Page 22 of Bewitched By the Headless Horseman
When Kit didn’t respond, she turned around to find him gone from her room. She glanced back out the window, and he stood only a couple of millimeters from her, startling her.
“Please don’t do that again,” she groaned.
“I’ll call on you soon,” he said. “Time is of the essence, and I must continue my search. Keep my bones safe, Pumpkin.”
“I thought you needed my help?” Stevie should just want to get rid of him, but after tonight, she’d only grown more curious. Itching to find out more. And she bet that was exactly what he’d wanted. Either way, she wasn’t a ghost that could stay awake for twenty-four hours and endlessly search for his head. Needing sleep was a downside of being a part of the living.
“In due time. Tonight I have Inferno to guide me.” Kit backed away from her and stroked his horse’s mane. He easily mounted the stallion, his powerful thighs pressing against the animal’s body. Without another word, the horse bolted forward, Kit’scape flapping in the air. They slipped straight through the fence—the specks of white light vanished from sight.
Stevie shut the window and drew the curtains closed. Roxy’s feet padding against the wooden floor sounded behind her.
“What a night, huh, Foxy Roxy?” Stevie plopped down on the mattress and patted the spot beside her.
As Roxy curled up next to her, a strange feeling formed in the pit of Stevie’s stomach. She sucked in a sharp breath when she realized something. Kit had whistled for his stallion, and the horse had answered his call... She remembered his words from the other night,Your tiny fox is all yours, Pumpkin. I prefer to claim stallions as mine.And then…He comes when I desire it.
If she ever needed Roxy, Stevie knew she would come to her if she whistled, hearing the call from anywhere she was. It wasn’t just any horse … it was aghost sidekick.
And only seers had those.
Chapter Nine
Roxy rolled on the floor, playing with a ball of yarn like a baby kitten as Stevie looked at the list of items that were sold overnight from the apothecary. Stevie stood over the cauldron in Lucia’s basement and tossed a few wilted petals into the spelled lavender liquid, then pricked her finger to add one drop of blood. Once she stirred the contents, a sweet scent wafted through the air and the color changed from lavender to a light shade of blue.
With this particular spell, the magical brew could be used for several things. Hair color that lasted a year without roots ever showing—the one Stevie hands down would continue to always choose—a lie detector test for up to three questions, and one broom levitation.
Stevie poured the brew into containers before packaging them up, then worked on the other requests for crystals, candles, bat wings, chicken eyes, and wolf hair. She took the last clove candle and would start on a fresh batch when she returned. But she needed to swing by the apothecary since one of the jars was out of black crystals to complete the order. She already needed to go in that area for her brother anyway.
The cauldron continued to bubble, its fire not hot to the touch even though it easily heated what was inside the iron. Eventually, Lucia and Gideon were going to get a bigger place like Ginger’s since there wasn’t room to keep livestock that were necessary for certain spells. Lucia wouldn’t want to spend forever running to her aunt’s house to fetch a fresh ingredient that she didn’t have lying around.
Roxy hopped in the passenger seat of the car beside Stevie, and they headed to her brother’s store first.
Gideon popped his head out from the back room. “Give me a few minutes. I didn’t know you were coming this early,” he grunted.
“You said the packages were literally ready.”
“I thought they would be, but you know how that is.” He shrugged, his hand skating down his beard.
Stevie rolled her eyes and found Roxy in the corner of the store beside Erik, her head resting on his leg. He pored over a comic and ran his fingers through the fox’s fur. Her chest tightened—she’d give anything if she could pet her sidekick.
“Have you still not spotted the Horseman anywhere?” Stevie had dropped by the store more frequently for Gideon and had asked Erik each time. He at least didn’t freak out from such a simple question as most of the other ghosts had. Besides the kid ghosts—they didn’t seem to care.
“No, he still hasn’t made his presence known from what I can tell. It’s odd, isn’t it?” It really was.
It had been two weeks since she’d seen or even heard Kit riding his horse down any streets. She’d assumed he would’ve slipped back into her life the day after he left, but he hadn’t. Thesoonhe’d given her wasn’t very specific. Although he’d said he needed his head before the next new moon…
Ever since the idea of him being a seer had popped into her mind, she’d been anxious to confirm it. And if he was a seer, then she wanted to know why he’d hidden it, why he’d told her he hadn’t seen anyone until after the Eye opened. If there was a chance he really hadn’t seen the living before that, then why could the stallion still hear his whistle? Too many questions and a lack of answers.
“What are you reading this time?” she asked, kneeling on the other side of Erik.
“Your brother just got a couple of these in,” he said with a smile and held up aSleepy Hollowgraphic novel.
Stevie squinted at the pumpkins surrounding the Headless Horseman on the front. “How is it?”
“Dreadful.” He chuckled, setting aside the graphic novel on top of his backpack. “I’m about to sift through the rest of the new stash.”
“Let me give you one to try.” Stevie grinned and stood. She scanned the letters until she got to the “S” category and fished out a 1990s issue. “See if you like this. I used to read the Sabrina comics all the time when I was younger.”
Erik took the comic and opened it to the first page. “This is taking me out of my comfort zone, you know.”
