Devil's Food by Kerry Greenwood

Phar Lap and a will that could drive a feather through a marble tombstone. It was my turn on the soup van later this week. I always looked forward to it with a mixture of keen anticipation and serious apprehension. It was my taste of squalor and my thanks-offering to the gods who had made me healthy and sane and safe.
    On with the leavenless lentil bread, and I set the clock to remind me to take it out. Usually I know when bread is cooked by the scent, but this stuff was only going to smell like old beans until it began to smell like new charcoal. No accounting for tastes, I thought as the kitchen filled with the intoxicating scent of rich Welsh fruit bread, heady with spices.
    By the time Jason was back, the rye and caraway bread was in the oven and he was free to compound his chocolate muffins. When they were done I took three of them over to Meroe’s shop. I needed kitchen herbs for the herb muffins, and hers were extremely good. I don’t know whose organic garden she robs to get them, but she has packages of parsley and thyme with the dew of fairyland still on them.
    I got to the Sibyl’s Cave just as Meroe was unlocking the door. This morning’s mantle was of fine, bright scarlet wool figured with white sheep. Belladonna was taking up her position on the back of Meroe’s big chair, on which she has been stropping her claws since early kittenhood. She awarded me a brief purr as I stroked her, then returned grimly to her task.
    ‘Oh, those chocolate muffins,’ exclaimed Meroe, packing me a bundle of herbs. I watched carefully to see that I recognised each plant as she laid it down. Meroe also sells magic spell ingredients and I didn’t have any customers who needed to be turned into toads at present. Though this could change without notice, of course. ‘That boy was a find, Corinna. The Powers That Be were both merciful and on the alert the day he came into your bakery looking for a job. Of course, if you had not been receptive to their influence nothing would have happened.’
    ‘That’s me,’ I replied carefully. ‘Receptive.’
    ‘I have been talking to people in Sunbury,’ Meroe said. ‘Since their leader left, the coven has been in disarray, with quarrels and much disharmony. In which I am afraid your mother had some part.’
    ‘No kidding,’ I said, sitting down and cradling my herbs. Belladonna extended a thoughtful paw and combed her claws through my hair. She didn’t touch my scalp but it made me shiver. Or something did.
    ‘Star seems to have favoured a very strict, very punitive form of vegetarianism,’ said Meroe. ‘She had followers, but not enough to put her in charge of the coven. According to my friends, she won’t be welcome back if she tries to return alone.’
    ‘But she’s been there all her life,’ I protested. ‘She hasn’t got anywhere else to go!’ I swallowed down my fear that this meant she would stay near me.
    ‘Nevertheless,’ said Meroe, patting me, ‘she lives in a collective and the majority opinion rules. While Sunlight was with her, she was protected from expulsion, as everyone liked him. Also, he acted as a rein on her extravagant temper. Now he is gone, she is going to be on her own.’
    ‘Then we have to find him. We really have to find him.’ I would have jumped to my feet but Bella still had her claws in my hair. Meroe gently detached the black cat.
    ‘I think that Therese will take care of Star for a while, at least,’ she told me. ‘She doesn’t seem to even notice how rude Star is to her and Therese has managed to modify some of her very rigid standards. Come up this afternoon and you’ll see what I mean. I’ll be there. I’m teaching Therese to embroider in the Hungarian manner. It’s very pretty.’
    ‘I’ll think about it,’ I lied. ‘Now I’d better get Jason his herbs. Come over later and there will be pumpkin soup,’ I offered. Meroe smiled. Bella waved a paw at me. I left the shop, jangling through feng shui crystals and Celtic