A Witch’s Kitchen

by Sanchez, Dianna

  “Now then,” Headmistress Pteria began, “has everything you just told me been the truth?”

  “Yes, Headmistress,” Millie said.

  The dragon sat back and breathed out a small puff of smoke. “Well, then. It’s good to know my judgment is not impaired. Now, are you certain you’ve never been able to cast spells?”

  “No,” Millie replied. “Max said I used to cast spells all the time, and Cretacia said I lost my magic when I was five in some kind of accident.”

  Headmistress Pteria’s eyes narrowed. “Interesting. Did she say what kind of accident?”

  “No,” said Millie. “I wondered that myself.”

  “Do you remember this accident?”

  “No, Headmistress. But Cretacia said the accident affected my memory.”

  The dragon tapped a talon on the desk. “That is not unheard of, but it seems rather convenient.” She looked at Millie. “Tell me, Millie. Do you enjoy using magic?”

  Millie opened her mouth, but so many different things had popped into her head that she struggled to get them out. “Yes. No! Sometimes. I’m not sure. I don’t care. I want to...”

  “That’s enough. I’m asking the wrong question. Millie, what do you want to do?”

  Relief poured through her. That was easy. “I want to cook. I love cooking. And I want to make Mother happy.”

  “Why do you want to make your mother happy?”

  “So that she’ll finally love me,” Millie said, and then she gasped. Tears stung her eyes, and her stomach flipped.

  “Ah,” Headmistress Pteria breathed out. “I see. You don’t think your mother loves you.”

  “Of course not. I’m useless,” Millie whispered.

  “Enough,” Headmistress Pteria said, waving her wand. Millie felt the tingle fade. “Quercius, what is your opinion in this matter? Quercius?”

  “I BEG YOUR PARDON.” The Caretaker’s face appeared over the doorway. “I HAVE ALSO BEEN KEEPING AN EYE ON CLEANUP EFFORTS IN THE LAB.

  “NOW THEN, MILLIE, IT IS MY OPINION THAT YOU HAVE CONSIDERABLE MAGICAL ABILITY WHICH HAS BEEN FRUSTRATED FOR A LONG TIME. YOU HAVE SINCE DISCOVERED HOW TO USE THAT ABILITY, BUT YOU HAVE NOT YET DEVELOPED THE CONTROL NEEDED TO PREVENT, ER, LET’S CALL THEM UNFORTUNATE ACCIDENTS. I BELIEVE, HOWEVER, THAT YOUR INTENTIONS ARE GOOD. YOUR DEFENSE OF THEA IS STRONG EVIDENCE IN YOUR FAVOR.”

  Headmistress Pteria nodded sharply. “I concur. Millie, I think you’ve started leaking magic, even when you don’t intend to. You may have been leaking for some time, but your mother’s wards have been sufficiently strong to diffuse the effects until now.” She sighed. “Until further notice, I must ask that you stay out of magic classes and refrain from sharing your food with anyone. I will also write a letter to your mother, explaining today’s events. We can discuss this when we meet with her on Onesday.”

  Millie’s stomach churned. Mother is going to kill me, she thought.

  “DURING ENDSDAY, I WILL STRENGTHEN THE WARDS AROUND THE SCHOOL, PARTICULARLY IN MILLIE’S CLASS,” said Quercius.

  “Yes, good idea,” the dragon replied. “Now, Millie, while I am convinced that your charm was not intentional, you need to know that I will not accept that as an excuse. You are responsible for your own magic, and you must understand the consequences of your actions.” She took a slate from her cupboard and tapped it briskly with her claw. “Millie shall write, ‘I will not charm my classmates or teachers,’ one hundred times.” Then she handed the slate to Millie, along with a piece of chalk. “There you are. Get going.”

  Millie took the tablet and began scratching out I will not charm my classmates or teachers, over and over. After ten lines, her hand began to cramp up. She had never written so much, at a single sitting, in her life. By twenty lines, she began to garble the sentence. I will not clarm my chassmates... she began, and the slate swiftly corrected her. She rubbed out the chalk with her sleeve and started again.

  By the time she finished the final line, Millie was sure that school had let out, everyone had gone home, and the sun had gone down hours before. Her hand was shaking and would not unclench. Still she added, I’m very very sorry, before placing the slate on the desk.

  Headmistress Pteria looked up from scribbling on a scroll, one claw dripping purple ink. “Finished?” she asked.

  Millie gulped and nodded, handing her the slate.

  The Headmistress looked it over, then nodded with satisfaction. “Very good. Here is the letter for your mother.” She handed Millie a scroll tied with a green ribbon and sealed with wax. “It’s quite close to the end of school, so go down to your classroom and fetch your things. You are dismissed. I recommend that you think long and hard this Endsday about your goals here at the Enchanted Forest School, and I hope that you exercise better judgment in the future.”

  “Yes, Headmistress,” Millie said in a small voice. “Thank you, Headmistress.” Scroll clutched in her hand, she left the room.

  The Promise of Orange Peel

  As she went down the stairs to her classroom, Millie met Mistress Mallow going up with a large pot filled with soil.

  “Oh, Millie,” she said cheerfully. “You’ll be pleased to know that Thea has outgrown her pot. I’m just about to transplant her, but I can wait until after school if you’d like to help.” The brownie blinked, finally noticing the mud caking Millie and the dejected look on Millie’s face. “Good gravy, what happened to you?”

  “I charmed everyone in thaumaturgy, even Master Bertemious. But I didn’t mean to!” Millie burst into tears.

  “There, there,” Mistress Mallow said. She set down the pot and gathered Millie into a gentle hug. “It’s all right. Accidents happen.”

  “I’ll never be a witch. Never ever,” Millie sobbed. “I never do anything right.”

  “Dear girl, you’re already a witch,” said the Potions teacher. “You’re just going about it differently than most. And you shouldn’t be so afraid of making mistakes. We learn more from our failures than our successes.”

  “We do?” Millie asked, surprised.

  “Certainly. For example, you charmed that old curmudgeon Bertemious, didn’t you?”

  Millie nodded ruefully. “Yes, but...”

  “But you didn’t mean to,” Mistress Mallow finished for her. “You did, though, and that’s quite impressive. You somehow slipped in under his wards, and that means you’re either very clever or very strong. Possibly both. Either way, you’ve got talent. It just needs proper training, that’s all.”

  “Really?” Millie asked.

  Mistress Mallow smiled at her. “Oh, yes. I’m sure of it.”

  “Well,” Millie said slowly, “there’s another failure I’ve been meaning to talk to you about.” And she told Mistress Mallow about Horace.

  The brownie’s smile turned to a frown, which deepened considerably as Millie’s explanation went on. “That shouldn’t be possible,” Mistress Mallow said at the end. “Potions shouldn’t work on ghosts. But you say Horace has been eating food for years?”

  Millie nodded. “He especially loves chocolate.”

  “Good heavens, hasn’t your mother taken any notice? If Horace is actually eating your food, then you’ve been transforming your food into spirit food for him. That’s complicated. What’s more, you can still eat it, so it’s somehow both normal AND spirit food, which is terribly complicated.” Mistress Mallow thought for a moment.

  “All right, I can’t be sure of this, but I think you were on the right track with the orange peel,” said the brownie. “Your problem is that you hadn’t transformed it into something Horace could eat. If you just bake him something with orange peel in it, he should be able to eat it.”

  “Of course!” Millie blurted out. “I’ll make him orange-cranberry scones.” She paused. “But what if it doesn’t work? What if I mess up again?”

  Mistress Mallow smiled gently. “Then you’ll have learned something new. Now, do you want to help with Thea or not?”

  Millie’s face fell.
“I can’t. I have to go straight home and take this letter to my mother.”

  “Best get moving then.” The brownie gave her a last, reassuring squeeze before letting Millie go.

  “Say hi to Thea for me?” Millie asked.

  “Of course!”

  Millie continued down the staircase to her classroom. Quietly, so as not to disturb the class, she crept in, gathered her cauldron, and left.

  She had never walked home alone before. Millie had always wanted to do that, to have time to really look at things and explore, maybe try some of the Path’s side branches. Today, she just felt lonely. She missed Petunia’s happy chatter and bad jokes. She missed Max’s pompous talk and dimpled smile. She missed the flying carpet. She even missed Sagara’s sarcasm. Millie couldn’t forget the look on Sagara’s face at the end of Thaumaturgy, that look of hurt betrayal.

  Her stomach hurt. She stared at her feet, shuffling slowly along the Path. Millie felt so alone; she’d have been glad of any company right then, even Grumpkin’s. Anyone except...

  “Well, well. If it isn’t Duddy.”

  Millie looked up. Cretacia was standing in the Path, broomstick in one hand, blocking Millie’s way home.

  “What’re you doing out here during school?” Cretacia leered at her. “Playing hooky? Or did you get kicked out? The way you got me kicked out.” Cretacia’s hands twisted into claws.

  “What? Now you want to go to school?” Millie asked.

  “That’s beside the point. I do the rejecting, not the other way around.”

  “You got yourself rejected,” Millie told her. “Even if I hadn’t stopped you, Master Quercius would have known it was you who took Thea and hurt her. You would have been kicked out for sure.”

  “Hah! Think I’m that stupid?” Cretacia glared at her. “I was going to pin it all on Grumpkin. That’s what minions are for. Only you corrupted him somehow. Did you try to recruit him?”

  “No, of course not. Why would I do that?” Millie asked. Then suddenly, Millie remembered: Grumpkin had stolen and eaten her lunch, including those chocolate chip cookies, back during the first week of school. Did I charm him, just like the thaumaturgy class?

  Cretacia saw the look on Millie’s face. “You did! I knew it! Did you bribe him somehow? Offer him a better deal than mine?” She stomped her foot. “Ooh, when I get my hands on him...”

  “You leave him alone!” Millie said. “It wasn’t his fault. I charmed him.”

  Cretacia’s face twisted into a mocking leer. “Oh, come on, Duddy. You can’t even grow your own warts. Do you expect me to believe that?”

  “I stopped you in my Dome of Silence, didn’t I?” Millie flung back.

  Cretacia grew rigid with rage. “Yes, you did. How dare you? How dare you interfere with my plans? Did you know they scryed my mother? That I’m to be tried before the Coven? All because of your interference!”

  “You interfered first!” Millie yelled. “You only came to school to mess with me! You had no intention of enrolling, you just wanted to make me feel horrible, the way you always do. If you’d just left me alone, you wouldn’t have been there to get in trouble in the first place.”

  Cretacia smiled her glittering crocodile grin, and Millie took a step back, alarmed. “Oh, but then I would never have found out about Max,” she purred. “Poor little Max, he misses his big sister soooooo much, he actually cheated his way into school. I was wondering where he’d been hiding. I had a lovely spider charm I wanted to try out on him. But I couldn’t find him, got bored, and went looking for you instead. And there he was! I can’t imagine what his father will say when I tell him what Max has been up to.”

  “Stop it!” Millie said. “Why do you do that? Why are you always so mean all the time?”

  “Because I’m the best,” Cretacia answered. “I’m the top of the apprentice witches, everyone knows it. And I intend to stay that way. Baba Luci chose to send you to that stupid school, and everyone assumed it was out of pity. I just had to make sure. And Mom has been spending entirely too much time with that stupid brother of yours.”

  Millie’s jaw dropped. “You were jealous?”

  “Of him? Of you?” Cretacia laughed, clutching her ribs. “You’ve got to be kidding. Of course I’m not jealous. But no one gets what they want by just being nice. I know how to get what I want, and if that means I step on some idiots along the way, so be it. Really, that’s what being a witch is all about. Which is why you’ll never be a witch.”

  “Fine, I’m not a witch,” Millie said. “Now will you leave me and Max alone?”

  Cretacia considered. “I could, I suppose. If you made it worth my while.”

  Millie got a sinking feeling in her stomach. “What do you want, Cretacia?”

  Cretacia smiled. “See? You can be smart when you want to be. I want you to testify on my behalf before the Coven.”

  “What? But I’ll just confirm the school’s charges against you.”

  “No, you won’t,” Cretacia said. “Instead, you’ll explain that you framed me for the whole thing, and that it’s all your fault.”

  Millie gasped. “You want me to lie?”

  “Through your teeth.”

  “You want me to lie to the Baba?” Millie asked incredulously. “But, but she’s the Baba! She can always tell if you lie.”

  Cretacia smiled. “Then you’d better do a very, very good job. You convince the Baba, or I will make life miserable for Max, and he’ll hate you, too.”

  “But, if I tell the Baba it was my fault, I’ll be punished,” Millie said. “They might pull me out of school!”

  “Mmm, yes,” Cretacia said, resting her chin on one hand. “I suppose that’s true. But your brother will still get to go to that stupid school. Think about it, Millie. The next full moon is in three days. You have until then to decide.”

  Cretacia straddled her broomstick and zoomed off, cackling.

  The Crack in the Kitchen

  When Millie got home, she found a note on the kitchen table.

  * * *

  Ludmilla,

  I’ve been called to an emergency Council meeting. I hope to be home for dinner.

  Mother

  * * *

  “Oh, darkness,” Millie said, tossing her letter onto the table next to the note.

  Someone knocked on the front door. Startled, Millie jumped out of her chair and hurried to open it. “Max!” she cried.

  Despite all the mud, Max looked like he’d been in a hurricane, his hair blown straight back and his eyes watering. He was still rolling up his carpet. “I came as soon as school let out, as fast as I could go. Where’s Mother?”

  Millie stepped outside. “M-mother had to go to an emergency Council meeting. She won’t be home until much later. I’d ask you to come in and wait, but I can’t let you in through the wards.”

  Max’s face fell. “Just as well,” he lied. “She might ask awkward questions.”

  “You’re not afraid I’ll charm you again?” Millie asked.

  He grinned at her. “Preposterous. You can’t charm someone to like you if they already do.” He hugged her. “Now tell me all about what happened with the Headmistress.”

  They sat on the front step, and Millie told Max all about it, and about what Mistress Mallow had said.

  “She’s clever, and she’s right,” Max told her. “I blunder frequently, and I learn something every time I do.”

  Millie stared at him. “You do? But you’re so good at magic!”

  “I’m good at some things, like wards and countercurses, thanks to Cretacia,” Max replied. “But I struggle with potions, and transformations are quite difficult for me. Most people specialize in one or two things, not every aspect of magic.”

  “Hmm, like Mother with healing magic,” Millie mused.

  Max sighed. “Well, I guess I should go home and face the music. I can still come and visit, though, even if I can’t attend school anymore.”

  “Oh, I don’t think Cretacia will tell on you j
ust yet,” Millie said quickly. “I ran into her on the way home. She’s going to hold off a while to torment us both.”

  Max rolled his eyes. “Fantastic. Dinner at home is going to be soooo entertaining. But hopefully I’ll see you at school on Onesday. Let me know how it goes with Horace.”

  Millie nodded. “Be careful. Cretacia may not tell, but that doesn’t mean she won’t try to hurt you. She mentioned some spider charm.”

  Max shuddered. “I despise spiders. I shall double my wards tonight.” He gave Millie a last hug. “See you soon!”

  “Bye,” Millie said, squeezing him back.

  Back inside, Millie tossed her mother’s note in the oven firebox. Millie briefly considered throwing the Headmistress’s letter in, too, but instead she set it on a shelf next to the peppermint. She glanced around the kitchen, her kitchen, the place she loved most in all the world. Time to see if they’re right about me, she thought.

  And Millie started baking. Flour, baking powder, salt, butter, eggs, cream, dried cranberries, and grated orange peel. Millie sifted together the dry ingredients and cut the butter into them, all the while thinking, for Horace. But this time, she paid attention to the tingle of magic she felt.

  It was so faint, she had trouble finding it. But it was there, a low vibration in the soles of her feet. It felt heavy, forced, like she was pushing frosting through a tiny pastry tip. Something was holding her magic back, something smooth and hard, sort of like a ward. It was in her way.

  So Millie pushed at it. As she mixed and rolled the scones, she pushed at the wall holding back her magic, but it just kept pushing back. Finally, Millie poked at the hole, the tiny crack through which she could reach, a crack meant, she realized suddenly, for Horace. Taking up the knife to slice the dough into individual scones, she imagined prying into that crack.

  The wall parted, then crumbled, and the tingle washed right through her from her toes to the top of her head. Slow down, she thought. I’m just baking scones for Horace. Millie pulled the tingle back into herself, where it lay quiet inside her. She knew she’d always be able to find it now.