The Witch Is Back (2 page)

The Parrishables.

The dark coven run by Salem native and overall bad guy, Samuel Parris, tried to destroy the Cleri several months before, hoping that it would make them the ultimate superpower when it came to the magical world. And they'd almost succeeded. Until they'd come up against the younger members of our coven. That's where they'd messed up.

Much to my shock, it turned out that the Parrishables were actually after
me
. Apparently I'm some kind of magical powerhouse. I'd always known that my casting skills were superior to those of the rest of my coven, but until I'd gone up against Samuel, I hadn't realized the extent of my abilities. Once armed with that knowledge, we became an unstoppable force.

In the end, it had taken all of the twitches (our term for teen witch) in the Cleri—including our relatives who had already passed on—to defeat an evil that had begun in Salem.

Which brought me back to my dream. Memory. Whatever.

Yawning in protest, I walked into my bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. “Ugh,” I mumbled, squeezing my eyes shut against what I saw. Then, without another peek, I said, “Renewbus freshimo perfecto.”

As my mouth began to tingle and take on the taste of mint, I felt the rest of the changes happening. I didn't need to look to know makeup was being applied, hair was being smoothed, and my skin was taking on a dewy glow. When I felt the spell wind down, I opened my eyes again slowly. The transformation was amazing, but since I used this particular spell so often, the result wasn't exactly surprising anymore. While I preferred actually going through my whole beauty routine, the shortcut was a lifesaver on those days when I didn't have time to get ready. Or in this case, when I'd dreamed of Bridget Bishop the night before and had the bags on my face to prove it.

Thanks to the Renewbus spell, sparkly gold shadow now swept across my lids, making my eyes shine brightly. Dollops of pink danced on the apples of my cheeks and my full lips were perfectly glossed with just a hint of color to them. My dark hair, which had been a hot mess just a few seconds before, was now pulled back into a braid that swept across my forehead and then back into a ponytail in the middle of my head. I smiled at myself in the mirror, and caught a glimpse of my too-white-to-be-natural teeth. I was practically a walking toothpaste commercial.

A slightly more awake version of myself headed back to my room and pulled on a pair of black Soffe shorts that I retrieved from my drawer, along with a sports bra and oversize tank. I snagged my tennis shoes from the corner and laced them up in double-knotted bows.

A girl should always be prepared for any situation, and the last thing I needed was to trip over a lace and give myself a
reason
to get a nose job. I was sort of attached to the one I already had, thank-you-very-much.

“Had, breakfast is—”

My dad let the sentence trail off as I appeared at the kitchen door and then plopped down at the table.

“Impressive spread,” I said as I looked at the pancakes, bacon, eggs, fruit, yogurt, and toast that was piled in the middle of the table. I scooped up some plain nonfat yogurt, topped it off with blueberries, raspberries, and strawberries, and then settled back into my chair to eat.

“That's all you're having?” he asked me. I could tell he was disappointed I wasn't eating more and instantly felt guilty.

“Sorry, Dad, but if you want me to actually be able to run after this, I can't exactly eat heavy now,” I said apologetically.

“Oh, uh, right. Of course,” Dad said, like the thought hadn't occurred to him until now. And it probably hadn't. I watched him scratch his head absently as he looked around at all the food that was going to go to waste. “It's just that they say breakfast is the most important meal of the day and all. . . .”

I didn't ask him who “they” were, because I already knew. He was talking about the parenting books and chat rooms. It had been like this a lot lately. Him going overboard on his parental duties, as if he'd forgotten everything he'd ever known about being a parent. Suddenly, he was worried about me eating three meals a day, whether I was doing all of my homework, and if I was dating anyone. The week before, he'd even asked me if I had a bedtime.

But I got it.

Without Mom around, we were both sort of learning how to live together again. Just the two of us. I mean, Mom had always handled the day-to-day household stuff before. So now whenever Dad
was
home and not traveling, he tended to take things a bit too seriously. And as much as I liked the attention, it was a bit much.

At first I'd been dealing with a healthy dose of fear over the prospect of his leaving town again for work. After all, the last time he'd gone, we were all almost killed and I didn't think I'd ever see him again. So, you can understand my apprehension. But Dad had to pay the bills and we both needed to move on, so I'd taken Dad's spurts of overcompensation—like this morning's banquet-size breakfast—with a grain of salt, always reminding myself that it could be worse.

A lot worse.

I took a big bite of my breakfast and ate it like it was the best thing I'd ever tasted. “The fruit and yogurt is really good though, Dad. Totally what I wanted,” I said, trying to wipe the disappointment off his face. It seemed to work and he smiled slightly.

As I went for another scoop, there was a knock at the back door and I heard the familiar turn of the metal knob. The sound brought me back to the dream I'd had and I couldn't help but shiver despite the warmth of the kitchen. Even months later, I was constantly on edge, waiting for the Parrishables to come back. But running on fear was no way to live, so I forced myself to stay glued to my seat and fought through the thought that something bad was about to happen. The only way to get over fear was to walk through it. My mom had taught me that.

“Hey, Had,” Asher said, breaking the silence and kissing me on the cheek as he came up behind me. I relaxed as he took a seat at the table. “Wow, Mr. Bishop, are you feeding an army?”

“Apparently not,” Dad said, frowning as he placed a few eggs and fruit onto his own plate.

“Need some help getting rid of it?” Asher asked, eyeing the food hungrily, but not yet moving to take a plate.

I could see the instant relief in my Dad's face, and my heart swelled with gratitude for my boyfriend. Since we'd arrived home from the cabin after defeating the Parrishables, he'd been the model guy: taking me out on dates, going to games to watch me cheer, and hanging around the house to get to know my dad better. All things I would've never thought possible when we'd first met. In fact, given that our whole relationship had started off as a lie, I thought we were doing pretty well.

It was hard to believe that less than a year ago Asher had been secretly batting for Team Parrishable. Back then, he was just this amazingly hot guy with jet-black hair, styled in a metro-looking faux-hawk and eyes that seemed like they could pierce my soul. And his lips?

Very kissable.

After some flirting, a few major fights with other witches, and an innocent—but awesome—sleepover, I'd found out he'd been working with the enemy. Well, kind of. Turned out, my nemesis, Samuel Parris, had been holding Asher's sister hostage and was threatening to hurt her unless he did as he was told, which included infiltrating the Cleri and relaying our secrets.

I was pretty pissed at first, but could hardly blame him for trying to save his sister. And by this time, I'd already fallen in love with him, which made everything more complicated. In the end, Asher had stepped up and helped us take down Samuel. Literally. He even jumped in front of a speeding spell to save me, risking his life in the process.

Now, back in the nonmagicking world, with Samuel gone and Asher's sister back home safe and sound, we could finally be a normal couple. Well, as normal as a couple of twitches could be, anyway.

And it was amazing.

“Help yourself,” Dad said, gesturing to the food in front of us and popping a blueberry into his mouth.

Asher didn't wait for him to offer again and immediately dug in.

After our run, I freshened up and headed over to Asher's. Slipping in through the side gate, I found my boyfriend—man, I loved the sound of that—my
boyfriend
—the words were totally delicious—standing in the backyard a few feet away from a man in an oversize trench coat and striped fedora. The stranger had his back turned to us, so I couldn't make out who he was, but I was instantly suspicious.

Furrowing my brows, I took in the scene before me. Who wears a trench coat in the middle of the summer? People who are up to no good, that's who. I began to fall back into a fighting stance, but before I could do anything, Asher let loose a spell of his own.

“Flameeble ignitus!” he yelled at the ominous figure.

Almost instantly, a puff of smoke exploded at the guy's feet, creating a steady stream of white, which circled and covered the area in wisps. I had no idea what was happening, but the man in the hat wasn't moving.

“Dammit!” Asher said loudly as he walked over to the man and pulled off his hat forcefully. Then he began to fan the area until the smoke dissipated. Thoroughly confused, I made my way across the yard until I was close enough to see what was going on.

“Did you just turn him into a mannequin?!” I asked, slightly horrified and impressed at the same time. “Asher, I'm sure you had your reasons, but . . .”

“Huh?” he asked, looking over at me as I walked up. “No. I mean, I know. He already
was
a mannequin. I was trying to cast a flame, but all I ended up doing was setting off a smoke bomb. Great for stupid high school pranks, not helpful in defeating bad guys.”

Waves of relief rushed over me.

Though I was embarrassed to admit it, I
had
thought for just a moment that maybe Asher was back to his old tricks. That he was using less-than-savory magic for his own purposes again. It was only for a moment though, and then I remembered that the lying, sneaky Asher wasn't the
real
him. But I couldn't help the knee-jerk reaction. Apparently I still had some trust issues that I needed to work through in that regard.

“Well, maybe Brighton will be good for us after all,” I said, seeing how frustrated he was by the failed spell.

“I'm just a little rusty, that's all. I didn't use magic at all when we first met, and lately I've been too busy to practice,” Asher said, placing the hat back on the dummy's head and giving me a pointed look. This was his way of letting me know—not so subtly, I might add—that this was because of me.

The truth was, spending all our time together had made it difficult for either of us to focus on magic lately. Except for the kind we were making together. But that wouldn't come in handy if we were going up against guys like the Parrishables again, which was still a possibility, considering that many of Samuel's followers had run off into the night after we'd banished their leader.

“Brighton will give us both a chance to catch up on the things that we've let slide,” Asher said.

I walked over to him and threw my arms around his neck.

“I still think we could have done that here,” I said, kissing him on the cheek softly. Then I moved my lips up to his temple and kissed him there, before heading over to the space below his ear and lingering for a moment. His body stiffened beneath mine. “Then we'd be able to be
alone
. I bet it'd be easier to concentrate without all those other people around.”

“You're the only thing I'd concentrate on if we stayed here, and you know it,” Asher said, pulling away from me but keeping his arm on my waist. “You know I love you, Had, but not all of us are magical geniuses who don't need to practice their craft. I've been letting that side of my life slide these past few months. Don't get me wrong—it's totally been worth it, but still . . . Let me put it this way: I respect you for being the kick-ass witch that you are, but I want to at least be in the same stratosphere as you. You might not need me to save you from evil, but I don't want to be a liability, either.”

As a witch, I understood what he was trying to say. Magic was important to both of us, and in a way, it
should
trump our relationship. But as a girl, all I heard was that Asher would rather go to some summer magic intensive than spend time alone with me.

Ugh, is this what it's like to be in love
? Blinded by rainbows and unicorns, and sappy soundtracks that played in your head whenever you were around each other, and having all logic and sense of self thrown out the window? Had I turned into the kind of girl who put a boy before her magic?

All of these thoughts must have been running across my face, because Asher pulled me back in for a kiss. “We'll still have plenty of time for
us
this summer,” he promised. “But I
do
think we need to make magic a priority again. What happens if Samuel comes back and I can't even do a simple flame-throwing spell? With my skills as they are, I'll only be able to give him smoke inhalation.”