Bella had left the front door unlocked for them. When they came back with three of the ingredients in hand, they found Ashton sitting on the floor of the living room, playing with something that looked like a star chart. Brom sat next to him, rambling about the different constellations.

  “Most humans call that one the big dipper, but it’s actually the drinking gourd, and was named after a very famous squash-”

  “Hey, Brom, where’s Bella?” Noah said, as he set the bag of bone meal on the coffee table. Jesse was impressed he carried the heavy bag all the way from the corn maze without stopping.

  “What do I look like, her keeper? She’s somewhere around here.”

  Right on cue, there came a loud crash from upstairs.

  “There she is,” Brom said.

  The kids rushed to the second floor, only to find Bella on the floor in front of a large cabinet. A box and all its contents were strewn about around her.

  “Are you okay?” Siobhan asked as she helped her up.

  “I’m fine,” she said, brushing herself off. “But it’s not here either.”

  “What isn’t?”

  “Something I need for the potion.” The concern must have shown on Jesse’s face, because she quickly waved him off. “Don’t worry, I’ll find it before midnight. Did you get everything on the list?”

  “Almost,” Siobhan answered, as they headed back down the stairs. “We still don’t have the vulture feathers or primrose petals.”

  She handed over the baggie of nightmare hair while Noah brought the bone meal into the kitchen.

  Jesse reached into his pocket to grab the eye of newt, but quickly retracted it when something sharp sliced his finger. “Ow!” Bright red blood ran down his finger and dripped onto the floor.

  Bella was immediately on him, taking his hand in hers and examining the cut. “Doesn’t look too bad. What happened?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Siobhan gasped. “Jesse, your pocket!”

  She was pointing at the pocket he had just reached into. He hadn’t noticed before, but there was a stain on the front leg of his pants, dark enough that it mostly blended into the black fabric.

  At once he realized what that cracking sound he heard when he fell in the maze was and he cursed. He quickly shoved his hand into his other pocket and fished out the still-intact bottle. Relief washed over him when he saw the green eyes staring back at him.

  “The eyes of newt are fine,” he said, placing the bottle on the counter. “It must have been the earwig eggs Mr. Pennyshire gave me that broke.”

  “Sit over here,” Bella instructed and she led him to a kitchen chair she had pushed to the side to make room for the cauldron.

  As he sat, she started pulling different ingredients out from her cabinets, mixing and crushing them with a mortar and pestle.

  “You okay, man?” Noah asked.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. Like she said, it’s not that bad.” He flexed his hand and more blood trickled out.

  “Ugh,” Siobhan shrinked away.

  “Oh, right, sorry.” He pulled his hand to his chest. “I forgot about your thing with blood.”

  “Wait, don’t you love horror movies?” Alicia asked. “How can you be afraid of blood?”

  “Because that’s all fake blood! Corn syrup and stuff. The real thing grosses me out.”

  Bella finished up whatever she was making and turned back to Jesse, holding a cloth soaked in something. “Okay, give me your hand.”

  He did so, letting her gently touch the cloth to his finger as she said an incantation in Latin. Almost immediately, the cut sealed up, flesh knitting together like a zipper being pulled up on a jacket. When she wiped the remaining blood away, it was like nothing even happened.

  “Woah.” He held his hand out, marveling at the magic.

  Bella handed him the cloth. “You can use this to get the glass shards out of your pocket and throw them in the trash can.”

  He did as he was told and she faced the rest of the group. “Right, so you said we’re missing the vulture feathers and primroses. Those will be tricky to find, especially since all of the vultures around here already migrated south for the winter.”

  “Do you know where we could get them?” Siobhan asked.

  “Not off the top of my head. Brom, any ideas?” she called into the living room.

  “You’re asking the wrong pumpkin,” he yelled back. “Before tonight, I hadn’t left my patch in years.”

  “Don’t know why I bothered,” she muttered.

  “Wait, where’s Ashton?” Alicia asked.

  Jesse poked his head back into the living room to see that the small boy was nowhere to be found. Again.

  “Oh, he walked out the front door like five minutes ago,” Brom said.

  “What?!” Alicia exclaimed. “Why didn’t you stop him?”

  “With what hands?”

  “Ugh! Not again.”

  She marched out the front door, the rest of them exchanging glances before following her.

  Out on the street, she scanned every direction. “Over there.” She pointed to where they could see the gleam of his helmet round the corner of a house, headed to Moonset.

  When they caught up to him, he was standing in front of a dunk tank booth, staring up at the wall of prizes on display.

  “Ashton,” she kneeled down so they were the same height. “You have to stop running off on your own, it’s dangerous. Why did you even leave?”

  He said nothing, continuing to stare up at the booth. Jesse followed his gaze. There were many prizes strung up along the back wall, including some very creepy looking bunny dolls. A sign above them read, “Stuffed with real vulture feathers.”

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  “Oh,” Alicia noticed them too, and her eyes widened. “Nice work, Ash. But seriously, don’t do that again.”

  Jesse knocked on the counter of the booth to get the attention of the man working there. He had seen so many strange things tonight that it almost didn’t register that the man was part bird. His black feathery wings tucked behind him as he turned around and his beak split into a friendly grin. His name tag labeled him as “Archie.”

  “Excuse me, what will it take to get one of those dolls?”

  “Oooh, I’m sorry,” he said. “The only way to win one of my luxurious prizes is to dunk my lovely assistant here into the water.”

  Jesse looked at the empty chair inside the tank. “No one’s there.”

  “Exactly. I’m afraid Harold had to leave early due to an emergency, so unfortunately I’ll have to close up shop for the night.”

  The kids let out a collective groan.

  “There’s no way we could just buy a doll off of you?” Noah asked.

  “No can do!” He looked offended at the very idea. “I run a strict business here; selling the prizes would be against the spirit of the game.”

  Jesse checked his phone again. They were running low on time with only an hour left until midnight.

  Archie seemed to sense their desperation, because he took pity on them. “Tell you what, how about one of you take Harold’s place and the rest try to dunk them. If you manage to knock them down, I’ll give you whatever prize you want.”

  Jesse looked to the others. There was no time to find the vulture feathers somewhere else. This was their only option.

  “I’ll do it,” Noah volunteered.

  Siobhan grabbed him harshly by the sleeve. “No, you won’t.” When Archie gave her a funny look, she quickly let go. “Don’t you remember? You have a fear of water, so you can’t go in the dunk tank, especially not dressed like that.” She strained that last part.

  Noah seemed to understand what she was getting at. “Oh, right. Yeah, I’m afraid of water.”

  “Are any of you not aquaphobic?” Archie asked.

  The girls were in the same boat as Noah; if they got dunked, the water would wash away their makeup, ruining their disguises and exposing them as humans. And there was no way they were dunking Ashton. The only one of them who could do it was…

  “I volunteer,” Jesse said.

  “Excellent! Right this way.”

  Archie led him around the back of the booth to a set of stairs he could use to get into the chair. The water below was dark and cloudy, and even though logic told him it couldn’t have been more than a few feet deep, he felt that if he fell in, he could never reach the bottom. As he settled into place, Archie handed a basket of baseballs to his friends.

  “You each get three chances,” Archie explained. His voice was slightly muffled by the plastic walls surrounding Jesse. “Try to hit the center of the target here. Oh, I almost forgot.”

  He banged his fist against the side of the tank, causing Jesse to flinch. “Wake up!”

  Something stirred in the water beneath his feet. He tried to lean over to get a better look, only to pull back when a fish jumped out, sharp teeth snapping at the air where his nose had been seconds before.

  “No break time for you.”

  “What are those?” he asked.

  “Amazonian shark-toothed piranhas.” Archie looked proud of his carnivorous fish. “Makes the game more interesting. Perhaps a little too interesting, as one took off Harold’s ear earlier. That’s why he had to leave. Of course, they shouldn’t be a problem for a vampire such as yourself.”

  “Right.” There was a slight tremble in his voice that he couldn’t stop.

  “Uh, on second thought, maybe we don’t really need that doll,” Alicia said.

  Archie waved them off. “Nonsense, there’s nothing to be afraid of. They only really go after human flesh.”

  Another piranha jumped up to take a bite out of him, this time his shoe, which he quickly yanked back. A few droplets of water landed on his hand and he was taken aback by how cold it was.

  “Great,” Siobhan said. She looked pale.

  “Guys,” Jesse said firmly. “It’s fine. Throw the ball.”

  He hoped he sounded braver than he felt. The truth was he was freaking out on the inside. But if they kept protesting, they were in danger of outing themselves. He had to make a decision now, before Archie started getting suspicious. If he wasn’t already.

  Besides, piranhas were only dangerous in cartoons, right? Just a few bites wouldn’t kill him.

  Those teeth did look pretty sharp, though.

  “If you’re sure,” Alicia said. She hesitated before throwing her first ball.

  It missed, sailing over the target. Her next throw hit the target at the very edge, jarring it slightly. Jesse felt the seat shudder underneath him.

  “Come on,” Archie said. “You have to do better than that if you want to dunk him.”

  Her last throw missed wildly, and Jesse could see that her hand was shaking. She quickly hid it behind her back. Ashton patted his sister’s leg in an attempt to comfort her.

  “Darn. Too bad.”

  Siobhan stepped up next, but as she got ready to throw, she started trembling.

  “Are you alright there, Miss?”

  “Oh, yeah, I’m fine. I think I, uh, pulled a stitch or something earlier.” The shaking didn’t stop.

  Noah placed his hand on her shoulder, and wordlessly, she let him take the next shot. Jesse met his eyes and gave him a small nod.

  He pulled his arm back and threw the ball with everything he had. It sailed through the air for what seemed like forever before landing squarely in the center of the target.

  Time froze, and for a split second, Jesse wondered if anything would happen. Then he felt the chair give out under him and he was sent plunging into the freezing water. The last thing he heard was Siobhan screaming before his head was completely submerged, drowning out any other noise.

  He couldn’t see more than a few centimeters in front of him in the murky water, but he could feel the piranhas swirl around, grazing his clothes as they swam past.

  Panic mounted as he waited for one to make the first move, because surely the rest would follow. But they never did. He took advantage of his inexplicable good luck and kicked up. Once his head breached the surface of the tank, he took a huge gulp of air.

  Archie was standing above him, hand outstretched to help him up and a big grin on his face.

  “See, that wasn’t so bad, was it? You kids were acting like he was going to die or something.”

  Jesse took his hand, scrambling out of the tank. Archie threw him a towel from behind his booth and he wrapped it around himself, shivering as the cold air met his wet skin.

  Siobhan threw herself on top of him, wrapping her arms around him, not caring if she got herself wet. He welcomed the extra warmth.

  “We knew he would be fine,” Alicia lied. “It’s just that he's also afraid of water.”

  Noah thumped him on the back so hard he stumbled forward. “Way to face your fears.”

  Jesse would have glared at him if he wasn’t too busy trying to keep himself warm. And silently surprised at the fact that he was still alive and unscathed.

  “But it’s strange,” Archie leaned in to examine Jesse, and for a moment, he was afraid he might figure out their secret. “It looks like the piranhas didn’t attack you at all. Wait, is that-” He took a big sniff. “Earwig eggs. I thought I smelled something familiar. No wonder they didn’t attack you.”

  At the look of confusion on their faces, he continued, “Amazonian shark-toothed piranhas hate earwig eggs. Can’t stand the stuff. Just a little bit is enough to repel them.”

  Jesse patted his pocket where the glass bottle had broken and remembered the look on Mr. Pennyshire’s face when he had given it to him. Maybe the rumors were true and he really could see the future.

  Alicia held out her hand to Archie. “We want that doll, please.” She pointed to one of the vulture feather stuffed rabbits.

  “Are you sure?” he said. “How about this giant loch ness monster-”

  “We’re sure.”

  He shrugged. “Suit yourselves.” He took the rabbit down and handed it over to Alicia. “Enjoy your prize. You’ve earned it.”

  Finally, Jesse thought to himself as he returned the towel to Archie. Just one more to go and we can-

  “There you are!” Suddenly Ronnie, the furry monster from earlier, was running up to them. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

  His appearance was so unexpected, it took Jesse a minute to realize he was talking to him specifically. “Me? Why?”

  “The costume contest award ceremony is about to start.”

  “But what does that have to do with me?”

  Ronnie looked at him like he was crazy. “Your name’s on the ballot. Don’t you remember signing up?”

  “What? No, I never- “

  “Oh no, Donnie’s gonna kill me if I’m late,” he said, looking down at his watch. “Hurry up, there’s not much time.”

  He grabbed Jesse by the arm and started pulling him down Moonset, through a throng of people crowding around the center of the cul-de-sac. The others couldn’t do much more than helplessly follow along, Alicia picking up Ashton so he wouldn’t be left behind.

  It looked like they were going straight from the frying pan into the fire.