Pawsitively Cursed

by Melissa Erin Jackson

  “What?” Amber asked, quickly closing the distance between her and her aunt. Amber placed a hand on her elbow. “What do you mean?”

  Gretchen turned to her, arms still crossed. “I was working on another batch of tinctures the other day, and pulled out my container of gola blossom. It’s hard to find, but it’s one of the main ingredients for my foresight potions. Well, I’m getting near the end of my stash, and yesterday I found remnants of a very fine powder at the bottom. All this to say … someone put something into my supply that has been causing me to slowly get sick.”

  Amber’s stomach knotted. She was reminded of Whitney Sadler’s and Susie Paulson’s slow poisoning of Melanie Cole with ethylene glycol. “Why didn’t you say anything sooner?”

  “I only just found it and I wanted to test it before I alarmed either of you.”

  Amber frowned. “Do you know what is it? Are you … is it—”

  “I’ll be fine,” Gretchen said, taking Amber’s hands in her own. “The powder is made up of two ingredients, one to induce vomiting and the other to aid in sleep. When combined, it left me feeling generally queasy and sleepy. No matter what I did, I never seemed to be getting better. But if this substance had been added to the supplies I use for my nightly tea, I’ve essentially been making myself ill for weeks.”

  Amber’s magic thrashed beneath her skin like a moth slamming futilely against a bright light bulb.

  “Calm yourself, little mouse,” Gretchen said, giving Amber’s hands a warning squeeze.

  Willow spoke up from her spot at the end of the bed. “We have to either decide to give him the book and hope it doesn’t horribly backfire on us, or live trapped in this tiny shoebox of an apartment forever and hope he gives up eventually.”

  “Belle and Theo wouldn’t have planned to give you girls up unless something in that book was dangerous,” Aunt Gretchen said. “They worshiped you both. We’d be dishonoring their memory if we gave up the grimoire.”

  Amber pulled her hands free from her aunt’s light grasp. “What’s the alternative, though? You just admitted that someone found some way to slip something into your supplies without you knowing. He could have killed you at any point between now and then, but he clearly chose not to. That could have been you instead of Wilma in the hotel room, but he chose to kill an innocent woman and ruin her family’s life instead. He’s toying with us. But he’ll snap eventually. We have to figure out what to do before that happens.” Amber’s breath hitched. “I can’t lose either one of you. I won’t survive it.”

  Willow took one of Amber’s and Gretchen’s hands in either of hers. The trio formed a circle, hands clasped. “This Penhallow doesn’t know who he’s messing with. We’re Blackwoods. We’ll figure it out.”

  Amber angled a small smile at her optimistic sister, hope shining in Willow’s eyes like it had always shone in their father’s. But niggling doubt wormed its way through Amber’s gut.

  Amber worried her parents’ life of secrets had sealed their own fate, dooming the remaining Blackwoods to something even worse.

  Chapter 15

  The following day, Amber, Willow, and Gretchen were no closer to figuring out what to do about their cursed-witch problem. Gretchen had concocted an even stronger—and more foul-tasting—protection tincture. Willow had perfected an airtight truth spell that could be used on anyone they suspected could be a Penhallow.

  Amber, meanwhile, had worn a hole in the floor thanks to all her nervous pacing. Last night, her dreams had been so fraught with terrifying images, her magic reacted by lifting not only the dining room table and all the chairs off the ground, but the bed Willow and Gretchen had been sleeping in. When Willow awoke suddenly to find her nose practically touching the ceiling, she’d yelped, waking Amber and dispelling her magic.

  Thankfully, Tom had been curled up with Amber on the couch; otherwise, he would have been crushed under the weight of the falling bed, whose frame cracked on impact. Amber was mildly surprised the whole thing hadn’t fallen through the floor and crashed into the shop below.

  So, at the end of the day, after the shop was closed and the three Blackwoods busied themselves with cleaning up after the tsunami of Olaf Betzen fans, Amber’s already frayed nerves frayed further when her phone, miraculously wedged into her back pocket for once, started to ring. She immediately worried it was Chief Brown calling to report some new, awful piece of news, but the number that popped up actually brought a smile to her face.

  “Ooh,” said Willow from across the room. “I think a boy is calling her.”

  “Which one is it?” Gretchen asked absently, her attention focused on organizing a candle display. “The reporter or the baker?”

  Amber and Willow exchanged a look. Before bed, Amber had told Willow that the last face the Penhallow had worn was Connor’s. Amber had told her merely as a warning to stay alert—to remind her that it was impossible right now to know who was being impersonated by the witch. Her sister’s expression had shuttered a bit after that. Amber truly wasn’t sure if Willow was jealous or merely worried. After all, the Penhallow would have chosen Connor’s face for a reason. Was it because the witch knew the two were acquaintances? Or had the witch sensed a deeper connection between Amber and Connor and tried to use that to his advantage?

  “The baker,” Amber said now, before accepting the call. “Hi, Jack.”

  “Hey,” he said. “Is now okay? I figured the shop would be closed by now, but the town’s so overrun, I know several people are staying open later to soak up as much extra business as possible, so I wasn’t—”

  Amber interrupted his rambling with a laugh. “Now is perfect.”

  Then, before she let guilt convince her not to, she mentally uttered Willow’s new truth spell, and sent a tendril of her magic toward Jack.

  “Why are you calling me, Jack Terrence?” she asked, wincing a little at the formality of the question, but her magic needed a clear direction, otherwise it would circle aimlessly.

  She could hear the smile in his voice when he said, “I, Jack Terrence, am calling you, Amber Blackwood, to ask if you’d be my date to the junior fashion show on Saturday.” He paused. “Wow, that was weird. I’d planned to ease into that a little more.”

  Amber’s magic quickly retreated. He was very much Jack, and he very much was asking her out. Her cheeks heated slightly. “I’d love to.”

  “Yeah?” he asked. “I know it’s not the most glamorous of first dates, but Purrcolate is providing refreshments that night. Sort of a trial run for the Here and Meow. Would be nice to have distractingly lovely company while I’m mentally having a meltdown.”

  Amber laughed. “I would be happy to be your distraction.”

  “Excellent,” he said. “Maybe we can grab a bite to eat after? The show is from four to six since the stars of the show are all minors.”

  Amber was oddly flattered by how nervous he sounded. “Can’t wait.”

  “Cool,” he said. “So … yeah. Cool. I’ll come pick you up around two? I assume the Whisker—why did I just call it the Whisker?—will be closed early since most of the town will be at the show. I have to set up the refreshments and whatnot, so I need to be there early. Or, I mean, I could start and then leave to come get you and then Larry can set up without me for a while. He’s a grown man. Or—”

  “Jack!” Amber said, laughing. “Breathe. Not only will I be your distraction, you can put me to work. I’ll be ready as soon as you need me. You’ll just owe me dessert.”

  She was almost positive he was grinning now.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Middle-school-level crush, remember? You said yes and my brain short-circuited.” Releasing a slow breath, he said, “I will pick you up at two on Saturday.”

  When she finally hung up, still smiling, she looked up to see Willow and Gretchen watching her, equally goofy smiles on their faces. “What?”

  “It’s good to see you making an effort to get out of the house more,” Gretchen said.

  “And with a
boy,” Willow offered in her best little girl voice, fluttering her eyelashes dramatically.

  Amber rolled her eyes, shoving her phone back into her pocket.

  “I would say to leave a sock on the doorknob if you and the baker need some alone time Saturday night, but there aren’t any doors to speak of in that shoebox of yours,” Gretchen said.

  Amber stifled a gasp. Willow clapped her hands over her mouth.

  Gretchen turned to face them, hands on her hips. “Oh, don’t look so surprised! And don’t let this calm outward demeanor fool you. I’ve been around the block a time or two. In fact, I’ve had a man I know back in Portland ‘blowing up my phone,’ as you say, because he’s itching for me to get back.” Then she waggled her eyebrows at them.

  Amber and Willow shared a long, horrified look, then burst out laughing.

  The next couple days, since Amber seemed to be useless at all things magic—though she hadn’t made the bed levitate in her sleep again, so she called that a win—she was tasked with trying to get a hold of Edgar on the phone. She only had a landline number for him; she had no idea if he owned a cell. He’d answered the first time she tried yesterday, but no sooner had she gotten the words “Hi, Edgar, please don’t hang up” out of her mouth, he’d hung up. Every couple of hours, she’d call and leave a message on his answering machine.

  It was her lunch break now and she was trying him again, except this time it just rang incessantly. After the twentieth ring, she hung up and tried again. This time, she got a busy signal. Had he taken the phone off the hook? She imagined him waiting for the ringing to stop, then plucking it from its cradle, leaving the receiver lying on a table, then trudging up the steps of his house, letting the discarded phone blare its persistent, weary cry into the dark.

  Sighing, Amber ended the call, then dropped her cell onto the counter. She propped her elbows on the worn wood, fingers thrust into the hair at her temples. Why did Edgar have to make this even harder than it already was? Then she chastised herself for blaming a mentally ill man for any of this. It wasn’t his fault his mind had cracked.

  She nearly toppled off her stool when her phone started to ring. But it wasn’t Edgar. Her stomach lurched.

  “Hi, chief,” she said, phone pressed to her ear and a thumbnail wedged between her teeth.

  “Hi, Amber. Is this an okay time to talk?”

  She wasn’t sure if it was a good or bad sign that he was calling her “Amber” rather than “Miss Blackwood.” Swallowing, she gave the chief the same treatment she’d given Jack a couple days ago. Once the spell had been uttered, she said, “What is the reason you’re calling me, Chief Owen Brown?”

  Almost robotically, he said, “I’m calling you, Amber Blackwood, to inform you that I have recently had a telephone conversation with an acquaintance of mine in which we discussed one Edgar Henbane and his time at the Belhaven Psychiatric Hospital.”

  Truth.

  Her magic retreated.

  “What in the—” Then in a hushed tone he said, “Did you just do your … hocus pocus thing on me? Through the phone?”

  If Chief Brown were the kind of man to clutch his pearls, Amber figured he would be doing that right now. The image made her smile, despite how frazzled she was.

  “It’s a spell for truth,” she said. “The Penhallow is losing control of his sanity—or maybe just his patience. The spell is very short-lived and merely proves you are who you claim to be.”

  After a long pause, he asked, “Do I want to know?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Fair enough,” he said. “So, like I forcefully said earlier, I talked to my guy at the hospital. Clients’ records are sealed for privacy reasons, so I can’t get direct access to his files unless I get a warrant—and I currently have no reason to do so.”

  Amber sagged.

  “But, in the process of talking to him, he let slip that the arrival of Edgar had always stuck with him because he came in with an unusual wound.”

  Amber perked back up. “What kind of wound?”

  “Rumors about what happened to Wilma are already making the rounds within law enforcement fields in the surrounding areas, and since my buddy occasionally is in contact with the police for various reasons, he heard about Wilma too. And said the starburst mark on her stomach sounds a lot like the starburst mark that Edgar came in with. He said the black lines covered nearly his entire back.”

  “No way,” Amber hissed. “But … how did it not kill him?” She asked herself more than she asked the chief, but he replied anyway.

  “Possible he was affected differently because he’s, you know, magical and Wilma wasn’t?”

  “I … guess so? I really don’t know. Penhallow magic behaves very strangely. No one really knows what the extent of the curse is.”

  Amber wondered now if being hit with this cursed magic is what caused the drastic change in her cousin. If being hit with this magic didn’t kill a person, did it slowly drive him mad, just as it did with the Penhallows?

  “You have any clue who this witch is?” the chief asked. “We’ve got … nothing. Virtually no evidence left at the scene. We’re chasing tips but they aren’t leading anywhere.”

  Amber sighed. “You aren’t going to like this …” Then she explained the witch’s ability to change faces.

  He was silent a long time before he said, “You’re right. I don’t like this.” Grunting, he added, “I want him out of my town.”

  “We’re working on it.”

  He chuckled darkly. “The tables seemed to have turned on this one. It’s not often that I’m calling up a civilian hoping they have information.”

  “For what it’s worth, I prefer when the crimes are run-of-the-mill and I have no idea they’ve even happened.”

  “Same here,” he said.

  Silence descended on the conversation. Was she supposed to hang up now? Ask him how he was doing? How his wife was feeling? They weren’t friends, not really. “You going to the fashion show?”

  “Strictly in a professional capacity,” he said. “These Olaf Betzen fans are something else. Need to be there to keep an eye on things. Jessica will be there with Sammy, though. He’s a fan of the show. Said he wants to be on it when he’s older. He made me a vest out of felt.”

  Amber snorted. “I’ll be sure to say hi if I see them. I’ll be going with Jack Terrence.”

  “So you do date,” he said, then immediately seemed to catch himself. “Oh, I mean … uhh … you keep to yourself quite a bit. Wasn’t sure if maybe that wasn’t a thing you did …”

  Amber might have been offended, but she could easily picture how embarrassed he was, and it only amused her. “I admit it’s been a while.”

  “Well … glad to hear you’re getting out there,” he said. “Does Jack know about the … how you … that you’re a—”

  “Definitely not,” she said. “You’re the only one in town who knows. Well, aside from my aunt and sister.”

  “And the cursed, face-changing psychopath,” he added.

  “Yeah, and him,” she said. “Thanks for the information about Edgar.”

  “You bet,” he said, sounding a bit more like himself, and also relieved she’d given him a way out of the conversation. “I’ll be in touch.”

  Amber only had enough time to run upstairs to grab a bite to eat before she had to open the shop again.

  The street outside was swarmed with people. She saw quite a few women with shirts that said, “Ramp it up and sew some chaos!” She could only assume it was a catchphrase from the show.

  She tried to imagine what her cousin’s starburst mark must have looked like. Was it still there? Was it still a stark black on his skin, or had it faded over time?

  What happened to you, Edgar? she wondered as she unlocked the door. And how do I keep it from happening again?

  On Saturday morning, Amber, Willow, and Gretchen worked in the shop until noon. The Bowen sisters had the day off, especially since their niece was one of the junio
r designers competing in the show today. After flipping the lock on the door, Amber took down her chalkboard sign and headed behind the counter with it in order to shield it and herself from any possible prying eyes outside.

  Sweeping a hand over the board, the word “Open!” changed to “At the fashion show. Good luck, Edgehill designers!” The bespectacled cat logo now had a yellow fabric tape measure draped around his neck like a scarf, and he wore a black band around one wrist, a round pin cushion resting in the middle. A trio of red-tipped pins stuck out of it. The other paw held onto the brim of his top hat, and he winked one eye.

  After placing the sign back on its peg, she dashed upstairs to get ready for her date.

  Amber refused to wear anything more elaborate than jeans and a nice sweater, but she allowed Willow to style her hair into a cascading wave of curls. Willow smudged on eye shadow, swept mascara onto Amber’s eyelashes, dusted her cheeks with a faint pink blush, and applied a soft, shiny gloss to her lips. Then she cast a no-smudge spell to assure every curl and lash stayed in place for the majority of the evening.

  “I’ve had to do enough work events to warrant the perfection of such a spell,” Willow explained as she finished, taking a step back from where Amber sat on the closed toilet lid, to examine her handiwork. “You’ll never have to run to the bathroom to freshen up. Unless of course you hate your date and are planning an escape.”

  “I don’t know why I’m so nervous,” she said. “It’s just Jack.”

  “It’s because you actually like Just Jack,” Willow said.

  “You also said that about Connor.”

  Willow ignored that. “You haven’t really let yourself like anyone since Max. Things are looking up!”

  Amber pursed her no-smudge shiny-pink lips. “Have you talked to Connor? He must be totally stressed out today.”

  “No,” she said quickly, busying herself with putting her makeup supplies away. Abruptly abandoning the task, she left the bathroom.

  “Will?” Amber said, following her sister into the main part of the studio. “What’s wrong?”