“This is Dana Radcliff with Action 5 News, live at the scene of unfolding tragedy. The pile of rubble you see behind me is all that remains of Nightingale Books. The beloved Seattle bookstore was destroyed this morning in what authorities suspect was a gas-leak explosion. Two women were treated by paramedics for minor injuries. One man is reported missing.
“In a bizarre twist to this already-unusual story, several neighbors report witnessing an elderly woman fleeing the scene on a… broom. Local officials have sealed off the street amid growing concerns over the presence of gas and other hazardous chemicals.”
I leaned against the cold steel railing and stared into the mist, straining my eyes to see the barest hint of gleaming blue water or emerald-green forest. All I saw was white. Overhead, a seagull cawed. Behind me, a foghorn moaned. Not the homecoming I’d dreamed of, but then again, Charm Haven wasn’t my home. Not anymore.
It barely felt like we were moving except for the salt spray in my face, except for the thick sea breeze. I breathed deeply, enjoying the cool, humid air. It no longer smelled of the city, of cars and idling engines, or the funky, brackish tide pools near the dock. It was clean and briny, with hints of spruce, cedar, and pine.
Belowdecks, the ferry’s engine rumbled. I’d felt it in my feet when we first boarded, but the constant vibration left my toes feeling tingly and numb. The engine revved louder. My feet slipped gently backward. The railing pressed against my stomach.
We were slowing. We were arriving.
My backpack lay on its side. I leaned over and gripped its scratched aluminum frame. I grunted and heaved it upright. Drops of water rolled off the faded pink-and-yellow nylon. The color scheme wouldn’t have been my choice. I’m more of a rolling-luggage girl than a backpacker. But my luggage was gone like everything else.
I didn’t want to remember. I didn’t want to see my bookstore, and my apartment above it, explode in a ball of flame. I didn’t want to see Maleia, my arsonist great-aunt, fly away on her broom. I didn’t want to walk in on my fiancé and my best friend wrapped in each other’s arms.
At least I still had Gran’s necklace. Maleia hadn’t stolen that. She’d tried, but Hazel and I stopped her with— I felt crazy calling it magic, but what else could it have been?
What else could it have been?
My whole life had been nothing but questions. What happened to our parents? Why did Gran turn her back on us? Why didn’t she tell us about her evil sister, Maleia? Why did she give me the necklace?
For all my thirty-nine years, I had filed the questions away. I ignored them. I forgot them. I focused on school, then on my bookstore. I built the perfect life with the perfect job and the perfect man. Or… so I’d thought.
That was gone now, and I was through with questions. If I was going to start my life over, I needed answers. I knew where to find them.
A speaker behind me chimed, and a terse, weathered voice began speaking. “Now arriving at Charm Haven terminal. If you have a vehicle on board, please proceed to your vehicle. Passengers without vehicles, please proceed to the main passenger lounge on the upper deck. Our crew members will be there to assist you and guide you through the disembarkation process.”
“That’s us,” Hazel said, joining me at the ferry’s bow, looking out on the shadowy masses beginning to emerge from the fog. “Did I miss anything?”
“No. It’s been foggy most of the way.” I glanced at my sister. She was a decade younger than me and a head taller. She was the only woman I’d ever met who looked put together in a caftan. The one she was wearing was bright yellow with a subtle red zigzag pattern block printed around the hem. Her sun-bleached auburn hair fell in loose waves to her shoulders, onto the straps of a new electric-blue pack. If you put her in a lineup next to me in my jeans, dark cotton blouse, and brown hair in a tight bun, you’d never guess we were related. “Where have you been?”
“Not out here getting soaked, that’s for sure.” She glanced away and smiled. She was up to something.
“What is it?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously!”
“Remember when I was home from college after my softball team won state and you came home late and missed dinner?”
“What is this? The Spanish Inquisition?”
“Mom and Dad asked you where you were. You said you were studying for the SAT. They believed you, but I knew something was up. You wore that little black top.”
“Which I told you I was buying because Johnny Marko had a crush on that girl in that movie who wore it. You don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to put two and two together.”
“You’re deflecting.”
“Fine!” she huffed, but I knew she was enjoying herself. She held up a small yellow square of paper filled with blue ballpoint pen.
“A phone number?”
“I met the ship’s mechanic. He offered to give me a tour sometime when he wasn’t on duty.”
“I don’t believe you!”
“What?”
“Here we are, heading back to Charm Haven to attend Gran’s will reading, and you’re flirting up a storm.”
“Why do you have to make such a big deal out of everything?”
“Why won’t you take anything seriously!”
She sighed. I sighed. We both looked out at the fog. Sometimes the two of us were oil and water. I had used my share of our parents’ life insurance money to start my bookstore. I’d expected Holly to open a bakery. After all, she spent four years at that expensive pastry academy. Instead, she used her money to travel the world.
“Is he cute?” I asked.
“In a mechanicky sort of way. I probably won’t call him.”
“I’m jealous. How come you can talk to anyone and make a connection? When you flew into Seattle, you got a date with the flight attendant for crying out loud. What happened with that?”
“She wasn’t looking for anything serious. I’m not sure why you’re jealous. I just talk to people.” She paused and tilted her head as she looked at me. “You know, we could go out. I could be your wingman.”
“Too weird. And… I don’t want to date anyone so soon after Caleb.” After Caleb what? Cheated on me? Died in the explosion? Why would I want to go through all that again?
Hazel put her arm around me and drew me in. I let my head rest against her shoulder. “You’re right. It’s too soon. I didn’t mean dating though. Wouldn’t it be fun to go out, to get your mind off what happened for a little while? You can’t tell me you weren’t out here staring into the fog and running through it all again.”
“I… can’t.”
Two red-and-white buoys bobbed in the water, marking a path for the ship. A tower emerged from the fog, just big enough for one or two people. A gray-and-black hemisphere, an antenna rotating lazily on the roof. The tower was right on the edge of the water. The fog obscured everything beyond, merging Charm Haven into an unreadable mass, dark against light.
A lump formed in my throat. I suddenly understood why I’d stood out here the whole trip, why I’d stared into the fog and let the salt spray sting my eyes. I’d been hoping the fog would clear. That I’d see the island of Charm Haven all at once, in Technicolor.
I’d hoped our old friends and neighbors would be standing onshore, waiting to greet us. Shoot, I’d hoped I might be able to remember our friends and neighbors or Charm Haven itself. My memories were so muddled I couldn’t even remember Gran’s house.
Was it a fantasy? Sure, but the empty, fog-shrouded dock told me it wouldn’t be that easy. I hoisted my pack up to one shoulder. My sister grabbed the frame and held it while I slipped my other arm through the padded nylon strap. If Charm Haven wouldn’t come to me, then I’d have to go to it.
The ferry came to a halt, and a couple of orange-vested workers hopped onto the dock and began looping enormous ropes around wide steel pillars. The speaker behind us came to life. “Final call for walk-on passengers to disembark.”
“Oh my goodness,” Hazel said, pointing to something in the parking lot below. A Volkswagen camper van from the eighties. It had been… customized.
The windows had been replaced with double-hung house windows, semicircular at the top and bracketed by wooden shutters. The door on the side was something from a Victorian mansion. Its top half was cut glass and the bottom carved with intricate scrollwork. I barked a laugh. Amazing.
Green plants and blooming flowers covered the roof. Butterflies and hummingbirds fluttered among bushy rosemary, sage, tarragon, and other plants I didn't recognize. Coming up through the roof was a brick chimney belching greenish-white smoke. A small sign hung on the side by the door. I could barely make out the text: [Spells on Wheels]{.smallcaps}.
There, next to it, standing on the blacktop, was an elderly woman dressed in a ragged black dress. Her white hair stuck out wildly at all angles. She held a long wooden staff. Or… was it a broomstick? Maleia?
