How Torie Got Her Hex Back: A Paranormal Women's Fiction Novel: Singing Falls Witches Book Three

by M. J. Caan

  Opal’s scream reached their ears, and Torie saw her floating down towards them, carried by ghostly tentacles, her face a mix of fear and anger. Instead of attacking them, she ran past them, kneeling at the side of the hunter, gathering up her bloody form in her arms as she cried.

  Away from her, Fionna sat, back in her human form, and stared in horror at what she had done to the hunter. From where they sat, Torie could not tell if the hunter was breathing as Opal rocked her limp form back and forth.

  She got up and ran to Elric’s side.

  The wolf was covered in blood, and spreading from the wound in his chest was a patchwork of black spiderwebs that seemed to be spreading under his skin, traveling across his body.

  He wasn’t breathing, and if his heart was beating it was too shallow for Torie’s fingers to pick up as she felt the side of his neck.

  She looked up just in time to see Max arrive at her side, bloody from his fight with the gunmen. Jasmin dropped down beside her as well, placing a hand on Torie’s shoulder.

  “Torie, help him,” she said, her voice shaking.

  “What…how?”

  “The same way you saved your life. Save his. They’re your magics. Call to them.”

  Torie looked down at the man she loved. He was so still, so fragile in her arms. She placed her palm on his chest and leaned in until her lips were mere inches from his.

  Then, closing her eyes, she whispered.

  “Light of my life, depth of my heart,

  I pray it is not yet time for us to part.

  Grant me the will to take your pain,

  as I purge this blackness from your veins.”

  Elric’s body stiffened in her arms as he began to convulse. The black ichor that seemed to be coursing through his body gathered itself and raced up his torso, into his neck, and then flowed out through his parted lips, entering Torie’s mouth.

  She jumped back, gasping for breath as she clawed at her throat. Panic set in, and her eyes grew wide as she looked around for help.

  “Torie,” said Jasmin, calmly, reaching for her friend’s hand. “You got this. Focus your mind and do what you have to do.”

  Despite the fear, Torie did as she was told. She calmed herself, sank within her emotions, and touched something that she had given up hope of ever finding.

  Her magic.

  Her hex power, buried and apart from her for so long, now sang.

  She called to it, embraced it, felt it burn through her, blasting away the black poison she had absorbed from Elric. It blasted out of her, pouring out of every pore in her body as radiant white light; the blackness burned away by the power she drew upon.

  When the last of it had left her system, she stood there; strong, fierce, and complete.

  Her eyes glowed white, and a patch of silver streaked through the center of her hair, from front to back. She felt better than she had in months and her tears flowed freely as gratitude washed over her.

  She took Jasmin’s hand again and together they turned to face her sister.

  Opal, still cradling the body of the hunter, glared at them, her eyes burning with hatred.

  Torie reached out with her magic, brushing it over the hunter.

  “There is still the spark of life in her, Opal,” she said. “Let us help her.”

  “Please,” said Jasmin, holding her hand out to her sister.

  Opal spat her rage at them. “Never. I will never let you touch her. She would rather be dead than know you saved her.”

  With that, she cast her gaze to the ceiling, eyes white as she called on spirits to take them away.

  Before either of the witches could stop her, sister and niece were gone in a blinding nimbus of light and smoke.

  24

  “You sure about this?” Jasmin asked.

  Torie nodded. “It’s time.”

  “It’s going to be a lot of work; and money,” added Fionna.

  The three of them stood at the end of a gravel road, looking out over an idyllic meadow. It was bordered by trees on all sides with the only break being the one to allow the patch of gravel where they were standing.

  “I just don’t see why you want to build when you can just stay with me,” said Jasmin. “I have plenty of room.”

  “And you also have a life of your own that you need to get on with. We both do,” replied Torie. “Plus, my mother’s house was pretty much totaled. It would cost as much to rebuild it as it would to build new. Besides, that was her home. It’s time I made one of my own.”

  She wanted to add that it would be the first time she had ever done that; created a house that was all hers. Not her parents’. Not her ex-husband’s.

  “It’s just…I was getting used to having you around all the time,” said Jasmin.

  “You mean you were used to my morning breakfasts.”

  “Well, I know I was used to that,” said Fionna. “Now what will I do? Who will I drop in on that has perfect coffee, perfect crisp bacon, and perfect blueberry scones?”

  “It’s like it’s the end of an era,” said Jasmin sadly.

  The three of them turned and walked across the driveway and onto a small path that broke through the trees. The morning light greeted them as the exited the wooded patch to a cobble stone path that led to the side entrance to Jasmin’s house.

  “I’ll literally be two minutes away from you,” said Torie. “I’m pretty sure you can still come over for breakfast anytime you want. You too, Fionna,” she added before the squirrel shifter could lodge a complaint.

  “Well, with my knees you might as well be miles away,” said Jasmin, feigning insult.

  “Please. I saw the way you jumped on that golem’s back,” said Fionna. “Them knees were just fine.”

  “Were is the operative word,” said Jasmin. “I have permanent aches settling in from that. I’m sticking to magic from now on. You shifters can have all that physical nonsense.”

  They all laughed as they made their way into the kitchen.

  “So, how are you?” asked Torie. “We haven’t really talked much about what happened that night.”

  Jasmin shrugged. “Well, I guess I’m doing fine. I mean, for someone whose only sister teamed up with her long-lost daughter to try and kill her; I’m right as rain.”

  The sarcasm was tinged with hurt, and Torie smiled at her friend.

  “I still can’t believe Opal orchestrated all of that,” said Torie. “When you called her asking for help because I had lost my power, she seized on the opportunity to take her revenge on you for all these imagined slights against her. And she dragged your daughter into it as well.”

  “Looks that way,” said Jasmin. “Elric and Max paid their old boss in Trinity Cove a visit and settled with them once and for all. In exchange, they got some intel on my daughter and Opal. They saw the chance to use Elric and Max’s old mob bosses by promising them she’d bring the wolves back to them for a hefty fee. That gave them a cover for wanting to come to town in the first place. She had been stalking me for years apparently. She knew everything that was going on in my life. Knew what it would take to hurt me the deepest.”

  “So there was never really a hit put out on Max and Elric?” asked Torie.

  “No. But of course, she made the bosses an offer they couldn’t refuse. An eye for an eye, so to speak.”

  “So no word on Opal or your daughter? Where they might have gone?”

  Jasmin shook her head, her eyes cold as she stared straight ahead.

  “Do you think we’ll see them again?” pressed Fionna.

  “I’d bet on it. Maybe not tomorrow, or the next day. Probably not anytime soon. But one day, I’m betting they turn up again,” said Jasmin.

  “Like a bad penny,” said Fionna.

  “Or herpes,” grumbled Jasmin.

  “Maybe we should look for them,” said Torie. “I mean, it’s your family; you could try getting through to them again.”

  Jasmin shook her head and placed both arms around Fionna and Torie.
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  “This,” she shook them gently, “is my family.”

  Torie could only smile as she pulled away from the two of them. The last thing she wanted was to start crying first thing in the morning.

  “So, what about you,” said Fionna. “How are the boys?”

  Torie sighed. “They’re good. Max is back in his role as sheriff so, things in town are getting back to normal.”

  “I hope he replaces those deputies of his. He was missing for three days and not one of them went looking for him. Lazy-ass shifters. No offense, Fionna.”

  “None taken,” she replied cheerily.

  “And what about Elric?” asked Jasmin.

  Torie couldn’t hold back her smile. “He’s as great as ever. Things are really good with us.”

  “You know, he is welcome to sleep over,” said Jasmin. “I can magically soundproof all the rooms so you too can get your freak on if that worries you.”

  Torie blushed and gave her friend a cross look. “That won’t be necessary, Jasmin. We are just fine.”

  “Uh huh. If you say so,” Jasmin said.

  “I hear the humans in town are pissed that their magical abilities all went away,” said Fionna. “I feel sorry for Myra Simms.”

  Jasmin nodded. “Yes. Her grief over the death of her husband was so great that she used a stone to animate mud. That’s some powerful magic, by the way.” She glanced at Torie. “Even Opal was impressed by that. I kind of think that was what she wanted the golem for…to reverse engineer how your magic was able to create it. Good thing you destroyed it.”

  Torie didn’t answer but instead began rummaging through the refrigerator.

  “And Fionna, it was never their magic,” said Jasmin. “The crystals they found that had absorbed Torie’s magic would have eventually run out of juice, even if Torie had not reacquired said magic.”

  “How did you get it back, Torie?” asked Fionna.

  “I’m not sure. I guess it was always there, and being placed in a position where I was afraid for my life allowed me to tap into it.”

  Jasmin shook her head. “No, sis, that ain’t it. You were in a position where you were afraid for someone else’s life that you valued more than your own. You were fighting for something, someone, that you loved more than yourself. That’s growth. And that’s what allowed you to tap back into your hex.”

  “Well, one thing is for certain,” Torie said. “I will never take my powers for granted. I feel whole once again, and I am so thankful for that.”

  She took a pitcher of fresh orange juice out and sat it on the island, followed by a chilled bottle of champagne. Looking across the kitchen to a glass-fronted cabinet, she saw the last thing she needed. She concentrated, and with a nod, summoned a trio of champagne flutes from the cabinet to her hands.

  “Morning Mimosas,” said Jasmin. “Perfect.”

  “When I lived in New York, I learned the perfect Mimosa recipe,” she said. It felt odd, referencing her life before Singing Falls. It seemed so far away that it barely registered in her memory.

  She poured champagne into the flutes, held the orange juice carafe next to them and gently waved her hand between them.

  “The secret is to only provide a whiff of orange scent into the champagne. No more; no less.”

  Jasmin and Fionna laughed uproariously at the image before each taking a glass. The three women clinked glasses, making a point to stare one another in the eyes as they did so.

  “To friendship,” said Torie. “Long may it reign.”

  “And to having each other’s back,” said Jasmin. “I wouldn’t be here without you two. I love you ladies.”

  “And we love you,” said Fionna. “So, Torie, this house you’re building next door; what’s the details on it? How many bedrooms? What kind of kitchen are you going to have? Oh! Are you going to put in a panic room?”

  “More importantly, will Elric be moving in?” asked Jasmin.

  Torie laughed. “No, he will not be moving in. At least not at first.”

  Jasmin and Fionna laughed and began chatting about decor, wall color and the best time to go furniture shopping. Torie sipped her champagne and watched them with affection.

  She had come a long way and was grateful to the two women standing before her that had been an integral part of her life. She didn’t know what was coming next, but she knew that with friends like these, there was nothing they would not be able to handle.

  The End

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  About the Author

  M.J. Caan is a science fiction and fantasy author living in North Carolina. When not convening with the spirit world via keyboard to create fantastical new worlds, M.J. can be found cuddling with a very energetic Australian Shepherd that is too spoiled for her own good.

  If you like this book, please leave a review. If you would like to contact M.J. please don’t hesitate to reach out via email or Facebook. I can always be reached at:

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  Also by M.J. Caan

  The Trinity Cove Trilogy

  The Girl With The Good Magic: The Shifter Wars Book One

  Enter The Wolf: The Shifter Wars Book Two

  The Return Of The Witch