Linda Joy Singleton, page 7
“No more magic,” Skye said firmly. Hobbi would probably swipe one from a zoo and Skye would end up in jail for grand theft.
“But it is my job to please. What can I do to make you happy, boss?”
Skye thought of Hobbi’s attempts to “please.” The stolen black outfit, Kristen’s book cover leaping to life, and the attack of the killer rope.
“If you want to make me happy, don’t do anything.”
Lavender eyes twinkled as Hobbi smiled sweetly. “As you wish, Boss.”
Skye thought uneasily, Why don’t I believe her?
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Unicorns flew in the air, vipers swarmed on an island, and a bell rang over and over.
A bell.
The phone.
Skye sat up in bed, rubbed her sleepy eyes, and reached for the ringing phone. “Huh? Who is it?”
“Skye! I’m so glad you answered!”
“Kristen?” Skye yawned and glanced at her illuminated bedside clock. Midnight. “Do you know what time it is?”
“I don’t care. Skye, this is important.”
Skye’s fuzzy mind cleared and her heart pounded. “What?”
“I found it!”
“You mean—”
“Yes! A spell that will get rid of Hobbi. It was in Simple Sorcery , under a chapter on disappearing.”
Skye bit her lip nervously. “But I don’t want Hobbi to disappear … just to send her back. Nothing bad had better happen to her.”
“It’ll be okay. I promise. She’ll be perfectly safe. She’s my friend, too, and I want what’s best for her … for all of us.”
“I’m scared. And I feel like a creep for plotting behind Hobbi’s back.”
“You’re not a creep. You’re just human, something that Hobbi can never be.”
“Which is the problem,” Skye said with a deep sigh. “Hobbi should be with her family. I hope she’ll be happy in Specter—wherever that is.”
“My book said Specter isn’t visible to human eyes. That’s what gave me the idea to look up invisibility spells. I found one that will make signatures disappear.”
“Like my signature of Hobbi’s contract?” Skye guessed.
“That’s right,” Kristen answered, sounding excited. “Your signature will vanish and the contract will be broken. You’ll be free of your fiend.”
“But what will happen to Hobbi?”
“She’ll return to Specter … I think. I’m not positive,” Kristen admitted. “The book doesn’t say exactly. Magic is very complicated and this spell involves several unusual ingredients and moonlight.”
“Moonlight?”
“Don’t worry about it. Once I find the ingredients, I’ll cast a fantastic spell. By this time next week, Hobbi will be gone forever.”
CHAPTER NINTEEN
Tuesday, Skye couldn’t think of anything but the spell. She felt guilty, worried, and relieved all at the same time.
“I’ll be glad when this is over,” she told Kristen as they walked to the O’Malley’s house after school. Hobbi had promised to milk goats for Skye’s aunts, and had gone directly home.
“So will I,” Kristen agreed, hugging a book bag to her chest. “Do you think Hobbi suspects anything?”
“No.” Skye shook her curly head. “For once she’s kept her promise and stopped reading my mind. Thank goodness, or else she’d know about our plan.”
“And ruin everything,” Kristen said gravely.
“Tell me about the spell.”
“It’s simple. We gather some special ingredients, follow easy instructions, and chant magic words in the moonlight. Friday night the moon will be full, so that’s when we’ll do it.”
“What ingredients?” Skye asked.
“Honeysuckle, manzanita branches, and daisies.”
“That won’t be too hard. What do we do with these things?”
Kristen gave a half-grin. “We arrange the manzanita branches in a circle on the ground, wear daisy crowns on our heads, chew honeysuckle and chant magical words in the moonlight by a rock shaped like a frog.”
Skye almost choked. “A frog!”
“Yeah. I guess that could be kind of difficult.” She shrugged and spread her arms in a hopeful gesture. “Know where we can find a frog-shaped rock?”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“Nope.”
Skye stopped on the sidewalk and groaned. “This is never going to work.”
“Sure it will. Look on the good side. At least the spell didn’t ask for eye of newt, bat wings, or slimy gizzards.”
“Yuck!” Skye couldn’t help but giggle. “You’re impossible.”
“And determined,” Kristen stated. “Let’s look for the easy stuff first. There’s a manzanita bush in a field near my house. We can probably find some daisies there, too.”
There was no arguing with Kristen, so Skye shrugged and said, “Lead the way.”
Thirty minutes later they had collected six smooth reddish manzanita branches, a pretty bouquet of daisies, and a bag full of sweet yellow honeysuckle. Luckily, Kristen had a honeysuckle vine growing in her own backyard.
But no matter how hard they looked, they couldn’t find the frog rock.
“We’ll never find a rock shaped like a frog,” Skye complained, looking around the third field they’d searched. She felt disappointed and tired. The sun was setting and she knew they would have to head for their homes soon.
“Maybe you’re right.” Even Kristen sounded discouraged. She pointed to a rock at the base of a towering oak tree. “That little rock resembles a chicken.”
“We need a frog.”
“Maybe the spell won’t know the difference.”
“No messing with the ingredients,” Skye warned. “I don’t want anything to go wrong. Hobbi could get hurt.”
Kristen sighed. “Well, we still have a few days till a full moon. Let’s look again tomorrow.”
Skye agreed, and picked up an armload of manzanita branches. Kristen held a few branches plus a small bag of daisies. Skye thought how odd they must look, trudging through weedy grass and scraggly bushes, carrying their treasures.
Kristen squeezed through a tunnel-like opening between two trees, but Skye’s armload was too wide, so she made a jog around the trees. But she could barely see where she was going because of the shiny burgundy wood piled high in her arms. Her foot shot out, she stumbled, and branches flew everywhere as she tumbled. She ended up flat on her bottom.
“Skye!” Kristen called, hurrying over. “Are you all right?”
With branches scattered around her feet, Skye shakily stood up. A jagged scratch ran down her arm and her backside ached. She rubbed the back of her pants and said, “Ooh! But I smacked my arm on something. What did I hit? Oh … a dumb rock.”
Skye looked at the round odd-shaped gray stone, and frowned. It was about four-feet tall and larger at the bottom than the top. Skye’s frown changed as she stared, realization making her jump up excitedly.
“Kristen!” She grabbed her friend by the hand. “I can’t believe it, but this dumb rock is shaped exactly like a frog!”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Friday arrived, and Skye was a basket case at school. She tried not to think about the spell, but magic was never far from her thoughts. Tonight was the night. By tomorrow morning, Hobbi would be back in Specter.
Fortunately, Hobbi didn’t seem to notice the difference in Skye. In fact, Hobbi had never been happier. She talked about how much she loved the aunts, the animals, and even school.
Which made Skye feel like a triple creep.
If only Skye could trust Hobbi not to cause trouble. But she couldn’t. Hobbi was a fiend, after all.
During lunch, Skye sat with Kristen and Hobbi at their usual back table. Brian, Tyrone and some other boys chose to sit at the next table. Skye would rather the boys sat as far away as possible. When she saw them whispering among each other, she felt a tremor of worry.
“I wonder what those boys are up to,” Skye commented, holding a carrot stick.
“Would you like me to read their minds?” Hobbi offered.
“NO!” Skye and Kristen said at the same time.
Kristen sipped milk through a straw and added, “I don’t mind the boys. I think Brian looks kind of cute in his Giants cap.”
“Don’t get boy-crazy on me. Brian is a goon. He’s only wearing that cap to hide his red hair,” Skye replied.
“I happen to like red hair,” Kristen retorted, winding a strand of her auburn hair around her finger.
“Keep your voice down or those dumb boys might decide to bug us.” Skye sighed. “I have enough things to worry about today.”
Hobbi chewed a bite of a shiny green apple, then glanced curiously at Skye. “But why do you worry, Boss? We did well on the oral science report and Mr. Reuben loved the animal footprints so much, we both got A’s. Today is a very good day.”
Skye glanced uneasily at Hobbi, taking close note of Hobbi’s braids which were—thankfully!—not moving in mind-reading circles. Hobbi could be so sweet at times, and Skye’s heart felt heavy at the thought of losing her. But Hobbi would be happier with her own kind, and Skye’s life would return to normal.
“You’re right, Hobbi.” Skye managed a weak smile. “Today is a good day … a day I know I’ll never forget.”
Kristen blushed guiltily, focusing on her pickle and scrambled egg sandwich. “That’s for sure,” she muttered.
Skye bit her lower lip, and reminded herself that sending Hobbi back was the right thing to do. For everyone. Yet Skye couldn’t forget that today was her last lunch with Hobbi, her last day at school with Hobbi—the last day forever.
Skye gulped and tried not to feel sad. She glanced away and noticed that Tyrone was folding a piece of paper in a triangular shape. Not another paper airplane attack , she thought with irritation.
“Don’t look now,” Kristen whispered, leaning over toward Skye. “But Tyrone’s aiming a paper plane in your direction.”
Skye rolled her eyes. “Just what I need! Not!”
As she spoke, a plane swooshed by her head, and then another one snagged in Kristen’s auburn hair.
“Brian!” Kristen yipped, yanking the paper missile out of her hair. “You creep!”
The boys at the next table laughed, and Skye realized that kids at other tables were watching, too.
Hobbi frowned and asked Skye, “Why are those boys throwing papers at us? Is this a game?”
“Not exactly,” Skye answered with a grimace. “They want to make us mad. Boys can be such pains!”
Three more planes zoomed by the girls, and Hobbi’s frown deepened. “I do not like this game.”
“Neither do I.” Kristen yanked another plane from her hair.
Skye ducked as a low-flying paper craft sailed by. “I wish they would stop bugging us!”
“As you wish, boss,” Hobbi said quickly.
Before Skye could put a leash on her fiend’s magic, Hobbi had pressed two of her colored fingernails and electricity seemed to vibrate in the air.
Suddenly, paper airplanes filled the cafeteria airway, but the boys no longer commanded the flight plan. Like a flock of birds, over a dozen planes circled in perfect formation, as though communicating through invisible radar. Fiendish radar.
Squeals of delight and alarm filled the room.
Teachers, cafeteria workers, and students exclaimed and pointed in astonishment.
“Hobbi!” Skye cried, unsure whether to stop Hobbi or sit back and watch the fun.
The paper airplanes spread out in an arrow shape, aimed at Brian, Tyrone, and their pals. The boys watched with their mouths’ open and their eyes bulging. They seemed frozen in place, until the planes shot forward, directly at the boys, and ATTACKED!
“Hey! What’s happening!” Tyrone cried.
“Back off!” Brian shrieked, jumping up and running. But even as he ran, several planes followed, all the way out of the cafeteria.
The remaining planes targeted Tyrone. They circled overhead, then as if obeying an invisible flight plan, swooped down on Tyrone. They landed in his hair, on his lunch tray, and jabbed his arms.
Tyrone cried out again, swatting at the paper army as if they were annoying flies.
“Cut it out!” Tyrone wailed, then he jumped up and headed outside. As he ran, the planes continued to chase him until Tyrone—and the planes—disappeared through the doorway.
While everyone else was in an uproar, Kristen, Skye, and Hobbi exchanged grins.
Kristen laughed. “Now that was magic!”
“Only small magic,” Hobbi said. “When the planes left the room, the magic left, too. But perhaps the boys did not look behind them, and are still running.”
Skye couldn’t help but grin. It was hard not to enjoy Hobbi’s magic.
“You showed those boys!” Skye lifted her hand and high-fived Hobbi. “Way to go, Hobbi!”
“I only did as you wished,” she said, her tone a mix of modesty and pleasure.
“Well, thanks.” Skye gave Hobbi a grateful glance.
Kristen giggled. “One thing’s for sure.”
“What?” Skye asked.
“Those boys won’t dare bother us again.”
Another thing is for sure, Skye thought to herself sadly. Every minute I spend with Hobbi makes it harder to send her back to Specter. If only she weren’t a fiend.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINTEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
Mail Order Monster, Linda Joy Singleton
