The Gift

I tiptoe out the store’s front door, and suddenly I feel a vibration under my arm. More precisely, it’s coming from the very un-Wistylike white purse tucked there.

Another text message. I click the phone on.

A text message in my mother’s handwriting. WTH…?

IT’S OK, WISTY. SHE’S AN ALLY. GO WITH HER.

With who? Suddenly I feel very un-alone. I hear someone’s voice.

“Well, we meet again, my dear!”

I yank my head to the right, and there, leaning on the hood of a long-dead station wagon, one leg crossed over the other, is the little old ninja lady. The one who gave us the map that saved our lives. And now that I’m able to scrutinize her more closely, I realize she’s also the woman who almost got me arrested in a diner on my very first trip to the City of Progress. Mrs. Highsmith!

“It’s okay,” the strange little woman says in a high nasal drawl. “Go ahead and SMS or whatever it is you people do with your silly little gadgets. Your mother’s not particularly close, but you’ll at least see that she’s safe.”

I quickly type back,

If she’s an ally, y’d she try to get us arrested?

My mother’s handwriting replies,

SHE PANICKED-SHE THOUGHT YOU MIGHT BE A NEW ORDER SPY. YOU SAW THEM TRY TO ARREST HER. WHY WOULD SHE WANT TO HELP THE NEW ORDER?

K, but how do I know this is u?

HOW WOULD ANYBODY ELSE KNOW THAT BEN CAMPBELL USED TO PULL YOUR PONYTAIL?

OMG, Mom!!!

I type as tears well up.

GO WITH HER QUICKLY, DEAR. GIVE WHIT A KISS FROM US. DAD AND I ARE THINKING OF BOTH OF YOU. ALL OF THE TIME. WE LOVE YOU SO MUCH.

Mrs. Highsmith comes up to me with an old-fashioned handkerchief that I numbly accept. It smells like witch hazel.

“You see? Your mother’s okay,” says Mrs. Highsmith. “Now, please come with me to my apartment-so we don’t get the New Order looky-loos all excited about capturing two witches on the same day.”

Chapter 34

Wisty

SO HOW DO YOU think we get to the City of Progress in about ten minutes flat? Broomstick? Portal? If I told you, you wouldn’t believe me-and that’s saying a lot, given what I’ve gotten you to believe about our insane lives so far.

Let’s just say Mrs. H. has some powers that might, just might, rival The One’s. If I didn’t have “Mom” telling me she was on my side… I’d have to wonder.

Okay, check this out: Mrs. H.’s apartment is a cluttered, dimly lit place-the heavy curtains are drawn even though it’s a sunny morning. There’s not an empty shelf, table, or chair. Even the piano top is covered with novels, hardbacks, paperbacks, notebooks, antique tomes. Obviously all banned. The walls are chockablock with pictures-some framed, some crudely taped up-and there’s even an easel with a half-finished painting of a dragon on it, which I almost trip over. There’s barely a path for me to follow her into the kitchen, which smells like some sort of heavily spiced tuna casserole. It must be 120 degrees in here.

“Pardon me while I finish working on this stew,” she says, peering over the lip of a giant black barrel sitting on a couple of hot plates in the middle of the kitchen floor. It’s enormous and looks like some kind of oil shipping container. She could fit a small horse in that thing. Maybe she has.

Mrs. H. dips a ladle into the soup for a taste. She offers me some, but I shake my head violently. “Needs some more willow bark and sassafras root anyway,” she says. “I underestimated how much this broth was going to absorb.”

Okay, remind me: how did I end up with an old witch stirring potions in a boiling-hot apartment, instead of with Drummer Boy, chatting and eating burgers in a very cool diner?

“Don’t think I don’t know what you’re thinking,” she says with a disapproving look. “So I’ll get to the point. Here’s the deal: as you may have discovered, The One Who Is The One is a complete yenta.”

I look at her quizzically. A yenta? Is that good or bad or something in between?

“A yenta is a person who wants to get into everybody else’s business. And, what’s worse, he wants to put an end to all their business and make it all about his business. Everything.” She pauses to take a sip of her brew and makes a face.

“He’s basically a conduit for the worst kind of evil. I’m talking stuff that makes a person want to put out her eyes and ears rather than to see or hear it,” she continues, wincing and replacing the ladle in the barrel.

“And, unfortunately, he’s figured out a way to get himself more power than any other individual in the history-or even the prehistory-of the world.”

“So are you here to tell me he can’t be stopped?” I say. “Typical grown-up stuff? Give it a rest? Get real? Stop fighting for nothing?”

She chuckles to herself. “I’ll let that slide, because you obviously don’t know me. Yet. Now, ready to take notes?”

She picks up her ladle and flings the tip toward one side of the room, then another, and then back toward me, spraying me with disgusting bits of her soup in the process. In a flash a pencil and a piece of paper fly into my hands.

“Didn’t know I was in school again, but… okay,” I say tentatively, wiping the drops of gag-worthy gruel off my face.

“There are two X factors in this entire situation that can give us the edge. Care to guess what they are?”

“Timing and luck?”

“Positive energy and negative energy. We need to maintain a surplus of the former. And we need to send that sick son of a gun a good dose of the latter. Capiche?”

I nod. Capiche?

“Now, I’m no fan of that Stockwood Music Festival-too many sweaty young bodies and too much mindless bobbing and weaving for my taste-but I heard last night through the underground newswire that you’re apparently quite musically talented.” I nod again. “Music, my dear, is a more potent force for change than you may think.”

“No offense, Mrs. H., but you have no idea how powerful it is unless you’ve performed on a stage in front of thousands. Plugged in.” I shiver just thinking about it. I can hardly wait to get my hands on a guitar again.