Hex and the City

by Kate Johnson

‘When you’re a witch nothing is a figure of speech,’

They all looked at her in a way Poppy had only ever experienced with witches. As if what they saw wasn’t just your outer self, but all the layers of secrets and history you were trying to hide.

‘Broomsticks are not a particularly viable thing in London, but maybe we can go and visit our sisters in Essex and you can try there.

A nod to the characters from the previous book, perhaps?

Chaos is necessary and healthy for growth, it brings creativity and breathes new life into stale order.

And she’d tried not to be devastated every time someone she fancied let her down. Most of them were just silly crushes anyway.

How do you do your glowy hands thing?’ ‘Glowy hands?’ There were things scuttling on the ground. Scuttling. ‘Yeah.’ She swished her hand around in the air in a parody of his stage act. ‘Like a dude on the cover of a paranormal romance from the mid-noughties.’ ‘Oh, you read a lot of paranormal romance, do you?’

Pull yourself together, Poppy. You’re a witch. This is magic. You can handle it. A tiny little voice underneath the pep talk whispered, I’m so tired of handling it.

Snow fell, only it wasn’t snow. Poppy had never seen ash come down from the sky before. It swirled and eddied in the wind, settling hot on her skin.

Having experienced watching ash from nearby forest fires fall from the sky, it's definitely surreal how much it falls like snow. A bit frightening too.

‘Where were you on 9/11?’ Alex asked. That was surprising enough to halt her tears. ‘What? What has that got to do with anything?’ ‘I saw it on the morning news,’ he said. ‘It was like a weird movie. It didn’t seem real. Do you remember?’

‘Well.’ Iris looked at the others. ‘I knew Else as a female … person.’ ‘But she wasn’t always female?’ Poppy asked, thinking of Avery this morning. She hadn’t asked whether Avery’s appearance changed cosmetically, or physically. It hadn’t felt like the sort of question you could ask someone you’d only just met.

Creativity can’t exist without chaos.’

‘What happened?’ ‘I got old, and he didn’t.’

‘I did explain about the candle thing, and they said God works in mysterious ways.’ ‘But,’ Poppy said, ‘didn’t the Church used to condemn witches?’ ‘We also used to burn Catholics at the stake, love. Things have moved on.’

‘Don’t you ever wish I was normal?’ Poppy said. They looked surprised she’d even asked. ‘What is normal?’ her mum said. ‘Nobody’s normal. Trying to be like everyone else will only make you unhappy.’

‘Do you mean to tell me,’ she said, ‘that I’ve been paying through the nose for my Oyster card, and hiring bikes by the mile, and all this time I could have been flying?’ ‘Well, not all the time, Pops, be reasonable,’ said Iris. ‘You can’t go flying everywhere. You’d get hit by drones.’

‘Hi, everyone,’ said Poppy, because Alex was gazing at her instead of introducing the show. ‘I’m Poppy Thistlewood, and this is my glamorous assistant, Alex.’ He laughed. ‘Hi, I’m Alex Raine, and I used to be a stage magician. This is Poppy, who is the real power behind the throne, and one day somebody will actually realise that’s the truth.’

My family, both the human and feline members. I don’t know how people get through the day without a cat; happily, I’ve never had to find out.