Something Wicked_A Witch Cozy Mystery Series

by Freya Darcy

  “That is the best thing I’ve heard in months!” Payton squeals. “You’re going to do it right?”

  “Don’t get too excited,” I say, my hands up. “I don’t know anything about running a guesthouse. But I’ve made an appointment with Mr Greystone to talk about it. Delilah said you’d be happy about the idea.”

  “Yeah!” Payton says, like it should have been obvious. “One of the biggest barriers to our budding tourism trade is the fact that there is just the one tiny inn run by Melinda Jennings.”

  “And she’s been talking about selling up since her kids moved away,” Derick adds. “Says she can’t run it all on her own for much longer. “

  “Mrs Jennings has been running that inn since I was a kid.” Payton says. “If anyone understands the business, it’s her. We’ll introduce you, if you like?”

  We order another round and Payton shakes her head and puffs out a breath as she glances over my shoulder at something behind me.

  “My god, he’s hot,” she says.

  I turn to look again just in time to see a pretty brunette manage to slip in under Connor’s arm. He grins down at her and says something, she nods, and they leave together.

  “I will admit, he’s smooth,” I say, laughing. “Girls must fall out of the trees and into his arms when he walks by.”

  I’m about to offer to buy the next round when I catch sight again of Vanessa at the bar. She downs another shot and another. When she spots me watching she grins and flashes me her middle finger before turning unsteadily on her feet and stumbling towards the door.

  “She really hates you,” Payton says.

  “Does she live nearby?” I ask. “Maybe someone should drive her home?”

  After a long-suffering sigh, Derick says. “We’re on it.”

  Payton looks over her shoulder at Vanessa then back at us and nods. “Yeah. Bad blood aside, she just lost her best friend.”

  We say our goodbyes and I watch them go feeling better and better about my decision to move into this strange little town. As dangerous and odd as Radcliffe Wood is, the people are good to each other. That’s something I didn’t see much of in the city.

  Chapter Sixteen

  WHEN I SEE THE BOY standing on the side of the road, at the edge of the woods, my first thought is of Connor’s warning to never stop for a child or elderly person emerging from the woods.

  But that’s ridiculous.

  I slow as I draw closer. The boy has short black hair and is dressed in a loose fitting white shirt and pants, could be pyjamas. He doesn’t try to wave me down or show any distress but something about a child standing on the edge of the road just feels wrong.

  Shoving away the warning, I pull my car over, wind my window down and call out.

  “Hey, are you okay?” The boy doesn’t seem to notice me, just looks right ahead. “Can I give you a ride home?”

  Maybe he’s sleepwalking?

  There’s something about the way he just stands there that makes cool fingers dance over the back of my neck. But he can’t be more than five or six and he’s on the side of the road. I can’t just leave him.

  “This is a bad idea,” I mutter, then open my door and get out.

  “Hi,” I say, as gently as possible. “Did your mum’s car break down? Is she nearby?”

  Finally, he looks at me but doesn’t reply.

  I step closer. “I know your mum probably taught you not to speak to strangers,” I say. “And that’s very good. But you shouldn’t be out here alone.”

  I take another step closer and he tips his head to the side as if assessing me. He might look about six, but his eyes seem older, much older.

  “How about we get you back to your mum and dad, huh?”

  Now he smiles. It’s slow and controlled and feels almost predatory. Then all at once he turns and runs into the woods.

  “No, wait!” I call out. “It’s not safe.”

  I follow him in, running over dead leaves and branches and soft earth as the small white form flitters between the thick tree trunks.

  There’s a giggle, then another, but the second comes from behind me.

  Stopping, I pivot on my heel, and again. The boy is gone and I’m alone in the woods.

  Which way was the road again? I look up at the half moon and stars. The sky is so clear and brilliantly starry, but when I look around me everything is dark.

  Is it getting darker? It’s like the woods are closing in around me.

  There’s another giggle and something white runs by. I try to follow but another giggle comes from behind me and I spin to face a little girl.

  What the hell?

  “Hello?” My voice cracks and I have to work to get myself under control. “Is your house around here somewhere? I think I might be lost.”

  The little girl has long black hair and I guess by her pale complexation and similar white pyjamas, that she and the boy are brother and sister.

  She performs a similar head tilt that the boy had just moments ago, then lifts her nose to sniff the air.

  Okay, that’s creepy.

  “I think you should take me to see your mum and dad,” I say as sternly as I can.

  Her smile is slow, and wide, and reveals that her small mouth is actually full of tiny razor-sharp teeth.

  “Oh.” Is all I can think to say until three others step out of the darkness. “Shivers.”

  “This is a dangerous place for a lady alone,” one little voice says. The voice is soft but crackly like dry dead leaves.

  Seriously, how many times do I need to be told I-told-you-so before I learn? But Connor’s warning was crazy. What kind of monster would just leave a child standing on the side of the road?

  I guess the kind of monster who also doesn’t get eaten by tiny vampires.

  They start to circle around me and as I watch, two more step out and join the dance.

  “Do you want to play with us?” One says.

  “We want to play with you,” says another.

  “We just want to play. Nobody plays with us anymore.”

  “Oi!” There’s a high-pitched whistle and we all turn to see the tall figure of Jack, marching through the underbrush, an axe hanging loose but ready in his right hand.

  “Jack!” One child yells.

  “Have you brought us a present, Jack?” Asks another.

  “Have you come to play with us too?”

  “Shut it, you lot,” Jack snaps, his voice deep and commanding. “You know the rules. I saw her car on the side of the road.” He turns and points his axe at the first boy. “You made a promise. No more luring people from the road.”

  “We were lonely,” the girl says. “Nobody comes to play with us anymore and the old lady stopped bringing us rats.”

  “She doesn’t like us anymore,” says the boy.

  Jack sighs and looks up at the sky for a moment. He sort of reminds me of a parent trying to reign in his temper. Now that they aren’t circling and giggling with those sharp, sharp teeth, I see they really are children, but not only children.

  “Are you talking about my aunt? Judith Silverstone?”

  The children grin, fifteen in all, and all showing those teeth again. “Aunty Judy,” they chime together. “She wasn’t afraid of us, she liked us, and she brought us rats to eat and play with.”

  “Well this—” Jack points to me “—Is Kismet Silverstone, Judy’s niece. Aunty Judy had to go away for a long time and I’m sorry I didn’t come and tell you. But that is no excuse to break your promise.”

  The children look at their feet. “We’re sorry.”

  At this Jack gives them a patient smile and nods. “Alright, you’re forgiven. But this is the lady who decides whether you get to play in the woods or go back to hunting for yourselves again. I think you owe her an apology.”

  The flood of tiny apologies was almost endearing. Almost.

  I manage a smile, but if they’re expecting actual words, they’ve got no chance.

  “Right, I’m going
to take Aunty Kizz home and then I’ll come back with some food and we’ll play some hide and seek, how does that sound.”

  “Yay!” Fifteen small, otherworldly voices cheer and chant, “Hide-and-seek, hide-and-seek.” Before disappearing into the surrounding woods.

  “Come on, let’s get you home,” Jack says.

  My whole body is still shaking, so when he offers to drive, I just pass him the keys.

  We’re only a few minutes from the house and when he pulls into the driveway, I feel under control enough to put at least a couple of words together.

  “Were they vampire children?”

  “Not exactly,” he says, his voice way too calm and matter-of-fact. “They’re what you might call, ghouls. A sort of scavenger. They eat already dead flesh, sometimes they eat the living too, but mainly small rodents.”

  “Were they going to eat me?”

  He cringes. “Maybe? But it’s not their fault. It’s mine. They’re good – goodish – most of the time.”

  I’m pressed against the passenger door and staring at him, wide-eyed.

  “Look,” he says. “The world is full of strange and dangerous creatures. But just because they look a little scary and can be dangerous, doesn’t mean you need to be afraid of them. Cautious, yes. Prepared, also yes.” He points to the axe that I’m currently gripping.

  “Who are they?”

  He shakes his head. “They’re just kids. Some from the town, others who found their way here. What’s happened to them, isn’t their fault, and most of them don’t want to be bad, they just want to be kids. The more you treat them like children, the more like children they are. Does that make sense?”

  I nod then shake my head. “So, my aunt took care of them.”

  “Since she started taking care of them, the number of missing people and pets has gone way down.”

  “Oh.” I nod as if I understand but my head is spinning. “I think I should go inside, now.”

  I get out, slam the car door and a few seconds later slam the door to my house too.

  “Kizz?” My Spider familiar is frowning at me when I press my back against the closed door. “What’s going on?”

  “I need to know how to protect myself against tiny ghouls. Apparently, the woods are full of them.”

  “Beheading is the quickest way.”

  “That’s horrible!” I feel sick even thinking about it. “They’re just children.”

  “Children who can and will eat you if you give them the chance.”

  But they hadn’t. They might have if Jack hadn’t come along, but all he did was talk and they were like any other children.

  “Damn.” Then, after some thought I say, “House, do you know how Aunt Judith was finding rats?”

  PING

  “Finding rats?” Jaz asks incredulously. “Why on earth would you want to fond rats.”

  “Because Aunt Judith was taking rats to the Ghoul children. That’s how she’s been keeping them from hunting. She was taking care of them.” I feel a fuzzy kind of warmth at the thought. “I guess that’s my job now too.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  MY PHONE BUZZES LOUDLY on the side table with a sound even more annoying than the ringtone.

  “So much for silent mode,” I grumble and grope for the phone, pressing it to my ear with a tired, “You’ve reached Kismet’s early morning swearing service. Would you like the S words, the F words, or the C words?”

  “Miss Silverstone? This is Detective Jameson.”

  “Do you know what time it is?”

  “Yes, it’s almost one in the afternoon.”

  Oh. I pull the phone away from my ear and blink at the time. I need to start using my alarm clock.

  “Sorry,” I say. “I had a bit of a late night.”

  The phone is silent on the other end and I wonder if he’s still there.

  “Kismet, I’m going to need you to come down to the station.”

  “Is something wrong?” My stomach twists uncomfortably.

  “It would be better if we talked here.”

  That sounds bad. “Let me grab a shower and I’ll be right there.”

  He thanks me and ends the call.

  Thirty minutes later, I’m sitting in Detective Jameson’s office, watching him pace in front of me looking more like a trapped tiger than a detective.

  “Did you know Vanessa Harmon was reported missing this morning?”

  That isn’t what I expected to hear. It’s like my head fills with air and I wish I was standing up, so I could sit down.

  “Missing?”

  “Yes,” he snaps. “Missing, as in her mother reported that she didn’t return home last night and didn’t show up for work this morning.”

  I don’t know what to say to that, so I spend way too long staring at my hands because Detective Jameson won’t stop staring at me.

  After another very uncomfortable moment I look up and meet his stony gaze. He’s giving me blank cop eyes. It actually hurts more than I expect.

  “I don’t know what you want,” I finally say. “You are clearly expecting me to have some kind of answer, but I’ve got nothing. I didn’t even know her.”

  He licks his lips, brushes the side of his nose with his thumb, and takes a seat. “Kismet, did you have some kind of argument with Vanessa on Monday morning?”

  “Really?” I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation. “She’s a grown woman, for all you know, she just jumped on a bus and left town. It happens all the time.”

  “Maybe in the city,” he snaps. “But not here. Now answer the question.”

  “Fine.” I cross my arms and sit back. “If by argument you mean, did she yell at me then storm out, then, yes. Also, just so you don’t hear it from anyone else. In the bar last night, she flipped me the bird before leaving the bar, very intoxicated.”

  “Did you follow her? Maybe just to make sure she got home safe.”

  “No, I didn’t, I thought I might just make things worse and I felt bad enough, since she’d just lost her friend and all. Derick and Payton offered to drive her home.”

  “Why was she so angry with you?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s just an angry drunk and I got the brunt of it. I wouldn’t know since I don’t know her nearly at all.” I hold up three fingers. “In fact this is the exact number of times we’ve even been in the same place. Three.”

  “And she was angry with you during two of those meetings.”

  My head hits the desk. Clearly, he’s not going to let this go.

  Looking up at him I see his hair is mussed, he needs a shave and a change of uniform. He looks tired and I suddenly feel guilty. He’s just doing his job and right now, things are bad.

  “She saw some sketches, she wasn’t supposed to see,” I say, my voice quiet. “I was just doodling, getting some stuff out of my head when she grabbed my book and started looking through it. There were some sketches of Meghan— you know—and Vanessa, justifiably, became very angry with me.”

  His expression softened. “Do you still have these drawings?”

  “Hell no! I threw them away. I felt horrible. Nobody was supposed to see them, and I certainly didn’t intend to hurt anyone. But that is the reason why she was angry with me.”

  It’s another twenty minutes later that I manage to get out of there, relieved that he didn’t decide to hold me on suspicion of killing two complete strangers and kidnapping a third.

  Who would have thought convincing a man that I’m nobody would be so difficult? Craig had been the king of making me feel like I barely existed, but now this detective seems to think that I’m some pivotal key to a case I know nothing about.

  My trek back to the car is slower. All I want to do is crawl back into bed and stay out of everyone’s way until whatever this is, resolves itself.

  Murders, missing pets, creepy ghoul children... Maybe this isn’t the place for me after all.

  Hearing angry voices makes me stop walking. I recognize those voic
es.

  “We don’t know anything about her!” Derick is hissing at Payton as they round the corner.

  I jump out of the way and behind a car before they see me. I hate when people argue around me and it’s even worse when they try to pretend everything’s fine when they see me, so hiding tends to be my go-to solution.

  “We know enough,” Payton says. “Look, she’s one of us, I feel it.”

  Huh? Are they talking about me?

  “I say we bring her in. We can use someone like her and she’ll totally understand everything we’re doing when we explain it.”

  “And if she doesn’t? What if she just turns us in.”

  Something cold settles in my chest.

  It can’t be them. It must be a mistake. Maybe they’re talking about something completely unrelated to the two deaths that happened this week... Something else that they’re afraid will be reported.

  I peak over the hood of the car I’m crouching behind just in time to see them disappear into the woods. I remember how Derick had snuck into those same woods that morning I found Meghan, and then how he’d come out of nowhere the day before the camping trip.

  I also remember my dream. The one where Meghan’s ex fiancée was arguing with a witch just before he too was murdered, and when I woke up, both Derick and Payton were mysteriously missing.

  Aunt Judith might have been a recluse, but she did everything she could to protect this town and I have the feeling it wasn’t just from the ghoul children either. If I’m going to live here I need to step up.

  Some kind of black magic ritual had been used to kill Meghan and maybe Robert too. The police can’t control that, but maybe I can.

  Summoning the little bit of courage I still have, I follow the two dark witches into the woods.

  I try to pick my way through as quietly as I can, but every dry leaf and twig is like a crack of thunder to my ears. After a couple of minutes, I still don’t see them and start to wonder if I’ve just wandered off in completely the wrong direction.

  But then I hear it.

  They’re still arguing and as I get closer, I see a surprisingly well built little shack. It’s painted in the same shades as the trees and foliage. If I hadn’t been looking I might have walked right past without seeing anything.