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Thorn didn’t speak frog, but that “Ribbit!” probably meant, Witch, I’ll make you suffer for turning me into a hideous amphibian and setting your vicious cat on me!

because the frog bounced off the cauldron’s tripod, tipping it to balance on two legs.

The red brew sloshed up and over the mouth of the cauldron.

Once again, Thorn attempted another extraordinary feat of athleticism. But she landed short of the cauldron. It was a bloodbath. Red was everywhere, dousing Thorn’s outstretched arms, splashing all over her face, and spreading across the floor.

Lucky that potion wasn’t scalding, Bandit said from his safe and dry perch atop the back of the chair. At least he had the decency to pause his hunt to make sure his witch wasn’t cooked. Then off he went again. Die, frog!

As Thorn watched her hard work seep into the timber, she cursed the spirits of the woods, the earth, the oceans.

All of them. But then she saw that they had saved her a bit of hope.

At the end of her outstretched arms, her favorite cup was half filled with her freshly brewed New-and-Improved True Love potion.

With a care usually reserved for highly volatile potions, she set the cup down on the stool next to the armchair.

Then she marched, broken glass crunching under her feet, to the wall of hundreds of drawers, slid one open, and reached in.

She turned around and scattered a fistful of dried crickets onto the floor.

It wasn’t long before Penny-Pincher’s escape path crossed with the sacrificial cricket ground. She couldn’t help but stop to slurp up some of the bugs, despite her human mind screaming a bloody no. Just as Bandit was about to sink his claws into his prey, Thorn scooped her up.

Hand over the frog.

Thorn plopped Penny-Pincher into her pocket. “I told you, she’s not really a frog. She’s a woman.”

Witch.

Thorn’s back creaked, her muscles seized, and her tongue swore. She was even more out of shape than she’d realized. Typically, aches from unusual physical movements only set in after a day or two. Clearly, thirty-nine years old was when the human body started to disintegrate.

She flopped back into her favorite armchair and was a little horrified by what she heard come out of her throat. She wondered how long this sighing-when-sitting-down had escaped her own notice. She was pretty sure that five years ago, sighing was only an emotional response, not a physical one.

She reached for her long-awaited cup of tea sitting on the stool and took a long sip. How vile. The tea was lukewarm.

Only it wasn’t tea.

She spat and spat and coughed and coughed.

Do you have a hair ball? Bandit sauntered toward her, but then he saw the bright-red splatters around her feet and skittered away. Consumption!

“That’s just the New-and-Improved True Love potion.

I forgot I hadn’t made tea and picked up the cup out of habit.

” She put the cup back down on the stool.

There were barely more than a few drops of potion left in it.

She would have to whip up a second batch before she begged Madam Maude to arrange her another date.

But first, she had to brew the antidote, or she’d fall in love with the next man she saw.

Not that it was raining men around these parts, but she didn’t want to take the chance.

After all, Penny-Pincher had come a-knocking.

As she pushed herself out of the armchair, the frog croaked out a muffled ribbit, and Bandit pounced. “Bandit, no!”

The big tomcat crashed into her lap. She thought she heard her back snap. Witch, cat, and frog toppled backward into the armchair.

Except, instead, Thorn’s butt hit the floor.

She groaned in pain. “Who took my chair?”

Inexplicably, Bandit abandoned his frog hunt and scampered under the bed. Witch, what did you do?

“I stopped you from murdering a human…” Thorn trailed off, realizing Bandit wasn’t referring to the frog. Her armchair had completely vanished.

So had the mess of broken glass and porcelain, and the spilled potion.

In fact, her house looked the cleanest it had ever been.

And neater. Her cauldron was once more hanging in the fireplace, but the fire was out.

Her favorite cup had been moved from the stool to the table, sitting together with her kettle.

Next to the kettle was a mortar and pestle, but not her wooden set.

A marble one. Her hat was still perched on her broom next to the front door, but there was a kink in its pointy tip.

Large furniture like a couch and a low cabinet had also suddenly materialized inside her cottage. And there was a series of strange golden poles arranged in two lines, with thick red velvet ropes hanging from them, creating a narrow hallway that cut the cottage into two halves.

All the peculiar changes to her cottage were plain for her to see because it was now light, when it had been night just a second ago. And the sun streaming through the windows was brighter than it normally was even in the middle of a summer’s day.

Then she heard noises. Footsteps. Voices. Multiple!

People were trampling everywhere.

“There’s a plague on my house!”