6
W hen the water turned a deep brown from the nixgrass, Bennett seemed to forget his fear in favor of curiosity. He wandered down from his perch and nudged my leg.
Are you making progress, Cissa? he meowed.
“Yes,” I said without looking down. With tense concentration, I fished out the limp nixgrass pulp from the cauldron with a wooden spoon. A few drops of water hissed and sizzled on the stove. Giselle hadn’t instructed me on how to turn down the heat, so I left it alone and carefully moved the cauldron onto the counter to let it cool.
As I looked around the clutter of ingredients for something called broadleaf gelatin, Bennett leapt onto the countertop and poked his nose over the rim of the steaming cauldron.
Smells nice , he said, curling his tail. One of his paws knocked over the wooden spoon I was using. It clattered to the ground.
I crossed my arms. “They say curiosity killed the cat.”
Bennett looked at me with wide copper eyes. His whiskers twitched.
I sighed, wiping my hands on my apron. “Why don’t you go out and play?”
Play? he asked, aghast.
I reckoned he hadn’t been told that in a decade. I looked out the bay window, noting the lush herb garden and a comfortable patch of sunlight that shone in the center. A cat’s heaven.
“Well why not?” I asked archly. “You’d be more comfortable out there than in here. Plus there’s a stove and I don’t know how to use it. I don’t want you bumping into anything hot.”
Bennett picked his way across the countertop, but I lifted him up before he did any more damage. I set him on the windowsill and opened the window. The hinges squeaked, letting in a sprightly whoosh of wind.
“Go on,” I said.
But Cissa—
“Please. I need to work.”
He shook off his paws. If you insist.
He hopped down to the garden. I watched him nose around the shrubbery for a moment before closing the window and returning to the potion book.
“Broadleaf gelatin...” I surveyed the clutter of leafy herbs and jars above me, none of which had labels. Frustrated, I wiped my hands on my apron, which was already streaked with stains.
“Giselle!” I called out, traversing down the hall to her room. I hoped it was too soon for her to have left. “Can you help me find...oh!”
The white-haired witch at the end of the hall was certainly not Giselle.
“Lady Narcissa! Well, hasn’t it been a while?” Ferdinand said with a toothless grin.
I had met the old charmwitch at the Grand Alevine Opera last winter during the kingdom tour. I smiled, hoping I didn’t look too frazzled.
“Hello, Ferdinand. What are you doing here?”
“I live here!”
“Oh, I didn’t know,” I said, flustered. My ire at Giselle only seemed to grow. She should’ve told me whom this house belonged to.
“I suppose Giselle brought you over.” Ferdinand shifted the basket of greens on his arm. “I don’t believe you’ve met my grandson yet?”
A strapping young man appeared behind him, a crate of red and yellow bell peppers in his arms. His chocolate brown hair curled charmingly at the nape of his neck.
I blinked. “Gio?” Surely this wasn’t the same little boy I had met at the Grand Alevine Opera.
The young man chuckled. “That would be my little brother,” he said, shifting the crate to his side. He smiled and offered me a calloused hand. “Alexander.”
I shook it gingerly, not used to this form of greeting from young men. Usually they opted for a bow or a kiss on the hand.
Ferdinand cleared his throat. “And what are you doing here, milady? You’re dressed like a proper witch and all.”
I bit my lip, wondering if I should spill my worries to an old witch I barely knew while my fiancé was frolicking in his garden as a cat.
Decidedly not.
“My... friend was turned into a cat,” I said, blushing at how ridiculous that sounded. “Giselle’s lending me her space—er, your space—to make him an antidote.”
“A cat? Good prank to pull,” said Alexander with a grin. “Need any help with the antidote? I reckon you haven’t much experience potion-making.”
My shoulders relaxed. I hadn’t noticed how tense they were.
“Yes, that would be perfect!”
I thanked Alexander profusely as he followed me to the kitchen. The clutter of ingredients on the counter hadn’t made sense of themselves since I stepped out.
“There,” I said, gesturing to the recipe book. “I need broadleaf gelatin, but I’m not sure what that is.”
Alexander surveyed the shelf before us. “Here we are,” he said, leaning in behind me to grab a rectangular paper packet. He gave me a devastatingly charming smile. “How many sheets, milady?”
Heavens. He was a shameless flirt.
I was about to say something to discourage him when his gaze flicked to the window. “Is that your afflicted friend?” Alexander asked.
Bennett sat on the windowsill, scratching at the glass. His brow was lowered in a forbidding frown—or at least it would have been forbidding if he weren’t a cat.
“Yes, he is,” I said. I lifted the window. “What is it?”
It’s getting cold outside , Bennett meowed.
I surveyed the sunny garden. There wasn’t a cloud in sight, but I let him in anyhow. With Alexander here, at least the stove wouldn’t be a complete hazard. Bennett landed on the countertop.
“Aw, cute little thing, isn’t he?” Alexander patted Bennett’s head.
Bennett hissed. I grabbed him before he did something foolish, like bite. “Apologies. He’s not in a very good mood,” I said, holding him to my chest.
Alexander raised his brows. “Why? They didn’t give him a permanent transformation potion, did they?”
“I sincerely hope not.”
Alexander tilted his head to the potion book and removed three clear rectangular sheets veined with green from the packet. He set them in a separate bowl and soaked them with a ladle full of nixgrass tea from the cauldron—all with more ease than I could hope to have.
I leaned over to watch him work. Bennett meowed in protest, but I held him firm. “Are you an herbwitch, Alexander?” I asked.
“That I am,” he said. He set down the ladle. “I do need to head back to the fields in a few minutes, but is there anything else you need my help with?”
Perhaps some innocent flirting was in order. I pulled on my winning smile, hoping it was charming enough to relieve me of more labor. This seemed to have the desired effect. Alexander’s cheeks pinked.
I tucked a stray curl behind my ear. “Yes, please. If you could—”
A white paw hit my chin, then my mouth, then my cheek. I sputtered through a mouthful of fur and grabbed the offending paw, which promptly escaped me.
“If you could please help with the rest of the potion that would be greatly appreciated,” I gasped, turning my face away from the feline attacks.
Alexander laughed. “You weren’t kidding about your friend being in a bad mood.”
We don’t need an outsider here , Bennett yowled. He’ll ask too many questions.
I need his help with the potion. It’ll go by ten times quicker with an herbwitch who knows what he’s doing , I thought to Bennett fiercely. I was used to talking to Misty in this way, and I was relieved to find that it worked with Bennett too. Aren’t you sick of being a cat?
It’s been lovely, actually.
I was all too aware of Alexander watching us have a silent conversation. I pulled on another smile for his sake, but suffered another soft paw to my lower lip. I blew a breath. “Bennett, stop that!”
Alexander’s eyes widened. “Bennett? As in Crown Prince Bennett?”
I realized too late that I had spoken aloud.
The cat in question hopped to the floor and gave an affirming meow. He seated himself at my feet, the picture of dignity, as if he hadn’t attempted to swipe my mouth off my face seconds ago.
I pressed a hand to my forehead. “Yes,” I said, utterly spent. I couldn’t even muster a shred of amusement that my fiancé had turned into a badly behaved cat. “If you could keep this a secret, that would be greatly appreciated.”
Alexander nodded, his lips parted in wonderment. Luckily, he asked no more questions and turned his attention to the recipe book. Awkward silence ensued, broken only by sound of Alexander working and Bennett’s obnoxiously loud purrs as he rubbed himself against my leg—an overt show of affection that would’ve made any cat blush.
My face was aflame by the time Alexander finished preparing the rest of the ingredients. The cauldron was boiling again, and he had diced up a strange pink fruit and ground up the shrew tail into powder. He turned to me.
“All that’s left is to put everything in the cauldron. The wood should be burned through by the time you’re done,” he said, wiping his hands on his trousers. “I must go now. Best wishes, Lady Narcissa. If you visit Witch Village again do come by and...er...”
Bennett bared his fangs.
“You’ll do great,” Alexander finished with a cough. He executed a quick bow to the calico at my feet. “Your Highness.”
I thanked Alexander weakly. When the door clicked shut behind him, I lifted Bennett from the ground.
“That was very rude,” I said, holding him at arm’s length. “Of all the impertinent ways to behave—”
He was the one behaving impertinently, Bennett meowed, turning up his nose. And you ought not to smile like that at everybody. I fell in love with you that way.
My lips parted. Becoming a cat must have scrambled his brain.
“No you did not,” I whispered harshly, hearing Ferdinand’s voice on the other side of the door. “You fell in love with me when I attacked my own mother with swans, which is a very impertinent way to fall in love with somebody!”
I do not believe you’re using that word correctly, Cissa.
I gave a strangled groan and set him firmly on the windowsill. “Please go outside!”