The witchs apprentice, p.1
The Witch's Apprentice, page 1
ALSO BY ZETTA ELLIOTT
Dragons in a Bag
The Dragon Thief
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2022 by Zetta Elliott
Cover art copyright © 2022 by Geneva B
Interior illustrations copyright © 2022 by Cherise Harris
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Elliott, Zetta, author. | Harris, Cherise, illustrator.
Title: The witch’s apprentice / Zetta Elliott; illustrations by Cherise Harris.
Description: First edition. | New York: Random House Children’s Books, [2022]
Summary: Now that he is Ma’s apprentice, Jax is finding himself mixed up with all sorts of magical doings, like taking care of a phoenix egg that is going to hatch soon, trying to bring back the creatures Sis stole, finding his grandfather, and convincing Sis, the guardian, to reunite the two realms—and hopefully living to see Brooklyn again.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021021448 | ISBN 978-0-593-42770-5 (trade) | ISBN 978-0-593-42771-2 (lib. bdg.) | ISBN 978-0-593-42772-9 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: African American boys—Juvenile fiction. | Magic—Juvenile fiction. | Witches—Juvenile fiction. | Apprentices—Juvenile fiction. | Phoenix (Mythical bird)—Juvenile fiction. | Brooklyn (New York, N.Y.)—Juvenile fiction. | CYAC: African Americans—Fiction. | Magic—Fiction. | Witches—Fiction. | Apprentices—Fiction. | Phoenix (Mythical bird)—Fiction. | Brooklyn (New York, N.Y.)—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.E45819 Wi 2022 | DDC 813.6 [Fic]—dc23
Ebook ISBN 9780593427729
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Contents
Cover
Also by Zetta Elliott
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Acknowledgments
1
I keep having the same dream. Night after night I fall asleep knowing that I’ll wake up sweating, with my heart racing and my hands curled into fists. Even after I’m wide awake, I hear a man whispering in my ear: “I’ve been waiting for you, my son.”
Nobody calls me “son”—not anymore. Sometimes I wake up so upset that I can’t tell what’s sweat and what’s tears. I wash my face in the bathroom and then try to fall back to sleep. Sometimes I can. Sometimes I can’t.
I haven’t told Mama. She’s got enough to worry about, and talking about my father just makes her sad. Plus, she’s a really sound sleeper, and I’m too old to be waking my mom up just because I had a bad dream. It’s not really a nightmare, but I told Ma because I don’t keep secrets from her. She’s a good listener, and, well, she’s a witch! So there’s always a chance she’ll be able to share her special knowledge with me.
Ma isn’t my mother or my grandmother, like I once thought. We’re not related at all, but right now Mama and I are living with Ma while our own apartment is being renovated. Now that school’s out for the summer, I spend a lot more time with Ma. She has a thick Book of Dreams in her library, but Ma won’t let me read it yet. Instead, she made me describe the dream over and over. Then she told me to write down all the details I could remember as soon as I woke up each night.
I don’t see how that will help, but since I’m Ma’s apprentice, I do as I’m told. Some nights the dream does change. Last week I felt the man’s hand on my shoulder as he spoke—like he was standing behind me. But last night the hand was in front of me, reaching out from a fun house mirror that turned the man’s body into a rubbery smear. I couldn’t see his face, and I hate to admit it, but I don’t remember what my dad’s hands looked like. I remember how safe and strong I felt whenever he wrapped his fingers around mine, but that’s it.
I’m busy writing all this in my Apprentice Journal when Ma knocks on the door with her cane.
“Ready?” she asks.
I nod and close my notebook, but Ma isn’t there to see it. I hear her shuffling down the long hallway that leads to the front door. Today Ma is wearing a bright orange bubble coat that’s so puffy, it rubs against the wallpapered walls as she walks. She’s got her purse slung over one shoulder and her folding stool tucked under her other arm. When Ma’s got a job to do, she’s totally focused and ready to get started with or without me. That’s Rule #1: Always be ready.
I shove my notebook inside my knapsack before hustling down the hall after Ma. She’s already outside the apartment waiting for the elevator, so I grab my sweatshirt and holler, “Bye, Mama!” over my shoulder as I slip out the front door.
“Got your gloves?” Ma asks. Her eyes are watching the illuminated numbers that show the elevator’s ascent, but I take my gardening gloves out of my bag and wave them at her anyway. I have just enough time to pull my warmest hoodie over my long-sleeve T-shirt before the elevator bell rings, the doors open, and Ma nudges me inside. She passes her stool to me, and I hold it close to my chest. It’s a tight squeeze with Ma’s puffy orange coat taking up most of the space in the elevator, but soon we reach the ground floor and head over to the park.
My recurring dream isn’t the only strange thing that’s happening around here. There’s also something wrong with the weather. Summer in Brooklyn is usually sweltering, with lots of humidity and heat rising in waves off the concrete. But when Ma and I reach the park, nobody’s wearing shorts or tank tops. It’s too cold! Even the joggers are wearing tights, and one guy races by with earmuffs on! I don’t blame him—it’s the middle of July, but it feels more like the end of November.
Ambrose would be warm enough with his many layers of clothing, but he hasn’t been stationed at the park entrance since last spring. Bro’s gone, the guardhouses he protected no longer travel between realms, and Ma’s turning me into a botanist instead of a witch. Almost every day we come to the park to forage. Fortunately, the cold weather has scared off all the bugs, but it’s still no fun crawling all over the park while Ma stands over me pointing to different plants with her cane.
The first plant she taught me to spot was poison ivy. But turns out that’s not the only plant that can make your skin itch. So I started wearing Mama’s gardening gloves, and that helps, but foraging still isn’t my favorite activity. Ma says being a witch is mostly about helping and healing. And making medicine from plants is one way to help folks heal. I get that—I really do. But when I decided to become Ma’s apprentice, I thought I’d be doing something more…exciting.
I mean, Ma and I went back in time and saw dinosaurs! We found a special crystal, and I delivered baby dragons to the realm of magic. I know no job can be that exciting all the time, but…well, pulling up plants day after day is just boring! Ma won’t even let me study the different plants listed in her books. All of a sudden, her entire library is off-limits.
I snuck into the living room last week and pulled one book off the shelf—Shape & Substance: A Beginner’s Guide to Transmogrification Spells. I managed to smuggle the heavy tome into my bedroom without anyone noticing, but when I locked the door and opened the book, all the pages were blank! And I could hear Ma cackling with delight in the room next to mine. She outsmarts me every time.
Ma says I’m not ready to learn about the spells contained in those books. She insists that I need “hands-on training,” but I’m the only one who’s crawling around on their hands and knees. Ma supervises me while sitting comfortably on her collapsible stool that I carry to and from the park. I doubt her back aches as much as mine, but what bothers me most is, I don’t feel like I’m learning anything important.
“What’s that over there?” Ma asks after her long, loud yawn finally ends.
Since she’s sitting a couple of feet behind me, I follow the general direction her cane’s pointing and reach for a plant that has round, glossy leaves and tiny yellow flowers. “This one?” I ask.
“No!” she barks. “That other one.”
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Ma sighs with impatience. “No! Look where I’m pointing, Jax.”
I press my lips together so I won’t say anything that might sound like sass. Mama taught me to respect my elders, and at her age, it’s not like Ma can get down here in the dirt with me. So I just point my index finger and slowly move my arm from left to right. Ma grunts and sighs some more until I point at a strange purple plant with triangular leaves. It’s nowhere near where she was pointing her cane, but Ma finally seems satisfied.
“That’s the one,” she says. “Pull it up gently, Jax, so you don’t break off any of its roots. That’s the part we need.”
I do as I’m told and shake off the loose soil before handing the plant back to Ma. She sniffs the roots and even takes a small bite before placing it in a mesh bag.
“Good. Now keep your eyes peeled. We need a whole lot more of these.”
“How many more?” I ask.
Ma shrugs and pulls her pipe out of her coat pocket. She taps a bit of ash out of the bowl and says, “A couple hundred should be enough.”
Two hundred! I sit back on my heels and scan the grass around us for more purple triangular leaves. “I don’t see any more, Ma.”
She grunts and says, “That’s ’cause you don’t know how to look properly.”
“Well, how am I ever gonna learn if you don’t show me?” That’s what I want to say, but I bite my tongue and say nothing instead. I don’t know if witches can read minds, but Ma must know I’m feeling salty, because she suddenly suggests we take a break.
I happily yank off my gardening gloves and pull a granola bar out of my knapsack. Ma sticks the pipe in her mouth and searches her bag until she finds the mint tin that once held three baby dragons and then a feisty fairy. Ma flips open the lid and frowns when the tin turns out to be empty.
Ma grumbles as she leans forward on her stool to peer at the grass between us.
“What are you looking for?” I ask, even though I know the answer to that question might mean the end of my break.
“Gum grass,” Ma says with a groan as she pushes back on her stool. “You found some for me last week, remember?”
I don’t. But lately Ma has taken to smoking her pipe every evening, so I must have found a lot of this particular plant. Mama thinks smoking a pipe sets a bad example, so Ma leans way out the kitchen window and blows the smoke into the alley behind our building. Gum grass doesn’t smell like bubble gum—it’s more like the spicy incense I smell at Vik’s place sometimes. Once I went into the kitchen for a glass of water and heard Ma talking to someone in between puffs on her pipe. It was hard to see past her body, which filled up most of the window, but I’m pretty sure I saw a squirrel’s fluffy tail waving above the fire escape railing.
“Ma!”
We both look across the meadow and see a park ranger making his way over to us on a mountain bike.
Ma waits till he’s within earshot and then calls out, “Got anything for me, Cyrus?”
The ranger laughs and reaches into the pocket of his khaki coat. Rangers normally wear short-sleeve shirts and shorts in the summer, but not this year.
“Good morning to you, too,” he says with a smile and a tip of his funny dented hat. “I was going to offer you the pleasure of my company, but I found this last week and suspect you might prefer it.”
The ranger winks at me before handing a small white envelope to Ma. She peeks inside and then beams up at Cyrus. “Gum grass!”
“Found a patch of it growing over by the Nethermead meadow—some good mushrooms, too, if you’re interested.”
“No time for mushrooms today,” Ma says while packing a bit of gum grass into her pipe. “We’re on a mission.”
“Top secret?” the redheaded ranger asks.
“Naturally,” Ma says with a wink.
Cyrus turns to me. “Then this must be your accomplice.”
“Actually, I’m Ma’s apprentice,” I tell him.
Cyrus’s eyebrows go up, and I realize too late that he probably doesn’t know that Ma’s a witch. Ma glares at me before forcing a fake laugh to distract the ranger.
“Jax has been helping me gather some wild silver root. How you been feeling, Cy? You look tired.”
“Tell you the truth, Ma, I’ve been under the weather the past couple of days. No fever or body ache,” he explains. “I just feel worn-out.”
“I thought a little fresh air would perk me up, but I’m feeling kind of drowsy myself. Why don’t you take a couple days off, Cy—get some rest,” Ma suggests.
The ranger shakes his head and stifles a yawn. “Can’t—we’ve already got five people who called in sick this week. Seems to be spreading all over the city. Strange, huh? Just one symptom: fatigue.”
Ma sucks on her pipe and studies Cyrus for a moment. Then she reaches into the mesh bag we’ve been filling and pulls out the purple plant with the triangular leaves. Ma snaps off a length of root and blows on it. She pops half into her own mouth before offering the rest to the ranger.
“Here—chew on this.”
Cyrus turns it over before popping it into his mouth. The root must be bitter, because he crinkles his nose and then takes a drink of water from the bottle clipped to his bike. “Whew! That’s got quite a kick.”
“Silver root is a natural stimulant. A little of that root goes a long way. Keep an eye out for it when you’re making your rounds. Get some to your coworkers if you can.”
“Will do,” the ranger says, looking more alert already. “Thanks, Ma,” he adds with genuine gratitude.
“Right—break time’s over, Jax.” Ma leans heavily on her cane and eases herself off the collapsible stool. “Time to head home.”
A moment ago, Ma said we needed to pull up a couple hundred silver root plants, but if she’s changed her mind, I’m not about to argue. I fold her stool and tuck it under my arm. Cyrus waves as he pedals off.
“I gotta make a call,” Ma says with a frown.
Unlike most people, Ma doesn’t have a cell phone that she can carry in her purse. Instead, she’s got an old-fashioned rotary phone that doesn’t actually plug into the wall. I’ve only seen her use it once before.
“Do you need to talk to L. Roy?” I ask. I met L. Roy in the realm of magic last spring. He’s the one who mailed Ma three baby dragons from Madagascar.
Ma shakes her head and doesn’t seem to notice when something small and white falls off her Afro.
My first thought is Does Ma have dandruff? But it would be rude to say that, so instead I ask, “Is that snow?”
Ma sticks out her hand, and within a few seconds, several tiny flakes drift down from the sky and land on her palm. They don’t melt when she rubs them between her fingers.
“Not snow,” I conclude.
Ma sniffs at the white bits and then blows them away. “Hmm.”
“Feathers?” I guess next.
Ma shakes her head and starts heading toward the park exit. “It’s ash.”
Ma complains about her knees a lot, but with the help of her cane, she can move pretty fast when she wants to. I hustle to keep up. When we reach the street, Ma doesn’t turn right. Instead, she heads north—away from our building.
“I thought you needed to make a phone call,” I remind her.
“I want to check something before we head home.”
I follow Ma along Empire Boulevard and think about my grandfather as we pass the fast-food place where he got us burgers last spring. That was the first time we ever met, but we hit it off right away. Trub and Mama don’t always see eye to eye, but they’re learning to trust each other again. When my granddad’s around, I feel like my family’s whole again. Nothing can take the place left by my dad, but now with Ma and Trub and a little magic, my life feels a lot fuller.
I haven’t seen Trub much lately. Ma says he’s become Sis’s right-hand man, and that my granddad will be around more once Ma retires and goes to live with Sis in the realm of magic. Whenever I ask her when she plans to retire, Ma just looks off in the distance and says, “Soon.” I guess that’s when I’m going to see my grandfather again.
