“Follow my lead,” I said.
“Because you're the all-powerful witch and I'm a big stupid nothing?” She narrowed her eyes at me.
A big stupid nothing? Uh-oh. The stomach growl had been a warning. My daughter was now past hungry and veering into hangry territory.
I finished unlacing my boots and straightened up as I patted her head. “Don't be sore that you haven't gotten any powers yet,” I said softly. “Hang in there. You'll get them eventually. Remember when you were ten or eleven, and you were so worried you'd never get boobs or hips? You would put your Barbie dolls under your pillow as tributes for the Boob Fairy.”
Her eyes widened. It was an adorable story, yet for some reason, my teen daughter didn't appreciate me bringing up the Boob Fairy story.
“Mom!”
“Well, it worked, didn't it? Sure, it took a couple of years, but you got your wish eventually.”
She squeezed her fists together in front of her chest and gave me a dirty look. Then she stomped off, going in the direction Zinnia had gone.
I finished taking off my boots. They were the new ones my aunt had paid for the day we'd bumped into each other. I loved the long, leather laces, but they did slow me down, thus removing all the dramatic flair from my entrances and exits.
I heard water pouring and dishes clinking. The other Riddle witches were in the kitchen, by the sound of it.
On my way to the kitchen, I stopped to admire the flower wallpaper in the hallway. Well, maybe admire is the wrong word.
As I ran my fingertips over the giant rose and zinnia blossoms, I wondered, if Zinnia hadn't been part of a conspiracy to bring me to Wisteria, who was? When she'd told me her only involvement was writing the recommendation that Kathy Carmichael asked for, I'd wanted to believe her. She was family. She was eccentric, but I did like her already. And it wasn't just because her face was a mirror of mine. Or was it?
Stay vigilant, I told myself, and then I felt silly.
I was probably overreacting.
This must be exactly how conspiracy cranks feel, I thought. It was a chilling realization to see the similarities between myself and those kooky guys who find an unwilling audience for their talk about the Illuminati and other secret organizations. Every library gets its fair share of this type. They're generally harmless and can even be entertaining. But you wouldn't want to turn into one.
I had a funny thought about turning the tables one day and telling an unsuspecting conspiracy crank all about how witches and wolf shifters are real, and there are secret organizations who investigate homicides and supernatural occurrences.
Chapter 26
Zinnia's kitchen layout was similar to mine, right down to the central island surrounded with stools, but her appliances were older. The refrigerator was vintage from the nineteen-fifties—the rounded kind with a moving handle and a full door. Seeing it reminded me of the troublesome toaster we'd put on a time-out inside our freezer. A lot had happened in the three days since we'd seen my aunt, and there was so much to be discussed.
My aunt set out an array of cookies and prepared a pot of tea.
She explained, “You girls ought to know, I've been planning on gradually easing you into the magical world.” She gave Zoey a sympathetic look. “But then your mother had her temper tantrum and stormed out of here. Frankly, I was a little taken aback.”
“It wasn't a temper tantrum,” I said. “It was a perfectly reasonable reaction to an unreasonable situation. Most people would prefer to wake up safe in their own homes after being electrocuted rather than be kidnapped to another location. Especially another location that isn't a hospital.” I sniffed twice. “You know, I can't remember the last time the inside of my nose didn't have a funny smell.”
Zoey said, “Shooting blue lightning balls at a shifter bird probably didn't help your nostrils.”
Zinnia dropped the tea kettle onto the counter with a clunk. “Shifter bird? Lightning balls? Tell me everything.”
I waved my hand. “It was no big deal. I was walking in the Pacific Spirit Forest, all by myself, when a crazy bird started dive bombing me.”
“You weren't alone,” Zoey said.
I shot her a be-quiet look so she wouldn't divulge Chet's big secret.
“Right,” I said. “I wasn't alone, because there was a big dog who came charging onto the scene right when I was running out of blue lightning juice. The dog was big, like a wolf, and it chased away the bird.”
Zinnia frowned at me. “How big was this bird?”
“Pterodactyl sized.” I laughed. “But you know how fear exaggerates things. It was probably just an owl mistaking me for prey.” I glanced over at Zoey to gauge her reaction. When I'd first told her about the attack, I'd downplayed the size of the flying beast.
Zinnia slowly picked up the kettle and resumed making tea. “Interesting,” was all she said.
Zoey and I took turns making her plate of cookies disappear.
Zinnia refilled the plate with more cookies, put everything on a tray, and nodded for us to follow her out of the kitchen. She led us into a small, formal sitting room. We didn't have a room like this in our house. There were brocade curtains framing the windows, tapestry rugs covering most of the wood floor, and every piece of furniture was buttoned, tufted, and tasseled like a showroom for buttons, tufts, and tassels.
“Cute room,” Zoey cooed. “It's so girly. The decorating gene skipped my mother entirely. Her idea of style is anything that doesn't show grease from pepperoni fingers.”
Zinnia's mouth curved down in distaste. She eyed us both with suspicion, like we were about to go full slob in her pretty room.
“My daughter's right,” I admitted, glancing around at the dizzying floral surfaces. Even the wallpaper had roses, ivy, and zinnias. “But rest assured, there's nothing in here I'd wipe my pepperoni fingers on.” I took a napkin from the tray and spread it across my lap to put her at ease.
Zinnia poured the tea.
She asked me to explain to her again what had happened in the woods, and I did.
“It's a wolf shifter's blood on your skirt,” she said. “Was it badly injured?”
“At first, but I put my hands on the wounds, and they glowed with an orange light, and then its hide stitched together by magic. I also got these visions, or memories, I guess. From Winona Vander Zalm. Other times in her life she was helping people in medical emergencies. Was she a witch, too?”
Zinnia nodded. “In a manner, yes. Winona was a healer.” She looked down at the dried blood on my skirt and scrunched her lips. “Please be careful of the upholstery.”
“Oops.” I moved myself over to a wood chair. “We wouldn't want to infect your sofa and have it shift into a zebra,” I said.
Zoey giggled at my joke. Zinnia did not.
“It appears Winona Vander Zalm has imbued you with some of her abilities,” Zinnia said. “I wonder if it's permanent.”
“You mean you don't know?”
Zoey uncrossed and recrossed her legs. “Auntie Z, we hoped you had all the answers.” She looked at me. “Mom, tell her about the toaster.”
Zinnia gave off the vibe of someone who didn't want to hear about our evil toaster, but I told her anyway.
“Hmm,” she said in response. “Where is this walking toaster now?”
“Having a time-out in the freezer. Should we have put it inside a circle, or a pentagram made from chalk?”
“Salt,” my aunt said. “We contain dark forces with salt, not chalk.”
Salt. I'd have to try that next. “Now what? Wait around to see if Winona's old appliances try to kill me again?” I clutched my chest. “What if it's the dishwasher? I can't live without a dishwasher.”
“Give me a minute,” she said, getting up.
She left us alone in the overdecorated sitting room.
Zoey turned to me and whispered, “She's probably getting us a potion. She's really into potions.”
“The kind that turns people into toads? Or more like
love potions?”
Zoey gave me a serious look. “She makes a sandwich spread that tastes exactly like mayonnaise but has zero calories.”
“You're pulling my leg.”
Zoey wrinkled her nose. “She says that unfortunately, there are side effects. You have to go to the bathroom within five minutes of eating it. She says she'll iron out the wrinkles eventually.”
“Good to know. If she offers us any sandwiches, I'll politely refuse.”
“You could use your telekinetic magic to scrape all the witch-mayo out of your sandwich.” She sighed.
I leaned over and gave her knee a loving squeeze. “Zoey, be patient. Your magic is coming. Mine probably came on fast because it was sixteen years overdue. We'll keep trying together, okay? We're in this together.” I squeezed her knee again. “Everyone else comes and goes, but you and I are forever. Family is something you're stuck with.”
Right on cue, Zinnia returned to the room. She had a book in her hands.
“Let me explain about the letter,” Zinnia said.
“Nobody's stopping you,” I said.
She sat in a tapestry-upholstered chair across from me and folded her hands on top of her thick book. I leaned over, trying to get a peek at the spine, but I couldn't see a title. The brown binding appeared to be leather, wrinkled and cracked with age.
“I've known your boss, Kathy Carmichael, for years,” Zinnia said.
Zoey interrupted, “Is she a witch, too?”
Zinnia smiled. “Not everyone in this town has supernatural powers.” She pursed her lips and tucked a strand of loose red hair behind her ear. “Kathy noticed that one job applicant had an unusual name similar to my own, so she asked if we happened to be related. That was when I seized the opportunity to put in a good word for you.”
I gave her a suspicious look. I was still feeling distrustful of my aunt, but not too distrustful to help myself to a few more cookies.
Zinnia smoothed her hands over the book in a bewitching, delicate gesture. “Have I convinced you?” She arched her red eyebrows. “Or do you still want to waste time accusing me of being a liar?”
Her voice betrayed her hurt feelings.
The woman was sixteen years older than me and far more worldly, but she was on her own. She lived alone in a big house. All at once, I sensed her desperation for connection. The flowers and elaborate furnishings filled the rooms in her house to compensate for a lack of family or friends. Zinnia was lonely. She needed us more than we needed her.
I could see it on her face because her face was a mirror of my own. I craved connection as well.
“No more accusations,” I said.
Her eyebrows continued to climb. “Are you certain? If you look closely enough at any yard of fabric, you'll find a loose thread. Examine any human heart and you'll discover imperfections.” Her lips pursed into a tightly wrinkled heart.
“Auntie Z,” my daughter said gently. “Nobody here thinks the Riddle family is perfect. We want to get to know you. The real you.”
Zinnia blinked and looked down at her hands. “You're here because you seek knowledge and magic. Let's not beat around the bush.” She held up one hand, palm out. “Please, don't embarrass us all by pretending otherwise. I know I haven't yet earned your trust. For tonight, however, please humor your dear old aunt.”
Zoey and I exchanged a look. “Sure,” we both said.
My aunt's chair creaked as she leaned forward and held the book out toward me. “Take this, Zara, and open it to a random page. Completely random.”
I took the tome, which was even heavier than it looked, and flipped it open at the one-third mark.
Before I could even look at the ornate script or drawings on the page, Zinnia snatched the book away again.
“It worked,” Zinnia said, leaning over to study the page.
“We're new to this,” I said. “You're going to have to explain everything to us like we're a couple of magical ding-dongs, because we are.”
She smiled and held up the book to show us an ornate page. Then she flipped the page to show the next one in the book. It was blank. So were the following dozen pages that she flipped through.
Zoey gasped, “It's a magic book! The text only appears when you need it.”
“Our youngest novice catches on quickly,” Zinnia said proudly.
“What about the page I picked?” I asked. “Did it fill up with a message just for me?”
She flipped back and turned the book around to face me. The swirling words seemed to move, undulating like kelp at the bottom of the ocean.
“This confirms that you are Spirit Charmed,” she said. “Zara, you are charmed against harm by ghosts, and you may communicate on their behalf.”
“Like The Ghost Whisperer?” I turned to Zoey and explained, “That was a TV show. It's not on anymore. Maybe they'll reboot it for your generation and you guys can pretend it's brand new, like you do with everything else.”
Zinnia said, “You won't learn anything about your skills by watching that show, but I admit I do enjoy programs about ghosts and witches. Even though they get absolutely everything wrong.”
“My favorite was Wicked Wives,” I said.
Zinnia's face twitched. “Well, you might learn a thing or two from that one. One of our own must have consulted in some fashion.”
I slapped both of my knees. “No kidding!”
She nodded down at the book. “A witch who is Spirit Charmed will become a magnet for lost souls caught between worlds. This witch doesn't communicate directly with the spirits, but they can do things through her.” She scrunched her face and scratched her head. “Those things don't usually include electrocution by toaster.”
“A toaster is how she died,” I said. “Apparently, she loved heating up Pop-Tarts while she was in the bathtub.”
Zinnia blinked. “I can't tell if you're joking.”
“I wish I were,” I said. “A guy who lives in the neighborhood told me all about it. Oh, and the neighborhood kids call our place the Red Witch House. How's that for keeping a low profile?”
“We ought to paint the house,” Zinnia said. “Yellow?”
I bounced up and down on the wooden chair. “Great minds think alike. That's exactly what I was thinking.”
Zoey leaned forward, reaching for the book. “What about me? Will the book say anything about my gifts?”
Zinnia handed her the book. “Let's find out.”
We all held our breath as Zoey opened the book.
The pages opened. They were blank, and they stayed blank. She made a tsk of disappointment. I leaned forward and patted her knee.
“Your page is still unwritten,” I said. “That means you have unlimited potential.”
“You're only saying that because you're my mother.”
“That doesn't make it any less true,” I said.
“Magic works in circuitous ways,” Zinnia said. “Magic has a mind of its own. It's probably why you applied for a job in this town and why you went to the shoe store the same day I did. Some people call these things coincidence, but we witches know it's magic.”
Zoey sighed. “Except some of us aren't witches.”
Zinnia gave her a kindly look. “Your gift might be delayed to give us all time to adjust to Zara's gift.”
“Some gift,” I snorted. “I wish Winona's ghost would just tell me what she wants.”
“Ghosts aren't people,” Zinnia explained. “They're more like recordings, like messages that play on repeat.”
“I've heard that before,” Zoey said. “I read it on the internet. I thought you said the internet got scrubbed clean of real magic stuff?”
“Mostly,” Zinnia said. “Some information is just so old that it's gotten embedded in the collective unconscious.”
My stomach growled. The cookies were all gone. “Aunt Zinnia, do you mind if we order some pizza, or move this conversation to somewhere with pizza?”
“I've got plenty of food in my kitchen,” she said, lean
ing forward to stand.
“Stay where you are,” I said. “I'll whip something up. Other than your mystical mayonnaise, is there anything else in your refrigerator I should steer clear of?”
“Don't touch the jar of white things that look like eyeballs,” she said.
“Is it something gross?”
“It's eyeballs,” she said.
Twenty minutes later, I was serving appetizers to my daughter and my aunt.
“This is incredible,” Zinnia said.
My daughter said to her, “It's a new skill she's acquired since moving to Wisteria, and it's the strangest thing. Back home, we joked about her burning ice cubes.” She held one hand alongside her mouth and stage-whispered, “Which is a thing she actually did once.”
“I heard that,” I said as I set the tray of food on the sitting room's coffee table.
“These new culinary skills are part of being Spirit Charmed,” Zinnia explained. “You take on the special life skills of any ghost who gets attached to you.”
“Attached?” I looked over my shoulder. “I've got a ghost stuck to me?”
She took a deep, serious breath. “I'm afraid you do. Winona Vander Zalm must have attached herself to you the moment your powers kicked in. That's how you were able to whip up those fancy appetizers. It's something she would have done.”
Zoey asked, “How long will this last?”
Zinnia tilted her head from side to side. “Hard to say. Eventually, she'll go away.” Zinnia waved her hands like bird wings.
I hugged my arms around my chest. “Where will she go?”
“Where we all go, once we've found peace.” Zinnia picked up a tiny sandwich delicately. “Once she's completed her unfinished business.”
“What if her mission is to be alive again, living inside her Red Witch House and throwing elaborate dinner parties?”
Zinnia chewed slowly and then swallowed. “Is that what you think she wants?”
I scratched my ear, which had a tickling feeling inside the ear canal. Dinner party, something whispered. Was that Winona, whispering her wishes to me? Dinner party! The voice sounded enthused. Making appetizers at my aunt's house had gotten Winona Vander Zalm in a mood for entertaining.
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