Witchling Wars

by Shawn Knightley

  “In the mean time, help that policeman with the disappearance of Miss Samantha Larsen. I have a feeling once we receive a few more answers, others will start to slowly unfold.” He reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and pulled out a leather notebook with a tassle wrapped around the outside. “When you learn anything new, write it in this journal. It has an enchantment over it allowing me to see what you’ve written through a similar notebook in my possession. You’ll see my response shortly after. I’ll be in touch, Miss Ashwood.”

  He placed the notebook on the kitchen table and turned to my sister.

  “You have a lovely home,” he said. “And thank you for the coffee and a few moments of your time.”

  He walked out of the kitchen. I could hear his feet echoing through the living room and through the back door. Once he reached it, the back door creaked and shut. I got up from the table and walked back to the window in just enough time to see him open up a tunnel in Madison’s backyard and step inside. The girl’s swing set wafted behind him as the tunnel closed like a strong wind had pushed them back and forth.

  That was the end of my first encounter with a vixra. Witchling royalty had walked into my life, gave me orders, and left.

  One other detail crossed my mind. I had gotten up from the chair and walked over to the back window without even an ounce of pain from my chest.

  Eli did something when he shook my hand. He healed me. Slowly and without me immediately noticing. I always knew that my mother and gran hadn’t given me all the details about the witchlings. Mostly because they didn’t know. So much knowledge was lost over time when the witchlings became divided. But Eli was powerful. In more ways than I was aware. All this time I had been worried about Nathaniel. I didn’t realize that even more powerful forces were at play. Ones that I knew would be a mistake to disappoint.

  Chapter 11

  “Please don’t be too upset with me,” Madison pleaded. I turned around to see her arms crossed and her eyes cast downward at the floor in shame. I knew better. She was quite pleased with herself. She managed to manipulate me into helping out Officer Parker. Which was exactly what she wanted all along. She played on my need to rebel. She knew me too well.

  “Upset? All you did was place me in the cross-hairs of one of the most deadly vampire covens in the entire world and under the radar of the vixra who despise us. Why would I be upset about that?”

  She rolled her eyes. There it was. The truth. She thought she was the one who had the right to be irritated. Not me.

  “I had to know,” she said. “I had to know if they had found us. For my girls.”

  “Don’t get them involved in this. Don’t use them to guilt trip me. I know you’re not above such tactics, but no. Not this time.”

  “You were miserable, Harper!” she argued. “I would come over to your house and you had week-old pizza on your counter. There were mountains of used tissues all over the house. You were wearing the same clothes for weeks. You didn’t want to move. You didn’t want to live. I was devastated when Caleb died too, you know? We all adored him. You two were perfect for one another and I know how happy you were. But I already lost mom and gran. I wasn’t about to lose my sister too.”

  Uh oh. Her eyes. They were starting to water. I saw hints of a single tear starting to curl at the edge of her left eye.

  “You would have allowed your grief to take you straight to a grave plot next to Caleb, and I wasn’t about to let that happen,” she yammered on. “Then I ran into Officer Parker. He asked if you might be able to help him. He said he had a few cold cases. He barely described them and I knew it was the vampires. I had to know if they were getting close. If they had discovered us. And if it got you out of that house and gave you a sense of purpose again then it was for the better.”

  So now the game was that she did all this out of love for me? Nice. Really nice. Basically, if I got mad I was a monster. If I used sarcasm I was dismissive. And if I walked right out, I didn’t care about the girls. She trapped me. I loved Madison. I did. But her powers of manipulation made up for her weaker magic. At least a little weaker than mine. Her gift of getting what she wanted, however, that was there before she even had kids. It only grew in force once they were born. Everything had to be done for their benefit. And the worst part about it? I had no choice now. I had to move in with her. At least for a little while. Isaac destroyed a good chunk of my house by opening up the tunnel inside it. And I sure as hell didn’t have the money to fix it.

  “I need to go by my house,” I said, changing the subject. “To get a few of my things.”

  “I already did that,” she said. She disappeared into the living room and brought out Caleb’s old duffel bag. “I have your clothes, some of your hair products and a few other knick-knacks right here for you. Nathaniel watched you while I went back for your things.”

  “What? Are you nuts? Isaac could have found you there. Or he might have followed you back here.”

  “He can’t enter the house. It’s in Ted’s name. He would have to let him in and he’s even more wary about strangers than I am.”

  My shoulders slumped. There was no escaping her now.

  “Go upstairs,” she said. “Get cleaned up. Then I’ll drop you off at the police station. I can even go in with you if you want.”

  “No,” I said shaking my head. “Officer Parker wants the case to remain as tight-lipped as possible.”

  “Not for that,” she said, stepping closer and placing her hand on my shoulder. “You went missing for three days, Harper. Officer Parker is going to need to hear some made up story about what happened and how your house was wrecked.”

  “Three days? That didn’t happen last time. I returned the same night when Nathaniel-”

  “Eli said it had something to do with his grandfather sending you back through the vixra tunnels. He didn’t know exactly what time you were from. Apparently, he was lucky to have brought you back within the same month. Eli said what he did was no easy task. Especially not knowing exactly where or when to send you. You were lucky to have stumbled upon such a powerful witchling like you did.”

  I couldn’t help but scoff. “How the hell am I supposed to explain my disappearance to Officer Parker?”

  “You could always say it was a robbery.”

  ‘More like a kidnapping.’

  An hour later I was showered, dressed, and helping Madison make a fresh batch of waffles for her girls. Ted was just starting to wake up as he groggily sipped his black coffee at the kitchen table in the same chair where Eli sat only a short time ago.

  “The girls have ballet class this evening but I should be back long before I have to take off again,” she said to me before giving him a brief kiss and reaching for her purse.

  “Be careful you two,” said Ted. “Glad to see you’re okay, Harper. Maddie here was losing her mind. Call next time before you leave town. Even if it is on super secret witch business, alright?”

  I gave him a reassuring nod before reaching for the front door handle. “Yeah, sorry about that Ted.”

  Ted handled what Madison and I were in the same way Caleb had. By ignoring it even existed and only referring to it in a teasing manner. I told Caleb what I was after a month of knowing him. I knew we would get married one day. Call it silly puppy love, but I knew from the start that he was special. Madison had felt the same way about Ted. She said he had the right to know given that she would pass the gene along to her kids and they might have to move right away if their cover was ever blown. Or if one of the girls threw a temper tantrum and pictures started flying off the classroom walls at school. Otherwise, there would have been some massive explaining to do. That was why our mom homeschooled us until we got to junior high. Just to make sure we were mature enough to handle our magic in front of the other kids. Madison didn’t seem to share those fears, even though she pretended to when she wanted me to help Officer Parker. She didn’t want her kids sheltered like we were. And I wasn’t about to make the mistake of tellin
g her how to properly raise her daughters.

  ‘I should have known better. She always resented mom for being so overprotective of us.’

  “What did you think had happened when you came by my house and Officer Parker said I was missing?” I asked as we walked down the front porch’s steps and toward her car, veering right and left around the toys her girls had left scattered across the lawn.

  “Naturally I thought the worst. That my efforts to try helping you had gotten you killed.’

  “I’m sorry you worried like that.” The words came out of my mouth without thinking, but my subconscious told me it really was true. She would worry regardless, but I had given her even more just cause to act as a hover parent toward me.

  The hum of her car started as I buckled my seat belt.

  “What else did Eli say before I woke up?” I asked.

  She finished backing out of the driveway before speaking. “Let’s just say that the vixra are keeping closer tabs on what goes on with other witchlings than mom was ever aware of. They made the mistake over a millennium ago of not watching our kind like hawks when we started mating with humans and diluted our magic.”

  Figures. I couldn’t imagine they were pleased with me and Madison taking up with humans, but what were we supposed to do? There were barely any other kruxa left and the other witchlings looked down on us.

  “So,” she continued with a quizzical smile on her face. “Nineteenth-century Washington D.C. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a bit jealous. The inner history nerd in me would have loved to have seen that.”

  I shook my head and stared out the window at the trees going by. “It wasn’t anything worth bragging about. It was dirty, cloudy, muddy, and it smelled like a sewer. I only ever saw it at night but it left a rather bad impression on me. But to be fair, that also could have been the fire coming out of Isaac’s hands aimed in my general direction.”

  “Fire? How poetic,” she sneered.

  “Yeah. You would think after centuries they would come up with a more unique way of executing kruxa. The vampires were efficient in telling humans how to hunt us. That’s for sure. If the vixra were as good then at keeping an eye on things as they seem to be now, maybe they could have prevented so many kruxa from dying.”

  Madison didn’t say much to that. We had such conversations when we were growing up, wondering why the vixra or luxra didn’t help us when the vampires decided in medieval Europe the only way to prevent a kruxa from marking them was to help humans discover us and kill us. The plan was efficient and lethal. Humans were quick to accuse women and men of being witches and either burning them or drowning them. For all we knew the other witchlings might have seen our demise as punishment for having mixed so much with humans and diluting the magic that runs through our veins. Whatever the truth was, it was long lost in time. And even with my loose tongue, I would never ask such a question to a vixra. They were still our superiors. And they had to be respected. Especially if Eli was going to guarantee my safety along with Madison and her girls.

  Minutes went by until we reached the police station. As we pulled into the parking lot I turned to look at her. She refused to look back at me.

  “I’m still pissed at you,” I said quietly.

  Her shoulders slumped even though her eyes were defiant. “I know. But I’m not sorry. You needed the push.”

  Chapter 12

  Officer Parker wasn’t in his back office when we got there. The gentleman at the front desk said we would have to wait because he was running a touch late on a shift change. Which only left me with the option of waiting there for him with my sister. The air between us grew thicker. Heavier. The sensation of static drifting between us could have sparked. I drifted somewhere else as I sat in the chair near the front desk with Madison beside me. She was in her chair, pointing her finger down to turn a page on her Kindle as we waited. When I looked back over to the front desk, it was covered in murky brown gunk. Or was it mud? I got up from where I was sitting and went over to touch it. It was slimy and thick. And oh my god did it smell! Like a sewer. No. Like a swamp.

  I flinched as something dripped down on my face. Almost as if rain droplets started falling inside the lobby. When I dared glance up, not sure that I wanted to see what was above me, my mouth opened wide. Samantha was floating just below the ceiling. She was still in the same dress from the evening party last week, but it was torn at the waist revealing her milky thighs. Twigs and leaves floated around her. But it was her hair that truly grabbed my attention. It was drifting about like she was in a pool of water. A long chain was wrapped around her ankles, pulling her down. But pulling her down where?

  Her eyes lifted. She was staring directly at me. More droplets started falling until there was a torrential downpour right there in the police station. I was drenched in a matter of seconds. I craned my neck up to see Samantha again, but she wasn’t there. She was right in front of me. Standing before me with a black eye and a busted lip. Only the blood had turned brown just like the mud over the front desk.

  “You knew,” she whispered. Her voice didn’t sound at all like the Samantha and I knew and disliked. It was different. Frightened. Sad. Echoing off the walls. And she got angry. The air grew thicker as she took a step closer to me. “You knew,” she repeated. “And you never said anything.”

  Knew? Knew what?

  The vision. The vision I had of her at the evening party. I had a feeling she might not live long. But this? Tied down by a chain and beaten to a pulp? If anything I thought the Catach-Brayin might find out just how useless she was and get rid of her with the brand on her side. But not this. Never this.

  “You knew!” she screamed at me. And when she did, the glass of the windows shattered. I didn’t realize until then that the whole police station was under water. Disgusting brown swamp water cascaded inside the station and slammed into my body with a force I had never experienced, pushing me right into the back wall, pinning me down where I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t even think. I was trapped. Just like she was.

  “Miss Ashwood,” a voice brought me back to reality. I must have had quite the expression on my face because I jumped at the sound of my name and let out a big breath. A harsh burning erupted in the back of my throat and I started coughing.

  People always say that drowning is a peaceful way to go once you stop struggling. I just got a sneak peek of what it felt like. And here’s the kicker. It’s not peaceful. It was torturous. And I didn’t even make it to the end.

  Officer Parker was looking down at me in my chair. His brows were furrowed with concern. Brian, Samantha’s fiancé, was beside him with his eyes wide and his mouth half open. I must have looked like I was going to throw up because for a moment they were leaning down to see if I was alright. Then they both took a few generous steps back. Except for Madison. She knew exactly what just happened.

  “Harper, you look pale,” she said as she felt my forehead for a temperature. “You’ll have to excuse her. She woke up not feeling very well this morning.”

  ‘Nice cover, sis. I’m mentally rolling my eyes.’

  “Miss Ashwood, are you alright?” Brian asked.

  Quite the question given that he was the one who looked like he hadn’t slept in days. There were huge bags under his eyes and his shirt had pit stains like he hadn’t changed it since the weekend. And maybe he hadn’t. Maybe he had spent the last few days doing nothing but look for Samantha.

  “I’m going to take her to the restroom really quick,” said Madison. “Where is it?”

  “Right there,” said Officer Parker, pointing to the right end of the hall behind us.

  Madison tried hard to make it look like she wasn’t rushing me to the bathroom. She failed. In fact, it wouldn’t be a stretch to say that she was dragging me by the arm.

  “What did you see?” she asked, almost letting the words slip out of her mouth before the door was shut behind us.

  “Um…”

  “This isn’t the time for um,” she
snarled.

  “What the hell, Madison?” I spat, jerking my arm away from her. She was gripping so tight that I thought I might get a bruise.

  “Sorry,” she said, trying to collect herself. “It’s just… you went missing, Harper. I couldn’t reach you by phone. I went by your house and it was completely wrecked inside. I spent over forty-eight hours thinking the most god-awful thoughts. Officer Parker thought you had been kidnapped. Hell, I thought you had been kidnapped. Or worse. That you were dead. Then a vampire shows up at my house wondering where you are. Followed by a vixra who explained that you were trying to get home and his grandfather from ages ago was going to send you back. And then there’s this girl that’s gone missing. Harper, what did you see? I know I’m the one who got you in the middle of this. And I’m still not sorry I did it. But I’m perfectly aware that I need to take some of this off your shoulders. So tell me what you saw. Let me help you.”

  Damn her. I couldn’t stay mad at her for too long. I wasn’t capable of it when she was trying so hard. It came from a good place. But then again, I was being thrown about in a world of vixra, vampires, and the police. And now I knew it was all because of her meddling. As it turns out, sisterly love can get you killed.

  “I’ll only tell you if you stop this crazy helicopter parent garbage,” I whispered. “Madison, I know you mean well and you were trying to help me, but you put me in danger. Officer Parker put himself in danger too. From the moment I first stepped into his office I saw a vision of his chest ripped open. His heart looked like it had been torn out. And now…” I hesitated. Would this cause her to helicopter parent even more? Or would it just make me feel guilty for getting her involved?

  ‘Screw it.’