Page 40

THIRTY-FOUR

Walls’s pocket buzzed. He ignored it. Whoever it was could wait. He concentrated on driving.

After Rose had texted him that Thorn was back at her cottage, he had revved up his car, dropped Charlie off at his parents’, then sped straight to Covenstead.

Walls thought he must be imagining things. But he could swear a raven was following him down the long driveway and through the park. In his rearview mirror, he kept seeing the inky bird.

He stepped on the brakes and practically leaped out of his car. In front of him stood the cottage.

In the two weeks since Thorn’s inexplicable departure, he had dropped by often, hoping that he’d catch a glimpse of her getting annoyed by a tourist, brewing a potion, or even stuck in the bathroom as a giant.

A silhouette appeared at the window. He tried not to get his hopes up. It was probably Rose. He’d met her once when she first took up the Covenstead witch job. He had hoped she’d tell him Thorn’s whereabouts.

The figure in the window right now was at least half a head shorter than Rose and had a slight slouch.

He ran to the door. “Thorn!”

When he stepped inside, her face lit up at the sight of him. But she seemed distressed. She paced in front of the fireplace.

“What’s wrong, Thorn?”

“I can’t stay long in this century unless I get this potion right.” She stirred the bubbling cauldron. “I only have a few minutes.”

“What can I do to help?”

She opened her mouth to reply but stopped herself. She shook her head. “You’ve done too much for me already.”

“I want you to stay. Tell me.” Walls walked around the couch and spotted the pentagram. He recalled that Thorn had once mentioned that without the Dire Dagger, one could still use a pentagram to cleave a soul. “Thorn, you…”

He didn’t think that Thorn would take any of his soul, not after the way she’d kissed him on the cheek the last time he saw her.

But she had been so distressed the night before she disappeared; she’d cried herself to sleep in his arms. Whatever it was from her past that had returned to haunt her had driven her to ask him this favor.

A last resort. He took a big step right into the middle of the star inside the circle. “Go ahead. Take a piece of my soul.”

Thorn picked up her spell book. “It won’t be a piece. It will be all of your soul.”

The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. This woman in front of him looked exactly like Thorn, but his Thorn would never risk his life, no matter how desperate she was.

“Just a second. Someone’s calling me,” he lied to buy himself time. He fished out his phone and saw ten missed calls from Thorn. He called her back.

“Walls! Do not step into that pentagram!” the Thorn on the phone yelled. Her voice was suffused with fear. Fear of losing him. Now, there was his Thorn.

He glanced at the other Thorn standing right before him, the one making sure her feet were right outside the edge of the chalk circle. “Too late.”

“Drink the red potion in the basket on the table!” the real Thorn yelled.

The fake Thorn closed her eyes and chanted, “Inside this circle I present.”

Walls tried to flee, but he managed only to take half a step out of the pentagram when he found himself being pulled back inside it. His phone tumbled out of his hand.

The fake Thorn smirked as she kept chanting. “A sacrifice for my wish.”

Walls leaned away from the pentagram and reached for the table. But the white chalk lines peeled themselves off the floor and curled around his arms like ghostly tendrils. He could hear his Thorn screaming into her phone. “Walls! Walls!”

He kicked the table. The basket tumbled off. Glass clinked and broke. But two vials of red remained unbroken, and one rolled toward him.

The fake Thorn was distracted, but only for a second. “A power for my potion.”

He snatched up the vial and drank the potion inside.

“A life for love.” The fake Thorn put down her spell book and smiled triumphantly. Then her face fell.

Walls had disappeared into thin air.

Walls found himself surrounded by many witches. All with pointy hats. Some with frog-green skin. There were also animals, half-animals, and monsters. But most of them were kids. They jostled past him up and down the street. As they knocked on doors, they shouted, “Trick or treat!”

Then he spotted her, ten steps away from him. She stuck out like a sore thumb. Not just because she was standing still, but she was a hatless witch.

She said, “It’s a Bring Me to My True Love potion.”