“Hey, Sheila,” Lachlan said nervously, checking over his shoulder. “You remember Bartholomew—”
“He’s that sweet boy who runs the baked goods booth,” Sheila said jovially. “How are you doing, sweetheart? You look a little frazzled, and the day has just begun!”
“Actually,” Bartholomew said, grateful—so grateful—for Lachlan’s heat at his back, “I’m looking for three candles. Black, white, and amber colored.”
Gretel cocked her head. “Witchcraft?” she asked. “Clarity, protection, purification, restoration?”
Bartholomew almost cried. “Yes!” he begged. “Sage, chamomile, lavender.”
Gretel nodded. “We have those in tea-sized. They’re in the back for our Wiccan customers. I never would have taken you for a practitioner, Bartholomew. Imagine that!”
“It’s really our cul-de-sac,” he said, so grateful for Gretel’s knowledge and acceptance that he wanted to weep. “There’s seven in our coven, you see, and we tried to cast a spell last night, and I think something went wrong….”
Lachlan grunted as someone bumped him from behind. “Jesus, people seem to be in a hurry today. The floor’s getting really crowded really fast.”
“No, you can’t have a bite of my cinnamon vanilla loaf!” A strident voice sounded behind them. “It’s mine! And I’m in love! I can feel it! This next bite is everything I’ve ever wanted in a baked good. Now back off!”
Bartholomew swallowed, a lump in his throat forming with the suspicion in the back of his mind. “Really, really wrong,” he finished weakly.
“So you’re trying to reverse the spell?” Gretel asked. “Then here—here’s purple. It’s got your lavender in it, and it helps for refining intentions. It’s dark purple because I guess someone had dark intentions, so hopefully that will help.”
“We’re probably going to reverse the spell at home,” Bartholomew said. “This is for our booth, to protect people from whatever forces we set loose. It’s been sort of a… well, let’s just say something’s very wrong.”
“Upside-down starlings,” Lachlan said. “Squirrels in single file. Snakes in apple trees. I don’t know what any of this means, but it sounds like the background of a sci-fi/fantasy novel, and I can see why he’s rattled.”
Gretel’s eyes grew very wide. “Oh dear. Here, my boy. I’ve got a witch’s nine-pack here—light the purple, not the gold, and the black and the white in the corner of your booth, on the candleholders for safety. Let them burn for five minutes. Do you have your string?”
Bartholomew nodded.
“Good. Then recite your protection spell and blow out the candles so we don’t burn the place down, but keep the string—tape it to the floor if you have to. That’s some scary magic, sweetheart. And here!”
She went to a small shelf with pewter candlesticks and doodads on it and pulled two pentagrams, each swinging from a white ribbon. “One for you and one for your young man there—to keep you safe.”
Bartholomew opened his mouth to ask how much for one for each member of the coven, but Lachlan beat him to it.
“His friends are here too,” he said.
Gretel bit her lip. “Then send them my way. These are for you two.” She closed her eyes and then opened them and looked at Bartholomew with a sort of exquisite gentleness. “You’re our white-bound virgin, aren’t you?”
Bartholomew’s entire world went uncomfortably sweaty and red.
Gretel patted his cheek. “Oh, honey, don’t worry. It’s never as scary as we think. Now you two go cast your spell around the booth. I think that’s a very good idea. And let us know if you need any help in your neighborhood. I don’t know what your coven leader was thinking, letting you leave the premises with that much magic on the loose.”
“Well, we don’t really have one,” Bartholomew said. “I mean, Jordan’s our leader—he’s the one who decides which spells we’re going to cast, but the rest of us all pitch in.” He smiled weakly, glad he couldn’t see Lachlan’s face. “I do potions.”
“Figures,” Lachlan rasped in his ear, and he sort of yearned to lean back against that lovely chest and feel Lachlan’s tough-as-tree-root arms around him.
“Well, that is your gift, isn’t it?” Gretel said sweetly. “Just as distilling the truth is Jordan’s, and making the world homey is Kate and Josh’s, and imagining other worlds is Cully’s.”
Bartholomew frowned, feeling as though two of his friends had been left out. “But Alex and Dante—”
“Alex’s gift is order,” Sheila said with a sober nod. “And Dante’s….” They both met eyes and shrugged. “Well, we’ll figure it out when he does.”
Well, that alone pretty much proved they were on point. Poor Dante—he was decent but bored at his day job at the local newspaper, and he tried desperately to have a hobby like the others. Unfortunately the only thing he seemed really suited for was keeping Cully from losing his nut.
“He’ll find it,” Bartholomew said loyally, and Lachlan grunted as someone else bumped into him. “And in the meantime, we need to get back to my booth. Thank you both so much. It’s been a—”
“Wait,” Gretel said. “Do you know what went wrong? I forgot to ask.”
Bartholomew grimaced. “We… well, we sort of… not lied exactly, but we cast a wishing spell, and not one of us planned to ask for what it was we really wanted.”
Sheila and Gretel both did a slow blink. “Not one?”
Oh, how embarrassing. “No, ma’am.”
“What did you ask for instead?” Gretel asked, dreamy eyes unusually sharp.
“What we thought we were supposed to want.” Bartholomew had figured that out on his very own.
Both women let out inelegant snorts. “Jesus, Gretel—only when you’re young.”
“Right? Unbelievable. Well, young virginal Bartholomew, you and your friends are going to have to come clean before this is righted—you know that, don’t you?”
Bartholomew refrained from looking behind him, but Lachlan’s arms tightened around his shoulders as Lachlan protected him from more jostling. “Yeah,” he said in a small voice. “We got that feeling.”
“Well, run along, boys,” Gretel said kindly. “Lachlan, you come to us if you need anything, yes?”
“Ma’am, I don’t know anything about spellcasting,” Lachlan apologized. “I just didn’t want Bartholomew to be alone.”
And with that, he took Bartholomew by the shoulders and guided him back out on the floor.
Another group was coming toward them, comprised of four people cosplaying various Naruto characters. One of them had a paper bag with Bartholomew’s little logo sticker on it, and Naruto and Kakashi were reaching over Sasuke’s shoulder.
“C’mon, Jessie,” Naruto begged. “We can smell it from here. We don’t need to wait until lunch, right?”
“I bought them,” Jessie/Sasuke said. “I was going to bring them to my sister, since she missed out on the con!”