Chapter One #2
‘They’re not cookies to make him fall in love with me!
Love spells are strictly forbidden, you know that,’ I stressed.
‘They’re Cupido cookies. Once I eat one, all they’re going to do is create a silver string that’ll wrap around my wrist and lead me to my soulmate.
It’s not like I’m bewitching him. Ergo, technically it’s not illegal. ’
Raven was quiet on the line, giving me enough time to get the final ingredient out of the pantry. The glass bottle was shaped like a heart with a silver stopper corking it shut; inside, a dark-amber liquid sloshed around. Vanilla extract. Ivy’s fancy kind.
‘Fine,’ Raven finally said, sounding resigned.
‘Fine, but just – just don’t get caught, Maya.
OK? Because I cannot graduate this year alone, while you’re stuck living out a sentence of mortality for a year.
The plan is to graduate together before I go off to MAC.
I want us to have one last summer of fun before I go. ’
A lump formed in my throat as I began to imagine Maple Falls without Raven.
I tried to envision how I was going to take the popular route of an apprenticeship with Ivy; how I could learn more kitchen magic while Raven would be off at the Magical Academy for Creatures.
MAC was a college dedicated to creatures who wanted to work in higher-defence positions – that’s your Coven members, town inspectors, curse breakers.
Positions that required lessons in forbidden spells and defensive magic.
The downside? It was a boarding school, and I would barely get to see Raven while she was there.
I didn’t want to tell her, but that was part of the reason why I was so desperate to cast the spell: once Raven went to MAC, I would be entirely alone.
Unless I had someone who would never leave me. Like a soulmate.
‘I promise,’ I vowed, and I meant it. With every fibre of my being. This was going to be a good year.
I was going to get the guy, graduate with my best friend and I wasn’t going to get another point on my licence.
The dough for the Cupido cookies was the same as your classic chocolate-chip cookie; I decided to shape the dough into hearts because why not.
But before I could get to the fun part, I needed to add the final charmed ingredient: the vanilla extract.
I took the heart-shaped bottle, uncorked it and ghosted my fingertips over the rim.
In front of me, I flipped open the spellbook I found in the library to the page I had bookmarked.
I had to translate the spell from Latin to English – I would say the spell in its original language, but I didn’t want to mess up getting the pronunciation wrong.
Amore transfige et cor meum liga, Cupido, quaeso, figam tuam reperi.
To pierce with love and bind my heart, Cupido, please land your mark.
I raised my hand and drew an air-heart above the vanilla-extract bottle, while I whispered the translated spell.
Familiar warmth tingled on the tip of my index finger; my magic bloomed to life under my skin.
The whispered spell crystallized in the air as the vanilla extract turned a bright gold before settling back down to its usual amber colour.
I held my breath for several long moments, waiting for the bottle to shatter, for the Wishing Well Bakery alarm bells to blare to life, for Vale to break through the doors and burn me to a crisp.
But nothing happened.
The enchanted vanilla essence sat in front of me, waiting to be used.
I was a flurry of movement after that. I ended up making a batch of twenty cookies, hopeful that Ivy might let me sell them if this all worked out.
She’s not always on board with my more adventurous bakes, but this could change everything.
I mean, I could be Maple Falls’ resident matchmaker baker; the baker who helped people find their soulmates.
My head was full of excitement and daydreams as I shaped the biscuits into hearts and popped them into the oven. I sat on one of the stools Ivy had peppered around the kitchen, tapped my fingers anxiously on the steel countertops and settled in to watch the timer.
Twelve minutes later, the trill of the bell rang through the air, and I was off my chair in a breath, pulling the trays out.
I laid the cookies on a wire rack, staring down at them while they cooled.
They were a perfect light-brown colour, bursting with melted chocolate chips.
Nothing about them screamed I-will-help-you-find-the-love-of-your-life.
I waited exactly three minutes before taking a cookie. When I finally sunk my teeth into it, melted chocolate chips, vanilla, butter, sugar and warm deliciousness exploded on my tongue. It was a good cookie. A spectacular cookie, if I do say so myself.
As I brushed the crumbs from around my mouth, I looked down at my wrist to see if the string had started to form yet.
Nothing.
OK, maybe I just needed to wait a little longer.
While I waited for the spell to come into effect, I cleared up around me – glancing down at my hands every so often.
No change.
Not after ten minutes. Not even after twenty. The relentless optimist in me reminded myself that magic could be slow sometimes. Maybe another cookie could help. So, I ate another.
And another.
And another.
I stood there, eating bite after bite of the cookies and nothing happened. No silver string formed around my wrist, winding down the streets of Maple Falls to Silas Moon’s home – or anyone else’s for that matter. No major cosmic shift as my soulmate was revealed.
My phone flashed, and Raven’s name showed up on my screen. I picked it up without thinking.
‘Put me out of my misery and just tell me – did it work?’ Raven asked, full of excitement.
‘It didn’t work,’ I replied tightly.
‘What do you mean it didn’t work?’ Raven demanded. ‘Did you cast the spell wrong?’
I looked over the pages of the spellbook, wanting, desperately, for there to be a glaring error.
‘No, no, I did everything right,’ I complained, checking off each step.
There was no reason for the spell to fail. None at all. Not unless –
‘Oh.’ I exhaled quietly.
‘What? What is it?’ Raven asked, alarmed.
‘I’m never going to have someone to share the last pizza slice with,’ I replied, my voice sounding far away to my own ears now.
‘I’m never going to be with someone who can read me like an open book.
’ I couldn’t stop. ‘Someone who knows my coffee order, or my hot chocolate order, or my tea order. Someone who walks on the road-side of the pavement automatically. Someone who will –’ The lump in my throat wouldn’t allow me to continue.
‘Maya,’ Raven’s voice had softened but still carried worry for me. ‘I’m sure –’
‘I didn’t cast the spell wrong,’ I interrupted, my throat aching with the urge to cry.
At a little past midnight my life did change. Just not in the way I expected.
‘The spell didn’t work, because I don’t have a soulmate.’