinking of his arms and legs to accelerate a bit, and his hands grew smaller and more delicate with pretty, manicured fingernails; by the time they calmed down and marshaled themselves to new positions—one in front of his chest and the other behind his back—Cassius had gained a rather short, girlish figure for a guy. The ghost in front floated forward a little more to rub its hands up and down his neck, while the other one seemed to just disappear right into his lower back, going intangible along the way. “Heheheh....” Cassius started to laugh, like the ghost touching his neck tickled. “Haa~aa, hahahahah...!” His voice began to rise in pitch, and his initially boyish chuckle turned into giggling. “HeheheEE~heeheehee, haa~aaa~AAAh, hehehehe~!” He folded his slim arms over his stomach, his cheeks starting to redden with a blush, and it was quite clear that the ghost which had disappeared inside of him was definitely accomplishing something, something which caused little cries of delight to mix in with the giggling as his voice floated higher and higher. And then...!

“Heheh, eeheehee~EEeeheeheeehee~!” Cassius's voice deepened and matured, his giggling turning into a kind of cackle briefly, before it was interrupted by a rather final-sounding “Ooooohh~...” and a sharp deepening of the blush. Thana was not the only one who suspected that the person before her had just changed sex, but her powers automatically informed her that this hunch was correct. The ghost that had gone into Cassius's back came out from the middle of her stomach, its job finished, and floated up next to the other one, which was dropping its little hands away from her neck. They quickly whirled around the new girl's upper body, and little ripping sounds could be heard as the sleeves of her suit tore away, except for a couple of pieces on the left wrist and forearm, and the collar split off from a deep V-shape the rest of the shirt was opening into along her neckline. The ghosts were on either side of her at the end, and the vest had clearly turned into a deep-cut blouse, the tie now a deep purple ribbon helping keep it together in the middle of the chest. It had quite visible cups to it there, which were looking awfully empty...and at this point each ghost moved into one side of Cassius's flat chest to correct that.

“Heheh...mmmh~..” Cassius chuckled softly, blushing brighter again, as two little bumps rose up there. “Aah? Hmmn, hmm hmm hmm~,” she hummed a pleased little tune to herself as they continued to grow and rise, clearly already quite comfortable with the deep, sexy feminine purr of her new voice. She sucked in a sudden gasp as the bumps jumped a bit in size, and then let out a pleased, breathy “Aaahhh~” as they bounced out bigger still.

Soon they filled in the top quite nicely, and the growing seemed to slow to a halt. But she looked down at her newfound bust and tilted her head slightly. “Hmmmnn...hmn!” she raised her hands up and swept them in a swift outward gesture, and her breasts began growing all over again, visibly stretching the material out as they did. “Heeheehee...mmmnnnh~...!” She closed her eyes again, her face almost entirely red, as the top grew to fit her enhanced endowments, only for them to stretch it out even further, two or three more times. Finally, the ghosts popped violently outward, leaving her new, enormous pair of globes to gently bounce into place. The whole display had left Thana with her jaw hanging down and quite a blush of her own, especially when the beautiful woman reopened her eyes and gave a little wink.

The ghosts arced their way around and inward, clearly aiming for Cassius's hips to perform one final step in her transformation. They swirled around her pants, up and down around her legs. From the thighs down, the leggings grew tighter as their material changed to soft, shiny thin cloth, while the upper part of the pants steadily puffed out more and more. Her hips grew wider, her thighs thicker and her butt bigger, further accentuating her narrow waist and giving her the bottom third of her generous hourglass figure. The ghosts ended up on either side of the puffy upper parts to the pants; each one grabbed a side and pulled, and with a small ripping sound the leggings separated into a pair of striped thigh-high stockings while the rest spread out into a short skirt, deep purple like her blouse with a similar bright orange frilly trim. They kept on pulling the skirt out while the new witch raised her right hand, making a basket full of candy appear in a small shower of orange sparkles, and adjusted her hat ever so slightly with her left. They looked just about ready to lift the skirt all the way...!

And then, finally, the ghosts disappeared into white puffs of smoke, blowing away in the wind and dropping her skirt to let it swish gently back down. There were a couple of seconds of dead silence, just the gentle wind and the quiet swishing of fabric, and then the whole gathered crowd applauded and cheered, every one of them having been as impressed by whole the display as Thana was. The noise was enough to break the nekomata out of her stupor, and once she had picked her jaw up off the floor she joined in enthusiastically, even going so far as to un-fur her arms to have human hands to clap more loudly with.

“Thank you, thank you~!” the witch said, nodding and waving to everyone, and giving a small twirl. “Now, some of you may have met me earlier, but allow me to reintroduce myself. I'm Cassilda, but you can call me Cassy if you want. I knew a few tricks before, but thanks to the lovely Thana here” (she waved toward the catgirl, who blushed and ran a hindpaw across the ground nervously in response to the sudden attention), “I know quite a few new ones, and would be more than happy to show them off for you. If you want?”

The response was a predictable but overwhelming cheer of approval.

“Wonderful~! Now, let's see if we can make a little bit of a stage.” The witch led the way to a spot a little closer into the yard, waved for people to make some space, and cast a spell to summon up a raised platform covered in purple curtain. Several ghosts similar to the ones that had changed her were summoned after that, bringing out of their magic circles a bunch of folding chairs so everyone could sit down and enjoy the show. Thana was offered a front-row seat by some of the other guests as thanks for whatever (to them) unknown help she'd given the witch, and took it after only a little bit of protesting.

The show went on for a couple of hours, past midnight that night, but eventually Cassilda said that was all for the night, and gave a little bow to the audience's roaring applause before disappearing from the stage in a puff of orange smoke as one final trick. The platform sank back into the ground, and the summoned extra chairs disappeared as soon people got up from them and headed off to resume the party or go home. After a short while Thana got up herself, knowing full well that the witch was just invisible in the same place, and walked a little closer to her after the crowd had mostly dispersed.

“Soo, what'd you think?” Cassilda said when she came closer, reappearing through some orange sparkles.

“That was amazing!” said the nekomata. “I-I mean, I've had magic for a month and never thought of anything as creative as that stuff...but um, I think your first trick was still your best, to be honest.”

“Heheh, I thought you might say something like that.” The witch moved a little closer, and before Thana could wonder what she was doing she'd pulled the catgirl into a close hug, running one of her soft hands down her head and across her fuzzy ears. She had ended up at about an average height for a girl, taller than the nekomata by just enough that her head wound up half-buried in that gigantic pillowy chest from this gesture. While Thana returned the hug, purring and blushing profusely, Cassilda continued: “I really have to thank you for giving me such a wonderful opportunity. You know, at first I couldn't make sense of all that new power at all, but something just clicked when I thought of myself as a witch on a stage. Can't say I ever thought about turning into a woman before, but now I can hardly imagine being without it.”

“Mrr..I-I know what you mean,” Thana said, leaning her head back just enough so her voice wouldn't be muffled.
“Oh, really? You too? Heh, small world.” The witch released the hug and took a small step back, patting the catgirl on the head. “Uh, sorry if that was too much in your personal space. Not sure what came over me.”
“I-it's fine!” said Thana. “Actually...in fact, I really liked it! Um...I dunno how to explain this, but ever since I turned into this I've wanted a pretty witch to pet me...” she said quietly.
“Well, you're awfully cute. I'm surprised nobody else took you up on the offer by now,” said Cassilda.

“The only witch I could find already has a kitty,” she said, “so...I thought I needed to make one.”

“I guess you succeeded at that,” she shrugged, and crossed her arms, looking slightly away to one side. “The one thing I kept thinking during tonight's performance was how nice it'd be to have a lovely assistant to work alongside me.”

“Really?” Thana knew there were probably stars in her eyes from the way she leaned forward and said that.

“Hahaha..you like the idea that much?” She patted the nekomata's head a couple of times again, and she replied with a loud affirmative purr. “Still, we sorta just met. There's no telling how well we'd get along if you just suddenly committed to it right away.”
“Aww, you sound like Maka,” the catgirl said, her ears lowering a bit.

“Who's that?”

“Um, the person I was talking about before, who turned into a demon? But I guess you're both right...” Her expression brightened again, and she looked up at the witch with her ears up and tails flicking across each other again. “You'll just have to take me on on a trial basis and see how it works out!”
“Oh, now that could be arranged,” Cassilda said.

After that, she pulled Thana gently into a side-hug and began leading the way toward the backdoor of Reiko's house. “I left my phone in the dining room, I think. We should at least exchange numbers so we can start planning our first performance together, right?”
“Yeah!” the catgirl said happily.
“My, you've got a lot of energy,” the witch said.

“You know, this really could be the beginning of a beautiful partnership. Or a huge disaster! That's just the nature of stepping out into an adventure, though, isn't it?”

“Mm-hm,” Thana agreed. She purred softly again, feeling quite optimistic about this one, and guessing from Cassilda's bright smile that she was thinking the same. Maybe it wasn't Halloween anymore, but there was still magic in the air, and plenty of room for tricks...and treats!