by Claudy Conn
Text copyright ©2016 by the Author.
This work was made possible by a special license through the Kindle Worlds publishing program and has not necessarily been reviewed by Robyn Peterman. All characters, scenes, events, plots and related elements appearing in the original Magic and Mayhem remain the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of Robyn Peterman, or their affiliates or licensors.
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Table of Contents
Witchin' Hard
~ One ~
~ Two ~
~ Three ~
~ Four ~
~ Five ~
~ Six ~
~ Seven ~
~ Eight ~
~ Nine ~
~ Epilogue ~
About Claudy
Witchin’ Hard
By Claudy Conn
Edited by: Alicia Carmical
Cover by: Dawn Sullivan
The Prophecy
“Dark Chamber of Spells blesses the witch’s hand.
Sifting, sifting, sifting over Rucker land.
Beware
The light extinguished – darkness blights all.
One will stand against evil’s call.
Beware
Donai hovers, and falls, but she may shine.
Crossing, ever crossing the dark line.
Beware.”
~ One ~
ONE MINUTE, I WAS standing over Kallem…waiting for Zelda to do her thing and heal him and the next minute, I was distracted by a whirling noise that buzzed incessantly in my ear. It was like a fly who just won’t take a hint. I almost swatted at the noise.
Kallem looked like he was in a coma. My heart ached. I was helpless, and it was a damnable position. He had been shot protecting me and my mother.
He had been shot five times with iron tipped arrows. He is a Fae and the iron poison had taken almost an immediate effect. Although he is not just a Fae, but a royal, a prince of Daoine, iron is a poison that can kill him.
Zelda was a human witch with the gift of healing. Would Zelda be able to heal him?
She looked distressed. She cursed and said something about iron poison being out of her normal healing capacity.
Iron poison is a tricky thing for Fae and he had taken several hits. So much of it was in his blood. I started biting my nails as I clasped my hands and watched her bend over the love of my life.
“Zelda…please?”
“Good Goddess, I’m working on it!”
A very large, gray cat waddled over and said, “Zelda…I have a bet going on with Jango that you can heal this sucker, so put all you have into it!”
“If I do save him, Fat Bastard, you are splitting the winnings with me. Now quiet!” Zelda said, putting up a hand to silence him. He sidled off mumbling something not very pretty.
“Zelda…hurry.” I was anxious. Something was wrong in the aura above me. Something awful was about to happen. I could sense trouble about to explode. My mother hung near me, touching my back to give me comfort.
Zelda made a face at me, but allowed her palms to hover over the wounds, one at a time. She looked like she was going to collapse. Oh no, oh no.
The strength of the buzzing all around my head increased in volume, but no one else seemed to hear it. Where was it coming from?
The roof?
I stared up at the ceiling and all at once, a splintering of wood and fragments of the roof shingles went flying in every direction, leaving a hole in the roof and the atmosphere the size of an elephants’ middle.
That dark hole continued into the blue sky for as far as I could see. I stared, more than a little dumbfounded.
Zelda shouted, “What the fuck! Someone is going to pay for my roof damage!”
Whatever had made the dark hole, took shape.
Sharp clawed hands that seemed to have arms stretched out of the long portal.
Just before the claws grabbed me, I heard a primal grunt and I’m pretty damn sure I saw glowing red eyes.
I struggled against the claws that pricked me and felt my warm blood begin to ooze out of the wounds they made.
Mom threw herself at me and caught me around my middle. She wasn’t letting go anytime soon, but I screamed, “Mom…let go! Please, Mom, stay safe with Zelda.”
She didn’t listen. Of course she didn’t listen. I love my mom, but it isn’t often she will listen to me. She held on and chanted magic, but the claw that had me yanked hard.
Hence, the two of us went hurtling upwards, sucked up by a force neither one of us was able to escape. I held onto my mom’s clothes so she wouldn’t be ripped apart from me as we traveled through a funnel where tornado like winds swirled around us.
My legs kept smashing into the slimy walls of the portal (it had to be a portal). I saw Mom was suffering the same hits. Damn, but we were going to be seriously bruised after this trip.
I took a hit to my shoulder. Holy Hell, that was going to leave an ugly bruise.
I lost one of my beautiful boots. Now that was annoying.
It’s odd what occurs to you when you are being abducted by a monster. It occurred to me that I was going to have a difficult time replacing my boots, as I had gotten them on sale.
Why was this happening now—now when my prince needed me?
Where would this land us? Why did I ask such a stupid question?
Because I knew. I knew where this was going to plop us down.
How could I not know? Only one warlock would go to this much trouble to get his hands on me and the ‘key’, and that was Morlan.
Of course, he had located us. That was my fault. I used my magic to create a portal to get Kallem to Zelda. It would have been great if Kallem had been conscious enough to have shifted directly to Faery and been healed by his own. However, he had been in no condition to use his shifting to get home. So, I had only the one option. And that option meant I had to use my witchy magic, strong, darkly tinged, witchy magic and Morlan immediately tracked its scent.
Damn, and double damn.
We landed heavily, Mom and I rolled across the floor. I scrambled to my feet and helped my mother up before I looked around.
Being right, I have discovered many, oh so many, times is not always fun.
Morlan stood with his arms folded across his chest, in his black wizard robe flowing around his tall lean form. His auburn hair, now slicked back and braided, had gained (since I last saw him) a long white streak at his forehead. It decorated the braid, which reached the middle of his back. Some females in our realm think Morlan is ‘hot’. I don’t.
He has always given me the creeps and now, I just want to cut him until he is dead.
At the moment, he appears to be possessed—and beyond reason by his obsession with me and the key. His eyes were nearly black with evil and glee. He didn’t speak.
“Morlan,” I said in way of acknowledgement rather than greeting. Time to get the show going. I had to stall him while I figured out a way to rescue my mom and myself.
I hoped he wouldn’t notice me doing a quick assessment of our location. I knew where we were, I have often been here with my parents for formal events. We were in what used to be the Rucker Palace ballroom—turned into an enormous office, where he no doubt held court.
The scene around me made me roll my eyes.
Morlan always liked showing off and this was his way of saying he was the victor. He had taken possession of Rucker Palace.
Damn him.
I have never before thought I could be a cold-blooded killer, but when I look at him and remember how he murdered my father, I turn
deadly.
It was how I felt right then looking at him—deadly and ready for the first opportunity that presented itself to kill him. I needed to snuff his life out and avenge my dad. Does that sound awful? Probably.
I don’t care.
He looked furious all at once as he stomped across the room to tower above me and grit out angrily, “Don’t look at me like that, don’t ever look at me like that!”
He grabbed hold of my hair, making me wish it weren’t so long, and then what he did next made me taste bile.
He sniffed the strand of hair he held. He sniffed my hair. Ugh, yikes. I hauled off and shoved him hard.
He grinned and said, “Your hair always smells, as you do, of lavender and vanilla. It is particular to you. I have never come across your natural scent anywhere else. Most alluring.”
Zelda might call him an asswipe. He was. Oh, he was.
I had taken a stance in front of my mother. She whispered in my ear, “Don’t antagonize him, baby-girl.”
But he marched back at me and grabbed my arm.
“Sorry, Mom, got to,” I told her, and brought my single booted heel up and roundly kicked him in the balls.
Yeah, that’s the way to do it, I said to myself and grinned.
It is a wondrous thing—a male’s balls. So easy to bring a man down by giving his privates some special attention, one way or another.
He let go of my hair and groaned as he bent over himself.
I ran to my mom. She had a bruise across her chin from being knocked about in the portal. I touched it and said, “Oh Mom…”
“It is nothing. We Crescent witches heal quickly.”
The next thing I knew, she had produced her wand and was making tiny circles with it.
My mom uses a wand.
She doesn’t have to, none of the witches in the Rucker Realm need to use a wand, but it is her thing. Hey—whatever.
She used it to create a bubble around us.
I smiled at her and said, “Cool, but now what?”
Morlan had begun to unbend and he snarled, “Do you think I wouldn’t be prepared for your magic? Do you think I will allow you to leave now that I have you?”
As nothing happened at that moment, I assumed he wasn’t yet back to full magical strength. Think—I had to think.
“Baby-girl, time to go. You can use the key inside of you and leave,” Mom whispered.
“Yeah, but how…he’ll follow if I create a portal.”
“Not with a portal. You are the key. It isn’t just inside you, baby, you are the key. You can go anywhere at all. Just imagine a door to wherever, and then think where you want to be…”
By then, Morlan had stumbled to our bubble and pounded a fist into it. He cut through our mystical protection, but I zapped him with hard energy and he withdrew his fist.
Yeah, I had the ability to hurt him.
The ‘key’ was more than a power to unlock doors and take me where I wanted to go. It gave me potent mana and that mana seemed to be more dark than light.
I was inside a bubble made with White Magic.
He was ranting outside the bubble. I simply lifted my hand and sent Morlan flying across the room.
Had I used Dark Magic to do that? I wasn’t sure. It didn’t feel familiar. I was sure the power had come from the key. Damn, hot damn, I was good.
I did wish I knew more about this tricky thing inside of me.
“Now would be a good time to leave, baby-girl,” Mom said. “Don’t worry, I’ll be right beside you. The key will transport both of us.” She took my hand.
Morlan was back to full strength.
He jumped to his feet and with a sneer and a flick of his wrist, he melted our bubble and took hold of my mom’s arm, pulling her towards him.
“Stop!” I screamed, stalling for time. “Leave her with me and I won’t try and escape.”
His laugh was harsh. “Do you take me for a fool?” He nodded to the guards and Mom called out over her shoulder as each man took an arm and began dragging her out of the chamber. “Dilly, don’t give in to him. No matter what. Don’t do what you know I wouldn’t want you to do.”
Morlan stalked to her and slapped her hard with his open hand.
That did it.
Something inside me snapped. My magic bloomed first light and large and then ominous and dark, so dark. The power inside of me opened up like petals of a rose that bloom red and then turn black with age. My magic went through its stages, but instead of withering, those dark petals grew.
The combined Dark and Light Magic made its way down my arm and into my fingers, which closed into fists.
My mom is a fighter and she called him a few choice names, and he slapped her again.
She spit in his face….whoa, Mom! It all happened so fast.
Even as I raised my arm, the pig of a warlock punched her in the gut and she collapsed.
I opened my fist and with my palm, I leveled my newly acquired Dark Magic at him with a force I am sure he has never felt before.
This time when Morlan went flying across the room, he did not get up. He lay there, unconscious.
I hit his guards with the same newly acquired Dark Magic and down for the count they went.
I ran to my mom and put an arm around her and in a puff of my standard purple smoke, I transported us to our old house.
Home, if only for a moment.
Mom was coughing and putting her hand out as she tried to speak. I told her, “Just recoup, Mom.” I ran and got her a glass of water.
Her coughing subsided enough for her to take a sip and she said hoarsely, “Baby, go. Hide. This is more important than either of us. Your father died protecting the key. He only used the key once in all his life, and then never used it again. He said it was addictive and it worried him. But you, you will know how to rein it in and make it yours. We, we have to honor your father’s sacrifice and save the realm.”
“Not going until I get you somewhere safe.”
“Then hold onto me and unlock the key to another world,” she whispered. “He won’t be able to track us when you use the Key of Dark Spells.”
“But…not sure how, Mom?”
“As I said, imagine…block out all else and imagine a door to where you want to go,” she whispered and then stopped me, “here quick, get some clothes for us…” She got up and threw me a leather satchel.
I hurried around throwing in clothes from her closet and mine while she rested at the kitchen table.
All the while, all I could think about was not my present predicament, but Kallem, Kallem, Kallem.
Kallem falling…shot full of iron. Kallem hurt…and unconscious. Kallem. It drew a sob out of me as I took Mom’s hand.
“Aw honey…what is it?”
I just shook my head. This wasn’t the time.
She understood and simply hugged me tight, kissed my head, and encouraged me softly, “Life has ups and downs, sweetheart. If you are on a downward swing, don’t you worry…before you know it, being who you are, you’ll climb out of it.”
I smiled at her. Those were words and right now, words weren’t enough. But I had to get my mom to safety so I could return to Kallem.
Let’s go…key, open the door to my grandfather. Do it now, do it quickly, I actually spoke in my head. Nothing happened.
I could feel Morlan’s aura in the atmosphere. I sensed he was tracking and would soon have our direction. We didn’t have time. He would be on us any moment.
I tried again. I repeated the words and still nothing! Absofreaking nothing.
If I was the ‘key’, I wasn’t real good at working my inner talent.
I don’t know what instinct made me turn to the Celtic language. Perhaps because I remembered that the ‘key’ originated with the Fae. Their language was similar to the Celtic language. So, I told the blasted thing, Tá mé an eochair. Fosgail! Loosely translated, I had said, I am the key—open.
All at once, the room went dark, and I held my mother’s hand tig
htly in mine. Out of the darkness, scenes began to unfold. This was the first time I had used it, and apparently, the key was giving me choices. “My grandfather,” I repeated in English. Somehow, I knew it understood me. What? Had it just been playing games?
Gramps was the one who had sent me to Zelda’s attic while he sent my mom off in a different direction. I had no idea where he had gone to hide himself. It could be another realm altogether?
Without a moment to lose, because Morlan was nearly at our door, I saw Gramps walking on a trail in a dark forest!
I pulled my mom through a misty threshold and just like that, we were on solid ground. The woods surrounded us. We were somewhere in the forest setting the ‘key’ had shown me.
Gramps stopped short as we came face to face and then ran to each other.
Family hug time.
I was crying and laughing all in one. Tears streamed down my face and then I looked around again. It felt familiar.
“Gramps…wait a minute. Where are we? I know this place.”
The woods were lush with variegated shades of green, and I so knew this place.
I had come here over the years. It was a favorite haunt as a child and later as a teen.
I knew these trees because my friends and I had climbed them and used them as look-outs for so many years, filled with a simple thing called fun.
This was the Rucker Vampire Territory!
“Gramps…you are staying with the vamps? Isn’t that dangerous? Won’t Morlan figure it out and find you here?” I looked around. “Morlan knows the vamps are with you…he knows.”
During my short time at Zelda’s, I had come across some nasty vamps. I had been shocked to discover that vampires in the Human Realm actually drink human blood. Yuck. Not our vamps.
Many of the Human Realm vampires are dangerous and even kill their victims. Others seem to have some humanity and control over their appetites, taking blood without murdering their victims. Rucker vamps, like the Human Realm vamps, have the power of ‘compulsion’ and can sedate the victims as well as ‘compel’ them to do their bidding.
Rucker vamps use this power on the animals they choose, to keep them calm and unafraid. They use their power here not to subjugate, but from kindness. It is sort of like hypnotism, and then the Rucker vamp takes a drink before sending the animal on its way. Vampires in the Human Realm are way different.
