Page 1 of Hex Appeal
Chapter 1
Jess
The lip gloss burped. Not a polite little ‘excuse me’ burp, but a full-on volcanic hiccup that spat peach-scented glitter across my desk, my spellbook, and my cat-shaped pencil holder. The glitter didn’t just splatter; it drifted in slow, hectic spirals through the rays of sunlight like tiny stars, sticking to my skin in miniature warm pinpricks, like the air itself was trying to leave a kiss.
Somewhere in the chaos, the cauldron made a faint fizzing noise, the magical equivalent of carbonated soda about to explode. Raven flinched as a sparkle landed on his wing, which he tried to get rid with the disgusted precision of a cat shaking off water.
“Not a good sign,” Raven remarked from the windowsill. He’d perfected the art of a judgmental bird glare; head tilted, black eyes bright, wings tucked like a disapproving mother.
“It’s fine,” I said, jumping up and down and waving away the smoke. “Every spell gets… gassy at this stage.”
“It’s not a spell. It’s an emotional landmine in a tube,” he said. “Love magic never ends well.”
Neither does failing Calc, but, I’m fine with risking that, too. College applications are due in two weeks, and I’ve spent more time researching moonstone powder than actual tuition costs.
My eyes flicked to my laptop. “And it’s not love magic,” I lied, giving the glittery liquid a slow swirl with a charcoal pencil I’d swiped from my love interest’s desk at school. “It’s a gentle romantic push in lip-gloss form.”
He made a noise somewhere between a croak and a sigh. “So, love magic.”
I set the cauldron on a low heat and lined up the ingredients on my desk like soldiers waiting for inspection: moonstone, the dried rose petal, a pinch of gold glitter I’d left under the full moon, and three drops of honey.
I measured out the moonstone powder the way the book said, then tipped in a little extra, just for luck. The glittering dust swirled like it couldn’t decide which way was up, sticking to the rim of the bowl. Honey came second, slow and sticky, wrapping everything in sugar, followed by a peach and the dried rose petal from my mom’s old prom corsage. Magical tradition said objects tied to past romance could nudge feelings in the present. I crushed it between my fingers, let the dust scatter into the gloss, and whispered the binding charm. The surface shimmered, pulsing with warm light.
The gold glitter caught the sunlight as I tipped more in—a girl could never have enough sparkle—and watched the tiny stars sinking into the peachy swirl. I twirled the lip brush between my fingers, then hesitated. Every love spell I’d ever read said to add something personal. I wasn’t about to pluck one of Nate’s hairs, that would be creepy. So, when Raven was busy pruning himself, I yanked one of my own loose strands and dropped it in. It curled in the mixture, catching flecks of moonstone powder until it gleamed.
“That’s got to make it stronger,” I told myself.
I traced the rim of the cauldron with my wand and whispered,
“Peach for sweetness, rose for fire,
Let warmest wishes now conspire.
Honey bind, and gold alight,
Turn his distant heart my way tonight.”
Three times I said it, each louder than the last, until the gloss sparkled and bubbled in the pot as if it had heard me. A faint warmth rose off the surface, scented with peaches and something sharper, something that felt like a secret.
Magic was part of life in Hallowell Bay, at least for families like mine and Nate Martinez’s. I’d seen the faint glint of a protection charm under his collar once, the kind you get from a proper witch or warlock household. Not that we’d ever talked about it. He was the type to keep his spells tucked away like sketches in a closed notebook.
To tourists, our coastal town was just a New England postcard: cobblestone streets, historic storefronts, and salty wind drifting in off the harbour. To witches, it was one of the anchor points keeping magic in balance. You could walk down Main Street and smell the cinnamon-vanilla haze from the bakery that, if you knew the right words, sold cupcakes that cured heartbreak. Souvenir shops sold seashell charms to tourists who thought they were cute knickknacks, never realizing they were low-level wards against storms.
The harbour weather didn’t follow forecasts so much as it obeyed the moon. Fog might roll in on a clear day just because the tide felt moody. At the corner, Mrs. Drummond’s thrift shop displayed ‘vintage’ sunglasses that just so happened to keep you from seeing ghosts. Next door, the fish market swore their catch was always fresh, not mentioning the stasis charms they kept under the ice bins.
Tourists thought it was quaint. Us witches knew better. We passed our magic down through bloodlines, working it through enchanted objects, talismans, and spells. And sometimes, in my case, cosmetics.
The problem? Magic was as temperamental as a cat in a bath, especially when emotions got involved. Mine weren’t just messy, they were explosive. I’d been bottling up a crush for years, and the spellbook had a whole page of warnings about casting under extreme emotional duress. Apparently, longing strong enough to make your heart trip over itself counts as extreme. Which was why the peachy-gold concoction had a fifty-fifty shot of changing my life or detonating in my face.
The shimmer in the gloss sharpened into something almost too bright to look at. The rose petal dust swirled faster than it should have, little sparks catching on the glitter like fire on dry leaves. I frowned; the reaction was stronger than the book’s notes said it should be, but I blamed the extra moonstone powder I’d tossed in for oomph. Or maybe it was the corsage, Mom had always said her prom night had been… complicated.
“Easy,” I muttered, tapping the cauldron’s rim. The gloss quivered like it wanted to climb out.
Raven leaned forward. “Jessica, stop.”
“I’m fine?—”
Pop!
