A Witch on Mintwood Mountain (Witch of Mintwood Book 4)

by Addison Creek

  “We all have our limits,” said Greer. “Mine is confronting a witch when I’m not one myself.”

  “They really aren’t here,” said Aunt Harriet. “I wouldn’t have brought you if they were.”

  “But what if they come back?” Charlie worried. “They’re surely going to come back. There’s something about this house that they like.”

  That sounded ominous.

  Unlike the last time my roommates and I had been here, when we split up and went around each side of the house alone, this time Aunt Harriet went straight up to the front door. She tried the handle, but it was locked. With barely any movement at all she waved her wand and sparkles floated out of it and settled on the door. I heard a click and a pop and the door swung open, hinges creaking and groaning and surely alerting anything alive in the house to our presence.

  “If they didn’t know we were here before, they certainly do now,” Greer muttered.

  “At least we alerted the mice, too,” I whispered.

  My aunt led us inside without a word. The interior of the house was so dark that I couldn’t see a thing.

  “Lemmi, why don’t you conjure a lantern,” my aunt suggested.

  “I can do that?” I asked.

  “You’ve never done it before?” She sounded shocked.

  “Basically, all the magic I’ve done has been with you, plus the little bit I managed the night Ellie attacked us,” I explained.

  “If that’s the case, then it’s better not to risk trying to perform a spell and having something go awry,” she said. She waved her wand again in a motion so slight that I only saw it because we were standing close enough to the front door to catch the moonlight. Out of nothing, a lantern appeared in Harriet’s hand and a merry yellow glow beamed out of it, lighting the path directly in front of us but making the house no less creepy.

  “Are you ever going to let go of her?” Greer asked Charlie, who was still hanging onto me as if her life depended on it.

  “Yes, when we get back to the car,” muttered Charlie. But she did release my back after that, forcing herself to stand up straight and look around. Charlie was a reporter, after all, and this was exciting stuff.

  As the four of us wandered through the first floor of the little house, I started to wonder if Betty and Possy had left any traces of their presence at all. The place was spotless. There were no dishes in the sink, and it looked like the floor was freshly swept. If I hadn’t known better I would have thought that no one had been here at all, because my house certainly never looked like this, even after I’d just cleaned and even with Charlie living in it.

  “What are we looking for?” whispered Greer.

  “You really don’t have to whisper,” said my aunt.

  “I feel better whispering,” Greer admitted.

  “Suit yourself,” said Harriet. “We’re looking for anything they might’ve left behind. I wouldn’t have expected them to be so bold as to come and stay in a house in Mintwood while they made plans to attack you, although I guess I shouldn’t be so surprised given that they apparently knew Evenlyn when she was young.”

  “Do you know how they knew each other back then?” I asked.

  One of the first things I had done after my aunt arrived was to show her the picture we had found in Grandmother’s old album. It was a snapshot of Evenlyn with Ellie and Betty, all three of them smiling and laughing like old friends. My aunt had said that my grandmother was very secretive about her past and had never explained who those people were, even though in the picture they appeared to know each other well. So in terms of understanding the background of what was going on, we were still at square one.

  “What about upstairs?” said Charlie.

  “Yes, let’s wander into the upstairs of the witches’ house,” Greer said.

  “We have to go upstairs,” my aunt confirmed.

  Lighting the way, she made for the stairs, which creaked as badly as the front door, the well-worn carpeting doing almost nothing to soften the sound.

  We fell into step behind Aunt Harriet, but it was no use trying to be quiet. My aunt finally gave up tiptoeing and just went up the stairs forthrightly, the rest of us following behind. Now, instead of creeping along, we all sounded like we were stomping.

  The upstairs was very small, with two bedrooms and nothing else but a small closet.

  “Charlie and I will go in one room, you and Greer go in the other,” said my aunt with a nod at me. She spun around, and there was a second lantern in her hand that she handed to me. Then Harriet turned left and Charlie followed, shrugging, while Greer and I turned right into the smaller of the two bedrooms.

  Just like downstairs, the place was spotless.

  “This is ridiculous,” Greer grumbled. “Who keeps the house this clean?”

  “They probably used magic,” I said.

  “Let’s look under the bed and stuff,” suggested Greer. “I’ve seen movies, and that’s always where everyone looks first.”

  I rolled my eyes. Then we got serious.

  Greer walked around the room, testing the floorboards, searching for any creaks or hollow sounds as she moved. I opened the small dresser and checked inside, but it was empty. I got down on my hands and knees and looked under the dresser and the bed, but there was nothing there, either.

  “Find anything?” said Greer.

  “Nothing,” I said.

  We were just about to walk back out to the hallway when something glinted at me from the dark corner under the window. Lifting the lantern, I went over to see what it was.

  “Look at this,” I said, bending down and picking up a pink marble, milky and shiny with lots of sparkles inside. It fit perfectly in the palm of my hand.

  “Let’s show your aunt,” said Greer, peering over my shoulder to get a better look.

  “Any luck?” said Aunt Harriet when we rejoined her and Harriet in the hall.

  “Just this,” I said, holding up the marble to my aunt for inspection.

  “Ah, yes,” she said, taking the shiny thing and looking at it carefully. “Didn’t you say you were attacked one night and the mist that surrounded you was pink?”

  I nodded, my mouth going dry. “Was this what they used?”

  “It’s entirely possible. They didn’t care who found it here at the house, because they already knew you assumed they were the ones who had attacked you.”

  “Can I see it?” Charlie asked, stepping forward.

  Harriet yelled “No!” – but Charlie’s movement was too quick. Before my aunt could stop her, Charlie had reached out and put her fingers around the marble. Instantly, her eyes rolled up and she started to fall sideways. A quick-thinking Greer managed to grab her just before she landed on the hard floor.

  “Charlie,” I cried, looking frantically at Harriet.

  “She touched the dark witch magic that’s burning inside that marble. We have to get her back to the farmhouse now,” said my aunt. “There’s no time to waste.”

  Charlie dropped the marble in her swoon, and it started to roll away. Harriet ordered me to pick it up, preferably using a cloth instead of touching it with my bare skin. I went into the bathroom, found a neatly folded washcloth, and wrapped the marble in it, being careful not to touch it again.

  I was breathing hard, and my aunt’s movements were clipped and tightly controlled. She might not be expressing it out loud, but she was clearly upset.

  Charlie’s eyes were softly closed, and she was pale and clammy. The fingers that had touched the pink marble were red and swollen. Her breathing was labored, but at this point I was glad that she was breathing at all.

  How we got Charlie home I’ll never know. It took all three of us taking turns carrying her to get her back to the car. My aunt didn’t want to perform any more spells on her, so transporting her was up to us. I drove as fast as I had ever driven in my life, and if Detective Cutter had been around he surely would have pulled me over and given me a ticket.

  To his credit, Paws could tell i
mmediately that something was wrong, and he didn’t make any of his usual sarcastic comments. In fact, he saw our fearful faces getting out of the car and dashed to help us.

  “What is it? What happened?” he demanded.

  I explained to him as quickly as possible as we carried Charlie inside.

  Greer looked pale and upset, but she was doing her best to get Charlie to a safe place with a minimum of jostling. When we laid our friend out on the living room sofa, she rolled around as if she was uncomfortable.

  “Cuddle pillows,” she muttered irritably as she thrashed around.

  Greer and I exchanged looks. Then Greer raced into Charlie’s room, grabbed a pillow, and brought it back to put on her friend’s chest. Immediately Charlie’s arms came up around the pillow and a smile came over her face. “Cuddle pillow,” she said happily.

  “Now that’s done,” Greer muttered.

  What do you need?” I asked Aunt Harriet. Charlie looked peaceful, but she still wasn’t awake, and my heart was still pounding.

  “We need your grandmother’s stores of herbs,” she answered.

  “Where did she keep those?” I said in bewilderment.

  My aunt looked at me in surprise. “She never showed you her herbs? You never found them after she died?”

  “She left a lot of stuff, and I’ve been through quite a bit of it, but I’ve never seen a collection of herbs,” I said, embarrassed to admit that I hadn’t gone through all of Evenlyn’s things with a fine-toothed comb.

  What, I’d been busy, and she had a lot of stuff.

  Harriet looked around the living room as if she was about to spot the herbs just sitting there on the side table. “She used to keep them in a suitcase. Her brown suitcase.”

  “I bet that one’s in the basement,” said Greer, snapping her fingers and moving toward the kitchen again.

  I didn’t remember any suitcase in the basement, but Greer was more observant than I was so I trusted her instincts on this. I followed her into the kitchen to get a cloth to soak in warm water to put on Charlie’s forehead.

  Paws was in the living room when I got back with the cloth. It was such a serious situation that he had braved the indoors and was now sitting on the floor next to the couch.

  “You let her touch a magical object?” he groaned.

  “‘Let her’ is pretty strong,” I said defensively.

  “Judging by the current situation, it’s not as if you stopped her,” the cat pointed out.

  “Judging by the current situation, it’s not as if your mother ever taught you manners,” I shot back, stress over Charlie’s condition making me short-tempered.

  “Oh, boohoo. You’d hurt my feelings if only I had any!” Paws replied.

  Once he was finished yelling at me, he started yelling at my aunt. “I didn’t have time to stop her,” said Harriet. “I didn’t know we’d find a magical object. I was just hoping we’d come across some papers.”

  “The dark witches probably left the object precisely so you’d find it,” Paws hypothesized. “They know you associate with humans, and they hoped something like this would happen.”

  He looked at me and I shrugged. “‘The humans’ are part of my investigations,” I said curtly.

  Paws adored Charlie; I knew for a fact that he’d be devastated if anything happened to her. Looking at my face, he dropped the argument.

  “The cloth now, on her forehead please,” my aunt instructed. I did as I was told and was glad I could help.

  Greer reappeared carrying a large brown suitcase.

  “That’s it!” my aunt cried.

  The suitcase did look familiar, one of those items you’ve seen so many times you forget about them.

  I hurried over to help Greer, and between the two of us we got the suitcase to the front of the couch. I tried to open it, but it wouldn’t budge.

  “Use your wand,” Paws growled, impatiently hopping around from one foot to another. I did as he suggested, tapping the wand against the lock. To my utter astonishment, it popped open.

  “Yes, it’s so shocking when I give you good advice, except that it happens all the time,” said Paws through gritted teeth. He looked upward as if wondering when I would stop being surprised.

  Ignoring him, I flipped the lid of the suitcase and peered eagerly inside at jars upon jars upon jars, all labeled in my grandmother’s scribble.

  “What are we looking for?” said Greer. She was about to reach out to pick up a jar when she stopped and drew her hand back. “Probably best if I don’t touch any magical objects.”

  “You can touch the herbs,” said my aunt. “It’s only the ones with evil intent that you have to watch out for, and maybe a love potion or two.”

  I glanced sharply at Harriet, because it hadn’t occurred to me that she would ever produce a love potion.

  “I need mint and I need ginger,” she instructed. We searched through the clinking jars until we found dried mint and dried ginger; my grandmother had left a lot of both. I handed the jars to my aunt, who disappeared them into the kitchen, from where I could hear her banging around and starting the kettle to boil some water.

  “You think she’ll be okay?” whispered Greer, moving to the foot of the couch to sit by Charlie as we waited for the witch to prepare her brew.

  “I think so,” I said. “She seems okay, just not awake.”

  “She’ll be fine. Harriet is excellent at making potions,” said Paws. “Don’t tell her I said so.”

  “I heard that,” my aunt called from the other room.

  “Heard what? I heard nothing,” said Paws.

  I rolled my eyes.

  “She never cared about her talent,” said Paws. “Your grandmother kept wanting her to learn more, but she wanted to travel and see the world and all of that nonsense.”

  “It’s not nonsense! There just isn’t a future in potions,” said my aunt. She returned from the kitchen carrying a small mortar and pestle, ruthlessly mashing something inside the little bowl.

  “Greer, can you go into the kitchen and get the steaming cup of water I left on the counter? We need Charlie to drink this,” said my aunt. Greer scurried into the kitchen and came back with the water.

  My aunt’s movements were slow and relaxed, and I almost wanted to shake her and tell her to hurry up. She didn’t seem as concerned as Greer and I were, and I wondered how many times she had done this before. Maybe she was calm because Charlie looked perfectly happy to be cuddling a pillow and sleeping.

  “She’s going to be okay, isn’t she?” I asked anxiously.

  Greer had already asked, but I needed to hear the words from my aunt.

  “She’ll be fine. There’s only a very little remnant of magic in the marble, and even if there were more, it wasn’t a killing spell,” she said. I wasn’t sure if that made me feel better or worse.

  “I think it’s ready,” said Harriet, sniffing the mixture she had concocted. Evenlyn’s daughter had been staring into the glass of hot water as she stirred, muttering words I couldn’t quite hear. Once the drink was ready, she fished out her wand and tapped the glass three times. It started to turn a beautiful green, reminding me of a certain someone’s eyes, but I shook my head to clear the nonsense out of it. This was no time to be thinking about Jasper.

  “I’ll hold her head,” offered Greer. She lifted Charlie’s head high enough so that my aunt could lift the glass of liquid to Charlie’s lips. Slowly but surely, they got Charlie to drink almost half the glass. When the cloth slipped off Charlie’s forehead, I took it back into the kitchen and ran it under hot water again.

  “We need her to drink just a little more,” said Aunt Harriet.

  “There’s already some color returning into her face,” said Greer, sounding relieved.

  “I think that’s good for now,” said my aunt, taking the glass away from Charlie’s lips. “She’s had about half the glass, and I’ll give her the rest in a little while.” Harriet sat back on her heels and watched Charlie calmly.
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br />   “This is why you shouldn’t go anywhere without me,” said Paws.

  “How would you have stopped Charlie from touching the marble?” said my aunt.

  “I would have found the marble before Lemmi did,” said Paws.

  Grudgingly, but only to myself, I had to admit that he had a point. As a cat he would have been on ground level. I chided myself for not having thought to come back and get him after the town meeting, and promised myself I’d do better next time.

  The four of us settled into the living room to wait. Aunt Harriet wanted to get Charlie to drink more, but Charlie apparently needed a bit of time before she could swallow more of it. While we waited, we told Paws about the town hall meeting and how half the town believed that there were ghosts around.

  “Never have I heard something so absurd in my life,” Paws huffed.

  “You know you’re a ghost yourself, right?” said Greer.

  “Yes, but of all the things I would steal, a trowel would not be one of them,” sniffed Paws. “I do not garden.”

  “Maybe it’s a ghost that likes to garden,” Greer argued, trying to defend Charlie’s position, since Charlie wasn’t able to defend it herself.

  “It wasn’t a ghost that gardens. There has to be another explanation,” insisted Paws. Then he looked at me and asked, “Are you going to go back there and look around?”

  “I don’t know. I have to go to the mountain and try to find Chloe first,” I said.

  “You don’t have to find a ghost at Farmer Franklin’s if there isn’t one,” said Paws.

  “You’ve said that so often, I’m wondering if it’s you taking the tools,” said Greer.

  “I might be a renowned cat of mystery, but I do not spend my time gardening, thank you very much,” said the cat.

  We all knew it was true. His nails were perfectly manicured, and I was sure that if he ever got dirt under them he would quickly clean it away.

  “What are we talking about?” asked a weak voice behind us.

  We all turned around with a cry to see Charlie trying to push herself into a seated position. Harriet stood up and told Charlie to lie back down, and Charlie sank back gratefully. My aunt grabbed her concoction again and said, “Here, drink this.”