Potion Problem

by Linnea West

“Well there was, but I had already screwed it up,” Ivy said. “I made an appointment to talk to Plant and I told her that I wanted to be moved out of the kitchen. I laid out everything and every reason why I should be the next successor. I set it up like I could almost be her personal assistant when it came to things with the coven. But the meeting didn’t go well.”

  Ivy sniffled a few times as a few more tears fell. The distraught witch was staring off into the distance, past Vinnie and Diggy. Obviously she was reliving the memory of this meeting in her head.

  “Instead of listening to what I was saying and considering my offer, all she could see was my vulnerability,” Ivy said. “I made the mistake of bringing emotion into it and Plant sensed that. She took hold of my emotions and twisted it all around, telling me that I would never be her successor because she could tell I was weak. Plant said it was a good thing she had stuck me in the kitchen and kept me there, even when Thistle had requested it. She said it was good for me to learn to do things I hated.”

  Ivy’s face crumpled and she buried her head in her hands. As she loudly sobbed, Vinnie could hear the thumping sound again. This time it happened a few times, but Vinnie still couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. She had a pretty good idea of what it was though.

  “You hear that too?” Vinnie whispered to Diggy, keeping one eye on the loudly sobbing Ivy.

  Diggy nodded, her eyes wide and scanning the whole kitchen.

  “Can you tell where it’s coming from?” Vinnie asked.

  “No,” Diggy said. Her eyes were bouncing around the room like she was watching a ping pong match.

  Time was ticking away. Glancing at her watch, Vinnie could see that if the transport came on time, it would be there in about two minutes. Thoughts were racing through her head, but nothing was falling into place. Lavender’s fate and the fate of their brand new job were resting on this. What were they going to do?

  Vinnie jumped as Diggy nudged her hard in the ribs. She turned to look for an explanation and was greeted by an overly exuberant Diggy. The bun that had been holding her hair back was nonexistent, her brown locks now cascading around her shoulders and she practically danced in her chair.

  “I know how to find Thistle!” she squealed.

  With a glance at Ivy, who now seemed to be lost in her sadness, Vinnie was ready to try anything. Hopefullly whatever Diggy had in mind would work

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  With less than two minutes until transport came, whatever Diggy was thinking had to be good and it had to work. There was no other option. Vinnie glanced once more at Ivy, wondering how to handle her but one look told her that Ivy was in the midst of a crisis. The witch was rocking back and forth on her stool, wailing. Vinnie wasn’t exactly sure what was going on with her, but if it would take Ivy out of the equation for a little while, that was okay with her.

  “What’s your idea?” Vinnie whispered to Diggy.

  Diggy smiled and shoved the Magical Impression Sensor at Vinnie. Taking the helmet, Vinnie realized what she meant just as Diggy explained it to her.

  “We look for her magical impression,” Diggy said. “Now that we know that Ivy’s is purple, Thistle must be green. That thumping has to be her and if we can just see some of her magical impression, we can follow it to figure out where she is.”

  Vinnie didn’t really want to brag, but her niece must be a genius. The answer was so obvious, but Vinnie would never have thought of it. Her practical mind had been preoccupied with outsmarting Ivy or finding a way to demand she tell them where Thistle was. Using a magical object hadn’t even crossed her mind.

  Once more, she jammed the helmet on her head and strapped it under her chin. When Lavender was back with them, she made a mental note to ask for the helmet to be made a bit sleeker. As cool as the idea was and as well as it worked, it looked like she was wearing something a child made from spare parts they found in the trash of a construction site they lived next to.

  “Let’s do this,” Vinnie said, feeling simultaneously like a gigantic nerd and like an action hero about to finish the mission. She nodded at Diggy and her orange glow before she started to scan the room.

  The room was mostly full of purple flecks, which made sense because Ivy was the one who ran the kitchen. There was a bit of orange around from Diggy since she had been in there so recently. And every once in a while another color would come into view.

  Finally, Vinnie spotted the green that they were assuming must be Thistle’s color. It made a trail through the kitchen and seemed to disappear behind the stone wall. There must be a hidden room or something that they had to find.

  “She went that way!” Vinnie cried, running towards the wall with Diggy close behind.

  Once she got to the point in the wall where the green disappeared, she started to frantically feel around. There must be a button or a switch hidden somewhere in the stonework. As she hit it, a faint thumping noise came from the other side. They were on the right track.

  “The green disappears here,” Vinnie said. “Help me figure out how to open this up.”

  Diggy gave Vinnie an odd look as she watched her aunt slap the wall, poking and prodding the rocks. Vinnie turned and looked at Ivy, who was still sitting on the stool crying, but now she was watching what Vinnie and Diggy were doing. She seemed almost like she was watching it passively, like they were a show on the television. It almost felt like Ivy didn’t think she could intervene. Maybe she thought things were already over for her.

  “What are you doing?” Diggy asked.

  Vinnie suddenly realized that Diggy couldn’t see what she could through the Sensor. She thought briefly about putting it on Diggy’s head so that she could see, but they didn’t have the time.

  “Her magical impression makes a trail through the kitchen and stops at this wall,” Vinnie said. “She is on the other side of this wall, but I can’t figure out how to open it up.”

  Diggy joined in, frantically searching the wall with Vinnie. Their hands ran over the cool, bumpy wall, feeling every rock and looking for any groove to push or bit of protruding rock to pull on. Nothing was working. The wall wasn’t moving and time was quickly running out.

  “You fools,” Ivy said from her perch. “You’ll never figure it out that way.”

  Vinnie glanced at Ivy over her shoulder. The witch seemed to be coming back to life, like she had cried out all of her weakness and insecurity and now her power was slowly being sucked back into her. That did not bode well for them.

  “Pathetic,” Ivy cackled at them. “I thought Halloween Helpers were supposed to be powerful witches and here you two bumbling idiots are the ones who swoop in to try to save the day. You’ll never figure it out and you have less than a minute left.”

  Vinnie kept searching the wall. She didn’t have time to deal with Ivy right now. But she could feel Diggy starting to shake beside her until finally she exploded, words flying out of her mouth.

  “You sound just like what Plant sounded like,” Diggy said. “Everyone said she was so mean and cruel? Well so are you. I thought you wanted to be a different type of leader. Wasn’t that what you were telling us?”

  “I will be different,” Ivy said, her big eyes unblinking as she stared at the two women feeling the wall. “You see, my motivation is different. Where Plant was cruel just because she liked to be cruel, I just call them like I see them. You two don’t have enough brains to figure this out, so I let you know that.”

  The thumping on the wall was sounding again, but Vinnie wasn’t sure what to do. There was less than a minute left and they needed to do something. Suddenly, something so simple popped into her head.

  “Diggy, is there a spell to open things?” Vinnie asked, hoping her question didn’t sound stupid.

  Diggy slapped her forehead and then nodded at her aunt before she raised her hands up in front of her. She muttered a few words under her breath and moved her hands around a little. The movements had some sort of intricacy that was lost on the non-magical
Vinnie.

  The wall in front of them shook slightly and with the sound of grinding stone, started to swing towards them. Diggy and Vinnie jumped back, wondering if the wall was collapsing. Diggy grabbed Vinnie’s hand. The young girl was practically shaking and Vinnie could tell that she was scared she had done something wrong. Vinnie squeezed her hand to reassure her that this seemed right.

  When the wall had swung open, a space behind it was revealed. It looked like it was supposed to be some sort of pantry as it was lined with shelves of jars with barrels and crates of fruits and vegetables underneath. But right now, it was also a jail cell. In the middle, just on the other side of the wall, was a chair that Thistle was tied to.

  Thistle appeared weak, but she had a smile on her face. It looked like her hands had been tied at one point, but she had managed to loosen them and now all that remained was a rope around her middle that was holding her onto the chair.

  “Get out of the way,” she shouted.

  Vinnie tackled Diggy to the floor as Thistle shot some sort of spell towards Ivy. As they watched, Ivy looked like she was put into invisible handcuffs. She seemed surprised, as if she genuinely thought that she was going to get away with everything.

  The Halloween Helpers dashed over to Thistle and helped free her from the chair. Her hands were shaking as they helped her out of the pantry and into the warmth of the kitchen.

  “I thought you’d never find me,” she said. “But I never lost faith in the two of you, especially you Diggy. You’re a more powerful witch than you know.”

  Before the touchy-feely love fest could continue, a sudden lightning strike hit the middle of the kitchen floor. The transport was here.

  Chapter Thirty

  Out of the lightning strikes and rolls of thunder stepped Norhand, looking like his usual creepy self. He emerged with his long, greasy hair looking just as unbrushed as the last time. His robes swirled around him like there was a fan blowing from some hidden location.

  “Oh good, you’re all ready,” Norhand said. “Thistle, you’re coming with me.”

  Norhand reached out and wrapped his long, bony fingers around Thistle’s arm and started to pull her along. Vinnie grabbed onto Thistle’s other arm. She couldn’t let this mistake continue.

  “Stop, you’ve got the wrong witch,” Vinnie said. She was holding on so tight that she was afraid she was hurting Thistle, but she figured Thistle would forgive her if it prevented her from being locked up for the rest of her life.

  Norhand dropped Thistle’s arm, taking two steps forward until he was too close to Vinnie’s face for comfort. His greasy hair looked even worse up close and his breath smelled a little bit. He twisted his already ugly face into a contorted mess.

  “What do you mean this is the wrong witch?” he asked. “You told me Thistle was the one. Now you’ve changed your mind?”

  “I haven’t just changed my mind because I felt like it,” Vinnie said. “Some new information has come to light and I was wrong before. The witch who killed Plant was Ivy.”

  Vinnie pointed to the stool where Ivy was magically imprisoned. She wasn’t even trying to fight it, instead seeming to accept her fate. Thistle was rubbing her arms, trying to heal the pain from the tug of war that had ensued over her. Diggy stood frozen, looking back and forth between everyone and once again looking more like a child. Vinnie didn’t blame her, this was a tough situation even for adults to be in.

  “Fine, explain it to me,” Norhand said with a sigh.

  He waved his hands and the living room set that had been in Vinnie’s entryway appeared in the kitchen. Vinnie shot a confused look at Norhand, who simply shrugged.

  “I figured I’d keep it,” Norhand said. “Apparently we are going to have to have these sit down meetings more than I had originally hoped, so I may as well have somewhere to sit comfortably while we do.”

  Vinnie, Diggy, and Thistle all squeezed together on the loveseat while Norhand settled himself into the large armchair. With a wave of his hand, a tea set appeared on the table in front of them, steam rolling out of the tea pot.

  Norhand poured himself a cup while Vinnie tried not to be bitter. He could have made his own tea before, he just didn’t want to. Vinnie was a little disgusted with his behavior and a little annoyed at herself that she hadn’t called him on his behavior. Of course he hadn’t needed her to actually make the coffee, Norhand was magical. All he wanted to do was assert his power over her. He was as bad as the coven witches at this point.

  “Alright, start at the beginning,” Norhand said.

  “Shouldn’t we bring Ivy over here?” Vinnie asked. “Since she was the one who actually killed Plant?”

  Norhand rolled his eyes and clicked his tongue at her, but he extended one bony finger towards Ivy and beckoned her in his direction. Her chair rolled like it was on wheels around the counter and up to the new seating area, stopping to rest beside Norhand’s chair. Norhand turned and looked at Vinnie before he spoke again.

  “There you go,” Norhand said. He was becoming a bit frustrated and it was showing, his words coming out more forcefully than calm and collected like they had before. “Now begin.”

  So Vinnie spun the tale of the coven. She set the stage with Plant’s cruel behavior and controlling ways which lead to unhappiness from all of the other witches. Then Vinnie told the group how Ivy had approached Plant to try to become her second in command and her successor, but was laughed out of the meeting because of her emotions.

  While Vinnie told that part, Ivy started to softly cry on her stool again. Norhand looked at her, disgusted, but tried to hand her a monogrammed handkerchief before he realized that her hands were magically bound. With one wave, he undid her invisible shackles, but placed her in sort of a bubble which allowed her to wipe away her tears, but not to escape.

  Thistle took over the explanation of what had happened with the potion, since neither Vinnie nor Diggy really knew how to describe it. She talked about the ingredients and what went wrong, causing the horrible death of Plant.

  Vinnie took over the storytelling once again, detailing how their investigation had gone and what clues they had found that had lead them first to Thistle, but ultimately to Ivy. When she got to the part of Thistle leaving the room, she let Thistle take over.

  “Ivy came to the room to check on me,” Thistle said. “Which I thought was pretty sweet because I hadn’t had any visits from any of the coven witches. So she came in and shut the door and then she told me that I had to come with her. She had this crazy look in her eyes and she told me that she was going to help. I told her no, but she put a spell on me so that it almost felt like I was on a leash. I couldn’t do anything to stop her because I was under magical arrest.”

  Thistle paused her story for a moment, looking down at her hands as she seemed to be gathering strength to go on. Diggy reached over and put her hand on Thistle’s forearm, her face earnest with respect to a witch who may finally be able to be her mentor.

  “She dragged me all the way here to the kitchen,” Thistle said. “I’m not sure if she used magic, but somehow we didn’t see anyone else as she did it. But when we got to the kitchen, Ivy opened up the pantry and made me get inside. She tied me to that chair, telling me that she was going to use both magic and a real rope, but after she got the rope all set, she kind of forgot to do anything else so I was able to get my hands free to knock on the wall. It was a long shot, but it worked out in the end.”

  Vinnie took over the story again, talking about their race to find Thistle and how they bumped into Ivy who brought them back to the kitchen. Finally, she ended with Diggy’s wonderful idea to use the Magical Impression Sensor to find Thistle.

  “Let me see that…thing,” Norhand said, sticking his bony hand out.

  Diggy had been holding the helmet in her lap and she looked at Vinnie for what she should do. Vinnie figured there wasn’t much Norhand could do to it, so she gave a curt nod and Diggy handed it over.

  Norhand turned the helmet
side to side, looking at all aspects of the helmet. His sneer slowly melted into more of a look of admiration before he handed the helmet back to Diggy.

  “Where did you get that?” he asked. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

  “Lavender invented it,” Vinnie said. “She’s quite creative and she manages to make all sorts of helpful magical objects. This was just one of a few that we used to solve this case.”

  As soon as Lavender’s name was mentioned, a devious smile spread across Norhand’s face. Vinnie couldn’t tell what he was thinking, but by the dastardly twinkle in his eye, she was pretty sure she didn’t like it.

  “What an interesting story,” Norhand said. “I may have to see if Lavender will do a little work for me now that I know her ingenuity. Isn’t it nice that you actually figured out your first case? Congratulations.”

  “But they aren’t done,” Ivy screeched from her spot on the chair. “They still need to name me the leader of the coven.”

  Every head in the room swiveled to stare at Ivy. She seemed to be alternating between looking miserable and looking outraged. Vinnie had assumed she was joking when she heard her yell, but Ivy instead seemed to be lost in her own world, genuinely curious as to why they were not appointing her as the leader.

  “She’s right about one thing,” Norhand said. “You aren’t done. Who did you decide was the leader of the coven?”

  Vinnie’s head spun. She had sort of figured that she would have some time after the murder case was solved to think through the possible candidates, but she got the feeling that Norhand wanted an immediate answer. She said the first thing that came into her head.

  “Thistle deserves to be the leader,” Vinnie said.

  A wide smile spread across Diggy’s face as Thistle gasped, looking thoroughly blind-sided. Ivy looked like she was frozen in place and for a moment, Vinnie wondered if Norhand had put a different sort of spell on her. But then she opened her mouth and let out a primal scream. It was all a bit too melodramatic for Vinnie’s taste.