Finally, I sat down beside her and hung my head. Then I ran both hands through my windswept curls and pressed my palms into my eyes. “It’s my fault. It’s all my fault. That’s why Minerva came to me.”
“How can this be your fault, dear girl?” Sinda moved to my other side and infused some energy into my arm. I didn’t want to take much, knowing how it cost her, but a little pick-me-up would help in the task ahead. “They’re criminals whose greed knows no bounds. This is on them.”
“Tingle,” I said. “One across, six letters. Town founder.”
They took so long to process this that Bixby shouted the answer. “They know someone exposed the town sentry!”
I just let that sink in with my friends. “Think about the headline. Magical newbie destroys an entire town by accident.”
“Good thing the newspaper is heavily policed, and by the magical variety,” Bixby said. “The big question is whether anyone knows it was you. Or how you did it. I bet it’s just a rumor that got the bad guys’ hopes up.”
Sinda turned up the volume on the infusion. “If anyone knew, we wouldn’t be sitting here quietly. The police would have hauled you in for questioning. And Oscar and crew would be shaking you down to find out how.”
“I agree,” Ren said. “It sounds like they were hoping to find the solution in the library. You said they were disappointed.”
I nodded. “Very much so. There were new books in the collection from an anonymous donor that caught their interest. They’re hungry for this. Really hungry.”
“And maybe really grateful right now,” Sinda added. “Because if Angus MacDuff found the solution first, it didn’t end well.”
Bixby stopped in front of me. “Never thought I’d say this, but the turkey might have done you a favor.”
“Oh yeah? Enlighten me.”
“The golf posse will guess you had something to do with the birds. Especially if they flew away after we did. And they’ll think it was a bungled spell by a talentless hack.” He walked over and tapped my leg with his muzzle. “They won’t come knocking on Whimsy’s door for answers.”
“All I did was a simple reveal spell that day in Tingle Square. It’s magic 101.”
He stalked off again, nails clicking. “How often do I need to tell you it’s about intent? They’re corrupt, so it won’t work for them. They’re trying to find another way in. Ruthann said lots of people had tried and failed to reveal the sentry over the decades. But not you.”
“But I didn’t intend to reveal it. It just happened from a simple spell, probably goosed by a hiccup.”
“Don’t say goose.” Bixby stared at me. “Say, hiccups begone.”
I got up to obey. “Ladies, let’s spell.”
My first effort failed. As did the second and even the third. I knew it, even without hiccupping. There were birds tapping on the window behind the blind, and plenty of them.
Nerves were causing my diaphragm to spasm even without delivering a full-on hiccup, so hopefully the birds were only sparrow-size.
“All I need to do is reverse Dr. Featherburn’s spell,” I said. “Something we’ve done plenty of times. “Are you sure we have the words right? I was half stoned.”
I’d written all the words I could remember on a notepad and we went over them again now. Something was off. All it took was one wrong word.
Bijou reared up and started dancing on her hind legs. “Got it. Got it. Got it. ‘And’ and not ‘but.’”
I tried it again, reading the words backward carefully, channeling all my focus into reversing her spell. Banishing the hiccups. Banishing the birds.
When I was done, the tapping resumed. More slowly now. The beaks were either smaller or fewer.
“Nearly there,” I said. “Bijou are we missing anything else?”
“Nope. Nope. Nope.”
The repetition made me think of my crossword puzzle. “Three down. Four letters. Trio. We need to do this together, friends.”
Sinda and Ren came around the counter and each grabbed a hand. Then we read the spell backward together, slowly and carefully.
When it was done, there was silence. Sweet, merciful silence.
Broken immediately afterward by Mr. Bixby. “Hello, original problem.”
He walked over to the window seat and swung his nose up toward the cushion. It was hard to miss the sunflower growing quickly.
I didn’t curse often, but I let a blue word rip now. “Out of the fire and back into the frying pan.”
“Suggestion,” he said. “Go get that book of yours and find a legit spell for erasing things.”
“If it had one, surely Liberty would have tried it.”
“Maybe she did try it and never realized that’s what worked. Regardless, you need to do something and the spell book hasn’t let you down yet.”
“No? What about when it brought Elsa back in pieces?”
“User error. Obviously. That spell worked perfectly once you got your ducks in a row.”
I walked into the back room and collected Everyday Spells for Everyday Magic from its hiding place. “Let’s put the word duck in the lexicon of forbidden words.”
