Page 9 of Hexes and Hiccups (Mystery In A Bottle #3)

D aisy

Even the prized chicken salad sandwiches from Ronald’s diner couldn’t keep the scowl off of Tessa’s face.

They picked up their lunch on the way back from town center, the parking lot slowly growing more and more full of townspeople.

The words once written about Rebecca were no longer visible on the side of the truck, and her secret was soundly safe.

Their food was spread out over the empty part of the counter within Fields’ Herbals , the rush of customers gone for the time being.

A quiet whistle crept through the shop as Susy swept up after the patrons, pushing stray leaves and blades of grass out the opened door.

For the millionth time since coming back to the shop, Tessa muttered something angrily under her breath, her mouth full of her sandwich. She tried to straighten her back out but groaned, something cracking in her bones.

“Hear that?” Tessa asked. “That’s the price of doing good.” She raised her voice so as to carry it through the shop. “You hear that, Susy?”

Susy laughed and shook her head, continuing on her cleaning spree.

“Just eat up,” Daisy said, motioning towards the food. “You’ll feel better with a full stomach.”

“No,” she snapped. “I’ll feel arthritis with a full stomach.”

Daisy bit back her laugh. It wasn’t like she took pleasure in seeing her friend in such annoying pain, but there was something humorous about it all.

Daisy knew that Tessa wouldn’t have really turned away from Rebecca’s pleas for help, even if she was backing away.

There wasn’t a selfish bone in Tessa’s body, and Daisy could say that with total confidence behind her words.

She sighed as some pain riddled through her back next, her arms almost too sore to hold above her head.

Re-painting the truck had taken far longer than either one of them had anticipated, and despite having Susy already scheduled to open up the store, Daisy had expected to spend some time in the shop that day.

She had a list of potions to stock up on, and a few custom orders that were still waiting to be fulfilled.

But, after their unexpected painting session, Daisy wanted nothing more than to take a long nap in her cozy bed.

Standing up from her spot at the counter, Daisy wiped the crumbs from her mouth and chest and wound her way towards the kettle.

There was an elixir lying around somewhere for quick muscle regrowth, though it tasted rather foul.

She found that mixing anything unpleasant in some sort of ginger tea normally did the trick of masking the gross flavor.

Ginger was one of her favorite things, though that might’ve been considered odd to some people.

She set the water on the burner and collected a few mismatched mugs, putting her homemade tea blend within them.

“I hope that’s the healing tonic you promised me,” Tessa mumbled.

“Not quite.”

Tessa groaned.

“Don’t knock it till you try it,” Daisy said, giving Tessa a light pat on the back. “It’ll help, I promise.”

As she worked on making the cups of tea, Tessa collected all the strips of torn pages they had recovered from the Book of Gossip, lining them up on the countertop beside the register. She eyed them all one by one, her finger pressing into her chin thoughtfully.

“None of this is making sense,” she said as Daisy placed two steaming cups on the counter.

“What?”

“These rumors,” Tessa replied. “If only some of them are true and some are false, how can we find any reason behind them?”

Daisy sighed as she retook her seat, taking a few long sips from her tea. “There’s just something we haven’t seen yet,” she said. “Something to connect it all. From Riven being petrified to the very first note we found.”

Tessa gulped, her eyes landing on the one with her name upon it. “I hardly want to think about that one.”

“I know,” Daisy replied, giving her friend a small smile. “Just try to forget it. There’s no truth behind it, and as long as we know that –”

“Is that the most important, though?”

Daisy eyed her. “What do you mean?”

“I haven’t forgotten the point the Witch Council made. Have you?”

Pushing her food away, Daisy tried to get rid of the growing pit in her stomach by taking large gulps of her tea.

The Witch Council had assumed Tessa was at the center of their mystery, since Riven had been found with the slip of paper in his hands with Tessa’s name very pointedly written upon it.

It was an easy guess to make, of course, though Daisy wasn’t as quick to jump on it.

She had known Tessa since they were children, and there was no occasion when she had ever been accused of cheating.

Daisy had never believed it from the very first moment she saw it.

She had only wished that Tessa could see herself in the same light.

“This is all going to go away,” Daisy finally said. “Either when we find the Book of Gossip, or when the Council manages to revive Riven. Your name will be cleared, and we can go back to normal.”

Tessa rested her chin against her hand. “Don’t you find it odd that it hasn’t been done yet?”

“What?”

“Riven’s still a statue,” she murmured. “They didn’t seem in any hurry to bring him back, even if he could point out his attacker the moment he came back to reality.”

Daisy tilted her head at her. “The potion to break that sort of spell is rather tricky, Tess. It would take more than you’d think to heal him.”

Before Tessa could reply, the front door to the shop swung open, the bell sounding through the air. Iskra slipped through the aisles before appearing behind them, a kind smile on her face, despite the stress lines beginning to crease around the corner of her eyes.

“Iskra,” Daisy greeted, standing up from her seat. “How are you?”

She sighed, her voice heavy with exhaustion. “Perhaps you can ask me that again, at a later time.”

“That bad?”

Iskra shrugged. “Things have been a bit uneasy with this rumor business going around,” she replied.

“Townspeople come flocking to Gray Manor, demanding to know the meaning behind it and wanting to know what will be done. There isn’t much I can say, except to ask for as much patience they can give.

I was hoping to see if you two had managed any better than us. ”

Daisy stepped aside to show the Elder the strips of torn pages they had collected so far. “All we have managed so far is to track down more pages,” she explained. “The tracking potion I made was meant to uncover the book, but it only leads to the next rumor.”

Iskra leaned over the counter and read the pages, her lips moving as she did so. When she finished, she straightened back up with a tense expression. “Troubling,” she murmured. Her eyes grew foggy for a moment, but she quickly returned to reality. “Anything else?”

The Elder was a master at divination, allowing her to get small glimpses of the near future, or a possible one.

Daisy wondered if Iskra received some sort of vision in that moment, one that drove her further into the ball of worry she already found herself in.

For a second, Daisy almost blurted out a demand, wanting to hear what it is she saw, but she held herself back.

Daisy was far too greedy for an answer to their case, determined to figure out who would spread such careless rumors about the people she held incredibly dear to her chest. Her gaze snapped over to Tessa for a second, but her expression was unreadable.

“Well, from all four rumors we have uncovered,” Daisy explained, “we can say that two of them are false, while the other two are true.”

Iskra raised her brow. “What makes you say that?”

“Either common knowledge, or the people themselves.”

Iskra looked away from her, once again staring down at the papers. There was something trapped behind her lips, something she wished to say but kept locked behind closed lips. She fidgeted uncomfortably, as if she wanted to leave.

“What is it?” Daisy asked. “What is it that you want to say?”

Iskra hesitated, but her shoulders eventually sagged, as if she didn’t have all that much of a fight left in her.

“While your heart is incredibly true, Daisy,” she began in a quiet voice, her eyes not looking at Tessa in particular, “I can’t help but wonder if all these rumors are true, but your judgment is clouded by your…

” her eyes snapped towards Tessa, “friendships.”

“I wouldn’t say that at all,” Daisy countered, an edge of anger in her voice.

“Well, I –”

“No, Iskra,” Daisy interjected, confident in her words.

“If we were all to succumb to the single rumor, how would there be any friendships in the first place? All relationships are built on trust, and if I trust someone to know their character, why can’t I assume it to be a false rumor?

I’ve spent all my life knowing these people.

I know them. These,” she pointed to two slips of paper, “are wrong. I know it.”

Iskra looked as if she wanted to argue, but she held herself back, only leaning against the front counter. The Elder witch grew quiet as she looked over the rumors, her eyes growing cloudy the longer the silence continued on.

Daisy, pushing away the irritation that arose from Iskra’s words, crossed her arms over her chest, determined to regain control over the conversation.

She could feel Tessa’s embarrassment and shame from even where she stood, and there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t do to make sure her friend no longer felt that way.

“How goes the potion brewing?”

Iskra blinked a few times, her expression puzzled. “What?”

“The cure for Riven’s petrified state,” Daisy clarified. “I know it is a difficult brew to master. Is it serving you well so far?”

“We have managed to collect a few of the ingredients,” Iskra said with a sigh. She didn’t meet either of their persistent gazes. “Though the rest of them are quite out of our reach. The Council has a few worldwide contacts that could gather them for us, but only time will tell.”

Though there was something concerning about how Iskra seemed to lack urgency when it came to the cure, Daisy only allowed herself to be glad that they were doing it in the first place.

“Freeing Riven from the state he’s in might be the easier route to go down,” Daisy finally said. “You understand that, right?”

Iskra eyed her. “It is an option we’re trying to take.”

“It might be the best option.”

“Luckily for us,” Iskra continued, skipping over Daisy’s tone, “Riven is fully unharmed, and even unaware of the predicament he’s in.

” Iskra stood up straight, as if she was getting ready to take her leave.

“There was something I wanted to make clear to you both. Something that I believe you deserve to be on the same page about.”

The sudden seriousness and tension in Iskra’s voice caught both of their attention. Daisy felt the pit in her stomach grow, that feeling of unease and paranoia quickly returning to her.

“Until you manage to prove otherwise,” Iskra began to explain, “the Council is under the belief that Tessa Hala turned Riven to stone in order to stop him from telling anyone about her cheating.” She held onto Tessa’s stare.

“The evidence is too blatant for us to ignore, not when we’re met with more questions than answers. ”

“But…” Tessa began, though she quickly allowed her head to drop, the confidence seeping out of her.

“I will always believe in innocence before immediate guilt, Iskra,” Daisy snapped, curving around the counter to stand behind her friend, placing her hands over her shoulders.

“The only evidence you have is a matter of mere circumstance, nothing tangible. You and the rest of the Council should think about that .”

Before Iskra could respond, her phone began to sharply ring through the store.

She turned away as she pulled it out, flipping it open and pressing it to her ear as she stepped away from them.

Daisy kept her arm tightly around Tessa, determined to let her confidence sink into her friend.

Everything would so easily crumble away if Tessa didn’t even bother to believe in herself, something that Daisy was unable to do for her.

As the silence stretched on, Tessa reached to place her hand over Daisy’s, giving her a tight squeeze.

At least there was one thing Daisy could be sure of, and that was that Tessa would never be alone throughout all of it.

Iskra rounded around the aisle, the color drained from her face.

“What is it?” Daisy asked.

The witch’s next words sent a chill through the air, a feeling Daisy would not forget anytime soon.

“They found another statue.”