“That’s G … R … I … S,” said Esmerelda in a helpful, condescending sort of voice.
Poppy showed admirable restraint in not hexing her, I thought.
“And next to you?”
Esmerelda came to a decision. “On one condition,” she said.
“Yes?”
“Give me all your yak fur.”
“I don’t … I don’t have any yak fur,” I said, thrown. “Poppy?”
Poppy had a suppressed look that said she might break out into laughter at any minute. But she said, perfectly soberly, “I have a standard capsule of it in my bag.” She produced it and said, “You tell us what you know, and it’s yours.”
8
Out of the Frying Pan, into the Terrible Teleportation Spell
Poppy and I talked as fast as anything, all the way to school. Our idea that the worst hex you’ve ever done might now be coming back to bite you seemed extremely plausible. That left us with an ethical dilemma.
Most of the witches deserved what was coming to them.
“Let’s review,” said Poppy. “First possibility. Malkin did the spell as one last nasty gotcha to the coven. No further rhyme or reason to it, no motive. In that case, we should warn everybody, because Malkin was a piece of work.”
“Two, my mom did it,” I said. “And she vanished her own self as a red herring. In that case, maybe everyone deserves it and we shouldn’t warn them. Maybe they—I don’t know—didn’t do their recycling this week or something. That would be good, because then Sarmine would be safe. But it would be bad because, if Valda was telling us the truth, then our moms were at least tenuous allies in the coven. So why would she have included your mom in the spell?”
“And you,” said Poppy.
“And me,” I admitted, but I was used to Sarmine coming up with terrible teaching plans. Would I put this whole stunt past her? I couldn’t decide.
“Or, three, some other witch did it,” said Poppy, “using Malkin’s death as a cover. Motive unknown.”
“Who’s next?” I said. “Is it someone we care about?”
Poppy passed over her phone, where she had been jotting down the witches around the thirteen points in the circle. I made a couple additions to remind me who was who. And then a couple more notes, just to be a completist.
Hexes So Far
1. Sat Midnight: Sarmine Scarabouche (Cam’s mom). Vanished.
2. Sunday Noon: V. Valda Velda (grumpy stompy witch). House tried to destroy her.
3. Sun Midnight: Esmerelda Danela (pissy blonde witch). Old and ugly.
4. Monday Noon: Ingrid Ahlgren (tough blonde with dog)
5. Mon Midnight: Ulrich Grey (creepy Unicorn Guy)
6. Tuesday Noon: Fiona Laraque (Sports Team, Canadian)
7. Tues Midnight: Jen Smith (Leggings, Canadian)
8. Wednesday Noon: Penny Patel (Boring Skirt, Canadian)
9. Weds Midnight: Rimelda Danela (Esmerelda’s 100-year-old mother)
10. Thursday Noon: Hikari Tanaka (Sparkle)
11. Thurs Midnight: Lily Jones (Poppy’s mom)
12. Friday Noon: Claudette Dupuy (ice-cold French-Canadian witch)
13. Fri Midnight: Camellia Hexar (Cam) (duh.)
“Ingrid Ahlgren,” I said.
“And her ‘polyester fake fashion.’”
“Aka, the blonde lady with the dog. Can you get her address?”
Poppy nodded. “If not, I’ll call Esmerelda and threaten to withhold her yak fur,” she quipped.
“What is it with yak fur, anyway?” I said.
Poppy laughed, the first real laughter I’d heard from her. It was the sort of laugh you laugh when your life has been absolute nonsense and you have to either laugh or cry. “Yak fur is a de-escalator,” she said. “You use it if you’re trying to stop something that’s, well, escalating.”
“You mean—”
“I mean whatever that terrible hex is she did, it doesn’t just cast itself and stop. It keeps going—from bad to worse. She’s probably used all her yak fur so far to try to halt it. She’ll go through mine and need more. And every moment, she’ll appear to get older and uglier.” Another gale of laughter. Poppy pushed up her plastic glasses to wipe tears from her eyes and said, “I shouldn’t laugh. But if anyone deserves it, it’s her. She’s the one who thought up that spell in the first place and cast it on someone.”
“It’s not very feminist,” I ventured.
“No,” said Poppy, settling her glasses in place. “It’s literally not. Whatever traits she decided were ugly—well, she decided that, you know? I could argue with her all day about whether it was ugly to have a warty face or wrinkles, but the point is, those are precisely the things she thought were the most terrible. Oh, the amazing justice.”
We were running so late that the parking lot was nearly full. Poppy headed to the very back, and I crossed my fingers there was a spot for us. Rourke did not like it when I was late to Algebra.
“Do you know Ingrid at all?” said Poppy.
I shook my head.
“So, if my memory is correct, then there’s just one problem,” said Poppy. “Oh, there’s a spot.”
“Yes?”
“She lives in the mountains. Like four hours away.”
“And we are going to get there during a eighteen-minute lunchtime how?”
Poppy stopped the station wagon and looked me squarely in the face. “How do you feel about teleportation?”
A cold lump formed in my stomach. “I’ve never done it,” I said.
“It’s expensive,” she admitted. “Mom doesn’t like to do it, either. But I brought the supplies. I packed them up yesterday, just in case. We can do it. If you’re not too scared.”
“I’m not,” I said. “I’m just wondering if, you know, if we should even warn this Ingrid. Or not. Maybe ‘not’ is the answer. Maybe not warn her.”
Poppy took a deep breath. “I don’t think we should warn her, either,” she said.
“Oh good.”
“I think we need to sneak up on her.”
“Sneak—What—No.”
“Invisibly, of course,” said Poppy. “I still have my cloak.”
“I don’t use invisible eels,” I said automatically. “Not unless—”
“They were ethically found dead on the side of a creek where they lived their happy, stinky lives. I know,” said Poppy. “No. We’ll use your new invisibility spell on my cloak. Duh.”
“Ah.”
“Because I’ve heard my mom talk about Ingrid. She’s a bad one. And you heard what Esmerelda let slip about her, right?”
I thought back. “Something about black market money?”
Poppy seized my hands. “Valda said the main thing that keeps fracturing the coven is the discussion of what to do with Sentient Magicals. What do you think the black market for witches is?”
I swallowed, thinking of the magical ingredients that slid very quickly into unethical territory. Werewolf hairs. Bigfoot claws. And that just scratched the surface. “Things I don’t want to think about?”
“Exactly.”
“You think she might be the one behind the spell?”
“Well, she’s next on the list,” said Poppy. “Either we’ll rule her out or we’ll learn something. Or both.”
I grimaced. “Teleporting into a wicked witch’s yard.”
“I know,” said Poppy in frustration. “I just don’t see what else we can do. My mom could be in all kinds of trouble and she wouldn’t even tell me, just so I wouldn’t worry. She treats me like my dad. But I can’t sit and do nothing. I hope you have A lunch.”
“I do,” I said. “And we’ll meet—”
“Poppy,” hallooed a girl, coming up from the other side of the parking lot. I didn’t think Poppy was embarrassed by me—I mean, I’d finally changed out of that Newt Nibbles shirt—but still. We were both people who kept our witch lives secret. We were one person at home. Another at s
chool.
“I’ll meet you here,” I said.
We nodded and split. Coconspirators to the end.
* * *
I was dubious about how I was going to get through my morning with teleportation hanging over me, but school had to be gotten through, wicked witches or not.
Devon and I still shared an Algebra class this semester, but Rourke had moved us far apart, so I couldn’t sit there and stare at his hair. I mean Devon’s hair, not Rourke’s.
Devon was already at his desk when I hurried in. I could see from the back that he was wearing visible clothes. A ball cap with some platinum blond hair escaping from it. It was definitely not his usual shade, but I appreciated that Jenah had clearly sacrificed her eighties hair band wig to cut it into Devon’s haircut. I was going to have to repay her for that.
I wanted to stop at his desk, but I could see how his shoulders were tensed, how he was trying to casually chat with the guy next to him and ignore me walking in the door. Either he didn’t want me to stare too closely at his getup and spoil things, or he simply didn’t want to talk to the girl who had hexed him. I made a wide arc around him to my seat.
Jenah came in and perched on the desk next to me. “I have so much to tell you,” she said.
“Join the club,” I said sourly.
“Lunchtime,” Jenah promised. “But I’ve been dying to tell you one thing since last night. Oh, why don’t you have a regular phone?”
“Hey, I can call Sparkle any time I want,” I said, holding it up. “Whee.”
“Bryan messaged Bobby who texted Olivia who sent me the link. They posted the cast list online. Early.”
I suddenly noticed that Jenah was wearing shorts, tights, and hot-pink leg warmers, as if she had a really important dance rehearsal to go to and she couldn’t possibly change at any point later in the day. I perked up. I knew how important this was to Jenah. “And you got in?”
“Yes,” said Jenah. “You are looking at Rosie, aka Kit Kat girl number one, leader of all the Kit Kats. The three female leads all went to seniors, of course, but I got the best part of any of the sophomore or junior girls. I did that thing.”
“You. Are awesome,” I said. I hugged Jenah and congratulated her, and then the fact that she had said “lunchtime” a few sentences back finally percolated through my brain. “Ugh,” I said. “I want to hear the whole story, but I can’t join you at lunch. I have, um. Something to do with Poppy.”
“Poppy Jones? Captain of the debate team Poppy Jones?”
I nodded. “Let’s just say our mothers are friends.”
Jenah whistled in understanding at my code. “Her mother? Wow.” She leaned closer. “So are you guys going to talk to Sam the piano player? Because I still feel guilty about that.” She pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to me. “Look, I called the pizza place yesterday and wormed his name and address out of one of the college kids. We could go check on him and see if he’s okay.”
She was so close and yet so far. I couldn’t even begin to tell her everything that had happened since Saturday evening, not in public, not sitting in the classroom waiting for Algebra to start. And I hadn’t thought about Sam since Sarmine disappeared, and that made me irritated at myself.
“You can’t go there,” I whispered. “You know you can’t. That woman is dangerous.”
“I know, but…”
I could see it in her eyes. Her drive to help could easily overwhelm her common sense. And Sparkle was right—we had to protect Leo from that witch. “Jenah. You can’t. Just … just focus on Cabaret.” I put the paper in my backpack, away from her reach. “I’ll let you know if you can help.”
Jenah drew back, looking a little hurt. “Fine. I can’t really leave for lunch anyway. Henny was going to join us for lunch, and she made it into the show too. We have so much to talk over that you might feel left out.”
“I wouldn’t,” I protested, but I did. “Since when does Henny do theater?”
“I told her she should audition so she could hang with me. And then it’s a high school show, you know. They cast twenty Kit Kats instead of six. So she’s like Kit Kat girl number nineteen, but she is so-o-o happy.” She saw my face. “I would have asked you to audition, but you’ve been busy, you know? And you’ve said a million times that dancing around in corsets isn’t your thing.”
“Oh,” I said. “It’s not,” I said. “You crazy kids have fun,” I said. And then Rourke ahemed loudly and we had to bust it up and sit down.
Rourke glared at the phone on my desk and I slid it into my pocket. “Miss Hendrix? I trust we are not interrupting your social life any more than necessary?”
“No sir,” I said, face flaming red.
His gaze roved the room till he found Devon. “And Mr. Maguire? We are interrupting your busy rock star schedule?” He gestured to Devon’s sunglasses and ball cap.
“Dilated eyes, sir,” Devon said. “I have a note from the nurse.”
“Peculiar,” said Rourke with a sniff. He poured himself a mug of root beer while he surveyed the room, looking for something else to complain about. We all waited patiently until he finally said, “Please open your textbooks to page one hundred eighty-three,” and sighs of relief went around the room.
I glanced around at my classmates, busy living their ordinary human lives. How I wished the only thing I had to worry about was sarcastic teachers.
* * *
If one can hurry in a reluctant fashion, then that is how I got to Poppy’s station wagon at lunch. I would much rather be having lunch with Jenah than teleporting to Ingrid’s house. Even if Henny was there.
Poppy was already in the car, pulling her cloak out of her messenger bag. It was all visible except for a few blurry patches, and it stunk of eels. “I can’t believe I forgot to pull this out and bleach it,” she said.
“We’ve been busy,” I said dryly.
“I got you some inferior Parmesan,” she said. “So do your stuff.”
I was a little nervous, now that I was the one working spells in front of Poppy. My forte was brilliant ideas like pouring water on a magic bomb. Carefully, I combined the ingredients I had used before, but this time added a dusting of Parmesan cheese. I sprinkled it all on Poppy’s cloak.
Nothing happened.
Poppy wrinkled her nose, considering. “Did you think of anything in particular while you did it last time? Class Ten and up spells need a significant mental oomph from the witch—”
I raised a hand, forestalling her. Of course. I knew what to do now.
I looked at that cloak and thought about how desperately it needed to disappear. How that was the only thing that could make us safe from Ingrid. How it was the only way we could find our mothers. How lives were at stake.
The cloak obediently vanished.
I beamed. Poppy beamed. This was tremendous. We were on fire.
“That was amazing,” she said.
“Did you see that?” I said.
“I’m telling you, you could turn that into a business,” she said.
“Or we could,” I said.
“No more babysitting.”
“I could get a real phone.”
“I wish we could go home and do it right now,” Poppy said. “Except…”
Except we still had to go to Ingrid’s.
Darn it.
I came back to reality with a bump. “Did you get her address?” I said.
“This one was easy,” said Poppy, folding the cloak into her messenger bag for safekeeping. “Apparently she runs a dog breeding business called Ingrid’s Purebreds. There was a picture of her property on the website, which is important for visualizing. But like I said, it’s about four hours from here. In the mountains. Alone. No one around for miles.”
“Are you stalling? I feel like you’re stalling. I’m stalling. We don’t have to do this, right? We could go home and set up our invisible cloak business instead?”
“Teleportation is a perfectly natural process.”
“Of what … taking your atoms apart and reassembling them halfway across the state?”
“You’ve been watching too much Star Trek. We’re going straight through N-space.”
“Which is better because…?”
“It’s the place where the demons live.”
“Yes, much better than splitting us apart and putting us back together.”
“It’ll be incredibly hot. Witches can only stay in for a split second. But that’s enough time to jump through to anywhere you want to go. As long as you keep a mental picture.”
“Ugh. I guess we’d better.”
Poppy measured out the precious drops of attar of roses and dropped the jackalope whisker into it. Because of the rose oil, she couldn’t mix the ingredients on her phone, so she took a small wooden bowl from her messenger bag and put the mixture in there. She rummaged around and pulled out the vial that she and her mother had referred to as containing powdered claw.
Powdered claw. And Claudette, the only other witch I knew who could teleport, had been chasing a Bigfoot.
The penny finally dropped. “That’s Bigfoot claw,” I said.
“Just toenail clippings,” Poppy said shortly, forestalling my complaint about ethics.
“And the jackalope died of a heart attack … I know, I know,” I said. But it did explain why everyone wanted to get their hands on Sam the piano player. He was the key to the semisecret teleportation spell. “How did your mom learn about teleportation?” I said.
Poppy shrugged. “Aunt Jonquil, maybe? She does a lot of enforcing for her coven. Hears about weird things.” She smeared the oil on my palms and pulled out her wand. She took a deep breath. “Now, in order to not get lost in N-space, you need to think hard about where you’re going. Think of Ingrid’s house.”
“I’ve never seen her house!”
“Okay, think of me. Look, hold my hand.”
“Oh god oh god oh god.”
“One … two … three!”
Flames sprang up around the edges of my vision. They licked the car. They engulfed us. I tried to tell Poppy that I had very much changed my mind, but my words were lost in the fire. It was incredibly hot. Like being under the sun when it’s 110 degrees outside. Worse. I could feel the oil smeared on my palms burning off, and as it did, it became hotter and hotter, until if you had asked me I would have screamed that I was actually on fire.
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