"It's supposed to be for your birthday!"

Dani sticks her tongue out and s.n.a.t.c.hes her necklace out of the box before I can pull it away. She fastens the clasp and looks at herself in my mirror. "Why don't we give them all out tonight?"

"I guess we could. It'll steal a bit of the spotlight away from Margo." I take my necklace out of the box and rub my fingers on the blue stone. "Mine says 'Turquoise, Decembers birthstone, protects the wearer from evil, and warns of approaching danger.' Do you really think the stones do what the cards say?"

"Do you believe in witches?" Dani says with a laugh.

"Ha-ha, but seriously-stones and crystals are so Wiccan, and most of that stuff is nonsense and luck, right?"

Dani shrugs. "Let's ask your mom."

"Gemstones in themselves are just vessels for power," Mom says. "They need to be activated to be useful."

"Why don't we ever use them, then?" I ask.

Mom puts the necklaces back in their boxes and pushes them across the kitchen table toward Dani and me. "Oh, it's a bother. You need blood to activate them, and the duration of the power is unpredictable. A person might head out not knowing their vessel had emptied-so to speak. Then they confront someone or something, thinking they're protected and I'm sure you can imagine the unpleasant results."

We both nod.

Mom gets up and I can't help but roll my eyes. She's wearing her lame initiation robe embroidered with moons and stars, and a hideous crocheted silver scarf wrapped around her neck.

After I go through my initiation, the first thing I'm going to do is pet.i.tion to do away with the moronic ceremonial uniforms.

"Well, I better head out-I told Helena I'd help set things up," Mom says. "Don't wait up for me after you get home." She takes her dress cape out of the closet, and grabs her broom.

"How long does it take to say 'Happy birthday, welcome to the club?'"

Mom looks at me like I'm three again. "It's a bit more involved than that, though I'm sure with Margo, things will run smoothly."

"Are you implying my initiation won't go smoothly?"

Mom winks. "That all depends on you."

"We'll see you soon, Mrs. Harris," Dani says. "We're gonna grab something to eat, and then we'll fly over."

"Don't be late, girls."

Mom heads out the door and I look at the necklaces on the table. "Let's do it!"

"What? Nachos?"

"No! Let's activate the stones."

Dani curls her lip and shakes her head. "Uh, no. I don't like spells that need blood. It's bad enough getting scratched or bit when we're hunting, but drawing blood on purpose? I'll pa.s.s."

"Fine, we'll use my blood."

"We don't even know how to activate the stones."

"That's what books are for."

Dani looks at her watch. "We have to be at the meetinghouse in, like, forty minutes and I'm hungry."

I get up and pull a couple of books off the shelf in the living room and bring them into the kitchen. "If we can't find a spell soon we'll skip it, okay?"

Dani reaches out for a red leather book t.i.tled Birth Signs, Stones, and Spells and opens to the table of contents. "I guess." She looks down at the page, and sighs. "'Chapter seven, page forty-six-activating birthstones.'" She flips through the book and shrugs her shoulders. "Actually, this doesn't look too bad. We need to write down all of our birthdays on separate slips of parchment, wrap the necklaces in them, put them in a bowl with five drops of blood, and set them on fire. When the paper burns off, the stones will be activated."

"Cool! I'll get Mom's spell bowl from the pantry. You cut up some paper, and I'll write our birthdays down."

I take the first piece of paper. "Margo-October twenty-fifth. Sascha-October twenty-ninth. Dani-November first. Zahara-November tenth. Julia-December third."

"I want to wrap mine up," Dani says.

We put the wrapped necklaces in the bowl, and Dani hands me a pin. "You sure about this?"

I look at the tip of my finger and jab it in. "Ow, yeah." I squeeze out five drops of blood, landing one on each packet. Dani lights a match and drops it in the bowl. We jump back as fire shoots up two feet in air.

"Holy s.h.i.t!" Dani yells. "That almost burned my bangs off!"

We watch the fire devour the parchment paper, and then I fish out the necklaces by hooking the pin in the chains.

Dani gingerly pokes hers. "Wow, it's cold."

I pick my necklace up and rub the turquoise. "Evil beware," I say, fastening the clasp.

Dani puts hers on. "I feel safer already."

"Let's pack up the other necklaces and head out-if we hurry we can give them to everyone before Margo's birthday candle is lit."

Dani elbows me, and rolls her eyes when Helena calls Margo up to the front of the room.

Helena's piled her white hair up in some sort of weird tangle-more bird's nest than bun, and with her silver dress robe and scarf, she looks like a ghost about to disappear into a gray mist.

Helena nods and Margo's mom joins them at the front of the room, taking Margo's hand in hers. Her dad waves from the side of the room, and I remember how Margo used to lord it over us that she and Zahara were the only ones whose fathers were still around-as if that made them better than the rest of us.

I look at Sascha on my other side playing with the chain of her necklace. She turns and smiles at me. "Thanks again-it's really cool," she whispers.

Zahara leans forward and glares at us. "Shh!"

I look around the room, only one chair empty out of thirty-five. Everyone's here except Connor.

"Tonight," Helena begins, "we welcome Margo into our inner circle. I know I speak for all of us when I say we couldn't be happier our girls are now coming of age, and ready to embrace their new roles in the coven."

She nods her head at Dani, Sascha, Zahara, and me. I plaster a smile on my face and wish she'd just get on with it so I can head home and check my cell messages to see if Connor called.

"Let us start with Margo's birthday candle." She places a small black stub of a candle on the silver cloth covering the table.

Margo strikes a match and lights the candle.

"For eighteen years we've lit this candle as a symbol of Margo's journey toward becoming a full member of our Revealer Sisterhood. Tonight, when the wick burns away the last bit of wax, Margo will join the inner circle and finally know her destiny."

We all clap, and Hattie Murphy, the coven accountant, turns in her seat and looks at us with tears in her eyes. "No worries, girls. Everything will be fine."

"Hattie!" snaps Margo's grandmother, Miranda, who's sitting next to her. She turns and smiles at us. And waves a shaking hand dismissively. She's so thin and frail, I find it hard to picture those shaky hands of hers ever spiking a vamp.

Miranda smiles broader and her faded blue eyes are lost in the crinkles. "Of course, everything will be fine. This is a wonderful time for you girls." She faces the front again, but I don't miss the fact that she kicks Hattie ever so slightly with the side of her foot.

"Like the generations of Revealers who have come before us," Helena continues, "Margo will become a part of the coven's guiding hand that is sworn to protect mankind from the monsters that haunt us."

Helena wraps an ugly silver scarf around Margo's neck, kisses her on the cheeks, and faces us smiling. A chill runs up the back of my neck. Helenas smiles have never seemed right to me- like she's smiling, but she'd really rather be biting our heads off.

"We've watched Margo grow from a child into a strong, determined young woman who I know will continue to be an a.s.set to the coven. Margo demonstrates poise beyond her years, and I am confident she will carry the mantle of responsibility well."

Margo throws her shoulders back and looks out at us. All I can think is she's taking this way too seriously, but then she's always been really into all the coven c.r.a.p. She reaches up, fingers her star necklace, and blinks twice. She takes in a sharp breath and looks around the room, with wide eyes. I swear I see her opal crackle with light-like the "captured lightning" is trying to escape. Margo pales and drops the necklace under her robe. She turns her head to Helena and then her mother-brow furrowed.

Sascha leans in toward me. "Did you see that?"

"The necklace?" I ask.

"Yeah."

Sascha holds her star up by its chain-the opal is flickering, but nothing like Margo's. She moves her eyebrows up and down. "Freaky!"

I try to remember what the card said about opals. Inner beauty? Foresight?

I look down at the star resting on my chest. The gem in the middle is glowing blue and I cover it with my hands. Am I being warned of approaching danger, or guarded from evil? I scan the room and look at the familiar faces I've grown up with. Everyone's eyes are on Margo, nothing seems wrong. The door in the back opens slowly and Connor slinks in. My cheeks flush and I turn my focus back up front.

I realize Helena's asked everyone to come forward and congratulate Margo before they take her away for the private part of the ceremony. I get in the line and nearly pa.s.s out when Connor slides in behind me and presses his chest against my back.

He puts a hand on my shoulder and leans in closer-his warm breath burning my neck.

"Meet me at your mom's studio," he whispers, sending goose b.u.mps up my arms. "So we can talk."

"Uh-" I stammer, but he's already gone-winding his way through the crowd to the door.

"What did he want?" Dani asks.

"To meet me at my house."

"That's good, right?" Dani asks.

I bite my lip. "Too soon to say."

Dani squeezes my hand. "You'll work it out, I know it."

I make it to the front of the line, and give Margo a weak hug. "Your necklace was flashing-did you see it?"

Margo looks past me to Dani. "It-it was nothing." She holds out a hand to Dani-I've been dismissed.

Dani meets me outside. "Is your necklace doing anything?" I ask.

"Actually, it was kind of b.u.mping around just before." She pulls the chain out from her cape. "Oh, my G.o.d."

The star is jerking around-the inside of the topaz swirling, like it's filled with a yellow fog being whipped around in a storm.

I lift my star up. "Look at mine."

"What does it mean?" she asks.

"Maybe it's a sign that Connors going to break up with me."

"Or maybe it's a sign that something bad is going down."

I drop the star under my cape and shake my head. "I bet we end up going on a hunt tonight, that's got to be it.

"Yeah."

Dani and I stand in silence, and I wish I wasn't filled with a deep sense of dread. "Well, I better get going-not that I'm in any rush to get dumped."

Dani squeezes my hand. "He's not going to dump you, but if he does, I'll research the nuts-to-raisins spell myself!"

"I can think of at least one other thing that might need to be shrunk!"

Dani laughs. "Call me as soon as you can."

"Okay." I mount my broom and head home. The wind freezes my cheeks and hands-I will it to freeze my heart so I won't be able to feel a thing if Connor decides to break it.

5.

I uncloak as I land in my yard, and stumble none-too-gracefully to a stop. It's hard to land smoothly when your feet are numb. I try to tread quietly through the frosty leaves, lean my broom gently on a nearby tree, and peek in the front window of Mom's shop-the pale yellow flicker of candles inside warming the gla.s.s.

My insides melt when I see three small, white jack-o'-lanterns-Luminas-lined up against the far window by the pond. The light from the candles catches in the gla.s.s strands of the witch b.a.l.l.s hanging above them. A C is carved in the first pumpkin, a heart in the second, and a crooked J carved in the third. There's a small red candle on the table next to one long-stemmed white rose, and Connor is looking nervously at the door.

I watch him and smile, knowing he remembered that every Halloween I always pick white pumpkins instead of the plain orange ones. Madeline Kline, who cultivates the small field near the coven meeting house, always plants a special row of Luminas and Baby Boos just for me. She told me a while back that the cool spring rain damaged a lot of the pumpkins and my white ones didn't make it this year. So that means Connor went out of his way to find these.

It means he does still care.

He takes his wallet out and lays it on the table in front of him. We didn't have condoms last time-did he buy some? Are they in his leather wallet? Is that why he said he wanted to meet? So we could finish what we didn't last time?

I frown and feel a wave of anger bubble up in me, bursting any hope I had for this evening.

If Connor thinks carving our initials in a few gourds is going to make up for the fact that he blew me off after our first heavy hook up-after all the things he said and promised-well, he has another thing coming.