by Zoe Arden
Disappointment washed over me. I had really expected to find the liner's match inside this bag. My stomach gurgled, and I suddenly realized how hungry I was. I'd never finished my lunch. My streusel waffle cake had been delicious but hardly filling.
I stopped off at home on my way back to Mystic. The second I opened the door, Snowball, my fluffy white familiar, came running up to me.
"Mama, Mama, Mama!" she cried in her tinny voice. She was a full-grown cat now but I still thought of her as a kitten. She rubbed her head against my ankles and made soft purring noises. I reached down to pet her and realized her tail was all fluffy. Every hair was standing on end. I picked her up and she licked my face.
"Is everything all right, Snowy? Why is your tail all fluffy?"
"Snowball saw a black cat outside the window. Snowball did not like it."
I scrunched my brow together. I knew all the cats in the neighborhood; there were a few black ones but they were friendly as pie. "Did it have one eye?" I asked, thinking of my neighbor, Mrs. Stokes, and her fuzzy black feline.
"No, Snowy knows Mittens. Mittens is a good kitty. This one was bad. He gave Snowball a bad feeling."
"Was there anything unusual about the way he looked? Did Rocky and Tootsie see this cat, too?" I asked. Rocky was Eleanor's wolfhound, a familiar she'd had for just about ever. Tootsie was Trixie's familiar, a fluffy orange cat that was almost as loyal to me as it was to her.
"Rocky and Tootsie were sleeping," Snowball said. "They are still sleeping. Rocky snores. Snowball does not know how Tootsie can sleep through it." She licked my nose and I giggled.
"Okay, well, it was probably nothing," I told Snowy, setting her down. "Sometimes cats like to wander around when they're bored."
"This one was not bored. This one was looking for something."
"What makes you say that?" I asked.
"Snowy could tell."
I bit my bottom lip. "Are you sure you didn't notice anything unusual about him?"
Snowy licked her paw. Her ears straightened to points. "There was a white spot on bad cat's ear. Snowy thought it looked like a white paw print but it was a birthmark." She scrunched her face. "Also, Snowy thinks it smells funny in the house."
"Funny?" I asked.
She shrugged.
"Like bad tuna."
"Do you think it was the cat you saw who made it smell bad?"
Snowy blinked. "Snowy doesn't know. Maybe."
"Hmmm..."
The physical description she'd given me of the black cat sounded vaguely familiar, though I wasn't sure about the smell. I didn't smell anything, though my sense of smell wasn't nearly as strong as Snowy's. I wracked my brain trying to think of where I knew that cat from but couldn't quite place it. Snowball was looking up at me.
"You did good, Snowy," I said and patted her head.
"Snowball gets tuna now?" she asked, wagging her tail.
"She sure does."
I dumped a can of tuna into her dish and a grabbed a bagel for myself. I was halfway back to Mystic when it hit me.
"Nightshade!" I said and thumped my hand to my forehead.
I started toward Mystic, anxious to tell Eleanor and Trixie the news, then veered my course for the Coffee Cove. If I was right and the cat Snowball had seen was Nightshade, then that meant a trip to Mistmoor Point. And that meant I needed Lucy.
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CHAPTER
NINE
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"Say that again," Lucy said, her jaw hanging open and her eyes wide as saucers. She looked as though she'd just seen a ghost. We went over a bump in the road and her head almost hit the top of the car as we bounced up and down.
"Come on," Lucy said. "I need to hear that you're joking, or that I'm nuts, or something. You can't really mean what you just said."
"Sorry," I told her. "It's all true."
She let out a long sigh.
I hadn't seen Lucy the last couple days. She'd been busy at Coffee Cove, and I'd been busy with work and everything else. So, I'd decided that the two-hour drive to Mistmoor Point was the perfect opportunity to fill her in on everything that had been happening.
She'd heard about the murder, of course, and knew that my aunts and I had been there when it happened—at this point, the whole island probably knew that—but she hadn't yet connected the murder to the storm cloud we'd seen that day outside Mystic or to Sadie Belle. She'd texted me as soon as she'd learned the tourist had been killed and I'd been there when it happened but I hadn't wanted to go into details in a text message. Besides, to tell her everything would have been like fifty text messages and my fingers weren't that nimble.
"This isn't a sick, twisted joke? A belated April Fool's day gag? Or an early one, I suppose, depending on how you look at it."
I told her again that we suspected a dark spirit was on the loose, possibly inhabiting Sadie, possibly jumping around town. It was still unclear. Her eyes widened that much more.
"You mean there could be a spirit out there right now hiding inside someone and making them kill people?"
"Yes. Well, sort of. Eleanor said these types of spirits can only inhabit a witch or wizard who's ill or weakened in some way. They have a much harder time inhabiting witches who are strong."
"That's good for you and me, then, I guess. We're the strongest witches I know, even if you are a newbie."
Even now, she couldn't resist making a joke. I wanted to be irritated with her but the corners of my lips curved up into a smile.
"Eleanor and Trixie are pretty strong witches, too," I said. "And Sadie. If she hadn't been sick..." I let my thoughts trail off. Conjuring a dark spirit wasn't her fault; it was an accident. It could have happened to anyone with a bad cold who sneezed at the wrong time.
"Do you think the spirit's in Nightshade?" Lucy asked suddenly.
I paused and cocked my head to the side. "That hadn't occurred to me, actually. I wonder if that could happen. I mean... I know that dark spirits can inhabit witches and wizards but animals? Especially familiars? They have some powerful magic inside them." I shot her a glance and she shrugged.
"I have no idea. I was just taking a guess. It might explain why he was lurking around your house the other day, though, don't you think?"
"What do you mean? You think Nightshade wanted to kill us?"
She shrugged again. "Maybe. Or maybe he was just being his usual charming, feline self."
I didn't find her "maybe" particularly reassuring. "Maybe we should call my aunt. Eleanor can tell us if it's even possible for a dark spirit to inhabit a cat."
I didn't want to use my phone while I was driving, so I asked Lucy to dial Eleanor for me and pose the question. I hoped we didn't sound totally crazy by asking it.
Lucy fished my phone from my purse and dialed. I could hear the muffled sound of a ring.
"Eleanor?" Lucy said a minute later. "It's Lucy. Ava and I have a quick question for you." She paused a moment, biting her lip. I knew that she was listening to Eleanor speak but I also knew that she was trying to come up with the right way to phrase her question so as not to alarm anyone.
"We're fine," Lucy said after a minute. She looked at me and mouthed the word, "rambling."
"Well, that new recipe sounds amazing," Lucy told her. "Chocolate and wine go together like... well, like chocolate and wine. It's amazing no one's ever thought to put the two together into a cupcake before." She paused, and that was her mistake. Eleanor started rambling again.
"Look, Eleanor," Lucy said, cutting her off, "the reason I called is that Ava and I were just talking, and we were wondering something... can dark spirits inhabit familiars as well as witches?"
I shot her a look, dying to know what Eleanor was saying.
"Oh, I see," Lucy said, nodding her head absentmindedly. "Okay... okay... yeah, thanks."
Lucy hung up the phone and looked at me. "She said no way. Spirits that d
ark need something bigger to use as their host. Cats are too small. Most animals are. Even Rocky wouldn't qualify, according to Eleanor."
"That's good... I guess. For a minute, I thought maybe you were onto something."
"That doesn't mean Nightshade isn't involved in the murder somehow. Everyone knows that Edith Woodruff's cat is as evil as she is."
"Well, evil might be a little harsh. I'm not sure I'd put it quite like that."
"Her bakery dabbles in dark magic. They make cupcakes that could kill if the wrong person ate them, and cookies that can make you go insane. I'd say 'evil' is the perfect way to put it."
"When you say it like that... I take your point."
"I don't know how they're still in business. You'd have thought that COMHA or the Witch's Council would have shut them down long ago."
"They've tried but Edith and her daughter never really cross any of the hard lines, just the soft ones. Those cupcakes that could kill, for instance, are just like you said—they won't kill just anyone. It has to be the right person. And they're very specific. Like someone with a cleft chin who also speaks French, or a human with blond hair and a nose piercing. Same with their insanity cookies."
"Sounds dangerous to me."
"From what I've heard, they actually take those recipes pretty seriously and will only make them by special order and if they know the reason you want them. What might kill one person could give another person the best day of their life."
Lucy scoffed but I thought it was an interesting way to run a bakery. Not something I'd ever do but interesting nevertheless. It was probably the extractor expert in me. Creams, Cakes, and Creations used extracts in their cupcakes that I'd never get a chance to work with because they were too dangerous. Part of me envied the things they got to try that I never would.
"Maybe that tourist who died just ate the wrong cupcake," Lucy said after a moment.
"It wasn't a cupcake that killed him, though. There was a broom sticking out of his chest."
"Oh, right. I almost forgot."
"You wouldn't if you'd been there." I shuddered at the memory.
I stepped on the gas as we got closer to Mistmoor, more and more anxious to get to Creams, Cakes, and Creations. I'd been there a few times before, usually when something went wrong over in Sweetland Cove. Edith's bakery always seemed to hover in the shadows whenever things went south. A murder... a break-in... whatever it was, it frequently traced back to Creams, Cakes, and Creations. Though nothing had ever been officially connected to them. It was more like they enjoyed watching the chaos as it happened, rather than causing it. Still, eventually, something would have to give. You didn't stand on the edge of evil without ever dipping your toe in.
"You said Snowball thought Nightshade was looking for something," Lucy said. "Any idea what?"
"Maybe the wrapper I took from the scene," I suggested. "If he was hiding at Knobs and Broomsticks somewhere and saw me take it, he might've wanted it back."
"Or maybe it was Edith who was there hiding and told Nightshade to go and get it."
"Good point."
"I almost forgot," Lucy said. "I did some research after you called me last night. I still have all my old spell books and things from high school. I started going through them and read in one that when a dark spirit inhabits a person, it leaves a mark on them."
"A mark? You mean like a scar?"
"I guess."
"What does it look like?"
"It didn't really say. It just said that it's usually on the palm of the hand."
"Hmmm... that's good to know."
When we finally got to Mistmoor, I stepped out of the car and a warm breeze seemed to sweep out of the sky and smack me full in the face. It was nice but strange, like everything in Mistmoor. A lot of the town looked similar to Sweetland Cove—tall palm trees with different colored leaves, some of them a bright orange, others the traditional green; sandy beaches that touched the Atlantic; small-town shops with that small-town feel. The kind that made you feel cozy and good inside.
Except, of course, that everything in Mistmoor seemed just slightly off balance. I knew it was probably because I didn't live here—if I did, I was sure I'd feel differently—but the place just gave me bad vibes. There were good things about it and good people here but most of them disliked Sweetlanders as much as we disliked them. It was an old, silly rivalry but it had been going on for hundreds of years and I didn't think it would be ending anytime soon, despite the efforts of the towns' mayors to forge a better relationship.
A woman walked past with her dog; they both stared at us. I heard her say to her dog, "Sweetlanders. Hmmph!" and she moved quickly away from us as if we had just threatened her.
"Come on," Lucy said, pulling open the door to the bakery. "Let's hurry up and get this over with before that woman comes back and sics her dog on us."
"Good idea," I said and hoped this would be easy. I knew I was fooling myself, though. Nothing about Edith Woodruff was ever easy.
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CHAPTER
TEN
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I stepped into Creams, Cakes, and Creations and the bell above the door chimed an off-key jingle that made my head hurt with its screechy musical notes. Edith probably thought it was cute. She came out of the back room, an older woman settled into her fifties. She had dark gray hair that had probably once been black and dark eyes to match. She was actually quite pretty, whatever age she might have been, and her voice was always warm and friendly, though it carried an undertone of contempt.
Edith was followed by a second woman in her thirties with dark hair and a tight-lipped smile. Blossom Woodruff was her daughter, and they ran the bakery together much like my aunts and I did. The only difference was that we didn't sell things that could hurt people.
I bit my tongue when I saw their famous demibane cupcakes. Demibane was a dangerous herb that was on the verge of being ruled illegal but hadn't quite made the grade yet because of people like Edith, who threw their support behind it. I'd heard it could do a lot of good if used correctly, which is what Edith and Blossom claimed to do with it, but I had my doubts. Still, a part of me was curious about it. It was one of those herbs I'd never touched and probably never would.
"Ava Fortune and Lucy Lockwood. Always a pleasant surprise. What can I do for you?" Edith asked with that sickly-sweet contemptible tone.
There was no point beating around the bush. Edith and Blossom already knew I didn't like them, and they didn't like me. The only one in their family I thought was halfway decent was Blossom's daughter, Calista, and that was probably because she was a dim-witch—a witch whose magical powers had never fully developed.
I pulled out the cupcake wrapper I'd gotten from Knobs and Broomsticks and held it stretched out for her to see. "Does this look familiar?" I asked.
"Way to be subtle," Lucy muttered under her breath.
Edith looked at Blossom, who shrugged.
"Why do you want to know?" Blossom asked.
Lucy jumped in front of me, her hands on her hips. In a loud, piercing voice, she shouted, "Because this wrapper was found at the scene of a murder, and your fingerprints are all over it. If you two don't answer our questions, you're gonna be in a lot of trouble."
I pulled Lucy back and shot her a look. "What are you doing?" I mouthed.
She shrugged and whispered back, "I thought we were doing a good cop-bad cop thing."
I shook my head and when I looked up, Edith was laughing.
"Fingerprints? I sincerely doubt that." She looked at Blossom, who smiled slyly, and I felt like an idiot. "It's no secret what we sell here," Edith said and indicated her display cases. "Take a look for yourselves."
I walked around and looked at shelf after shelf. Several of the cupcakes had similar wrappers as the one I'd found but none were quite the same. Finally, my eyes landed on one shelf in particular, set off a bit from the
rest of them.
"That's it," I said, pointing to a dark chocolate cupcake with chocolate bats popping out of them as if they were flying. They were wrapped in a white liner with black sparkles.
"That one's very dark," Edith said. "Not just the cake but the magic in it as well. It's actually not one of our more popular items, I've been thinking of taking it off the menu, but Blossom loves them."
"People wouldn't know a good cupcake if it hit them in the face," Blossom said.
"Can I see the bottom of it?" I asked them.
Edith looked quizzically at me but decided to humor me. She reached into the display case and held up one of the cupcakes so that I could see its bottom. A black rose was printed on it.
I looked at Lucy, finally feeling as if we were getting somewhere. "Why would this wrapper have been found under the body of a dead man?" I asked her.
Edith scrunched her face up. "Wait a second, you're not talking about that tourist that got killed on your side of the island, are you?"
I nodded.
"Now just hold on," Edith said, her voice had an undercurrent of anger along with surprise. "You're not suggesting that we... that I..." She looked at Blossom, who seemed twice as angry as her mother.
"We had nothing to do with that," Blossom snapped. "I don't know how one of our wrappers made it to your side of the island but I'm sure that it was just a coincidence."
"Maybe it wasn't you who had anything to do with the murder," Lucy said. "Maybe it was one of your customers. You said these cupcakes aren't very popular. That should narrow things down. Can you tell us who's bought them recently?"
I looked at Lucy and smiled. I knew I'd brought her for a reason. She had moments of brilliance.
Blossom opened her mouth, but Edith put a restraining hand on her arm, stopping her from saying anything else. "We don't reveal the names of our customers," Edith said.