Two Peas in a Potion
Western Woods Mystery #2
Samantha Silver
Blueberry Books Press
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Epilogue
Also by Samantha Silver
About the Author
Chapter 1
“This cannot be right. I’m totally not eating this.”
I looked directly into the mixture bubbling away in my cauldron. It looked a little bit like someone had taken a giant mud puddle, let it evaporate for a few days, and then put it in a pot to boil. Slow, large bubbles formed, taking a few seconds to reach the surface, expand above it, and then disappeared with a long sound that reminded me of the plumbing at my old apartment which used to go on the fritz regularly.
“It looks fine,” Ellie said. “Besides, I watched you do it. You did everything right and it looks exactly the way it should.”
“I want to meet the first witch or wizard who came up with this potion and decided ‘yeah, I’m going to put this in my mouth and see what happens.’,” I muttered as I gave the side-eye to the mixture.
Ellie laughed good-naturedly as Chestnut, her little Pomeranian, ran excitedly around the table. I had lived in Western Woods for just over a week, now, and this was my first lesson in potions - or concoctology if you wanted to be fancy – taught by my roommate and fellow witch, Ellie Graham.
“It’s hilarious watching you question this stuff,” Ellie said. “We all learned it when we were young enough to just do what our parents said.”
“Yeah, yeah, rub it in. Anyway, I’m not eating this.”
“Fine, well, I guess I’m the only one who’s going to feel a lot happier today.”
The potion we’d been working on was a general mood booster. Supposedly, it was one of the easiest potions to master, since it only involved four ingredients – water from the ocean, mint, three hairs from a dog and a little bit of milk chocolate were the only requirements. Plus, the motions – basically the magical word for steps – were definitely on the simple side as well. Combine everything except the chocolate, rotate eight times counter-clockwise with a stick of sugarcane, drop the chocolate into the mixture, and let it sit for five minutes.
Even I, the person who in cooking class in eighth grade managed to put salt in my cookies instead of sugar, could manage that.
On the other hand, I hadn’t expected the end result to look like the soup we liked to call the “mystery special” that they served in the cafeteria at lunch.
“Why don’t you try some of it first?” I said to Ellie, offering her the spoon, but she grinned and shook her head.
“Sorry. I actually will take some after, to make sure it’s definitely right, but part of being a witch and learning to do potions is having to test your own handiwork.”
I sighed. “What if something goes horribly wrong?”
“Well, it’s Heather’s day off today, and she lives like three houses down from here, so I can definitely get us some help pretty quickly.”
Heather Neach was the mother to Sara, another one of my roommates, and one of the witch Healers in town, which was the local name for doctors.
Taking a large, wooden spoon, I dipped it carefully in the liquid and scrunched up my nose. It wasn’t that the potion smelled bad – on the contrary, I couldn’t help but notice it had no smell at all – but it still looked absolutely vile.
I closed my eyes and stuck my tongue out, the smallest glob of the liquid touching my tongue. Ellie laughed.
“You’re going to have to drink more than that if you want to see any sort of effect. But you’ll notice that you’re not dead, and it wasn’t disgusting.”
I had to admit, Ellie was right. As bad as the liquid looked, it didn’t actually taste bad at all. It kind of tasted a bit like a mint Oreo milkshake. I took a deep breath and drank the rest of the liquid on the spoon, half expecting to drop dead any second.
And yet, that didn’t happen. Instead, I felt a light tingling in my hands before a feeling of pure euphoria came over me.
“I did it!” I said, my smile filling my face. “I really did it! And I think it worked!”
“It certainly looks like it,” Ellie laughed, grabbing the spoon off me and taking a sip herself. “Yup, it worked.”
I knew that part of my happiness was simply because that was what the potion was supposed to do, but I was still genuinely happy simply from my own success. I had actually managed to make a potion, and it had gone well.
“This went so much better than the spell I did with Amy!”
“That’s because potions, unlike spells, aren’t coven-specific. All witches and wizards use the same recipes to make potions, regardless of their celestial affiliation.”
“So until we figure out what coven I really belong to, I’ll always be better at potions than spells?”
Ellie nodded. “Exactly.”
“Well, I know what I’m going to focus on then. What else can we do?”
Ellie laughed. “For one thing, we can wait until I come back from work.”
“Do we have to?”
“Unfortunately, yes.” Ellie worked as a cook at the local coffee shop, Hexpresso Bean, and while I generally loved the fact that she could cook up the most delicious pastries and infuse them with her particular brand of magic, right now I’d rather have her here so I could keep learning.
“Ah, well. I’ll come by later and say hi. I don’t have much planned for today, since Sara is out doing her new job training, and Amy is at the Academy studying.”
Ellie nodded. “I hope things are going well for Sara.”
“Me too.” Sara, unfortunately, wasn’t particularly skilled at using either spells or potions. In fact, a magical mishap was the reason we now had a giant pool in the backyard. However, she was an absolute ace on a broom, and after using it to rescue me from a murderer last week, she had gone from unemployed with virtually no prospects to landing a job as a driver for a local law firm whose owners decided she could transport their elven associates to meetings far more efficiently than the current method they used, which was walking.
“Anyway, I’ll see you later,” Ellie said. “My shift ends at close tonight, so I’ll be back around seven.”
“See ya, have fun,” I said with a smile as Chestnut ran out the door with Ellie. The little Pomeranian was just a ball of boundless energy.
“Good, finally that monster has disappeared,” my familiar, Mr. Meowgi, said as he came into the kitchen.
“Chestnut is a nice dog,” I scolded. “You should give him a chance.”
“Right. The Trojans thought the wooden horse was a sign of peace, too.”
I rolled my eyes with a smile as I placed the cauldron in the fridge. According to Ellie, this was a potion that could keep for about four days in the fridge, but would only last about twelve hours if I left it sitting outside. Eventually, the potion’s powers would wile away, and while it wouldn’t have any negative effects if I did eat it after the best-before date, I also wouldn’t feel the same light, giddy feeling that I felt now if I did either.
“Well, I’m sure the two of you will be best of friends in no time,” I said happily.
“What’s wrong with you?” Mr. Meowgi asked, looking at me suspiciously.
“What?” I asked.
“You’re too happy.”
“There’s no such thing! But, if you must know, I just successfully made a potion to increase my happiness levels.” It appeared to be working, too; Mr. Meowgi’s rather rude comment about me being suspiciously happy didn’t affect me in the slightest.
“You witches are too naturally happy. What happened to some good old fashioned grumpiness for the sake of grumpiness?” Mr. Meowgi scowled, and I laughed. I was pretty sure that wasn’t the reaction he was after.
Just then, however, my phone beeped, indicating that I’d received a text message. It was kind of funny to discover that even in the magical world, texting seemed to be the most efficient way to stay in contact with people, and cell phones were a common thing here – though because the internet didn’t exist here, they were all old flip-style phones. Thirteen-year-old me would have been super jealous that I was currently flipping over a Motorola RAZR I’d been given a couple of days ago to check the text I’d just gotten from Sara.
You need to come over here, now. One of my clients just died on me.
Chapter 2
Ten minutes later, after I’d managed to get a bit more information out of Sara – like where the ‘here’ I was supposed to meet her at was – I found myself standing in front of a large, gothic-style building. This was where I’d been taken when I had first arrived in Western Woods, to see Aria King, the Chief Enforcer in town.
I could see her now, her tall frame poking up through the crowd, her golden blonde hair shining in the summer sun. Aria King was one hundred percent lion shifter, and she did not mess around.
I joined the crowd of people huddled around what appeared to be an invisible barrier – here in the paranormal world, I assumed there was no need for yellow tape when you could simply use magic instead. Paranormals of all types were pressed up against the magical barrier, like an invisible bubble they couldn’t pass through, looking over the scene.
Sara’s broom lay on the ground in front of the building, and next to it was a body covered in a sheet. Sara sat on the steps leading up to the court house, her head in her hands. Aria was speaking with another shifter dressed in uniform, who nodded as he listened to his boss’ instructions.
I’m here I texted Sara. A minute later she took her phone from her pocket, read the message, then looked up, scanning the crowd for me. As soon as her eye caught mine, she motioned to the back of the building and got up. I took the hint and made my way around the cordoned off area, behind the building.
A minute later, Sara showed up. Her eyes were red, and her shoulders slumped. I made my way towards her, but when I got about fifteen feet away, I suddenly hit the invisible barrier and was stopped.
“There’s no way past it yet,” Sara explained as she saw me hit the invisible wall. “Chief Enforcer King got it to surround the whole building. But we can talk.”
“Oh, Sara. Tell me what happened.”
“It was awful. I was taking him – Lorondir, one of the top lawyers here – to this building. I don’t know why; I never get told why. Anyway, halfway through the ride I felt him slump behind me, but I didn’t really think anything of it. After all, lawyers work such ridiculously long hours, and this was one of the head honchos at the firm. I figured he just fell asleep. So I kept going, and when we got here, I went to wake him up, but he just fell on the ground. That was when I knew something was wrong. So, since Chief Enforcer King’s office is right here, I ran in there to get her to help, and she called for a Healer, but by the time we got back out here he was already dead. He literally died on me, Tina.”
Sobs racked Sara’s body; she was obviously super shaken up.
“Wow,” I said. “That’s awful.”
“I know. It’s my third day of work and one of my bosses just died.”
“Well, I guess it happens. Law is a stressful job, and hearts give out.”
Sara gave me a curious look. “What are you talking about?”
“Well, my guess is he had a heart attack from the stress. I mean, it makes sense. Maybe he didn’t like flying, either, and that triggered it.”
“Oh God, I keep forgetting just how new you are to the paranormal world. Lorondir was an elf.”
“So?”
“So, they’re immortal. They can be murdered, but they don’t have heart attacks.”
My mouth dropped open as realization dawned upon me. “So he was murdered?”
Sara nodded glumly. “Yeah. While riding my broom.”
“Is that why you’re trapped in this bubble?”
Sara shook her head. “No. Aria told me I’m not allowed to leave town, but she set up the bubble as soon as she saw the dead paranormal was an elf. Anyone who was in the bubble at the time is stuck inside it until she’s done her investigation, which will probably take a couple more hours.”
“I’m so sorry. I bet now would be a really good time for a Hexpresso Bean coffee.”
Sara nodded. “No kidding. My anxiety is just through the roof right now. I keep catching myself hyperventilating. What if Aria thinks I did it? I mean, he was traveling with me when he died.”
“Hey, don’t think about things like that. I’m sure Chief Enforcer King knows you didn’t kill him.” Ok, so I was lying when I said those words. After all, if anyone was going to be the number one suspect right now, it probably was Sara. She was the only person with Lorondir when he died, after all.
“She can’t know that. She doesn’t know me at all. She’s probably over there wondering if she should arrest me for this or not.”
“I don’t think that’s true,” I lied again. “But tell me: when you saw Lorondir, did he have any markings on him? Like, was there any blood or anything?”
Sara shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. Why?”
“Well, if there had been a knife sticking out of his back, or something, then at least we would know how he was killed,” I explained. “If there were no markings on him at all, though, then it’s harder. Maybe someone knocked him over the head as you rode by or something? Did you see anyone on your way?”
Sara frowned. “No, not that I can think of.”
“How high were you flying?”
“We were basically floating at ground level,” Sara explained. “The elves I transport don’t like being high up in the air, even though Amy put a spell on my broom that makes it impossible for them to fall off it.”
“That would have come in handy last week,” I replied, thinking back to when I’d been knocked off my broom by a dragon who had been paid to scare me by a murdering elf.
Sara managed a smile. “She looked it up after your adventure. It turned out it came in handy given the job I had gotten. Well, handy for like, three days. They’ll probably fire me, now.”
“You don’t know that.”
“What do you think the odds are that I get to keep my job after this?” Sara wailed. “Oh, yeah, one of my bosses literally died while riding my broom, can I keep working here?”
I bit my lip to stop from laughing; it sounded a bit ridiculous. But at the same time, I knew Sara had a point. I didn’t know what kind of labor relations and worker protection laws there were in the paranormal world, but I had a feeling that having your boss die on you wasn’t a great way to keep your job.
“Well, what if Aria figures out who killed Lorondir? Then there would be no way for them to deny you your job, since it wouldn’t have been your fault.”
“Maybe,” Sara said, looking dejected. “My mom was so proud of me, too. This was the first job I’d gotten in so long, and it actually involved using magic, even if it wasn’t spells or potions.”
“I know. Okay, we’re going to make sure that whoever did this is found, so that you get to keep your job.”
“I don’t know,” Sara said. “What if it doesn’t work? What if it’s hopeless?”
“Well, it’s definitely hop
eless if you give up now,” I replied. I knew Sara had some self-esteem issues, and I knew that she had a tendency to give up on herself too quickly, and I wasn’t about to let that happen.
“Okay, fine. We’ll do it. But we have to be careful. And if we figure out who it was, we have to tell Chief Enforcer King this time.”
I nodded. I had absolutely no intention of repeating what had happened last time, when I was almost killed by an elf, along with Mr. Meowgi.
“So what are you going to do? I’m stuck here, for goodness knows how long.”
“Find out everything you can about the murder,” I ordered. “I’m going to go see Ellie, and Amy, and we’ll start taking over from here.”
Sara nodded, and I could see that having a plan in place was beginning to galvanize her. Her shoulders weren’t quite as slumped, and the redness was leaving her eyes.
“Okay. I have to find out whatever I can from whoever I can in here. I’ll meet you back at home as soon as I’m released. If I’m released.”
“You will be,” I said, with more confidence than I felt. As much as I knew Sara would have never killed anybody, I was also well aware that things looked really, really bad for her right now.
I flashed her a smile that I hoped exuded confidence. “It’s going to be fine. I’ll see you at home in a few hours, and we can see what everyone has found out.”
With that, I turned and walked away, wondering what on earth I had gotten myself into again.
Chapter 3
Hexpresso Bean was a large, comfortable space with exposed brick walls, plenty of seating, and a constant murmur of conversation which floated up from patrons. I had only lived here a week, but I had never seen Hexpresso Bean be less than almost at capacity. Not only were all of the tables almost always taken, but there was always a lineup of paranormals standing by the coffee machine waiting for their take-out orders.
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