Eastwind Witches Volume 1: Books 1-3: Paranormal Cozy Mystery

by Nova Nelson

  With a groaning effort, he rolled onto his side to face me, propping up onto his elbow. “What happened?”

  I turned my head, staring up at his pained face, thinking, Please don’t vomit on me.

  “The short one, Tybalt. He was harassing me a little bit. I was going to ignore it, but when I turned around, Duncan pinched my butt.”

  Donovan’s eyes narrowed and his top lip curled in disgust. “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah, I know, who would want to pinch my butt, right?”

  “No, that’s not— So then what happened?”

  “I kicked them out. I told them they needed to leave, and when they refused, I, um, might’ve made a scene.” I grimaced apologetically. “Maybe if I hadn’t made a scene solely to humiliate them, they wouldn’t have felt compelled to retaliate. That is what you gathered from the vision, right?”

  “More or less. But let’s back up to the part where you blame yourself for teaching a couple of screw-up teenage boys a lesson. This is not your fault, Nora.”

  My stomach was finally settled, and I sat up. “I’m sure I could have handled it better.”

  “Oh wait, did you slap them so hard their astral forms flew out of their ears?”

  I laughed. “No.”

  “Mm-hm,” he said, pressing his lips together and nodding knowingly. “See, that’s what I would’ve done in your position. So I think you handled it about as good as anyone could.” His expression softened as he sat up to face me. “Seriously, Nora, do not blame yourself. I’ve seen those little witches around town. They’re constant trouble. Honestly, it’s a miracle they haven’t gotten themselves killed, messing around like they do. And if no one puts them in their place now, they’re just going to become older and stronger bullies. You did the right thing.”

  “Thanks,” I said, feeling off-balance, though whether that was a remnant from the out-of-body experience or because Donovan had just been uncharacteristically supportive, I wasn’t sure. “It doesn’t change the fact that there’s a whatever-the-spell dark entity running around, and we don’t know all that much about it.” I sighed. “I guess I dropped the ball on the questions, because I don’t feel like we have the answers we need.”

  “Don’t be stupid,” he said, and the bluntness of it was comforting. This was the Donovan I knew. “We got plenty of information from the vision. We have a good idea of who summoned the thing, let’s call it a demon, and I’m pretty sure the answer to how we banish it is in a book.”

  “Awesome. Because there aren’t enough books to fill a coliseum scattered around this town,” I said impatiently. “Are we just supposed to go door to door asking people if we can browse their bookshelves?”

  “Riiight,” he said, inspecting me closely. “You don’t know.”

  “I don’t know what?”

  “Every book brought into Eastwind has an identical copy magically appear in the appropriate section of the Eastwind Library. If the book exists in this world, we can find it there.”

  That was pretty freaking cool. And no, I didn’t know that. Someone seriously needed to write a guidebook for this place. “Only one problem,” I said. “We don’t know what it’s called or what it’s about. We only know what it looks like. And even I can name three other books I’ve seen that look almost identical to that one.”

  “Sweet baby jackalope,” he spat. “For someone who likes running head-on into tricky situations, you sure construct a lot of obstacles between you and the easy stuff.” He stood, taking the spell book and cauldron with him.

  I wasn’t going to let him drop a bomb like that and walk away, though, so I followed him into his kitchen, where he set the items on the marble counter. “What do you mean?”

  He lit a candle and held the cauldron over the flame. “I mean exactly what I said. You’ll lure a murderous xana into your home or follow an equally murderous nix to a dark storeroom, no sweat. I mean, holy shifter, you were willing to charge into the Deadwoods with nothing but your unhelpful familiar as backup. But when it comes to going into a library in search of a book you need or, oh, I don’t know, going public with your relationship, you can’t bring yourself to go there.”

  “Why do you care about that?” I said.

  “I don’t.” He poured the smoking contents of the cauldron into a bowl of water, then set it back down on the counter before grabbing the book and walking away.

  I pursued him into a narrow hallway lined with books. “You do care, or else you wouldn’t have brought it up.”

  “I just think it’s peculiar.” He turned quickly, and I had to catch myself before I ran straight into him. He stepped closer, and I tried to move away, but my back found a bookshelf. I was pinned, and my heart raced.

  “It’s not that peculiar,” I countered.

  His warm breath caressed my face as he spoke. “I guess not. After all, I’m the exact same.”

  He placed the book back on the shelf just above my right shoulder then made for the kitchen again. “You coming with me to the big, bad library, or what?” he hollered.

  “Yes,” I said, my voice cracking. I cleared my throat, my back still against the shelf as I tried to slow my fluttering heart. Then I repeated, making sure my voice didn’t waver this time. “Yes, I’m coming.”

  Chapter Ten

  “I’m surprised you don’t spend all your free-time here, to be honest,” Donovan said as we crossed the bright, open entry hall of the library, carefully avoiding the books that floated this way and that. “If I was a Fifth Wind witch, I would spend all day here, picking the brain of every ghost who would spare me the time.”

  “Nerd,” said Grim.

  “You say that,” I replied, “but only because you haven’t spent the past four months being pestered by them.” Spirits bustled around us, lining the long studying tables, hunched as they pored over books. Some enchantment existed at the library that allowed ghosts to move things without effort, a skill usually reserved for poltergeist, or so I’d been told. But here, they were able to select the book they chose from the shelf, carry it around, and even turn individual pages. It wasn’t the worst way to while away the hours stuck between astral planes. “If there’s one thing I know about ghosts,” I continued, “it’s that they all want something. And they won’t stop until they get it.”

  Donovan narrowly avoided taking a book to the groin with a quick side step. “And that’s different from you and me … how?”

  I laughed. “I wish I knew what I wanted.”

  “You don’t? You strike me as the kind of woman knows exactly what she wants. Or who.”

  I shot him a nasty look. “We’re not talking about that. And what about you, Mr. Career Bartender. Are you telling me you know exactly what you want?”

  “Absolutely.”

  I stopped in my tracks. “And that is?”

  He shrugged. “To be left in peace, mostly.” He started forward again, and I hurried to keep up. “And see? I’m doing whatever it takes to achieve that.”

  “How so?”

  “I’m risking my hide by going into the Deadwoods with you because I know seeing this thing through will allow me peace in one of two ways: either we solve it and banish this demon thing so you and Tanner can go on your appallingly merry way with life and I can go back to my pleasant routine, or you get me killed, and I can rest in peace for all eternity.”

  “I thought you said you would haunt me if this got you killed.”

  “Right,” he said. “I mean, after I haunted you for the rest of your life, I would rest in peace. After all, when compared with eternity, the rest of your life is less than a blink of an eye.”

  “He has a point,” Grim said from behind me.

  Donovan led the way to the tall reference desk, leaning his elbows on the top and grinning wide at Helena Whetstone, the elf librarian who was likely older than most of the ghosts she spent her days around. She appeared, like most elves, to be much, much younger than her age. I would have guessed mid-forties, but who only knew
what that was in elf years.

  “Helena,” he said. “How’re you this evening?”

  She looked up from where she was working on some sort of numbers puzzle that I can only describe as Sudoku if the boxes constantly leap-frogged over each other. “Yes, Mr. Stringfellow? What do you want now?”

  Customer service at its finest, I tell you.

  “We’re looking for a book.”

  She frowned. “Ah, I can’t help you, then. Fresh out of books.” She looked back down at the puzzle.

  A muscle in Donovan’s jaw tightened, and I wondered if he knew how much enjoyment I was getting out of this.

  “It’s old, brown cover, might have something about an ancient dark entity?”

  Pursing her lips, Helena returned her attention to Donovan. “You’re going to have to do better than that.”

  “That’s all I know about it.”

  “Then you should learn more about it and come back. We’re open every day, six a.m. to midnight.” She cleared her throat and smacked her hand down on the puzzle to keep one of the squares from running off the page.

  “Could you at least—”

  She stuck her hand an inch from his nose, and he straightened quickly. “No. Not until you have a more specific title, author, or subject matter. Sorry.”

  A vein in Donovan’s forehead bulged as he wisely put a little distance between him and Helena.

  “Maybe someone else here knows,” I suggested.

  He looked around. “Who, Anton?” He nodded over at the ogre cook from Medium Rare, who spent most of his free time reading anything he could get his club-like hands on.

  “Maybe,” I said. “He practically lives here.” I paused. “Actually, he might live here.” I waved it off. “Doesn’t matter. Wouldn’t hurt to ask him about the book.”

  “You sure?” Donovan said, staring cautiously at him.

  “Please,” I said, approaching the ogre, “Anton wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

  I forewent mentioning that I’d once seen him snatch a fly out of the air and proceed to eat it. In his defense, it would’ve otherwise landed on the food he was cooking, and that was unsanitary.

  No, eating it wouldn’t have been my first choice, either, but I try not to nitpick how people, especially ogres, choose to live their lives.

  “Anton,” I whispered as we neared.

  He gazed up, his eyes slightly crossed toward his massive, pore-riddled nose. “Nora?”

  He seemed a bit dazed. Almost felt bad interrupting the guy. He’d worked a crazy shift this morning and deserved his alone time to unwind. “Hey, I have a question you might be able to help me with.”

  Anton grunted, as per usual.

  “I’m looking for a book and Helena isn’t being especially helpful.”

  He grunted again, and I assumed it was ogre for, “What’s new?”

  “It’s about this thick”—I indicated with my thumb and pointer—“brown, has illegible gold lettering, and contains information about a dark entity who can suck water from plants.”

  He blinked slowly, then his focus shifted to Donovan. “He’s with me,” I explained. “Can you help us?”

  Grunting again, Anton rocked himself sideways out of the chair and to his feet. He was built like a retired boxer with a lingering steroid addiction, and Donovan took a half-step back when the ogre began swinging his arms side to side. But Anton was simply stretching his back.

  “Follow,” he rumbled, so we did.

  We passed under a dark stone archway into a claustrophobic hallway leading into another wing of the library. Turning one corner after the next, taking a left at this Y and a right at another, sloping steadily downward until I wasn’t sure we were still in Eastwind, the room we eventually entered wasn’t much more spacious than the hallway had been. A single reading table was visible at the far end of a space that resembled a wine cellar more than a library. The walls were faded stone, and I was sure the temperature had dropped at least fifteen degrees from when we left the main gallery. Rows of books fanned out on either side of the table, chains dangling loosely, securing assorted tomes to their shelf.

  And at the table sat a single lonely spirit. With the body of a man and the head of a bull, he was not someone I wanted to strike up a conversation with. Then it occurred to me: Anton had just pointed straight at a ghost. “Wait, can you see him?”

  His grunt sounded suspiciously like “duh.”

  “And he might know about the book?”

  Anton grunted again, turned, and left.

  “I hate to doubt Anton’s legendary friendship,” said Grim, “but did he just lead us all this way to be killed? Are we a sacrifice for that thing?”

  “I wish I could tell you. We’ll find out soon enough.”

  “Do you see something?” Donovan asked, scanning the room blankly. “I mean, besides the books that are radiating alarming energy?”

  “Yeah. There’s someone at the table.”

  When the beastly spirit turned a page of the book he had engrossed himself in, Donovan nodded. “Ah. Okay.” Then he mumbled, “This seems like your type of thing—super dangerous, going in blind, et cetera. Lead the way.”

  Maybe Donovan had a point after all, because approaching this strange spirit with horns that, in life, could probably gore someone as thick as Anton, didn’t worry me. Or rather, it did, but my brain was able to compartmentalize it fairly quickly. Especially after I reached down and felt the amulet beneath my shirt. “Excuse me,” I said.

  The ghost’s head snapped up quickly, and a puff of steam issued from his snout. His dark eyes observed us carefully before he replied, “Which book?”

  “It’s about this thick—”

  “Stop.” His voice was thick with finality. “Don’t tell me about it. Show me.” He held out his hand, a human hand, thank Gaia, because for some reason, a ghost hoof would have been too much. I approached the table, paused, looked back, and saw that neither Grim nor Donovan was following behind.

  “Some back-up you are, Grim.”

  “I said I’d follow you into the Deadwoods. Bullhead over here wasn’t part of the plan.”

  “The library was, though.”

  “You expect me to anticipate that a quick trip to the library equals a heart-to-heart with a minotaur’s spirit?”

  “Is that what he is?”

  “You—” Grim shook his fluffy head. “You don’t even know what he is, and you’re about to take his hand? Sweet baby jackalope, some people just can’t be helped.”

  Did it matter that he used to be a minotaur? Now, his primary form was spirit. And I knew a little about spirits. Not much. But more than I knew about minotaurs, that’s for sure.

  Despite Grim’s disappointment in me, I reached out and took the minotaur’s icy hand. It felt solid, not like the other ghosts I’d encountered, and my heart raced. Was this a different kind of spirit than I was used to?

  I quickly discovered this wasn’t even close to the kind of spirit I was used to.

  “Close your eyes,” he said, so I did. “Conjure the book in your mind.”

  Steadying my breathing, I let the image of the book floating in the darkness surface in my mind’s eye.

  Then, next to it, the minotaur appeared in full, living form. He reached forward, grabbed the book out of the air, and turned it over in his hands, examining every inch. “More,” he said, and it felt like he spoke to me from my memory rather than the room in which we stood.

  “More?” I said. “More what?”

  “You know,” he replied. “Relax and let it out.”

  I did, and the battlefield reappeared. Only, the battle was over. Bodies were strewn everywhere, limp, baking in the sun. The shock of it must have caused me to tense, and I found myself back in the cold chamber of the Eastwind Library. I released his hand immediately, staring wide-eyed at him.

  “That book hasn’t been read in many years. What is your intent?”

  “To send it back,” I said quickly.

 
He bowed his head. “Then follow me, Nora.”

  While I hadn’t provided my name, I wasn’t surprised he knew it. After all, he’d just seen inside my head. Who knew what sort of dirt he had on me. Incredibly unsettling to consider, but at the same time, he probably encountered two beings who could communicate with him per decade, and he didn’t strike me as the gossiping type.

  However, it didn’t seem right that he should know my name while I hadn’t made an effort to learn his, so I asked, “What’s your name?” fully intending to use it as often as possible henceforth to butter him up just a bit. Couldn’t hurt to have a minotaur warm up to you, right?

  “No name. Not anymore.”

  O-kay then.

  The book he led me to was connected to the bookshelves by a heavy iron chain a few feet long which clanked as he pulled the tome from its spot and offered it to me. I was almost afraid to touch it, but when he shoved it toward me, I reacted, and I was touching it before I knew what had happened.

  Gazing down at it, I knew this was the one. Not just because of the brown cover and faded gold lettering, but because the image of the battlefield, before the carnage took place, became almost as vivid to my eyes as my physical surroundings.

  “That’s it,” said Donovan, hovering over my shoulder. “That’s the book.”

  “No kidding,” I said.

  As I opened the book to the first page, I didn’t know what to expect. Latin? Chinese? Sanskrit? When the words were in English, I was pleasantly surprised. The title page said Origins of the Unnatural, Vol. 394, Omzarka-Ostrogalia.

  While the table of contents was also in English, it was full of words I’d never seen before. The chapters were in alphabetical order, but that was all the sense I could make of it.

  “Omzarka, Onanchant, Onasias?” I looked up at the minotaur. “Am I supposed to know what any of this means?”

  “Wait,” said Donovan behind me. He leaned forward, and pointed to one of the words. “Oquay. I know about that. It’s one of the realms directly connected to Avalon.”

  “One of the realms?”

  “Yeah. Avalon is a central realm—some refer to it as a pivot world—and it has a bunch of other realms branching off from it through various gateways. Like, hundreds. I don’t know them all, but I do know Oquay is one of them.”