As I ate my breakfast at the small two-person table in the corner of the room, my phone dinged. That meant my daily email had arrived, with the list of plants I needed to collect by the end of the day.
I opened the email with one hand while shoving the last bite of toast into my mouth with the other and looked over the list. I worked for Magical Pharmaceuticals, one of the largest paranormal pharmaceutical companies in the world. They made pills and potions for all kinds of ailments and needed a constant supply of fresh plants for them. That was where I—and the rest of their worldwide network of plant collectors—came in. I would spend the day collecting everything they needed, then drop it all off in town by the afternoon.
Today’s list of ingredients was fairly straightforward. I needed to get seventy-five leaves of wild basil, and I knew exactly where a huge field of it grew. I needed two pounds of cedar bark—again, easy—and three dozen magic morel mushrooms. Those would be a bit tough to find this time of year, but I was fairly confident I would manage.
I finished off my breakfast, grabbed my collection bag with special compartments to keep each individual plant separated from the others, and headed off. I sent a quick text to Leda, telling her I hoped her day went well, and made my way to the edge of the forest. I knew all of the paths in the woods here in Mt. Rheanier like the back of my hand.
Mt. Rheanier was surrounded by a myriad of hiking trails in a network that spanned hundreds of miles. Some were easy, flat trails that even small children could manage, while others were steep and technical, involving ropes and basic mountaineering skills to navigate to their summits. For the latter, however, the views were often incredible.
Personally, I used the trails to get to my plants more easily. My favorite patch of wild basil was easy to get to—all I had to do was take Lakeside Trail until it intersected with Space Oddity. Then I followed that for about a mile until I reached the top of the lookout, and the field of basil was about ten feet away, inside the woods. All in all, if I didn’t dawdle, the basil portion of the day would take me under an hour.
Why was the trail called Space Oddity, you ask? Great question. The wizard who designed all the trails on the western side of the lake was an aficionado of human-world music, particularly of a man named David Bowie, and named all of the trails he built after his songs.
Fall was my favorite season. I loved everything about it—the crisp morning air; wrapping myself up in thick cardigans to keep the chill out; the deep yellows, oranges, and reds of the leaves before they fell to the ground; and, of course, pumpkin-flavored everything. After all, I was an earth coven witch. Pumpkin was practically in my blood.
I happily scrunched up my nose at the nip in the air as I made my way along Lakeside Trail, named because it ran from one end of town all the way around the far side of the lake before ending up back in the other end of town. The whole loop was just over six miles long and offered phenomenal views of the town, the mountain, and the lake the whole way. It was paved, about six feet wide, and extremely popular with everyone in town, from paranormals training for marathons to families just looking to enjoy the outdoors together.
It was still early enough in the morning that I only passed a few enthusiastic runners before reaching the intersection with Space Oddity. Taking the left onto the single-track dirt trail, I slowed my pace slightly as the trail rose up into the woods. Now, rather than being surrounded by the thigh-high grass bordering the lake, I found myself in a forest of cedars, with only the occasional beam of light making it through the thick canopy of conifers.
This was basically earth witch heaven.
About twenty minutes of slow walking later, I reached the first lookout on this trail, which was right near the patch of wild basil I needed. I took a moment to sit down on a rock on the edge of the lookout, staring over the lake and the city. The bells from the old-fashioned clock at coven headquarters chimed, their sound ringing through the valley, announcing that it was nine o’clock.
Sure, I had a job to do, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t take a couple of minutes to enjoy the view first. Life was for living, after all.
As the peals of the bells died away, I got up from my spot on the rock, wondering if my knees had always hurt like this, or if I was already feeling my age when I hadn’t even hit thirty yet. I looked down at my knees and gasped.
The rock I was standing on dropped away at my feet, revealing a small ledge thirty feet below. There, on that ledge, was Blaze.
His eyes were closed, and his head and neck were tilted at a strange angle. Too strange.
“Blaze!” I called out, my voice cracking. It was more out of desperation than anything. The way his neck was angled, there was no way he was still alive.
Great. What was I supposed to do? Leave him here? I had to call the local Enforcers. That also wasn’t the best option. I wasn’t exactly on the best terms with our Chief Enforcer. But I also couldn’t just leave him here.
I glanced at my bag. Ok, so the basil wasn’t getting picked today. Hopefully my boss would understand. Alerting the authorities about a dead dragon shifter trumped a few basil leaves any day of the week. Even if the authorities in question and I didn’t exactly get along.
I placed the call to the general Enforcer line and got a bored-sounding shifter on the other end. After all, this was Mt. Rheanier. When it came to crime, the worst that usually happened were drunk wizards casting spells they shouldn’t and overly aggressive shifters attempting to mark each other’s homes.
“Mt. Rheanier Enforcers.”
“I’m at the first lookout on Space Oddity, about a mile from the trailhead, and there’s a dead dragon shifter. I don’t know if he’s fallen off the ledge, or what. At least, I’m pretty sure he’s dead.”
I could practically feel the shifter on the other end of the line rolling his eyes. I was just another bored witch making a prank call, he must have thought.
“I’ll send someone by shortly to have a look,” he said. “Don’t touch anything.”
From the sound of things, I had a sneaking suspicion whoever he sent wasn’t going to be high up on the totem pole. I sat down and sighed, thinking I probably had a decent wait ahead of me before the Enforcers got around to checking on what they would obviously have believed to be a fake call.
As soon as I saw the wizard they sent out flying toward me, I let out a groan.
“You have got to be kidding me. They sent you?” I asked as soon as Jack Stone landed in front of me. He was tall, with sandy blond hair that always fell into his eyes. The way he brushed it aside made all the witches in town swoon. It was too bad all of their attention was wasted on Jack.
“I am an official Enforcer now,” Jack said, puffing out his chest slightly. “I know I’m the wizarding support staff, taking care of issues that require magic, but my official title is Enforcer.”
In the paranormal world, Enforcers were almost always shifters. Some places made exceptions, and Mt. Rheanier was one of them, where one witch or wizard would be hired to take care of any tasks the Enforcers needed that required the use of magic.
“So what was the magical requirement that graced me with your presence?” I asked, crossing my arms.
“Nobody else wanted to climb up here to answer a prank call, and I’m the only one who can fly a broom,” Jack said with a shrug. “By the way, what was with that, anyway? You’re not usually the type to do something like that. Is this to get back at me?”
“Please. Like you’re that important in my life,” I said, rolling my eyes. The reality was, it was exactly the sort of thing I would do to get back at Jack, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. “I’m not joking.”
“Seriously?” Jack peered over the ledge, and when he turned back to me, his face was a shade paler. “Have you checked to see if he’s alive?”
I shook my head. “Don’t have a broom to fly down and check. I just called the Enforcers straightaway.”
“Good. Stay here.”
Jack flew down to th
e ledge and carefully checked Blaze’s body for a pulse.
“He is dead, isn’t he?” I called down, and Jack nodded.
“Yeah. And I don’t think this was an accident.”
Chapter 4
Jack immediately called for backup, and half an hour later the town’s Chief Enforcer showed up. Lea Loeb had short blond hair and dark brown eyes; she was a lion shifter through and through. We’d had a couple of run-ins when I was back at the Academy as a teenager. Nothing too serious; I may have just taken a few potions that were a bit less than legal a couple of times.
She nodded at me, all professionalism, when she arrived. Despite the fact that it wasn’t the easiest hike, she wasn’t the least bit out of breath.
“What have we got?”
“Blaze the dragon,” Jack replied. “He’s on the ledge. Broken neck and leg.”
“What makes you think it wasn’t an accident?” Chief Enforcer Loeb asked.
“There’s a knife underneath his body, and some blood. I think he was stabbed before he was pushed off the ledge.”
My stomach turned. Blaze, murdered? Who on earth could have wanted to murder a dragon like him? I had known him for years, and he was a nice guy. He came from one of the richest shifter families in town, but he never flaunted his wealth. He did a bit of work here and there and volunteered for a lot of things, like taking part in Keith’s testing sessions. I knew he also did quite a few things for the shifter community.
“Can you bring the body up?” Chief Enforcer Loeb asked, and Jack nodded, moving back to the ledge and pulling out his wand. The Chief Enforcer turned to me. “Can you tell me everything that happened here this morning?”
I recounted my tale, leaving nothing out. I couldn’t believe Blaze had been murdered, and more than anything, I wanted to make sure the person who did this to him was found and brought to justice. I might not have been the best-behaved witch on the planet, but one thing was certain: murder was wrong, and the murder of good paranormals like Blaze was even worse.
Chief Enforcer Loeb took notes as I spoke, nodding here and there. When I finished, I took a deep breath and looked around. A couple of other Enforcers who had arrived with her were looking over the body. I couldn’t help but look myself. He almost looked peaceful. Well, apart from his neck being at an almost ninety-degree angle.
My eyes drifted over to the knife lying on the ground next to him. It was plain, with a wooden handle and a blade that was maybe six inches long. A kind of multipurpose knife that was both common and virtually untraceable. It certainly wasn’t one of the samurai swords that weirdo Ryan Westwood kept in his basement. That would have been way too good a clue.
“Right,” Chief Enforcer Loeb eventually told me. “Thank you for your help. I’ll ask you now to please head back into town. And I know this is Mt. Rheanier and nothing stays secret for long, but if you could avoid telling anyone what you saw until we have a chance to tell the family, I would appreciate it.”
I nodded numbly. “I won’t be telling anyone, I promise,” I said. I meant it. I didn’t want Blaze’s family to find out about this at the local coffee shop. I started to head down the path, and Jack joined me, finding it difficult to walk next to me on the narrow path, especially when I purposely walked in the middle to deter him.
“Listen,” he said. “I know you’re mad at me. But we used to be friends, and I still care about you. I want to make sure you’re ok.”
I stopped and turned to him, my hands on my hips. “You didn’t make sure I was ok when you started banging my boyfriend behind my back.”
Jack winced. “I know. That was a mistake. I’m sorry. I wish you could have found out the truth about Sean another way.”
I had been dating Sean Ashton for a year when I caught him in bed with Jack—one of my best friends, of all people. I had thought we were going to get married. But hey, that’s just the kind of girlfriend I was, the type that drove their boyfriends to the realization that they were, in fact, gay.
Deep down—like, really deep down—a part of me was happy for Sean. I was glad he was finally able to get in touch with his true feelings, and I knew in reality, our marriage wouldn’t have been happy with Sean secretly pining for other wizards. But I hadn’t been able to forgive either one of them for the way in which I found out the truth.
I had been hurt in a way I didn’t know I could hurt, and I wasn’t sure if I was ever going to be able to forgive them. I certainly didn’t plan on it.
“Yeah, if only there was a way to tell me the truth that didn’t involve seeing you both butt naked on my bed,” I replied sarcastically. I kept moving down the hill, refusing to look back. Thankfully, Jack didn’t follow after me.
I went straight home, lay back down on my bed, and stared at the ceiling for a while.
“Althea! Althea, I know you’re in there. Answer the door.” I groaned and grabbed a pillow, pulling it over my head to drown out the sound of my mother, but I knew it was no use. She knew I was home, and so she was going to keep knocking until I answered.
“Coming, Mom,” I whined. I must have fallen asleep eventually, because when I opened the door the sun had set. With her long black hair and black eyes, staring at my mom was like looking into the future. We looked like sisters with a twenty-five-year age gap between us. “What is it?”
“I heard about Blaze, and word is you’re the one who found him. I’ve made some stew for dinner; come over and have a bowl. I also made some cheesecake for dessert. Your favorite.”
Alright, so my mom knew the best way to my heart was through my stomach. As soon as I heard the word “stew,” my mouth started watering, and she sealed the deal with the promise of cheesecake. My stomach grumbled; I hadn’t actually eaten anything at all since that morning. “I’ll be there in five minutes.”
“Good.”
I closed the door, ran a brush through my hair, and made my way up to the main house that my mom now shared with my sister and my grandma. It was small—tiny, really—but I had grown up here, and this little cottage would always hold a special place in my heart. Especially since I knew how hard my mom had worked to keep us in this little space.
“There you are,” my grandma Rosie exclaimed when she saw me. Her hair was curled and dyed an interesting apricot color. She couldn’t have been taller than five feet and was surprisingly spry for a woman of her age. “I heard you saw a body today. Tell me everything.”
I sighed. “I’d really rather not.”
“Oh, come on, you have to. I need to know literally everything.” I sat down at the small dining table while my mom shot her own mother a look.
“You don’t need to know everything. Just look at her, Mother. Ali’s obviously had quite the shock, and you should leave her alone to eat her stew.”
My mom glared at Grandma Rosie as she placed a heaping bowl of beef stew laden with tender pieces of meat and thick chunks of vegetables in front of me. The aroma of rosemary and thyme rose to my nostrils and I grabbed the thick chunk of bread next to the bowl and chowed down before Grandma Rosie could keep harassing me.
“You’re going to have to stop eating eventually,” Grandma Rosie said.
“Why do you care so much, anyway?” I asked through a giant mouthful of stew. “You’re not usually so macabre.”
“Althea, don’t talk with your mouth open, you’re almost thirty,” my mom scolded from her spot in front of the oven.
“Haven’t you heard?” Grandma Rosie replied. “Blaze’s family have put up a reward to whoever can find the killer. Half a million abras.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Half a million? Seriously?”
“That’s right. Connie Sutherland told me about it this afternoon, and we’ve decided we’re going to work together to find the killer. That’s why I need to know everything. Having access to the person who found the body is our secret weapon.”
I looked at Grandma Rosie suspiciously. “How did you find out I was the one who found the body, anyway?”
�
�Oh, everyone knows that,” Grandma Rosie said, waving away my question. Mom brought over a couple more bowls of stew and sat down at the table with the two of us. “It was all over town. So, what was it? Stabbed in the heart? Was there blood everywhere?”
“Is this really a conversation you want to be having at the dinner table?” Mom asked, shooting daggers at Grandma Rosie.
“Oh, don’t be so sensitive,” Grandma Rosie shot back while I hid a smile. There was a reason Grandma Rosie was called Crazy Rosie by most people in town. And yet her friend Connie actually made her look normal. The two of them looking into a murder was probably not a good thing.
“He was stabbed, with a knife, and then pushed off a ledge,” I explained. “That’s all I’m telling you, because it’s all I know.”
“Well, do the Enforcers have any suspects yet?”
“How on earth should I know?”
“Weren’t you eavesdropping?”
“Of course I didn’t eavesdrop on the Enforcers discussing a murder.”
“Well, here I thought you were the more useful of my two granddaughters. I guess I was wrong.”
“Well I, for one, am glad that I raised a daughter who doesn’t eavesdrop on the Enforcers,” Mom said to Grandma Rosie.
“I’ll be glad when I get that half million abra reward,” came Grandma Rosie’s reply.
“Is that real?” I asked.
“Of course it’s real. They want their son’s killer found. Of course, I saw Chief Enforcer Loeb later on and she didn’t look particularly happy, but what can you do?”
“So how are you going to find the killer?” Mom asked.
“You’re not going to tell me not to do it?”
“You’re my mother. You’re thirty years older than I am. If you’re going to make bad life decisions, don’t let me stop you. Just let me know if you get yourself arrested so I don’t end up with too many leftovers for dinner.”
Going through the Potions Page 2
