Page 54 of Never Been Witched (Starfall Point #3)

“Oh.” Mina glanced up at the ghosts hunched on the roofline, who appeared to be waiting for their chance to flit away. “Right.”

“Everybody ready?” Riley asked.

“Ready,” Josh and Alice said together. Caroline and Mina simply rolled their shoulders and nodded.

“Chester!” Josh called. The little form turned into the darkness, chirping inquisitively. “What we talked about? Make the choice.”

“Oh, please,” Margaret scoffed. “Chester might be a little angry now but—”

Margaret was cut off when Chester jumped at her, landing squarely on her chest. Alice averted her eyes. Even if she didn’t want Margaret to walk away from this, she didn’t want to watch Chester do whatever it was he was made for.

“I don’t quite trust Chester,” Riley muttered as she, Caroline, and Mina drew a protective circle around them and Edison and Ben shook salt around them all, including Plover.

“Is there something I can do?” Collin asked.

Alice shook her head. “Just be here.”

With Collin’s hand on her shoulder, Alice gave one last final shove, ensuring Stanford would not return from the depths of the void. Meanwhile, Margaret…

Well, the tension of the Welling locks had disappeared entirely, because Margaret was gone. Chester chirped happily and skittered up to the protection circle. He nearly bounced off the line, making a disappointed noise.

“Sorry, buddy, it’s not personal,” Josh said. “It’s for all ghosts right now.”

Chester swept his paw at Plover, who was inside the circle. Josh nodded. “OK, good point.”

“We need to step out anyway and get a handle on that.” Riley nodded at the Welling candelabra. The ghosts on the roof were growing restless, a few of them carefully moving as if they were going to make a break for it.

“Great,” Caroline sighed, cracking her neck.

They stepped out of the circle, leaving Ben, Collin, and Edison in the circle with Plover.

As they dashed to the candelabra, Chester skittered up Josh’s leg, taking hold of his collar, riding there like a parrot.

Josh grinned and scratched behind Chester’s ears.

All the locks were apparently exactly where they were supposed to be on the candelabra, to best serve their purpose. Keeping a watchful eye on the freed ghosts, the coven formed a circle around the locks. Each put a hand on the next witch’s shoulder, joining their free hands in the center.

Something that felt like a cold hand of fear slid up Alice’s back. She shivered. It was like previous interactions with the locks’ magic, but more intense, and frankly, a little gropey.

“It’s a conversation,” Riley said, even while she shuddered.

“Just a really loud one, between our magic and the locks. We’re asking the locks to give their loyalty over to us, because we need to shove all those ghosts back into the house before they can, you know, wreak havoc on the island and its innocent citizens. ”

“Couldn’t we just shove them into the void?” Mina asked.

“I think we would have to push them all at once,” Riley said. “We couldn’t keep Plover or Natalie or the ghosts who aren’t ready to go yet.”

“It would be cruel.” Alice nodded, breathing deeply. Somewhere, in her magic, she asked that fearful pressure to move away and if it would mind if she used it to control the army of ghosts currently looking down on them from higher ground.

After a moment, the hand slipped away from her spine and seemed to join the coven’s combined energy in the center.

The candelabra spun in the dirt and the locks turned, like a dead bolt in Alice’s chest. She breathed out in unison with the others.

They turned their heads to the house and as one, moved their hands up.

The rooftop ghosts, even those who were trying to move away from the house, snapped to attention. The wards were back in place.

“Listen up!” Riley yelled. “All of you, except Plover and Chester, please return to the house.”

The ghosts didn’t move. Chester chirruped, as if pleased to be included.

“Please don’t make me force you,” Riley sighed.

“I’d like to maintain the spirit of cooperation in the house, so to speak.

I appreciate that some of you want to move on eventually or want to find a way to resolve your business.

And we can work with that. But leaving now?

We can’t just let you out all at once. It would be chaos. ”

Alice watched as the creepier specimens, the basement ghosts, were sucked into the house as if a vacuum was pulling them inside.

As for the rest, there was some resistance, but eventually, like a stream of water, the ghosts trickled back toward the kitchen door.

A precious few stepped toward Riley. A World War II soldier in a U.S.

Navy uniform seemed to speak for the group when he asked, “What if we don’t want to go back inside? ”

“I think I just went over it,” Riley said. “The basement ghosts didn’t get a choice. That’s just common sense. And I appreciate that you want to go out into the world, but—”

“No, look, we appreciate that you kept us for as long as you did,” another ghost, wearing a short-order cook’s apron and paper hat, told them as he nodded to the void. “But we think it’s time for us to move on. Just protect my toaster, will ya? It’s a good one.”

“ You’re the toaster ghost!” Riley cried. “I’ve been stuck with a 1950s toaster I haven’t been able to use for fear I’d lose a finger!”

The toaster ghost protested, “I’d never really—”

Riley held up a finger with a griddle-shaped scar.

The toaster ghost rubbed at the back of his neck. “Sorry. I just love that toaster. It was my ma’s.”

“If you choose to move along, I will treat it with kid gloves,” Riley promised. “Which I will wear. While making toast.”

He grinned. “Thank you.”

“All right, move along with my best wishes, if that’s what you want,” Riley said as the spirits moved toward the void. “I hope you enjoyed your stay in Shaddow House.”

The coven waited as ten or so ghosts faded into the empty space. The others dutifully filed back into the house until Plover and Chester were the only ghosts left outside. Natalie waved wordlessly from inside the kitchen.

The coven closed the void overhead with a final gesture. Chester hummed happily from Josh’s shoulder, nuzzling against his cheek. Alice shuddered as Chester’s sharp fangs came dangerously close to Josh’s neck. But the awful little thing seemed completely enamored of him.

Josh turned to his father. “Dad, can I keep him?”

“As happy as I am that you’re safe, that’s going to be a hard pass, son,” Ben told him from the circle.

“This is just like that time you asked for a ferret at the mall, with no prep work,” Mina told him, shaking her head. “No strategy at all.”

Edison scraped a foot across the salt line, allowing Plover to step out of the circle. “I believe it would be better if…Chester…stayed here at the house where I can keep an eye on him, Joshua.”

Chester made a sad little peep and nuzzled Josh’s cheek.

“I promise to take good care of Chester,” Riley said, looking very uncertain of the whole enterprise. “You just have to, you know, promise not to reach into my chest and stop my heart.”

Chester made what sounded like an agreeable rumble.

“I guess,” Josh sighed. “But I’ll come see you every day, OK? I’m right next door.”

“Also, both of you are getting a whole new edition of the stranger-danger talk,” Ben told his kids. “Clearly, I was not thorough enough.”

Josh threw his hands up. “You gave me the stranger-danger talk, not the ‘hot lady asking for help with her luggage’ talk.”

“Well, you should both prepare for many, many amendments to the stranger-danger talk,” Ben told him.

“So, you’re outside,” Riley said, beaming at Plover. “How does it feel?”

“Uncomfortable,” he replied. “I am so very proud of you, my dear. All of you. You’ve managed what generations of Dentons before you never could have imagined.”

“And we figured out who’s attached to the toaster,” Riley said, even as she blinked past pleased and tired tears. “The kitchen is safe for toast.”

She discreetly wiped her cheek as Edison wrapped an arm around her. She peered down at Margaret’s body, peaceful and still. It looked like she’d just decided to take an evening’s nap on the grass.

“We’re going to have to move her body,” Riley told them. “Celia is never going to believe this.”

“We’re interfering with crime scenes now?” Caroline asked.

“We didn’t commit a crime,” Riley insisted. “We’re just harboring a killer ghost hamster.”

Chester made an indignant peep from Josh’s shoulder.

“It’s a thin distinction, but it’s there,” Riley replied.

“Sorry, your theory about the ceiling ghost being a poltergeist was wrong,” Mina told Josh, putting her arm around his waist. She was careful to avoid Chester, who was sniffing at her, curious.

“I don’t know,” Josh said. “His attachment object was the house, so in a way… OK, yeah, we probably should have figured it out a while ago.”

“Well, we were kind of distracted,” Mina told him. Josh hummed. “Come on. Dad says we’re probably going to need to move Margaret into our yard. We’re going to tell Celia she probably felt ill and tried to drop by the house to ask for help. We’re going to need your upper-body strength.”

“Of all our family bonding experiences, this is the most traumatizing,” Josh muttered.

Alice turned to Collin, who appeared to be leaning against the gazebo railing, breathing deeply.

She was still upset with him, but the business with Paige seemed so distant now, unimportant.

He’d let another woman use her tub. And yes, they were going to have to have a lot of conversations about healthy boundaries and learning to say “no,” but for right now, she was really grateful to have someone in her life who would throw himself in front of an oncoming evil hamster for her.

Even if the hamster turned out to be mostly OK.

When directed appropriately.

“So… This is my life,” she told Collin. “Evil house pets. And haunted antiques. Occasionally covering up suspicious deaths. Ghost butler-dads who are going to think you’re not good enough for me, despite the fact that you’re ridiculously well-off and own all the things.”

“She’s right,” Plover said. “I don’t think you’re good enough for her.”

Alice snickered and Collin hugged her. She wasn’t ready for a kiss just yet, but that would come. It just felt nice to be held.

“It’s a very interesting life, and I would like to be part of it,” Collin whispered into her hair. “And I know I’ve messed up and we’re going to have to have a lot of talks about it, but I think I can begin to make it up to you with eight little words.”

She leaned back to look up at him. “What’s that?”

Collin grinned at her. “I’m going to have another stained-glass tub built.”