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Alice held her breath, hoping, waiting for something to happen. “Hugo?” Alice said once more.

Still no response.

She ran back up the steps, turned down the hallway and upstairs toward her bedroom. Her legs burned with every step. To Alice, if there were ten steps, then there were a hundred, each one more laborious than the last as she raced to the top of the steps.

She breathed deeply to catch her breath as she flung open the bedroom door. “Hugo,” Alice shouted. “Are you here?”

“Did it work?” Alice’s reflection answered.

Alice snarled and slammed the bedroom door shut.

“I’ll take it as a no,” Alice’s reflection’s muffled voice said from within the bedroom.

Alice charged back down the winding staircase and into the living room. “Hugo! Are you here?” she cried out.

There was no response.

“Hugo, this isn’t funny.”

The house was silent.

“Hugo?”

The ritual had failed.

Alice stormed over to the circle and snatched up Hugo’s hockey stick. She let out a barbaric yawp and threw it against her shelves. It cracked in half as it crashed into the corner of the wooden bookcase and tumbled to the floor.

Max buried her head deep under the pillows of the couch.

Alice covered her mouth, and a deluge of tears flowed down her face. She collapsed to her knees in a thud, hunching over. Her forehead pressed against the cold hard floor. “What did I do?” she cried. “I broke it. Why did I do that?”

Alice let out a bawling howl.

“I’m sorry,” Alice said through her tears. “I didn’t mean to.”

She crawled over to the broken stick. The shaft split in two, still held on by a faint piece of the carbon fiber coating. Alice crossed her legs and sat on the floor, cradling the stick.

She placed the two broken pieces together, holding their bond tight. Raising the stick to her mouth, she breathed over them. Alice then recited an arcane language to call forth her magick. With a few words, the shaft was as good as new, except for a small line where the two pieces fused together.

“A perfectly broken stick,” Alice muttered.

The images of her and Hugo walking through the woods flooded her mind. The day she bent down to pick up the broken stick and placed it in her bag. She would later use the same stick in the ingredient for makingThe Lovers’ Kisspotion with Hugo.

Alice laughed, wiping away her tears. She longed to make another batch ofThe Lovers’ Kisswith him. Her fingers tapped against the rubber like coating of the hockey stick. She would give anything to have him here to share this moment with her. Their second perfectly broken stick.

Alice stood, still clutching the black and gray hockey stick. She moved over to the red velvet, Victorian couch. Holding onto the couch arm, she eased down into the very spot whereThe Lovers’ Kisshad revived her. Alice glanced at Max. Her face was buried behind one of Alice’s many pillows. She scratched the golden retriever’s back. Max’s head popped up from the sanctity of her pillow cavern.

“It’s okay, Max,” Alice said as she ran her fingernails through the thick fur of Max’s backside. “We’ll try again. At least we didn’t summon a wraith this time. That’s progress, right?”

Max smiled, and the tip of her tail wiggled.

“Next time. We’ll find Hugo next time.”

After a moment, Alice rose to her feet and placed the hockey stick on the coffee table. With a snap of her fingers, her curvedwitch’s hat flew across the room and into her awaiting hand. She pulled it over her head and secured it into place.

“Max, I need a drink . . . and a hug.”

Alice took a deep breath and proceeded toward the basement door.