A Wild Conversion

by Katherine Gilbert

  This opportunity wasn’t exactly my greatest fantasy, but I didn’t see much way out of it. I felt my feet moving, remembered to breathe, as I reviewed the sort of thing I was looking for. Maybe, if my suppositions were right, there would be some old picture of Beatrix. I could get lucky and find a Twilight Zone-like photo of her in an antebellum dress, right?

  My whole body felt heavy as I entered, a deep shudder passing through me. Somewhere in my innermost heart, there was a sense of revulsion unlike any I had felt before—even when I had woken up this morning in Henrietta’s room—but I was determined to search, nonetheless.

  What I saw, as I glanced inside, didn’t look good for my intentions, only made the fear more solid around me. My sight was caught by a line of dolls to my left, all of them both eerily lifelike and oddly unreal.

  I had seen one or two of them once before, when Beatrix—pretending, I now understood, that it had been Henrietta’s idea—had allowed them to be put on display. I had always known that they were the room’s main contents. Still . . .

  Taking a deep breath, I looked at the line of pretty objects before me more closely. They were quite beautiful, these well-preserved, beautifully-clothed porcelain dolls, each one about eight inches high.

  I wandered along them, wondering. The ones closest to the door seemed to be the oldest—each of them delicate and perfectly made, a work of art.

  It was odd that they were up here, tucked away from view, rather than displayed for all the world—or, at least, that part of it which took a fancy to such things—to admire. These were not mass-produced throw-offs, were not even those made for the average, rich collector. They were museum pieces, auction house wares. Yet, there was something even more precious about each of them—a quality which could only be drawn from life. In each case, the artist had clearly taken a living model for his masterwork.

  My hand nearly touched one, before I drew it back. They even seemed to have been given actual human hair—the painted eyes disturbingly real. Truly, I was afraid that, if I looked away even once, they would blink.

  I had to swallow the terror back heavily to even try to push on, unable to focus on anything besides those terrifying, mesmerizing figures. Finally, I managed to turn my head—knowing that I was finding nothing that would benefit me, trying to pull away.

  I made it almost to the door, only to let out a small gasp. On the other side of the room, there were even more dolls—these not so perfectly preserved. Still, much worse than their neglect was the fact that their flaws didn’t seem to be accidental. Not at all. In each case, there was one intentional, damaging blow to destroy all the artist’s careful work.

  I didn’t really want to go any further, the sight making me want to run as far away as possible—but I already knew how far that was. While the dolls on my left were dressed in different, but beautiful, white outfits—each one representing a separate period in time, each comprised of what looked to be the most-precious velvets, silks, and lace, each doll with a lovely white ribbon holding back her hair—the ones on the right were all absolutely identically clothed. Each of these wore a stark, white cotton dress, had a red ribbon tied around her hair—and every one bore a mark that, in a person, would instantly lead to death.

  Barely remembering to breathe, I moved along the line, each of the girl’s fates somehow more terrifying than the last, sickening me. One little head was smashed in. Another had what looked to be a tiny bullet hole in her right temple. Some had blue lips—a sign of what had happened after a poisoning, perhaps? But it was as I came to the next to last one that I very nearly screamed.

  I couldn’t help staring, couldn’t move at all. This sad doll was of the little girl I had seen in the garden, the one who had hidden the key. Along her throat, there was a deep, red gash.

  I had to bite my lower lip hard to keep from wailing—suddenly understanding all too well. Even the numbers of the ones on each wall were matched. These were the sacrifices the house required, before it accepted the more permanent ones on the left.

  Spinning back toward them, I knew with horror what I would see. That dreadful sight stared back at me with haunted eyes. The last doll was myself as a little girl—and it was sitting right beside Henrietta.

  I wasn’t certain why I was shocked at this point, all of it making a terrible kind of sense. It didn’t even surprise me that I knew that it was my cousin’s image sitting there, although I had certainly never known her as a girl. Not only had I seen a picture of her in her youth once, but there was simply some quality in common between the doll and the woman—that chestnut brown hair, the lovely brown eyes reflecting all the innocence that she must have felt in the years before the house had taken its long, terrible toll.

  I had to try hard not to cry—for all of us. The only thing I didn’t understand was why there were more than five of them, the number not matching the graves out in the yard. The shudder which caught me made it difficult to hold back the sob. But maybe there had been other places once where one could bury bodies without much scrutiny.

  I was almost surprised having so easily found some of the evidence I had looked for—until a sudden, much deeper, terror gripped me; I spun back around. Yes, I was the current choice to be the house’s bride. That was all too clear. But, if a sacrifice were needed, as well . . .

  The last doll, the one of the person who was to be killed to seal my fate, was covered with a cloth. While I didn’t want to go toward it, didn’t want to see, I did need to know. Whomever this was—whether I knew them or not—was in just as much danger as I was.

  Tentatively, my hand reached for the sheeting, every part of me shaking. But I had no idea just what I expected to find.

  What I did discover nearly made me let out a shriek. The lovely face stared back at me, cold and dead in its porcelain version.

  I would have run, would have tried to warn her. But that was when the door to the room slammed shut—a blast of those demonic red sparkles overpowering me completely. And, like the ghastly night before, I soon lost consciousness of everything else.

  Discover more of Annabella’s fight to survive here: https://storyoriginapp.com/universalbooklinks/7b82271c-ba55-11e9-8f5b-9f4e4f93fd97

  IF YOU’RE HOPING TO find more humor and mystery, then here’s a taste of Unearthly Remains, a quirkily-humorous urban fantasy/paranormal romance with a bit of a paranormal mystery thrown in for good measure. Here's what happens when Sgt. Marilyn Jaye and her partner, Erick Lawrence, get called in to investigate a murder at a supernatural rehabilitation home in a disused railway hotel in London:

  Erick followed Marilyn to the door of a penthouse which seemed to take up the entire top floor. Odd noises were already coming from behind it.

  He raised an eyebrow, as she turned to him seriously. “It’s going to go against your entire nature, I know, but I need you not to comment on anything you see here.”

  His mouth opened to object, but she shook her head.

  “Yeah, yeah, I know you think you’ve seen it all, but you haven’t. Not yet.”

  She turned to knock, leaving him looking irritated, and then thought better of it, opening the door. For far too many reasons, there was no need to wait for an invitation.

  Erick’s reaction was exactly the one she had suspected. She tried to stop his look of shock with her own hard stare, but he was, sadly, a bit too bug-eyed to notice. She couldn’t really blame him. It probably wasn’t every day that mortals walked in on a full-on orgy.

  This was one of the better ones, too, she supposed. No one here was shy or uncertain, no one left out. There were at least 35 people in the room, all convulsing and cavorting in one rolling sea of naked flesh. The sounds of their orgasmic moans were nearly deafening.

  Marilyn didn’t share her partner's amusement or interest, however—and none of the participants’ apparent joy. She stood with her arms crossed, foot tapping, as a small man in a robe dashed up to her.

  He had to be new. He looked at Erick speculatively and at her a bit wor
riedly, wondering. “Um, did you wish to join?”

  She bit back the growl. “Just get him here.”

  The little man’s look became beatific. “You wish to see our Master?”

  Not really—but there was no avoiding it. Still, she couldn’t say it. “I know he's here. Just get him.”

  She was already mouthing the man's response, as it began. “Oh, our Master is always with us!”

  “I didn't ask for a sermon, just a summons,” she growled. When her badge materialized, it glowed a sort of electric blue. She really was annoyed. “I’m a sergeant with Supernatural Oversight.”

  The sound of her foot tapping nearly outdid the nearby moans. The fact that she didn’t give her name even caught Erick’s attention, which was hard to do, given their current distractions.

  She disapparated the badge and crossed her arms more fully. This little man seemed far too interested in her cleavage.

  “Just get the bastard.”

  That surprised him. “Oh, but . . .”

  She didn’t let him finish, using a very old trick to make her voice fill the room. She didn't have quite the range of her mother's magical abilities, but she hadn't gone to a witch school for nothing. “NOW!”

  She was pissed—it echoed.

  Still, it got her what she wanted, a feathery light descending into the shape of a robust, older man. His steel gray hair had not a strand out of place, his deep blue eyes twinkling on seeing her, smiling at her angelically. “Now, Marilyn, didn’t I teach you not to interrupt anyone’s pleasure?”

  She tried not to grind her teeth, ignoring the old barb.

  The bastard.

  Better to just get on with this. If he thought she’d already interrupted, he’d seen nothing yet.

  “Hi, Dad. There’s been a murder . . .”

  You can find the full novel and discover more about Sgt. Jaye here: https://storyoriginapp.com/universalbooklinks/ae69fb58-66a1-11e9-9b5b-b3150184f041

  Or you can pick up the short story prequel, “Things to Do at the British Museum When You’re Dead,” for just 99 cents and read about Erick’s first days in the S.O.: https://storyoriginapp.com/universalbooklinks/9b54fbf6-8fc5-11e9-8110-2fee6bca5160

  IF YOU’D RATHER TRY a new adult urban fantasy/paranormal romance with lots of humor, here’s a taste of Protecting the Dead, where Lydia tries to come to terms with her confounding new job at the Roanoke Apartments, where you never know what supernatural creature might be inhabiting the unit next door:

  Lydia blinked, staring at the previous applications, wondering about her current visitor. CP... CP... She picked up a pen, ignoring the fact that she was probably just being nosy, and began to ponder the possibilities. Her pen tapped against the sheets, until the woman looked up and Lydia smiled, forcing herself to at least be snoopy in a quieter way. Most of the rest of the tenant abbreviations were of one word. She started to scribble:

  Captain.

  Uh-huh. Of what, stupid? Undead European cheerleading? She glanced up at Irena and felt even more ridiculous, before trying again.

  Chaplain.

  She almost laughed, imagining. Our Lady of the Weirdoes, we beseech thee... Um, no.

  Culpepper.

  That’s a name, idiot.

  Cupholder.

  Now, she was just getting ridiculous. She tried not to tap the pen again, letting her mind roam. She didn’t notice Irena finishing the application, holding it out to her.

  “Cat Person.” There was a moment before Lydia realized she’d said it out loud. Then, it was her turn to blush.

  Irena was staring at her, understandably, her beautiful, dark eyes wide. Lydia wanted to pound herself repeatedly on the head. It took a lot of will to take the papers from her, even more to speak. “I’m sorry. I’m new.”

  She saw Irena blush and felt even worse. Who the hell was she to judge somebody else? She was clueless, useless, and probably demon bait. “And I’m unbelievably rude.”

  To her surprise, she heard a laugh, warm and amused. Irena was shaking with repressed mirth. “Sorry,” she managed finally. “I’m just not used to anyone saying it without a pitchfork.”

  It didn’t seem a likely way to form a bond, but it worked, mostly, Lydia decided, because of the cat person’s humor. Any further conversation between the pair was temporarily interrupted by Geoffrey. To her relief, he was standing in his office doorway, arms crossed over himself, smiling. “Lydia’s new to this world,” he informed the possible tenant. He said it with enough warmth that she could tell he wasn’t angry with her. When he moved forward to collect the applications, the warmth deepened. “There are a lot of God’s creatures for her to meet.”

  Discover more with the tenants of this supernatural apartment complex here: https://storyoriginapp.com/universalbooklinks/3caa27a2-66a3-11e9-8eff-bf586265c024

  IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR a book with quirky humor, romance, and a good side of suspense, then try the new adult paranormal romance/urban fantasy, Cursed in White. Here’s a scene where Carrie is taken on her first vampire hunt by the secret organization she’s been taken into, which is a little distracting when some of the vampires are on her side and also happen to be her love interest’s ex-girlfriend:

  One would have thought a cemetery at night would be creepy—all the silence so overwhelming that a single snapped branch made the heart skip a beat, the soughing trees becoming monsters through the shadows. What it actually was, though, was . . .

  “Dark,” Carrie noted, as she stood there staring into . . . well, very little at the moment. All she could really see was the night.

  This shouldn’t have been a surprise. It wasn’t like the keepers would light Bonaventure Cemetery for nighttime trespassers. As they had taken a portal to it, there weren’t even any headlights to help.

  She could feel the others staring at her, even if she couldn’t see them, knew she should have guessed that they wouldn’t have had her problem. None of them were quite—or, in most cases, at all—normal.

  Of course, she wasn’t really, either, but that didn’t extend to her eyesight.

  She guessed she could bring up a little lightning to help, but it wasn’t a solution which thrilled her. For one thing, it would probably only light a few inches around her hand. She could maybe use it to outline her entire body, but then she would look like a walking electrocution threat. Since she kind of guessed she was the bait here—thanks, Evan!—that wasn’t likely to make her seem like a particularly easy meal.

  There was more to the decision than this, though. If she brought up the lightning and showed just how much she could control it now, all of them would know—and she wasn’t certain which of them to trust.

  In some ways, this included Evan. In others, not. She didn’t think that he would premeditatedly tell his father about her powers now, not after all the changes she’d seen in him these past few months. But he had a lifetime of programming to overcome, could easily let things slip without even thinking about it. When his father said jump, he was already on the moon. Even with him, it didn’t seem a good idea to let too much slip.

  This said nothing of her other, current companions. With the general exception of Tatiana—whom she really liked and hoped wouldn’t betray her, although she’d never known anyone who wouldn’t—she either didn’t much know, understand, and/or like most of the rest of them. She got the feeling Susannah would sell her for a pack of cigarettes—and the woman didn’t even smoke. After that night when she had been tested on the ship, she was well aware that the less The Will understood of her powers, the safer she would be.

  Some sort of unspoken conversation was apparently going on among her colleagues—even Evan, who was human, if a witch, so she suspected must have some sort of spell to counteract this. Only when she felt him shift closer was the idea confirmed.

  “I’m going to have to touch you for this.” His voice was soft, and she wasn’t certain whether he was trying to keep from spooking her or was just hiding from the rogue vampires.

 
“Always encouraging words,” she muttered.

  When he didn’t touch her, though, she realized he was waiting for actual permission. Despite herself, she smiled. Pathetic as it was, she did enjoy knowing a man with that much basic decency.

  Once she nodded, she felt his thumb on her forehead. He just placed it there at first—but, when she relaxed a little, he started to stroke what she assumed was a spell. She noticed the green sparkle of his clair-lumes, as his magic worked. Well, that and the fact that she could now see everything around her perfectly clearly.

  It wasn’t like it was daylight, more like night lighting in a movie. Sure, everything was sort of dark, but she could see every detail.

  She relaxed further, hadn’t realized quite how tense she had been. Of course, it made sense. Unknown graveyard, dead of night, surrounded by vampires—both friendly, supposedly friendly, and not even close—and at least one ghost. Well, revenant.

  Potato, potahto.

  A small part of her insisted on pointing out that it was partly Evan’s touch which had calmed her, even if the lightning had twined around her fingers for an instant. She hoped that those around her assumed it was defensive, because she was discovering to her horror that it sometimes appeared just because she liked it when he was close.

  Thankfully, this wasn’t the time to ponder such things, which gave her a good excuse to tuck the idea away.

  Now that she could actually see something, she looked around. They were near a small building which said it was a visitor center with some restrooms nearby and the graves beyond.

  What kind of graveyard has a visitor center—or rest rooms, for that matter?

  Her brain answered a second later.

  A well-visited one.

  She couldn’t see much of the real graveyard from here, but what she could seemed impressive. Statues were everywhere, along with what looked to be hundreds of other ornate memorials. Maybe granite was cheaper a century or so ago.