‘So you see, everything with Anton and Emily … it’s naught but smoke and mirrors. Carmel wanted my witch out of the way, simply so she could destroy your chances. Perhaps she wanted to drive her to depression first with her lies, so that she would bow out of the examiner’s job. When that didn’t work, she resorted to murder. When even that didn’t work and another examiner was appointed, she found yet another way to target you. She did murder my witch, Wanda – but it was all about you.’

  I would have liked to tell her she was wrong – no one would be so preposterous as to kill someone just to upset me – but I’d learned that, actually, I inspired that kind of crazy hatred in quite a few people. Kilian Berry was the worst example of it, but what if Mizz Plimpton hated me just as much?

  ‘Well, I’ll look at every possibility,’ I told her. ‘And I’ll take the laptop and the chocolates with me for now. But Minnie, is there anything else?’

  ‘Not that I can think of,’ she replied. ‘Except to tell you that I hate being called Minnie.’

  9. A Price on His Head

  It was well after working hours when I left the cottage in the Hollow, so there was nothing to be done except drop the chocolates off at Ronnie’s lab, and the laptop off in Paul’s office, and wait for them to run their tests in the morning. If we found any trace of poison, or proof that Anton had been messing with his dead wife’s computer, that would be more than enough to make this a murder investigation. Then, it wouldn’t matter how much Anton protested – the autopsy would happen, and we would soon know the truth.

  Christine had cooked a dinner of roasted vegetables, quiche and couscous, so I had a little of that before doing the dishes, and then I took a long hot bath and prepared for bed. When I returned to my bedroom I found Dizzy hovering in front of my mirror, checking out his reflection.

  I grinned at my little bat familiar. ‘Hello you. I haven’t seen you all day.’

  He made a squeaking little giggle. ‘That’s because I was with a girl. Well … a girl bat, obviously.’

  ‘Really?’ I sat on my bed. ‘That’s amazing, Dizz. Tell me all about her.’

  He let out another giggle-squeak. ‘Her name is Flora, and she’s a Rarely-Heard-Of Sunflower Bat.’

  ‘That’s … her breed?’ It sounded unlikely, but what did I know. Dizzy was a Lesser-Known Mango Bat, and he was the only one of his kind I’d ever met.

  ‘Yes. She only eats sunflowers. Although she eats the seeds in the winter, of course.’

  ‘Oh, of course. And do you have a date tonight, you and this Flora?’

  ‘We’re going to have dinner together in the attic, and then go out flying. You don’t need me for anything, do you? It’s all been so quiet lately that I thought you could spare me.’

  ‘Of course I can spare you.’

  ‘It’s just that you’re home awfully late tonight. And you’ve been in bed by nine for months now. Not even reading, or watching television. Just sleeping. You know, seeing as you are awake, maybe we could watch something together. The new season of the Vamp Factor starts tonight.’

  ‘I’m tired,’ I said. ‘Anyway, you need to go on your date. Wouldn’t want to keep the lovely Flora waiting.’

  ‘No …’ He spoke uncertainly. ‘It’s just that you have a kind of an air about you. Excitable. Almost like the way you used to be, before, you know …’ He gave me a hopeful little smile. ‘Is there good news, finally? A way to bring him home?’

  ‘No. No good news on that front, unfortunately. If I seem excitable it’s only because there’s a murder. Well … we still need to find the evidence of that, but I’m pretty certain that the witch in question was murdered.’ I explained everything that had happened today, while Dizzy listened with his usual rapt attention.

  When I finished, he fluttered around the room excitedly. ‘We can’t just leave it there, Wanda,’ he said. ‘We should question Anton right now. Take him by surprise! Oh, and we should really put the screws on Mizz Plimpton. And Emily, too. Maybe they’re all in on it together. A combination of a scandalous affair and Emily’s and Carmel’s hatred of you. Heck, for all we know, Anton hates you, too.’

  ‘Yeah.’ I sighed, getting into bed and pulling up my covers. ‘Everybody hates Wanda. Anyway, you’d better get off. I’ll leave the bedroom door open so you can come back in here when your date is over. And the cat flap is open, too, so you can get in and out of the house when you’re going out flying.’

  ‘No, I’m staying in,’ he informed me. ‘Because not everyone hates Wanda. I love you. So much that I’m going to stay here all night long, no matter how disturbing your snores are. I’ll even kiss you in the morning, despite your morning breath.’

  ‘Aw. You do know how to bolster my ego, don’t you Dizz? But I’m afraid I’m going to have to say no. Go out with Flora, Dizzy. I’ll be really upset if you don’t.’

  ‘Well … all right,’ he said. ‘But I’ll be back early. Because I love you.’

  ‘Mm hm.’ My voice was growing drowsy. ‘Love you, too.’

  I drifted off to sleep, and I’m not sure how long I spent that way when the sound of squeaky chatters woke me up. I peeled open an eyelid, seeing Dizzy and a lovely little bat hanging upside down on the curtain pole, talking and touching wings. They must have moved their date in here when Dizzy told her he was worried about me. How sweet – how noisy, too, but mostly sweet. I shut my eyelid and pretended I was still sleeping.

  After a while, their happy chatter became background noise, and I sank into unconsciousness once more.

  ‘Wanda!’ squeaked Dizzy sometime later, his wings flapping in my face. ‘Wanda, your phone is ringing.’

  ‘It’s the middle of the night,’ I grumbled, ignoring the sound of my phone buzzing on my bedside table.

  ‘I can see who’s calling, Wanda. It’s Rover. He wouldn’t call this late unless it was an emergency, would he? Maybe you’d better answer it.’

  ≈

  As I neared the hospital room, I spotted one of the Queen’s guards patrolling the corridor, while another stood at the door. They waved me in and, with a small, grateful smile I entered the room and stared at him: not-my-Max, lying unconscious in the bed, pale and helpless. Rover’s urgent call had been to tell me that he had been rushed to hospital.

  When this other-world Max first arrived here, looking so much like my own, I think I always knew that he wasn’t the real deal. People can have identical faces and bodies, but there’s always something to tell them apart. Some mannerism, some mode of speech. In not-my-Max’s case, there were many things to tell him apart from my Max, but nothing was more obvious than the fact that he didn’t look at me the way my Max did. How could he, when he didn’t love me?

  But now that he was lying here unable to say or do anything, with his eyes firmly shut, there was nothing to tell them apart. It could have been Max lying in that bed, and it was so, so hard not to reach out and touch him.

  ‘Hello again, Wanda.’ Florence’s gentle voice hit my ears, and I jumped away from the bed. ‘Oh, don’t worry – you won’t be able to wake him. The Queen gave him something that will keep him asleep for a good while to come.’

  ‘I saw her guards on duty outside,’ I said to Florence. ‘Is she here? Her Majesty?’

  ‘She isn’t. She visited briefly and seemed to be humming at whatever magic she sees around him. In the end, she told us she thinks his body is battling some sort of poisoning, and she gave us something to add to a drip to help him through. He’ll heal, don’t you worry.’

  ‘Poisoning?’ My heart began to race.

  ‘We’re running blood tests, so we’ll soon know more. He’s had an unlucky few weeks, this not-your-Max.’

  ‘Unlucky?’ Once more, I had to resist the urge to grasp his hand. He wouldn’t appreciate it if he woke up and found me like that. To him, I was just a woman he barely knew. In his own world, he’d been married to Lady, and was still grieving her death. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, I know for sure that he choked on a breakfast burrito a few days ago and almost died. His friends from the Water Bowl told me he’s had some other unlucky incidents, too.’

  As she spoke, one of those friends, Rover, walked into the room. I wrapped my arms around the scary-looking weredog and just hung on for a minute.

  ‘Unlucky is putting it mildly,’ Rover said when I finally broke away. ‘It’s like this Max has a price on his head. Hence the Queen’s guards outside.’ He gave me a pointed stare. ‘After hearing about how your exams are going, it sounds like things might be the same for you. You know, you don’t need Potions to become a sergeant. Magical Law and Defensive Magic are the qualifications you need.’

  ‘I do know.’ I sat into the chair next to not-my-Max’s bed with a sigh. ‘But I want to go to the reopened station in Riddler’s Cove, and it’s going to have its own lab. Which means that they’ll be looking for someone who can wear a lot of hats, one of those hats being a degree in Potions.’

  ‘They means Christine and Finn, Wanda. If you want Riddler’s Cove, they’ll post you there.’ Seeing the look on my face, he waved a hand. ‘I know, I know, you want it on merit. But whatever happens with this exam, you do have the knowledge of Potions that the Riddler’s Cove posting is looking for, and you know it. But.’ His face crinkled up into a kind smile. ‘I’ve been talking with Finn and with the dean, and we’re moving the exam out of the college.’

  ‘Dean Carmichael agreed to that? Last I heard, he seemed to think I ought to get used to the fact that a bunch of people hate my guts.’

  Rover patted my shoulder. ‘He is a small man, Wanda. A man who spends his life moving from woman to woman, and yet somehow wonders why he feels empty inside. Don’t worry about what someone like him thinks of you. Now, I’ve ensured that the test is going to be held in a location that won’t be released until the very last minute, and I’ve ensured that there’ll be Wayfarers and Queen’s guards on watch. You want that degree, you’re getting that degree, Wanda. No one messes with my friends.’

  I grinned at Rover. Never before had we had a Minister for Education who looked (and sometimes acted) like a gangster. And never before had we had a better minister than Rover. ‘Thank you,’ I told him. ‘Now, all we have to do is figure out what’s up with this new Max.’

  ‘You know, I don’t like to point fingers. And I wouldn’t like to think that this is actually possible. But we do have to consider everything, Wanda. Everything, like the fact that Emily Caulfield’s recently been released from the Maze, and she might still have a grudge against you and Max.’

  ‘But this isn’t Max,’ I said sadly. ‘So it’d be just plain weird if Emily decided to hurt him.’ My mind went to the box of chocolates in Athena Gale’s fridge. What would Ronnie find when she tested them? ‘You’re right, though. We have to consider everything.’

  10. The Cure For All Ills

  When I arrived home for the second time, there was another bed in my room. Melissa had magicked hers in, squeezing it alongside mine so we could have a sleepover.

  After a long spell of hugging, I said, ‘I thought you were staying at the Nemo Foundation tonight.’

  ‘I was. But Miles swapped with me when we heard the news about not-my-Max. We both figured you’d probably need some company. Oh, and Dizzy finally went out for that night-time fly with his new girlfriend. Wow, she’s adorable.’

  ‘She is,’ I agreed. ‘I’m so happy for him. But you know, you don’t need to keep doing this.’ Ever since Max was sent to that other dimension, Melissa had slept in my room for at least half of every week. ‘You have a boyfriend, and a job, and all of those awesome Nemo kids to take up your time.’

  ‘I know.’ She gave me a lovely grin. ‘And I love them all. But you’re my best friend and my coven-sister, Wanda. You kind of trump everyone, you know. Plus …’ Her voice grew shaky. ‘I … I’m sad about it, too. I lived with you and Max for a long time. And him and me, we spent time together when you were at work or college. I bring lots of the Nemo kids over to Paws, too, so I’d see him there. And I’d see him at Mack’s place, whenever Max and Jasper were there with Wolfie. He … he was everywhere, in so many parts of my life, and now he’s not. So if it’s okay with you, I need this Wanda and Melissa time, too. A lot.’

  A tear ran down her cheek, and I reached over and stroked her hair. Melissa was beautiful even when she was crying, but I wasn’t jealous about that. All I felt was guilt. ‘I know that lots of people miss him just as much as I do,’ I said. ‘He was that kind of guy. I sometimes used to think that he couldn’t be real, you know? Like, how could anybody be that nice? How could anybody be that lovely, all the time?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Melissa gave me a tiny smile. ‘Saint Max, right? So … there’s something I actually want to broach with you, and I have no idea where to start.’

  ‘Is it about Mack? Is everything okay with you guys?’ Melissa’s rock-star boyfriend was just as amazing as Max, but maybe he was missing her. She already spent a lot of time working, and lately she’d been spending the rest of her time with me. I wondered when they actually got a chance to see each other.

  ‘Oh, everything’s great.’ She waved a hand dismissively. ‘This is about you, actually. A couple of mornings ago, after I spent the night here, I was looking for one of my shoes and I thought it might be under your bed. Only when I went looking, I found something else. It … it looked like an engagement ring, Wanda. I wasn’t snooping, it’s just … the box was open, and it was right beside my shoe.’

  ‘Oh, yeah. That’s … that’s exactly what it looks like.’ I rolled over onto my back, staring at the ceiling. ‘Rover gave it to me a while back. Max was … he was planning on … well, you know. Rover thought I should have the ring. Hold onto it until … until we get him back.’

  ‘Would you have said yes?’ Her voice was breathy. ‘I mean, of course you would. What am I saying?’

  I turned over to face her again. ‘I would have, I think. Do you think that’s bad of me, though? You do, don’t you? You think I shouldn’t have been going to say yes to Max when I still have feelings for Will.’

  ‘What? When have I ever said that? Wanda, I get it. I get why you would choose Max over Will. I get why you’d love him the way you do. I mean, I lived with you both. It’s like … this happy little bubble, when you’re together. Watching films, reading books, making food … that house was like a happy honeymoon every single day. Which is why I knew almost the second I moved in that it was a bad idea. Talk about feeling like a spare part.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be. I didn’t really feel that way. I loved how happy you were when you were with Max, and I always wanted you to choose him. I thought Will was bad for you. So much hard work. So much misery. He said all of those mean things that made you cry, flaunting Mandy Parker in your face. But then … then I found out why he was doing it all. And I got to know him. And boy, did I feel bad for hating him so much.’

  She shuffled across her bed so that her face was closer to mine. ‘Wanda, I don’t know what you saw in Pru’s prophecy. I don’t know if Max is ever going to come home, or when. And I don’t want you to tell me. I know how delicate the future is, and I know how important this is. It’s not something I’d ever expect you to mess up just to satisfy my curiosity. But … but I do know that if it was going to happen soon, or even a year or two from now, that you’d be happier. I know that you’d be preparing. And I know that if it is going to be a long time, Wanda … it would make Max so sad to see you like this. He would want you to be happy. He wouldn’t want you to put your life on pause.’

  ‘I’m not on pause,’ I argued. ‘I’m doing exams, and I’m working for a promotion. I’m even helping a know-it-all familiar solve her witch’s murder.’

  ‘You’re going through the motions. It’s obvious to anyone who knows you. I just want you to be happy. I want you to live your life. I think Max would want that, too. You’d want that for him, right?’

  ‘Of course I would want him to be happy. I mean, I would find it weird if he fell into the arms of the other Wanda, but … I’d have to get over it, right? Because I certainly don’t expect him to sit around pining for me. I just … even on the very small chance that I could ever move on, it couldn’t be with Will. It just couldn’t. No matter how great he is now, no matter what he’s done for us. It’s just, he hurt Max, Melissa. More than once. And I know it wasn’t him. I know all that. But it would be like … like a betrayal, if I was to choose him. It would be like I was saying, “Yeah, so listen, Max, I know that guy almost killed you a couple of times, and I know you’re the nicest guy I’ve ever known and everything, and I also know that you love me, but I just happen to be truly, madly in love with Will Berry, so you’ll just have to suck it up.”’

  ‘Wanda.’ Melissa reached across, and gently wiped the tears from my cheeks. ‘Don’t cry. I brought up a very stupid subject, and I’m sorry. But on a lighter note, did you happen to notice that there’s a tub of mint chocolate chip ice cream in the freezer? Because I certainly did. And while I know you think that apple tart is the cure for all ills, I’m here to inform you that you’re wrong.’

  ‘You’re serious? Ice cream in bed?’

  She grinned and pushed off her covers. ‘Oh yes. Ice cream. In bed. And I prescribe at least half a tub each for all that ails us.’

  11. Countdown at Caulfield’s

  At nine the next morning, I woke up to an empty bedroom. I quickly got washed and dressed and headed down to the kitchen, where I was greeted by the adorable sounds of Dizzy and his girlfriend saying goodbye by the back door. My mobile phone began to ring, and afraid that any conversation I might have would interrupt the cuteness, I headed out into the hallway.