Witchy Trouble (Witchy Fingers Book 1)

by Nic Saint

  “Christ!” Sam barked, and ran into the house, narrowly avoiding dropping down into the basement, and yelling to Pierre, “Watch your step!”

  The women were right, he soon found. In the middle of the greenhouse, which was just as a big of a mess as the house itself, some guy was lying unconscious. He was a big fellow with a fashionable beard, like Iron Man. Whether he was the invisible choker or not he did not know, but if Edelie said he’d tried to attack her and her sisters, that was good enough for him.

  “Do you think this is the guy?” Pierre asked, pointing his gun at the man.

  “We’ll know soon enough,” he said grimly. “Call for backup. And don’t let him out of your sight for one second.”

  He returned inside and briefly thought he saw Ernestine’s face flashing by. But it couldn’t be her, of course, for she was completely blue, like one of those Avatar creatures. He was starting to see things. “Mrs. Beadsmore. Miss Flummox,” he said when he’d joined the two women again, “I’m going to have to take your statements. And those of Ernestine and Estrella too.”

  “Of course,” said Cassandra courteously. “Do we need to travel with you to the police station, Detective? Or can we do this here and now?”

  “Well, I’m afraid you don’t have much of a house left to sit down in.”

  “Yes, that is quite an inconvenience,” Cassandra agreed, sharing an odd look with Edelie. “Perhaps we better join you at the police station, then.”

  “I think that would be for the best. What about Ernestine and Estrella?”

  Cassandra’s eyes closed momentarily, her lips moving wordlessly, and she seemed to make a little gesture with her hands that made Sam frown. Then she opened her eyes again, and yelled out, “Estrella! Ernestine!”

  And to Sam’s surprise, the two sisters suddenly emerged, looking a little frazzled but otherwise perfectly fine. And definitely not blue. “You were really lucky, do you know that?” he asked as they stepped from the house.

  “Oh, we do know that,” said Cassandra. “We are very lucky indeed.”

  There seemed to be some kind of bad blood between the sisters, for when he turned around, Estrella was pulling Edelie’s hair for some reason, and Ernestine was pinching her. Sisters, he thought with a chuckle. He had two sisters himself, and whether they were two or twenty, nothing ever changed.

  And as he opened the door to let the women into his car, he told them, “I’ll just be a minute,” and hurried back into the house. And as he strode in, to his surprise the big hole in the hallway wasn’t there anymore, as if the floor had somehow magically repaired itself. He stared at it for a moment, then shook his head. Seeing things, just like before. This case was getting to him.

  And when he stepped into the garden, he saw that the killer had regained consciousness, and he was now handcuffed, in spite of his vocal protestations.

  “I won’t be arrested!” he shouted. “I can’t be arrested!”

  “Well, then this is a first for you, huh?” Sam shouted back.

  “You’ll never convict me,” the killer taunted, his remarkable black eyes glittering menacingly. “You haven’t got a shred of evidence! Nothing!”

  “We’ll convict you, all right,” Sam growled, getting into the guy’s face. “We’ve got eyewitnesses who’ll testify you attacked them in their own home.”

  “No, they won’t,” he said, staring him down, cool as a cucumber.

  “Wanna bet?” he asked, then told Pierre, “Get this guy out of here.”

  In the distance, police sirens could be heard, backup on approach. It was still a mystery what had happened here, but he was sure the Flummox sisters and their grandmother would paint a complete picture, and then the invisible choker would get what he deserved, the women of this city finally safe again.

  Epilogue

  The three sisters were seated around the kitchen table, while Gran was cooking up a storm. In celebration of their newly restored house, she’d decided that it was time for her magical pancakes—pancakes with that extra special ingredient that made them extra-yummy. What the ingredient was, Gran had never disclosed. “That’s why it’s a secret!” she always said.

  Edelie thought it was simply better butter in the batter. And more sugar, of course. She was trying to read a book, but was having a hard time focusing, for the TV was blaring in the corner of the kitchen, Gran was happily prattling on about her pancakes, and Strel and Stien were trying to decide how many witches it took to vanquish a warlock. At the moment they agreed on a dozen, which Edelie thought was simply not right.

  “It only takes one witch to vanquish a warlock, you guys,” she finally said with a groan. “Don’t you get it? We girls are just as powerful as guys are!”

  “So why did it take the four of us to vanquish Joshua?” Ernestine asked.

  “Actually it took one witch to vanquish him. Gran,” Edelie pointed out. “All we did was make sure she could do her job while we distracted him.”

  “She’s right, you know,” said Estrella, studying her newly painted fingernails. “All we did was free Gran so she could take care of Joshua.”

  “So then why isn’t he dead? If it only takes one witch to destroy a warlock, why is Joshua in jail right now and not, you know, gone?”

  Edelie’s attention was drawn to the television, where Sam Barkley was just being interviewed. “Um, you guys? I think you should see this.”

  Estrella turned up the volume, and the threesome stared at the screen, where Sam stood defending himself against an irate crowd in front of the police station. Apparently Joshua had just walked from jail, free as a bird, the NYPD incapable of keeping him locked up for lack of evidence.

  “Where are the witnesses?” a CNN reporter was yelling. “I thought you said you had eyewitnesses to the invisible choker’s crimes? Where are they?”

  Sam was looking extremely agitated, and Edelie couldn’t blame him. Joshua walking was a big embarrassment to his department. “They backed out at the last minute. Seems like the whole thing was just one big mistake.”

  The three sisters turned to Gran, aghast. “Gran!” cried Ernestine. “You didn’t!”

  Gran shrugged. “I can’t very well tell the police that we’re witches and that we were attacked by a warlock, can I? Joshua threatened to expose us.”

  They’d gone into the station where Sam had questioned them, and Edelie had discovered it was very hard to say anything without compromising themselves. They couldn’t tell the police that Joshua had taken the place of Gran. They couldn’t tell them he destroyed the house by growing as big as the house itself. They couldn’t talk about the gemstones and their mystical powers and how he used them to kill witches. And they certainly couldn’t tell them Gran had vanquished him by knocking him out with one of her spells!

  So in the end the only thing she’d told Sam was that Joshua had dropped by the house that night and had threatened to kill them and that they’d jumped him and subdued him. Sam was disappointed, and seemed to feel they were holding back. He wanted to know why the house was demolished, and when she told him it was a gas explosion, he slammed the table and said Gran had told him it was an earthquake—miraculously ignoring all the other houses on the block—that Estrella said a tornado had struck out of the blue and Ernestine thought it was a meteor that had crashed through the roof.

  No, it was safe to say Sam Barkley wasn’t their biggest fan right now, but to let Joshua walk like this? That was insane!

  “He can’t do anybody any harm,” Gran pointed out as she placed the plate with pancakes on the table. “I took away his powers, remember?”

  “All he needs to regain them is to murder another witch!” Estrella pointed out, and to this Gran didn’t seem to have an answer, for she merely smiled.

  And they’d just dug in, the four of them—though Estrella said she really shouldn’t, considering the diet she was on—when the doorbell rang.

  “Oh, I’ll get it,” Edelie grumbled when the others simply ignored it. She loved pa
ncakes, and she hoped her sisters wouldn’t devour the entire stack.

  Before she left the kitchen, she caught Gran’s eye, and saw that that same smile was still firmly in place. A little puzzled, she sauntered off.

  She slouched through the hallway, then opened the door with a sigh, fully expecting it to be the UPS guy again, carrying yet another package for Strel. She’d become addicted to the Home Shopping Network lately, buying up widgets by the dozen. But when she opened the door, the first thing she saw was that funky little Iron Man beard, and then those intensely black eyes.

  Before she could slam the door shut, she was punched in the chest by the imposing warlock and was flung back several feet, landing on Gran’s new Persian rug. Gasping for breath, she cried out, “Joshua! He’s back!”

  The evil warlock stepped inside, towering over her with a vicious grin on his face. “I have some unfinished business here,” he sneered as he took a whiff. “Mh. Pancakes. My favorite. Well, apart from the smell of dead witches, of course.” And when Estrella and Ernestine came rushing in from the kitchen, he smirked. “Oh, there you are. Like I told your chubby sister, I seem to have mislaid something.” He brought a finger to his lips in mock contemplation. “Oh, yes. My powers!”

  And at this, he strew a string of small gemstones from his fingers. They rolled across the floor in Edelie’s direction, and before she could scramble to her feet, they were circling her, and then they were up in the air around her, whirling at dizzying speed, turning into the deadly hoops she knew so well. And with every revolution, they seemed to grow bigger and deadlier.

  “But Gran took away your powers!” she shouted.

  He grinned. “Yes, she did. But my gems only need the tiniest little bit of witchiness to get them going again. What little you have, my dear Edelie, is plenty. More than enough to take you out, and restore my powers in full.”

  “That’s not gonna happen,” Edelie grunted, raising her hands. She was sick and tired of this guy.

  “You killed our parents!” Estrella yelled.

  “You don’t deserve to live!” Ernestine added.

  Joshua laughed. “Oh, the three little witches are giving me lip? Well, without your granny you’re not as powerful as you think you are.” And with a flick of the hand, he sent the hoops whirling and attaching themselves to the three sisters’ throats, beginning their vile work of choking them.

  But the triplets were finally done with the creep.

  “Hvirfillia!” they all shouted simultaneously, pointing their hands at the warlock. It was an old spell Gran had taught them a long time ago, to make their crib mobiles spin faster or in different directions. They wanted to make this guy’s head spin so fast he’d think twice about coming back here.

  Joshua was still laughing, his arms outstretched as he soaked up the witching powers of the Flummox triplets. But then, suddenly, his smile disappeared, as first his head started spinning, just like his own hoops, then his neck, and finally his torso and his legs. Parts of his body were all spinning at different velocities, as the three sisters’ spells were highly uncoordinated.

  And then their coordination broke down completely, as his head spun to the right, his torso to the left, and his legs to the right again, with all his joints spinning in yet different directions still, and at different speeds. The warlock’s entire body seemed completely out of control now.

  “Hey!” he cried, sounding a little garbled. “Stop that!”

  But the three sisters didn’t let up, and as they kept repeating ‘Hvirfillia!’ under their breaths, their hands kept whirling, tiny colorful sparks now flying from their fingertips and joining the weird dance in front of them.

  It was working, for Edelie felt the chokehold of the hoop around her neck finally easing up, and then dropping away completely, as the hoop lost its power and dropped at her feet. Then, just as suddenly, all the hoops zoomed back to their master and joined the frantic dance of whirling body parts.

  And even as Edelie rose to her feet, and the three sisters now stood side by side, the warlock disappeared in a cloud of crazily vibrating colors and lights, smoke rising up as if from a clockwork whose parts are spinning into oblivion. Then there was an enormous bang, and when the smoke finally cleared, the warlock was gone! A bunch of marbles dropped to the floor, before they themselves also popped, one by one, and vanished into thin air. Soon, nothing was left of Joshua but a small greenish stain on the rug.

  “Nothing Mr. Clean can’t fix,” Edelie said with a satisfied nod.

  Just then, Gran walked out of the kitchen, a stern look on her face. “Girls! Your pancakes are getting cold!” Then she threw one look at the green stain, and muttered, “Need to clean that up.” And with a minute gesture of her head and a whispered spell, the stain suddenly vanished with a soft crumpling sound, and Joshua, the invisible choker, was gone for good.

  Gran eyed the three of them intently for a moment, then a warm smile lit up her gentle features, and she gave them a knowing nod, as if to say, ‘You guys did good.’ When she disappeared into the kitchen again, she was muttering something about stains, as if none of this had ever happened.

  The three sisters shared a proud grin. They might not be the greatest witches in the world, and every single one of their spells backfired quite disastrously, but they’d still managed to vanquish their first warlock.

  And as Edelie glanced around the hallway, which was now back the way it was before the intrusion of Joshua, as was the rest of the house and garden, she felt a sudden and very uncharacteristic surge of happiness bubbling up inside of her. For the first time in years, she felt she actually had a purpose in life. Something uniquely hers. And as she stared at her fingers, she saw they were still sparkling softly. And as she watched, the sparkle briefly flared up, then danced from her fingers and across the hall, soon joined by the sparkles of her sisters. The yellow, blue and red twinkles playfully leaped into the picture frame of their parents, hung next to the hallway mirror.

  And as the threesome watched in fascination, the sparkles reached their parents’ eyes, and a soft but distinct whisper could be heard. “Witchy fingers!”

  And when Edelie looked at her two sisters, she could tell they’d heard it, too, for they grinned just as wickedly as she did. Whether Gran liked it or not, her three girls were blessed with witchy fingers. On this, the eve of their twenty-first birthday, they’d finally discovered their purpose, and it wasn’t singing, or cooking, or lawyering. It was thieving, like only witches can…

  Excerpt from Between a Ghost and a Spooky Place

  Chapter One

  “I didn’t think you’d show up,” the gruff voice announced.

  Harry looked up from her perusal of the latest James Patterson. She quickly closed the book and shoved it into her backpack, then rose from her perch on the low wall of the underpass. She shrugged as she approached the hulking figure. “I’m always true to my word,” she told the man, doing her best not to look or sound intimidated.

  He really was a giant of a man, though she’d been told he wasn’t as dangerous as he looked. He could have fooled her, though. He had no neck to speak of, his arms alone were probably as thick as her waist, and she could have fitted several times in the long black overcoat he was wearing, she herself being rather on the petite side.

  She pushed her blond tresses from her brow and fixed her golden eyes on the stranger, rubbing her hands to keep warm. She’d removed her gloves and knitted cap and now thought perhaps she shouldn’t have. The cold drizzle that had started overnight had turned into a real downpour, and even though they were protected from the brunt of the autumn weather by the underpass, the wet cold still crept in Harry’s clothes and chilled her to the bone.

  “Let’s do this,” the man grumbled. “I haven’t got all day.”

  The watery sun that had tried to pierce the dark deck of clouds that afternoon had finally given up its struggle, giving free rein to the driving rain. But then this was London, a city that for some reason had collec
tively decided the sun had no business here, except on those very rare occasions.

  She quickly unzipped the main compartment of her backpack and took out the package, then handed it to the client. Through the clear plastic protective cover it was easy to make out its contents, but the burly man insisted on taking the book out nonetheless.

  “You’re going to get it all smudged,” Harry murmured, though she knew this was none of her business. Once the transaction was made, the book belonged to the client, to do with as they pleased, whether she liked it or not.

  “Looking good,” the man muttered, flipping through the pages of the voluminous tome. “How do I know it’s the real deal?”

  “You have Sir Buckley’s word,” she said with a light shrug.

  The client scrutinized her carefully, shoving the book back into its plastic covering. Then he nodded once. “Good enough for me,” he announced. He handed her a small black briefcase. “One million. As agreed,” he told her.

  She balanced the briefcase on her knee and clicked it open. Two thousand 500 pound notes should be there and as far as she could determine they were all present and accounted for. But then again, she didn’t think the client was going to cheat her. And even if he did, Buckley would handle it.

  So she clasped the briefcase under her arm and looked up at the man, a little trepidatious. Buckley had always told her to conclude the meeting the moment the transfer was done, and only rarely did a client linger. This one still stood staring at her, however, as if their business wasn’t concluded yet. They were the only two people there, as the underpass was quite deserted.

  This was Buckley’s favorite place to make a transfer, as this particular spot wasn’t covered by any of London’s half a million cameras. Which also meant that if a client decided to get any funny ideas, Harry had no recourse. It wasn’t as if she had a black belt in jujitsu or some other martial arts discipline. She’d recently watched a video on the Daily Mail website on how to protect yourself against an attack, but hadn’t the foggiest notion how to execute those nifty self-defense moves in real life.