“What keeps it upright?” Pepper asked.

  “It's the way the hex is drawn.” I walked up to the board and began drawing out the hex mark.

  “I've seen that before,” Dobbs said.

  “That's right. This is similar to the hex that is used for perpetual motion toys. The ones you sell at your father's emporium.”

  “Is it okay to use it, then?” A kid closest to Dobbs asked, eyeing the young heir with nervousness.

  He clenched his jaw and then said quietly. “Hex marks aren't copyrightable. As long as it's not used to make toys like ours it can be used. But why are you showing us this? You know I could take this idea to my father and create new tools.”

  “Because everything I'm showing you already has an open patent with the Baba Yaga. Every tool. Every hex. That means no one can have a monopoly on these items.”

  “Who would be foolish enough to make open patents when they could make money off this?” Dobbs asked.

  “Me. Three things happened in my life to make me feel this way. One, my invention was stolen and patented by a thief when I was in middle school.” I didn't look directly at Dobbs, but John did. He can't be blamed for his jerkface father's lack of integrity. “Two, my inventions were used to scam mortals.”

  “How?” Pepper asked.

  “You know those knives that never dull? That can supposedly cut through cans and vegetables? They don't work for mortals because the hex eventually fades and has to be redrawn and empowered, but mortals can't do that.”

  “That's terrible.”

  “I know. And so was the horrible payment plan.” My father at work.

  “The third is that I specialized in this for a long time, and I was burdened with overwork. Severe burnout can destroy your creativity and make you lose your ability to innovate. The more people who can do this, the less I can be pressured to overwork. Now, the market is open and free. And I can specialize in a type of hex or focus on efficiency, rather than trying to mass produce these for customers.

  Legitimate, law-abiding hexxers are a rare commodity in our world. Anyone can make a decent living off our work if we do the right thing, stay away from forbidden hexes, and support our community. That's why John created this Camp Event.”

  “Mine is turning super creamy,” Pepper exclaimed in excitement.

  “Excellent. Now you pour in two cups of whole milk, four cups of heavy cream, and three teaspoons of vanilla extract.” As each kid got to this stage, I helped them measure out and pour the ingredients. Even Dobbs was quietly working. Keeping the hand whisk going while adding ingredients was a hard thing to multitask. “Help each other out. You know how tough this whisking can be. Keeping it steady and focused is a hard job for me and look at how quickly you all picked it up.”

  I grinned as I leaned back against the instructor's table. “Keep stirring for at least two minutes. We need the mixture to be smooth and creamy.” The strong scents of vanilla, cream, and peanut butter permeated the room. My mouth watered for it, but I couldn't have even a nibble without needing an allergy shot or pill.

  It's why I made the peanut butter cloud hex as a kid. I thought I could at least try it in powder form. And that disaster was something I'll never forget.

  “You're a natural teacher,” John said.

  “They're just crazy for ice cream. One project isn't enough to say I'm good at this. There's still room to fail, here. Don't get too cocky about my abilities.”

  “You're still too hard on yourself.” He leaned against the lab table as well, looking entirely too relaxed for someone who was attacked a few hours ago.

  “What is it?”

  “Why are you so calm when you're constantly being targeted?”

  “What should I do? Run around in a panic and stop living my life?”

  “Well, no, but you should at least have some self-awareness. Increased protection. Something.” My frustration grew as I spoke.

  “If my family had their way, I'd be trapped in a lab with constant monitoring. I was trapped in that cycle for six years. My security team were my babysitters and every spell I created would be copied and sent immediately to our patent team of lawyers.”

  “That sounds horrible.”

  “It was. Until I broke away and built a personal pocket dimension lab.”

  I tossed out a low whistle. “That must have cost a pretty penny.”

  “I did some side work that brought in extra money, so it was easy to hide the funds until I could break away from them completely.”

  Side work. I couldn't imagine what he did to bring in that kind of income. “I'm jealous that you have a pocket dimension.”

  “Why is that?”

  “You don't have to worry about bills, power, or paying rent. If you want to disappear, you can do it whenever you want.”

  “Is that what you wanted to do? Disappear?”

  I shoved my hands in my jacket pockets and shrugged my shoulders. “What else would a middle school kid want to do when everyone knows your dad ended up on Baba Yaga's Most Wanted List.”

  “It wasn't your fault.”

  “I know that. But it's the reason I won't tolerate being used by people like your cousin.”

  “Alexander is–”

  “Save it,” I said, pushing away from the table's edge. “Whether he's innocent or not, he has a punch in the face coming to him for what he did to you and what he said to me.”

  “Wait, what did he say?”

  “Ask your familiar,” I said as I made my way down to the students. “Now we'll have to refrigerate it for two hours.”

  There were some groans.

  “You can't speed up time with hexes. Some are able to track time, though. They're often used in crime scene investigations.”

  “I know this one! They can reenact the events leading up to the crime by using a tracking hex. It moves objects around in reverse of the order they were used.”

  “Exactly. We won't need that. But what we do need is a way to refrigerate these. So let me show you my favorite hex in the entire world.” I took out some simple hexpaper and my favorite dip pen from my bag. In a side pocket, I pulled out an inkwell filled with Pepto Bismol pink ink.

  “What is that?”

  “It's an ingredient that is essential to this hex. Now watch me.” I dipped the pen in the ink and then placed it on the paper. “You need to infuse your magic as you draw this. What I'm making is a simple slime hex spell. It's the most versatile hex I own, and I'm going to show you why. This type of hex requires sigil work. Does anyone know what that is?”

  “Sigils are intentions, right? Like, love hexes. You can make someone want to be friends with you, or you can make them obsessed with you.”

  I cleared my throat. “Yes, and that's why love hexes are on the forbidden list. I hope none of you try them. Ever.” I looked around the room. All eyes were on me and no one looked away, so hopefully they wouldn't dabble in dangerous stuff like that.

  “You are right. It's about intentions. And your intentions are expressed in three ways. The type of paper, the type of ink, and any additions you add to the mark while the ink is still wet. Take this one for instance.” I finished the sigil and added some brown powder to it.

  “What are you adding?”

  “Dried chocolate taffy exploded into a fine powder.” I could feel their gazes on me. “That's an advanced class. You're not ready for ink-making yet.”

  “What is it going to make?”

  “It's a slime trap hex. Any volunteers?”

  John touched the sigil and a slime shot out from the paper, wrapping around his body with the consistency of taffy, trapping his legs in the gooey substance. The kids freaked out and one reached out to touch.

  “Don't touch it unless you want to be–”

  He did it anyway, and immediately the trap grabbed him, as well. Then another. And another. Until everyone but me and Pepper were standing free.

  I sighed. If I left them with more dangerous hexes, wouldn't they get themselves killed?

  The kids were all laughing. They couldn't move from their spots, but their hands and arms were free. “You can make the spell more powerful. Or layer it with another slime trap hex. The more you layer it, the tougher it is to escape.”

  “How do we get them loose?” Pepper asked.

  “That's easy.” I took out a bottle of liquid from my bag. “Every hex has a fatal weakness. Most of them can be dissolved in salt or water. A slime hex, however, requires salt water.” I opened the bottle and poured it on the hexpaper. The hex mark dissolved and so did the slime on their legs. No signs remained on their clothes. Only a damp puddle on the floor.

  “My clothes are dry.”

  “That's the nature of this slime hex. I could make some that leave a slimy, wet, or oily residue when they dissolve, but we're going for food-friendly hexes in our presentation.”

  “Are we going to use this one?”

  “Yes. But not quite like this one.”

  “What happens if the spell disintegrates the paper like the ones earlier?”

  “You use salt water on the person trapped. It's easy to dissolve.”

  “Don't ever ask for a hexxer's spell components without understanding what they are. This is dry ice. I store it in this small spell case that keeps it at -109.3 deg F. Touching this with your bare fingers will cause horrible burns. That's why we must wear our hex gloves.”

  “Isn't that too dangerous to use during the presentation?”

  “We'll set up the hexpapers for you ahead of time. So don't worry. Watch what happens.” I cast the hex and a slime bubble extended out from it, translucent pink.

  “You can touch the bubble, but don't try to puncture it.”

  “It's cool to the touch,” John said as he smiled at me. He appeared slightly distracted.

  “Inside it's a frigid -109.3 deg F, though.”

  “That's too cold, right?” Pepper asked.

  “Yes. But we'll use what we learned with the peanut butter spoon to slowly warm up the inside.”

  “But won't that cause an explosion? Dry ice is dangerous!”

  “That's right. Good call Dobbs. If dry ice was inside the bubble, sure. But remember, a sigil is about intentions. We told the slime hex that we wanted the inside to be this cold. So it was.”

  “Isn't that impossible? In nature, it would backfire.”

  “That's why we use the slime casing. It allows us to create an isolated environment where we can make our own rules.”

  “You're a genius,” John yelled, startling us all. “I've figured out how to solve our little problem and get more people interested in the hex makers program!” He rushed up and grabbed my hands. “Thank you. You have no idea how long I've been stuck on this problem.” He kissed my cheek and then released me.

  Before I could process what happened, he opened a pocket dimension and escaped. I blinked at the space where he'd stood a moment before.

  “Is he your boyfriend?” Pepper asked with a blush on her cheeks.

  “I don't have a boyfriend.” My cheeks burned. Was I embarrassed? Mad? Happy? I had no idea. But I knew I was definitely jealous of his pocket dimension.

  “I think he wants to be yours, though,” Pepper said.

  “Let's focus on ice cream, okay?” I turned to the slime hex and increased the heat within it. The entire spell suddenly melted. Shit.

  I squeezed my eyes shut.

  “What happened?”

  “This is the effect of heating too fast. The slime casing melts.”

  “I think you're distracted by him kissing you on the cheek,” Jack said with a grin.

  “Another word from anyone mentioning that kiss or any other relationship anything, and you lose ice cream privileges. Permanently.”

  The class erupted in laughter and I tried my best to ignore them.

  “Let's focus on this. Once we refrigerate it for two hours, we'll have to mix it again while keeping the bowl frozen, and then create a freezing slime hex.”

  There were a few groans, but I ignored them. We needed to get through this so I could find John and ask him what the hell that kiss, and the kiss on the palm of my hand, were all about.

  And then kick his ass for disappearing into his lab and leaving me to do all the dirty work with these kids.

  A splattering sound jerked my attention to the twins. “No, Jack, don't superheat the slime!” More splats sounded around me. Oh dear sweet Goddess, what have I done?

  12

  John

  I rushed to my lab, ignoring how the frost from my previous experiment had destroyed everything around me. When I arrived at the scene of the disaster, nothing remained of my magic containment circle.

  But it didn't matter.

  My smile widened. It didn't matter because she showed me exactly what I was missing. And I only had a few hours to prove it.

  The door creaked and I stiffened, the hairs on the back of my neck rising.

  “I didn't expect you to come back so quickly,” my cousin's voice cut through the stillness of the room.

  “I didn't expect you to turn on me, cousin” I ignored him and continued what I was doing.

  “It's not like you've given me a choice. There are expectations. Stakeholders. A business to run that would love nothing more than to work us all to death.”

  I moved some debris off my spell circle and opened a pouch at my side.

  “What are you doing?” My cousin came into my line of sight, stun artifact in his hand. A quick analysis confirmed that it was a hex artifact.

  I sneered. She was right. They tried to frame her. “Finishing the experiment.”

  His expression lightened immediately, and so did his stance. “Are you serious?”

  “Put that away. Aren't I doing exactly what the family wants?”

  “You gave up on the Camp?”

  “No.” I stood up slowly and took his measure, eying him up and down. “I gave up on you.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” His face contorted, showing an expression of disgust I’d never seen. “I protected you when they came after you in there.”

  “How did they get there?” I opened my ink palette and found the one I wanted. It was very similar to her slime hex, but a little more flexible.

  “What do you mean?”

  I didn't even look up at him as I began drawing my protection sigil around the spell circle. The smell of the ink reminded me of the time we were kids. When she had first developed her slime ink. How she'd shared it with me without even thinking about it. And my family would have stolen it from me and packaged it up for sale.

  “I have no idea how they got inside.”

  “Bullshit.” I drew steadily, dipping my pen nib back into the ink as needed, infusing the spell with the power of flexibility and cold. Why was I making four seasons using mortal physics? It’s an inefficient hex that no one could use. Or if they wanted to, there's no way in hell I'd let them have it. No one should have that kind of power.

  Her words and actions reminded me that there is no greater good when greed and profit are involved. But if I can change the playing field, I'd have a chance.

  “You're taking her side over mine. You know who her father is.”

  Fury lit me up from the inside and I reached out toward my cousin, marking him instantly with a leg hex. He teetered but caught himself on the desk.

  “This is stupid.” He swiped his hand down his leg. Then again. And again. “Okay, the joke's over. Release the spell.”

  “She is not her father.”

  “She shares the same blood he does. He's a criminal and so is she.”

  “What about you?” I knelt down on the ground as I returned to my work, glaring at him from time to time. “You're the dog of the family. Stealing my work. Playing fetch with my experiments. Setting up your teammate to take a fall to keep me trapped at home so I could churn out more hexes for profit.”

  He chuckled. “Who told you to be a genius? You should have lied low if you didn't want all the glory, cousin.”

  “I trusted you,” I jumped to my feet, yelling the pain in my heart.

  “Wow, so this is what it looks like when you get mad. Amazing. And I thought you were a robot.”

  Fury radiated from within me. Limbs shaking and stomach twisted, I realized that I had finally had enough. Any hesitation I had about my next step disappeared. “I am what this family has made me. Where are your two buddies? They didn't come with you?”

  “Someone has to keep an eye on things at the Academy.”

  Goddess, she was right. This was as close to a confession as I would get. Mark Anthony had filled me in after I woke up, and even finding planted evidence in the treehouse we'd set up for her to stay in didn't convince me. But at this moment, I knew there was no going back. And instantly the anger dissipated. Leaving only determination to destroy everything around me. “Leave the kids alone. Let them give their presentation, and I'll give the family what they want.”

  “I doubt that.”

  “Call your mother. Tell her to bring the stakeholders to the presentation tomorrow. I'll show everyone then.”

  “She's your aunt. Don't be so cold.” My cousin's voice held a bit of hurt.

  I ignored it and turned back to my work. “Leave. I have work to do.”

  “I can't do that. I have to stay here in case you pull something.”

  I rested on my knees and put down my fountain pen. With a whispered word, the telecom mirror appeared behind Alexander.

  “How did you move the mirror like that?”

  I clenched my jaw. “Looks like there are some things that will have to remain a secret. Call your mother.”

  His panicked expression would have amused me any other time.

  “This is rare. You're calling me for once?”

  “I will have the experiment ready for the stakeholders to view.”

  “Oh, excellent! When?” Her delighted expression couldn't hide the greed that oozed from her pores.

  “Tomorrow. At the Kitchen Witch Academy event grounds.”

  “Why there?” Her expression dulled. “We can host it like we always do at our estate.”

 

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