Pumpkins and Potions

by Tegan Maher

  To read more about Destiny and the Enchanted Coast, check out Book 1 in that series, The Deadly Daiquiri.

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  Old Ghost with New Tricks

  Elle Adams

  In Hawkwood Hollow, where the dead outnumber the living, Maura is used to the local ghosts showing up on her doorstep with requests. But when a ghost asks for Maura's help in finding a magical item which belonged to her when she was still alive and seems to have vanished somewhere in the local nursing home, she soon finds herself wrapped up in something a little more dangerous.

  Can Maura contend with eccentric witches and their even stranger animal companions to find the ghost's missing possession before chaos breaks loose?

  1

  “No, Mart, we can’t turn the games room at the inn into a ghost disco,” I told my brother.

  “Spoilsport,” he said. “It’s not like you use the room for anything else.”

  Carey and I were revisiting an old conversation about turning her family’s inn into a haunted hotel for tourists from out of town, and it came as no surprise that my brother had leapt on the idea. As a ghost who was continually stuck at the age of eighteen, he got bored easily and would never pass up the opportunity to participate in a haunting. Since Carey couldn’t hear or see him, I had to act as an interpreter between two of them.

  Just one of the many perks of being the Reaper witch. Though the ‘Reaper’ part was involuntary and the ‘witch’ part questionable.

  “A ghost disco?” echoed Carey. “Not sure that’d be a hit with the public unless they could actually see the ghosts dancing.”

  “Trust me, you don’t want to see my brother dancing.”

  Mart did the Macarena above a nearby table as if to prove my point. Carey’s mouth tugged in a grin. “He’s dancing right behind me, isn’t he?”

  “You’ve got it.” I shook my head at him. “We’re looking for ways to bring an authentic haunting experience with some good jump scares. If people want to party, they can just go to a nightclub.”

  Mart stopped dancing. “If you aren’t going to listen to me, then I’ll take my ideas elsewhere.”

  He leapt off the table, floating through the automatic doors and out of the restaurant.

  “His ideas get weirder by the day,” I remarked. “Honestly. I’m all for turning the inn into a ghostly hotspot, but I think inviting them to party would be more trouble than it’s worth.”

  “What about inviting them into the restaurant, then?” asked Carey. “A special ghosts-only hour? I’m already working on a cocktail menu which fits the theme.”

  “Do we want them interrupting everyone’s meals, though?” I said. “People camp out in haunted houses because they want to be visited by ghosts in the middle of the night, not at Happy Hour.”

  Or so I figured. I didn’t need to stay in a haunted house to get my own ghostly visitations whether I wanted them or not.

  Carey looked down at her notepad. “You aren’t wrong. We’d have to give them specific instructions.”

  “Hate to break it to you, but a lot of ghosts have zero concept of following orders,” I said. “We’d be lucky if they showed up, much less did exactly what we told them to.”

  Case in point: my brother, who was currently doing an interpretive dance behind the glass door to the restaurant.

  Carey turned the page of the notepad. “Should we trial all the local ghosts to see who’d be the best fit?”

  “Don’t get ahead of yourselves,” said her mother, Allie, walking over to our table. “We still need a new bartender. Preferably a living one.”

  Yeah… that would help. We’d had considerable issues with keeping any long-term staff at the inn except for Carey and her mother, not at all helped by our ghostly long-term residents, and if we did branch out into haunted tourism, we’d need more than a single Reaper Witch to keep the spirits under control.

  “True,” said Carey. “I’ve been working on ad materials, though. Want to see?”

  “Sure.” I leaned over the table to look at her laptop screen. She’d drafted a couple of posters to advertise an authentic ghostly experience at the Riverside Inn along with a glittering cocktail menu. Carey herself wasn’t even old enough to drink, but she’d been helping her mother run the inn and restaurant since she could walk. This new venture wouldn’t be her family’s first attempt to help inject new life into the town’s struggling tourism sector, but since the town’s only real attraction was the abundance of ghosts, they’d be the main draw.

  “Spiced Pumpkin Punch special?” I read.

  “Yeah, I wanted to have a specially themed new cocktail menu,” she said. “Like Halloween all year round. What do you think?”

  “That’s a great idea,” I said. “All we need now are the ghosts.”

  As though conjured up by my thoughts, Mart cleared his throat from behind me. I should have known he wouldn’t stay away for long.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “A ghost wants to talk to you.”

  “Not you?”

  “No, of course it’s not me,” he said. “Why would it be?”

  “I thought you might’ve started talking about yourself in the third person again.” Not that my brother generally gave any warning before he started trying to get my attention, and it wasn’t uncommon for the town’s other spirits to seek me out. I’d earned the moniker ‘Reaper Witch’ for a reason.

  “Back in a second,” I told Carey. “Sounds like a ghost wants a word with me.”

  “Have fun,” said Carey, as though I was off for a day at the beach, not a chat with a wayward spirit. Meanwhile, Casper, her familiar, ducked under the table. The cat wasn’t much of a fan of ghosts, which might turn out to be a slight issue when we did eventually turn the place into a haunted hotel. He’d been learning to tolerate Mart, though, and Carey insisted he was getting better at dealing with the town’s ghostly residents with each passing day.

  As I followed Mart through the automatic doors, I found the new ghost hovering outside the restaurant. She was older than the crowd that typically hung out at the inn, her faded grey hair and wrinkles telling me she’d most likely come from the town’s nursing home. She did look vaguely familiar to me, and I’d been there once a few weeks ago.

  “Hey,” I said. “I’m Maura. Can I help you?”

  “Oh, hello,” said the ghost. “I’m Gladys. I remember seeing you at the nursing home a while ago, with the detective. The handsome one.”

  Thought so. Drew and I had visited the nursing home in order to question another ghost, back when I’d been new to the town. The detective and I hadn’t even got along with one another at the time, but that hadn’t stopped the residents from staring at the pair of us and making pointed comments. Some ghosts could wander further than others, but it surprised me that she’d come all this way to find me. “Is there something you need me to help you with?”

  “It’s just a small thing,” said the ghost. “I died last night, you see…”

  “My condolences,” I said delicately.

  “…and there’s something I wanted to give to my granddaughter after my death, but it’s gone missing.”

  My brow furrowed. “Missing? What i
s it?”

  “It’s an enchanted music box,” she said. “I hid it in my room at the nursing home, you see, but nobody has been able to find it since my death.”

  “Did you tell…?” I trailed off. Even now, it occasionally slipped my mind that not everyone could hear or see the town’s ghosts. “I mean, did anyone search your room?”

  “Yes, they did,” she said. “The box is quite valuable, and I’d rather it’s found before my family gets here to claim their inheritance.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Is there anything distinctive about it?”

  “It’s a red box, maybe the size of your palm,” she said. “It’s enchanted so that the music never stops playing when it’s opened.”

  Oh, boy. I could see that causing a disturbance if one of the nursing home’s other residents got hold of it without knowing what it did. Besides, there was usually more to ghosts’ requests than met the eye. I could think of worse ideas than going to check it out.

  Frankie, the goblin assistant who worked at the nursing home, answered the door when I knocked. A hat perched atop her pointed green ears and her sharp teeth were bared in a friendly smile.

  “Oh, hello, Maura,” she said. “Need something?”

  “A ghost visited me,” I told her. “Gladys, she’s called. Said she died recently.”

  “Oh, her,” she said. “Yes, we’re cleaning out her room. She went peacefully. Came to see you, did she?”

  She didn’t seem surprised in the slightest, but she’d witnessed me speaking to the ghosts of the nursing home’s residents at least once before, so at least I didn’t have to explain my weird Reaper talents from scratch. Even in a town like this one where the number of ghosts outnumbered the living people, someone like me was a novelty to most people.

  “She said she wanted to find something that belonged to her before she died,” I explained. “An enchanted music box which keeps playing once it’s opened. She said it was in her room, but it went missing.”

  “Oh, that,” she said. “Yes, I gather that Gladys wanted her granddaughter to have it.”

  “She said you searched her entire room already, right?” I said. “You don’t think one of the other residents took it?”

  “Why would they?” asked the nurse.

  “Gladys said it was valuable,” I said. “I don’t know, I’m just throwing out ideas. Can I have a look in her room?”

  “I suppose you can,” she said. “We haven’t completely cleaned out the place yet, since we’re waiting for her granddaughter to come and claim her inheritance. Do come in.”

  I followed her into the wide room which formed the main gathering area for the residents of the nursing home, where numerous elderly witches and wizards sat in plush armchairs playing board games and watching TV. A pair of glass doors led into a spacious garden full of neat flowerbeds and carefully mowed lawns, while on my left-hand side, a carpeted staircase led up to the first floor. At the top, I found a corridor lined with doors which each bore a nameplate, which made Gladys’s room easy to pick out. Her door was unlocked, so I pushed it open, revealing a pile of cardboard boxes piled in the middle of the carpeted floor. I hovered in the entryway for a moment, a weird sense of unease trailing down my spine. I might spend a lot of time wandering around haunted establishments, but there was something uniquely unsettling about going into a room so soon after its inhabitant’s death.

  As I stepped into the room, Gladys popped out of thin air. You’d think seeing ghosts everywhere would make me less twitchy when one of them appeared unexpectedly, but I still jumped. “Hey, Gladys. Where was the box hidden the last time you checked?”

  “In there.” She pointed to a large wooden wardrobe, and I nudged the door open. Rows of clothes hung in rustling rows, while I found nothing but old shoes in the back even when I used my wand to conjure up a light to illuminate the dusty space. I closed the door and gave a quick search of the rest of the room, but I didn’t see any signs of a bright red music box anywhere.

  “Are you positive you didn’t take it out of your room at any point?” I asked her.

  “I’m sure,” she said. “I don’t make a habit of carrying it around. The music annoys everyone, for some reason.”

  I can’t imagine why. “Do you think anyone else might have taken it?”

  “Maybe,” she said. “I was dead for a few hours before I came back as a ghost. There was plenty of time for someone to have sneaked in and nabbed it.”

  “Because it’s valuable, right?”

  “Exactly,” she said. “It’s also very rare.”

  That figured. I shouldn’t have expected her request to be as straightforward as it’d initially seemed, but accusing the other residents of taking Gladys’s possessions might put me on the bad side of a bunch of elderly witches and wizards who had as much potential to hold grudges as the rest of their coven did.

  In fact, it might be that Gladys’s granddaughter was better equipped to find the missing music box than I was. Assuming she’d be willing to listen to her deceased grandmother’s wishes, that is. I’d run into all kinds of issues while expressing the demands of the dead to those who couldn’t communicate with them, including being fired from my last job at the morgue when my clients hadn’t appreciated me passing on their deceased relatives’ funeral requests. Granted, that was back in the ordinary non-magical world, but even here in Hawkwood Hollow, the ability to speak to ghosts remained a rarity. I couldn’t count on her granddaughter being one of the gifted few.

  I turned back to Gladys. “Is there anyone in particular you want me to ask about the missing box?”

  “Tina,” she said immediately. “She was always borrowing my things without my permission.”

  “Which one is Tina?”

  “You’ll know when you see her,” she said. “She’s wearing the pink hat.”

  “Okay, I’ll go and have a talk with her.”

  I went downstairs to find Frankie standing between two elderly witches who were arguing over the most comfortable armchair. She was too busy mediating the argument to notice me, so I made my way over to the only witch in the room wearing a pink hat.

  “Hey,” I said. “I’m—”

  The witch turned around and looked me up and down. “You’re the Reaper Witch, right?”

  How had my old nickname made it all the way to the nursing home? “That’s me. I was recently visited by Gladys’s ghost…”

  “Decided to haunt you, did she?” Tina said. “I’m not surprised. She liked the sound of her own voice so much when she was still alive that she probably went looking for the first person who might listen to her after she died.”

  Hmm. So they hadn’t been friends. Not entirely surprising, given that a bunch of older witches and wizards with strong personalities were bound to come to blows while living in such close proximity to one another.

  “She mentioned something went missing from her room,” I said. “Have you seen a red music box anywhere?”

  “Let me guess, she accused me of stealing it?” she said. “That’s low even for her.”

  “She said her granddaughter is set to inherit it, but nobody can find it,” I explained. “Do you have any idea where she might have left it?”

  “She probably hid it herself,” she said with a sniff. “To stop her granddaughter from claiming it, assuming she even shows her face here. If I were related to Gladys, I wouldn’t want to come and visit either.”

  “Is that the type of thing she’d do?” It surprised me a little, considering how mild-mannered Gladys had seemed, but I’d learned not to judge from outside appearances when it came to ghosts.

  “Yes.” She leaned back in her seat. “It’s going to be quiet without her hanging around pestering everyone.”

  She’s still hanging around… except a few less people can see her.

  “Is there anyone else who might know where it is?” I asked. “I think she really wants her granddaughter to have the box, and it’d be a shame not to honour her last wish. Even if
she did hide it herself, it’s not anywhere in her room.”

  “I have no idea where it is, then,” Tina said. “Maybe she threw it out. Not that it’s good luck to throw out a cursed object…”

  My gaze snapped onto her. “Did you say cursed?”

  “Well, yes,” she said. “I assume that’s why she wouldn’t let anyone touch it.”

  Oh, boy. “What kind of curse are we talking about?”

  “How should I know?” she said. “I barely got a glimpse of the box and she got all defensive. I doubt she wants anyone to take it away, and I bet that curse of hers ensures they don’t.”

  “I thought it was an enchanted music box.”

  A curse was a world away from a simple enchantment. What kind of curse had Gladys put on the music box… and why?

  2

  I went looking for Gladys again, but her ghost was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Frankie approached me, having broken up the argument between the senior witches. “Any luck?”

  “No, but Gladys showed up again and implied Tina might have taken the box,” I explained. “I asked Tina myself if she knew where it might be, but she said she didn’t. It sounds like they weren’t friends with one another.”

  “Oh, these witches and their endless grudges,” Frankie said, tutting. “I’ve lost track of their arguments, to tell you the truth.”

  “Tina said Gladys might have hidden the music box elsewhere,” I added. “To stop anyone from finding it. How likely is that, do you think?”

  Her lips compressed. “I can’t say I know for sure. That woman did have some odd habits, though I can say the same of a lot of our residents. If anyone took it, it might well have been Hannah. She gets confused, poor thing, and often wanders into the wrong room. Since Gladys had a tendency to leave her door unlocked, it was often hers.”