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Stevie’s lips were so firmly pressed together that they had almost disappeared.

It was the only way she could trust herself not to blurt out a line from Hocus Pocus or even, if really desperate, Macbeth .

But here she was, living her amateur wiccan dreams, about to assist a real-life witch with real-life magic.

‘Luckily I had this ready to use.’ Temperance held up a glass bottle with an old-fashioned stopper.

Inside were large, flat leaves, what looked like bright green sprinkles and tiny buttery-yellow flower heads, all floating in crystal-clear water.

‘I prepared it for the red robe, but I think soul-sapping powers are more important that intensely horny ones.’

‘Huh?’

‘I’ll explain once this is steeping. Remember – tongs at all times. Turns out this baby is pretty potent. It sent Mark from a heritage hero into a timid little country mouse. We need his grit and ambition back because it turns out he was on our side all along.’

Stevie carefully pulled Mark’s leather jacket out of the bag by her feet using the tongs from the Molland kitchen.

She gingerly hoisted it into the bucket in the middle of Try Again’s back garden.

Temperance unstoppered the bottle and poured over the mixture F had recommended as a cure-all neutralising potion for really big emotions.

She willed everything in her being that it would do the trick.

With a beach bucket of sea water as the last ingredient in this chancy cocktail, Temperance stirred it around and around until she felt the whole jacket was submerged.

She knelt down, placing her hands around either side of the bucket and closing her eyes.

She hoped that Susie might have guessed what her big sister was up to back in the pub, what with her weirdly specific questions about Mark’s belongings. If she did, she’d be trying to keep Mark busy for a while, so Temperance could have a stab at undoing their grade-A royal fuck-up.

‘Uhm, should I . . .?’ Stevie’s voice went squeaky and tapered off when Temperance opened one eye. ‘I mean, what do I do now? I’ll help however I can.’

‘It’s kind of a bloodline thing at this point. I’m going to focus on what I want the magic to do while I’m making contact with the jacket. Usually, I’d put my hands directly on it, but whatever we did to it is super toxic, so the bucket will have to do.’

Stevie grimaced. ‘You really gave him deadly nightshade, huh?’

‘Not directly .’ Temperance squirmed. ‘Just into a garment that he wears most days.’

Stevie played with the hairs above her ear. ‘It’s not what I thought witchcraft would be like.’

‘It’s not.’

‘Hmm, it kinda feels like . . . I don’t know how to say this . . . ’

‘It’s OK, you can say anything to me.’

‘Kinda feels like you drugged him,’ Stevie blurted.

Temperance spluttered. ‘What? No! We put the enchantment on his jacket , not directly on him . And we didn’t want him to get ill or anything, just take down his capitalist greed a notch or two.

Which, in fact, he didn’t have. Quite the opposite.

If we wanted to poison him, we could have just slipped the belladonna into a sambuca shot, to be honest.’

Stevie grimaced. ‘The calm way that you said that is very disturbing to me.’

‘But I wouldn’t . We got it wrong this time, stupendously wrong, but our intentions were good. Susie had a really strong vision and when we put that together with how Mark was acting . . . we just got the wrong end of the stick. But our hearts were in the right place.’

Still Stevie frowned. ‘I just think if you’re going to play with people’s emotions you’ve got to have . . . maybe, like, two-step authentication? Not just some vibes and hunches, but actual proof of wrongdoing. Feels like a slippery slope, right? Like Sabrina the Teenage Vigilante.’

Temperance sat down on the grass with a thump.

‘God. Yes. We were all fired up by our panic and fear, and took some pretty drastic action. You’re right, Stevie.

We need proper proof before we ever tackle anything like this again.

Don’t suppose you fancy a side hustle as a coven apprentice too, do you?

I think we need some dedicated help on this front, not just in the store. ’

‘Are you kidding?!’ The sparkle came back to Stevie’s eyes. ‘YES!’

‘Brill. First job in this new role is to go and make yourself a cuppa and put your feet up – we have given you a rough twelve hours and you’re going to need some decompressing time.’

‘How do you decompress in a coven?’

‘Same as regular people, really. Netflix, toast. A nice pair of socks.’

‘Got it.’

Temperance waved Stevie off and then turned back to her big mistake. She closed her eyes again and placed her hands on the bucket, drawing all the energy she felt into her fingertips and through the plastic.

A cartoon Mark shuffled along the green, dogged by rainclouds chasing him wherever he went.

As Temperance let out a long breath she blew those clouds away, into vapour, and the sun was coming out for him again.

Next, Mark was carrying a box of his things out the Beston office, but with his head held high and a spring in his step.

Racing towards his brave new future. Temperance, next, put him back in the thick of a busy night at The Witch’s Nose, holding court and laughing away. She restored the spirit that was his.

That which we dampened in you, we return. Your spark is your own once more. With a big apology.

The energy moving through Temperance felt different, still warm and tingling as it had always been, but now with a stronger core to it, a steely determination. She might make a mess, but she could also fix it. There was power in that.

When Temperance eventually headed back to her shift helping with prep at the pub, she couldn’t find Susie anywhere. On her second check on the snug, she almost collided into Abel carrying a huge crystal punchbowl.

‘Whoah there! ’

‘Steady. Gran says this is a proper family heirloom. Which probably means some great great grandfather smuggled it away from somewhere it genuinely belonged.’ He looked down at the sparkling facets of the crystal, the rainbow reflections catching in the pub lights, and scowled.

Could anything escape the condescension of Abel Gulliver?

Even old-timey dinnerware wasn’t safe these days.

‘Have you seen Suse anywhere?’

‘Gran sent her off with Mark to get some last-minute things from Salcombe. Apparently, she urgently needed some posh pickle from one of the delis for tomorrow. But I think she actually just wanted to give them some more time together. They were having a long, deep and meaningful talk out in the pub garden.’

‘That was sweet of Margie.’

‘We Gullivers aren’t all bad,’ Abel said with the smallest note of warmth to his voice.

Temperance chewed her bottom lip. ‘If you say so.’

‘Interesting guy, that Mark. He seemed the life and soul that night in The Fort, but today it was like he wouldn’t hurt a fly. Literally that he couldn’t .’

The guilt surging at Temperance for having unfairly magicked Mark into such a shell of himself made her snap, ‘People can seem one way but then be something completely different under it all.’

Abel’s eyes went wide. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Just . . . just that people change, don’t they? Sometimes completely without warning.’ She looked straight into Abel’s eyes, her meaning clear.

He pressed his lips together while taking a slow breath. ‘Sometimes they have to, Temperance. Sometimes they have no choice.’ His fingers went white around the punchbowl and he stalked away.

Margie came out into the pub lounge, a duster in hand.

‘Your face,’ she tutted at Temperance. ‘My god, no wonder we’re empty this lunchtime with that stormy mug on display.

You’d put anyone off their whelks. Oh – while I’ve got you, girl, tell me how much that gorgeous dress cost Abel.

He won’t let me pay him back, but I’m planning on sneaking the money into his bag before he goes. ’

‘Oh, I don’t know . . .’

‘You do know.’ Margie narrowed her eyes at Temperance, showing off a flash of her sparkly blue eyeshadow.

‘But I . . .’

Margie shook her head. ‘Your loyalty is with me, remember? Your local landlady and unofficial granny? Not some fool that’s buggering off back to Bath in two days.’ She checked her slim gold watch.

‘Would that be my one and only son you’re bad-mouthing?’ Diane, Abel’s mum, shouldered open the thick wooden door, two small suitcases in her hands.

‘Love!’ Margie bustled over to her, wrenching the bags away from her daughter-in-law. ‘I’ll get these upstairs, you sit yourself down.’

‘Why does everyone want you to sit down when you’ve had a long drive?

’ the woman asked, smiling. ‘I need to stretch my legs after all that holiday traffic, thank you. And help you get ready for this big do tomorrow. Which apparently is purple themed.’ Her eyes caught on Temperance.

‘Oh, Temperance, my darling, you’re a grown-up woman! ’

Temperance laughed nervously. ‘That’s what they tell me.’ It was hard to be mature and composed around someone who was a witness when you used to pull your swimming costume down to wee in the sea.

Diane came forward and squeezed Temperance with a rib-cracking hug. ‘It’s so good to see you,’ she said almost sadly, in a hollow voice. ‘After such a long time.’ She pulled back, her hands on Temperance’s elbows, taking her in. ‘You’re well? You’re doing OK? Happy?’

‘Um, yes. Course. Working in the shop with Mum. Running it, actually, while she’s away for six months,’ she replied, straightening her shoulders back a fraction.

‘And anyone in your life? Boyfriend? Girlfriend?’