B*witch Read online

  Regarding the latter, Binx seemed to be convinced that Div, Mira, and Aysha were behind it and that their coven should call them out on it, respond with fire and fury. Sure… maybe? Ridley prayed that Binx was right about their authorship of the shadow message. Still, she wished that the two covens could just get along and stop with the back-and-forth pettiness. It was exhausting; plus Ridley had better things to do, like work on that new transformation spell (transformation was Ridley’s thing) and that other new spell, too.

  “So, what class do you have next?”

  Penelope was hovering beside Ridley’s desk. Up close, she smelled like roses. Was that her perfume?

  “Um… uh… I have French. Room 291R. What about you?”

  “Spanish. Room 284R. I didn’t realize before that R stands for rear wing. Do you want to walk together?”

  “Sure!”

  Ridley stood up, slinging her backpack over her shoulder. As she followed Penelope to the doorway, she thought: It’s been ages since I made a new friend. Mostly, her social life consisted of hanging out with Binx and Greta—mainly Binx, who had become her best friend despite the fact that they were both private people. Or maybe because of it? Being a witch necessarily meant that you had to keep a distance from others because you never knew who might figure out your identity and turn you in to the principal or the police. (Even worse, you never knew who might be Antima, which used to not be a problem here but now it apparently was.)

  “See you tomorrow, Ridley. You, too, Penelope,” Ms. O’Shea said as the two girls passed her. “Oh, and, Ridley—there are tons of other countries whose governments are based on federalism. I’ll be sure to include that in our federalism discussion!”

  “Um… okay?”

  That was bizarre. How did Ms. O’Shea know that Ridley had written down that federalism question on her copy of the syllabus?

  Just outside Room 232R, the hallway swirled with students heading to their third-period classes. Penelope stopped and started to turn right; then she pivoted left, bumping into Ridley. Ridley blushed as she stepped away.

  “Sorry! I am such a klutz. Which way do we go?” Penelope asked.

  “That way,” Ridley said, pointing right. Why was her face so hot? “So, do you have Señora Quintana for Spanish? Everyone says she’s—”

  “Pen! Penelope!”

  A guy strolled up to them. He wore a white polo shirt and khakis, and he looked like an Instagram model.

  Oh, right. He had been talking to the new girl this morning. Colter something.

  “How’s it going? How are your classes?” He draped his arm around Penelope’s shoulder and kissed her hair.

  Penelope leaned into the curve of his arm. “Good! Do you guys know each other? Colter, this is Ridley. Ridley, this is my boyfriend, Colter.”

  Colter thrust out a hand and beamed at Ridley. “Awesome to meet you, Ridley.”

  Ridley took his hand and shook it. His grip was warm and strong, but she barely registered it. Her brain was still stuck on the words my boyfriend.

  “Awesome to meet you, too. Oh my gosh, I forgot my French textbook in my locker,” Ridley lied. Suddenly she had to get out of there ASAP. “See you later, Penelope.”

  “Okay, see you later!”

  “Nice meeting you,” Ridley added to Colter, even though she’d already told him that, then turned on her heel and headed in the opposite direction.

  It’s been ages since I had a crush, she thought. The last time had been in eighth grade, back in Cleveland; she and Natashya had dated for a few months before everything fell apart.

  But that was back then. And now here she was, having her first crush in ages, and the girl already had a boyfriend.

  Ridley stopped and U-turned in the middle of the hallway. The third-period bell was about to ring, and she had to get all the way to Room 291R.

  As she doubled back past the history classroom, she saw Ms. O’Shea standing in the doorway.

  Watching her.

  What the hex?

  And then an odd, random thought occurred to Ridley. She’d run into Ms. Hua over the summer at the grocery store—in July?—and she hadn’t looked pregnant. Was she really on maternity leave? Or had something happened to her?

  Stop being so paranoid, Ridley chided herself.

  Still.

  She glanced over her shoulder. Ms. O’Shea was gone.

  5

  HOT AND COLD

  Our minds are more powerful than you may think.

  (FROM THE GOOD BOOK OF MAGIC AND MENTALISM BY CALLIXTA CROWE)

  “I’m so glad that you were able to meet with me this morning. Thanks for giving up part of your study hall!”

  Mrs. Feathers leaned forward on her bright blue yoga ball and smiled kindly at Iris. She reached across her desk for a small brown ceramic bowl.

  “Can I offer you some M&M’s? They’re kind of my weakness.”

  Iris hesitated; sugar could sometimes make her even more anxious and agitated than usual. “Maybe just one. Thanks, I mean, thank you!”

  She started to pick up a yellow one, then gravitated to a green one instead. But what about the red, or the orange? Argh, it was impossible to decide.

  “I have a hard time with choices,” she admitted as her hand hovered over the bowl. “My therapist, Francesca—well, actually, she’s not my therapist anymore, but she was my therapist back in New York City—she says it’s because I’m worried about making the wrong choice and then being locked into that choice, and then what? What if I pick the yellow M&M, but I was really supposed to pick the red one, but it’s too late and I can’t go back and un-eat the yellow M&M… well, I could, technically, but that would be gross and really rude, right? Like, what am I going to do, spit it out and go for the red one instead?”

  Mrs. Feathers nodded sympathetically. “You can take all the time you need to pick out your M&M. Or take one of each color. Or take the whole bowl. Or I can put the bowl away for now and you can decide later, when you feel ready. This is an M&M-safe space.” She smiled again.

  Iris had no idea what an “M&M-safe space” was, but that was okay. Mrs. Feathers, who exuded a sort of hippie-grandma aura, seemed nice. Nicer than Mr. Zabel, the social worker at her old school, who used to make a sour-pickle face whenever Iris showed up at his office (which was often).

  Iris made herself do some therapy-breathing and settle back in her chair. She felt less crazy and chaotic than she had this morning before homeroom. She hadn’t run into the mean guy with the Antima shoulder patch again, and she hadn’t seen any of the three girls she’d felt watching her, either.

  Although she hadn’t gotten an Antima vibe off of them.

  Was it possible… could they be witches, too? Iris had never had a witch friend; it would be so cool to have witch friends to hang with.

  “So I just wanted to say hi and introduce myself and all that,” Mrs. Feathers said. “If you’d like, I can also go over your IEP with you and make sure you know what accommodations you’re entitled to. I plan to touch base with all of your teachers, as well.”

  “Does the IEP have the thing about loud noises? Because of my sensory processing disorder? I think my mom had that added last year.”

  Mrs. Feathers typed something on her computer keyboard. The computer was beige and boxy and ancient-looking. “Yes, it’s definitely on your IEP. We have noise-reducing headphones in every classroom for use during tests and quiet work time and whenever else you might need them. We can also give you your own pair to carry around in your backpack.”

  “Really? Cool.”

  Iris picked up an orange M&M, thought about eating it, then changed her mind and set it carefully on her lap. She was glad that Mrs. Feathers was familiar with SPD. The fact that Iris’s neurodivergent brain scrambled sensory input, at times interpreting soft sounds as loud and loud sounds as unbearable… or making her averse to the slightest physical contact one day, then wanting to slam into furniture (or into other kids in the playground, when she was younger
) the next… or being unable to tolerate the feeling of mashed foods in her mouth… was usually confusing and off-putting to those around her.

  As Mrs. Feathers typed something else, her gaze drifted to Iris’s pendant.

  “Is that a moonstone? It’s very pretty. You rarely see moonstones that color.”

  Iris reached up and curled a fist around the smiley face, not to calm herself but to hide it from Mrs. Feathers, although it was a little too late for that, like un-eating an M&M. She was usually fine wearing her pendant openly, since people didn’t recognize the yellow gem (moonstones were usually more moon-colored). The fact that Mrs. Feathers had identified it was kind of unsettling, since moonstone could be associated with magic. (And, in Iris’s case, the association was correct.)

  “Gosh, is that what it is?” Iris exclaimed, trying to sound surprised. “I always thought it was just some random stone. Mostly I just like the smiley-face part; it cheers me up.”

  “Well, we all need that, don’t we? Whenever I’m having a sad or bad or mad day, this is what I look at to cheer me up.”

  Mrs. Feathers picked up a framed photo and turned it around. A gray cat with a couple of bald patches was meatloafing on a couch. It had one milky blue eye and another that appeared to be scarred shut. In the background, a little golden kitten was curled up in a sleepy, furry puddle.

  “These are two of my kitties. I found her”—Mrs. Feathers pointed to the gray one—“under a highway, badly injured. The vet wasn’t able to save the one eye, and she can barely see out the other.”

  “Aww, poor kitty-cat.”

  “She’s a strong girl, though. A survivor. I named her Loviatar.”

  “Loviatar?” It sounded like one of Iris’s medications.

  “Loviatar is the blind daughter of the Finnish god of death,” Mrs. Feathers explained.

  “The god of… death?” Iris repeated, frowning. Why would someone want to name their cat after a death god’s daughter?

  “Loviatar isn’t like her father. In the myth, she becomes a powerful shapeshifter and warrior. She also tries to steal the sun, moon, and stars. Of course, the only thing my Lovi tries to steal is my breakfast, lunch, and dinner, right off my plate. Same with my other pets.” Mrs. Feathers chuckled.

  “LOL! I mean, that’s funny!”

  “Does your family have pets, Iris?”

  “Yup. My little sister has a pet mouse, Lolli McScuffle Pants, and my little brother has a hamster named Hulk. They’re new, we just got them from the Sorrow Point SPCA, I bet you didn’t know you could get non-cat and non-dog pets from there? We’ve also had Oliver P. and Maxina for a while; my parents adopted them from a cat rescue place on the Upper West Side. That’s in New York City. Let me tell you, they were not happy about the cross-country relocation thing.”

  “Why did your family decide to move here?”

  “After my dad died—that was in May, so basically four months ago—there wasn’t a lot of money. Not that we ever had a lot of money but there was even less, like my mom wasn’t sure how we were going to pay the rent or buy groceries. New York’s crazy-expensive. So my grandma Roseline, she’s my mom’s mom, said we should move out here and live with her in her house, and Mom could work at her restaurant—Café Papillon. Do you know it? It’s part diner and part art gallery and part bead shop. On Orchard Street next to the tattoo place? Anyhoo, so Mom and Nyala and Ephrem and I, and Oliver P. and Maxina, we packed up and moved here. Yay.”

  Iris twirled her finger in the air, then stopped abruptly.

  “Gah! Sorry, no offense! I am such an idiot! I’m sure Sorrow Point is super, super cool. I’m just not used to it. It feels, well, foreign. Which is a dumb thing to say because it’s not foreign, it’s still the same country.”

  “That’s tough about your dad,” Mrs. Feathers said softly. “My father died at a young age, too, so I know what it’s like to suffer that kind of loss.” She blinked and pinched the bridge of her nose.

  Was Mrs. Feathers about to cry? Iris had never seen a teacher cry. Although technically Mrs. Feathers wasn’t a teacher but a social worker. Same difference, though.

  “I’m sorry about your dad,” Iris murmured.

  “Thank you.”

  “Death really sucks.”

  “Yes, it most definitely does.”

  Now Iris wanted to cry. She pinched the bridge of her nose, hard, wondering if this was a stopping-tears trick. Hmm. It worked, sort of. Although now her nose hurt.

  The bell rang, signaling the end of second period. Iris tried to remember what came after study hall. Oh yeah, French.

  “Okay, well, merci beaucoup!” She picked up her backpack and jumped to her feet. As she did, the orange M&M that had been sitting on her lap fell to the floor and rolled under a bookshelf. “Argh! My M&M!”

  Mrs. Feathers pushed the brown ceramic bowl toward her. “No problem. Here, have another one.”

  “No, I’ll get it, I don’t want to mess up your office.”

  “Really, it’s—”

  Iris didn’t hear the rest of Mrs. Feathers’s sentence as she dropped to her knees (ouch) and crawled over to the bookshelf. She tried to peer under it, but all she could see was dust. And a piece of paper… maybe a newspaper clipping?

  Iris reached in to retrieve it. As her fingers grazed it, a white-hot heat seared through her.

  “Ow!”

  “Are you all right?” Mrs. Feathers called out sharply.

  Iris’s brain buzzed and prickled. An image came to her… signs held high in the air by angry-looking people. The signs had numbers on them.

  What the hex?

  “Iris?”

  Mrs. Feathers was next to her, bending down with a worried expression. Iris scooted back from the bookshelf and stood up, wobbly and dazed. She inspected her fingers; there was no burn mark, and no pain, either. In fact, they felt perfectly cool.

  Had she had an SPD moment? This was happening to her more and more lately. She’d touch some object, and weird mental images would come rushing at her.

  “Sorry! I was looking for the… and I accidentally touched a hot… except I think it was probably cold or regular temperature, and my brain went into… Never mind, I have to get to my French class.”

  Mrs. Feathers glanced at Iris’s hand, her brow wrinkled in concern. “Are you sure you’re not hurt? I think there might be an old baseboard under there. Do you need to see the nurse?”

  “No, I’m good. Bye, au revoir!”

  Iris saluted (why?) and headed into the crowded hallway. She pulled her schedule out of her backpack side pocket; what room was her French class in? Room 291R. Her brain was still a little bit buzzy and prickly. She wished there were a permanent magical cure for her SPD, and for her anxiety disorder, too (which also had initials—GAD, for Generalized Anxiety Disorder). But she didn’t remember seeing anything like that in Callixta’s witchcraft manual.

  Of course, Callixta said that magic was mainly about intention. If a witch could powerfully and deliberately think a thing, she or he or they could make it so. Spells, potions, mirrors, wands, and such were mostly just ways to enhance and channel the magical energy of the intentions. So maybe Iris just needed to, well, intend more strongly?

  Make my SPD and GAD go away… NOW! N-O-W! I MEAN it! she thought, squeezing her fists.

  Nope. Still the same. Big surprise. (She’d tried this before, many times.)

  Sighing, she headed down the hall toward what she hoped was Room 291R, where a familiar-looking girl rushed past her in a navy-and-white Juilliard hoodie. It was one of the three girls who’d been checking her out that morning.

  Iris watched as the girl went into Room 291R. So they were going to be in the same French class.

  Iris decided to sit far away from her, just in case.

  6

  SMACKDOWN

  Covens should be united against their common enemies.

  (FROM THE GOOD BOOK OF MAGIC AND MENTALISM BY CALLIXTA CROWE)

  By lunchtime, Binx
still hadn’t heard back from Mira or Aysha. Jerks. But no matter. She had the next forty-five minutes to track them down and force a confession out of them. She’d magically hacked into their class schedules and confirmed that they had A-lunch, too, so locating them shouldn’t be too difficult.

  She also hadn’t heard back from Greta and Ridley re: her brilliant detective work about Iris Gooding. Whatever… They could discuss what to do about Iris over lunch after they’d dealt with the Triad.

  Binx made her way down the main hall toward the cafeteria. Posters about homecoming, clubs, and athletics plastered the elegant cream walls. (She noticed that fencing tryouts were in November… Excellent. She’d always wanted to take up the sport.) A maroon WELCOME BACK, STUDENTS! banner hung cheerily from the high, molded plaster ceiling. The building, she’d heard, used to be a fancy resort in the late nineteenth century. Then it was closed and boarded up for decades. Then it was eventually reincarnated as Sorrow Point High. (The mood was very The Breakfast Club meets The Shining.)

  I wonder if there are ghosts here, Binx thought, then chuckled to herself. She didn’t believe in ghosts. Witches, yeah, but not ghosts.

  As she neared the cafeteria, she spotted Jennifer Liu and Joel Katz semi-hidden behind a fake potted palm tree, kissing. Ew. JennJo had been dating since kindergarten, practically, but get a room! Then she saw that approaching them from the other direction were… yessss! Mira and Aysha. Perfect timing.

  Binx was about to call out to them, but before she could, they sauntered over to JennJo like a pair of hungry panthers that had just found their prey. Aysha murmured some words under her breath. Then she flipped one of her boxer braids over her shoulder and touched Joel’s arm.

  “Hey, sweetie. Love your shirt. Really shows off your pecs.”