Crooks and Straights: Crooked World, #1

By Masha du Toit

Gia's brother Nico is different from other boys. And being different can be dangerous in Gia's world. Cape Town is no longer the haven for magical refugees that it once was. The Purists want to get rid of all magic and the newspapers are full of dreadful stories about the Belle Gente, the magical terrorists.

None of this concerns Gia, until the Special Branch— police who investigate the illegal use of magic— come knocking at her door, looking for Nico. When Gia turns to her parents for help, she finds only more secrets. Then she realises that she was the one who put her brother in danger.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Masha du Toit
• Release date: Jul 9, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223481737

Book preview

Rosemary and Burnt Rubber

chapter

"Four roeties!"

The woman banged on the hatch until it rattled in its frame.

Hey! Four roeties. Three chicken curry, one veg curry, and two potato wadas.

She shot Gia a look. Anything to drink?

No, thanks.

That will be thirty-five rand and fifty cents.

Gia handed her a fifty, and tried not to stare as the woman stood on tip-toe to see inside the till drawer.

She’s so small! She can’t be much taller than Nico.

"Here you go, sweetie. The woman slapped the change on the counter. Be ready in a minute."

She was clearly curious about Gia, and did not have any inhibitions about staring. Her eyes were sharp and unsettling, and Gia turned away, looking at the shop.

She’d never been in a place like this before, so unlike the clean, modern convenience stores she was used to. It wasn’t dirty, but it was old— decades old, she guessed. Vegetables shared shelf space with stationery supplies. Tools and toys crowded the shelves or hung from the ceiling. A refrigerator stood droning against one wall, dripping quietly into an enamel basin.

Gia felt herself relax as she breathed in the scent of Sunlight soap and curry powder.

You’re from that new place down the road?

The woman was back on her chair behind the counter, and resumed the task that Gia had interrupted— scooping nuts into small paper bags.

That’s right, said Gia.

It’s like a boutique? Ladies clothing and that?

Not really, said Gia. Well, sort of. We design and make the clothing ourselves. Fancy shirts, and wedding gowns. Matric dance dresses. That kind of thing.

The woman’s eyebrows went up. Expensive?

Very.

The woman nodded, satisfied. It looks good. Your daddy did up the shop like that?

Yes.

That was old Mrs Moses’s house. Another scoop of nuts was poured into a bag. She lived there for— oh, many years. Before my time, even. But it’s been standing empty too long now. Good to have new people moving in.

She added a few more nuts, then closed the bag with a practised twist, seeming unaware of Gia’s fascinated gaze.

She was worth staring at.

Her skin was brown as pastry, and her cheeks and nose were as shiny as if they’d been scorched. A gaudily striped headscarf framed her face and draped her tiny, hunched body. She wore an army of bracelets that clattered and clashed as she moved, and her hands, warped into gnarled roots by arthritis, were loaded with rings.

How could I picture her? thought Gia.

The scent of curry drifting through the hatch suggested the scene.

Gia could see it all perfectly in her mind’s eye: The old woman comfortably ensconced in a cooking pot, stewing herself until she wrinkled like a prune. She might even sprinkle spices over herself, and dip a spoon in to taste the sauce.

And that beautiful woman with the long hair? She’s your mother?

Gia came back to reality with a start.

Oh? Yes. She’s my mom.

"She was in here the other day. A real lady. You can sommer see it."

As usual, once she’d let her imagination off its leash, Gia found it difficult to rein it in again. It would be too easy to think of this old woman as an odd creature of some kind. She might be a worm-pester, an overgrown hobgoblin, even a witch.

You’d never find someone like this in Claremont or Plumstead, or even Harfield Village.

She glanced surreptitiously at the objects above the counter and was reassured to see the usual horseshoe nailed to the wall, as well as a number of rosemary and wormwood charms dangling among the paper lanterns and garlands of marigolds.

No chance of a magical so close to wards like those.

To her embarrassment she found that the woman was watching her. She shook back the bangles from her hands and picked up another paper packet.

No need to worry, deary, she said with a far from reassuring cackle. "I’m no witchy. Won’t put muti in your roetie. You can call me Granny. Everybody does. Everybody knows me."

Still smiling, she studied Gia.

You don’t look much like mom. Take after your father?

I’m adopted, said Gia, and waited for the usual uncomfortable pause, but Granny took it in her stride.

And the little one? He your brother?

The hatch opened and a teenage boy placed several paper parcels on the shelf below. Gia realised he must have been listening to everything they’d said so far.

Yes, she answered. My brother Nico. He’s seven.

That funny one, said the boy, leaning through the hatch. He looked very pleased with himself, and even before he said the words, Gia knew what was coming.

The retard—

Granny whipped round and slapped him on the side of his head.

"Skoert jy, she said. Hold your mouth about things you don’t understand."

The boy ducked back and shut the hatch.

Don’t you mind him, said Granny. He’s an idiot, just like his father. All mouth and no brains. Here’s your food. You want a bag?

Gia nodded, smiling as Granny took a thin plastic bag from under the counter, and packed the food inside it.

We’re open late, said Granny. You tell your mom, if she ever needs somebody to keep an eye on that little boy of hers, she can leave him here with me. He’ll be safe here. Everybody knows Granny.

-oOo-

Outside, Gia stood taking in her surroundings. It was a sunny, late summer day with the south-easterly wind whipping up a pile of clouds over Table Mountain, and sweeping the sky clear of smog. An alarm wailed in the distance. A line of prayer flags whipped and snapped on a nearby house. A taxi came past, booming out the bass-line, rocking over the speed bumps on its shot suspension, the gaardjie hanging out the open door and leering at her.

Cape Town, girlie? he shouted, but the taxi sped off before she had a chance to react.

This was so different from Plumstead, where the only pedestrians were street sweepers or security guards. Here, everyone was outside. Children played soccer on the street. Women sat on their doorsteps, chatting and smoking. It was friendly, if a bit intimidating. She felt very visible, the only white person in sight, and a bit too neat in her new school uniform.

Some things were the same, though. Almost every streetlight was strung with newspaper posters bearing slogans of the upcoming referendum.

She set off up the street. As she turned a corner, the alarm she’d been only peripherally aware of became louder. Children were screaming with excitement, but she could not see what attracted their attention. A yellow-and-black Special Branch truck blocked the road. A line of people stood well back, straining to see what was going on. Curious, she walked closer.

"You get back here, Melia, I’m going to donner you, you don’t listen to Mommy! A woman dragged a small girl away. Come inside now, Zaaid, Melia! Dadelik!"

Gia found a space next to a middle aged man in overalls with the words Woodstock Plumbing embroidered in large yellow letters.

He nodded at her. They found a nest, he said. "Haarskeerders."

She must have looked baffled.

Magicals, you know. But small ones. Mr Abrahams was fixing his shed and found a nest. Under the roof.

Beyond the truck a Special Branch officer, muffled in protective clothing, pulled at a sheet of corrugated fencing. He wore a padded jacket and a helmet with nets hanging down from it very much like a beekeeper’s outfit, and a large pair of mirrored goggles.

Isn’t it dangerous? asked Gia.

More uniformed men were moving in to help, tearing back the fence to expose the remains of a shed.

Ag, no, we should be fine back here, said the plumber. The cops would get rid of us pretty quick otherwise. Watch— they’ve got all kinds of tricks.

The fence was partly down, and she could see what must be the nest, a bell-shaped thing in the angle of the roof.

The man whistled.

That’s a big one. Oh— look, there’s the lure.

One of the Special Branch men moved toward the nest. He seemed wary, head bent, never looking directly at his target. He placed something on the ground, a nodding bunch of mirrors that dipped and flashed at the end of long wires. He bent over them, did something, and the mirrors started whirling slowly, casting spots of sunlight over the walls.

Another policeman approached with a tube that dribbled dark smoke. The crowd murmured in excited interest, and some people jumped up on garbage bins for a better view.

They’re smoking them out!

The policeman walked right up to the nest, and cautiously stepped onto the pile of fence sheeting that had been torn down. The pile buckled under his booted feet, and something must have shifted because suddenly he was off balance, and his shoulder struck the corrugated iron of the fence with a resounding bang.

The crowd gasped and drew back.

Gia heard the plumber draw in a hissing breath.

Little shapes separated from the nest, leaping out into the air on glittering wings. The policeman regained his balance and, with one arm crooked protectively over his head, placed the smoking tube next to the lure, and opened it fully.

Black smoke gushed out.

More creatures emerged, but instead of attacking the crowd as Gia expected, they seemed drawn to the sparkling mirrors of the lure, spinning and banking around it, oblivious to the rising smoke.

There was a humming buzz in the air above her. One of the things had flown out of the reach of the smoke and was hovering near. Gia stared at it, a rainbow blur like an enormous dragonfly.

Everything slowed.

The wings moved with infinite grace, drawing lingering shapes like smoke trails in the air. The shrill buzz modulated into a lilting song, oil drifting through water, velvet, rainbow shapes—

Ow!

Somebody had jabbed her sharply in the ribs.

Don’t look at it, man!

The plumber had her by the arm and dragged her back, but the creature was already gone.

You mustn’t look at them, he said angrily. They’ll glamour you, and next thing you wake up and you have no eyes, and your hair’s all gone.

Sorry!

She blinked and put out a hand to steady herself. The wall felt warm, and for a moment she felt intensely aware of it, as though she could smell it with her fingertips. Then the sensation faded.

I didn’t know it could happen so fast, she said.

That’s why they’re so careful, Special Branch, said the plumber. Seeing that she was unhurt, he turned back to the scene by the fence.

The smoke from the policeman’s tube drifted close to them, and Gia could smell it now, rosemary and burnt rubber.

A Special Branch policeman poked at the nest, pushing so hard that it rocked and tore open, but no more creatures emerged. The ones who’d been circling the lure must have succumbed to the smoke.

After a few more moments, the Special Branch man picked up the lure and the smoking tube. The smoke was dispersing fast, blown away in the wind. The crowd was moving on too, since nothing more seemed likely to happen.

Gia watched as the truck started up with a roar and bumped down off the pavement, hooting to clear the way. Soon nothing was left except the gaping hole in the fence, and a tinge of burnt rubber in the air.

Gia went closer, expecting to be stopped, but nobody paid her any attention.

There would be no bodies, she knew. Small magicals turned into soil and leaves when they died.

She went right up to the hole in the fence, careful not to lose her balance on the sheets of corrugated metal that still lay scattered about.

The nest itself was interesting, broken though it was. It looked like an enormous wasp’s nest, made out of translucent stuff much like waxy paper. Parts of it reminded her of a giant bird’s nest woven out of grass and strips of packing tape.

Or was that—

She leaned closer, peering at the nest. The main structure was made out of dried grass, but woven throughout there were finer fibres, strands of what could only be hair.

Human hair?

The plumber’s words came back to her.

…and next thing you wake up and you have no eyes, and your hair’s all gone…

She suppressed a shudder.

The torn-open interior of the nest exposed chambers and spiralling tunnels, lined with down. In places strands of hair and strips of fabric had been knotted and plaited together into intricate whorls like basketwork, threaded with tiny objects.

Plastic beads, the metal tabs from drinking cans, a doll’s hand, some empty snail shells.

A slender acacia branch poked out of one side. It made a grim sight.

That must have been their larder, thought Gia.

Little bodies hung impaled on the long, white thorns. Geckos and crickets, a dried-out frog, and even a baby bird.

Gia stepped even closer, and something crunched under her foot. She looked down.

She was standing on a scatter of charred leaves and ash. The leaves lay in curved drifts. If she blurred her eyes, she could almost see them as tiny curled-up figures—

There was a fluttering buzz just behind her.

A shadow on the wall beside her, blurred and hazy.

It swung closer, buzzing almost in her ear for an instant, and was gone.

-oOo-

The rest of the way home, she was too busy thinking to take in much of her surroundings.

She wondered how dangerous the creatures really were. What had the plumber called them?

Haarskeerders.

That was Afrikaans for hair shavers. She could see where that name came from. Clearly, the creatures liked to collect human hair, and other things too.

The protective clothing of the Special Branch officers, and their wary tension suggested that the creatures were dangerous. But it was hard to believe that the tiny shapes she’d seen flitting about could inflict much harm. Did they have stings, like wasps, or could they cast spells?

Gia wished she’d had a chance to have a proper look at the one that had hovered over her. It was odd, the way she’d gone all dazed. She must have had time to see it, but all she could remember was a spiralling haze. Thinking about it seemed to bring the strange feeling on again, making her dizzy enough that she had to stand, holding on to a street lamp for balance.

It took a few moments for her vision to clear. Everything seemed fascinating, the silvery wood of the lamppost, the grey and black blobs of the newspaper poster. She blinked and focused, and the blobs resolved into the face of Kavitha Pillay, smiling out from under the words "South Africa’s Darling".

The glamour those little things cast must be stronger than she’d thought.

She was still musing on this when she reached number five Lever Street.

Gia wasn’t sure how she felt about her new home. Walmer Estate was so different from Plumstead. They’d moved from one suburb to another, but it felt like a new city— a new country, even.

Her new home was part of a row-house, one long building with many front doors. Years ago each unit must have been identical, each with a balcony above a neat front door. Now, some were ragged with neglect, broken windows boarded up or patched with cardboard. Others were bright and new, wrought iron broekies-lace restored to mint condition, the fresh paint applied exactly to the theoretical edge where one house ended and the other began.

Many years ago the downstairs section of number five had been changed into a shop. There were two entrances: one to the ground floor— now the premises of her parents’ business— and the other onto the stairs to the living area on the floor above, that Gia still thought of as the dump.

Carlo Gotti, tailors and dressmakers said the elegant stainless steel engraving above the door to the studio.

Her father had put a lot of work into the shop front, and his effort had paid off. Gia liked the intriguing blend of old and new, gleaming plate-glass windows on either side of the old-fashioned door. She was tempted to have another look around the studio, to breathe in the scent of polished wood and admire her father’s handiwork once again. The effect was slick and professional. It made the move seem like a choice, and not a necessity. Nobody could see it and think the business was hovering on the edge of financial ruin.

The last few months had been one long rush of packing and moving. There had been Nico to look after, and her new, not-quite-so-expensive school to get used to.

The scent of food rising from her bag reminded her that her mother would be hungry. The moving vans had arrived this morning, and while Gia had been at school, her mother and Mandy would have been hard at work unpacking.

Gia unlocked the metal burglar gate, and climbed the creaking wooden stairs. Here, too, was a reminder that she was no longer living in Plumstead. There was no modern magic warding here. No carefully obscured chemical or electrical security systems.

Instead, the wards were very visible. The knocker on the front door was shaped like a two-thumbed hand, with an eye embedded in the palm. Five iron nails had been hammered into the wood around it, each bleeding a trail of rust into the milky yellow paint. The only other security was the gate at the bottom of the stairs.

As she unlocked this door, she heard her mother’s voice.

Careful! The cats!

She slipped inside and closed the door behind her. The hall was filled with boxes and chairs, and it took her a moment to spot the cat, Minou, balancing on a pile of magazines.

She’s been trying to get out all day. It’s a wonder she did not slip out when the movers arrived.

Saraswati, usually so elegant, looked crumpled in sweatpants and an old t-shirt, her black hair falling out of an untidy ponytail.

Nico, as usual, hung onto her waist, pulling her off balance.

Hi, Mom. Hello Minou. Gia reached out a finger.

The cat deigned to lift her nose in greeting, before turning her back and washing her shoulder most expressively. Her son, Pouf, wound himself through Gia’s legs, purring a greeting.

How was your day? said Saraswati. Then she noticed the food. Oh, good girl, I’ve not even had breakfast yet.

Gia squeezed past a stack of chairs and let her mother give her a quick hug and kiss.

Hello Nico, she said. I got you some potato wadas!

Nico detached himself from Saraswati, and flung his arms around his sister.

Gia! And reaching for the bag, Wada!

She lifted the bag out of his reach. Mandy appeared in the kitchen door and came hurrying down the corridor.

Is that food? Give me that. No, Nico, you must wait.

Wada!

Mandy took the food with one hand, and Nico’s arm in the other, and walked him back to the kitchen.

No, I’m not going to carry you. You must walk like a big boy.

Saraswati sighed and rubbed a hand across her face.

Could you help Mandy keep him busy just for a minute? I’ve not had a chance to shower yet today, and I’m all over dust.

Gia considered telling her mother about the haarskeerders, but thought better of it. Saraswati avoided all things magical, and would probably react with worry out of proportion to the actual danger.

Wasn’t Mrs Winterbach supposed to be looking after Nico? she asked instead.

She cancelled. We’ve had an exciting day, said Saraswati wryly.

But everything’s here now?

Saraswati looked around at the cluttered hallway.

Everything’s here. And we got quite a lot done. All the big furniture has been moved to the right places, it’s just this smaller stuff we still have to put away. Your bedroom is pretty much ready; you’ll just have to move things where you want them.

Gia grimaced. Sharing a bedroom with her brother was the worst part of her new home.

Her mother was looking tiredly at the boxes.

I was hoping to get all this sorted before your father came home, she said. But at this rate—

Dad seeing a client?

Yes. A new one.

Saraswati picked her way among the clutter toward the bathroom, and soon Gia heard the juddering groan of the old pipes as the shower came on.

Oh great. The whole place rattles every time somebody opens a tap. And the water’s probably filled with rust.

She looked at the objects that filled the hallway.

These must be mostly boxes of magazines. Where on earth would they go? And there were the living room chairs all in a heap. Behind them, almost concealed under a pile of curtains and boxes, was a metal trunk she did not recognise.

Probably full of sheets, or shoes, or something boring like that. Although it’s not really the right size. Not big enough.

Her curiosity roused, she heaved aside the curtains, and found new places for a box of clothes hangers and another box full of Nico’s toys.

I’ll just have a peek.

She tried to lift the lid of the trunk, but it would not come open.

Locked. Odd, to lock up an old trunk like this?

A crash from the kitchen distracted her, and she went to see what Nico was up to.

-oOo-

The crash turned out to be less disastrous than it sounded, just Nico dropping an empty mixing bowl.

Wow, said Gia, impressed by the change in the kitchen.

When she’d last seen it, it had been a gloomy, dusty room. But Mandy had been busy. The linoleum floor, faded though it was, gleamed with polish. The windows were clean, and let in more light than they probably had for decades. The familiar table from their previous kitchen took pride of place in the middle of the room, covered in the same striped cloth she knew so well.

Tadaa! Mandy grinned, seeing her surprise. We’ve been working, while you were lazing away at school.

It looks fantastic.

"It’s going to look fantastic, if I ever find room for all this stuff, said Mandy. This kitchen must be half the size of the Plumstead one. Lucky thing these old houses have lots of built-in cupboards.

Gia, put some plates on the table and let’s have a sit-down meal for a change. We won’t wait for your mom. Once she’s in the shower she stays in there all day.

Mandy had been with the family as far back as Gia could remember, cooking, cleaning and babysitting, freeing Saraswati to do her part in the dressmaking business.

Now, Mandy tucked an escaped curl of grey hair out of sight under her headscarf, drew out a chair, and sat in it, as at home in the new kitchen as she had been in the old. She lifted an eyebrow at Nico to stop him rocking on his chair, and picked up her knife and fork with a contented sigh.

Ah, it’s a pleasure to eat something you’ve not cooked yourself for a change, she said.

Gia ate her roeti straight from its paper wrapping. She was glad to see that Nico ate without any fuss.

That was a good sign. Usually, the slightest deviation from his routine caused him to become anxious, and when he was anxious, Nico did not eat.

Still, he was not completely at ease. Gia could see the signs. He ate mostly with one hand, the other reaching out every now and then to touch Mandy’s sleeve. As long as he focused on his food he seemed fine, if a little twitchy. But whenever he caught sight of the unfamiliar kitchen, he flinched, narrowing his eyes as if against a too-bright light.

-oOo-

Gia and Mandy had started shifting the boxes out of the corridor by the time Saraswati emerged from the shower, rubbing her hair with a towel.

Those empty boxes are going to recycling, so just pile them up next to the door, she said. Where’s Nico?

Gia nodded at the corner where her brother was dismantling a toy telephone. Then she pointed at the trunk she’d been wondering about earlier.

What’s in that, Mom? And why’s it locked?

Saraswati turned to look at the trunk and, for a moment, Gia thought that she stared in surprise. Then she seemed to recover herself.

That goes in our bedroom. Your father can move it when he gets here. She frowned at Gia. You going to stay in that school uniform all day long?

Gia was taken aback at the edge in her mother’s voice.

Why should Dad move it? It can’t be all that heavy.

Where are my clothes? she asked, trying to keep her voice neutral.

They’re in your room. Still packed.

Gia went to look.

The room she was to share with Nico was next to her parents’, and was far from ready. The furniture had been moved in, but nothing was where it should be. The little tank with Nico’s latest watery creature experiment was on the floor in one corner, with only enough water in it to keep the occupants alive. His rat, in its cage for once, was balanced on top of the record player. The posters and drawings that had plastered Nico’s walls in their Plumstead home were still in rolls on his bed, and all his toys, books, and other possessions were in boxes.

Her own things were in a stack of boxes and suitcases against one wall.

Gia looked around, calculating.

The room was much smaller than either her or Nico’s rooms had been, but it had similar proportions to Nico’s old room, with the door and window facing one another.

If I move his bed over there, it will be pretty much in the same place it was at home. Then I can move the bookshelf over there…

After a good deal of shoving and dragging, she’d arranged the furniture to her liking. The second bed went next to the door, as nearly out of sight as possible, and all her boxes were either hidden under it or stacked on top.

She arranged everything else as nearly as possible as it had been in Nico’s room in their old house.

The door opened and Mandy looked through. Can I leave Nico with you? she asked. It’s hard to clean with him hanging onto me all the time.

Sure. He can help me in here.

Nico went straight to the tank and peered into it with a worried expression.

Nico, said Gia. Do you know where the buckets are? Why don’t you fill that tank?

That kept him busy while she set up the record player. The familiar ritual of preparing the water with purifying chemicals and siphoning it into the tank seemed to calm him.

Gia lowered the needle onto his favourite record, and he looked up with a smile as the first chords played.

"The solar system, said a deep voice. This is a journey. A journey into space…"

Nico settled cross-legged on the floor. He’d taken Poepie out of his cage. The rat sat on Nico’s shoulder, whiskers twitching as he surveyed his unfamiliar surroundings. Gia was just putting up the last of Nico’s drawings— an enormous dinosaur drawn in cross-section to show its remarkably complicated inner workings— when Saraswati put her head round the door.

Oh! she said when she saw the room. "Gia, that’s wonderful. But where’s your stuff going to go?"

Before Gia could reply, keys rattled in the front door.

Nico was on his feet and down the passage in a flash. Saraswati and Gia followed, in time to see the door open and Nico fling himself at his father.

Whoa, boy, you’ll knock me downstairs. Karel grunted. No, you’re too big to pick up now.

He gave Nico a friendly shake, careful not to dislodge the rat, who still perched on Nico’s shoulder.

Sari, he said with a smile at his wife.

Close the door, said Saraswati, giving her husband a kiss. The cats will get out—

Gia, there’s a visitor for you, said Karel.

Gia tried to see who stood behind him.

Fatima!

The girls embraced, a little clumsily because Fatima held a motorbike helmet.

I missed you! said Fatima. You should have come with. We had the best time.

My school started on Monday already, said Gia. And I had to help here.

I suppose. Has Ben been round yet?

No, I think he’s still at that math camp thing.

Karel, one arm still around his wife, said, Why don’t you two move into the kitchen? It’s a bit crowded here.

Sure, said Fatima, moving down the corridor. You guys still unpacking boxes? Jeez, I’m hungry. My mother’s starving me. This the kitchen? Hi Mandy— did you have a good holiday?

She plunked her helmet on the kitchen table and stuck her head in the fridge.

Saraswati looked on bemused. Fatima, if your mother has you on a diet, I don’t think—

Oh, she’ll never know. Anyway, there’s nothing here. You guys seriously need to do a shop.

Fatima closed the fridge and sighed dramatically.

I’m doomed to starvation. Wanna go out Gia? There’s a new burger place at the Gardens Centre.

I’m afraid not, said Saraswati. Gia has to unpack her bedroom, and I’m sure she has homework. And this evening she has to watch her brother.

She turned a serious look on Gia.

We have to meet the new client, so I’m relying on you to look after Nico. And it’s a week night in any case.

Oh, Mom! flashed Gia. "As though I ever stay