Witch Myth Omnibus: A Yew Hollow Cozy Mystery

by Alexandria Clarke

  I opened my mouth to argue, to say that there had to be some other way to complete the ritual, but Cassandra whisked herself away, chaperoning my sisters into the night. I looked at Gwenlyn then gestured to the door. “Lead the way, boss.”

  I had never been to the mayor’s house before. It wasn’t a mansion by any definition, but it was easily one of the grandest homes in Yew Hollow. Large columns flanked either side of its oakwood double doors, and a beautiful terra cotta terrace circled the second floor. This, according to Gwenlyn, was our way in.

  “Dominic only placed protection wards on the first floor,” she explained as we crept through the shrubbery in the backyard. “I guess he didn’t think anyone would be able to get up to the second level, but there’s a giant oak tree right by the edge of the balcony. Idiot.”

  The tree itself soon came into view. Sure enough, it soared right up to the balcony, its lower branches easily reachable. Gwen glanced up at the windows of the house to make sure no one was looking out of them and then darted across the yard, sliding into the shadows beneath the large tree. I followed suit. The tree was the perfect cover. I could barely make Gwenlyn out in the darkness as she pulled herself up to the first branch and started climbing.

  Small twigs and broken leaves pattered down as Gwenlyn made her way up, so I kept my head ducked as I scaled the tree. It was a long way up, and my shoulders burned with the effort, but soon enough, the railing of the terrace was only a hand's breadth away. Gwenlyn had already made it onto the balcony, so she reached out a hand to steady me as I swung one leg over the railing.

  “Nice,” she whispered, when both of my feet were on solid ground again. “Over here.”

  The terrace was being renovated, and towering stacks of new terra cotta tiles had been piled up along the side of the house. We edged around these, taking care not to trip over the crumbling, cracked tiles that poked up from the balcony, and inched toward the first window. Gwenlyn peered inside, gave me the thumbs up, and we rushed past it together. The second window yielded a similar reaction. The view at the third window, however, in the center of the terrace, caused Gwenlyn to shrink away from it. She pressed a finger to her lips and pointed inside. My heart thundering, I switched places with her and glanced through the window.

  I looked into a capacious, well-decorated bedroom adorned with an elegant canopied bed and an old-fashioned writing desk. Dominic sat at the desk, facing away from the window, his forehead cradled in his hands. On the bed, his mother and his sister lingered in stark contrast to the opulent linens. The state of them shocked me. Somehow, the inhuman pallor of their bilious green skin was even more disturbing to behold than that of the reanimated corpses in the cemetery. Their eyes were so deeply sunken in that they appeared black, and I could practically hear the chilling rattle of breath across their prominent rib cages and protuberant collar bones.

  I swallowed back bile and glanced at Gwen. She nodded solemnly, confirming what was already evident. Dominic’s mother and sister were in no condition to be considered alive, and yet they were also far from dead. I thought back to when Dominic had first freed them from the otherworld. They had looked healthy enough, despite having been dead for several years, but in the time since then, to say that both women had taken a turn for the worse was a massive understatement.

  “They look even more terrible than the last time I saw them,” Gwenlyn whispered in a voice so quiet that it was almost swept away by the light breeze. “Must be because you’ve returned to earth.”

  “Too bad they won’t just wither away on their own then,” I muttered back.

  As a silvery ghost entered the room, I retreated slightly from the window, scared to draw attention to our position on the terrace. Muted conversation met my ears as Dominic and the ghost—a slender, middle-aged man that I didn’t recognize—spoke to one another. Suppressing the blue light of my witchcraft, I spoke the Latin for an eavesdropping spell, and the ghost’s gruff baritone echoed out to the terrace as if the window was wide open.

  “...haven’t seen hide nor hair of him ever since,” the ghost was saying.

  Dominic slammed his fist down on the writing desk. “What’s the point of having you idiots around if you can’t even keep track of one another? Find Ronan, you halfwit. He can’t have gone far, and he’s the only one of you morons who wants to shed the coven’s blood as much as I do. I need him.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The ghost made to leave the room, but Dominic called out again. “Wait,” he said, standing up from the writing desk. “Have you checked on the coven recently?”

  “No, sir,” said the ghost. “We were under the impression that there was no need to do so. Your trance is still in effect, is it not?”

  When Dominic turned to his mother and sister, I saw his face for the first time since he had unwittingly sent me to the otherworld. It was a travesty of his previous pulchritude. Not long ago, Dominic’s piercing blue eyes and confident smile could’ve entranced a whole room of women with just one look. Now, he looked more like a demon in disguise as a human. His cheekbones had hollowed out, and dark shadows encircled his eyes. He seemed thinner, less muscled, as if he had lost a lot of weight in a short amount of time. I wrenched my gaze away from Dominic—his haggard appearance was sure to haunt my nightmares—and focused on the ghost instead.

  “As far as I know, it is,” Dominic replied. He lightly caressed his sister’s hair, and several long strands of it came away in his hand. He balled it up in his fist. “They shouldn’t be like this, damn it!” He spun around to address the ghost again. “Something’s happened, I know it has. They were still walking just hours ago. Now they won’t even blink.”

  The ghost watched silently as Dominic snapped his fingers in front of his mother’s face. She made no indication that he even stood before her.

  “God damn it!” Dominic roared. He crossed the room swiftly to confront his cohort. “I want every Summers woman dead, do you hear me? Round them up in the town square, Carter. Sacrificing all of them at the yew tree is sure to be enough to return my mother and sister to their natural states.”

  “Are you sure you want to do that, sir?” Carter asked in a mild tone. “The townspeople are sure to notice if their beloved witches suddenly disappear.”

  “The townspeople are under my control,” said Dominic lethally. “Do you dare question my orders?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Then do as you’re damn well told, Carter.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Now.”

  Carter turned to leave the room, his silvery light disappearing around the corner.

  “And find Ronan!” Dominic bellowed after him, his hollowed chest heaving with the force of his shout.

  I moved away from the window, gesturing for Gwenlyn to follow me. We needed to get back to the rest of the coven before Dominic could send his ghosts in, and we had to find a way to complete the ritual destruction of the yew tree. There was no time to waste. We hurried across the length of the terrace, aiming for our natural ladder that was the old oak tree, but I slipped on a cracked terra cotta tile and landed with a loud thud. For one moment, Gwen and I stayed frozen, hoping that Dominic hadn’t heard my clumsy misstep, but the sound of the balcony door swinging open stopped my heart.

  “Run,” I said to Gwenlyn, pushing myself up.

  She took off at an impressive sprint, hurdling the railing of the terrace and landing amongst the thick branches of the oak tree. I ran after her as she disappeared from view, but my knee had taken the brunt of the fall and could barely hold any weight. I limped toward the railing, glancing behind me. Then I wished I hadn’t.

  Dominic stood at the balcony doors, his lips curled into a dangerous smile. He was the devil incarnate. As I raced for the edge of the terrace, he made no movement to follow me, but just as I planted my hands on the railing to climb over it, a ray of pale-green witchcraft swept over me. I was wrenched away from the railing, dragged back toward Dominic by whatever spell he had employ
ed. Horrified, I tried to summon a defense spell to free myself, but I was too distracted by Dominic’s wicked grin to actually work my witchcraft. I slid to a stop at Dominic’s feet, and his spell held me frozen in place.

  “Morgan Summers,” he drawled, gazing down at me. “No wonder my mother and sister have deteriorated so quickly. When did you return from the otherworld?”

  “None of your damn business,” I said. I couldn’t feel my fingers or toes. Whatever Dominic had done to me had numbed my entire body except for my head. I turned away from Dominic as he knelt down to my level and lifted a hand to run his fingers through my hair.

  “I missed you,” he said, “but I wished you had stayed dead.”

  My snarky reply died in my throat as he gripped my chin and forced me to look at him.

  “Do you know what I’m going to do tonight?” asked Dominic, and his blue eyes flashed with an intensity that I had once found handsome. The thought now made my stomach heave. “I’m going to kill your entire family, and I’m going to make you watch.”

  And before I could respond, he pressed his dry, wasted lips to mine.

  A loud crack echoed across the terrace, and Dominic disconnected himself from me to cradle the back of his head. As he turned away, he revealed Gwenlyn, standing above him and holding a broken piece of terra cotta tile between her hands. She had hit Dominic over the head with it. His attention to me wavered, and his spell released me. Dominic grappled for Gwenlyn’s knees, sending her tumbling across the terrace as she attempted to beat him away with the tile. I seized the back of Dominic’s shirt, wrenching him away from Gwenlyn. On one of Gwenlyn’s swings, the edge of the terra cotta tile had sliced a deep gash above his right eye. Blood poured from the wound, and Dominic wiped at it with the back of his sleeve, trying to clear his field of vision. I took the opportunity to aim a healthy kick between his legs. He grunted, keeling over. Then I grasped Gwenlyn around the waist—she had twisted her ankle in her effort to ward off Dominic—and half carried her to the railing. I heaved her over, listening closely for any signs of Dominic’s recovery, then vaulted the railing myself. As I shinnied down the oak tree, I caught one last glimpse of Dominic Dobbes. He was slumped up against the wall of the house, his palm pressed to the gash in his forehead, but his unobstructed eye remained fixed on me as I followed Gwenlyn to the ground.

  Chapter Eight

  In Which There Is Only One Way

  Gwenlyn and I didn’t pause to rest until we were well away from the mayor’s house. We stumbled into a small clearing of the surrounding woods, both of us panting heavily. Gwenlyn leaned against a tree, rotating her ankle to feel out her injury. As she generated an easy healing spell, the strand of her witchcraft that now resided in me quivered like a single guitar string being plucked. I wondered if the rest of the witches were able to feel it as well or if it was just my close proximity to Gwenlyn that allowed me to ride shotgun on her spell.

  Without the distraction of Dominic’s immediate presence, I could focus again on my own mind. There were several new things to explore, new abilities contributed by the other witches as my mother and sisters added them to the bond. I now had access to a whole host of powers, including weather manipulation, animal translation, the capacity to move and control shadows, and an innate sense as to where every other witch in the coven was currently located. I rifled through the coven’s collective potential, organizing the information into separate compartments of my brain to avoid being overwhelmed by it. A sense of unmitigated joy radiated through me. If every witch felt the same phenomenal cohesiveness that I did, the coven actually stood a chance against Dominic and his minions. I looked at Gwenlyn.

  “Do you feel that too?” she asked, still out of breath.

  I nodded, unable to keep a grin off my face. “We should’ve done this before Dominic even had a chance to get his army out of the ground.”

  “If you hadn’t been dead, that might have been an option,” joked Gwenlyn. She tested her freshly healed ankle. “How’s your knee?”

  Thankfully, the pain in my knee had subsided, but a dark bruise made the situation look worse than it was. Following Gwenlyn’s lead, I did a healing spell and watched as the bruise easily vanished in a few seconds. I gave a low whistle. It was the fastest healing spell I’d ever performed. I leaned experimentally on that leg, gleefully noting the complete absence of any pain.

  “Good as new,” I told Gwenlyn. She shook her head in stunned disbelief.

  Suddenly, a tug of power seemed to pull my eyelids shut. I went with it, recognizing my mother’s aura behind it. Cassandra had once described to all of her daughters what one of her visions felt like, so I didn’t panic when my view of the clearing was replaced with the dining room of the Summers house. My mother and sisters were due to soon return there with all twenty or so members of the coven in tow. Every seat of the dining room table was occupied as Cassandra filled the witches in on what Dominic had done to them. Then the vision vanished, and I returned to the clearing. From her absent expression, Gwenlyn had also been included in Cassandra’s vision.

  “Let’s hurry back,” I said, crossing the clearing to wave a hand in front of Gwenlyn’s perplexed face. “We have to get to the yew tree and perform the ritual before Dominic has a chance to stop us.”

  We hurried back to the house. Sure enough, the rest of the coven sat waiting for us, and when Gwenlyn and I stumbled into the dining room, a resounding round of applause burst forth from the witches. Heat rushed to my face as Gwenlyn stepped away from me and joined in on the applause.

  “Enough,” I said, waving my hands to silence the coven. The clapping died down, thank goodness. I thought I would explode from embarrassment. “Listen up, everyone. By now, I’m sure that Cassandra has filled you in on my return and Dominic’s intent, but we have bad news.”

  “More?” said someone from the back of the room.

  “Unfortunately,” I said. “As you know, Dominic’s mother and sister have all but wasted away. Dominic knows that I’m back from the otherworld, and he thinks that all of you are still under his trance. He intends to sacrifice the entire coven beneath the yew tree tonight in the hopes that it will revivify his mother and sister.”

  It was a mark of the severity of the situation that the coven did not erupt in angered conversation as they usually did at any mention of trouble. Instead, each witch gave me her undivided attention, waiting for further information and instruction.

  “We all share each other’s abilities now,” I said, too aware that my words now were more of a motivational, directional speech than anything else. The coven would take whatever I said and run with it. “You’ll all be able to see Dominic’s ghosts now, and obviously, you are no longer susceptible to Dominic’s hold over the town. We have to take advantage of our connection with one another. The next few hours hold an uncertain future. Take this time to embrace each other’s gifts, to become one with your sisters, because it is our bond and our dedication to our family’s survival that will ultimately be our greatest defense. Forget your quarrels, your daily afflictions, and yourself. We are a single entity, and we will not allow Dominic Dobbes to soil the Summers name.”

  The intensity of the witches’ spirits in the dining room was nearly palpable. They listened to my declamation with rapt attention, and when I paused for a breath, they remained silent and alert, as if expecting more.

  “I’m proposing a plan,” I continued, “and I encourage every witch in this room to speak up with any improvements or revisions to this plan. Our goal is to regain the power of the original Summers coven. To do so, we must ritually burn the yew tree. The only problem here is Dominic’s presence. If he catches wind of what we’re doing, he’ll send his army to the town square faster than we can say ‘demon.’ As such, I believe we need to create a diversion to distract Dominic and lure him as far away from the town square as possible. Any suggestions?”

  One of my eldest aunts, Alberta, raised a hand.

  “Yes?” I called to her.


  “It sounds like Dominic has already planned to come and collect the coven for his sacrifice, has he not?” Alberta asked.

  “From what Gwenlyn and I gathered, that is correct,” I said with a nod.

  “In that case, why not go along with his plan?” suggested Alberta. “He’s unaware of the fact that we’ve broken free of the trance. Half of the coven can wait in our homes and allow him to gather us together. That way, we can devise a sneak attack and detain him, while the other half of the coven performs the ritual at the yew tree. With any luck, Dominic won’t know we’ve stripped him of the original power until it’s too late.”

  I tipped my head in pleasant awe. Alberta had always seemed like one of the crazier entities in the coven, but here she was with a perfectly workable plan. Had I communicated more effectively with the rest of the coven in the past, we might not have ended up neck-deep in Dominic’s emotional trash.

  “Any qualms with that?” I asked the rest of the coven. No one objected. “Good. Before we start splitting up, though, I have one more thing to run by all of you.” I drew in a deep, steadying breath, planting my hands on the dining room table for support. “During the ritual at the yew tree, a new coven leader must be elected. The forces of the universe”—I gestured airily around me, implying that said forces weren’t exactly reliable—“have elected me to take over this responsibility for my mother. Despite this, I feel the need to ask every witch of this coven her option. Do you feel that this privilege and duty should fall to me? Or shall we vote on another course of action?”

  As the question left my tongue, lingering in the tense atmosphere of the dining room, I found my mother’s gray eyes. A glint of pride flashed within them as she gazed upon me, and when she gave me a tiny nod of approval, my lower lip trembled in anticipation of tears. I bit down on it, determined to retain a stalwart demeanor before the rest of the coven, but when no one member of the coven raised any grievance at my question, I let slip a disjointed inhalation.