Her eyes narrow. “If only you were as clever as you are ornery.”
“Don’t you think it’s odd Webb is so determined to make all magic the enemy, not just the Widow Witch? She sent a storm after the Warlock the other day, in his own house. Whatever Webb is telling you, they’re not allies conspiring against you.”
“I don’t know anything about that. The only storm I see is brewing over our heads right now. The sky is sick. Go home. I haven’t lived this long because I laughed at floods.”
Time for the cavalry. I reveal the offering in my tote bag. “I brought rum cake. A Frost family classic. Great for arthritis, I hear. With raisins.”Take the bait.
The door opens an inch. “… Did you soak the raisins?”
“Of course. Not a wrinkle in sight.” Gertha Fudge could use a rum soaking. She might be more pleasant then.
“What kind of rum?”
“Mount Gay.”
She finally relents, and swings a hand around the screen door. “Hand it over.”
I do as I’m told.
“My father always kept Barbadian rum in the house,” she says, sniffing the cake. “I like rum cake with a little of my pineapple jam on top.” Back behind the screen, she gives me her reluctant attention. “My arthritis makes me cranky sometimes. Gets worse with a storm.”
That might be an apology? “I understand the Warlock’s history with this town is a lot more complicated than—”
“Youdon’tunderstand, girl. Not this history. Not the Knights.”
“Hear me out, Ms. Fudge. I’m here as your Farewitch,yourneighbor. I came to ask about the Widow Witch, what you know about her. I’ll take anything you can tell me.Please.”
She clucks at me. “Here’s what I’ll tell you: If anyone’s capable of enraging the Widow Witch, it’s Knight. His fight with the old bat has been a long time coming. That boy’s been rotten and on her bad side since before you were eating solid food, girl. Nothing more dangerous than an undisciplined Warlock. Don’t need any fancy Eldercraft to tell methat.”
A Witch won’t argue there—wait.
Gertha Fudge remembers the Warlock.
“You knew him when he was younger, didn’t you?”That’swhy her anger feels personal.
“Everyone was a child once, girl. Terrible business with his parents. No one should meet the good Lord so soon.” Then she shakes herself out of that thought, jowls shivering. “Take that little boy and leave that tomb of a farmhouse. Some folks are just meant to be alone.”
“I don’t believe that. And I don’t think you believe it, either.”
“Didn’t your mama ever warn youa giggling girl and a gaggling hen always meet a terrible end? Go cluck somewhere else, girl. It’s Memorial Day and I’m resting.”
“Ms. Fudge, you’re retired.”
“What, so I don’t get a holiday?” she huffs, shaky hands gripping the rum cake. “Stop trying to play with magic bigger than you. Go back to your shop and just be a Farewitch.”
Ms. Zeen’s voice comes back to me.Angry women are usually right. “Honestly, Ms. Fudge, I think all this loathing of magic is because you’re scared, not mean.”
The tiniest morsel of surprise peeks through her expression, just before her face hardens into weathered stone. “You’re in luck, girl. ’Cause I can be scared and mean at the same time.”
The door slams in my face, the frame shaking with the force of her spite.
A clap of thunder cracks through my bewilderment. Right. I need to get back to the Manor before the hills turn to mud.
On the way back to the farmhouse, I expect a maelstrom, but the clouds only grow darker. Whichever way I look, the horizon promises storms. The sky threatens to weep but never does. In my rearview mirror, Foxe Holler hunkers under a blanket of sickly gray.
When I near the edge of town, a text pings my phone. I don’t check it, my eyes on the narrow country lanes, but my pocket buzzes with a cacophony of texts. Then, an actual phone call. That’s when I get worried.
I pull over at the town’s gas station to check my phone, and I see Silas’s text first.
