“Can we try again?” Astrid asked, looking at me with a sheepish and hopeful smile.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “But… but we should try to take your headache away, right? I’ll make sure to add the correct seeds this time, I promise.”

  “Um, I think we’ve done enough for today.”

  Astrid seemed disappointed and sighed. “How am I supposed to get the potion right if I don’t try to fix my mistake?”

  I took the dustpan and broom out from under the sink and started to sweep up the broken glass on the floor, but I kept gasping because my head felt like it weighed a ton and the constant knifing pain through my ears was getting hard to ignore. I really needed to take a swig of my Headache Draught and then lie down. This was proving to be one doozy of a headache and the idea of Astrid attempting to set it right… needless to say, I wasn’t up for round two.

  Astrid worried her lower lip as she faced me with concern. “Please don’t say you don’t want to continue teaching me?” Before I could answer and put her mind at ease, she continued. “You’re my only chance to become a real witch, Poppy, and I promise I’ll get the next potion right!”

  “First of all, Astrid, you’re already a ‘real witch’ and that has nothing to do with me.”

  “Right, but no one knows potions like you do.”

  “I’m not going to stop giving you lessons,” I responded, wanting to eliminate the concern in her eyes. “I just think we’d better call it a day… for today. That’s all.”

  “Can we please try to reverse whatever I messed up?” Now her voice was spiking into the shrill range. It made my head pound worse than before.

  I heaved a sigh. “Listen, sweetie, I’m done for the day. You go on home and we’ll pick up our lessons tomorrow, okay? I need to clean this mess up and…”

  “I’ll clean it up!” She lunged at me and snatched the dustpan out of my hand before I could stop her. “The explosion was my fault, so cleaning up is really the least I can do...”

  “As long as I don’t have to clean up,” Finn answered as he waved us both away and returned to his video game in the living room.

  “It’s okay, Astrid.” I slowly and deliberately removed the dustpan from her possession, and that was when she lost the battle with her tears.

  “I’m abysmal at making potions!” she cried. “I don’t know how I’m ever going to become a talented witch when… when that just happened!”

  “Astrid,” I started as I reached out and pulled her into a hug. Since Astrid was a witch, she wasn’t exactly used to physical affection, but she was warming up to it and significantly faster than was Wanda, her cousin with whom she lived. “That’s not true.”

  “It is true,” she sobbed as she wrapped her arms around me and cried into my chest while I crooned words of positivity into her ear and tried to ignore the pounding in my head.

  “You’re very talented with potions,” I offered. “But, some potions are more difficult to learn than others. We’ll try again tomorrow after school and you’ll be back to impressing us all with what a prodigy you are.”

  She pulled away and nodded while drying up the rest of her tears on the cuff of her sweatshirt. Poor Astrid had really had a tough go of things lately—after trusting her brother and poisoning Wanda with a hex potion, Astrid had found herself grounded for the month. But, she wasn’t grounded from her lessons with me, which was just as well because I enjoyed her visits (when she wasn’t destroying my kitchen) and so did Finn.

  Once Astrid begrudgingly agreed to leave me to my solitude, I walked into the living room and sank onto the couch, my head still pounding. I wasn’t sure how she’d managed it, but instead of creating a headache cure, she’d hexed me with the worst headache I’d ever had. I shut my eyes, but even that hurt.

  “Hey, Mom, watch me kill this Volatile with my sledge hammer,” Finn said, not bothering to look up from his game where it appeared he was attacking zombies.

  “I feel like a volatile hit me with a sledge hammer,” I grunted.

  Prying myself off the couch just long enough to rummage through my purse, I took out a bottle of Headache Draught I’d brewed a month or so ago, and uncorking it, downed the whole thing in one go. The draught had the sharp aftertaste of licorice. Before I could resume my spot on the couch, someone knocked on my front door.

  Dragging myself down the hall, I opened the door to find Wanda standing on my front porch, dressed to the nines as usual. Wanda was tall—maybe five-eight, and she was a definite looker with her waist-length black hair, curvy figure and beautiful face. Even though she was a witch and we were supposed to be sworn enemies, we’d become good friends. Though I couldn’t say I was happy to see her at the moment.

  She raised her eyebrows at me. “Is something wrong, Poppy? You look more… casual than usual.”

  That was her way of saying she didn’t approve of my customary uniform of sweatshirt and yoga pants.

  I didn’t respond, other than to sigh as I turned around and teetered back to the couch, leaving the door open so she could follow me. Keeping my hand on my head, I could only hope the pressure might relieve some of the pain. It didn’t. Good thing the Headache Draught would start working in the next ten minutes or so. I groaned again when I sat down and massaged my temples.

  “Hi, Wanda,” Finn called from where he was sitting on the floor in front of the TV.

  “Hi, Finn. How’s Piggy?”

  “Oh, he’s just great.”

  A while ago, Wanda had magicked to life Finn’s favorite stuffed animal—a pig aptly named, ‘Piggy’. Aside from giving me a heart attack every now and then with his high-pitched voice, Piggy was harmless.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Wanda repeated as she trooped in behind me.

  “Astrid.”

  Wanda’s eyebrows shot up. “Balls,” she swore.

  Finn laughed and Wanda gave me a ‘sorry’ expression, to which I just shook my head. Wanda and her vocabulary weren’t concerning me at the moment.

  “What did Astrid do?” she continued.

  “Destroyed my kitchen and gave me the worst headache I’ve ever had.”

  She looked around, frowning, “Where is she?”

  “I sent her home maybe ten minutes ago—you didn’t see her?”

  Wanda shrugged. “I haven’t been home yet. I just closed up the store and drove straight here.”

  “Oh.”

  “So what exactly did Astrid do? Hopefully not poisoned you with one of her awful brother’s potions?”

  I tried to smile, but failed. “She mixed the wrong ingredient in a headache tonic and instead of taking the headache away, it gave me a serious one.”

  “Well, it looks like her magic must really be something… you look like you got hit by a truck.”

  I snorted under my breath. “I feel like I got hit by a truck.”

  The headache was already starting to ease, but I lay down again, anyway.

  “Did you take anything for it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hmm,” she grumbled. “Well, whatever you did take for it… you might want to take something that will kick in… faster.”

  “Faster?”

  Wanda nodded. “You forgot, didn’t you?”

  I looked at her, not in the mood to figure out what in the world she was talking about. “Forgot what?”

  “That Henner invited Marty, you and me to dinner at the Half-Moon tonight.”

  I covered my eyes and groaned again. Dinner with the guys was the last thing I wanted to think about at the moment. “Ugh, I totally forgot.”

  “You sure you’re okay, Poppy?” Wanda continued, narrowing one eye at me suspiciously. “Usually you’re the one who’s on top of everything and I’m the forgetful one.”

  “I just… got a little overwhelmed.”

  “Is the dinner for Henner’s birthday?” Finn asked, still not bothering to look up from the zombie facing him on the screen.

  “No, why is it Henner’s birthday?” Wanda asked.

  “Yeah! It’s November sixth and RJ’s is the thirteenth!” Finn answered.

  “Well, regardless, this dinner doesn’t have anything to do with birthdays,” Wanda said as she faced me. “At least, I don’t think it does.”

  Henner had asked us to dinner because he wanted help to clear the rest of his grandmother’s furniture out of the basement. The dinner was just a thank-you in advance. I shook my head as she faced me, and that concerned yet judgmental expression was back on her face.

  “Darla keeps a bottle of gin under her pillow and they say alcohol helps headaches. Do you want me to...?” she started.

  “No, I already took a headache draught and I’m just waiting for it to kick in.” I sat up, shaking my head in irritation because the pain still hadn’t gone away and now I was getting frustrated. The draught should have worked by now, especially given how much I’d taken. “No gin.”

  “I have some vodka,” Wanda continued.

  I looked up at her and shook my head again. “No gin… no bourbon… no rum… and no vodka.”

  She looked away and huffed. “Wow, you really are in a bad way.”

  “About this dinner date—”

  “You’re going to try to get out of it, aren’t you?”

  “I’m hardly in any shape to go,” I pointed out.

  “Right, which is going to leave me with the two of them and… thanks, but no thanks.”

  “Maybe Lorcan will go with you.”

  She frowned. “And that’s supposed to make the situation better?”

  “Yes?”

  She flung herself into an armchair, propped her feet on the coffee table, picked up a magazine, and started flipping through the pages like she’d suddenly forgotten I was there. “Is that what you’re wearing tonight?”

  “I’m not going tonight.”

  She looked up from the magazine. “You have to go.”

  “I have a really bad headache, Wanda, need I remind you?”

  She tossed her magazine aside, set her feet on the floor, and leaned forward. Resting her elbows on her knees, she faced me and closing her eyes, held up her hands, angling them in my direction. I could see an ethereal ball of light that suddenly popped up between her palms.

  “Your ache is gone, you’re now pain free, such is my will, so mote it be!”

  I blinked, but the ache was still there. “Didn’t work.”

  “Oh, bother,” she grumbled as she stood all the way up and walked over to me with a shrug. “I was hoping I wouldn’t have to get up.”

  “Your laziness knows no bounds.”

  She frowned at that and, holding up her hands so they were centimeters from my face, she repeated the spell.

  “So?” she asked, looking at me.

  I waited a second or so before answering. “I think you moted it be.”

  Nodding, she returned to the armchair, throwing herself into it with another sigh. Wanda could be dramatic and then some.

  “I have a question to ask you, Poppy.”

  “Fire away.”

  As if the chair had just poked her with a red-hot stick, she launched to her feet and stormed across the living room, before turning around and pacing back towards me. Then she paced to the other side and repeated. All the while, her eyes were narrowed, and she worried her lower lip, tapping her fingers against her chin. Finally, after having finished her lap in my direction, she paused in front of me.

  “Don’t you think it’s odd about Henner inviting us to dinner?”

  I frowned. “Um what?”

  “Think about it—he wants to clear a basement full of heavy and big furniture, so he asked two waifs like you and me.”

  “Well, he also asked Marty.”

  She nodded. “Right. A human. And us—instead of asking Roy, Lorcan, or some other strapping male specimen who could sling a grand piano over his shoulders without batting an eyelash? I don’t think so.” She took a breath. “Also, notice who Henner didn’t invite.”

  “RJ.”

  She nodded. “Exactly… and why do you suppose that is?”

  “Because RJ isn’t up on all the supernatural goings on in Haven Hollow?”

  She nodded again.

  “So, what are you saying?” I asked.

  “I’m saying the invitation to dinner is a smokescreen.”

  “What would it be a smokescreen for?”

  “Maybe Henner just wants you both to know it’s his birthday soon?” Finn asked with a shrug.

  “I already knew it was his birthday,” I answered.

  Wanda threw herself back into the armchair again. “Oh, no more about birthdays!” Then she took a breath. “When I asked Henner about it, he said he wanted you and me there… just in case.”

  “Just in case of what?”

  She nodded. “When I asked that exact question, he changed the subject.”

  I laughed as I shook my head. Wanda and her paranoia could be completely ridiculous sometimes. “Are you sure you aren’t reading a little too much into this? Maybe Henner asked us because he enjoys our company and he didn’t want to be alone with another strapping male specimen?”

  “I would hardly term Marty a ‘strapping male specimen,” she started as she narrowed her eyes at me.

  “Well, he’s handsome,” I answered on a shrug.

  “Regardless, Henner’s basement is no laughing matter.”

  I wiped the grin off my face in a hurry. “You’re right. Sorry.” Breathing in deeply, I realized she was still wearing that serious expression, which meant I’d have to play along if I wanted to retire this subject. “So… if Henner asking our help is a smokescreen… what would you like me to do about it?”

  “Nothing,” she answered with a shrug.

  “Nothing?”

  “Well, I mean, there’s really nothing to be done about it, but…”

  “But?”

  “Will you stop repeating everything I say, Poppy? You sound like a parrot.”

  I chose not to be offended.

  “Can you think of any reason Henner would want us there?” Wanda continued. “Some reason that has nothing to do with moving furniture?”

  “Not really. I thought the invitation was innocent enough when he first asked us.”

  “Innocent!” she guffawed. “That’s exactly what it isn’t.”

  Wanda was naturally suspicious of everyone—it was a trait born into her and thus, she couldn’t be faulted for it—it was just the way she was.

  “Well, we can’t exactly start suspecting Henner of dirty tricks. If he invited us, he must have a reason, right?”

  She frowned. “I mean… I guess so.”

  “Then… I’m sure we’ll soon find out what that reason is.”

  She hesitated again, studying me. The silence went on for long enough that I started to fidget and assumed there was something more to her visit than just Henner’s odd request. “Is there something else you wanted to talk about?”

  She snapped alert so fast, she startled me. “Actually, yes. I need your… help with something.”

  Chapter Two

  “You want my help with what?”

  “I want to do some research on a few people Betanya Tayir mentioned in her journals.”

  “You guys are talking too much,” Finn announced as he stood up and gave us both a grumpy expression. “Killing zombies takes concentration.”

  “Sorry, buddy,” I offered.

  Finn gave me a big smile. “I’m going to go play Nerf outside.”

  “You know,” Wanda started, eyebrows elevated. “I could magick his Nerf gun so it shoots actual—”

  “No, that’s alright,” I interrupted, shaking my head, so she understood in no uncertain terms that I had no interest in giving my twelve-year-old son a real weapon.

  But, back to the subject at hand, I frowned because research wasn’t the sort of help I imagined Wanda would be after. Last I checked, she knew what Google was. “Can’t you do that yourself? You know how to work the internet.”

  “I already checked the internet and I couldn’t find the information I’m looking for,” she answered, appearing put out. “Really, Poppy, don’t you think I would’ve already done the obvious before asking you?”

  I shrugged. “With you, I never know.”

  She cleared her throat, giving me that raised brow expression that said she wasn’t amused. “Anyway…”

  “If these people you’re interested in can’t be found on the internet, I’m not sure why you think I’d be able to find them,” I continued with a shrug. In general, I liked being helpful, but in this case, I wasn’t sure what I could do. “Google.com is more helpful than poppy.com.”

  She shrugged. “I’m thinking you’d be better at searching than I would.” Then she cocked another elevated brow my way, this time paired with a smirk. “Poppy.com was cute, by the way.”

  “Thanks… but I’m sure whatever I can do, you can do?” I didn’t mean to sound like the antithesis to the Annie Oakley song, but there it was. And I also didn’t mean to be rude or to appear like I didn’t want to help, but I also wasn’t exactly overwhelmed with free time.

  Wanda shook her head. “I’m not very good at this kind of thing. In the coven, if we wanted information, we checked with the Archives clerk. He told us whatever we wanted to know.”

  “You had an archives clerk?”

  She nodded. “He had access to records from covens all over the world. Getting information then was simple. Now? Not so much.”

  I sighed, figuring I was as good as roped into another of Wanda’s situations. “So these people you’re interested in researching… are they humans or are they… more?”

  “I don’t know.” She crossed her arms against her chest and appeared put out.

  “Okay, well, what do you know about them?”

  “There are three people mentioned in Betanya’s journals—all women. The strange part is that they just appeared in her journal without any introduction—I turned a page and, boom, there they were.”

  “You mean she never mentioned them before?”

  She nodded. “Right. Betanya started writing about them like they’d just materialized out of nothing.”

  “Weird.”

  She nodded. “And when I looked the women up on the internet, there was no record of who they were or where they came from.”