Thank my Lucky Spells

by Samantha Silver

  Thank My Lucky Spells

  Moonlight Cove Mystery #3

  Samantha Silver

  Evelynne Page

  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

  Also by Samantha Silver

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  It was the kind of morning I very rarely got to enjoy. The curtains, magically enchanted to wake me up gently by pulling open and letting the early beams of sunrise into the room, had finally figured out how to do so without that awful loud rattling noise. The sky outside my window was a pale, wintery blue, the clouds full and fluffy like snowballs. Through the slightly parted window came a crisp breeze. It was cold outside, not quite freezing yet but very close. I knew it was only a matter of time before flurries of snow started to fall over my sleepy little coastal town. Moonlight Cove was extra beautiful in the winter, even if it was a colder, less forgiving kind of beauty. The way the shoreline looked with snow drifting in over the dark water, the fog freezing and thick - I could hardly wait. Of course, there were those of us who were considerably less excited about the onslaught of winter.

  “It’s so freaking cold,” Luna, my little black cat familiar, muttered from under the covers. She had burrowed so deeply under the mass of sheets and blankets on my bed that I couldn’t figure out where her voice was coming from; it was nearly muffled to silence.

  “Come on out and I’ll put that sweater on you,” I told her, my voice scratchy and rough first thing in the morning. “The one my mom made you. Remember?”

  “Oh, great. So I can be cold and tacky,” she scoffed.

  “Hey, she worked really hard on that sweater,” I replied, poking around in the sheets to find Luna. She was curled up against my leg, and wiggled away from my prodding finger.

  “I’m sure she did, and while I appreciate the sentiment and the determination, her sense of feline style needs a little tweaking,” Luna said, prissy as always.

  “Lu. Come out of there. It’s morning. We need to get up,” I said a little more firmly.

  I could feel her sigh, her warm breath against the ticklish back of my knee. I wriggled out of bed and stood up. My toes curled instantly at the freezing-cold wood floors, feeling around for my slippers that I knew had to be around here somewhere. Sliding them on, I padded back over to the bed and started peeling back the blankets to reveal the little black ball of fur that was my cat.

  Luna groaned in annoyance and tried to dive under a pillow, but I caught her in mid-jump and cradled her to my chest. She resisted at first, trying to stay angry at me, but she couldn’t help it. I knew she was happy to be held, since I was warm.

  “You’re lucky I like you,” she said, putting her little nose in the air. I carried her into the en suite bathroom, petting her soft head.

  “Or what? You’d scratch me to death?” I laughed. “Lumenoa,” I added, turning on the bathroom lights with a simple household spell.

  “You know, there are all those old wives’ tales about cats smothering babies in their sleep,” Luna said pointedly. “I could very easily do that to you.”

  I snorted. “Well, I’m not a baby.”

  “Same mechanics apply,” she replied. “I could just wait until you’re all comfy and sleepy and then crawl on your face and suffocate you with my fur.”

  “And you think I wouldn’t wake up the second you tried?” I asked, setting her down on the counter. She immediately began shivering again as she curled up in a tight ball.

  “It would be worth a try,” she sneered, licking at her front paw.

  “You know, for a familiar you sure do spend a lot of time thinking up creative - and ineffective, I might add - ways to murder me,” I pointed out as I turned on the shower and peeled off my pajamas. I waited until the water got very warm, almost too hot, and then stepped in underneath the stream with a sigh of contentment. It was going to be one of those mornings when all I wanted to do was stay in the shower indefinitely. It was so warm and cozy in here.

  “I may be your familiar, but I’m still a cat,” Luna said simply, with a shrug.

  “And all cats possess a degree of murderous intent?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at her through the steamed-up glass door.

  Luna nodded. “I figured that was common knowledge.”

  “Didn’t know I was living with a mercenary this whole time.” I began to shampoo my long black hair breathing in the scent of roses and grapefruit, two of my favorite smells that were very rarely used together. But my mom’s newest obsession was creating her own line of homemade soaps, shampoos, and lotions. She was experimenting with a bunch of different oils and essences to create personalized scents and products. She did stuff like this all the time. She would blow through about a month or two of one particular hobby, then get tired of it and move on to the next thing. For a while it was surfing. Then it was sewing. She tried papier-mâché, pottery, painting, knitting, and all sorts of things.

  “Hurry up,” the little black cat urged me from her perch on the counter. “You said you were going to help me put on that stupid sweater.”

  “I thought you hated it,” I called out, rinsing the shampoo and conditioner from my hair in a rush before doling out a thick lather of pumpkin-scented soap, also courtesy of my mother.

  “I do hate it. I hate how it looks, and I hate the entire idea of it. But practically, I need to wear the stupid thing. It’s cold, and while my black fur coat is exquisite and perfectly groomed, it does not quite keep me warm enough on its own,” she explained, sounding a little defeated.

  “Fashion is rarely practical,” I remarked, rinsing off and doing a quick, final twirl under the deliciously warm water before turning off the shower. I stepped out and toweled off quickly, then cast a drying spell over my hair. It never quite worked perfectly, always leaving tiny damp patches, but I still preferred it over spending half an hour under a non-magical, human hair dryer. Anything that needed to be plugged in was kind of a hassle, in my opinion. I could never figure out how non-magical folk could stand it. Always dragging around their hefty chunks of technology with their cords and wires trailing behind them all over the place. It had to be so annoying.

  I slipped on a robe and then hastily pulled Luna’s sweater out of the closet. I helped her squirm gingerly into it as she sighed and moped. I thought it actually looked pretty adorable on her, but I knew if I told her how cute she looked she’d insist I take it off. Looking into the mirror, rubbing a circle of clarity into the fogged-up glass, I had a look at my own appearance. My face was pale, save for the rosy spots on my cheeks. I looked as sleepy as I felt, but I decided that as long as I had no guests staying here at the bed and breakfast, I might as well take my time getting ready. I applied some black eyeliner, mascara, touched up my brows, and added a smudge of garnet-colored lipstick. It added a punch of vitality to my face and I smiled at my reflection.

  “Looks nice,” Luna said, surprisingly kind. Normally, she was critical of what I wore, how I applied my makeup. Everything. She wasn’t mean-spirited, just highly opinionated and a bit of a busybody. In short, she was a typical cat.

  “Well, thank you
,” I said, patting her on the head. She nuzzled into my warm palm, starting to purr. “What should I wear?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “Something warm. Oh, oh! I got it! Do you have a hideous sweater in your wardrobe? I’m sure you do. We could match.”

  “Hmm. You know what? Actually, a giant, ugly sweater sounds wonderful for this cold day,” I said with a small smile, ignoring the jab at her sweater, rifling through my wardrobe. Pulling out a thick, orange-ish sweater I’d had since probably my senior year of high school, I grinned. It had a pumpkin embroidered on the back of it, and a cream-colored lacy trim. It wasn’t really hideous, but it was definitely what one might call a statement piece. What that statement was exactly, I had no idea.

  “Perfect!” Luna raved.

  I slipped on the orange pumpkin sweater, a pair of black jeans, my trusty black boots, and a long, knitted black cardigan that came down to my knees. It was very much a fall look, that was for sure.

  “You look like a pumpkin,” Luna surmised, very pleased.

  “Why, thank you,” I laughed, ignoring the fact that I wasn’t sure Luna meant it as a compliment. I scooped her up into my arms and we headed downstairs. My footsteps echoed slightly in the big empty house. It was always weird, waking up to have nowhere to be, no one to cook for. I was home alone, with free reign of the whole Moonlight Cove Manor.

  Flouncing into the kitchen, I fed Luna, then flicked on the record player. An old album by The Hollies started playing, and I danced my way into the kitchen to make breakfast. I cooked slowly, singing into my whisk and wooden spoon, ignoring Luna’s sighs of embarrassment. Eventually, I sat down to my home-cooked breakfast: a plate of thin, delicate crepes with a honey-ricotta filling and a dollop of homemade blackberry preserves. Feeling especially indulgent, I also mixed myself up a mimosa, then carried it all over to the sofa. I curled up with Luna and watched one of those home improvement shows on TV while I ate, reveling in the comfort of being home alone with nothing to do. I was usually so busy that when I did get a chance to relax, I tried to make the most of it.

  Just as I was finishing up breakfast, Luna leapt off my leg like she’d just seen a huge spider, or something. Soaring through the air, she bounded out of the room like a bat out of hell. I stood up quickly, worried. Clearly, something had spooked her.

  “Luna!” I called after her. “What’s wrong?”

  A high-pitched, troublesome yowl came from within the house, and my heart skipped a beat. Ok, my heart skipped like ten beats.

  Something was very wrong.

  I started running after Luna, only to stop as I noticed that one of the front windows was ajar, the cool wind blowing in from outside. “Oh no,” I breathed. Why on earth had she jumped out of the house like that? Luna tagged along with me sometimes, but usually she was a strictly indoor cat. She didn’t like getting her feet dirty.

  “What in the world,” I mumbled as I threw on a black faux-leather jacket and sprinted out the door. I followed the sounds of what had to be an injured animal, incoherent squalls and shrieks. I feared the worst. Finally, I ran down the street toward the café where my friends Elisa and Bella worked, The Magic Bean. What I saw when I got there was definitely not what I expected.

  Luna was pacing in a circle with another cat - a gorgeous, fluffy, white cat that I knew belonged to a new resident of Moonlight Cove, the famous actress Lara Lancaster. Her name was Lucy, if I remembered right, and the conversation between the two of them was definitely not cordial.

  Luna was my familiar, so I could understand her, but as for other cats, it all sounded like meows and hisses. Luna was spitting mad. “You little brat! You come into my town and start blabbing your mouth like you know me!”

  The white cat yowled something at her and Luna gasped. “Excuse me?!”

  Another rude hiss from Lucy, and Luna yelped. “You’re gonna pay for that, you prissy little-!” They pounced at each other, a mass of white and black fur, gnashing teeth, and shiny claws.

  Great. A literal cat fight, and my familiar was involved in it. Terrified that one or both of them would get seriously hurt, I pointed my finger at them. “Separoa!” I practically shouted.

  Instantly, both cats were ripped away from each other, an invisible force field coming down between them. No matter how fiercely they leaped at each other, they couldn’t quite break through. They both looked over at me with anger flashing in their eyes, but I stood my ground.

  “Come on! Break it up, you two!”

  “It’s not my fault,” Luna whined. “She started it! Yowling outside our front door about what a coward I am because I’m an indoor cat.”

  Lara’s cat hissed and Luna glared at her. “What? You think I’m only inside because I’m a scaredy cat? No, you little ingrate! I’m indoors because I’m a princess and I deserve to be warm and comfortable. My human loves me, unlike yours who just leaves you outside!”

  “Where is Lara?” I asked, wondering aloud.

  “Yeah, where’s your snobby actress lady?” Luna demanded, earning herself a glare from me. That wasn’t helping. Lucy mewed something undoubtedly snide. “Oh, you don’t know? You don’t know where your human is? Wow, how pathetic is that?” Luna scoffed. “What a great familiar you must be.”

  “Lu, stop,” I told her quietly. Suddenly, I felt a little sorry for Lara’s cat. If she truly didn’t know where her witch was, then she had to be a little stressed out. It was difficult for familiar animals to be apart from their humans. And the little white cat was certainly too soft and delicate to really do well outside on her own. I made an executive decision and swooped down to pick up both cats by the scruffs of their necks.

  They flailed and protested at first, but when I murmured “laxoroa,” they both went calm and limp. I could tell they were enraged at my having used magic on them, but I didn’t know how else to deal with two snippy, snarly cats. With the two of them still hurling insults at each other, I carried them back to the Manor and dropped them inside.

  “Okay. You two need to calm down and put the claws away, got it?” I ordered firmly. Both of them gave me death glares, but I wouldn’t back down.

  “She started it! Whose side are you on?” Luna complained.

  “I’m on no one’s side. I don’t care who started it. I’m finishing it. You two need to talk this out. Nicely. I have to find out where Lara Lancaster went, okay? In the meantime, chill out.”

  “But-”

  “No buts. Be nice to each other. Or at the very least just ignore each other. Okay?” I said, giving them both a warning. “If I come back to a cat fight, you’re both going to be very, very sorry,” I said as I walked back out the front door. I snatched a hat from the coat rack and pulled it on tight over my head. I needed to track down Lara Lancaster before my house became a cat battle arena. I sighed. So much for a calm, relaxing morning.

  Chapter 2

  Winter in Washington could get a little nippy, to put it mildly, so before I got my broom and took off down the road, I pointed a finger at myself.“Insularoa,” I muttered. A moment later, heat began to radiate from my clothes, from my shoes to my hat, as if I were sitting next to a cozy fire, and I smiled to myself. The spell could be a little bit of a hassle, if only because I had to turn it off when I dismounted from my broom, but it was better than wrapping a scarf around my face and putting on oversized glasses. Besides, this was definitely a lot more cozy.

  Brooms didn’t have the convenience of human cars’ heating systems, or their wind proofing. Well, most didn’t, but I wasn’t the kind of witch who could afford one of those fancy-pants brooms with automated climate control spells enchanted into the very wood. I considered mine fancy for having my name etched into the handle.

  I kicked off the ground and floated toward The Magic Bean to find Elisa.

  There were a lot of reasons to love The Bean, but one of them was the café’s status as the town watercooler, where gossip abounded. If you needed to know what was going on in town, The Bean was definitely the best place
to stop.

  Winter was the coffee shop’s primetime. By the time my broomstick carried me down the cobblestone path to the cozy little building, the smell of fresh coffee was already radiating from cracked windows, and there were even people bundled up outside to chat with each other while drinking all the winter specials. It was hard to pick out specifics just by looking at them, but I saw some mugs full of inky black dark roasts, some crowned with flawless foam, and of course, others that were nearly overflowing with whipped cream and drizzles of caramel or chocolate.

  Winter was the best. Well, okay, fall was a contender too. I liked to think of them as neck-and-neck. I liked the cozy seasons.

  I slipped off my broom and propped it up on the broom rack outside before pushing the door open and getting hit with a wave of smells that made my mouth water the second I stepped inside.

  Hints of peppermint, undertones of lavender, and whispers of hazelnut and chocolate took over my sense of smell as I saw Elisa behind the counter smile brightly and wave at me. “Hey Arti! Come on in, I’ve got something for you to try!”

  “Oh, I’m in a little bit of a hurry,” I said as I headed over to the counter and leaned on it, but I knew I couldn’t resist Elisa’s beaming smile.

  “This one’s on the house,” she whispered, ignoring my protests. Her hands moved quickly as she whipped up what looked like some kind of mocha, but I could definitely smell banana in whatever she was doing. When she really got going, she was like a machine. “Anyway, what’s on the to-do list today, Arti? Besides being a guinea pig for my new banana nut mocha,” she added, flashing me a mischievous grin.