“Thus, they are considered the devils of the witching world,” Elder Rathburn speaks up from behind me, her creaky old voice ratcheting up my spine. “They are the single most feared and hated coven of witches on earth.”
I shudder at the thought, the hairs on my neck standing. “So, what do we do?”
“What can we do?” Elder Rathburn continues. “We have sound reason to believe we are in danger. We must prepare ourselves for battle.”
“With all due respect, Elder Rathburn, we need proof,” Cousin Viv says.
“Yes, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Shurgum blusters, all while my heart pounds in my ears.
“You say you’ve seen it? The mark of the Druens?” I turn to Cousin Viv.
“Of course, she has,” Elder Rathburn rasps. “The double ‘X’ is unmistakable! No man, beast, witch, or warlock will be safe if the Druens are turned loose on Hex Falls, you mark my word!”
“I hear you, Elder Rathburn, but I want to hear it from her.” I turn back to Cousin Viv. “Is it true. Did you find the mark?”
“I did. Your uncle saw it too.” She drops her chin.
“There, you see, we are under attack!” Elder Rathburn throws up her aged and trembling hands. “We must not delay this time. We must take action!”
“This time.” I turn on her. “You think somehow this is my fault?” I touch my chest. “You think it’s me who’s brought this upon us, don’t you?” She lowers her eyes. “Because of my incompetence of letting the ex-Supreme Leader go. A man with virtually no powers—”
“And no country.” She levels her gaze at me. “The perfect candidate for the Druens to recruit. Think about it.” She shoots toward me. “They are always looking for recruits. The disgruntled, the rejected, the cast aside. He seems to fit the bill pretty perfectly, don’t you think?”
A small wave of terror rolls over me. “You think the ex-Supreme Leader has gone off to join the Druens?”
“Well, you did send him packing without a coven and the thirst to get his magic back.” She narrows her blackened eyes at me. “A man who knows all there is to know about not only us, and our coven, but you, my dear.” She breathes out the words.
The marrow turns to ice in my bones.
“An unscrupulous soul who would do anything to get his magic back.” Her fingers spark.
“But he hasn’t any magic. He has no power at all. I saw to that. He was stripped of it before I sent him to be locked up in the caverns.”
“Ah...” She creeps closer, raising a sparking finger to my face. “But did you erase the final twinkle from his eyes.”
“What?”
“The final step necessary to successfully debilitate a witch, rendering him, or her, utterly powerless and unable to draw magic from any other source—for as long as the witch may live.” She smiles. “It’s usually, ceremoniously done, right before shoving him or her off to Nothingness Island, in a sort of ritual before the gods? Which, of course, in this case, didn’t happen.”
I swallow hard, fighting the urge to turn and run. No one told me of this possibility. Then again, I didn’t ask. There was so little time and so much confusion.
“You mean he could—”
“Be out there right now negotiating his powers back from the Druens, for say, an irresistible swap.” Her chilling eyes twinkle. “Perhaps his powers in exchange to access to the most powerful witch to ever live.” She tilts her head. “That would be quite the prize, wouldn’t it?” She smiles.
Elder Rathburn’s words burn in my chest.
“Oh heavens, no.” I gasp and reach for a chair back to steady myself, a rush of revelations flood over me. What have I done?
As blunders go, this is a whopper, Violet.
“So, just to recap.” I take a breath. “By allowing our corrupt and vindictive ex-Supreme Leader to escape, before making sure he was completely drained of his powers, he may right now be negotiating with, or have already joined, a bat-winged, witch extremist group of thugs, whose mandate it is to destroy all the good in the world...along with me and my coven.”
“Bingo,” Elder Rathburn rasps sardonically.
Wow, could this day get any better? I twist my hands.
I look around into the worried, distrusting, and judgmental eyes of my coven and draw in a breath. “Well then...” I pull up to my full height. “First things first then.” I exhale shakily, trying not to show them how worried I am. “I’d better go round up our former leader, immediately.”
And deal with him properly this time. I swallow.
“And then we’ll deal with this band of anti-venom witches.” I turn to leave. “So, you’d all better prepare yourselves for battle.”
Elder Rathburn’s teeth come together with a clack.
“What?” I turn to her. “How else does one deal with a fascist, bat-winged group of extremists who show up threatening to take down her coven?”
“It’s not that. It’s just that,” Elder Shurgum calls after me, “well, to be honest, it’s been a long time since our coven went to battle.”
“Two hundred years, in fact,” someone else adds.
“Then I suggest we rally the troops,” I say, firmly. “Because this coven’s not going down without a fight. Oh, and one more thing,” I say before I leave. “I’ll have you all know, right here, right now”—I stab a finger at the cloud floor and stare at Elder Rathburn—”it may be true that I am young and green, and I may have made a terrible first decision, but I’m also smart and cunning and not about to give up. I got us into this mess, and I’ll be getting us out of it.”
I turn and exit the room.
Even if I have to die, trying.
Chapter 3
I sink into one of Sotherby’s highbacked, cushy armchairs in the library and exhale, grateful for a brief reprieve from all the political witching mess I’ve created.
I love design work, and it loves me.
More than I can say for my witches’ council.
Though, we did leave things off on a better note than I expected.
I’ve already sent my henchmen—I mean, my new personal security hounds—off to try and track down the whereabouts of the ex-Supreme Leader again. Gods knows I’ve tried to find him. They claim they know all his local haunts, and he can’t have gone that far, according to them, on such little magical energy, and yet, he continues to elude me.
Here’s hoping he hasn’t caught up with the Druens yet and gotten himself re-charged.
My fingers are double crossed on that one.
I lean across the table, where my latest design board choices are all laid out for Sotherby to consider. Three choices per usual. “I’m unsure of the red one,” I say, tapping it. “What do you think?” Nervous butterflies take flight in my stomach.
“Unsure?” Sotherby cocks a curious brow. “Well, there’s something new. Violet Vance is unsure.” He runs his ghostly gray eyes over my troubled face. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this way.”
“Well, it is the formal parlor, after all. We have to get it right.”
“And we will. That’s not what I meant though.” Sotherby studies me curiously across the tabletop. “What is it? What’s troubling you?”
He looks at me as though he already knows. He can always sense when I’m off. We’ve grown strangely close in that way. Closer than anyone else I’ve ever known. “It’s nothing, really. I’m sorry. I’m afraid my head has been in the clouds all morning.” Quite literally.
“It can’t be nothing for you to be deferring to me on color choice.” He arches a solitary brow.
Suddenly, decorating Sotherby’s mansion seems far less important than discussing the pressing matters at hand. But I must keep the business side separate from my witching life. How else will I support myself? In the mortal half of my life that is. I refuse to give that up. My independence means a lot to me—witch council leader or not. I may be a prize witch and the new Supreme Leader, but a girl still has to have something to call her own.
Somehow, I need to learn to strike a balance between my two worlds. I can’t keep expecting Sotherby to be tolerant of all my otherworldly interruptions. Yet, everything is still so new. It’s so very difficult to sit here, pondering wallpaper and curtain choices, when a rogue band of anti-venom magic wielding witches may be indoctrinating the escaped ex-Supreme Leader into their herd. I drum my fingernails on the tabletop.
How is one to concentrate when that might be about to happen?
It’s all a little more than one starter-witch can handle. Or should I say, starter-witch-demi- goddess.
“Forget the boards,” Sotherby says, pushing them away. “Come.” He stands, offering me an arm. “Let us retire to the study for tea, where we can discuss what is really bothering you.”
“We shouldn’t,” I protest, falling back in my chair. “I mean...I’m already so behind on your house after all that’s happened.”
“Psshaw!” he tuts. “The house has waited a hundred and twenty-five years to be redone. It can wait a little longer. Besides, we’re making slow progress.” He smiles and shows me his arm again.
This time, I take it, and he tugs me off toward the library, gently patting the back of my hand as he floats. “You’re cold, my dear, and a little shaky. This must be very important.”
How does he know?
He always knows. My heart trips in my chest at the thought of that...and the way he looks at me that makes me think, if had I been born a hundred and thirty years ago, things between us might be very, very different.
I erase that thought immediately.
After all, Sotherby can read my mind. Though we have an agreement about that. He is never to do that without my permission. However, I know it wouldn’t be above his station to breach it. I smile.
Still, I can’t explain, but I get a deep, warm, all-encompassing feeling every time we’re together that feels a lot like something it shouldn’t. It preposterous really. It’s not like there could ever be anything between us.
Yet the feeling when I’m with him overwhelms me sometimes.
“There we are.” He lets go of my arm, guiding me down into a chair. The softer of the two that face the small round oak table in the middle of the room. “I’ll get the tea.”
“I can help you.”
“I’m quite capable.” He smiles, then floats off to the kitchen, hollering to me from there as he prepares it. “You still not taking sugar?” he shouts over one shoulder.
“No!” I holler back. “Still fruitlessly trying to shake a few pounds.” I then look down at my middle, which has become as thick as a tire since moving to Hex Falls. I blame Jeremy and all those sweet drink dates at The Bottom of the Cauldron.
“Somehow I don’t think the absence of a sugar lump in your tea is going to make the difference,” Sotherby says.
“Thanks.” I sneer in his direction.
“I simply meant you are perfect already.” He smiles back at me around the door jamb. “Thus, why deny yourself the sweetness of tea?” I catch him slipping one lump then two into my cup.
“Sotherby!” I shout.
“Tsk, tsk.” He waves a hand, then stirs the tea, placing the cup on an oversized serving tray, and whisks back into the room with it. “Any man who can’t see that you are perfect in every way is just plain daft and completely not worth wasting your time on.” He grins down at me. “Oh, right, that is who you’re dating, isn’t it?”
“Sotherby.” I frown.
“Sorry.”
“It might behove you to know that things have cooled a bit between us,” I say, peering slyly over my cup and through the steam.
“They have?” He sits down abruptly, looking shocked. “And why is that?”
“Oh, I dunno. I’ve been busy, I guess.” I take a small sip of too hot tea and scowl. Truth is, I’m not sure I’m feeling it for him. Sometimes I do and sometimes I don’t.
He passes me a scone with a warm smile and thankfully drops the subject.
“Now...” He sets his tea down on the edge of the table and drops back in his chair. “To the conundrum at hand. What has you so distracted today you can’t choose a color? Time to splash the tea, as you say?” He grins, chuckling.
“It’s spill the tea,” I say.
“Oh, is it? Drabbits, can’t seem to get those modern idioms right.” He laughs. “But do tell, what’s weighing so heavily on your mind?”
I take a bite of the scone and raise the cup again to my mouth. The buttery goodness of the scone and the pekoe of the tea fill my senses. Sotherby’s right. It’s better with sugar. “Well, you see,” I start. “You know how we spoke before, about my making the wrong decision, in dealing with the ex-Supreme Leader?” I choke on the words.
“Yes.”
“And as you know, as a result, he has gotten away and is still at large.”
“Right.” Sotherby nods.
“Well, I’m afraid things may have gotten even worse.” I cringe at the thought and briefly bite my lip. Sotherby’s brows rise. “As a bit of a sidenote, and not a very nice one, it appears a rogue band of formerly good, now terribly bad, witches may be in town. Witches, who have taken a darker path in life—the anti-venom-magical route—and are known for wreaking havoc throughout the nation.” I pause to sip my tea. “And who now, may have set their sights on annihilating my coven.” I grin, then chew at my lip.
“Boy. When you decide to get yourself in trouble, you really do a good job of it, don’t you?” Sotherby frowns.
“You could say that.” I gulp another swig of tea.
“And this group of rogue witches, are you sure they are after you?”
“Me, my coven, and possibly the ex-Supreme Leader.” I tilt my head. “Or perhaps he’s already joined them, and we can take him off the list.” I gulp, feeling a knot forming in my chest.
Sotherby lowers his teacup until it meets his saucer with a slight clatter.
“I know. Pretty bad, isn’t it?” I wince. “If it’s true.”
Sotherby’s expression draws out long and concerned.
“Even worse, some of my coven members seem to think I’m unworthy of the job of Supreme Leader and have called for my resignation.”
His expression sours.
“But don’t worry. They can’t fire me. It’s a lifetime appointment.” I toss him a half smile and shrug. “But at the moment, I can’t say I blame them. It is all my fault the ex-Supreme Leader got away and is likely negotiating right now with the Druens to get his powers back.”
“What?” Sotherby’s gaze pops.
“His powers.”
“No. The other thing.”
“The Druens. You know of them?” I guess by his gaunt expression. I slide forward in my seat.
“Well, not personally, no,” Sotherby says. “But they are notorious throughout the paranormal after-realm. They are the most fearsome bunch of hooligans.”
“So I hear. And dangerous too.” I glance at the floor. “Would you know one to see one?” I look up, again.
“No.”
“Drats. I was hoping you could help me.”
“Why? You plan on finding yourself one?”
“Hopefully. Before he finds me.” I hitch my brows.
“You can’t be serious, Violet. They are a ruthless bunch.”
“Again, so I hear.” I fold my hands in my lap, frustrated. “But you might know where I could find one, should I need to?” I ask.
“Well...I suppose we could tease one out of the woodwork if necessary. But I wouldn’t advise it.” He raises a cautionary finger.
I sit back, raise my tea to my mouth again, and slurp slowly. “I figure, if I were to take one on and teach it a lesson, my entire coven could avoid going to battle with them.”
“Battle?” Sotherby makes a sour face. “You can’t be serious?” He shoots forward in his chair.
“I’m afraid so. According to certain coven members, there appears to be no other way to keep them from destroying us.”
&nbs
p; “Oh my gracious,” Sotherby exhales, clutching his chest with a broad hand. “And you’ve agreed to this?”
“Well, sort of.” I tip my head. “That is, unless I can find some other way to get the ex-Supreme Leader back and avoid the confrontation altogether.” I slurp my tea again. “I should have appropriately dealt with him in the first place.”
“There, there. No commiserating over spilled milk, now.”
“My future as Supreme Leader depends on this. If I make the wrong decision this time, my coven will never trust me again. Not to mention, if the Druens get to the ex-Supreme Leader before I do, he may offer me up to them as a prize to get back his magic.”
“He can do that?”
“Apparently, when it comes to the Druens, the sky is the limit,” I say. “And since he knows all about me and the coven’s secrets, he’s doubly dangerous.”
“My goodness, you do have yourself in a pickle this time.”
“Forget the pickle. I’m fully submerged in the barrel.” I swallow.
I pour myself more steaming tea. It’s too hot and scalds my throat, but it’s nothing compared to what the Druens will do to me should the ex-Supreme Leader rat me out. My knees tremble in fear. “Did I mention, I’ve also been saddled with planning the annual fall fair?”
“You what?”
“Yes, because my supernatural side of life isn’t crazy enough, I’ve been chosen Grand Marshall of Hex Falls Fall Fair Extravaganza, in charge of all preparations.” I pull a face.
“How on earth did that happen?” Sotherby cringes.
“Well, in honor of my saving the sheriff from a burning building, of course.” I grimace. “Since when do people get awarded an extra job for their heroism?”
Sotherby laughs, choking on his tea.
“I tell you, I don’t know how I’m going to pull it off. They expect me to overhaul the whole thing. They said attendance is down, and they’d like to see me spruce it up a little. And by a little, they mean drag the centuries-old traditional country fall fair experience into this century. They want me to make it feel modern. To get up with the times.”
“Oh, goodness. You really do have your plate inordinately full, don’t you?”
Abracastabra (Hex Falls Paranormal Cozy Mystery # 4) (Hex Falls Paranormal Cozy Mystery Series) Page 2