“Did you happen to see who it was?”
No. But I know it was a woman. It might have been the same one who was looking through the window at the shop. I noticed long, black hair.
My hands balled into fists. “It has to be Chandra. It just has to. Everywhere I go, I seem to be haunted by some woman with long, black hair.”
Jade didn’t answer as she kept eating, but I didn’t need her to agree. Who else would try to cause so much trouble for me? She must have kidnapped Theresa to try to frame me, and when that didn’t work, she’d resorted to intimidating me.
But who could I go to for help? The police didn’t care. Chandra was a person of influence in town. What if everyone here, even non-witches, were under her thumb?
I considered calling Jo. He had told me to call him if anything else happened. But what could he do? He seemed to think that Chandra wouldn’t stoop to such tactics. What did he know about Chandra, anyway?
Jade mentioned Faith the night before, along with the fact that I hadn’t visited her in a while. I’d stayed away from Faith to protect her. If the intruder really was Chandra, then it was more important than ever to keep Faith safe.
But I needed help.
Crossing my arms, I began pacing the length of the kitchen, desperate for any ideas to get rid of my stalker. Were the intruder and the person who followed me to the shop the same person? I thought again about the brown leather shoes. They looked like boots with small heels. The more I thought about them, the more I knew I’d seen them somewhere before. But where?
I hadn’t gotten a good look at the woman who attacked Jade. She was still eating, so I waited for her to finish before I sat down next to her on the floor.
“Did you happen to get a good look at your attacker’s shoes?”
Yes. Brown leather boots with heels. Why?
A chill crept up my spine. “Then the woman who followed us and the intruder are the same person. I saw those boots when we were being followed.”
She jumped onto the kitchen table and circled a few times.
Why would she follow you to the shop? And why go to the house afterwards?
“I don’t know, but she must have been using an invisibility cloak. Do things like that exist?”
Jade rubbed at her nose with her paw.
No, not in the sense that you’re thinking. You can put a spell on a coat or cloak or cape to make you invisible while you’re wearing it. There aren’t any cloaks that are invisible on their own.
I tapped my chin. “Why would they try to get into the shop? The woman must have been desperate because her cloak or whatever didn’t cover her very well.”
Jade froze mid-stride, turning her head sharply towards me.
The apothecary. She needs potion ingredients.
I knew without a doubt that she was right. I took inventory every other day, and I knew nothing was missing from the apothecary. That meant the shield around the shop was holding, so the only way in was through the door.
“Wait a minute, how did the invisible woman get through my barrier? She followed me right to the door.”
It opens for you when you pass through. That’s probably why she followed so closely.
I frowned, resting my chin on my fisted hand as I paced the kitchen some more. The intruder needed a potion, probably to bring the barrier around my house down all at once. That would make it easier to get to whatever was in that room in the basement.
The last time the intruder had come, she’d used some kind of magical battering ram to punch a hole in the wall, but it alerted me. She was probably trying to be sneakier about it.
I grabbed the defensive spells book and flipped to the index, scanning the alphabetical list until I came to “Barriers.”
In the long list of subheadings, I found “Dispelling Barriers.” It was the section where I’d found the spells to try on the basement door. On the following page, I found another section that listed different types of barriers. There were force fields, protective bubbles, and…
“Sturdy barriers,” I murmured. I turned to the referenced page and got to the section about breaking down barriers. There was a spell to punch holes, which the black-haired woman must have used, along with spells for crumbling or dissolving the barrier. I had tried the dissolving spell without success, so I ignored it. I had dismissed the crumbling spell too, because of the footnote next to it that read “Requires Potion.”
There were no ingredients listed, so I got out my phone and pulled up WitchNet. I found the potion within moments. It was complicated, with about nine ingredients, including Ram’s Horn, Rhino Horn, and Hippopotamus Snout.
As I studied the ingredients, I remembered Theresa explaining that potion ingredients reflected the purpose of the potion. All of the ingredients were from animals who could slam into things and weaken them, making them easier to crumble.
An idea began to form in my mind. I wondered if I could use the potion to weaken the barrier on the basement door, then use the expanding shield spell to break it. It was an appealing thought, but my first priority was to get back to the shop and get the ingredients. If my black-haired opponent was after them, it would be better to get them away from the shop.
As far as making the potion, the only person I could turn to was Faith. She knew much more about potions than I did, even if she preferred spell work. I’d just have to make sure no one followed me to her house.
“Jade, I want you to stay here while I go to the shop to get ingredients for this potion.”
I’m not sure you should go to the shop alone, Sage.
“I’ll take the car. That way, at least I’m not out in the open.”
She agreed, but I could tell she was reluctant. To my relief, all was well at the shop. It took several minutes to find all the ingredients. Of the nine listed on the recipe, five of them must have been rare because I only had one bottle of each.
I hadn’t taken Jade to the shop, but I insisted she come with me to Faith’s so that I could keep an eye on her.
“Sage!” Faith cried when she opened the door. “Oh, thank goodness, I was getting worried. Come in!”
She ushered us inside, giving Jade a quick pat on the back. After settling us onto the couch, Faith hurried to the kitchen to make us some tea. She poked her head out of the kitchen doorway a few minutes later.
