Page 4

“Hey!” I exclaimed, shocked out of my trance and back to reality. “Hey, you can’t do that!”

But apparently the door could. It folded itself in half as though it was a piece of paper. Then it folded again…and again and again and again. It was the size of a regular door…then an extra large pizza box…then a manila folder…then a deck of cards…and then it simply winked out of existence altogether, leaving me standing in a strange new world I knew nothing about.

Stunned, I turned away from where the door had been and saw I was standing on a road at night. It didn’t seem like a highway, though—there were no markings on it—no white or yellow lines painted on it. It was paved, but not with asphalt, though whatever it was, felt hard and cold under my feet.

Ugh, was I barefoot?

I looked down and saw that I was. Natalie had asked all of us to take off our shoes when we came into her house and I had complied, not wanting to be rude. I had grabbed my purse on the way through the mysterious doorway, but not my shoes. Now I was out in the middle of a strange road wearing nothing but black yoga pants and a big orange T-shirt—(Natalie had asked all of us to dress ‘Halloweeny’ and this was as good as it got for me)—with no shoes on.

Luckily, being a Florida girl, I have pretty tough soles. But I didn’t want to walk barefoot on a dark road forever. I needed to find someone who could help me—hopefully someone who could send me back home before my stupid presentation tomorrow.

So I looked around. The far end of the road led into a dark forest—uh-uh, I didn’t want to go that way. The other end led to what appeared to be a little town, though I couldn’t see much of it except its twinkling lights. I knew which direction I was going.

But when I started to move towards the town with its inviting lights, Bartleby wound himself around my ankles, keeping me from moving.

“Hey!” I exclaimed, as I nearly tripped over him. “Watch it—will you? What are you doing here, anyway—why did you come with me?”

To my extreme surprise, he answered.

“I’m here to guide you, of course. Cordelia asked me to,” he said in a low, purring voice.

I nearly jumped out of my skin. Seeing Natalie’s dead grandmother appear in the crystal ball and stepping through a magical doorway was bad enough. Adding a talking cat to the whole business was too much—I felt like my mind was being stretched like taffy and I didn’t like it.

“Hey—you can talk?” I exclaimed, staring down at him.

“Of course, I can talk.” He lashed his tail impatiently. “Come on—you’re going the wrong way.”

I shook my head in wonder.

“Maybe Natalie’s grandmother was right—maybe I am a witch, and my power is talking to animals,” I murmured.

“Nonsense!” Bartleby lashed his tail again. “My power is talking to humans—when I want to. Your power is, as yet, undisclosed. Though I have a few guesses I’ll keep to myself for now.”

I frowned down at him.

“If you can talk to humans, how come you never said anything to Natalie?”

I knew I would have heard about it if he had—Natalie would never have shut up about having a “familiar” who could talk to her.

Bartleby made a slinky gesture with his back that looked like the cat equivalent of a shrug.

“I never said anything because there was never anything to say. Natalie’s an idiot with delusions of grandeur—I didn’t want to feed her vanity and make her think she really was a witch when she couldn’t turn cream into butter even if she tried.”

“That’s not very nice,” I remarked. “Natalie feeds you and scoops your litter box and makes sure you’re comfortable.”

“Yes, well, someone can be nice and stupid at the same time,” he pointed out. “More than one thing can be true at once.”

“But she always says you’re her familiar,” I protested.

He made a disgusted hissing sound.

“I was Cordelia’s familiar—Natalie inherited me when she died, but that doesn’t mean she inherited any of Cordelia’s powers. She got her house though and Cordelia was really upset when she found out she was going to marry that stupid Brad and put his name on the deed. Thank goodness you came along so she could warn her.”

“But this has to be a mistake—I don’t have any magic at all,” I said.

Bartleby sniffed my ankle delicately and then sneezed twice.

“Oh, you’ve got magic all right—it just hasn’t come out until now. That happens sometimes, you know,” he went on as we walked down the road. “A witch’s magic doesn’t manifest until she comes to the change of life. When the blood stops flowing, the magic builds up in her body. How long since your last period?”