Witch Twins Read Free Page A

course not,” snapped Grandy. “It’s always scrumptious to have my twinnies with me.”
    Claire crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue at Luna as if to say I told you so, although she was not convinced. She could tell by Grandy’s distracted face and slightly grumpy mood that this weekend just might be the wrong time to ask Grandy for a favor. Especially a witch favor.
    With witches, timing is everything.
    The car pulled up the rutted drive that wound all the way to Grandy’s house. The driveway was filled with several other musty, dusty, dark old Lincoln Continentals.
    “What’s going on?” asked Luna.
    “Didn’t I tell you? I’m hosting a retreat,” said Grandy. “Just a gathering of some of my nearest and dearest of the coven. Tonight’s topic is about saving the Goodacre Nature Preserve, where we hold our annual Inspirational Tales Evensong. And to think those greedy developers are trying to replace it with a car dealership! Well, they don’t know what they’re up against.” She got out of the car and slammed the door so hard it creaked and fell off with a thunk.
    Quickly Grandy snapped her fingers and cast:
    Oh, what a bore —
    Repair yourself, door!
    And the door jumped back to place and rebolted itself to its hinges, good as new.
    Grandy was a whiz when it came to spells.
    She’ll fix the Fluffy problem, easy, thought Claire.
    In the kitchen, Claire’s nose (which was good enough to smell an avocado) picked out crescent cookies, sugared popovers, and chicken soup made with garlic, rosemary, barley, and allspice. She could also sniff out that all of the food had been made with spells. It had that special, no-mistakes whiff to it. Regular cooking was filled with spill smells and burn smells and oops-I-added-an-extra-teaspoon-of-lemon-zest smells.
    Witch creations, on the other hand, were perfect right down to the last minute and milligram.
    Voices flowed from the parlor. Loud, bossy voices. Grandy’s nearest and dearest had been around for a long time, and they all had a lot of opinions.
    “Don’t be shy, you know the gang.” Grandy shooed them. I’m just going to doctor up this dinner. Well be eating in a few minutes.”
    “Grandy, will we have some time alone with you, later?” asked Luna. “Because we have a terrible prob—”
    “Anything you have to say can wait until later,” said Grandy. She sniffed first with one nostril, then the other. “Go, twins, go.”
    Which was actually a little spell, as Grandy had sniffed them right into the parlor. The other witches were upon them instantly.
    “Well, if it isn’t our favorite twin set!”
    “My, how they’ve grown!”
    “Come closer, let’s see your palms!”
    And so Claire and Luna were passed and poked and prodded as Grandy’s friends Diana, Aerianrhod, Isis, Demeter, and Mikki all grabbed at their palms and looked into their eyes, trying to tell their fate and fortune.
    “You’ll have to let me cast your runes,” exclaimed Isis. She was a magnificent old witch who, it was rumored, had stopped the last two hurricanes that had swept the Carolinas. “I’ve got some sublime new stones.”
    “And I’ll read your cards,” said Diana, who was Grandy’s oldest friend from college and the most elegant of all. Diana had long, gray hair that she kept in a twist, and she was always wearing something snakeskin. Today she had on a pair of snakeskin spike heels.
    Usually it was fun to be around other witches. Since one of the most important rules of the Witch Decree was No Telling, Claire and Luna had to be extremely secretive about even their smallest witch habits (like keeping one eye open when they sneezed or yawned). Grandy was always warning them that if their powers ever became known, the Decree Keepers up in Maine would snatch them away, pronto. So it was only in the company of other witches that the girls could feel truly comfortable.
    But this weekend, the Fluffy problem was too distracting for Claire to feel too at