“Ours, and Lucie and Jamie’s,” said Ken. “Lucie has been Lillian’s housekeeper and friend for almost thirty years now. Jamie worked at the library when the children first arrived”—Ken gestured at the large extension on the right side of the house—“but now he’s more or less the only parent they have. As for Ian and me, I’ve been Lillian’s groundskeeper for over twenty years. Lillian and Ian met at a charity gala back when he was still acting. She hired me and sold us the cottage for almost nothing.”

“All of which is relevant backstory to the tale we’re about to tell you,” Ian assured Mika.

An absent archaeologist, a housekeeper, a librarian, a gardener, a retired actor, and three unlikely witches. As backstories went, it was one of the weirdest Mika had ever heard.

“Who exactly are the children?” Mika asked. “I mean, how are they related to any of you?”

“Legally, they’re Lillian’s adopted wards,” said Ian. He paused, and his mouth twisted ruefully as he added, “But she’s away so often that Jamie and the rest of us have done the real raising of them.”

They had stopped in front of the house while Ken had been speaking, and Mika looked up at it now. It was an old, two-storied structure, with gabled roofs and windows, walls built out of warm, brownish grey brick and covered in vines of flowering ivy, and a merrily smoking chimney. On either side of the faded white front door, which was tucked under eaves, were wide bay windows, both gabled like the windows of the second story. And in front of the house, stretching out on either side of the front path all the way out of sight around the house, were the gardens, which were just as lovely as the tiny garden outside the cottage: oak trees, lavender plants, freshly cut green grass, a swing set, and an entire fenced-off vegetable patch. It looked, frankly, like a small piece of heaven.

“It’s beautiful,” she said simply.

“Beautiful enough to move in at once?”

“Ian.”

Mika bit back another smile and held firm. “I still need my answers. You haven’t really explained why you need me.”

“Let’s go in,” said Ken, pushing open the front door.

Mika lingered for a moment, her eyes on the garden. She hadn’t imagined the magic at the gates. There was magic here, she could feel it, and it wasn’t just because she was here, either.

There couldn’t really be three young witches living here together, could there?

“Is something the matter?” Ian asked her, rocking excitedly on the balls of his feet.

Mika avoided answering that by asking a question of her own. “How are the lavender plants still in bloom?”