Perhaps there’s a town, clinging to a forgotten road between one city and another. Nestled with its back against a jawbone of mountains and guarded by forests on all sides. Perhaps there’s such a town.

And perhaps, one night, a witch wakes to find the moonlight has carried her shop there while she slept. Perhaps that happens. Perhaps not.

Honey Chocolate Cake

One: remove ingredients from refrigerator and allow to come to room temperature.

With half-forgotten dreams in her eyes, Sage leaves the flat upstairs for the shop beneath to find a different street outside her window. A dusting of sugared starlight falls on new shopfronts. The ornate lampposts are an unfamiliar style.

The move didn’t wake her, the moving makes no sound. It’s as still and silent as the space between heartbeats, and the feeling it brings to Sage is as empty. She looks at the foreign street, wondering if this time she’ll let herself learn the town’s name. Befriend her neighbours. She remembers long ago places, where she was foolish and daring enough to fall in love. Remembers every leaving of things behind.

“So,” she hears herself say, “again.” And she turns for the kitchen.

Two: melt the chocolate in a glass bowl over a pan of simmering water…

Equinox waits, coiled around the tree branch mounted to the wall for him. His diamond-shaped head already quests toward the cookbook, tongue flickering.

“Today tastes like finding what is wanting,” he says.

“Good morning to you too, Equinox.” He turns pink eyes to her and tilts his head. A snake’s apology. Sage nods, then lets her fingertips brush the cookbook’s stained and threadbare cover.

“We’ve moved,” he says. “New people, new problems.”

“Aren’t you—” she starts to ask. The book interrupts her, creaking open on its stand. Pages begin to turn, faster and faster until they’re riffling with a sound like dead leaves in the wind.

Tired. Sage was going to ask if her familiar was tired.

The book falls still. Sage and Equinox hold their breath.

“Are you sure?” Sage asks, seeing the recipe, but the book doesn’t move. She turns to a bookcase groaning with honey jars. A thousand shades of gold. She passes her hand through the air in front of each one, waiting for a familiar buzzing warmth; the call of what this new town needs from her.

“Cloves,” she says when it comes. “You were right, Equinox.”

Three: preheat oven to 180°C. Butter and line a 23cm cake tin.

Pale dawn pries at blinds and the cracks beneath doors as Sage slides the last plate into the display. New town. New people.

“New problems,” she says, removing her apron.

Four: beat together the butter and sugar. Add the honey…

Sage helps many people that day. Jasmine flower cookies to the mother of the too-pale son. Sticky gingerbread to the couple that aren’t touching. Sage’s namesake to ease the grieving husband. They come to her with their pain, and she sends them away with the sweet piece of magic that will heal them.

Five: bake for an hour and a half. Check after 45 minutes. If catching, cover with foil…

When the woman enters, Sage knows why the book called for honey chocolate cake. Why it demanded cloves. Even before she speaks.

“I own Helen’s Pure Health, down the street.”

“Pleased to meet you. I’m Sage. Welcome to Sweet Healing.”

“Healing?” Helen snorts. “This place is a temple to decadent excess.” She gestures at the displays without looking. As if she can’t.

“Please,” Sage says, “look again.” She nods at the comforting glow of the room, at the tranquil faces of her customers. Helen frowns at the townspeople as if only then seeing them.

“Treating yourself is good for you too,” Sage says.

“You should be ashamed. Obesity is among the leading causes of death nowadays.”

“Actually—” but Helen is gone.

Come close of business, Sage packs away the chocolate cake. Still whole.

Chocolate Honey Glaze

One: bring the water and honey to a boil. Turn off the heat and add the chocolate…

Equinox wakes her this time, his sugar-white body glowing in the moonlight.

“There’s a madwoman in my kitchen,” he says.

Two: Turn the cooled cake onto a plate. Pour the glaze over the cake and smooth…

“I had to see… ” Helen says. Her fingers are sticky with glaze. She sucks them clean as she talks. “I had to know what you’d done… Why they all felt… better. I don’t eat chocolate. You’ve poisoned me.”

“A little chocolate—”

“No,” Helen says, “it’s this.” She snarls, grabbing up the cookbook.

“You don’t want to touch that.”

“No need to tell me it’s dangerous. Look at it. Cursed, revolting thing.” She flings it across the kitchen.

At first, nothing happens. Then the covers creak open, and the pages begin to turn.

“What—”

“It likes you,” Sage says. Then, “you’re feeling better, aren’t you.”

“I feel… whole,” Helen says, “at last.” She blinks, crossing to the book. “Apple muffins,” she says, a buried memory rising in her voice.

Sage draws her to the bookcase.

“Take the one that feels right.”

“This,” Helen says. Removing the lid, she inhales deeply. “Bay leaf. For clarity.”

Sage smiles.

“Would you take my shop,” she asks, “as a gift?”

“I… thank you,” Helen says, spellbound by the jar in her hand.

Sage moves for the door, pausing at the cake plate.

“Do you mind?” she asks. “For the road?” Helen smiles yes, and Sage cuts a generous slice.

Cloves, she thinks. For finding what is wanting.

Three: savour and heal.

Perhaps there’s a road through a forest. Perhaps a woman walks that road with a town at her back and a future before her, licking chocolate from her fingers. Perhaps there’s such a road.

Perhaps the moonlight settles like living silver on a scarf the woman wears, on its woven pattern of a white snake with pink eyes. Perhaps that happens. Perhaps not.

The End

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