A super chilled wind blasted across her exposed skin, causing her teeth to chatter. She opened her eyes in surprise and saw Devlin running toward her. He leaped over the logs that were not engulfed and pulled out a pocket knife to cut at her bonds.
“Run!” He grabbed her wrist and tugged her in the opposite direction of the police officers. The crowd shrieked in fear and parted for them easily. No one wanted to come up against two witches.
“What are you doing?” Anya said between breaths as she pumped her legs.
“I’m saving your life!” He yanked open the door to a Jeep and pushed her inside. He ran around and jumped into the driver’s seat, started it up, and peeled out of there.
Anya glanced in the side mirror and saw the police screaming at the crowd to move so they could get in their squad cars.
“Where are we going?” Anya’s voice shook. She’d almost burned to death.
“New Haven, Connecticut. I have family there that will take us in. You’re the most powerful witch we’ve had in centuries. You can control all four elements. I’ve seen it. I’ve been watching you.” Devlin grinned over at her, and then looked back to the road as they merged onto I-95.
“I’m scared,” Anya confessed.
“Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Author J. Laslie
J. Laslie lives in Louisville, KY with her wonderful husband, 2 kids, 4 dogs, 3 cats and mother-in-law. She has always been an avid reader. She loves Young Adult, Dystopian, and Paranormal Romance. Find her online at authorjlaslie.weebly.com.
If you enjoyed Solstice Flames,
check out UNTREATABLE
People are dying…
Tahlia and Quentin live in a world where the US population is starving to death one hundred years after a government-mandated “cure” for obesity. Tahlia’s ancestors escaped genetic mutation. Now she and her tribe must hide in the wilds of South Dakota to avoid being harvested for their untainted DNA. When Tahlia is captured on a supply run, she becomes a lab rat for the scientists searching for an antidote. The fate of humanity lies buried in Tahlia’s genetic code, and her own survival lies in the hands of Quentin — the only son of the very doctors who want to cut her open.
Harrowing and suspenseful, Untreatable transports readers to a dystopian future where everything is not as it seems and resilience of body — and spirit — is required to survive.
Available online where books are sold.
A Midwinter Manifestation
Sammi Cox
Maeve Featherstone stared out of the frosty window of Appletree House at the winter scene on the other side of the pane of glass. It was almost picture perfect.
From her seat, she could see the eight-hundred-year-old church lit up against the indigo sky. St Mary’s, like the rest of the village of Wood End, currently sat beneath a few feet of snow. The parish Christmas tree, set in the middle of The Green, was lit up in red and yellow and blue; little yellow lanterns were strung from the Victorian-style lampposts around its edge. In a few evenings’ time, the people of Wood End would turn out and congregate in the heart of the village, wrapped up against the cold to sing carols before retreating to The Charcoal Burner, the public house which sat directly opposite St Mary’s, to celebrate the season.
Maeve looked up at the sky; the moon was nearly at its fullest. Tomorrow was the Winter Solstice, and to celebrate, she planned to venture out into the ancient woodlands that gave the village its name. King’s Wood backed onto the garden of Appletree House, and a wooden door in the red brick wall that encircled the property gave Maeve easy, not to mention secret, access to the woodland. Which, of course, was just what every modern-day sorceress required.
Maeve loved the woods. She and Ed, her recently deceased boyfriend, had once spent many long days out roaming its dozens of paths. Now, they had to walk them by night, in case anyone saw the ghost walking beside her. No one but Maeve knew about Ed’s post-death transformation, and they were planning on keeping it that way.
As with most things pertaining to Maeve’s existence, the less other people knew about it, the happier she was. Only a select few knew Maeve was a sorceress. She preferred this title to witch, though she accepted both and never took offense at being referred to by the latter. Mostly, those in the know were other magickal practitioners: some whom she had taught, some whom had taught her. But there were a handful of others, also.
However, not another soul knew that Ed’s ghostly form resided in Appletree House. It was their secret and that was how it would remain.
Her mind turned back to the forthcoming Winter Solstice. She knew she should begin her preparations, but she was content to sit quietly and look out of the window for the time being. There was something pure and serene about the snow-covered village, something that made her want to stop, rest, and reflect, rather than move, do, and act. And so she stayed where she was, giving in to the soothing, relaxing feeling that overwhelmed her, which she no doubt needed after her busy day at work.
Maeve allowed her head to rest against the freezing cold window as she contemplated the quiet Christmas she was planning to share with Ed when he returned. He had spent the last two days in the north country, checking that his family were doing all right, but she was expecting him home at any minute. Her thick, wavy, dark red tresses, that flowed half way down her slender back when she was standing, made a very good impromptu pillow, cushioning her from the worst of the frosty glass. Every now and then, she caught her pale reflection staring back at her. The darkness beneath her eyes had yet to disappear, she noted, and no amount of make-up seemed to be able to cover it completely. It had been a hard year, and she would be glad to see the back of it, although the prospect of a few quiet days with none but Ed for company would be a welcome respite.
An urgent banging on the front door broke Maeve’s silent, seasonal ponderings. She jumped from her window seat, where she had been happily curled up, and ran into the hall, wondering what on earth could have been so pressing as to drive someone from the warmth of their home on such an evening.
On opening the door, Maeve found the diminutive Eve Whitworth on her doorstep. Eve, or Evie as she was known to most of the village, lived just down the lane.
“Maeve, please help me. You must. Oh! What am I going to do?” Evie clasped a hand to her forehead as she marched up and down the front porch. In her festive-themed green coat and red hat, she looked more elf-like than ever.
Maeve sighed. “What’s happened now?” she asked, resigned to the fact that her evening of quiet had been completely and irrevocably disturbed.
“I didn’t mean to do it. I swear.”
Maeve walked back through to the living room, leaving it up to Evie whether or not she followed. Evie was hard work, always, and she had a terrible reputation for doing things she shouldn’t and then expecting Maeve to fix them before anything serious could occur.
“What have you done now, Evie?” Maeve demanded, folding her arms across her chest as she turned to face her. It had been a long day, and Maeve could feel knots of tension causing havoc across her neck and shoulders. Rolling her head from side to side in an attempt to loosen her stiff muscles, she wondered whether she would actually have time to plan her Solstice celebration before she went to bed. It didn’t seem likely.
“I didn’t mean to. It was an accident,” said Evie defensively.
It was Maeve’s turn to clasp her hand to her forehead. She had at least some idea of what it was Evie had done. “You touched those books again, didn’t you?” Maeve hissed through gritted teeth. “Your mother’s books. I warned you… I told you… Why don’t you ever listen?”
Evie’s mother had been thoroughly fascinated by magick and the occult. As an avid collector of all sorts of books and paraphernalia associated with the mystical and paranormal, her home had become a library dedicated to the subject, although she was never much of a practitioner herself. Mrs Whitworth had died a few years previously, and for some reason Maeve had y
et to understand, she had left all but a few of these items to Evie. Maeve and Mrs Whitworth had naturally got along very well. Nevertheless, the sorceress was unhappy to learn that the mother had shared Maeve’s secret with her daughter. And now every time Evie dabbled in witchcraft, she very quickly found herself at the door of Appletree House asking for help.
“I didn’t think it would work,” Evie replied hysterically.
“You always say that, and it always does!”
“I am really sorry —”
“Save it, Evie. Come on.” Maeve stormed out of the room, swapped her slippers for her boots in the hall, and donned her long, thick woolen coat.
In silence, they stepped outside, closing the front door behind them as they exited Appletree House. The freezing cold air immediately began attacking any exposed areas of skin it could find, and so, in an attempt to keep herself warm, Maeve marched off down the driveway, and turned right when she came to the lane.
Evie did her best to keep up. “I am sorry,” she called out, a few steps behind Maeve. “It was only that… well…”
“Evie, please, just be quiet. Wait until I ask a question before you speak again. I need to try and clear my mind if I am going to be able to undo whatever it is you have done.” Maeve tried not to snap at the woman, but she found her inability to take sound advice terribly frustrating. This routine was familiar to both of them, such was the level of Evie’s stupidity and Maeve’s reluctance to allow the woman the chance to try and sort out her magickal mess herself, and in so doing cause even more trouble.
Turning up the footpath at the bottom of the lane, Maeve walked up towards Evie’s house, which was set back from the road. The light in the front window flickered on and off. It was obvious to the sorceress that Evie had raised or conjured something.
Halfway up the driveway, she came to a sudden stop as the sound of something smashing floated out to greet them. “Now would be a good time to tell me what you did,” the witch said, trying to remain calm and collected, trying not to show her exasperation and annoyance.
“Well… you see… You were right… It was from one of the books Mummy left me —”
“The spell, Evie? What spell did you cast?”
“This afternoon, I noticed how things were starting to get on top of me. And I just felt so tired, and the chores seemed to be beyond my ability to complete, and tomorrow my sister — you remember Lilian, don’t you? She’s arriving with her husband and two girls…”
An awful feeling came over Maeve. “Please, no… no… no…” She ran the rest of the way up to the house.
Evie, who could not look at Maeve, unlocked the front door, and for once didn’t say a word.
The sight that welcomed the pair was one of utter destruction. It looked like a tornado had moved from room to room, destroying everything in its path.
“An imp? You summoned an imp?”
“I thought it would be helpful.”
“Elves, Evie. Elves help with housework. Imps don’t fix things. They break things. They break everything.”
“Oh. Oops. It’s an easy mistake to make. I’ll remember that for next time.”
“Evie, there shouldn’t be a next time. You shouldn’t do magick. Why don’t you understand that?” Maeve shouted to be heard over the stereo that had just turned up to full volume.
But Evie wasn’t listening. She never listened when she was supposed to. “So, about this imp… What are we going to do?”
Maeve could have screamed in frustration as she watched Evie go to turn the music off.
*
Although an imp was not the worst creature Evie could have summoned, neither was it the easiest to get rid of. Unlike the majority of other magickal creatures, you could not simply undo the spell or cast another to send it away. The banishing of an imp required you to actually be in possession of said imp before you could do anything with it. And imps were notoriously cunning demons who took a serious dislike to anyone who tried to curtail their bouts of destruction. Thus they were also considered quite dangerous.
“The first thing we must do is secure all the exits. We cannot allow the imp to get out of the house, Evie. Do you understand how important that is?” Evie nodded, but then she always nodded and agreed with anything Maeve said before going off and doing whatever she wanted.
The sorceress could suddenly see terrible images of a crazed imp on the rampage through Wood End. It would be a disaster. One house after another would be destroyed, spoiling Christmas for everyone. It would attract all sorts of attention. Questions would be asked. Answers would need to be given. The fact that she was a sorceress might be revealed, her secret a secret no longer. What would she say? What if someone found the imp? What if it hurt someone? This was the worst possible thing that could happen at this time of the year. An uncontrollable imp would certainly ruin the Christmas celebrations of the entire village, and perhaps further afield, if the little demon got the opportunity.
Maeve locked the door they had just walked through, whilst Evie ran through the house to check the back door was still shut.
“Now what?” she asked on her return.
“Well, obviously we need to find and capture the imp,” Maeve said, rolling her eyes.
“Capture it? How?”
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. First, we need to locate it.”
“I’ll search upstairs, if you search down here?” Evie suggested, for once sounding sensible. And off she went, after being reminded to check all the first floor windows were closed.
Maeve decided to start the hunt in the kitchen. It was the room she most feared to find the creature in, as it would be surrounded by an arsenal of potential weapons, and so it was there it posed the greatest danger to anyone who sought to capture it.
Everywhere she looked as she followed the hallway through to the back of the house were the visible signs of a rampaging imp. Books and ornaments pulled from the sideboard covered the floor. Coats and jackets from the rack hung off the banister. Peering through the doorway of each room she passed, she could see all the drawers and cupboards had been emptied and left open, somberly devoid of their contents.
When she reached the kitchen, the scene was no less dramatic. The contents of the fridge lay strewn across the floor, and its door hung ajar, casting an eerie light in the otherwise dark room. The sound of rummaging from within told Maeve she had found the culprit.
Quietly, on the tips of her toes, she crept towards it. As she moved, she tried to hold her breath, concerned that her breathing would warn the imp of her approach. When she was a few feet away, she picked up speed, all caution gone out of the window as fear that the creature would escape played on her mind. On reaching the fridge, she tried to slam the door shut, but something was in the way, and the imp shrieked loudly, a high-pitched sound that went right through her.
As she tried again to close the door, the imp pushed against it, trying to get out. Maeve attempted to feel underneath it in the hope of finding what was preventing the door from closing, but when she inadvertently felt the hairy feet of the creature, she instinctively recoiled and stepped back. The door flew open, and in the light of the appliance, Maeve watched as the imp threw Evie’s Christmas turkey that had been defrosting in the fridge on to the floor, where it landed in a puddle of what appeared to be milk. Then it darted through her outstretched arms and out of the door.
Maeve had lost it.
Retracing her footsteps back to the hallway, Maeve wondered wryly how many witches it took to catch an imp. With a shake of the head, her quest continued.
She arrived first at the dining room door. As she stepped inside, the room was in utter darkness, and she could not see a thing. This made her wonder for a moment about the eyesight of imps. Could they see in the dark? Most magickal creatures could, for the majority of them were nocturnal, and so she concluded imps were, in all probability, the same. However, that did not help her; she was neither nocturnal nor gifted with night vision. Her
only recourse was to switch on the light.
She felt along the wall close to the door where she knew the switch was located, pushing it downwards when she finally found it. On came the light in the faux-crystal chandelier. It was so bright compared to the darkness that Maeve went momentarily blind. With her eyes squinted shut, she waited for the imp to come hurtling towards her.
But nothing happened.
Slowly, she opened her eyes, first one and then the other. The room was a mess. The imp had clearly been in here, turning out boxes and tearing up rolls of Christmas wrapping paper. Nevertheless, it was the silence in the room that told her the imp was elsewhere in the house. A cursory glance over all the potential hiding places confirmed this, before Maeve switched off the light and closed the door behind her. She was going to have to keep on searching.
Opposite the dining room doorway was a smaller one that led to the little room beneath the stairs. Maeve tried the door, but it wouldn’t budge. She pulled and pulled at it, wondering why it wouldn’t open. Then, suddenly, it came free, and she realized it was stiff rather than being held closed by a strong little demon hiding behind it. It was, no doubt, thanks to its sticky hinges that this room alone remained unaffected by the arrival of the small monster. Compared to the rest of the house, it was pristine and everything was still to be found in its right and proper place.
Leaving the small room, ensuring that the door was once more shut tight, Maeve knew there was only one more place for her to look: the living room. The destruction in here was worse than in the other areas she had been in. The light overhead had stopped flickering (it was this that they had seen from the front window as she and Evie had walked up the driveway) and now shone brightly.
Instinctively, Maeve’s hand flew to her mouth as she gasped at the devastation. The Christmas tree rested on its side; glass from broken vintage ornaments littered the floor. The presents that had been sitting beneath it, awaiting the arrival of Christmas morning, had all been torn open and then discarded. The sofa lay on its back. A bookcase had been pushed over, and its contents spilled. The coffee table stood on its end. Magazines and newspapers had been ripped to pieces.