by Ariella Moon
“I didn’t know they had a rare books section.” She skimmed through it, stopping when she encountered yellow streaks. “You highlighted it?” She sounded horrified.
“I didn’t. Parvani did. But it was an ordinary book when she highlighted it.”
Oops.
Salem narrowed her eyes again. “What do you mean?”
I considered keeping quiet. But Salem’s pale, kohl-rimmed eyes bored into me like police spotlights. I broke. “It was a regular paperback book when I bought it, but it keeps changing.”
“Are you serious?”
“Dead serious.” I winced as the words left my mouth, and I glanced at Dad’s cap. “For instance, the silver part wasn’t here yesterday.”
“Holy Goddess. Any idea what’s making it change?”
Bad mojo? “I don’t know, but it creeps me out.”
Salem sat cross-legged and flipped through a few more pages, tracing her finger along several of the highlighted sentences. After a few minutes, she glanced up. “What are you and Parvani up to?”
I chewed my thumbnail, something I hadn’t done since I was ten.
“Look,” Salem said. “This is serious magick. You shouldn’t do anything until you’ve read the whole book. And then you shouldn’t do anything without consulting an experienced practitioner.”
“You mean someone like Miss Ravenwood?”
“You better stay clear of her. Did you ever find your parents’ yearbooks?”
“I haven’t had a chance to look.” Miss Ravenwood and her broomstick had flown off my radar with all the other things going on. I glanced at the troll and tiara. “I read some of the first part. It looks pretty harmless.”
“It can be harmless, if you do it right and take certain precautions. If you ignore the warnings or forget a step, there could be serious consequences. Karmic consequences.”
The worry knot in my stomach grew like a population of rats without inhibitors.
“For instance,” Salem said. “Look at this.”
The book fell open to a section on love spells. My heart stopped. No yellow highlights. Clearly, Parvani hadn’t read this far yet. “Love Spells. Perform during the new moon to full moon, or on the full moon.” I made a mental note to check the calendar.
Salem skimmed her finger down the spidery list of correspondences. “Colors: red and white.” Gee, what a surprise. “Herbs and plants: apple, barley, Brazil nuts, ginger. Planets: Venus. Day of the week: Friday.” Figures. “Flowers: coltsfoot, daffodil, daisy, lavender, rose, etc.”
Salem’s finger, with its chipped black nail polish, halted. She read aloud, “‘Warning. Never try to bind someone to you through magick. Such misuse of the Craft will have dire consequences in this life and beyond. A love attained through magick is no love.’”
“Why tell someone how to perform a love spell if it is going to curse them for all eternity? And what about people like Parvani? She believes in reincarnation.”
Baby, who was quite fond of Parvani, whimpered from the doorway.
“The book is trying to warn you how you should and shouldn’t perform a love spell. Look at this part.” She pointed to another line. “’Do not direct your spell at a specific person. Instead, write down the qualities you seek in a true love.’” My heart somersaulted.
I read further. “‘Do no harm.’” I was not getting a warm, fuzzy feeling about this.
“The Wicca creed includes ‘Be silent’, but I’ll break it just this once,” Salem said. “I’ve been studying the Craft for a year now. So if you need any help…”
“Thanks. But I’m going to try and talk Parvani out of it. This time I’ll make her listen.”
“Then this isn’t about trying to contact your dad?”
I reeled back on my heels, shocked. “No, of course not. I hadn’t even thought of such a thing.”
“Good, because you need to take heed before you try to contact the Other Side. Especially this time of year.” I must have appeared as confused as I felt. Salem explained, “Samhain. You know, Halloween. The veil between this world and the spirit world becomes thin.”
“Oh.” I reached for Dad’s cap and anchored it on my head. It reeked of sweat and shampoo, but I imagined it also smelled of all the dangerous countries Dad had photographed.
The doorbell rang, startling me out of my reverie. “Must be the pizza,” I said over Baby’s barking.
“Maybe it’s Parvani.” Salem stashed the spell book beneath the discarded clothes.
Rattled, I led the way toward the entry.
Chapter Nineteen
It wasn’t Parvani at the door. It was Jordan. My stomach did a rollercoaster climb toward my ribcage, then freefell.
Jordan did a double take when he saw Salem. “Hey,” he said to both of us.
“Hey,” Salem and I said at the same time. She arched her over-plucked brows and slid me a what’s-up-with-the-jock glance.
I felt my face turn dodge ball red. “Jordan sits behind me in Bio,” I explained. “We’ve known each other since preschool.”
“He sits in front of me in History.” Salem assumed a reproachful tone. “And totally blocks my view of the board.”
“Sorry about that.” Jordan tousled her hair like she was a five-year old. Salem knocked his hand away. I held my breath, waiting for her to smite him or something. Jordan just grinned and puffed out his chest. “Evie let me do the perp walk to the office with her. She needed a bodyguard, like, in case Evan was waiting to whack her with his crutches.”
I swatted his shoulder. My pulse skittered when my hand made contact with his solid bicep.
The pizza guy drove up in a little white truck. “Come in,” I told Jordan. Then, to the delivery guy, “Be right back.”
Mom emerged from the kitchen with her bulging red wallet in hand. I winced when I noticed all the discount coupons sticking out. “Hi Jordan,” she said as she handed the pizza man some cash. “Want to stay for dinner?”
Jordan breathed in the garlicky pizza smell and breathed out the word, “Yes.”
Hoping Parvani wouldn’t discover us, I rushed everyone to the kitchen. Mom said, “Can you get…?”
“Got it.” I pulled another placemat from the drawer. The dark green mats cover a lot of scratches on the table. Mom should stick to the studio, or be more careful when she works on her greeting cards in the kitchen.
“So what happened?” Jordan asked as I handed him four sage-colored plates. For the third time, I told about my suspension. “And Evan got a week? Harsh.”
Salem came to my defense. “He’s a jerk. Besides, he should pay for all the things they didn’t catch him at.”
“Amen.” Mom placed a big glass salad bowl on the table and began tossing mixed greens and feta.
We ate in silence. Baby watched us with bright eyes, no doubt willing us to drop something. After a while, Salem cleared her throat. “Mrs. O’Reilly, I heard you grew up around here.”
Mom nodded. “In this house.”
“I think my parents were a year ahead of you in school. Maybe you remember them. Mitch Miller and Kimberly Cain?”
Mom lowered her wedge of pizza. “Is your mom a pretty blonde? Petite?”
“Yeah.”
Mom broke into a smile. “Now I see the resemblance.” Salem blushed.
“Cool.” Jordan reached for his third slice of pizza.
Salem stabbed a piece of butter lettuce. “I saw your picture in their yearbook, and Miss Ravenwood’s.”
Mom’s smile vanished.
“No way!” Jordan said. “My math teacher went to Jefferson?”
“Oh, yes.” Mom’s voice dripped venom. “She had quite a crush on Evie’s father.”
I almost choked. Mom must have inhaled too much glue while she worked on the cards. Salem and I exchanged sideways glances.
“Wretched,” Jordan said. “Did they, like, date or anything?”
Mom’s face scrunched like she had an unpleasant taste in her mouth. “I think they went
to a Halloween dance during our junior year.”
This time I did choke. No one had to do the Heimlich on me, but Salem thumped my back between my shoulder blades, which hurt. When I could breathe again, she nudged me with her foot.
“I heard she’s Wiccan or something,” Salem said when I stopped coughing. “I wonder if she was practicing back then?”
“Wicca is white magick.” Mom’s tone suggested Miss Ravenwood dabbled in something quite the opposite.
Every poisoned apple, boiling cauldron, turn-the-world-into-perpetual-winter scene I’d ever read, or watched at the multiplex, flashed before my eyes. Salem nudged me harder. Jordan just blinked several times.
Mom wiped her hands on a paper napkin. “Enough ancient history. I better get back to work.” Her chair scraped against the wood floor as she stood. “Sarah, let me know when you’re ready for a ride home. I can give you one too, Jordan.”
Salem nodded, her mouth full of salad.
Jordan said, “Thanks, Mrs. O.”
After Mom headed up to her studio, Salem leaned toward me.
“Can you believe it? Miss Ravenwood had a crush on your dad.”
“Gross,” Jordan said. “What if you were Miss Ravenwood’s daughter?”
“Eww.” Salem shuddered.
I could think of one advantage—I might have been good at math. So not worth it.
Jordan used his fork to chase a piece of arugula around his plate. “Speaking of Halloween dances, either of you planning on going?”
“Not my thing,” Salem proclaimed. Given her earlier revelation, I wondered what she did do on Halloween. Wasn’t it a witch’s major holiday?
“Evie?” Jordan drew out my name in a funny way. Before I could answer, he captured a lock of my hair and twirled it around his finger. “Think you can avoid further suspensions so you can go to the dance?”
It almost sounded like Jordan was asking me to the dance. I couldn’t tell for sure, so I played it cool. “Well, I don’t know, Kent. It depends on whether or not Tommy Deitch stays clear of me.”
Salem snorted. Jordan blinked at her, as if he’d forgotten she was there. He released my hair and leaned back in his chair. His hand dropped to the table, about an inch from mine. If either of us moved our pinkies, we’d touch.
“I hate to eat and run,” Salem said while carrying her plate to the sink, “but I better go home and feed Einstein.”
“Einstein?” Jordan asked. I swear his hand slid a heartbeat closer to mine. “I thought he was, like, way dead.”
“Einstein is her dog.”
“My sister’s dog. Amy is away at college. MIT. So I’m stuck with dog duty.”
“Wretched,” Jordan said.
I tried to focus on their banter, but it was difficult with my hand tingling.
“I hate to interrupt your mom when she’s working.”
I dragged my attention up to Salem. Little worry lines creased her forehead. “Better to interrupt her now than later when she’s immersed. I’ll help you gather up your stuff.” I rose and reached for my water glass, accidentally on purpose brushing Jordan’s hand. He was eyeing the last piece of pizza, but his fingers twitched as if he were trying to catch me.
“Why don’t you polish off the pizza so I won’t have to wrap it?”
“If you insist, Lois.” He reached for the slice. I didn’t know how he stayed in such great shape. Skateboarding and football must burn lots of calories.
“We’ll be right back.” Salem linked her arm through mine and dragged me from the kitchen. When we were halfway down the hall, she whispered in my ear. “Lois?”
“It’s a Superman joke.”
Salem’s brow furrowed. “Oh, I get it, Lois Lane and Clark Kent. Jordan Kent. He so digs you.”
A warm flush crept its way up my throat. “He does not.”
“Couldn’t you see he wants to take you to the dance?”
I could. One slight problem—my best friend so digs him.
We reached my room. Salem giggled. “Just think, Lois. Unlike Miss Ravenwood, you don’t need to perform a spell to get a date.”
“Don’t ever say that in front of Parvani.”
“Why?” Salem’s gaze swung to the pile of clothes concealing the spell book. “Don’t tell me. Parvani…”
I clasped her arm. “Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Of course I won’t. Parvani wasn’t planning on directing the spell at a particular person, was she?”
I bit my thumbnail. My eyes kind of rolled in their sockets toward the kitchen.
Salem gasped. “Jordan?”
I nodded.
“Holy Goddess. We have to stop her.”
Chapter Twenty
I knew Parvani. I couldn’t just tell her, “Don’t do the spell.” I’d have to provide evidence—preferably written, highlighted evidence. She already grasped the whole karma thing. I’d just have to prove it applied in this case. And if I failed, maybe the timing of the moon would be on my side. Otherwise, Parvani might think I’m jealous and want Jordan to myself. Which is true, but beside the point.
I decided to start with the phases of the moon aspect. After Mom and I dropped off Jordan and Salem, I snuck back to my room, grabbed the calendar off my desk, and pulled out Teen Wytche. It was past time for a spell check.
I reread the part about the new moon to the full moon phase being most optimal for casting a love spell. “The full moon is this Saturday,” I told Baby. “Parvani will never be ready by then.”
I searched the October calendar page for the dark circle representing the next new moon. October 25th. The date seemed too close to Halloween if Parvani was hoping Jordan would ask her to the dance. Maybe I’d get lucky and she’d drop the whole thing.
Maybe Salem and I wouldn’t have to pull an intervention.
****
“Evie?”
I willed my face to levitate from my pillow. It wouldn’t.
“It’s after ten,” Mom said from the vicinity of the doorway. “Time to get up.”
I peeled one eye open. Light streamed through the white metal mini-blinds. She must mean ten in the morning. “Go away.”
“Five more minutes, Miss. Walk the dog after breakfast, then come up to my studio. We’re on deadline. Since you’re suspended, you can help stuff envelopes.”
I pictured the stiff plastic display envelopes Mom used to protect her hand-painted greeting cards. “There are child labor laws in this country,” I mumbled into the pillow.
“They don’t apply to family-run businesses,” Mom said in a trilling voice.
Uh oh. Deadline madness has set in.
She came back in five minutes, but it felt like five seconds. “Evie Elizabeth O’Reilly. Get a move on. We have a mortgage to pay.”
With a groan, I rolled out of bed and grabbed my sweats from a pile on the floor. Remind me to kill Evan. I’d much rather have faced school, Parvani, and the rumor mill than my parents’ studio. I’d avoided it since Dad’s death. As I climbed the wooden stairs, it felt like I had the Quarter Guardian stones strapped to my legs.
“There you are.” Mom swiveled her chair toward me when I opened the door. She’d tied back her auburn hair with a black scrunchie. Light sliced through the oversized windows, illuminating a sprinkling of gray strands that hadn’t been there before Dad died. “Ready to stuff envelopes?”
“Sure.” I took a seat beside her at the worktable. Dad’s desk, with its seventeen-inch monitor, and his darkroom with all its memories, were behind me. Even so, my heart clutched. I remembered the darkroom’s chemical smells, the tight space, all the hours Dad and I had spent there when I’d been little, before we’d gone digital.
“Want some music?” Mom asked.
“Sure.”
Mom punched the play button on the CD player Dad had given her five Christmases ago. After a second, a Beatles song came on. “Don’t forget these.” Mom handed me a pair of white cotton gloves, so I wouldn’t smudge the cards or leave fingerprints
on the plastic envelopes.
I reached for a stack of cards, expecting Mom’s usual, hand-painted dragonflies in rich emeralds and glittering teal damselflies. They worked amazingly well on everything from birthday cards to sympathy notes. I stared down at the card in my hand. “Mom?”
“I know. They’re not what you expected. Do you hate them?”
“No, of course not.” I studied the night scene. A pale-skinned woman, dressed in a long black dress, stood before a low-hanging full moon. “It’s beautiful. Somber, but beautiful.” I checked the back. “Is it mass produced?”
“Yes. From a painting I did—rather, three paintings. I’m trying something new. But don’t worry. I’ll include plenty of my standard dragonflies and damselflies with each shipment. I still do those by hand. These are my Maiden series.”
She set out two more cards. In one, a serious-faced woman held a dazzling yellow-and-orange sun in front of her chest. Her heart radiated light. In the other, a woman in a long, white tunic reclined on a boulder beside dark blue water. Behind her, emerald ferns and deep green trees gave the scene a fairy glen feel. A damselfly perched on the boulder beside the woman’s foot.
“They’re beautiful.”
Mom lowered her shoulders. “I’m so glad you like them.”
Half an hour must have passed before I got up the courage to ask, “How do you do it every day?”
“Do what?”
“Work up here, surrounded by all these memories.”
Tears crested her eyes. Mom brushed them away with the paint-stained sleeve of her sweatshirt. “I lit a tea candle every morning. I told myself I had to work and could not fall apart until the candle guttered.”
“Did it work?”
She shook her head. “Not at first. But I had to support us, so I kept trying. Finally, I made it.”
“Wow.”
“Working in the studio was easy compared to going into our bedroom every night.” Mom sighed. “I can’t believe it’s been almost two years.”