Her voice is all charm and warmth, but we all detect the meaning buried underneath. I can feel us teetering on the edge of dangerous territory. Rosa must be more suspicious of us than her coven “children.”

But suddenly in the midst of this, an idea sprouts in my mind, fertile and ripe.

I am walking the path to honor Grandma’s legacy.

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I am walking the path to potential personal power.

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Grandma clearly had sayings she always repeated, but a very specific one unfurls in my head now: If life is what happens when you’re busy making plans, then mysteries are what happen when you’re busy missing the details. It makes me think that we all glossed over that pentacle platform, but what if there are details there we missed, especially inside that hidden compartment?

“Well, if we’re taking votes on how to solve this case,” I begin, “I say we return to the scene of the crime. From everything we’ve been exploring, I bet there are more clues hidden there. Especially since we don’t seem to have all the pieces to this particular puzzle yet.”

Rosa looks at me, holding a penetrating stare. I can’t tell if she is buying my little ruse or if she just sees right through me.

“Besides, my grandma always used to say: If you find yourself stuck, change your perspective,” I continue, trying not to let Rosa fluster me. “Even if there ends up being nothing where the card was hidden, a change of scenery might help us see things differently, anyway.”

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Though it’s not an idea, really, so much as an image: the platform compartment in the Repentant shack. Suddenly, in my mind’s eye, I remember seeing writing inside its shadowed walls.

We breezed over the platform earlier in our rush to find out what happened to the missing King card and… Anwar. But I shove all that aside now to try to focus on the image. Unfortunately, I don’t remember what the writing actually is; I just can see it’s there. I really believe the clues we need to solve this equation must be in that compartment, but how do I maneuver us back to the shack without drawing even more suspicion?

“What if we’re thinking about this the wrong way?” I begin. “You said this Carson guy thought of Pentacles as the suit of spellcraft in all its forms?”

Rosa stares me down, eager to hear more. I can’t tell if she is buying my little ruse or if she just sees right through me, but I press on anyway.

“Well, doesn’t all spellcasting require specific conditions, in addition to specific ingredients? Would it make sense that, to ‘cast this spell,’ we’d need to be in the right location?”

This idea only elicits thoughtful silence, so I keep going.