Jinxed!: The Curious Curse of Cora Bell Read online

  ‘What are we looking for?’ Cora asked as they walked past the candle shop.

  Tick and Tock shrugged.

  The next shop they came to had bones dangling in the window. Cora grimaced. Tick and Tock shook their heads.

  ‘Nope,’ said Tock and the three of them moved down the paved road.

  They walked past a shop window that had three mannequins dressed in capes. The store didn’t seem too bad. Cora pictured herself wearing one. Then suddenly the capes on the mannequins burst into flames. Cora jumped back.

  ‘Combustible capes,’ said Tock.

  ‘They were popular a few years ago,’ said Tick.

  ‘Until they burnt everybody,’ added Tock.

  ‘Then they became very unpopular,’ said Tick.

  The shops at the market definitely weren’t like any Cora had ever seen before. Next to them, a woman came out of the store. She stopped when she saw them before pushing past down the road.

  ‘Not a very cheerful place,’ mumbled Cora. In a way, it reminded her of Urt.

  Ahead of them, two people walked down the paved road. As they walked by, the man and woman stared at them. Then opposite, a young man came out of a shop, his eyes on them before he quickly scuttled off down the road. Why was everyone looking at them like that?

  Cora turned and then through a shop window, she saw an older woman peering out at them.

  ‘Are we allowed to be here?’ Cora asked as they walked.

  ‘Definitely not,’ said Tock, also noticing the eyes on them.

  ‘The Black Market of Gwell is hidden for a reason,’ said Tick.

  Cora’s stomach lurched.

  ‘And fairies aren’t particularly welcome,’ said Tock.

  ‘Why?’ asked Cora.

  ‘Neither are children,’ added Tick.

  Cora groaned. She pulled the hood of her coat up and over her head.

  The next shop they walked past had cages in the window. Inside the cages were jumping spiders with very long legs.

  ‘Let me guess,’ said a voice to their left. Cora, Tick and Tock turned to find a woman standing by the door of a shop behind them. She was hunched over and her long, black hair fell past her shoulders. She leant on a walking stick.

  ‘You need an eye,’ the woman finished. ‘We only have troll eyes left.’ She cackled loudly revealing sharp, yellowing teeth.

  The three of them looked at her, confused.

  The woman stopped cackling and then annoyed, pointed to Cora.

  ‘Oh, ah, no, thank you,’ said Cora. She shuddered at the thought of having a troll eye. What would a troll eye even look like?

  ‘We need something to hide her scent,’ said Tock.

  ‘From a werewolf?’ the woman asked.

  Cora swallowed. Werewolf?!

  ‘A Jinx,’ said Tick.

  The woman nodded. She looked at Cora. ‘Pity,’ she said. Then she turned and entered her shop. Cora glanced inside the window of the woman’s shop but black curtains covered every inch of it. She looked at Tick and Tock. They shrugged. Cora wondered if the woman could help them. She didn’t say she couldn’t. Without another thought, Cora walked across the paved road and followed the lady into her shop.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  When she entered, Cora wasn’t surprised to see that the inside of the shop was just as darkly lit as it seemed from the outside. Each corner of the room was filled with unusual items she definitely couldn’t have found at a trader’s stall in Urt. Glowing crystals sat in baskets at her feet, chimes made up of charred animal bones dangled from above and small, black cauldrons billowed small puffs of smoke nearby. Cora peered into a cabinet lined with what looked like plaits of woven human hair. Next to it was a shelf of toenails, each of them a different size, shape and tinge of yellow.

  Why would somebody want to buy somebody else’s toenails? she wondered, a little disgusted.

  Tick and Tock peered into a large round bowl that sat opposite her. Something squelchy slithered around inside it.

  ‘Lizard guts,’ said the woman.

  Tick and Tock recoiled.

  Cora walked over to a tray and picked up what looked like a handful of dried leaves.

  ‘Dried bat tongues,’ said the woman.

  Cora dropped them instantly.

  The woman cleared her throat loudly and moved to the back of the shop.

  ‘Nothing here will help you,’ she said. ‘Not from a Jinx.’

  The hope Cora had briefly felt was suddenly snuffed out like one of the candles in the first shop window.

  They watched as the woman then turned, pushed aside the black curtains at the back of the shop and entered another part of the store.

  Tick, Tock and Cora looked at each other.

  ‘I think she wants us to follow her,’ said Tick, unsure.

  There was a pause.

  ‘I do,’ came the woman’s voice from the other side of the curtains.

  Tick, Tock and Cora walked to the back of the shop and pulled aside the black curtains. Behind them sat another, smaller room that was darker than the first. It was dimly lit by candles grouped in threes and fours. Glancing up, Cora saw symbols carved onto the ceiling. They glowed like stars in the night.

  There were piles of large, heavy-bound books and opened drawers filled with neatly placed jewellery. Cora looked down at what she thought was a gold and red bracelet . . . until it sat up and scurried across the drawer. The woman quickly grabbed hold of the bracelet and put it back in its original spot.

  Tick and Tock walked over to an open drawer filled with colourful stones while Cora made her way over to a tall shelf stacked high with glass jars in the corner of the room. The jars were different shapes and sizes. The first jar had a thick, brown liquid inside it. It looked kind of like mud. The next had a yellow paste inside it that moved around the sides of the jar like a slug. The third jar was round and filled with small, green legs.

  Frogs’ legs? Cora wondered. They twitched in the jar. Cora grimaced. Next to the frogs’ legs was a large jar filled with bright green and red eyeballs. Cora stopped.

  ‘Troll eyes,’ she gasped. The eyeballs were huge. They were almost the size of her hand. With a finger, Cora tapped lightly on the glass jar. Then suddenly all of the eyes rolled around to look at her.

  ‘Ahh!’ she cried out, jumping backwards in surprise.

  The woman cackled loudly as Cora quickly backed away from the shelf of jars. The eyes followed her.

  The woman walked over to the large, locked cabinet on the far wall. It was almost as tall and wide as the room. Cora watched as the woman pulled a small, gold key on a chain from around her neck and unlocked the cabinet. The woman opened up the doors wide.

  Inside the cabinet lay a selection of sharply pointed knives, maces, bow and arrows, sickles and even a sword. Cora swallowed as she looked at the deadly collection of items in front of her.

  Tick and Tock walked over to the cabinet, too.

  ‘The Jinx curse is very powerful,’ said the woman. Then she picked up something shiny from the cabinet. She turned and showed them. It was a small dagger.

  ‘What’s that for?’ Cora asked worriedly.

  ‘My nails,’ said the woman as though it were obvious. She started to clean her nails with the sharp knife.

  ‘For the Jinx you’ll need something like this perhaps,’ said the woman once she had finished with her nails. She pulled open a drawer that lay inside the cabinet and pulled out a jar filled with thick, green liquid. The liquid popped and sizzled in the jar. ‘It will need to be drunk at least six times a day. Side effects include boils, pustules, blisters and excessive armpit hair. It’s usually used to ward off ghosts but it could work on a Jinx.’

  Tick and Tock looked at Cora.

  Cora imagined herself covered in boils, pustules and blisters and growing excessive armpit hair. She shook her head.

  Then Cora spotted a small, gold necklace that sat near her and picked it up. ‘What about this?’ she suggested. It looke
d harmless. And she wouldn’t need to drink it.

  The woman nodded. ‘You could try it,’ she said. Then she smiled her yellow, toothy smile. ‘But you will need to bathe in the blood springs first.’

  Cora put down the necklace.

  ‘What about this?’ asked Tock, holding up a bright red stone. It glimmered in the candlelight.

  ‘That only works on babies,’ said the woman.

  Tick looked at Cora, squinting.

  ‘I’m not a baby,’ she said.

  Tick nodded.

  ‘Perhaps this,’ said the woman. She held up what looked to Cora like an oddly shaped potato.

  ‘What is it?’ Cora asked. She hoped she didn’t have to eat it, although it did look more edible than the thick, green, popping, sizzling liquid.

  ‘Whisper root,’ said the woman. ‘Rare. We only have one left.’

  ‘What do you do with it?’ Cora tried to picture herself using it against the Jinx. Would she throw it at it? Feed it to it? Leave it somewhere for the Jinx to trip over?

  ‘You must burn it and cover yourself in its smoke,’ said the woman. ‘It won’t last but it will help cover your scent for a short amount of time . . . or so I hear.’

  Cora looked at Tick and Tock. It sounded easy enough. She reached out her hand as the woman offered her the oddly-shaped potato. As she grabbed hold of it, Cora’s coat sleeve moved up and the woman’s eyes glanced down at her wrist. Cora took the oddly shaped potato and quickly covered her bracelet again with the sleeve of her coat.

  The woman looked back at her, intrigued.

  ‘Do you know what that is?’ she asked, pointing to Cora’s wrist with her knife.

  Cora remembered what the fairy godmothers had said. ‘It’s . . . for protection.’

  The woman nodded. ‘It’s made from ice stone. A very powerful material. Often used for protection from others.’ The woman paused. ‘And sometimes used for protection from oneself.’

  ‘Oneself?’ Cora echoed. Why would she need to be protected from herself?

  The woman nodded. ‘I can take it off your hands,’ she said, her eyes gleaming in the dim candlelight.

  Tick and Tock came to stand by Cora.

  ‘If you know that it’s ice stone . . .’ said Tick.

  ‘. . . then you know it can’t be removed,’ said Tock.

  ‘It can’t?’ asked Cora, looking at them. She pulled back her coat sleeve and looked down at the white chain on her wrist. She tried to remember if she had ever taken it off. She hadn’t.

  ‘There are ways,’ said the woman, with a shrug.

  There was something about her expression that made Cora never want to find out what those ways were.

  ‘Do you want the whisper root or not?’ the woman asked, impatiently.

  Cora nodded. Perhaps it would be enough. At least for a little while. At least until she could figure out what to do. The strange feeling she felt at The Hollow still bubbled beneath her skin.

  The woman closed up her cabinet and made her way out of the room. Cora, Tick and Tock followed. They pushed aside the black curtains and stopped in their tracks. A man stood in the middle of the brightly lit store. His dark hair was grey at the sides, long and untidy. His mouth curved downwards into a grim line.

  Archibald Drake.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Archibald Drake turned his gaze away from a jar of enormously sharp teeth and looked over at them. Cora, Tick and Tock stared back. Cora’s bracelet tingled at her wrist. Her stomach squirmed as the warlock’s dark eyes rested on her and his mouth curved upwards into a strange smile that stretched slowly across his thin face.

  Crud.

  In the air beside her, she felt Tick and Tock move closer towards her. Archibald must have noticed it too because annoyance coloured the man’s face.

  ‘Smelda,’ he said to the woman. ‘You’re not serving fairies and children, are you?’

  Cora gulped. She remembered what Tick and Tock had said about the Black Market. Fairies and children weren’t welcome.

  The woman faltered. ‘I . . . uh . . .’ she said. ‘I was just telling them to leave.’

  ‘You cannot follow rules, can you?’ Archibald spat. ‘This is exactly the sort of behaviour that forced the witches to cast you out.’

  The woman looked away.

  Cora clutched the whisper root in her hand. The woman was just trying to help her. Suddenly the feeling she felt in The Hollow, the one she had been pushing aside since she woke up in Gwell, bubbled to the surface.

  Oh no.

  ‘We were lost,’ said Tock, hastily fishing a couple of coins out of his pocket and handing them to the shopkeeper.

  ‘This strange woman was just telling us to leave,’ said Tick.

  Archibald stepped in front of them, blocking their path.

  ‘Lost?’ inquired Archibald.

  Tick and Tock nodded.

  ‘You accidentally opened the charmed jewellery box that brought you here?’ he asked.

  ‘We were in the market for one,’ said Tock.

  ‘A jewellery box?’

  Tick nodded. ‘They’re very pretty.’

  Archibald stared at the fairies. Cora could see that he didn’t believe a word they were saying. A small bell tinkled and through the door two men entered the shop. Archibald turned around to look behind him at the two men.

  Cora breathed a small sigh of relief. A distraction. The fairies could use their magic to get them out of the market while the warlock wasn’t looking.

  ‘Do your magic,’ she whispered to Tick and Tock out of the side of her mouth.

  ‘We can’t,’ whispered Tock.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Fairy magic doesn’t work in here. There’s only one way in and one way out,’ whispered Tick.

  Cora groaned. The painting. How would they get past Archibald?

  In front of her, the men locked eyes with Archibald. They spun around and left the shop the way they came, the small bell tinkling after them.

  Cora’s stomach dropped. They were trapped in a room with a warlock and a witch. And the only way out was the way they had come in. She fought the feeling that gripped her. She felt like she needed to scream. Like she needed to let something go. She took a few deep breaths.

  No, no, no. She tried to push it down.

  ‘Are you alright?’ Tock asked.

  Cora felt her hands begin to shake.

  ‘Now,’ Archibald began, turning to them, ‘where were we? Oh, yes!’ His eyes settled on Cora. ‘You.’

  ‘Me?’ Cora replied.

  ‘I know what you are,’ he said, taking a step forward.

  ‘People would,’ he paused before smiling, ‘kill to have what you have.’

  Cora swallowed. She didn’t like the way Archibald stared at her. His eyes shone with greed. He knows what I am? What am I?

  ‘You are coming with me,’ he growled.

  ‘No,’ Cora blurted out. It came out louder than she had meant it to.

  A noise had started to pound in her ears.

  Archibald tilted his head at her, a surprised smile on his face. ‘She speaks.’

  Cora glared at the warlock.

  ‘But,’ he said, ‘I don’t remember asking.’ Then Archibald raised a hand in front of him and Cora felt herself being pulled along the ground towards the warlock. She tried to fight it but her feet were dragged in front of her of their own will. She looked back at the fairies, wide-eyed.

  Then Tick and Tock flew at the warlock. But Archibald was faster. He held up his other hand in front of him and both of the fairies suddenly froze in the air. Slowly, the warlock clenched his hand. And Tick and Tock screamed, their bodies twisting in pain as they hung suspended in the air.

  ‘Stop it!’ Cora cried out, horrified.

  Then the warlock reached down and grabbed Cora’s arm fiercely. She gasped. It hurt. Then the feeling she had had at The Hollow broke free. She couldn’t stop it. It filled her up. Cora pushed the warlock as hard as she could
and he flew up into the air and across the room, smashing through the shop window with a CRASH!

  Cora stared open-mouthed.

  The shop was quiet. Tick and Tock had stopped screaming. Cora looked up at them and was relieved to see that they were no longer twisting in pain. Their eyes were as wide as hers as they stared out the broken shop window. In a heap of glass and black curtains, Archibald Drake, warlock, lay on his back in the Black Market street.

  Cora looked down at her hands. She still felt the strange feeling squirming beneath her skin. ‘What’s happening to me?’ she gasped. Her head felt dizzy. The shop began to spin around her.

  Tick and Tock looked down at her worriedly.

  ‘Run,’ said Smelda, the shop owner. ‘Run. Now!’ she said.

  Cora couldn’t think straight.

  Tick and Tock flew down to Cora and pulled her by her coat towards the shop door. She stumbled out of the doorway with the fairies and into the Black Market street. Cora stopped and stared down at the unmoving warlock. How did I do that? Fear and unease sloshed around in her stomach like ingredients in a soup, making her feel sick.

  Then up and down the market road, people and shop owners walked out of the stores on either side of them. Ahead of them, more and more people started filing into the street. They looked down at the man on the ground and then looked up at Cora.

  ‘Hey!’ a man in a dark suit called out to them. He pointed a finger towards Tick and Tock.

  ‘Hurry . . .’ Tock said.

  ‘. . . this way,’ said Tick.

  The fairies pulled Cora in the direction they had come in. They hurriedly pushed through the people that had gathered behind them on the paved road. Someone in the crowd tried to grab Cora but Tick and Tock tugged her harder.

  Cora stumbled with the fairies until she had to run to keep up. Her head still felt dizzy. She reached a hand to her temple and realised she still held the whisper root.

  Then more shouts came from behind them. Angry shouts. Tick, Tock and Cora raced down the paved road, away from the crowd. Cora looked behind her. A few people had started running after them. She tried her best not to fall over as she ran. But the ground wasn’t staying still. It moved like water beneath her boots. She tried to focus on the fairies zipping ahead of her.