toad witch 04 - aunt tilly were canning demons

by Christiana Miller

  SOMEBODY TELL AUNT TILLIE WE’RE CANNING DEMONS

  CHRISTIANA MILLER

  HEKAROSE PUBLISHING

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie We’re Canning Demons

  by Christiana Miller

  Copyright © 2017 Christiana Miller

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover Art was licensed through Big Stock Photos at

  http://www.bigstockphoto.com/

  HekaRose Publishing,

  A Division of HekaRose Enterprises Inc.

  All Rights Reserved

  Electronic Edition 2018

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portion thereof, in any form, without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  CONTENTS

  Also By Christiana MIller

  Summary

  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

  Acknowledgments

  Thank You!

  About the Author

  Also By Christiana Miller

  ALSO BY CHRISTIANA MILLER

  TOAD WITCH: A PARANORMAL MYSTERY SERIES

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie She’s Dead

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie We’re In Trouble

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie We’re Kidnapping Cupid

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie We’re Canning Demons

  A Tale of 3 Witches

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie We’re Speed-Dating the Christmas Demon (to be released)

  TOAD WITCH & STACY JUSTICE MYSTERY NOVELETTES

  A Tale of 3 Witches

  THE THIEF SERIES

  The Thief Who Stole Midnight

  CROWN OF FIRE SERIES

  Cerridwen’s Cauldron (short story prequel)

  Light and Dark Are Turning (includes Cerridwen’s Cauldron)

  Luck Be In The Burning (to be released)

  ANTHOLOGIES

  Naughty or Nice

  Love and Other Distractions

  Every Witch Way But Wicked

  Hex the Halls

  SHORT STORIES

  Cerridwen’s Cauldron

  Krampus Klaus: A Christmas Nightmare

  NON-FICTION

  Self-Publishing On A Shoestring: Insanely Helpful Links For Indie Authors*

  *If this book isn’t available, it’s because it’s been taken down to be updated. It will be available again after it’s updated.

  Audiobooks

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie She’s Dead

  Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie We’re In Trouble

  If you would like to be notified of future releases, giveaways and sales, you can subscribe to my newsletter at: Christiana’s Newsletter

  SUMMARY

  Towards the end of her pregnancy, Mara and Gus get a call for help, from Mama Lua.

  Mama Lua has to go to New Orleans for a family emergency, but her store is under attack and she can’t leave it unattended. She asks Mara and Gus if they can fill in for her while she’s gone, deal with the assorted, eccentric customers, and figure out who’s trying to shut her down.

  When Mara and Gus arrive in Los Angeles, they have their hands full and Mama Lua is nowhere to be found. Aunt Tillie, who insisted on accompanying them, has her own reasons for wanting to be in Los Angeles, and isn’t being very forthcoming.

  Mara and Gus soon find themselves knee-deep in paranormal weirdness. Not only does Mara catch a wannabe vampire feeding on the customers, there’s a flesh-eating demon on the loose, working its way up the food chain, and now someone’s called up a homunculus.

  It’s up to Mara and Gus to sort everything out and can that demon before it claims any more victims on its homicidal snacking binge. But they need to get things under control fast, before Mara goes into labor and her unusual baby makes its long-awaited appearance in their world.

  To all the angels in human form, who show up in your life, radiating light, when you think you’re hopelessly lost in the darkness; who go above and beyond, just because that’s their nature. Those lights can help lead you out of the darkest, thickest parts of the wilderness and back onto your path. May we all be those lights for each other.

  CHAPTER 1

  “Grundleshanks lives again! Mwahahahahaha,” Gus said, doing his best evil laugh as he walked into the cottage, carrying a box. “Or at least, he will, once I’m done.”

  “All right, Dr. Gusenstein. What monstrous thing are you setting in motion now?” I asked.

  Gus set the box down on the table and grinned at me. I tossed another log on the fire. Dr. Frankenstein had nothing on Gus for sheer ingenuity. It’s no wonder Aunt Tillie calls us the Witchy Menace. Although, it’s usually a toss-up which one of us is Witchy, and which one is Menace.

  Gus is my best friend, fellow witch and cottage-mate. He’s Pirates of the Caribbean meets The Craft, with a unique, sexy look that screams to be on book covers and accessories that loudly proclaim his witchiness. But if you meet him, and you’re not a witch yourself, you might think he’s a little nuts.

  A blast of arctic wind slammed the front door shut. Despite the calendar’s insistence that it was June, winter had steadfastly refused to leave. Devil’s Point was breaking weather records like crazy and it was all Gus’s fault.

  Unfortunately, when it came to magick, (yes, magick with a ‘k’—it’s the difference between witchcraft and otherworldly magick and stage magician-type magic). Anyway, like most things in life, you either took the time to do it right, or you could spend months or years—or a few lifetimes—trying to fix the mess you made and deal with the consequences.

  Ritual in haste, repent at leisure.

  Gus was even worse than me about leaping without looking and it didn’t always end well. Despite what Aunt Tillie thought, at least I tried to think of potential consequences before I rolled out my cauldron and wand.

  My name is Mara Stephens. I’m a witch too. Not the type you see on TV. I’m the type of witch who gets her ass handed to her on a platter, more often than not. I suspect I’ve only been given witchy powers because it gives Themselves, (a.k.a. Otherworld Deities), something to laugh about—some days more than others! At least my mistakes have taught me to be more careful, so I’m not totally hopeless—no matter what Aunt Tillie thinks.

  I groaned as I pressed my hands against my lower back. I was so ready to have this baby, I didn’t even care anymore whether it was going to be human, or come out with horns and hooves.

  ARAMIS, (our black-and-tan Dobe), and Apollo, (our red Dobe), got up from where they had been lazing in front of the fireplace and trotted over to greet Gus, their stubby tails wagging.

  “Rejoice and be triumphant! I present to you, Grundleshanks the Third,” Gus said gleefully, opening the box.

  The skull on our mantle rolled its eyes. You might think that’s a physical impossibility, but the spirit of my Aunt Tillie was chilling in the skull, so technically, it
was Aunt Tillie rolling her eyes.

  Over the winter holidays, Aunt Tillie had been trapped in the skull by Gus’s ex-boyfriend, Forrest. We managed to release her, but—go figure—she had grown fond of the thing. While she was trapped, she had turned the inside into a mini-version of the cottage and grounds, so she decided to keep using it as her base of operations. When she wasn’t roaming through the afterlife, stirring up mayhem, she would chill in the skull and eavesdrop on our lives.

  People with any psychic ability at all, could feel her presence. People who were on the witchy side of the scale, could actually see her face super-imposed over the bone, when she was in residence. (Although she often preferred to be in stealth mode, so she could gather intel for later meddling). Sycamores—the word Gus and I used for mundane humans—just thought the skull was a cool decoration.

  I LOOKED over Gus’s shoulder as he removed a small, plastic aquarium from the box. Inside it, one miserable-looking toad sat on a wet kitchen sponge, surrounded by even wetter vegetation. Aramis and Apollo stuck their noses under Gus’s arms and sniffed at the aquarium. A surprisingly inquisitive cricket was hopping around inside, making itself at home.

  I grimaced. “That toad doesn’t look good. Is he sick?”

  “Nonsense. He just needs some encouragement.”

  “What he needs is CPR,” Aunt Tillie said. Then she cackled. “Maybe he’ll turn into a prince after you give him enough mouth-to-mouth.”

  Gus ignored her and lifted the aquarium, until he was face-to-face with the toad. “Come on, Junior. Wake up. Time to man up and step into Grundleshanks’s warty toe-pads. You come from a very distinguished line. Dare I say it, an heroic line. We’re expecting a lot from you.”

  Grundleshanks was our previous (not-as-departed-as-you-might-think) toad and Gus was determined to hang onto him, any way he could. After Grundleshanks died, Gus had a taxidermist stuff him and place him in a ten-gallon aquarium habitat. While his spirit often hung around the tank, it wasn’t the same as when he was actually alive. So, Gus contacted his toad wrangler, looking for a Grundleshanks descendent.

  Gus placed the aquarium on the credenza, next to Grundleshanks’s tank, and waved his hands over the top of it. “Rise up, Grundleshanks the Third. Rise up and be counted amongst thy fellow Toad Lords.”

  The Dobes sat back on their haunches, tongues hanging out, looking thoroughly amused. The spirit of Grundleshanks stirred and hopped out of his tank, to check out the new toad. The toad made a weird shivering movement and fell over onto its back.

  “I don’t think he’s all that impressed,” I said.

  “He’s just cold. Rise, I command you!” Gus ordered, as theatrically as possible.

  The spirit of Grundleshanks, the Dobes and I all waited. One of the special qualities of Devil’s Point—depending on your point of view, at least—was that it was situated on some kind of weird portal to the Otherworld. So, who knew what could happen. Maybe Gus would be able to pull off a miracle and rouse the toad, after all…

  Maybe…

  …On a different day.

  …But not today.

  Crickets.

  Literally.

  Nothing much was happening in New Toad City, except for the cricket hopping around.

  “The toad’s not moving,” I pointed out, stating the obvious. According to Gus, that was a specialty of mine.

  “He’s power-napping.”

  “I believe that would require breathing,” Aunt Tillie chimed in.

  Gus took a closer look at the toad.

  “Even if he’s not dead yet, won’t toads die if they stay on their backs for too long?” I asked.

  “Good point,” Gus said. He took the lid off and flipped the toad over, getting drenched by toad pee in the process. “Aha! See? Oh, ye of little faith. I told you he was still alive.”

  Gus walked into the kitchen, washed his hands, then popped back through the open door. “Where’s your heating pad?”

  “You’re not wrapping the toad in it.”

  “Of course not, silly. I don’t want to cook him. I want to put it under the aquarium, to warm up the wetlands in there. You don’t want him getting toad-pneumonia, do you?”

  While Gus set up the heating pad, I pulled out a chair and sat down to watch the show. If anyone could figure out how to bring a toad back from the dead, it was Gus.

  “WHERE’S YOUR PHONE? We need to document it as he warms up and wakes from his slumber,” Gus said. “It’ll be epic.”

  “Especially if he’s actually dead. That will go viral, for sure. We can call it the Travails of Lazarus the Toad.”

  “Less talking, more recording, woman. Make sure you get me in the shot too.”

  I activated the camera app on my phone and hit record as Gus waved his hand over the tank again, chanting an incantation in what sounded like gibberish. “What are you doing?”

  “Trust me, this will look great in post. Stop interrupting and zoom in. He’s going to be doing toady push-ups any second now.”

  Aunt Tillie laughed. “The only thing he’s going to be pushing up are the daisies and morning glories in the back cemetery.”

  I snorted and zoomed in on the toad, who still wasn’t moving.

  “Nonsense. He’s out of the Grundleshanks line. He’s a toad’s toad. He’s just…stoic. There, did you see that? He moved.”

  I stopped recording and looked at Gus. “By moved, if you mean, did I see Aramis bump the aquarium with his nose, then yes, I did. I hate to tell you this, but I think Aunt Tillie’s right. Your toad has cashed in his crickets.”

  “What did you expect? You should have waited until summer. It’s fifteen degrees outside. He’s traveling in the back of an unheated truck. Poor thing probably got cryogenically frozen en route,” Aunt Tillie said.

  “Dead like Disney,” I agreed, nodding.

  Gus made a face at me. “My toad isn’t dead. He’s just hibernating. And he has a body. Disney’s a head in a metal tube.”

  “Seriously? What’s the point of that?” I asked.

  “Hello? That’s what I’ve been sayin’. Have people never heard of oracular heads? Bran the Blessed? John the Baptist? Disney’s head should be on display, where he can talk to people, not locked in a tube.”

  “That would be a cool addition to the Haunted Mansion,” I agreed.

  Aunt Tillie laughed. “You’re both imbeciles. How you managed to graduate from high school, with only ten brain cells between you, is beyond me. No one decapitated poor old Walt.”

  “I’m going to look it up.” I opened the Google app on my phone. One of the problems with being a witch, is we can be hell on electronics, so I had to wait for the software to catch up with me.

  Gus snapped his fingers. “I’ll bet the tube is a smokescreen. I’ll bet they have Disney’s head on an altar, deep in the heart of Tomorrowland, where he’s still running the show. The Main Street electrical grid is probably plugged into his brain.”

  I shook my head. “Aunt Tillie wins this round. He wasn’t frozen, he was cremated. The first human was frozen a month later.”

  “That’s what they want you to believe,” said Gus. “Look at Einstein. He was cremated—mostly. But his brain’s been all over the world. And his eyes wound up in a bank vault in New Jersey. You never know who’s going to come along and help themselves to a part or two before the body is disposed of.”

  I looked up from my phone. “That seems…wrong.”

  Gus shrugged. “Bodies have no rights once the spirit is departed.”

  Aunt Tillie tsked. “I suppose you think that’s the way it should be? You sacrilegious mouth-breather.”

  Gus ignored her. “Did you know, Napoleon’s penis is under some guy’s bed in New Jersey?”

  I started laughing. “If there’s a penis roaming around without a body, trust you to find it.”

  “We all have our talents.” Gus grinned.

  “Who knew New Jersey was so interesting?”

  “I know, right? Famous
body parts. The Pine Barrens. The Jersey Devil. Sounds like my kind of place. Road trip?”

  “Maybe. After the baby is born.” I took a roll of antacids out of my pocket and popped two. Supposedly, the more heartburn you have, the more hair the baby has. At this rate, I was going to be giving birth to a Yeti.

  The cricket moved from checking out the vegetation, to tap dancing on the toad’s head, with seeming impunity. Grundleshanks’s spirit phased through the wall of the plastic aquarium and hopped over to the toad. The toad fell over on its back again.

  “Looks like Grundleshanks is getting ready to escort his toad descendant into the Otherworld,” I said.

  Gus groaned and hung his head. “Fine. I admit defeat. That damn toad’s been floating down the River Styx since it was delivered.” He reached into the tank and carefully flipped the toad’s body right-side up.

  I focused the phone’s camera on the toad. To my surprise, instead of escorting the toad’s spirit out of the tank, Grundleshanks’s spirit shoved his way into the toad’s body, sending it into convulsions.

  “What the hell?!” I yelped. “What is he doing?!”

  “Keep recording!” Gus yelled.

  After a few seconds, the toad’s body stopped convulsing. I watched as the departing spirit floated out of the plastic aquarium, towards the ceiling, where a multi-colored, swirling vortex had opened up. As it entered the vortex, light exploded everywhere. Then, the vortex swirled shut and blinked out of existence.