House of Shadows

by Morgan Hawke

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  House Of Shadows: Book One

  Enchantment in Crimson Series

  Copyright ã 2004 Morgan Hawke

  ISBN: 1-55410-092-5

  Cover art and design by Angela Knight

  http://www.angelasnights.com/

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.

  Published by eXtasy Books, a division of Zumaya Publications, 2004

  Look for us online at:

  www.zumayapublications.com

  www.Extasybooks.com

  This is a work of fiction.

  All characters, incidents and situations related in this tale are fictional. All resemblances to actual witches, sorcerers, vampires, werewolves, societies, ghosts or demons, are purely coincidental.

  Also By Morgan Hawke

  Demoness

  Phantasmagoria: A Collection of Darker Passions

  Acknowledgements:

  Without your help, encouragements and ashtrays, this novel could not have been written.

  Thank you.

  Lava Java Coffee House - Charlotte NC

  For giving me gallons of coffee, and the loan of your power cord for my laptop all summer.

  The Common Market - Charlotte NC

  For letting me write, drink Butterscotch Toffee coffee and smoke indoors all winter.

  Mike - Pre-editor and saving grace.

  Randwulf - Proofreader and Scholar Arcanum

  Derrick - Inspirational research assistant

  A very special thanks to Daria - for all the help with Russia & the Ukraine.

  And most especially, thanks to:

  Michelle B. & Jane H.

  Who slogged through the whole thing repeatedly, and encouraged me anyway.

  ~ One ~

  Auspice

  The witch stepped out onto the narrow back porch of her small second story apartment. A chill gust of wind, carrying the scent of rain, curled under her waist-length copper mane and blew the fine, straight strands across her pale brow.

  “Hmm, I forgot that it would be a new moon tonight.” She brushed the spider-silk strands of hair from her face, narrowing her eyes. The radiant silver smile appeared to sit as though perched behind the twisted branches of the winter bare oak tree by her porch in the darkening twilight.

  “Other people have nice, normal lives full of random events,” she mused out loud, shaking her head with a tight smile. “Me? I randomly catch a moonrise and it’s an email from the Powers That Be.” She pulled the lapels of her plush black velvet robe closer to her throat, then slid the glass door closed behind her with a soft thump. “I guess this means I’m about to start something new. Damn...”

  Absently, she dug a slender black cigarette from the pack and lit it on the unwavering blue jet of flame from her silver, ultra-modern lighter. She exhaled the rich, clove smoke with luxurious relish, and the wind carried the thick, perfumed cloud away. “Let’s see what else appears. Maybe I can figure out what’s coming to get me before I get myself cornered.”

  With a rustle of black feathers, a crow dropped from the darkening sky and landed in the tree right by her porch. Not an uncommon occurrence. However, this crow balancing on the slender branch was framed perfectly by the horns of the rising moon.

  “One crow for sorrow,” she quoted softly. “And perching in the horns of the new moon.” She smiled sourly. “Terrific. Whatever adventure I’m about to start is going to involve some form of angst and very likely drama.” She drew on her cigarette. “Well, that means it’s not going to happen at the library.” She snorted. “Nothing with angst or drama ever happens at the library, and certainly not at my reference desk.”

  The crow turned his head to the side and peered at her from one bright eye. It released three harsh cries then mantled its wings and flew straight at her. It banked sharply upward and over the roof.

  “Oh, goody, this is going to be personal,” she said in complete disgust. “But with one crow in a tree framed by a new moon, I can’t tell if it’s just a random nasty event I walk into, or if someone is pissed off and out to get me.” She drew on the cigarette and stared at the smiling crescent. “On second thought, this is a new moon, so it’s a new problem, something that is not rooted in the past.” She closed her eyes and groaned. “Damn. That means it’s something I’m going to stir up all by myself.” She shook her head. “This is getting uglier by the second. Why can’t I just get nice clear visions like all the TV psychics say they do?”

  The tree rocked in the breeze. Her eyes narrowed sharply as the moon began to change. Slowly, the entire bottom half of the crescent became tinted a definite red. The tilted silver smile suddenly looked a lot more like a curved fang stained with blood. A fang trapped among branches that looked like groping skeletal fingers.

  The witch blinked at the view and felt the hair on her neck shiver to attention. “That does not look good,” she said very softly to the universe at large. “I need...” Carefully she took a mouthful of smoke, then exhaled. “A second opinion.”

  Abruptly, the neighbor’s black collie-mix dog lunged energetically from one the first floor apartments, towing her neighbor Caroline from the end of his leash.

  The witch leaned over the rail of her porch. “One second opinion, right on cue,” she said softly. “Hi, Caroline!” she called and stubbed out her cigarette.

  Caroline, her sandy curls swept up into a bobbing ponytail, turned her soft green eyes upward. “Oh, hi!” She smiled. Her dog towed her directly under the overhanging porch. “It’s Rowan, right?”

  “Yep, that’s me.” Rowan smiled and made a wry face. “I know this is going to sound weird, but I think I need new glasses. Can you tell me what color the moon is?”

  Caroline obligingly looked up at the moon. “It’s a bluish-white.” She turned back to Rowan. “Why? What color do you think it is?”

  Rowan squinted up at the moon. “Does it look a little...reddish to you at all?”

  “No, not at all.” Caroline shook her head and smiled. You do need glasses.”

  Rowan smiled in return. “Well, thanks, and have fun on your walk.”

  “Glad to be of help.” Caroline laughed. “I gotta go! Take care!” She waved, then allowed her dog to tow her across the frost-seared lawn toward the next apartment complex over.

  Rowan stared at the moon and lit another cigarette. “Great,” she grumped. “My nice quiet life is about to be invaded by scary, weird shit.” She flopped down on one of the plastic lawn chairs on her small porch. “As the only working witch in town, I get all the midnight ‘help my house is haunted’ phone calls. Why do I have a feeling that this means I’ll be running into something a lot nastier than a simple haunt?”

  After a while, she crushed out her cigarette and sighed. “Time to get ready.” She stood up, then jerked the sliding glass door open. “With that omen hanging over my head, I really don’t want to go out tonight.” She looked back at the moon floating among the tree branches. “But I have bills to pay.” Her lip curled in disg
ust. “I wouldn’t have to pimp out my witchcraft by playing fortune teller if the pay didn’t suck as a librarian.” She stepped inside and closed the door firmly behind her.

  – Two –

  Oracle

  Rowan shoved open the heavy door marked: ‘Employees Only’ with one hand. She pushed with her shoulder, wrestling with her large, black brocade shoulder bag and grabbing at her long, pitch-black, ground-sweeping coat to avoid trapping the hem at her boot-heels in the closing door.

  She wove her way through the crowd while nodding in time to the familiar brooding and violently loud music. It was a typically crowded Friday night at the club Gothic Noire. As usual, she had to practically shove her way across the main room, heading toward her fortune-telling booth. It was on the other side of the dance floor near the main entrance door. Waves and smiles greeted her from patrons in varying outfits of plastic, leather and black fishnet. They swarmed, conversed, smoked and drank while endeavoring to look both sexy and intimidating. The music was loud and throbbed with deep rich inflections. The air was scented with clove smoke from all the black cigarettes.

  While passing the long bar, she smiled at the two harried, handsome and barely dressed bartenders. Stopping briefly, she gave a quick, passing hug to Tony, the big, gruff club manager, then continued deeper into the club, her heels clicking on the hardwood floor. She spared a glance in the ornate mirror behind the bar. Rhinestones twinkled in the smoked metal headband that held her waist-length, pin-straight copper mane back from her brow. She stopped and took a moment to tuck an errant lock back into the glittering band, then continued onward.

  As she passed the far edge of the bar, Rowan felt a shimmer of otherworldly chill. That feels a little like magic and death. She stopped on the edge of the dance floor and looked over at the very end of the bar. Holy shit, Rowan thought in astonishment. There should be a law against a guy being that beautiful.

  A blindingly handsome young man was sitting on one of the barstools nursing an imported beer. His dark, straight hair was pulled back into a tight tail that fell over his shoulder and brushed his forearm. His pale, chiseled face was pared to the bone, showing fine, sharp features and full lips that belonged on the cover of a pulp vampire novel.

  He turned slightly and saw her. His pale brown eyes seemed to collect the light from around him, reflecting a soft, shimmering green the way a cat’s does in the shadows. Slowly he twisted around in his stool and looked her full in the face. His silky, sleeveless black shirt framed his broad shoulders while showing off the ropes of muscle in his arms and hugging his flat stomach and narrow waist. The black leather pants he wore looked as though they had been tailored to fit. A long, typically Goth coat was flung over the bar. He smiled.

  Rowan felt her heart thump in reaction and the warm roil of her libido sitting up and taking notice. This one is definitely too pretty for anyone’s good, she thought in bittersweet admiration, then realized that the cool brush of subtle danger emanated from him. She gave him a tight smile, then sharply turned on her heel and marched toward the small corner booth on the other side of the dance floor.

  I am not running away, she told her fast-beating heart. I just don’t have time for incredibly cute metaphysical weirdness. I have work to do. A glance in the mirrors behind the bar showed that he was watching her. She walked away and felt her body clench in greedy longing. Ahem, brain to sex-drive –we already have a ‘too cute for his own good’ boy-diva, she told herself sternly. She bit her lip and climbed the three small steps that led to her corner, set aside for the house fortuneteller. We don’t need another potential heartbreak.

  Rowan dropped her black leather satchel on the curved, red plastic bench of her semi-private booth. She shrugged out of her long coat and straightened her long, beaded black skirts. She pulled her silver pentacle from where it had tucked itself into her corset, then adjusted the black fishnet that stretched across the pushed-up fullness of her cleavage. The deep black velvet of the tightly laced, Victorian style corset accentuated her unusually narrow waist and framed her rounded hips.

  Tugging at her full skirts, she settled into the booth, then pushed the fishnet sleeves up to her forearms. Time to set up shop…She opened her satchel, then laid out the tools of her trade. A red velvet cloth covered the small, bare and drink-stained table. A small gargoyle holding a short, squat red candle, her oversized Tarot sign and the small, freestanding pricing list completed her setting. Rowan pulled her set of tarot cards from the sandalwood box. She was open for business.

  A flurry of friends came in and paid to have their fortunes told.

  Rowan was kept busy for a long while, smiling and counseling as needed, bestowing congratulations or comforting hugs to soften emotional bruises delivered by her readings.

  The stream of friends and new patrons finally died down, and Rowan was able to sip at her ginger ale in relative quiet. Every last one of her readings had involved someone’s love life, which of course depressingly brought to mind her own. Plenty of sex, not one drop of real affection... She grimaced. I need a hobby that doesn’t involve men.

  She stood up in her booth and signaled one of the waiters that she needed another soda. Catching sight of her reflection in a small smoked mirror by the opposite bench, she leaned over and absently checked her make-up. Hmm, I’ve been talking all this time, might want to put on a bit more lipstick...

  She slid back into her booth, settled her skirts, then dug her small purse out of her satchel. She reached in and pulled out her compact. A small, framed photo slid from her bag. It hit the corner of the table with a crack of breaking glass, then fell to the floor. A shiver of foreboding raced up her spine. Someone is coming. Someone I don’t want to see.

  Looking carefully under her table, she found the photo of her current boyfriend. She picked the fallen photo out of the glass and frowned. A sharp shard had gouged a long tear though the picture’s mouth. Instinctively she understood what the symbolic rip meant. Lies... Suddenly another shiver skimmed up her spine, raising the hairs on her arms. Trouble is coming and if the photo is any indication, it’s probably him that’s going to bring it.

  There was a heavy thump on the stairs to her booth.

  She closed her eyes. “Please don’t be him. Please, make it somebody else. I don’t want to deal with this tonight.” She opened her eyes to find her boyfriend glowering from the side of her table.

  “We need to talk,” he said, practically spitting the words out.

  “I am working, can it wait?” Whatever the hell he wanted, she just knew it was going to be ugly. He wasn’t supposed to stop by until after she’d finished working the club, but his short hair was slicked back with gel and his designer clothes were neatly pressed. Rowan frowned. Do I smell beer on his breath, and cologne? Where the hell has he been?

  “You’re using me—for sex!” His hand cracked down on her table. “You, and your witchcraft!”

  She raised her brow and slowly stood up. “This is a public place, can’t you wait to shout at me in private?”

  His face turned an ugly mottled red. “You’re not a witch, you’re a goddamned vampire!”

  “I’ll take that to be a: no, you want to have a shouting match right here,” she said softly. Over his shoulder she caught a glimpse of one of the larger bouncers making his way toward her booth. Behind him, the cute gothic hunk at the bar was standing and watching.

  “You screw me every time you use your magic, and suck me so dry that I can’t...”

  Her gaze shot to her boyfriend’s and narrowed. “Can’t what?” She could feel the truth hovering unsaid in his mouth. Wait a damned minute, I’ve heard this complaint before... And that’s not cologne, that’s some girl’s perfume. Her lips curled up in a sour smile. “Let me guess, you just got back from playing with some other chick and you couldn’t get it up.”

  His face went bone white.

  She felt her lips curl back from her teeth in a parody of a smile. “You wanted to ball somebody and couldn’t.”r />
  He jabbed a finger toward her. “Because you sucked everything out of me, like the damned vampire you are!”

  “You weren’t complaining last night!” she shot back. “Now get out of my club.”

  He jerked back. “What?”

  “You want to go screw other people? Fine, go do it.” She flung a hand out and pointed toward the door. She watched the thoughts race across his face. Apparently, he hadn’t meant to admit that he was sleeping around, which meant that he hadn’t meant to get thrown out of her bed, either. She snorted. Idiot...

  “Look, I don’t mean that the way it sounded,” he said as though in apology. “You’re the best I ever...”

  “Best ride that you ever had? I know.” Her smile was feral. “And now you can forget about ever having it again.”

  He frowned. “Did you just curse me?”

  She hadn’t, of course. “Sure,” she said out of pure spite. “And if you don’t want your dick to fall off, you’ll get the hell out of my club, and never show your piss-ant face here again.”

  “You fucking bitch,” he snarled. He turned on his heel and stalked toward the door. She watched the bouncer meet him on the floor. He spoke a few soft words, then escorted her brand-new ex-boyfriend out.

  She swiped a hand across her cheek, wiping away a tear she refused to acknowledge. “Damn, now I have to find another boyfriend.” Rowan raised her ginger ale and frowned at the pale-gold soda in her glass. A pity alcohol kills my talent; I could really use a beer right now. Absently, she swiped at the chill moisture on her other cheek. She dug a black cigarette from the pack. “Cheating moron…”

  Her lighter clicked. She lit the clove, then exhaled the sweet smoke. “I really need to find a guy that’s older and less stupid,” she muttered softly then sighed. You’d think the library would attract a smarter selection of guys. She shook her head. I have got to stop using work to pick up men when I need to get laid. I’m so sick and tired of insecure idiots that can’t handle my being a witch. She sipped at her ginger ale. I definitely need a vaguely decent man in my life… Her eyes drifted back over to the unsettling hunk at the bar. Or a distraction...