Contents
Foreword
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Also by M.Z. Andrews
About the Author
Foreword
I would just like to first say THANK YOU to everyone who has been patiently waiting for this book to come out. It feels like it’s been a long time coming, and I’m so glad to finally get it out into all of my wonderful fans’ hands!
The Witch Within is kind of like the “season finale” of the Witch Squad’s first year at the Paranormal Institute for Witches. I think you’re going to like the fact that it wraps up a lot of the ongoing storylines from season one, so that in “season two” we can start delving into some new storylines.
With that said, I do have one fun, shorter book planned. It’s going to be about the girls on a little summer getaway. The lead in for that, you’ll see, is at the end of this book. But after that, the next “season” starts with the girls as second year witches at the Institute!! So if you don’t already get emails when my new books come out and you’d like to, you can sign up for my newsletter by clicking here. If you’re already signed up, no need to do so again.
Once again, I’d just like to thank all of my AMAZING readers! Thank you to everyone who’s left feedback on social media or who’s left reviews. All of your positive energy and feedback has pushed me harder to keep moving and keep writing stories about these girls!! I appreciate each and every one of you!
XOXO
M.Z.
The Witch Within
A Witch Squad Cozy Mystery
M.Z. Andrews
The Witch Within
The Witch Squad Cozy Mystery Series: Book #8
by
M.Z. Andrews
Copyright © 2018 by M.Z. Andrews
ISBN-13: 978-1721068968
ISBN-10: 1721068961
All characters herein are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the author except for the brief quotations in a book review.
1
“But, Mom!”
“I’ve made myself perfectly clear, JaclynRose. And you know how I feel about begging.”
JaclynRose Stone, known to her friends as simply Jax, plumped out her bottom lip and stomped one striped witchy foot on the floor with her hands fisted by her sides. “But that’s not fair!”
“This discussion is over. You may see yourself to the door.”
With her brows lifted and her mouth agape, Jax plopped down into the chair in front of her mother’s desk. “Uh! But, Mom, I don’t want to go to normal college! It’s not my fault Gran cursed me and our family!”
Sorceress SaraLynn Stone’s frosty blue eyes snapped up off the papers she’d been grading, and she turned her glare onto her daughter. “Phyllis Habernackle is not your grandmother, JaclynRose, and I refuse to hear you call her as such.”
Jax shrank in her seat. “Well, she’s Mercy and Reign’s grandmother, and they’re my cousins, so she’s kind of like my grandmother.” Jax’s voice was small now, intimidated by the veracity with which her mother spoke.
“That woman cursed our family. How you could think of her as family…” Sorceress Stone swallowed hard before shaking her head haughtily. “It’s just beyond me. I’ve already allowed you to live with her daughter. Isn’t that enough?”
Jax splayed her thin fingers out in front of herself. Looking down at them, she responded quietly. “I mean, I appreciate you letting me live with Aunt Linda and Mercy and Reign and all my friends for the rest of the semester. I just don’t understand why you want me to go to a normal college in the fall.”
Sorceress Stone furrowed her brow. “Well, obviously it’s because you’re not a witch and you’ll never be a witch. It’s ridiculous to maintain hope after what we’ve learned about the curse put upon you and our family. College is supposed to prepare you for a life past high school. How will you support yourself as an adult if you don’t have any kind of real-world skills or an education?”
“But you let me go to witch school this year.”
“I had hoped that perhaps by your eighteenth birthday you might have been granted your powers, which is why I’ve allowed this charade to go on for as long as it has. But now that we know the truth—it’s simply pointless.”
“Pointless! But, Mom…”
Sorceress Stone closed her eyes and shook her head. She inhaled a deep breath through her long, thin nose. Exhaling slowly, she opened her eyes and glared at her only child. “Now it’s time for you to go to a trade school or a secular college where you can learn a real skill. Perhaps nursing. That’s a noble profession. I believe you possess the proper acumen for a career such as that.”
“Nursing? But, Mom, I wanna be a witch!”
“JaclynRose, stop being obtuse. You’ll never be a witch. You’re a mere human and that is that.”
Jax’s bottom lip quivered. She’d never heard her mother speak with such finality regarding her witch status. In the back of her mind, Jax knew that her mother had been holding out hope for all those years, just as Jax had. But now that it had come to light that Phyllis Habernackle had cursed her family as retribution for something that Jax’s own grandmother had done to Phyllis years ago, Jax knew her mother had finally given up any hope that Jax might someday get her powers. “But, Mom…”
Sorceress Stone planted both of her palms on her desk and pushed herself into a standing position. Her long white hair rippled down over her shoulders and back. “This conversation is over. You may see yourself out.”
Jax bit her bottom lip and tried to keep from crying even as her eyes became glossy. She hung her head and turned towards the door. Reaching out to take the knob in her hand, she turned to look back at her mother one last time. There was so much more that she wanted to say. Her mouth opened, but no words came out. With her head lowered, she opened the door and quietly left the room.
The second she was out the door, Holly Rockwell, who was seated in a chair in the secretary’s office, lurched up and out of her seat to rush to Jax’s side. “Well, what did she want?”
Jax took one look at Holly’s expectant face and burst into tears.
Holly wrapped her arms around Jax’s tiny shoulders. “Oh! Jaxie! What did she say? It can’t have been that bad!”
Seated behind her desk, Brittany Hobbs, Sorceress Stone’s secretary, grabbed a tissue and walked it over to Jax. “Here, sweetie.”
Still clinging to Holly, Jax took the tissue and sniffled. “Thank you.” Her shoulders shook as Holly squeezed her tightly. Finally, she disengaged from Holly and stood up straighter, blotting the tears that continued to fall.
“Gosh, Jax. What in the world did she say?”
Jax could barely get the words out. “Sh-she said I-I have to go to noooormal college next yeeeeearrrrrr,” she bawled. “Because I’m not a witchhhhhh.”
2
Seated in a group on the bleachers later that afternoon, Alba leaned over and whispered loudly to our little group. “What’s Shorty’s problem?”
Jax sat two rows below us with her arms crossed and her chin tucked down against her chest. Her eyes were glued to her mother as she entered from the other side of the auditorium.
Holly put a hand in front of her mouth to muffle her words so Jax wouldn’t hear. “Sorceress Stone called her into her office this morning and told her she has to go to normal college next year.”
I sucked in my breath sharply. “What?!” Holly’s words came as a shock to me. Jax hadn’t said a word to me about it. I couldn’t believe Sorceress Stone would really be that evil that she’d kick her own daughter out of witch college. “Why?”
Holly rolled her eyes. “Well, obvs, because she’s not a witch.”
With my feet up on the seat of the row in front of me, I flipped my long auburn braid over my shoulder and leaned forward until my chest rested on my knees. I looked sideways at Holly. “So? I told her we’d work on figuring out how to get the curse reversed.”
Holly shrugged. “I guess Sorceress Stone thinks she’s a lost cause.”
Sorceress Stone infuriated me. She treated her daughter like a cast-off piece of jewelry. Something to have worn once and then tossed out when it didn’t fit her style anymore. “So she just throws her out on her butt? Some mother.”
Alba puffed air out her nose. “Stone was born without an empathy card. The woman’s a disaster as far as mothers go.”
“Alba,” I hissed, glancing down at Jax and hoping she hadn’t heard Alba. Despite the horrible way Jax’s mother treated her, I knew how she felt about us bad-mouthing Sorceress Stone. No matter what happened between the two women, Jax had always found reasons to continue loving her mother.
Alba shrugged and leaned backwards against the wooden bleacher behind her, letting her butt fall into the gap between seats. “Hey, listen. I call ’em like I see ’em. We all know the truth about Stone. It’s not like it’s some big secret.”
“Yeah, well, you don’t have to make her feel worse about it than she already does,” I muttered.
“Hello, girls.”
Alba, Holly, and I looked up to see Libby and Cinder Hafström, second-year witches at the Paranormal Institute for Witches, standing at the end of our row of seats. Cinder’s fiery-red hair flared out around her shoulders as she looked down at us. Between her hair, her fire-starting abilities, and her fiery demeanor, most girls called her the Fire Queen and her frosty-haired, ice-shooting twin sister, Libby, the Ice Princess.
The girls and I had befriended the twins, who hailed from Sweden, during our first week of classes and they’d helped us when we’d had to save Jax from a particularly harrowing hostage situation during the first week of school. Because of our fairly close friendship, we just called the girls by their first names.
“Hey, Cin,” I said with a grin, pulling my Converse sneakers off the row in front of me and sitting up straighter. “Hey, Lib.”
Libby stuck her head around her sister’s shoulder. “Mind if we join you?”
I slid closer to Holly, and Alba sat up and scooted closer to me. “Nope, there’s plenty of room.”
The duo passed us, filling the two empty spots on the other side of Alba. As the rest of the auditorium filled and the noise level steadily increased, I looked around curiously. A small wooden stage had been erected in the center of the auditorium with a podium sitting center stage. Off to the right of the podium was a row of chairs with five older women I didn’t recognize seated in them. Brittany Hobbs rushed around the platform like a little worker bee, while Sorceress Stone greeted each of the women in the chairs with a perfunctory handshake.
“So, anyone know what this assembly is about?” I asked.
“Cinder and I do,” said Libby in her pronounced Swedish accent. “We went to the same assembly last year.”
“So what’s it about?” asked Holly. “And what’s up with all those old ladies sitting down there?”
Libby was just about to respond when Sorceress Stone tapped a finger on the microphone, sending a crackling noise skittering across the gymnasium and making much of the chatter quiet down.
“You’ll see,” whispered Cinder.
“Good morning, witches!” shouted Sorceress Stone into the microphone as if she were suddenly a Hunger Games announcer or something. The three words came out with more enthusiasm than I’d heard her muster up in the entire nine months that I’d gone to her school. I curled my lip and wondered if her sudden enthusiasm wasn’t for the benefit of the panel of women behind her, making me that much more curious as to who they were.
Several voices from the bleachers shouted back at her. “Good morning, Sorceress Stone!”
Alba glanced over at me. Rolling her eyes, she whispered out of the side of her mouth, “Brownnosers.”
Holly laughed.
“Today is a very special day here at the Paranormal Institute for Witches. With only one week remaining of the current school year, the time has come to discuss finals week and declaration requirements for the first-year students as well as graduation requirements for the second-year students.”
Several of the older girls around the room applauded. I doubted the applause was for Sorceress Stone. It was more likely for themselves, as they were excited to finally graduate and be rid of the Paranormal Institute for Witches and Sorceress Stone once and for all. I knew I couldn’t wait for that day to come.
“But before we begin the business for the week,” continued Sorceress Stone, holding up one long, skinny finger, “it is my very great honor to introduce to you a group of very special witches. The women you see behind me are the newly appointed members of the Great Witches Council!”
Cheers went up around the room. When they died down, Sorceress Stone continued.
“The members of the Great Witches Council are Institute alumni. Each of these members has experienced great success in her life since walking our hallowed halls. New members are appointed to their positions by the departing Council members. These witches have come to us from all around the United States and from many different walks of life, and I’m very honored to bring them all here to you today! And now I’d like to introduce the Council to you. Beginning on the left, we have Stella Blackwood!”
The woman on the end pulled herself to her feet with the aid of a gnarled red cedar cane as thunderous applause lit up the audience. Stella was a short, round woman with shoulder-length flaxen hair that swept across one eye. She wore a loose, flowing black tunic with colorfully patterned leggings underneath. She smiled out at the audience and straightened her back, giving a sweeping wave.
“Sorceress Blackwood has come to us all the way from Alaska. She was an herbalism major during her time at the Institute, and she’s spent the last few decades of her life researching new, plant-based potion ingredients. In addition, she’s consulted for some major pharmaceutical companies in providing plant-based remedies for medical conditions and diseases.”
Stella gave one more perfunctory wave to the crowd before sitting back down.
“Next we have Poppy Ellabee. Poppy is not only a former student of the Institute, but she’s a former instructor as well. During her time as a student, she double-majored in animal science and animal spirits, and she went on to teach those subjects for years. Now that she’s retired, Poppy volunteers for pet shelters in her home state of Nevada and has created a foundation that matches witches with their spirit animals.”
Legends of Poppy Ellabee abounded. She’d been a popular instructor back in her day, and both animal sciences and animal spirits were popular subjects at the Institute, so most of the students had heard of her. The Animal Powers Club in the upper left corner of the bleachers went wild, cheering and whistling for Poppy. Likely because she was a regular financial donor to the organization. She was so philanthropic that she’d even had a scholarship named after her: the Ellabee Animal Spirits Scholarship.
The woman stood. She was taller and nimbler than Stella Blackwood. Her brown hair was cut fashionably to the bottoms of her earlobes, and she wore brown pants and loafers with a cream blouse and a paisley silk scarf tied around her neck. As Poppy shot the crowd a wide, friendly smile, her eyes crinkled in the corners. She waved animatedly before sitting down.
“Third up is Elodie Goodwitch. Elodie hails from a small town in Iowa. She was a potions major in her day at the Institute, and now she owns a very popular magical apothecary in her hometown.”
Elodie waved excitedly. She was a tiny woman with narrow shoulders, big, bright green eyes, and curly brown hair that seemed to form a glowing halo around her head.
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