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Book Three in The Skinwalkers’ Witchling Trilogy: THE WITCHLING SEER
Cassandra Booth snuggled deep into her covers. It had been days … nope weeks, since she had slept so well. Basically, she hadn’t had a full night’s sleep since she took her witchling exam and was finally brought into the truth about her small town, which included people who turned into monsters at nighttime and liked to drink blood—especially witch blood. Now that she was one of the witches, or would be soon, that didn’t exactly bode too well for her. She had brokered, or rather forced an unstable peace on the two rival clans, but she wasn’t about to worry about that. She desperately wanted things to return to normal … or at least close to normal. School was tomorrow since it was Monday, and Cassie was looking forward to something as incredibly boring and normal as class.
The smell of breakfast wafted upstairs. Yes, Cassie was more than happy to be home. Uncle John, while extremely moody, was an excellent cook, and she could smell bacon. Cassie snuggled a bit deeper in her blankets. She was happy to be home.
Pots clanked down in the kitchen, and Cassie could hear voices. Aunt Maria was back. It was almost like old times. Well, like old times if you forgot to mention the whole ‘coven tried to strip your powers, alpha tried to force you to mate to his son, and please come rescue us’ activity of the past week.
The smell of pancakes and breakfast overwhelmed Cassie. She wanted to get up and get some of that good food, but she needed a shower first. She couldn’t even remember the last time she had a shower.
Cassie hurried over to her small bathroom and turned on the hot water. She peeled off her pajamas and hopped under the warm stream pouring out of the shower head. It felt great to wash all the dirt and grime off. She was pretty certain she even had bloodstains on her feet from the night before.
Cassie let the hot water warm her and massage her as she thought. She had started the week by running away and trying to get rid of her mate. She hated that term, but it was growing on her. Now she had ended the weekend with two mates. Cassie did consider skipping breakfast and climbing back in bed. She didn’t need more mates. Two were two more than she wanted.
Nate and Jared were too different. She could now remember their childhood, and they had always been that way. It was nice to see that even if they spent the last eight years apart, at least some things were the same. But it would have been even nicer if she wasn’t bonded to them. They had stayed out of her head overnight and the long morning she slept, but she could feel them both waiting.
Cassie turned off the water as her stomach grumbled. Food would help her figure it all out, and maybe Aunt Maria would have a solution. She’d always been able to fix things for Cassie in the past.
Her bedroom was warmed from the steam in the shower, but she still hurried back into a clean pair of pajamas before she got cold. She had absolutely no ambition to do anything for the rest of the weekend.
Cassie tossed her dirty clothes in the clothing shoot next to her bedroom door before making her way downstairs. People talked, but it grew quieter as she began her descent. That was normally the indication of company, but again the bacon smelled too good to pass up. Cassie paused before turning the corner into the kitchen. She had on her old, snuggly, penguin sweatshirt and her favorite very worn pair of pink sweats. She would have normally cared how she looked, especially with company, but now she didn’t because she was too hungry. Her stomach growled louder this time as she contemplated going back up to change. She heard a few laughs from the kitchen when she decided to go in anyway, and regretted it immediately. She knew who the laughter came from.
Aunt Maria was sitting at the table while John was at the stove cooking. Seated on each side of Maria were Cassie’s new mates, Nate and Jared.
Cassie groaned and tried to backtrack back upstairs. Bacon or not, she didn’t want to deal with the two of them after her first good night’s sleep in forever.
Hopping up from the table, Maria ran over to grab Cassie’s hand and pulled her to the table. “Your friends here were just telling me about last night.”
Cassie groaned more. Maria hadn’t been there, but Cassie was pretty sure John had given her the details. She didn’t need to be sitting there chit chatting with Nate and Jared.
“I’m going back to bed. Save me some of that for later,” Cassie said to John as she tried to stand. Jared’s hand reached out and grabbed her left hand while Nate grabbed her right. Cassie groaned inward to herself.
‘We need to talk,’ Nate said at the same time as Jared.
‘Can I get a moment alone with you?’
Maria smiled at Cassie from across the table. John came closer with a plate of food for her and the spatula still in his hand. Both boys immediately dropped their hold on her with the look John was giving them. When she smiled back over her shoulder at her uncle, he nodded to her.
“I believe my niece needs to eat something. She’s had a few trying days,” John told them. Both pulled out of her head also.
“Try weeks,” Cassie replied, grabbing the syrup. Once her pancakes were covered, she reached for her milk first.
“Jared was just telling me that him and some of his friends decided they want to enroll in school,” Maria said, starting back up the conversation.
Cassie almost spit out the milk she was drinking.
Jared shrugged. “I’ve pulled from school eight years ago and want to give it another try. I think my grade level matches up with you. Maybe we will be in the same classes.”
Nate’s level of annoyance with Jared was slowly rising.
“Aren’t you a senior like me?” Nate asked.
Jared shrugged again. “I’ve missed a bit of schooling over the past few years. I figure it would be best to go back a grade and make sure I didn’t miss anything important.”
Cassie stared across the table to Maria. She mouthed, ‘Help me,’ to her aunt. There was way too much testosterone in the room for Cassie to deal with. She planned to finish her food and march straight back to bed. She would stay there until the guys went away. It was her day off, and Cassie wanted peace and quiet.
The back door flung open, and Cassie was relieved to see Whitney standing there. Cassie stood and ran over to hug her friend, but stopped in her tracks when she saw her tear-streaked face—Whitney was distraught.
“What’s wrong?” Cassie asked.
Whitney started to cry. Jumping up, Maria helped Cassie usher Whitney to the chair she had just been sitting in. Cassie stood by her friend, worried. Something had to be majorly wrong. Whitney barely ever cried, unless it had something to do with Sam, her little brother.
“What happened to Sam?” Cassie asked.
She hadn’t thought they would allow someone that young to fight the night before, but she didn’t know how the clan worked. Whitney had explained that Sam had already changed twice into his totem. If you were old enough to marry at sixteen, maybe you were old enough to fight at twelve.
“They’re still missing,” Whitney sobbed.
“Who is still missing?” Cassie asked. John and Maria had freed all the witches the night before.
“Six of the witches are still missing. My mother never came home.” Whitney began to cry again.
‘We didn’t touch them the whole time we had them,’ Jared quickly told Cassie, even though her thoughts hadn’t drifted there yet.
If the wendigo hadn’t done anything, and John had freed them, then where did they end up? Cassie glanced up at her uncle, and the metal spatula had been crushed to nothing more than a ball of metal in his squeezed hand. She turned to Jared, who looked as confused as Nate did. Why were there six witches missing?
[link] The Witchling Seer
Acknowledgements
As with any work of fiction, there are many people to thank along the way.
To you, the reader. Thank you for taking the time to read this story and go
on the journey with me. If you liked it, please leave a review on your favorite online bookseller (or all of them!) and connect with me on Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, etc. The greatest help you can do to keep a writer going is to support them by spreading the word about their books and leaving them encouraging words. If you are really inspired, join my mailing list to get updates first on my current and future writings.
Also I would like to thank my editors and cover designers. A good editor is essential to getting the story correct (and in my case- more than one). Thank you so much, Kathie at Kat’s Eye Editing and Melissa at There for You Editing. They made the book just that much stronger and such a better story that you all got to read. It would not be the same book without them. Also a thanks to my proofer Ashton Brammer for going over the novel with a fine toothed comb to catch little errors that bug people. A thank-you to my cover artist Jessica for such a pretty cover. I’m not very specific with cover requirements- so finding an artist that can do such a great job and get what I am thinking is great! They may say never judge a book by its cover, but everyone does! I greatly appreciate all those that can do what I cannot, like editors and cover designers. I’m grateful I was able to find great professionals to work with on this book.
I’d also like to thank my hubby for continuing to push me further down the writing road. He gives me time when I need it to work on my stories. He encourages me to keep going each and every day on this adventure. And he does all the behind-the-scenes effort to make this work (have you seen my trailers- he is awesome!). This would be so much harder without his help. So thank you, B. for pushing me off the deep end (or the cliff as I see it sometimes). And a great big thanks to my little munchkins who keep me going from before the sun comes up ‘til long after it sets. Love you AK, KB, and EM.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read my novel!!
About the Author
B. Kristin McMichael is the author of YA and clean NA paranormal fiction. Her vampiric "Night Human World" includes the YA coming of age series "The Blue Eyes Trilogy" and the spin-off adventure series "The Day Human Trilogy". She's also the author of the NA time travel romance series "The Chalcedony Chronicles".
For more information on all of her books, visit http://www.bkristinmcmichael.com
Subscribe to her mailing list for new release notifications and deals: http://www.bkristinmcmichael.com/list
B. Kristin graduated with her PhD in biology at Ohio State where she worked as a scientist before taking her passion of writing full-time. Besides writing, she enjoys chasing her kids, playing outside, and baking cookies.
B. Kristin McMichael lives in Ohio with her husband and three children.
Other Books By This Author
The Night Human World
The Blue Eyes Trilogy (Series One)
o The Legend of the Blue Eyes
o Becoming a Legend
o Winning the Legend
The Day Human Trilogy (Series Two)
o The Day Human Prince
o The Day Human King
o The Day Human Way
The Skinwalkers Witchling Trilogy (Series Three)
o The Witchling Apprentice
o The Wendigo Witchling
o The Witchling Seer [2016]
The Chalcedony Chronicles
o Carnelian
o Chrysoprase
o Aventurine
o Chrysocolla
Standalone Books
o To Stand Beside Her
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Wendigo Witchling Page 20
