The Haunted National Park: A Tale from the Peter Wood Multiverse
Chapter Six: Family & Alchemy

Peter and the other sleuth scouts spent the next little while standing around uneasily, only daring to edge near the Witch—who was still sitting on the couch—when absolutely necessary.

It was Peter who took the first attempt at having a conversation with her—and she did so while ignoring Mindy’s disapproving scowl. The two began talking about Sleuth Scouts mostly. One of the things they were doing before they found the Witch was a bunch of scout activities. Some of them were the kind of things their scout patrol would be doing on a regular night with their patrol leader, and the patrol leader’s corporal. Neither Tommy nor Jamie had joined them at the park that night. They were both in trouble for a stunt they had pulled the other night with their friends, the Little Daredevils.

Eventually Oliver and Lily began talking to the Witch too and explaining some of their patrol did to help out their community. The Witch didn’t seem as cold as some of the stories they had heard about wizardkin in the past. She was distant from them as if she hadn’t fully decided whether or not she had to worry about us, but as the night went on, her quiet one-word questions and answers became a solid conversation with her asking them many questions about themselves. All the while, Mindy was off sulking, leaning up against the wall across the room from them and frowning at them from afar.

“Hey, where did Lily go?” said Oliver suddenly.

“I’m here.” Said Lily, coming around the corner from down the hallway. In her hands was what Peter thought was a tattered pillow of some sort. What it turned out to be was the same brown teddy bear that was sitting in the Witch’s lap when they found her in the staffroom.

“I was just in the staffroom looking for some snacks and I found this—”

“Don’t touch that!” Before anyone knew what was happening, the Witch’s wand was pointing straight at Lily and at the dusty teddy bear she was holding. It flew out of Lily’s hands and the shock of the Witch using magic on her sent Lily stumbling back onto the ground. And once the bear was safely in the Witch’s arms, she turned her back to them and said, “Don’t ever touch my daughter’s things!”

“Sorry…” Lily said timidly, as Peter helped her back to her feet. “I…I didn’t know—”

The Witch stormed past her, muttering something under her breath about the snoopiness of “the little brats”, marched into the staffroom, and slammed the door shut behind her.

“What just happened?” said Mindy. She came over to examine Lily for any wounds.

“I’m alright. Well, mostly…I was just looking to see if there was any food and I saw the teddy bear on the table. I didn’t know it was her daughter’s though. I didn’t even hear her say that she had a daughter!”

“That’s because she didn’t tell us that until just now.” Mindy gently turned Lily’s head from side to side, presumably for any bruising or scratches. When Mindy was finally satisfied with her examination of Lily, Peter then found himself being guided by Mindy alongside Lily towards the Visitor Room. “Come on, we’re just getting started on working on our project for school. Peter, Oliver, why don’t you guys help us?”

“Sure.” Peter piped up. “Sounds good to me.”

The subject that the girls’ project was for was alchemy. A subject that Peter was admittedly not the best in the world at, but he was more than willing to help the two out with. All of the children went to Mt. Wondorica, one of the four mountain-schools in the city they lived in, Flinderyork.

For the project, the triplets had to create an alchemical solution that would allow them to transmute a simple but delicious candy bar—with bits of colourful chocolate—into a bar of solid gold.

“Now…”said Mindy, carefully adding the final ingredient to the bowl holding the mashed-up candy bar with the turkey baster that she brought from home. “In a few minutes, this pile of candy bar pieces should be a pile of golden nuggets!”

Peter leaned in close as he and the others stared at the bowl on the floor, watching for even the slightest signs of change in the sweet treat. A loud pop from the bowl sent a jolt right up Peter’s spine and the whole lot of him and his friends jumped backwards. The bowl of candy bar pieces dissolved into a bubbling, popping goop that was glowing with colours as bright as the candy bar’s coloured pieces of chocolate. The bowl fizzled and popped for a few seconds, but just as the solution was starting to turn a bright gold colour, it gave up a loud puff of smoke and turned into a cold, rock-hard, bowl of burnt chocolate.

“Aw man…” they all sighed together.

“Whelp,” said Peter. “So much for that.”

“I think I’m done with alchemy for now.” Said Oliver.

Everyone seemed to be in agreement with this sentiment. Peter looked around the room and saw a lot of weary looks on everyone’s faces. Whatever relief was provided by the distractions that came up was slowly being eaten away and was almost completely gone now. Thankfully, the wailing from outside was starting to die down a bit, but not nearly enough for any of them to try venturing outside to try and make it back to the campgrounds. Even with his super speed, Peter knew that he wouldn’t be able to match the wicked speed of a ghost that truly wants to get its hands on him.

“Alright then,” Mindy said, jumping to her feet. “There’s only one thing left to do then before we wrap up for the night, I’d say.”

Peter looked around the room and saw confused faces that matched his own. “What do you mean?”

Mindy gave him a quizzical look. “Hello? Prayer, guys. End of night prayer, remember?”

“Oh, right! Forgot that’s all.”

Mindy grabbed the bowl from the middle of the room, placed it out into the hallway, and then came back to join Peter and the others as they gathered around in a circle.

“So,” Peter started. “Besides the obvious ghost stuff, does anyone have anything to pray about?”

“My goldfish is still glowing purple.” Said Oliver. “Can we pray about that?”

“Oh, and my neighbour’s cat still hasn’t come yet.” Said Mindy.

After they had all given their prayer requests, they all bowed their heads. But just as Peter was about to lead in prayer, someone gasped and Peter opened up his eyes again. They were all staring at something behind him. He turned to replace the Witch standing by the hallway entrance just watching them.

“Sorry.” Said the Witch. “Didn’t mean to interrupt. I just wanted to check in on you all.”

“We’re fine,” Mindy said, coldly. “Just leave us alone.”

“Wait, don’t leave.” Said Peter. He ignored the glare Mindy shot at him. “Why don’t you join us?”

“What are you doing?” asked the Witch.

“Just praying.”

“Why?”

“It’s part of what we do for scouts. Since we’re stuck here, we decided to just treat it like a regular scout meeting night and work on some activities and school projects. At the end of every meeting we always close the night with a quick prayer.”

The Witch gave him an apologetic smile. “Well, that’s very nice of you to invite me into your little…prayer circle…but it’s probably for the best if I don’t join you.”

“Why not?” said Oliver. “What if you just sit with us and listen?”

“No, no, that’s quite alright.” Said the Witch, when they all started asking for her to join them—all except for Mindy. “I think I’ll just stay over here and join…in spirit.”

“Alright well, we’ll just have to pray for you then.” Said Peter.

Again, the Witch just offered an awkward smile as thanks and allowed them to continue on as Peter led them in prayer.

“Hi, God. Thanks for keeping us safe in this old Ranger Station while the ghosts are outside. Please help all of the ghosts to rest in peace for the night so that we can get back to the campgrounds before anyone notices we’re gone. Thanks for the Witch and her magic spells—even though we know you don’t like that stuff—and thanks for using it to help keep us safe. Also, please help Mindy’s neighbours replace their lost cat, and—”

“And my fish!” Oliver blurted out.

“Yeah I know!” said Peter, as everyone else around them quickly shushed Oliver. “And Oliver’s goldfish is still purple…please let it go back to normal very soon.”

“And,” said Mindy. “Please let Oliver remember to not take any more advice from the Little Daredevils on how to take care of it so that they don’t prank him like this again in the future.”

“Whatever…” Oliver mumbled under his breath.

“Anyways,” Peter continued. “Thanks again for keeping us safe, and please help the Witch get out of here safely as well to wherever she calls home. Amen!”

“Amen!” everyone echoed.

“Hey, where’d she go?” said Oliver.

Peter turned to replace that the Witch was no longer standing at the edge of the room. He got up to go to the hallway and found her standing in the middle of it, holding the bowl containing their failed alchemy experiment. The others quickly joined him.

“You left in the middle of prayer.” Said Peter.

“I’m sorry,” the Witch smiled apologetically. “But I did warn you that I didn’t think it would be right for me to join you. I heard you mention me, though. Thanks for that, I mean it.”

“You’re welcome.”

“What was this supposed to be?”

“That was Mindy and Lily’s alchemy project for school.”

“Oh, an alchemy project. How wonderful. What were you trying to do?”

“We were trying to turn a candy bar into a bar of real gold.” Peter then told her the alchemical solution the lot of them had drawn up in order to pull this off.

“What’s so funny?” Mindy glared.

The Witch was covering her mouth with her hand, but Peter could still make out the edges of her smile just past it. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t laugh. It’s just that…well, it’s a very ambitious project for children to take on. Where do you go to? Oh, Mt. Wondorica! I assume you’re in your first year of school then, or maybe you're second? Well, I’m sorry to tell you this, but you probably won’t learn how to transmute items into gold on your own until your much older and have much more practice under your belt.”

“Oh…” said Peter.

“But,” continued the Witch. “I think I might have something that could help you all along your journey into alchemy. Come with me, children.” And with that, she spun around on the spot and headed back towards the staff room.

“Follow you?” said Peter, as he lead the others in her direction. “To where? The staff room?”

“Well, yes and no. I have a laboratory that I brought with me to this station some time ago. That’s where I conduct my experiments, only the lab can only be accessed through the staff room. You see, I too am an alchemist.”

“Oh, great.” Mindy rolled her eyes. “We don’t need your help, y’know. We’ll figure it out ourselves.” Mindy then spun around and looked at Oliver and Lily. “Get our alchemy stuff and try adding some Ratweed to the bowl.”

As the Triplets went off with their orders, the Witch said, “Now, kids, I wouldn’t do that if I were—”

“We don’t need your help! You’re dangerous!”

The Witch threw up her hands in surrender. “Alright, suit yourself. If the rest of you want to come with me, I’ll be headed down to my lab to grab some supplies and I would appreciate the help.”

“I’ll go with you.” Said Peter.

“What?” said Lily and Oliver.

“Well, then I’ll come with you too.” Said Lily, which surprised Peter.

“Splendid! Come along then.” The Witch led them back to the staff room and towards the large fridge.