I eyed the spices scattered across the surface of the white flour. They looked normal enough. I obviously just had magic on the brain.
Except I’d changed what I said from my usual words, hadn’t I? Depending on what was happening in my life, I’d sometimes said cinnamon was for prosperity, or ginger was for passion, or cloves were for abundance, or nutmeg was for when Josh and I argued and I wanted to clear the negative energy.
Oh boy.
My legs felt a little weak, so I braced myself against the counter and stared at the bowl. Elwood had been teaching me magic all those years ago, and I hadn’t even realized it until now.
I backed away from the ingredients. One step. Two steps. Three…
My back hit the fridge. I stared unblinkingly at the spices like they were ingredients to a bomb.
I swallowed hard. Good grief… were they?
Could they explode if I did the right (or wrong) thing or said the right (or wrong) words? What if I stirred clockwise instead of counterclockwise? What if I put the cinnamon in before the nutmeg? Would any of that change the outcome?
If I said,hey, magic-that-I’m-not-sure-is-real, let’s make a firecracker from mustard seeds and oregano, would it work? What were the limitations? The potential? Was black magic a thing? How would I know if I was skidding over to the dark side?
Outside the kitchen window, a raven hopped along the windowsill. Hell, for all I knew, the raven was magic, too. The town was named after ravens, so maybe it was. I slid down to the floor and hugged my knees.
Ever since this morning when everyone was talking so casually about magic and dead vampires and all the rest, I’d been holding it together pretty well. But that was just the way my brain worked sometimes. And obviously, this was one ofthose times when I’d needed a minute or two hundred to churn through everything.
It was a good thing I was sitting down because dizziness was washing over me in waves. It was dizziness, right? Or was it magic?
Would I second-guess every single thing in my life from here on out?
I pressed my palms against my eyes.
Maybe they were all pranking me?
Except that, of course, wasn’t true. Winston had definitely been dead. Leon had definitely accused Elwood of murder. And Gideon… Gideon had definitely said he was a wolf shifter—one that couldn’t shift, butstill…
I sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. I didn’t feel much better, so then I held my breath for a count of ten before forcing as much air from my lungs as I could.Nope. That didn’t help, either.
Maybe counting down from one hundred would help me feel less panicky. Or was that just good for falling asleep? No, that was counting sheep, right?
Wait… were sheep shifters a thing? If wolf shifters existed, presumably they would too, right? Did wolf shifters hunt sheep shifters?
Somehow, I sensed I shouldn’t ask Gideon that question. Was that my common sense kicking in? My intuition? Or my magic? I had no idea.
And what else was real that I’d always dismissed as fantasy?
I banged my head against the fridge door to stop the whirl of questions.
None of those were what I should be thinking about. I needed to concentrate on proving Elwood’s innocence. But just when I thought I’d reclaimed control of myself, another question popped up, and it was a doozy: Could I do magic?
I wasn’t a vampire, a shifter, or a mermaid, but I didn’t think Elwood was either. Did that mean all the weird merchandise he carried in his store could do actual magic? Specifically, could I use them to perform magic?
The buzzing, popping sensation that’d been floating in my chest since I’d arrived in Ravenstone warmed and cascaded through me, down my limbs, out to my fingers and toes, up to the hair on my head. And deep inside me, something whisperedyes, yes, yes…
I sucked in a breath and released it slowly.
Even if that was possible, which I wasn’t convinced it was, it didn’t make much of a difference right now. I didn’t know how to use magic. I was probably a magical dud. Maybe my dad was, too. That might be why he was so determined to make his life so different from the way Elwood lived.
Yeah. That made sense. If I had magic, I would know.
Reciting all the supposed magical properties of cake ingredients really wasn’t making a spell. It was just a quirky little thing I did. With that settled, I stood up and brushed off my pants. Then I went back to making my cake. As I worked, I let my thoughts turn to Winston (and away from ridiculous thoughts of me having magic).
It was obvious not everyone at last night’s meeting had liked him. But how much would you need to dislike someone to decide murder was the only solution? And why use a crystal point? Had someone taken it from Elwood’s store to use it as a weapon? Or had Winston owned it?
