Sunday, October 19, 2025
👻🎃Random Paranormal Tales of 2025 Part 7🎃👻
Random Paranormal Tales of 2025
Summary:
Black and Blue #2
Levi Black has mostly recovered from the events of a year ago. The only lingering effects are that he’s much more well known in York than he’d like to be, and he’s a lot more cautious about walking around his house naked. However, those events brought him the capricious and fascinating Blue, so he’s not complaining. On the contrary, he’s happy, in love, and looking forward to Blue finally moving in with him. And if sometimes he wonders what Blue sees in a boring cartoonist, he keeps that to himself.
Blue Billings is finally ready to throw off the memories of his past and move in with the person who means the most in the world to him. His psychic abilities have grown in the last year to his mentor Tom's consternation, but Blue is determined to look on the bright side. He’s also focused on ignoring all the warning signs that he’s received lately.
However, even deeply buried secrets have a way of rising to the surface. And when a surprise from Blue’s past turns up and draws them away to a lonely house on the Yorkshire moors, Levi and Blue must fight for their survival once again.
From bestselling author, Lily Morton, comes the second book in the Black & Blue series. The books are intended to be read in order.
Summary:
Rick and Ernie found the perfect apartment on Chicago’s West Side. Before they’re settled, Rick begins having all-too-real disturbing “dreams.” Each time, an emaciated young man with sad brown eyes appears, terrifying and obsessing him.
From their next-door neighbor, Paula, Rick learns about Karl and Tommy, who lived there before them. Tommy’s mysterious disappearance pains her. When she shares a photo of her with Tommy and Karl, Rick is shocked and troubled. Tommy is the man who appears to him in his dreams.
The ghostly visitations compel Rick to uncover the truth about Tommy’s disappearance. It’s a quest that will lead him to Karl, Tommy’s lover, who may know more about Tommy’s disappearance than he’s telling, and a confrontation with a restless spirit who wants only to—finally—rest in peace.
Summary:
Tales from the Gemstone Kingdoms #1
Every Winter Solstice, the Emerald Kingdom sends the dreaded Ice King a sacrifice—a corrupt soul, a criminal, a deviant, or someone touched by magic. Prince Reardon has always loathed this tradition, partly because he dreams of love with another man instead of a future queen.
Then Reardon’s best friend is discovered as a witch and sent to the Frozen Kingdom as tribute.
Reardon sets out to rescue him, willing to battle and kill the Ice King if that’s what it takes. But nothing could prepare him for what he finds in the Frozen Kingdom—a cursed land filled with magic… and a camaraderie Reardon has never known. Over this strange, warm community presides the enigmatic Ice King, a man his subjects call Jack. A man with skin made of ice, whose very touch can stop a beating heart.
A man Reardon finds himself inexplicably drawn to.
Jack doesn’t trust Reardon. But when Reardon begins spending long days with him, vowing to prove himself and break the curse, Jack begins to hope. Can love and forgiveness melt the ice around the king's cold heart?
THIS SECOND EDITION INCLUDES A NEW COVER AND RE-FORMATTED INTERIOR BUT NO SIGNIFICANT CONTENT CHANGES FROM THE ORIGINAL.
Summary:
I’m what nightmares are made of, but I’m not sure who’s more dangerous: him or me.
In the world of witches, Keller Rex is a legendary monster—a dark sorcerer with a gift for suffering. He has long been the protector of the Zayne coven and their ancestral home in Charleston, South Carolina. When the family matriarch, Vivian Zayne, dies under mysterious circumstances, he is tasked with finding the only person who can open her sealed Book of Shadows: the son no one knew she had.
Dylan Quinn has never bothered to figure out why cats follow him everywhere, but it’s been that way for as long as he can remember. After the unexpected passing of his adoptive mother, he had to make a new home for himself in small-town Ohio. Things have been quiet ever since, but lately, there are strange voices in his dreams and a sense of being watched.
When a striking Southern gent appears in town, Dylan welcomes the distraction. Keller is handsome and charming, but Dylan can tell there’s something else, something eerie about him. And he discovers he's right, as Keller goes from being Dylan’s seducer… to his abductor.
Now back in Charleston, Dylan’s newfound family is shocked when it’s discovered his magical affinity is for death itself. Despite his fears, he’ll need to learn to control his terrifying powers in order to open the Zayne Book of Shadows. He also needs to keep his coven safe, and time is running out. The estate's protective wards expire on Halloween, and power-hungry witches from all over are ready to pounce.
While Dylan’s awakening darkness threatens to overwhelm him, Keller finds himself confronted by feelings he thought long dead. Keller will do anything to protect his young necromancer and open Vivian’s Book of Shadows, but the Zaynes are in for a surprise when Dylan resurrects someone he shouldn’t.
Law and Supernatural Order #2
A bear of a man and a bear shifter. What could be better?
I run a shifter club, not an easy job, but as a bear shifter myself, I have all the necessary skills.
While trouble tends to follow my kind, finding dead werewolves in my office shocks even me. But my bad day gets better when Lt. Seth Morrison shows up to investigate.
It’s not our first run in, nor is it the first time I’ve flirted outrageously with the big, gorgeous man, but this time, I’m determined things won’t stop at flirtation.
I’m going to get my paws on Seth, no matter how forbidden he is or how many men would like to see us both dead.
The Quiet House by Lily Morton
Chapter 1
Blue
I see him as I answer questions at the end of my ghost tour. He’s at the back of the group, standing slightly apart from everyone. He’s an old man with white hair and a very lined face and dressed all in black. He looks like he’s cosplaying a funeral attendant to the extent that he’s even wearing a black hat with ribbons trailing down the back.
No one else seems to have noticed him, but then it’s a Friday night in York in December, and there’s a lot of fancy dress going on. Ghost tours are everywhere, as are the human detritus from the pre-Christmas parties. I’ve already had to deal with a group of drunken hecklers and a woman throwing up in a doorway, and it’s only eight o’clock.
Even so, I eye the man curiously. He seems too still somehow to be a part of the Christmas revelling. I wonder idly whether he’s a spirit, but a second glance dispels that notion. He’s too substantial for one of those and seems firmly planted on his own square of York pavement. However, I notice that no matter how raucous the crowd passing by, they all seem to give him a clear path.
I turn my attention back to the group of students who have stood at the front of the group all night peppering me with questions about the York Devil.
“So, did you really find body parts in jars in your house? Were they dripping blood?” a young, dark-haired bloke asks with grisly relish.
I smile. “So many body parts and blood everywhere,” I say dramatically and not particularly truthfully. “It was like a Tesco for serial killers down there.”
This sets them off even more, and I sigh and try to check my watch discreetly. Levi and I have got plans tonight, and I need to hurry this along. I look up and blink. The old man has gone. And the cheeky sod’s gone without paying me for the bloody tour, I think indignantly. However, amidst the bustle of leave-taking and multiple thank-yous from my group, he fades from my mind, and by the time I’m heading up the lane to Levi’s house, the old man is far from my thoughts.
Levi
I follow Blue as he turns left off the main road and down a little snickleway. “Where are we going?” I ask for the third time tonight.
He looks back and gives me his wicked grin. “Are you worried that I’m going to lead you astray?”
“Not worried, exactly. More sure of the fact.”
He laughs. It’s husky and warm and very familiar after a year together, but it still has the power to make my stomach tighten.
“We’re here anyway,” he says and throws his arms out in a dramatic gesture that I’ve seen him use on his ghost tour many times.
I look at him and then up at the old building we’re standing outside. “An Irish club? This is where we’ve come for the evening?”
He grins. “Yep.”
“If I had a hundred guesses, I’d never have got this one.”
The door opens as a couple come out, and a snatch of music dances out into the air. It’s a fiddle playing, and the tune instantly grabs at your heart and makes you want to tap your feet. I look over at Blue and smile immediately. His head has come up like a dog scenting the air, and his fingers are tapping the beat out on his jean-clad leg.
“You ready?” he asks. “Is this okay?”
I smile. “Of course, it is. I’m with you.”
He grimaces. “We’ve got to break you of this habit of saying romantic things.”
“Really?” I ask, holding tight to his free hand as he moves away so the momentum swings him into my body.
He immediately melts into me. “No,” he says, a serious expression on his face. “I hope you never get over that habit.”
Shaking his head at the romantic sentiment, he pulls me into the building, and I look around with interest. A stage is set up on one side of the room in front of a huge wooden dancefloor. A band is playing, and a crowd of people are dancing. With their syncopated movements, it’s a bit like the line dancing my mum once took me to when I was little.
The room is low lit and the beams festooned with fairy lights. Old Irish advertising pictures hang on the walls.
Blue begins an immediate progress towards the busy bar, stopping every few seconds to answer someone’s call or be hugged. He’s obviously known and well-liked here. Finally, we arrive at the bar, and the barmaid comes over. She’s middle-aged with red hair and a huge smile on her face.
“Well, as I live and breathe it’s Blue Billings,” she exclaims. “Wherever have you been, love?”
“Shannon.” He smiles. “I’ve been holed up and living in sin with my bloke.”
She turns to me and looks me up and down. “Well, he’s a handsome one to be sure. How did you two meet?”
Blue grins wickedly, and I immediately wince. “He indecently exposed himself to me, Shannon.”
“Oh my God,” I sigh as the woman laughs loudly.
“Tis the truth,” he says. “And nothing but. You know how I am about being honest.”
“Oh, you’re absolutely fanatical,” I say dryly. “Where’s that accent come from anyway?” I ask him.
He looks puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“Your Irish accent. It’s stronger than usual.” His voice usually has a trace of it, but now it’s very strong.
He shrugs. “I can’t help it. It’s being around other Irish people. It brings it out. My mum had a really strong accent.”
I lean closer. “I like it,” I whisper. “It’s very sexy.”
He looks startled, and then his wicked grin pokes out. “Ah, so it’s the Irish you like. Better not let you watch Eammon Holmes on This Morning then, or I’ll have competition.”
I laugh. “Not likely.”
The barmaid leans forward. “You playing tonight, Blue?”
He immediately looks embarrassed. “Oh no,” he says quickly. “I haven’t played in years, Shannon. I’d be rustier than an old bucket by now. I don’t want to embarrass myself. We’re just here for a drink and the craic.”
“Play what?” I ask.
Blue looks like he’s seriously considering moving the subject on, but Shannon answers the question. “The fiddle. Blue’s a dab hand. Beautiful player.”
“Is he really?” I say, glancing at Blue. He’s flushed bright red, making his pale blue wolf eyes even more distinctive than usual.
“I’m not that good,” he says, worrying at his lip ring.
Shannon shakes her head. “Yes, you are. We’ve missed you around here. Riordan will be looking for you as soon as he finds out you’re here.”
She moves off to serve some customers, and I look at Blue, who is staring with studied concentration at the dancefloor. “So?” I say, elongating the word.
He nudges me. “Oh, shut up.”
I laugh. “No, really? You can play the fiddle, and I’m only just finding it out now.”
He edges closer into my side, the heat of his body a now-familiar weight against my own. “My mum could play. She was amazing. We used to busk outside all the Irish clubs in London. There's no bigger tipper than a sentimental drunken Irishman.”
I smile tenderly. He still doesn’t talk much about his mum and who can blame him? There doesn’t seem to be much good to relate about his upbringing. Sometimes he’ll mention an incident with fondness in his voice, and I’ll be hard-pressed to conceal my horror because it would by no means be a fond memory for anyone of a sane mind. However, this seems to be one of the rare good ones.
“What did you play?” I ask.
“‘Danny Boy’, of course. That got the most money.” He shakes his head. “And the most tears. Loads of men weeping over me.” He grins. “A foretaste of my adult romantic history.”
I bite my lip to hide my own smile. “Such a heartbreaker.” He laughs. “So, why don’t you play anymore?”
He looks surprised. “I pawned my fiddle. Well, it was hers, really. I took it when she died and kept it with me. I used to play here in exchange for food, but then I had to pawn it when my money ran out. Riordan bought it off me and then let me play it whenever I wanted.” He pauses. “Blimey, I haven’t thought of that for years.”
There’s a shout of Blue’s name, and when I look up, the giant on the stage is crouched down and signalling my boyfriend. Blue shakes his head, trying not to smile.
“Go on, then.” I nudge him. “Sing for our supper.”
“Do you mind?” he asks. “I didn’t think this through. I just wanted to take you somewhere with good food and a cracking atmosphere.” He looks suddenly discomforted, which I know always heralds something tender. “I wanted to show you a bit of myself.”
“It’s brilliant,” I say, and when he stands, still undecided, I push him gently. “I can’t wait to see you play.” I wink. “Make me proud, baby.”
He wrinkles his nose. “Ugh,” he says succinctly and walks off.
I lean against the bar and watch as Blue nears the stage. He and the big man hug and then Blue vaults onto the stage and is immediately surrounded by the band. He’s buried beneath back-slaps and hugs, and when he reappears, he’s trying not to smile.
“Look who’s here,” the big man says over the microphone. “Little Blue Billings come to entertain us, folks.”
The crowd cheers, and Blue shakes his head at the man whom I presume is Riordan. He passes Blue a fiddle, and from the surprised way Blue looks at it, I’d bet that it’s his mother’s old fiddle. He cradles it tenderly as the big man talks to him, occasionally nodding. When the big man steps back, Blue looks up and says something which makes the man laugh.
Riordan steps back to the microphone. “How about a little something to get the soles of your feet itching?” he says.
The woman to the right of Blue starts a beat with her bodhrán. It’s slow and steady but almost magic, making fingers tap and senses tingle. It’s obviously a well-known song because the crowd roar with approval and bring their partners into their arms.
Blue meets my eyes over the crowd, his gaze searching before he puts the fiddle under his chin. When he starts to play, my mouth drops open. I don’t know why I’m surprised that he’s so bloody good, because he seems to have a knack with anything he puts his mind to. Maybe I was lulled by his careless words, and I shouldn’t have been. When he’s at his most dismissive is when things mean the most to the complicated man I love.
The melody floats over the dance floor, melancholy and beautiful at the same time. Then Blue’s fiddle and the bodhrán pick up speed as if they’re duelling, and the crowd begin to dance. They whirl and spin, their shadows dancing on the walls in the low light, and then suddenly it’s as if I’m looking through a tunnel. The dancers fall away, the only sign of their presence the thump of their feet on the wooden floor beating percussion. All I can see is Blue swaying on the stage, his pale eyes far away and focused on something only he can see, his long fingers clutching the bow which catches the light as it moves.
The song gets faster and faster, the noise beating its way to the rafters until it feels like the whole roof might lift off. And then Blue gives his bow a last flourish. The music dies slowly until the bodhrán gives a final thump and Blue steps back. He looks up and, finding me watching, he winks irreverently. I inhale, suddenly aware that I’ve been holding my breath.
“Told you he was good,” Shannon says, tapping my shoulder.
I nod, smiling at him up there on the stage. Flushed and slightly dishevelled and all mine.
A few hours later, we make our way home, filled with food and tipsy from the seemingly unending pints of Guinness that Blue was sent. He walks next to me, his hand holding firmly to mine and humming slightly. There’s a bounce to his step, and it makes me smile. I want night after night like this—him and me.
“I can’t wait for you to move in,” I say impulsively as we move through the snickleway that leads to home. “Tomorrow can’t come soon enough.”
He turns to me. “Really?”
I narrow my eyes at the surprise in his voice. “Of course. I’ve wanted it for ages.” I pause. “Have you changed your mind?” I say slowly, trying not to betray my disappointment. It’s been a long job getting Blue to trust in us enough to make this move.
He looks startled. “Of course, not,” he says passionately, and I relax my shoulders, exclaiming in surprise as he pushes me into the wall by the side of the snickleway. We’re standing cloaked in the shadows of a large tree and out of the way of the wind. “I want to be with you.”
I smile at him. “Well, that’s good because I want to be with you too.”
“Yes, but this is your house. You must tell me if you change your mind,” he says earnestly.
I look at him in incomprehension. “I’ll never change my mind,” I say, the simple truth ringing in my tone. “Never.” He relaxes a little, but I know he doesn’t quite believe me that this is it for me. He never really sees his own worth. Just mine. “Would it be easier if I made the house half yours?” I ask.
“What? Bloody hell. Have you gone completely daft, Levi? You need to look after what’s yours better than this.”
“No,” I say, feeling warmth in my stomach. He looks after all my possessions better than I do, making sure that they’re all accounted for and not broken. “Because the thing that means the most to me is you. The rest is just brick and mortar.” I chuckle. “Well, and Rosalind. I’m not quite sure what an estate agent would think of her.”
He shakes his head, a tender look on his face. “What am I going to do with you, Levi Black?”
“Move in with me tomorrow?” I say hopefully, and he smiles.
“Far be it from me to discourage you from the madness in your brain, but of course, I am. Although you’ll be forgetting that silly idea to give me half the house.” He tuts. “Crazy.” I smile, and he looks at me searchingly. “You look surprised that it’s happening?”
“I am a bit.”
“Why? I said I would, and I always keep my word to you.” I repress a smile at the righteous indignation in his voice. “Besides, Will is already packed up and moving into the flat at the bookshop,” he adds.
“I never thought I’d see the day,” I say marvelling. “I thought he didn’t like relying on anyone.”
“He’s had a year like me to recognise that some people are exactly who they say they are. That’s more of a gift than a bag of cash.”
“Really?”
He wrinkles his nose. “No, of course not. Cash wins every time.”
I laugh, and then it dies away as he lowers himself to his knees in front of me.
“What are you doing?” I hiss.
He looks up and winks. “I’m getting ready to polish your shoes. I hope you’re a good tipper. What does it look like I’m doing?”
“Like you’re getting ready to give me a blowjob. Outside. In the street where we live.” He lowers the zipper on my jeans, and I swallow hard. “Outside where we can be seen,” I murmur and he grins.
“It’s lucky I’m an exhibitionist then, Levi.”
My thoughts scatter as he pulls my dick gently out and suckles it, his eyes closing in happiness. He loves to do this when my dick is soft, and he can feel it grow in his mouth. I stroke my hand through his hair.
“But you’ve never been at my feet before. Are you sure?” I ask because this position can’t have good memories for him. It reeks of power.
He looks up, and I relax because his eyes are clear and serene. He pulls off my dick, and I shudder at the cold air.
“I must be doing something wrong,” he says conversationally. “If you can still talk. I obviously need to practise more.” He licks a stripe up my cock and suckles gently on the tip.
“Oh …oh, mmm, God … you should practise as much as you want,” I say fervently, and he grins before turning back to his task, which tonight appears to be sucking my brain out through my dick.
Blue
We shower together when we get home, and I stay as close as possible, running my hands down his body and hugging him tightly. Tonight had been the first time I’d been on my knees for him, and for a moment I’d wondered whether I’d be able to go through with it.
The act has always seemed too close to my past, somehow. I’ve been on my knees in back alleyways sucking the cocks of more men than I can count. It was never particularly pleasant but it was always necessary.
However, this was Levi, and once I caught his scent and felt his cock in my mouth, all my old memories flew away, replaced by the utter love I have for this man and the safety I feel with him no matter how vulnerable I make myself.
It has left me feeling a bit unsettled though, and while Levi doesn’t say anything, I know he understands. His hugs are extra tight tonight and seem to envelop me so that my entire focus narrows to the warmth of his wet body and the scent of my shampoo in the shower cubicle.
It’s one of the things I love most about being with him. I don’t have to keep explaining specific triggers. Levi really cares, and shows his love by taking the time to know me inside out. I feel seen by him. Seen and understood.
I wander into the bedroom, rubbing my hair on the towel while he finishes drying off in the bathroom. “Brr, it’s fucking freezing in here,” I call to him, shivering. “Has Rosalind turned the heat down again?”
Our resident ghost seems to be obsessed with keeping our bills down at the moment, and we’re forever finding the thermostat turned down on the boiler.
“Probably,” Levi calls. “She turned the radiators off today. I felt very judged. It was like being a teenager at home again. I expected to be shown the gas bill at any second. Get into bed. You’ll soon warm up.”
I smile at the sound of his voice. “Going to let me put my feet on you?”
“When don’t you do that?” he says, coming into the room naked. “It’s like sleeping with an ice block.”
“But a very sexy one,” I say.
He grins. “But of course.”
He slides into the bed, and I take a second to appreciate the lovely view. All that honey-toned skin and shiny brown hair. All mine.
“Hurry up,” he calls. “It’s bloody cold in here. I want a cuddle.”
I turn to the window. “One cuddle coming up. I’ll just close the curtains and—”
I’m stunned into silence. The old man from the ghost tour is standing on the lane outside our house. He’s staring up at the window with a peculiar intensity, and even though I’m clearly in view, he doesn’t move away in embarrassment at being caught like a normal peeper would. Instead, he just carries on bloody staring.
“What the fuck?” I breathe.
He’s standing as still as a statue, and my stomach lurches when I note that, although the wind is blowing the tree about, not one piece of the man’s clothing is moving.
“What is it?” Levi asks.
“Come and look at this,” I say, beckoning him over. He throws the covers back and pads over to stand beside me.
“Look at what?” he says, peering down into the lane. “There’s nothing there.”
“Can’t you see him?” I glance at him and when I turn back to the window I go still. The lane is empty once more, the only sign of movement a crisp packet tumbling along in the wind. “He’s gone,” I say stupidly, something cold running down my spine—a sensation I haven’t felt in a year.
Levi doesn’t show a trace of surprise at being called over to look at nothing. I suppose he’s well used to it after the past year. “Who’s gone?” he says, brushing my hair back from my forehead.
“I don’t know,” I say slowly, my gaze on the empty lane. “I really don’t.” I turn to him. “But I’m going to find out.”
Wounded Air by Rick R Reed
Chapter One
I had been mesmerized by the apartment for months, perhaps years, on my Brown Line L train ride from Western Avenue to downtown Chicago. The place was hard not to notice, even in a city as big and crowded as Chicago. Unique things tend to stand out.
The loft apartment took up the top floor of a storefront building. Every time I passed it, I caught my breath just a little. I mean, I couldn’t help but stare at the soaring glass wall that fronted one side of the unit. It was a voyeur’s dream—or maybe an exhibitionist’s? It certainly grabbed my attention.
Sitting on the train, I would peer into the apartment, but curiously enough, I never managed to catch a glimpse of anyone who lived there. With its openness, it had the look and feel of a movie or stage set. Every time the train went by, I would look up from whatever I was reading to simply see if I could glimpse anyone in this place that had taken on such a weird fascination for me. I desperately wanted to see the person or people who lived there. Even though it was irrational and maybe even a bit stalkerish, I wondered about who they were, what their lives were like, what drew them to this unusual apartment. Or maybe it was a condo?
It had to be one of the most unusual homes on the North Side of Chicago. The loft was just one big, open room with an open stairway up to a mezzanine, where the bedroom would be. The steps were simple wood slats with a streamlined railing made of steel cable. The wall opposite the soaring glass was exposed brick, distressed, dripping mortar between the red bricks. Simple. Minimalist. Almost industrial. Ductwork was visible, silver, and a little bit corroded.
It had hipster charm for days.
I often imagined that, despite it being so open to prying L-rider eyes like mine, I would love to live there. There was something both magical and magnetic about the place. I longed for the day when I would roll on by and see a FOR RENT or FOR SALE sign affixed to the glass.
I think I even dreamed about it a time or two.
Even though I never saw them, my imagination worked overtime to visualize the people who lived there. I imagined an artist or maybe a sculptor, someone creative anyway. I’d put myself in his or her place, hoping one day I would have the opportunity to move around that large inviting space, to tiptoe up the stairs to the loft in the evening, to cook a meal in the small kitchen, to gaze out as trains rumbled by, sparks from the rails in their wake.
Inspired.
I never imagined my dream would come true.
But it did. And in a funny way, what drove me to this particular apartment led to a lot of dreams coming true.
But dreams can turn to nightmares in the space of a single breath.
Fate stepped in one day and changed everything—past, present, and future—when I rounded the bend of the L tracks and my glass-walled apartment came into view.
On that day, there was a change, a difference of two words.
Hanging as though suspended in midair was one of those black-and-red signs one can buy at the hardware store. The sign proclaimed: FOR RENT. Below the bright red letters was a white rectangle with a phone number written in black marker.
Oh my god. It’s coming true. This place will be gone by the afternoon! I can’t let anyone else have it.
I dug inside my messenger bag, groping for paper and pen to jot down the number. I’d call the moment I got to work, already feeling like I was racing against some imaginary clock hanging just above my head. Such a unique place wouldn’t be on the market for long. Hell, someone else might have already snatched it up.
I wasn’t fast enough to write the number. Of course, I wasn’t. The train had stopped for only a minute, two at the most, long enough to let a few folks off and a whole bunch on. There was a lot of chatter, the huffing of the train, the pneumatic hiss of the doors closing, and the garbled announcement for the next stop.
The apartment—and the FOR RENT sign—sailed by as it always did, and the phone number along with it. I turned in my seat, straining to try to see the number from this distance, even though I knew it was a stupid and impossible move.
I knew, as sure as anything, if I waited until the next day, with my pen poised and ready over a pad of paper, the sign would have vanished. Someone else would take possession of what I felt, in a weird and possessive way, was rightfully mine.
There was only one thing to do.
I tried to be patient despite my thundering heart, waiting until we neared the next station. I leapt up and edged my way through the crowd toward the doors. When they slid open, I stepped out and stood on the platform, giddy with my own impulsiveness. This wasn’t like me. I was usually a planner, every decision carefully considered before moving forward—or not.
Impulsive was something other people did.
On the platform, I paused for a moment, watching the southbound Brown Line train as it continued its journey toward the Loop. In the distance, the skyscrapers of downtown rose. A breeze rustled my hair. Autumn was definitely present, even though the sun peeked out through scattered clouds, drifting downward in illuminated shafts, like a religious painting. There was an undercurrent of chill that, at the time, I attributed to nothing more than the changing of seasons.
But now I wonder—was the chill an omen, foreboding? Was fate trying to tell me to get back on the next train and get to work like the safe and dependable guy I was? After all, I had a home and in it was a man I loved, a man to whom I hadn’t even whispered a word about wanting to move.
It was late autumn in Chicago and the day had all the portents of the coming winter. Gray, low-hanging clouds amassed near the horizon, some of them so dark they verged on black.
In the short time I stood there, the weather made a dramatic change, which, if you’ve ever visited Chicago, you know isn’t unusual. “Don’t like the weather?” Self-proclaimed wits were fond of saying about the Windy City. “Stick around for a few minutes, and it’ll change.”
The little sun there was vanished, beating a hasty retreat behind a bank of fast-moving and bruised clouds. Drizzle hung in the air. A needling, cold mist crept into my bones, making me shiver. This was worse than a downpour because it seemed like no matter how much one bundled up against it, the cold seeped into one’s bones, making it nearly impossible to get warm. The wind, which blew off the lake two miles east, picked up, running at a breakneck pace, westward bound, down Irving Park Road. I watched from the platform as the people below rushed to get out of the inclement weather, their umbrellas turning inside out. The wind ripped the last of fall’s leaves from their branches.
In spite of the weather, I made my way along the old wooden L platform to its northern end so I could stand directly in front of the object of my desire.
It was the first time I’d actually seen it up close. And now it almost looked unreal, as though it were a movie location dreamed up by the guy who did the set for Hitchcock’s Rear Window. My current view had that same urban, surreal feel, that same voyeuristic quality.
Looking back, I wondered if it also had that same air of menace Hitchcock was so noted for.
Close up the apartment was different.
I admit—I had idealized it. The soaring glass wall that I was so taken with was actually part of the roof and the glass had metal mesh inside it. I had imagined pristine glass; this was marred by water and mud stains, the color more a translucent gray than clear.
But I could still see inside the apartment, which looked quite small, but interesting: it was all one room, on two levels, with a large living area and kitchen down, and the sleeping area up. I don’t know if the current tenants were in the process of moving out or if they were simply minimalists. The place contained only a platform bed on the upper level and a swooning couch on the lower.
Whoever, they were, I decided, they lived much of their home lives horizontally.
I liked that.
And then I noticed one more thing—an elaborate screen pushed to one corner, near the wall that could be called the kitchen because of its stove, refrigerator, cupboards, and sink. Even through the rain-smeared glass and in the dim light of a rainy autumn morning, I could make out that the screen had been elaborately painted in a kind of graffiti style that reminded me of Keith Haring. Lurid red, white, and black leaped out at me from across the way.
I first heard and then saw the approach of another southbound train. I knew I had time to write down the phone number written on the FOR RENT sign, but inspiration, or fate, stepped in once more.
Why not just get off the platform, descend to street level, and see if I can claim this little piece of home right now?
Because my confession to not being very impulsive was somewhat true, I did take the precaution of jotting the number down.
And then I turned and descended the steps off the platform and continued through the turnstiles. Once I was in the relatively quieter environs of the Irving Park Brown Line L station, I pulled out my cell phone and called the number.
It took me by surprise when a woman picked up on the first ring. It’s almost like she was sitting by the phone, waiting for me to call. I’d expected to leave a message, so for a moment, I was a little taken aback, tongue-tied.
When I could engage brain and mouth, I said, “I’m calling to inquire about the apartment for rent.”
As soon as I said the words, I had the eerie feeling that I’d crossed a line. Nothing was ever going to be the same again. The words tumbled out and even then there was something within me, something no logic or reason can account for, that caused me to inexplicably know my fate was about to change and my wish for that apartment, placed into the universe subconsciously over many, many morning trips to work, was about to be granted. There was also a moment where an almost irresistible force compelled me to simply hang up, let go of this dream. Following it was rash, impulsive.
Before the woman even continued speaking, I knew I would be moving into that apartment the first of November. Even as the woman, her voice chipper and upbeat, perhaps a bit too friendly, invited me to come and have a look at the place right then, another thought, a clichéd one, intruded: Be careful what you wish for.
“I can be there in ten to fifteen minutes, depending on traffic. Twenty, maybe, it is rush hour after all.”
“No worries. There’s a coffee shop across the street from the L station. I’ll just hang out there until you get there.”
“Oh, Matilda’s?”
I glanced over at the hand-painted sign on the storefront window. “Yup. That’s the one.” The place actually looked inviting, what with the damp and the temperature plunging downward. Snow was not unheard of in Chicago in October. I imagined I could smell the approach of a few flakes on the draft riding into the train station.
“Say hi to Dorothy, if she’s working. And grab yourself a cinnamon roll with your java. They’re to die for. Better than Ann Sather’s.”
“That’s a tall order—” I started to say because Ann Sather’s Swedish restaurant a few stops south, on Belmont Avenue, was famous for their gigantic and super-delicious rolls.
But the woman had already hung up.
I said to my dead phone. “And your name is? What will you be driving? Will you be driving? How will I recognize you?” I laughed at myself and powered off my phone, slid it in my pocket, and headed outside.
The cold wind nearly took my breath away as I hurried across the street and into Matilda’s. Inside, the windows were steamed up, but it was warm. The espresso machine hissed noisily. Jazz tinkled softly over the sound system and I recognized Oscar Peterson’s piano. The song was “Night Train.”
I stepped up to the counter and a rail-thin woman with her salt and pepper hair pulled tightly away from her face hurried over from the machines to take my order. She looked more like Auntie Em than Dorothy.
I smiled. “Are you Dorothy, by any chance?”
“You mean as in Gale?”
“What?”
“Dorothy Gale? Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore? Follow the yellow brick road!”
I guffawed. “Um, no. Someone just told me to say hi to Dorothy.”
She narrowed her dark eyes at me, almost as though she thought I was pulling her leg. “You mean Dorothy Bartsch, I think. But whoever told you that was putting you on. Dot passed away a couple of years ago. Stroke. She used to own this place with her wife, Matilda. Matilda’s in Naperville now in an assisted living joint.” She sighed. “But that’s probably TMI when you just want your caffeine fix, right?”
“I’m sorry.”
She waved my apology away. “What can I get you? The Sumatra is excellent.”
“I’ll take that.” I pondered for a moment, my sweet tooth clamoring for attention, so I added, “And a cinnamon roll.”
“Sorry, hon. We sold the last one half an hour ago. Morning rush. We’ll have more in the afternoon.”
I laughed. “I didn’t need it, anyway.”
“We still have the pecan rolls if you want one of those? A donut, maybe?”
“Just the coffee, please.”
“You want room?”
“Nah.” I was tempted to add the old chestnut, “I like my coffee like I like my men. Black.” But one never knows how such jokes might be taken in our PC times even though the line was quite true in my case.
Once I had my coffee, I meandered with it over to the window to wait for the mystery woman who would hold the key, maybe, to the apartment—and my future. Our future. Me and, as Sophie Tucker might say, my boyfriend, Ernie’s. I hopped up on a stool, set my coffee on the little wooden bar bisecting the window, and wiped the steam away with the wrist of my jean jacket.
I waited for ten minutes, maybe a little more, when I saw her hurrying down Ravenswood Avenue from the north, head bowed against the wind. Something instinctive and prescient assured me, without a doubt, this was the woman I’d spoken to on the phone. She wore a beige raincoat, bright orange rubber rain boots, and had a mane of wild and frizzy red hair. Her glasses were rain-splattered and fogged. I wondered how she could see. She paused at the front door to clean her glasses and fluff her hair—which made it look exactly the same as it had before. If this were a movie, Diane Keaton would play her.
I turned on my stool a bit as she entered the restaurant. Out of the corner of my eye, I observed her looking at the chalkboard above the counter, and then her gaze landed on me.
She smiled. I grinned back. She was an odd character, but attractive in a weird sort of way. Her eyes were an arresting shade of green and the irises were magnified by the big round tortoiseshell-framed glasses she wore. This one was probably close to blind without her specs. Her hair framed her pale, freckled face in a way I’m sure a straight guy would find alluring. She had that kinda sexy librarian vibe.
She took a longing last glance at the counter and came over to me, hand extended. “You’re the guy who wants to look at the studio on Ravenswood? I didn’t catch your name.”
I hopped down from my stool so I could shake hands. “It’s Rick. Rick D’Angelo. And you are?”
“The real estate lady?” She laughed. “I’m hedging because no one believes me when I tell them my name. My folks had a perverse and, I might add, a very cruel sense of humor.”
“Okay.”
She seemed flustered. “It’s Olive.”
“That’s not so weird.” I shrugged. “A little old-fashioned, maybe, but normal. I like it.”
“Wait until you hear the last name.”
“What is it? Green?” I chuckled.
“Close. Branch. Olive Branch.” She eyed me and then held up a hand. “I don’t want to hear another word about it.”
I was relieved. What can you say anyway when there’s an olive branch right in your face?
“I don’t have a ton of time, Rick, so if it’s okay with you, let’s go check the place out.”
I followed her outside. The rain had slowed to a drizzle, which wasn’t unpleasant.
We traversed the short distance to the industrial building I’d looked at from the L platform. There was a storefront at ground level that was closed, and I wasn’t sure it was still even in business. It was one of those places that sold ready-to-assemble hardwood furniture that you’d need to sand and stain or paint yourself. I didn’t see the appeal.
“They’re out of business.” She nodded to the furniture store, pointing out the obvious. “The unit’s pretty quiet.” Grinning, she added, “You get used to the trains. After a time, you won’t even hear them.” Olive unlocked a side door and swung it open. I followed her up a narrow staircase. The hallway had a musty odor. “Sorry about the smell. Someone needs to open a window.”
We got to the top and I thought I’d die of impatience as Olive fumbled finding the keys to the front door.
After a few mumbled tsks and curse words, she found the right key and turned it in the deadbolt. She swung the door open and stepped aside to let me enter.
As I walked in, I had an odd sense of déjà vu. I suppose I could attribute it to seeing the place from the train, but the sensation gave me pause.
It was akin to stepping through the looking glass. I mean, I’d peered into this very same space for so long that I felt as though I knew it. Perhaps my knowledge was a snippet left over from a dream…
I took it all in, trying to ignore the feel of Olive’s gaze on me.
The place looked familiar, yes, but also felt different. Smaller, maybe. There was the open staircase up to the loft. Here was the little kitchenette, looking more run-down than I would have imagined. The Formica countertop was scuffed and the chrome trim held spots of rust. The white porcelain sink bore brownish stains, probably from the steady drip, drip, drip of the tap. The cabinets, which I had assumed were painted white wood, were actually white metal and they too had a few spots of rust, like a cancer. Still, I told myself they’d be functional.
I looked up, marveling at the black stamped-tin ceiling, at least fourteen feet above us. Vintage.
The floor was old parquet, oak, scuffed, and in need of refinishing. Dust motes danced in the air in the sparse sunlight filtering in through the wall of glass.
I closed my eyes for just a moment to breathe in the place’s essence, to solidify the fact that I was finally here. While my eyes were shut, I felt Olive’s hand on my shoulder for just a moment—a light squeeze and then gone.
I opened my eyes and turned to look at her.
She was at least ten feet away near the glass wall, head cocked and—I suppose—trying to gauge my reaction to the place.
I shuddered. It was just your imagination, that’s all.
I moved a little toward her, looking out over her head at the view outside once more.
Olive must have seen me gazing toward the window because she said, “Privacy. You’re thinking about privacy.”
She pointed to the red and black screen I’d viewed from the train. Close-up, it looked like someone had taken part of a graffitied wall, framed it, and stood it up in here. “The previous owners left that behind, so it helps. Comes with the place, if you want it. Or I can have it taken away. But people are going by too quickly on the train to really pay much attention.” She shrugged. “These days, everyone’s looking down at their phones all the damn time anyway.”
“Ain’t it the truth?” I agreed softly. My own phone vibrated in my pocket. It was probably my boss, wondering why I wasn’t at work. I didn’t bother to check, but did a quick tour of the place. The bathroom was vintage, with black-and-white tile floors and a clawfoot tub with metal piping around the top to enclose it for showering.
I was just about to turn and to tell Olive I needed to get a move on, when I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. I turned quickly and saw the back of a person—not Olive—reflected in the mirror. I blinked.
There was nothing there, of course.
In spite of this, I told her, “If you don’t have a long line of takers, I’d be interested in a lease.”
Ernie is going to kill me.
“I knew you would. It’s a unique property.” She dug in her voluminous orange leather bag and pulled out a credit application. “I was ready for you.”
She smiled.
I ignored the fact that I sensed something predatory in that grin.
The Prince and the Ice King by Amanda Meuwissen
Chapter 1
Reardon
Reardon shivered with a bone-deep chill. Despite hugging the thick furs of his winter cloak around him, he thought he might never be warm again.
Ice clung to the castle walls both outside and in, spreading from the corners of the interior chamber like mold. The deeper Reardon went, the less tolerable the cold became, like being dropped to the bottom of a frozen lake with no hope of surfacing.
Here the walls were not merely dusted with ice, they were coated, covered, practically made of it, and so were the ceiling and floor. The décor looked as though it might have been beautiful once, elegant and exquisitely made, but it was all distorted now, the tapestries faded, their original colors impossible to determine.
As Reardon continued, he stopped and shivered for a different reason.
There were frozen remains against the wall.
No, not remains like a pile of bones, but a full, undecayed corpse, with its mouth wide open in a preserved scream.
“That was the last outsider who found his way to my door,” a low, resonant voice rumbled through the chamber, making Reardon shiver harder. “He tried to break into my castle, to steal from me, before stumbling across the same threshold where you stand now.”
A powerful arm struck out and smashed the body into broken chunks—all clear, like ice, not red and bloody as Reardon had feared. But still, he believed that had been a man once, shattered now.
Dead.
He dared not move to face where the brief glimpse of a bestial hand had come from, but it had to be behind him. He could feel breath like an icy wind on his neck that made his skin prickle.
“And what did you come here for? Hmm? To slay me?”
“If I have to,” Reardon answered, because that had indeed been his intention when he made his way to the Frozen Kingdom—to end this once and for all.
“Try it, then,” the voice said, “but be warned, if your skin touches me, you will end up just like he did.”
Reardon spun, reaching for his sword, but while the monster he expected did indeed tower over him—a great, jagged creature made of ice, with angular features, clawed hands and feet that crunched into the floor, fangs as clear as ice themselves, and its head lengthening upward into what appeared to be an icy crown—the eyes made him pause.
Because those eyes, crystal clear and sparkling blue, held intelligence and curiosity that something otherwise out of a nightmare had no right to—entirely human.
Blue eyes in a sea of white.
Just like Barclay’s prophecy.
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“Blue eyes in a sea of white? You mean old. My true love is aged and wrinkled with white hair?” Reardon exclaimed. He had nothing against those lucky enough to live to see old age, but he couldn’t bear the thought of waiting another fifty or more years to finally be happy.
“I didn’t say old,” Barclay countered. “I didn’t not say old. You know my visions aren’t always clear!”
They sat huddled at the table in the back room of the alchemist’s shop where Barclay was apprenticed. They had met right there, years ago, on Reardon’s first solo outing from the castle. Or he’d assumed he was solo at the time, though he’d learned later that General Lombard had accompanied him unseen, like a silent bodyguard.
Reardon had always found alchemy fascinating, so the shop had been his first destination that day. Not many practiced the art, but those who did were often great healers, able to create potions that could make someone stronger, faster, more resilient, think clearer, sleep better. The effects only lasted a short time, but it was as close to magic as anyone in the Emerald Kingdom could ever get.
Reardon found magic fascinating too, even more so than alchemy since it was forbidden, but he dared not tell his father or anyone other than Barclay, who was secretly gifted with mystic blood himself and saw visions when he touched people.
Usually it was flashes of the past or present, which could be useful when Reardon forgot where he put his cloak pin or if someone had just nicked something from the shop, but the brief glimpses into the future were what Reardon truly coveted.
“You said ‘Love, death, and blue eyes in a sea of white.’ How else am I supposed to interpret that? I’m not going to find love until I’m old and dying!”
Barclay snorted. The teakettle whistled on the hearth, prompting him to rise from the table to remove it. “You know I can’t always tell what the visions mean. It could be saying that you’ll find love during wartime or… um… after stepping on a bug!”
“And what about the sea of white?” Reardon pressed, sitting back in his chair to watch his friend.
Barclay was slight, compact of stature but bursting with energy that made his brown cheeks glow. His long dark hair was tied up messily to keep out of his face while he worked—which he still would be if Master Wells, the High Alchemist who’d chosen Barclay as his apprentice, hadn’t stepped out for the afternoon after Reardon came for a visit.
It wasn’t because Barclay was a commoner that he was the one making the tea. Reardon never wanted special treatment for being the prince. They alternated. Today was simply Barclay’s day.
“Sea of white could be… a shroud. I mean cloak!” Barclay corrected.
Reardon groaned. He would be old and creaking before he found true love. He’d lusted before, many times, what little good that did him, but he’d never found anyone who captivated him the way tales of love described it. Not how his father had loved Reardon’s mother, Queen Reagan, before she died. Not anyone Reardon could have, anyway.
There had been whispers that magic might have saved Reagan where alchemy had failed, while others insisted that hidden magic within the castle was what made her ill. Neither theory changed that she was gone.
“Don’t fret so much,” Barclay said, pouring the steaming water into their mugs for ginger tea. “It’ll be all right.”
“How? I’m twenty. Father will have me married by twenty-two to some noblewoman or princess I’ve never met, and I’ll only ever know true love in secret.”
“And what do you think will change if you find love before your twenty-second year? That you’ll run away with whatever man steals your heart?”
“Maybe….”
Barclay reclaimed his seat, setting the mugs between them, and reached for Reardon’s hand. There was only friendship there. Barclay fancied women, and Reardon didn’t see his friend that way, but the love they shared was strong because they knew each other’s deepest secrets, secrets that would strip Reardon of his crown and risk Barclay being imprisoned or chosen for that year’s sacrifice.
Don’t steal, don’t cheat, don’t injure or kill. Most laws were just and sensible. But to love someone of one’s own gender was corruption—and so was magic.
Barclay hadn’t chosen to see visions. It was something that started happening when he hit adulthood, and if anyone else in his family experienced them, no one talked about it. He had no control over what he saw, just as Reardon had no control over what he desired.
“You’ll find love someday.” Barclay smiled warmly. His magic required touch, so Reardon felt comforted by the gentle squeeze Barclay offered, since Barclay would be able to see if that wasn’t true. “Whatever else my vision means, I’m sure of that.”
He squeezed once more and then pulled away to add a dab of honey to his tea.
Reardon added two dabs—more like three—and took a long, calming sip. It may have only been the ginger’s natural properties that comforted him, but he imagined there was some soothing potion added. Whether that was true or not, it made him think, however fleetingly, that maybe Barclay was right.
He would find love, even if all he got to know of romance were stolen moments in the night with a man he had yet to meet.
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Barclay’s vision couldn’t mean this, but it was all Reardon could think about as his hand slackened on his sword.
“Is that cowardice? Or fear?” the Ice King boomed, moving fast and powerful like a hulking behemoth that shook the chamber with each stomp forward.
Reardon stumbled, still trapped by the Ice King’s eyes—his blue human eyes—and slipped on the icy floor to land hard on his back and the edge of his sheath. He hissed but had precious little time to react before the Ice King was upon him, falling to all fours to claw closer, mere inches from touching Reardon as he’d threatened.
“Perhaps both,” the Ice King growled, hovering over Reardon like an avalanche about to crash down upon the side of a mountain. “Not much of a hero if you can’t even slay the beast… little prince.”
“H-how…?” Reardon quivered, teeth chattering from the proximity of the Ice King’s frigid form.
“As if your finery wasn’t enough? Only the House of Thom that rules the Emerald Kingdom has eyes as green as yours.”
He knew. He knew exactly who Reardon was. “My mother….”
“So a queen sits on the throne now?”
“She died. My father is King Regent until I marry.”
“Is that what this is about?”
Reardon gaped.
“You’re looking for a boon or trophy to gift your betrothed?”
And then he exhaled, feeling very foolish, yet grateful that the cold kept his cheeks from flushing. “I have no betrothed. I came here for my friend.”
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“You can’t be serious! It’s Barclay!”
“You know what happens if we do not give the Ice King his tithe.”
“No, I don’t. And neither do you! What does everyone even fear? An army on our doorstep? A plague?”
“Magic’s corruption could cause any number of calamities.”
“That is ludicrous! Barclay has lived here all his life!”
Reardon stood, fists clenched, in King Henry’s personal chambers, just off the side of the throne room. Well, King Regent, since it was Reardon who would succeed his mother. He wouldn’t normally berate his father so openly in the presence of others, least of all General Lombard or Master Wells, but this matter could not wait for a private audience.
Soldiers had just taken Barclay away in chains.
“You can’t do this,” Reardon lamented, shifting to appeal rather than anger.
His father was a reasonable man, had been long before he became king and had so many more responsibilities heaped on his shoulders. He couldn’t let Reardon’s worst fear be realized just because too many people had pointed their fingers and cried witch.
Henry sighed, sympathy creasing the corners of his dark eyes. He was a striking man, taller than Reardon and broad-shouldered, with brown hair and a healthy beard speckled with gray. He rarely wore his crown, only during official summons and proclamations. Like Reardon, he would often go into town with as few adornments as possible, just as he appeared now in a modest doublet. He hadn’t been a prince when he married Queen Reagan, only a noble, but while he’d had a high station, he’d never acted like more than a commoner.
Reardon had often been told he was just like his father but that he looked more like his mother, lithe and willowy, with a fair face, auburn hair that could appear almost red in the sun, and the emerald eyes of the House of Thom. Never once had the bloodline’s crown king or queen been without them.
“May I speak, Majesty?” Lombard submitted from where he stood vigil at the door.
“Of course, Lombard. What say you?” Henry gestured him forward, and Lombard’s armor and the sword at his belt clattered as he approached.
He was near Henry’s age, though without any hint of it in his flaxen hair. Unlike most soldiers, he kept his face clean-shaven. He was a handsome but imposing man, who always left Reardon feeling small. Not because he was unkind, but because he’d been the first target of Reardon’s lustful fantasies when the stirrings of manhood began.
Even now, a long stare from his piercing blue eyes made Reardon’s chest feel hot.
“The Ice King is a magical being, my prince, far more powerful than the elves who abandoned the Mystic Valley and just as un-aging, possibly immortal. He could corrupt this kingdom in so many ways, with plague or war or worse, but he stays on his hill so long as he receives his yearly offering.”
“I know the story, Bardy,” Reardon addressed him informally, “but every legend about the source, the reason, is different. What if none of them are true? Have you ever even sent an emissary to the Frozen Kingdom?” he returned to his father.
“Your mother’s father’s father did,” Henry reminded him. “You know that tale as well.”
“That the emissary’s head came back as a broken-off chunk of ice, but it too could be a myth. An exaggeration.”
“You would risk that when you will be king in less than two years’ time? What if you’re wrong? You ask me to destroy your mother’s legacy, as an outsider of the bloodline.”
“Mother hated this tradition too!” Reardon bellowed.
“Yet she upheld it.” Henry came closer, and Reardon wanted to back away like a petulant child, but he allowed his father to take his hands. “I have ruled these past ten years in her stead only to hold the line for you. If you wish to bring down all the traditions of your ancestors when you take the crown, so be it, but beware the consequences when you go against the will of the people. We send an offering of corruption at the start of every Winter Solstice, and we are safe from the Frozen Kingdom for another year.”
“Barclay isn’t corrupt,” Reardon choked out, the heat in his chest spreading to his eyes and making him blink away wetness.
“He admitted to the visions,” Wells said, a man a good decade older than Henry or Lombard, in robes and a skullcap, with a graying ginger beard much longer than Henry’s and what Reardon had once thought were kind amber eyes.
“They’re just images in his head, not—”
“It’s magic,” Henry stated firmly. “Can you really deny it is?”
Reardon wanted to say, “Why does magic have to be bad?” but he knew where that conversation led, especially with Lombard watching, who rooted out those claimed to have magic and imprisoned them just like Barclay. “Choose somebody else,” Reardon pleaded.
“Your friend cannot be exempt from the law. I know it hurts you, my son, but there were too many corroborations, including by Master Wells, and he confessed. He is touched by magic. He could bring disaster down on all of us.”
“You condemn my friend for superstition!” Reardon wrenched his hands away.
“Magic brings curses in its wake—”
“You only say that because you believe magic killed Mother!”
Henry went cold, but he did not raise his voice, merely looked sorrowful and empty. “What else could it have been? To find her without breath, with no other explanation….”
“Yet alchemy is never a problem.” Reardon clung stubbornly to his bitterness, not hiding the sneer he passed toward Wells.
“Alchemy is science,” Henry affirmed.
Reardon had never understood why such seemingly simple differences should matter. “Not even you, Master Wells, will vouch for Barclay, after all these years training him to succeed you?”
Wells looked away, but his expression wasn’t resentment, or even only fear, but guilt.
“Corroboration including by you, Father said. You turned him in, didn’t you? His own family shuns him, yet I thought you, of all people….” Reardon trailed off, too angry to finish the thought. “Of course you turned him in, because you’re a coward like everyone else, afraid you’ll be counted a witch with him if you don’t throw him to the wolves.”
“Reardon—” Henry tried, but Reardon whirled on him too.
“You’ll never listen. Tradition, old ways, old laws. You’ll uphold them even over me.” Reardon had never told his father the truth of his heart’s desires. How could he?
“When you are king, the decisions will be yours.”
“By then it will be too late.” Barclay would be gone, and besides, Reardon knew his father was right; that was why he’d never looked forward to his coronation.
He couldn’t marry to become king, and then turn around and admit the marriage a sham, changing everything the kingdom believed in. It would cause a revolt. The people already believed that those who yearned for their same gender were corrupt, poisoned by magic somehow too, against science and nature and all that made sense to them. Reardon was helpless and about to lose the one person who understood him.
“When I am king, maybe there will be so little left of me, I won’t care if they revolt…,” he muttered and turned on his heel to leave before his father could call him back.
Reardon was denied an audience with Barclay until the day came for him to be taken to the Ice King’s gate. Reardon had never seen someone bid a heartfelt farewell to those taken away. He tried not to attend the departure of the offerings either, tried not to watch, to will it all away, but with Barclay, he couldn’t be so blind and apathetic, not like Master Wells and Barclay’s own family.
Reardon went right up to the prison cart that was attended to by Lombard and two of his soldiers. He reached for Barclay’s hand through the bars before the cart could be covered and start down the main road, ignoring the confused murmurs from the watching townsfolk.
“I tried, Barclay. I swear I tried.”
“I know. It’s okay. They were bound to find out eventually.”
“Don’t be scared. Whatever the stories say, we don’t know what happens.”
Barclay put on a brave smile. “At least I’ll make an attractive ice sculpture. I will, right? And don’t only say it because you’re my friend.”
Reardon laughed despite his tears. “Barclay….”
“I love you, Reardon. Don’t do anything stupid, okay? Whatever befalls me, I don’t want it to befall you too. Be a good king and wait for your love. You’ll find him.”
The clop of Lombard’s horse coming closer was all the warning Reardon received before the cart lurched forward, tearing their hands apart. Reardon stood in the dirt and watched after his friend until he was nothing but a distant haze on the horizon.
He tried for weeks, months to follow Barclay’s wishes, wondering if his friend was even still alive. He did not want to believe the stories, but those sent to the Ice King never returned.
Reardon had so few friends who were real, though it wasn’t anyone’s fault but his own. Both nobles and commoners alike were welcoming wherever Reardon went, appreciative that he was never boastful about his station. Reardon enjoyed their company too, but he felt like a fraud, like a half-formed shadow of himself, except around Barclay, because no one else knew his secret.
It was lonely, and lonelier still with fresh whispers about Reardon’s overly kind heart.
“He must have been bewitched,” he’d hear someone say, sympathetic, just out of earshot, “to mourn so for one of the corrupt.”
“Ever our sweet prince,” another would mutter, “too soft, like his mother.”
On Barclay’s birthday, Reardon got so drunk at the tavern, he couldn’t walk straight along the cobbled streets when he tried to go out back for a piss in the troughs. Several of the patrons inside, including the barkeep, had offered to assist him out the door, but he had been too stubborn to accept. He made his aim, thankfully. It was a modest sewer system, but still kept the filth from running into the streets.
Just as Reardon was about to finish doing up his trousers, rough hands seized his shoulders and the world spun.
“If it isn’t His Highness,” someone said—a tall someone.
And broad. And reeking of ale.
Unless that was Reardon’s own stench.
“S’Reardon,” he corrected, slurring slightly. “And I don’ wanna be prince no more.”
“Aw, such a sorry sap,” another voice said.
There were two—or was it four?—figures around Reardon. He couldn’t be sure if he was simply seeing double. It was dark as pitch, and his eyes refused to focus.
“Lemme go,” he said, realizing the larger man still had hold of him. “I’m goin’ home.”
“Thought you didn’t wanna be prince no more,” the second man said. He was tall too but stringy, with long, scraggly hair. “Everyone knows what you want, pretty thing, they just love you too much to admit it. When you get pissed, you think your eyes don’t wander? Is that why you really miss that last offering, hmm? He bewitch your trousers too?”
Reardon heaved backward, soberer in an instant at what was being implied, but the big man’s grip was like a vise. “I’m not bewitched. He was my friend.”
“Good friend, I bet,” the larger man chortled. “You wanna be our friend, pretty prince?” His breath smelled rancid up close, and it mixed unpleasantly with the odor of the piss in the nearby trough, even as they backed him away from it into a tinier alley that had no exit.
“You’re talking treason a-and… depravity!” Reardon fought, but he couldn’t fight the spinning night.
What did it matter if he was depraved too? He didn’t want these men.
“Who you gonna tell, boy?” the stringy one said, a bony hand grasping Reardon’s chin while the larger man still had his arm. Meatier fingers started pawing at his trousers. “Gonna cry to the king? You won’t even remember what we look like.”
Reardon wouldn’t. He couldn’t tell what they looked like now, in the dark, with their bodies pressing tight and those meaty fingers reaching. “Stop—”
The air was cut with a thunderous swish, and the larger man gurgled and fell, his thick fingers leaving with him.
Another swish, and the stringy man followed, two thuds on the street.
Reardon squinted through the dark, and when his eyes finally revealed to him the shadow moving closer, it wasn’t some bandit, but Lombard.
Ruthlessly, he drove his sword into both bodies, leaving any further gurgling silenced. Then he wiped his blade on the back of the downed men and held his hand out to Reardon.
Reardon took it, pulled powerfully into the embrace of the general, who kept him close to prevent him from wobbling.
“You remember now why I have repeatedly asked you to not go out of the castle alone at night?”
“They were awful,” Reardon said in reply. “Most people aren’t awful.”
“You haven’t met most people, my prince. Do you think I should have shown mercy?”
“I….”
“Mercy merely means you might end up the dead man instead. Come.” He pulled Reardon along, sheathing his sword and choosing side streets and alleys with as few evening strollers as possible.
Reardon was grateful but also surprised. He’d been terrible to Lombard ever since Barclay was taken away.
Sudden fear wrapped around his heart as he realized that Lombard must have been watching him all along. “D-did you… hear…?”
“Their blasphemy? It was obvious in their actions, which was why I cut them down. You need not worry.”
That wasn’t what Reardon had meant, but if Lombard had heard what they accused him of, he must not deem it worthy of comment.
Everyone knew, they’d said.
Did they really? Did others suspect that Reardon was corrupt?
But no. Reardon wasn’t the corrupt one. He never would have done what those men tried to do, and Barclay had only ever used his visions to help people and keep himself safe. The real corruption was rarely what people thought.
“Do you really think it was magic that killed my mother?” Reardon asked in the dead of the quiet streets, thinking more clearly by the step, with the castle courtyard coming into view.
“I don’t know, my prince,” Lombard answered. “No one does. But it could have been.”
“If it was… if it was,” Reardon said, like punching the past with his words, “it wouldn’t change my mind. Barclay didn’t deserve to be taken.”
“Your father can only answer the people’s call. There were other criminals who might have been chosen, but your friend was fresher in their minds and something far more frightening, so they cried for him instead.”
Reardon knew, of course, and there weren’t many criminals in the Emerald Kingdom—not who dared get caught, because if they weren’t cut down where they stood, as those deviants in the alley had been, they’d be imprisoned until the next offering. Only if they were passed by as sacrifice could they be considered for release.
But not magic-touched. Not what they’d call “deviants” like Reardon. They stayed in prison indefinitely or were exiled.
“I’ll stop it,” Reardon swore. “I’ll never let them do it again.”
“You can try, my prince. And when you are king, maybe you will succeed.”
Reardon didn’t remember much more about the walk to his room. He awoke in the clothes he’d worn the night before but tucked neatly under his covers. He told no one of what had happened, least of all his father, trusting that Lombard wouldn’t either, not when the matter had been resolved. But as he washed and changed and looked himself in the mirror that morning, he became more determined than ever.
The sacrifices had to stop.
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“Your friend?” the Ice King asked, curious again.
“Barclay, House of Numara. He was last year’s offering.”
“A rescue mission?”
“And to see for myself if you are like the stories.”
Even with a cracked face in shades of white, blue, and gray, the Ice King’s expression betrayed his amusement. “And what are your findings so far, little prince?”
Reardon trembled beneath him, but only from the cold.
He wasn’t scared. A single touch might turn him to ice like the thief who’d been shattered—and the form of the Ice King, naked but sexless, pure ice from head to toe, was close enough that a touch would be easy—but he felt none of the same helplessness that those men in the alley had instilled in him.
“The truth may be worse,” Reardon said. “They call you Ice King, but I didn’t think it meant this. If your whole castle is like this chamber, then I fear my friend no longer lives. But then I also have to wonder: Why speak with me at all? Why not kill me outright?”
The Ice King studied him with his penetrating gaze. “Perhaps you’d make a fine ransom, an added bonus to the sacrifices your kingdom sends.”
“No, I don’t think you’re the monster you appear to be. Your eyes give you away, Your Majesty, whatever else you might be.”
The pregnant pause that filled the chamber made Reardon fear he’d guessed wrong, especially when the Ice King leaned closer, mist rolling off him, cold enough to frost the ends of Reardon’s hair.
“Jack!” a melodic voice cut the quiet, making the Ice King grimace. “The sacrifice didn’t come through the gate! The cart left! What—what on earth are you doing?! Who is that?”
As the Ice King lifted off him, all Reardon could focus on was how she’d called him Jack, which further proved his point.
The Ice King couldn’t always have been like this.
Frost still clung to Reardon, but he was able to take a deep breath and shake some of it from his hair as he sat up and looked past the Ice King, past the window he’d climbed through using a grappling hook and staunch patience, to the formal entrance of the chamber, where the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes upon stood.
She was also monstrous in her own way. Her gown and jewelry were all made of gold, with a delicate crown atop her head, but her hair and eyes and skin were all gold too. The fabric moved like silk as she came closer, and her golden hair, curled in waves down her back near to her waist, shifted around her shoulders like silk, but she was clearly not painted, but made of gold down to every fiber, just like the king was made of ice.
“The Emerald Prince thought to kill me,” the Ice King said.
“Only if you’d proven to be a villain!” Reardon protested, confident enough now to stand, though he was careful with his footing on the slick surface of the floor.
“Are you certain I’m not?” The king’s fangs glinted in the sun coming in through the windows.
“Prince? Why would they send their prince?” The woman approached more swiftly, practically floating over the floor and bypassing the king without concern. She was even more beautiful up close but still unsettling to look at. “Did you do something vile?”
“No. I replaced the real sacrifice and sent him toward the Shadow Lands to make his escape. No one knows I’m here. The soldiers didn’t see me make the switch. Are you the Ice King’s queen?”
She laughed, and the Ice King snorted.
“His sister, dear. Princess Josephine. Call me Josie.”
“Reardon of House Thom, prince and future king of Emerald.” He reached instinctively to take her hand, but she drew back.
“Best not do that. My skin is as deadly as my brother’s. All I touch turns to gold.”
Reardon looked on her in further awe, but still, he wasn’t afraid. “You’re magical, clearly, but you couldn’t have been born like this.”
Again, the Ice King snorted, standing to his full height, which made him twice the size of his sister, like some massive ogre. “Our mother would have been quite the sight if we had been.”
“Don’t be rude, Jack. This castle is cursed, sweet prince,” Josie said. “Don’t you know that?”
“They know nothing,” the king spat, falling back to all fours with a slam and shudder of the room. “Their stories became half-truths and then lies since the curse took us.”
“I believe you,” Reardon professed. “I suspected as much for years, that whatever you truly are must have been lost to time.”
“Careful,” the Ice King warned, for Reardon had made to appeal as close to them as possible with a frantic dash forward, yet he understood the need for distance. “I’m still debating whether to add you to my garden of statues.”
“You try to frighten me, Majesty, but it’s clear you won’t risk harming me.”
“No? I will not hesitate to kill an enemy.”
“And I am not one.” Reardon took another step forward, and while there was plenty of space to protect Reardon, they both leaned away, confirming his beliefs. “I only wish to see my friend and know that he is safe.
“Or… has he become cursed too?” Suddenly Reardon wondered if he was also susceptible and already becoming something deadly at his touch.
“The sacrifices do not join in our sorrows,” Josie assuaged him. “Only those of us who were here in the beginning are cursed. But there is one boon the offerings receive.”
“Josie—”
“No one ages within these walls.”
“You mean, the sacrifices from almost two hundred years are all still here and as young as the day they arrived?”
“See what you’ve done.” The Ice King stomped around Reardon. “He’ll want to stay now.”
“And why shouldn’t he? He’s this year’s offering, isn’t he?”
“He isn’t—”
“Come, see for yourself.” She motioned Reardon toward the doors to venture ahead of her. “They’re all eager to meet the new blood.”
“Josie.”
“Hush, Jack. I’ll bring him back to you once he sees his friend is safe.”
Trusting that the Ice King would not freeze him from behind, Reardon moved as indicated, ginger in his steps, though the closer he got to the doors, the less ice there was to disrupt his footing.
Josie had left the doors open, giant things, three times the height of a man, with the ceiling even higher in this master chamber of the castle. Reardon had chosen wisely, assuming the Ice King would reside where the most ice gathered along the walls outside. Now he found himself assaulted by a surprising but comforting warmth as soon as he crossed the threshold to leave.
He stepped out onto the landing of an immense staircase leading down. As he began to descend, Josie floated out after him to get in front and lead the way—and she did indeed float, for her feet did not touch the ground.
“Which friend is yours?” she asked over her shoulder, keeping pace a few lengths in front of him. “A recent offering?”
“From last year. Barclay, House of Numara.”
“Barclay?” She stopped, and Reardon had to catch himself from walking into her. He worried for a moment that something was wrong, that something had happened to Barclay, but she smiled. “Of course. Reardon,” she said knowingly and continued on without another word.
There were other landings they passed, leading to hallways and more doors, but she brought them down and down, around and around, winding toward the ground floor, where the din of the some two-hundred attendants of this castle could be heard wondering where the sacrifice could be.
By the bottom of the staircase, Reardon’s hair and clothing were wet from the frost having melted. He felt like a drowned dog, grimy from almost three days travel and restless sleep. It was as warm in this castle as any other, maybe cozier than it should be, considering the chill of the Ice King’s chamber.
And it was grand, so grand and beautiful, with tapestries and archways and furniture that belied what Reardon had seen upstairs. Only the Ice King lived in drab darkness. The rest of this castle was a wonder—as were its people.
“There he is!”
“Josie brings him!”
“Oh, he’s handsome!”
“And armed! Relieve him of all that immediately!”
Reardon was swarmed, feeling the onset of panic, even if he had discovered a different sort of kingdom than expected. Some of the faces were familiar, from the last twenty years or so, a few even looking at Reardon in recognition as well, but there were also elves and half-elves. He’d heard that in ages past elves lived hidden in his kingdom, but he’d never seen anyone of elven blood before, the race most known to be born with magic in their veins.
It was said they’d hidden their ears with magic too, for it clearly gave them away, the full-blooded elves slimmer, with long, tapered ears stretching away from their heads, and the half-elves closer to humans in appearance but still with prominent points to their ears and an extra shimmer in their eyes.
Reardon was so stunned, taking it all in, that he didn’t think to fight back as he was divested of his sword belt.
“Are they sending us nobles now?” A woman with dark skin and intricately pinned hair sneered at him as she inspected his sword. “What’s your crime, darling? Bugger a few boys?”
“No,” Reardon exclaimed, stricken by her coming close to guessing the crime that would have condemned him had he been the real sacrifice. “I’ve never—”
“Reardon!” a familiar voice shouted, and Reardon’s head snapped around so fast, he didn’t care that some wild-looking half-elf with very strange clothing had just snatched the bejeweled dagger from the sheath on his ankle.
“Barclay!”
The others parted, Josie watching from a safe distance up the staircase, as Barclay appeared, barreling toward Reardon to throw himself on him with enough force that Barclay’s feet left the ground. The embrace felt more sound and secure than any Reardon had experienced since Barclay was taken.
“Oh, my friend, I’ve missed you.”
“I told you not to follow me,” Barclay chided once he’d finished squeezing Reardon. “But today is the day of the offering. Does that mean you did it? You finally convinced your father to stop?”
Reardon looked down in shame, holding tight to Barclay’s forearms to keep him close. “I tried so many times, but he wouldn’t listen. I traded places with this year’s sacrifice to come free you.”
“What is going on?” a new voice boomed over the din of the crowd.
The other voices stopped, and anyone who hadn’t slunk away did so now, all save Barclay, who kept an arm around Reardon’s waist and turned to face outward as if to ward off some great threat.
Then Reardon saw why, because what came forward through the wide berth the humans and elves of the castle had created had to be another creature of the curse.
Just as the king was made of ice and Josie of gold, this man, big and burly and menacing, was made of flames. He seemed mostly nude like the Ice King, but a long vest hung from his shoulders, made of his element just like Josie’s garments.
Reardon leaned into Barclay. He’d rather turn to ice or gold than be burned.
“Why are you clinging?” the flaming man demanded of Barclay. “Who is he?”
“This is Reardon, Branwen. My friend.”
“Not the sacrifice?”
“Not technically, but—”
“Then what is he doing here?” Branwen demanded like the roar of a forest fire.
“Calm down,” Josie spoke over him. “Prince Reardon replaced the sacrifice. Your temper doesn’t have to be as fiery as your face, you know.”
Reardon didn’t think he could ever get used to reading expressions in elements, but Branwen looked like burning fury. “Jack knows about this?”
“He does. I’ll take the prince back to him once he’s had a moment to collect himself. Maybe we can clean and clothe him too, make him more presentable. Jack’s temper isn’t any better than yours these days.”
“How many cursed are there?” Reardon asked in wonder after Branwen grudgingly backed off.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” a whispering voice said from nowhere and yet right at Reardon’s ear.
He jumped, leaning against his smaller friend again as something began to form at his other side, an outline around a figure that didn’t seem to be there but was, like an apparition.
The phantom appeared slight like Barclay and young, though Reardon knew most of the people here were well over a hundred, if not two hundred, years old. This new cursed creature was fully clothed, but his garments were all transparent.
“I’m Spymaster for his royal high-horse up there. Zephyr if I like you.” He grinned, his not-there eyes boring right through Reardon.
“What happens if you touch someone?” Reardon asked.
“Poof,” he said with a pop of the P. “But don’t be too worried, pretty prince. There’s only one more of us, though he might be the most shocking.”
Reardon frowned, suspecting hidden meaning in the word—but also not liking being called pretty. While once he’d found the compliment flattering, now it reminded him of those awful men in the alley.
“Go on, Barclay,” Josie said, “get him tidied up so we can return him to my brother. Everyone!” she shouted louder, since the crowd had started to titter again. “Make sure the cart is truly gone and that everything is sealed up tight. Nothing changes about the welcome feast unless the king deems it so, and so far, he has not made up his mind. Go!”
Everyone scattered, loyal to their princess, as any good servants would be. She then favored Reardon and Barclay with a warm smile.
Reardon was whisked across the large foyer of the castle with Barclay still holding his waist, leaving Josie behind and the wisp of the Spymaster, and then passing the smoldering Branwen. One more who was cursed, Zephyr had said, which made five in total with the king. What a lonely place this must have been before it was filled with sacrifices. No wonder they welcomed them.
There were so many rooms and corridors and staircases smaller than the one that led to the Ice King’s chamber, Reardon would need a guide for weeks to learn this place. At long last, having passed many of the bustling servants preparing for this supposed feast, they arrived at a long row of more closely spaced doors, and Barclay brought him to one that remained open.
“This was to be the new sacrifice’s quarters. It’s yours, I guess, until the king decides what to do with you.”
It was still spacious for a servant’s room, even with its own privy, bath, washbasin, and access to running water through a pump. There were clothes of varying sizes for men and women in an open wardrobe, and the bed had a beautiful patchwork quilt in bright colors and patterns.
“I feel like an honored guest in a noble’s house, not taking the place of a servant for an enemy king.” Reardon spun about to take it all in. “You all have rooms like this?”
“We do. Though they’re becoming less abundant. They’ve remodeled several old guardrooms and larders in recent years. We make do.”
We, because Barclay was part of this kingdom now, not Reardon’s.
As he turned to his friend, he could see how healthy and happy Barclay looked, maybe more so than he’d ever been in Emerald. He no longer had to pretend here, and he was clearly cared for. His clothes looked brand new, and there was an extra ruddiness to his brown cheeks.
“We should get you cleaned up,” Barclay said, indicating the bath, which someone had already filled with hot water. It looked very inviting, given the chill that had set in after meeting the Ice King and with Reardon’s clothes left damp. “Go on. I’ll find something in your size from the wardrobe.”
Reardon did as he was told, stripping off what he’d thought was his plainest outfit, though everyone had still recognized his station. He left it all in a basket near the bath. The water was absolute heaven after three days on the road and a brush with being frozen.
“What will they do with my weapons?” Reardon asked after he’d sunk his head below the surface to warm his chilled hair.
“I’m sure you’ll get them back. They only take such things until they’re sure there’s no threat. Branwen will oversee it all. He’s master of arms and used to command the king’s army—when they had one.”
“With Josie as princess and Zephyr the…. Spymaster? Sounds ominous.”
“It’s a more daunting name than the truth. Zephyr merely watches and listens to be sure there’s no unrest. He isn’t as sinister as he acts. Most of the time.” Barclay appeared from behind the bath, bringing a dry robe and some soap and oils that he set on a shelf within Reardon’s reach.
Reardon utilized the items to clean himself as his friend sat, close but keeping his eyes averted. “You’re all servants. Does that mean they force your labor?”
“Nothing like that. We just have our place. A place we got to choose. I’m finishing my apprenticeship with Liam, the king’s wizard, and Widow Caitlin. She was sacrificed a decade ago.”
“Did you say wizard? Magic instead of alchemy?”
“Liam uses everything. I’ve learned so much this past year, Reardon. Magic is a wondrous thing that can work alongside alchemy to create and heal, not only destroy. You’re right to challenge your father.”
“I know, I just wish challenging him was enough. Does all this mean you have no desire to escape with me?”
Barclay looked up at him fearfully.
“We can go,” Reardon whispered, resting his arms on the edge of the bath. “Right now. Convince my father together. Tell him everything about this place.”
“I can’t do that.”
“You’re a prisoner?”
“No. I could go, if I wanted. Everyone is free to leave if they choose.”
“Then you don’t want to come home?” Reardon’s arms dropped back into the water. “Your family stayed silent like all offering families do, but I’m sure they miss you.”
“You’re sure? Really?”
Reardon hadn’t actually seen them—Barclay’s parents and older brother. They always ducked away if they saw him coming. “I missed you. If I can convince my father of the truth, wouldn’t you want to be free of this place? It’s remarkable, the people too, but it isn’t your home.”
Doubt was the only clear emotion on Barclay’s face as his gaze drifted, but before he could say anything, the door opened.
The creature that entered was indeed shocking, for he was a storm in motion, made entirely of lightning. He entered with a crackle, and all the hairs on Reardon’s body outside the water stood tall and tingling.
“Would you hurry up?” His voice snapped like lightning too. “Clean, dry, dress. These aren’t complicated tasks.” He too had attempted clothing, but only a robe. Anything else wouldn’t have held its shape. He also had a face somehow, even eyes, separate from the other sparks of electric light that made up his form, though Reardon wasn’t sure how to describe it other than magic.
“Sir Liam?” Reardon asked, hiding his body behind the tall back of the bath.
“Liam is enough.”
“As court wizard, serving Josie and Jack? Do Branwen and Zephyr shorten their names and titles as well?”
“Branwen is Bran to some, but if you call Zephyr Zeph, he’s likely to take you to bed.” Liam laughed—at least Reardon thought the crack was a laugh, though he was busy blushing at the comment. “Formalities don’t stick around here long, so don’t expect me to call you Highness. Now hurry up. Your next audience with the king requires our assistance.”
Our was revealed as Liam entered fully and a woman came in behind him with long brown hair and a steely expression, who Reardon took for Widow Caitlin. She carried a potion bottle with a glowing blue substance swirling inside.
He couldn’t be sure if her cool expression was simply her demeanor or directed at him as prince of the kingdom that had shunned her. He vaguely recalled when she was chosen, because it had been around the time of his mother’s death, and she was one of many called witch that year.
“If you want to avoid frostbite every time you’re in the king’s presence, you’ll drink this,” she said simply.
They made no move to turn away, simply stood there waiting for Reardon to get out of the bath.
He ducked down lower.
Barclay scrambled to bring him the robe so he could step out without giving his audience as much of a show.
“Thank you,” Reardon whispered.
There was a dressing screen at least, where Barclay had already draped some suitable clothing—basic trousers and a shirt and doublet, with a pair of leather boots. None of it was frilled like a noble would wear, but it was of far better quality and color saturation than Reardon had ever seen on the commoners of his kingdom. Whoever made their clothing was a true artisan. He rather liked the deep red and marigold of his new garments, trimmed in leather to match his boots.
“Do you need someone to help tuck your cock away too?” Liam called when Reardon had yet to emerge from the screen.
“Liam,” Caitlin said in a reprimand.
“Please, he’s a prince. As if he hasn’t dipped his wick in a few brothels.”
“He hasn’t,” Barclay defended, but Reardon did not want that conversation to continue.
Summoning his courage, he stepped out from behind the screen and approached the wizard, careful not to get too close. He imagined that someone who touched him would be struck down like a bolt had come from the heavens.
Caitlin came forward to hand him the potion, and he drank it swiftly. He expected it to be cool, but it burned down his throat.
“This….” He coughed as he handed the empty bottle back to her. “… this will protect me against the Ice King’s touch?”
“No, but it’ll make it more bearable to be near him. The effects will last a few hours. You’ll know when it starts to wear off, though I doubt he’ll keep you for that long.” Her unfriendliness certainly felt personal with the way she stared him down, but he had little to defend himself with, other than being too weak for too long to stop any of this.
Reardon wondered if there were potions to protect against all the elementals in the castle, but their proximities didn’t cause as extreme results. Around Josie there was a slight metallic taste in his mouth, Branwen made him sweat, Zephyr made him lightheaded, and Liam made his ears tingle and his hair stand up.
The Ice King was far more potent.
“Come.” Josie appeared, floating in the doorway. They all floated in their own way, Reardon had noticed, except the king, who made everything quake with his steps. “Jack grows impatient.”
Reardon looked to Barclay, but he’d barely opened his mouth before his friend pounced upon him once more for a tight embrace. Then Barclay gasped, a common enough occurrence when he touched someone, but Reardon hadn’t heard that sound in a year.
“A vision?”
“I… I don’t know how to explain….” Barclay pulled back, stunned but difficult to read.
“What did you see?”
“I can’t say.”
“Barclay—”
“I can’t say!”
It was then that Reardon realized… he was going to die here. Barclay was never good at hiding his emotions. But if Reardon was headed to his execution, then he vowed to make his time here count.
“It’s all right.” He coaxed Barclay to return to him, and when he didn’t move, Reardon breached the space between them and hugged his friend again. “I love you, and I am so glad I got to see you again. I’ll be back soon.”
Without waiting to hear Barclay’s response, Reardon moved for the door, past the lightning wizard and his sharp-eyed assistant, to follow Josie back through the castle.
Reardon paid less mind to the servants they passed, moving quietly behind the golden princess, lost in thought. He could salvage this, even if he was destined to decorate the Ice King’s garden.
“Your hair’s still damp, sweet prince,” Josie said once they returned to the grand hall that connected to the main doors of the castle and the bottom of the staircase that led to the Ice King’s chamber. “That won’t do around Jack, even if Liam and good Widow Caitlin gave you some protection. Bran!” she called to the fiery man, who was as large as any normal soldier Reardon had ever met, though not as looming as the Ice King.
Branwen seemed to stomp as he moved toward them, but he too floated, flames pulsing from his body when he came to a halt. “What? Can I turn this brat to ashes yet?”
“No. Just a small little puff, dear, to dry his hair.”
Did she mean—?
Branwen snarled like an angry dragon, and Reardon jolted backward as a burst of heat nearly licked his hair with flames, leaving his face hot and his hair completely dry.
“Using me like a bloody barber,” Branwen grumbled as he walked away.
“Not quite. We’ll need Zephyr for that,” Josie said with a scrutinizing frown at Reardon’s dried locks falling into his eyes.
“At your service.” Zephyr’s voice preceded his appearance again, right at Reardon’s side, where he puffed a breath, like blowing him a kiss, and the madness of Reardon’s hair was suddenly tamed.
“Much better.” Josie turned to the wall behind them and touched a dull stone with the tip of her finger, turning it to shimmering gold and reflecting Reardon’s image back at him as clear as a calm pool.
The finest barber in all the Emerald Kingdom couldn’t have done better.
“No following us the rest of the way now, Zephyr,” Josie said, continuing toward the side staircase they had descended before. “You know Jack hates it when you stick your nose where he hasn’t ordered it.”
Zephyr’s translucent face pouted, and then he vanished on the spot.
The ascent to the Ice King’s chamber seemed longer than the way down, as Reardon’s stomach filled with encroaching dread. “Jack can’t be his given name. What is it short for?”
“Crowned King John of the Sapphire Kingdom, but that was a very long time ago.”
Sapphire. Reardon had never heard this place referred to as anything but Frozen.
Their journey ended abruptly before Reardon could ask any of the questions that had arisen within him. He’d felt the increasing cold as they drew closer to the frosted doors, but it wasn’t as unbearable thanks to the wizard’s potion, even with only a simple doublet instead of his furs. Once inside, he found his feet didn’t slip as easily either.
At the very end of the large room, the Ice King sat with a door on either side behind him. Reardon wondered where they led. The throne the king perched on was magnificent, covered in crystals of ice, yet he lounged in such a carelessly human way.
The throne was so large that he must have barely filled it as a human. Now he took up the entire thing and had to kick his legs over one side of the arm to fully support him—though maybe that was merely how he preferred to sit.
“All pampered and catered to, little prince?” he called down the expanse that separated them.
Josie stepped aside, and Reardon moved forward. As he approached the throne, he soon no longer felt Josie behind him but dared not look back to show weakness.
“This doesn’t mean you are safe,” the king warned, “or that you are welcome in my home.”
“Jack, is it? Far better than ‘Ice King,’ I suppose.”
The king frowned.
“I’ll call you Majesty until we trust each other. But on that day, I will call you Jack.”
“Is this a game to you?” The Ice King straightened. Reardon stood almost directly before the throne now, chilled and shivering but without any creeping frost on his hair or clothes. “What do you hope to accomplish?”
“My father is wrong for what he does, but seeing this curse on you makes me wonder if he is right about magic’s corruption, despite all the wonders it can do.”
“Magic alone did not curse us!” the king roared. “One person who wielded it did, and I brought her wrath upon me myself.”
That gave Reardon pause. There was so much he didn’t know. “You could tell me your story.”
“It is a long one, little prince, and I grow weary of your presence already.” He stood, crunching down the steps between Reardon and the throne and bringing a gust of icy wind with him.
Reardon sensed how close he was to death but stood his ground. “I only want to bring my people home.”
“And where are they supposed to go? Home, you say. The thief who almost lost her hands because she was starving, the man who lusted after the wrong noble’s son, your friend who has visions—do they have a home to go back to when their own people cast them out as villains?”
“I didn’t.”
“Good for you. You only cared once it finally affected someone you knew.”
Reardon’s fists clenched to be called a heartless coward, but he’d called himself worse this past year.
He also couldn’t overlook the example of a man and a noble’s son.
“I suppose you’ve taken in all the corrupted, haven’t you?”
“You call them corrupt”—the Ice King stomped another clawed foot closer—“yet ask for leniency?”
“I only speak as I was taught. I don’t agree with it. I don’t believe they’re corrupt. Not any of them. I don’t want to. If my father understood—”
“He’d still keep up the status quo. Your kingdom shuns what they don’t understand because of my curse, yet they don’t even remember the time before.”
“So tell me! Let me know the truth so we can learn from our past instead of continuing to repeat it.” Reardon stepped forward—too close, he knew—but like before, instead of reaching out and ending him, the Ice King backed away. “You’d really let them all go, wouldn’t you? If they wanted it?”
“They don’t, but you are welcome to ask them, including your friend.”
“Then I am not a prisoner either?”
“That is up for debate.”
If Barclay had seen Reardon’s death in his vision, it couldn’t be now. Not yet. “Give me the chance to prove I will go back and change things for the better. I’ll stay for as long as it takes, but once you believe me, once you know me and I know you, let me go.”
“And what if I never believe you? You’re the prince. You could bring an army to my door after learning my secrets.”
“If you never believe me… then you either have another servant or another statue to crush. But that means you take an audience with me every day.”
The king scoffed, turning to stomp back up to his throne and throw himself onto it with an elegant ease that should have been impossible. “Sounds frightfully dull.”
“Yes, I can see your calendar is quite full.”
He rumbled with laughter like a brewing winter storm.
For a long stretch of minutes, he stared at Reardon with his uniquely human eyes—different from his companions. The Ice King was more tied to his humanity, even if he’d lost the feeling of it in his heart, and more cursed and tortured because of it, perhaps.
Yet still he said, “Fine. But make no mistake, little prince, if you prove unworthy or attempt to betray me, I will not hesitate to turn you into frozen rubble like that thief.”
All Reardon could do was return his stare and wonder—What was this curse? Why had it been cast? And what had the king been like before it changed him and his kingdom? He had to know, even if a mysterious and frightening future stretched out before him.
Love, death, and blue eyes in a sea of white.
Whatever that might mean.
“You have a deal, Your Majesty.”
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Jack
After the prince left, Jack rose from his frozen throne and lumbered toward the door behind him at his right. The path there led throughout the castle, to intricate passageways only meant for the royal family. These passageways were also frozen due to continued use, but they allowed him to keep watch without forcing his cold on those who served him.
Branwen kept the castle warm and bright. Liam kept everyone healthy. Josie kept them happy. And Zephyr kept Jack informed of all he ever needed to know. Still, sometimes he preferred to see for himself.
He went to the servants’ quarters, where he knew they had set aside a room for this year’s sacrifice. He did not have doorways into every area, but it was easy enough to remove a small stone brick somewhere unseen to spy on Prince Reardon and young Barclay.
Barclay was… fine. Jack had barely spoken to him in the many months since his arrival. He barely spoke to any of them. That was for his advisors to attend to. But Josie liked Barclay, and he hadn’t raised any fuss or trouble with the others. He’d been learning the ways of alchemy and magic from Liam alongside the healer, Widow Caitlin, making a fine addition to their community, a simple man who was unfortunate enough to have been gifted something the Emerald Kingdom feared: visions. His powers required touch, however, and for that, Jack was grateful.
He didn’t want to know anything of his own future, spanning endlessly before him.
Watching Reardon and Barclay talk, alone in Reardon’s quarters, all he overheard them discuss at first was Reardon’s deal with Jack, and then what each of them had been up to during their year apart.
“You see. Just two friends happily reunited.”
“Maybe.” Jack didn’t bother turning to face his sister, who’d come from the other end of the passageway. “Barclay is inconsequential, but that prince….”
“What are you thinking?”
“In the end, he’ll try to kill me again. If he does, I’ll kill him first.”
She laughed, softly so as not to be overheard.
Reardon was beautiful, energetic and bold, and not as afraid as many others, even some who’d been in the castle for decades or more. Jack could admit that he found him captivating, but his heart was as much a block of ice as the rest of him. That wouldn’t change. That would never change. And neither would the hard-heartedness of others, the Emerald Kingdom included, even if their prince proved soft.
No, nothing would change, but whatever happened when Jack and Reardon began their “audiences,” he hoped the end he foresaw did not come too quickly.
Light from the Grave by Sara Dobie Bauer
Chapter One
KELLER
When someone dies, you’re supposed to say nice things about them, attend their funeral, maybe weep if you’re into that. Keller Rex had done one of those things: attended, but hadn’t pretended to care. No one expected much emotion from him anyway. Now, he tap-tapped his fingers on the fireplace mantle as he awaited the reading of the will, because there was something he wanted—no, needed—from the deceased Vivian Zayne: a wicked witch of a woman whose cause of death was still shaky at best.
“Witch” was not hyperbole; she had been a witch. They all were, everyone spread around the vast parlor of the Fairview Estate outside Charleston, South Carolina. Even if they had all hated Vivian, they were a coven, half connected by blood, while the others were wanderers in need of shelter and support in a world that didn’t believe in them.
Keller fell into the latter category.
Thank Christ, he thought to himself.
Gazing around the room at the remaining members of the Zayne clan, he was happy to avoid their unsightly hook-noses (for witches, how very on the nose) and unique style of crazy that made living in normal society damn near impossible. Magic was useful but came with a cost. No one knew that better than Keller, so he stood with one elbow on the fireplace mantle, waiting as Vivian’s lawyer made himself comfortable behind the dead woman’s desk.
“Ah-hem,” the lawyer said. Not a clearing of the throat, but a very intentional ahhhh-hemmm. Warming up to sing the contents of the will, perhaps? Maybe he had a lovely falsetto. “Thank you all for being here today.”
As if any member of the Zayne coven would miss it. They’d put up with Vivian long enough to deserve something. Keller knew Vivian’s brother and sisters were interested in the estate itself—the house, land, and everything within—but they wanted the Zayne Book of Shadows too, its secret contents lorded over them by Vivian for decades. The siblings all needed that book.
So did Keller.
He supposed so did Mama— who, like him, had no relation to the Zayne clan. Everyone just called her “Mama,” this ageless New Orleans woman who’d swooped into Fairview some years ago. She perched on the edge of an antique chair in the sprawling room’s back corner. Keller wasn’t sure what Mama wanted, only that she’d been Vivian’s “friend,” that she spent her days wrist-deep in dirt, and that she dabbled in voodoo.
Raven was there as well, in the leather jacket he’d gifted her, standing stock straight with arms crossed. At only nineteen—and also not blood-related—she was Keller’s protégé and almost as morally bankrupt as he was. It was the main reason they got along.
“In accordance with the wishes of Vivian Zayne, in the event of her, urm, death.”
No one wanted to call it murder. Yet.
The lawyer kept reading. The house would be left in the family. All the remaining Zayne siblings would take equal ownership of the mansion, its grounds, and its many valuable trinkets. Nothing shocking about that. Even if Vivian had hated, well, everyone, there was no way she would allow the homestead to fall into the hands of some “non-magic,” or worse, some charity.
Keller, still leaning against the mantle, blinked to alertness when the lawyer said, “Now, onto the Zayne Book of Shadows.” The lawyer didn’t stutter when he said this. He was a witch like the rest of them, after all. Behind spectacles, the man’s eyes skimmed before he said, “Oh. Oh, dear.” His head lifted with the hesitation of one suspecting it to soon be lobbed off.
“What? What is it?” Isador—the eldest sibling, now that Vivian was dead—growled. She was always growling, a trait picked up perhaps from all her feral pets.
“Well.” The lawyer showed his teeth when he cleared his throat like a cat prepping to vomit a hairball. “It says here…” He tugged the collar of his shirt and quoted, “‘In the event of my death, my Book of Shadows will become sealed shut. Using the spell included below, the only person able to reopen it will be my…’” He gulped. “‘Son. Dylan Heath Zayne.’”
Keller’s elbow slid from the mantle’s edge, and he took a stumbling step forward to avoid a full face-plant onto the Persian rug. The rest of the room erupted in screams. Not the horror movie kind. More like a horde of bawling cats with too many questions.
A son. Vivian Zayne had… a son?
The woman had never touched a man unless about to beat him senseless. How had she managed a son?
“Madness!” Great, now dear brother was up and pacing. Zelig Zayne might as well have been an extra in a Jane Austen film with his ruffled collar shirt and blue velvet overcoat, tailored and buttoned tightly across his skinny chest. Keller was just waiting for him to one-day show up wearing a powdered wig. “Vivian bore no offspring!”
“And how would you know, moun sot?” Mama veered into Creole when annoyed. She was the only person in the room who seemed unshaken by the revelation of Vivian’s offspring. She was a statue of grace in stained cargo pants and thick gardening boots with her black dreads flowing free around her face.
Raven had her hands dug deep in her short blonde hair.
“It’s preposterous!” Zelig shouted. He probably would have tugged his hair too, if he’d had any. Poor man had gone bald at thirty, hence Keller’s powdered wig expectation.
Meanwhile, meek and mad Camilla—the youngest Zayne sibling—stood in a white gown, quietly giggling in the corner.
“Oh, give me that.” Isador elbowed her way to the desk and snatched Vivian’s will from the lawyer’s hands. Isador, in polite terms, was homely; in Keller’s words, “a mangy mutt.” Showers, combs, and clean clothes were beyond her realm of knowledge, and a spider named Earl lived in her hair. She pulled smudged glasses from the back pocket of a patchwork muumuu and squinted. “Dylan. Heath. Zayne.” She howled at the ceiling. “Bring the Book of Shadows!”
“It’s… it’s right here.” Zelig gestured to the edge of the desk.
Isador shuffled over barefoot because like shampoo and deodorant, she also did not believe in shoes. She tossed the final page of Vivian’s will over her shoulder and reached for the coven’s massive, aged, black spell book—and was promptly zapped by a strike of blue light. The bolt erupted from the book’s bindings and hit her right in the forehead, which would have been hilarious if Keller weren’t also so desperate to get his hands on Vivian’s spells.
Well, one spell in particular.
“Noooooooo!” Isador shrieked and fled the room in a putrid rage with Zelig right behind her. Camilla, humming, danced from the room with her white-blond hair bobbing like a halo around her.
Mama stood. “Walk with me,” she said.
“Not sure my feet are working at the moment.” Keller could barely speak with his jaw clenched so tight.
Mama had yellow eyes. Disconcerting on a good day, they were downright murderous right then. “Don’t be ridiculous. You want that book, or no?”
Keller hesitated just for show and followed Mama into one of the many dreary hallways at Fairview. With the estate’s creepy vibe, the title was a misnomer to say the least.
Mama stomped in her heavy boots, leaving traces of dirt in her wake. Keller stomped behind her too, finding that particular gate appropriate under the circumstances. He suspected he knew what Mama was going to ask of him before they traversed the doorway of one of Fairview’s many dens. Keller wasn’t sure it could be called a “den” when there were so many rooms of a similar ilk, filled with books in haphazard piles, booze, and threadbare couches. If one were to say, “Meet me in the den” at Fairview, that person would probably never be seen again.
Mama poured each of them a tumbler of bourbon. Keller finished his in one go, but Mama took only a sip as she strode to the window and stared out into an early autumn afternoon. The orange sky mimicked hellfire.
“She would do something like this, wouldn’t she? For fun.”
Keller kept his distance and always did from Mama. He respected her, but he’d never trusted her. “You mean have a secret child to play a joke on her coven when she dies? Certainly seems like something she’d do, considering she’s already done it.”
“If she suspected one of her coven members might be the cause of that death one day, then yes. Smart, too: now no one can lay a finger on her son if they find him because he’s the only one who can wield the power of her Book of Shadows. It’s amusing really. I’m sure she’s cackling in her coffin.” There was no humor in her words. She finished her bourbon and handed the glass to Keller. “Another.”
“I’m not your servant, Mama.”
“No.” She tilted her head. “But you were Vivian’s, weren’t you? Her murderous pet.”
Could he take Mama? Keller considered it. From what he’d seen of the woman, it would be one hell of a fight and a wonderful stress reliever.
“Another,” she repeated with more force.
He refilled his tumbler almost to the top and hers to a mere inch.
She accepted his passive aggressive offering, even as her yellow eyes never left the dancing foliage outside. As a nature witch, Mama was always in tune with things outside the window rather than within. “Dylan. Twenty-four.”
Keller didn’t ask, because Mama always eventually made sense.
“The young man is twenty-four. Practically a child,” she continued. “It was before either you or me arrived here but a topic of much gossip in the southern witch world. Vivian disappeared for a year. Twenty-four years ago. She came home fat. Apparently Isador wouldn’t shut up about it.” She sighed and turned to face him. With Keller of average height and Mama in her perpetual boots, their eyes were even. “You know what you have to do.”
“Find him. Bring him back. But I’m not doing it just because you’re asking.”
“I know that. You’re doing it for yourself.” She pulled a pocketknife from her pants and sliced into the palm of her hand. A thin stream of blood shone red before she wiped it on a handkerchief—also pulled from her many cargo pants pockets—and handed it to him. “Payment for Serafine.”
He folded the offered item and clenched it in his hand.
“Keller.”
He looked up at the volume of her voice.
“Don’t tell anyone why you’re looking for the boy. If any of the other covens learn our Book of Shadows is sealed, well…” She didn’t have to say anything more.
The wards protecting Fairview and its powerful underground energy vortex only held until the end of each month when they needed to be renewed to deter outside invaders. They required Vivian’s spell book to do so, and Halloween, October 31, was a little over a week away. They were running out of time, which was why he needed to get Vivian’s son back to Charleston. Fast.
“One more thing, Keller.”
He waited.
“Be certain to bring him back alive.”
* * *
When it came to seers, Keller always went “out of house.” Secrets spread too easily amidst covens. Even if they were supposedly all dedicated to each other, that didn’t mean betrayals didn’t happen. Vivian’s death was a good example.
If Keller wanted to learn something about this “Dylan Heath Zayne,” he would learn it—and tell no one but Raven and Mama. There was no telling what one of Vivian’s siblings might do if they found Dylan first. Not that they could just zap him to death and claim the will inactionable. Magic wasn’t as easy to work around as the law. Seemed they needed the twenty-four-year old alive more than anyone else on the planet.
Serafine March lived out in the woods like a witch from a scary children’s book. Keller drove as close as he could to her hidden abode but ended up having to tromp through overgrown grass, wet with nighttime dew that he was glad not to feel through his high-ankled leather boots. South Carolina wasn’t known for its alligators, but he still kept his ears open with every step. He was also wary of the wards that protected Serafine’s cottage. He had her blessing to pass through and had for several years, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t cautious. Keller had learned from experience to always be cautious.
He didn’t have to get close enough to knock. Nearing Serafine’s abode, he noticed the flicker of a fireplace behind the warped front windows. The woman herself stood in the open door, backlit by the dancing flames with her hands on her stout hips. Based on her size, Keller thought she might in fact eat children. Or gators. She could be capable of either.
“And what are you doing here at this time of night, I might ask?”
Keller stopped ten feet away. “I need to find someone.”
“Take off those glasses, boy.”
He did remove them—wire rims that Raven deemed “totally uncool”—but Keller had his reasons. Anyone who’d seen him without his protective glasses knew as much, but most of them were far too dead to tell tales. Serafine didn’t fear Keller, though, and she liked looking people in the eye before letting them into her home. She said it was to make sure guests weren’t up to “no good.”
She sighed and beckoned him closer. “All right, then, come on.” She turned and left the door open.
Keller wiped his boots on her front mat, a habit of his Southern upbringing. Serafine’s house wasn’t clean but instead a hoarder’s paradise of parchment paper, spilled herbs, and random articles of clothing.
The seer turned to face him and scrutinized Keller with her one eye.
Yes, she had one eye.
The irony of a seer with one eye was not lost on Keller, even if the man wasn’t known for his sense of humor. Serafine didn’t wear a patch. Her empty eye socket stared back at him. Maybe due to her psychic abilities, it saw more than skin. Maybe it saw through him to what he really wanted. If so, she didn’t say anything. She gestured to a rickety wooden chair next to a table covered in dried flowers. Keller sat, and she settled across from him.
She folded pudgy fingers on the tabletop. “Now, who is it you need to find?”
“Dylan Heath Zayne.”
“Another Zayne?” she shouted. “I suppose he appeared after Vivian’s murder like a corpse’s last fart?”
Keller clicked his tongue. “Ah, ah, we don’t know she was murdered.”
“Heh, so denial ain’t just a river in Egypt.” She slammed her hand on the table. Flowers shivered as she laughed.
“He was mentioned in Vivian’s will,” Keller continued.
“What’d you bring for me as payment?” She leaned her ample breasts on the tabletop, covered in several layers of knit fabric. He would have guessed both Serafine and Isador shopped in the same dumpster.
Keller reached into the inside pocket of his suit coat and revealed the handkerchief with Mama’s blood. He extended it to Serafine, who sniffed it like a dog catching a scent.
She quirked a white eyebrow at him. “Mama gave her blood for this? Hmm, boy must be important then.” She stood with more speed than one would expect from a woman of her age and build, but Keller wasn’t surprised. Like Mama, Serafine was much more than an old woman in a spooky house.
She snatched a metal bowl from a shelf before prancing around, grabbing handfuls of herbs from here and there. She placed everything on the table in front of Keller, humming to herself, whispering incantations. He’d seen the show many times before, whenever he or Raven were sent to “find”someone. She spun once and made a pair of scissors seemingly appear from nowhere, but who knew what she hid within the many folds of her clothes? With the bloody handkerchief placed carefully on the table, she cut but a tiny, tiny square of red. Blood was powerful—especially Mama’s—so Serafine would be able to use it in many spells if she used it sparingly enough.
She tossed the piece of fabric into the bowl, whispered something, and poof! The bowl erupted in flame. Keller leaned back at the force of heat. Although his gaze lingered momentarily on the blaze before him, he soon focused on Serafine, whose one good eye had closed while her empty socket continued to stare.
It wouldn’t take long. Never did. As expected, about two minutes later, Serafine said, “He’s got four names.”
Well, that wasn’t helpful. “Okay,” Keller said.
“Don’t use that tone like my insight is worthless, Keller Rex.” She sighed. “Dylan Heath Zayne Quinn.”
He hadn’t been alone all his life then, kept in a cage until his mother’s death. Strange, though; if Dylan had been adopted, wouldn’t his parents have chosen a new name, not the same one mentioned in Vivian’s will? At least the “Quinn” alluded to some form of family outside his Zayne heritage.
Serafine hummed. “Blessed youth. He’s young. Aura’s bright. Either he’s powerful or handsome, maybe both.”
“What color is his aura?” That could be a hint to his abilities, whether he was a healer, potion master, nature witch like Mama, weapon like Keller, or something else entirely.
Serafine’s brows lowered in concentration. “Hmm. Can’t see it.”
“What?”
She opened her eye and repeated herself, slowly, like talking to a child.
“That’s never happened before,” he said.
“I’m guessin’ it’s Vivian. She might be dead, but that don’t mean all her spells go with her.”
Well, that was certainly true. Whatever spell she’d put on the Book of Shadows was holding steady and strong. “What kind of spell would she have put on her son?”
Serafine’s one eye bulged. “Her son?” She grinned, revealing crooked, rotten teeth.
Keller should not have said that. Too late now. “Yes, her son that no one knew about until today, and I need to find him. And you won’t tell anyone about it. Will you?” He glared at her and let some of his own magic show. To Serafine, his eyes would disappear, cloaked behind the ominous green glow of his glasses.
“No need to threaten. You know I keep my secrets.” As a seer, she was a treasure trove of information, but witches everywhere knew Serafine would take that information to the grave. It was a seer’s solemn oath, and those who broke that oath never lived long after. “What kind of spell would she put on her son, he asks? Who knows? We’re talkin’ Vivian. Maybe it’s protectin’ him.”
“From?”
She smirked. “Things like you.”
“I need him alive.”
“Another coven might want him dead, if they find him first. The last thing most witches want is another Zayne walkin’ around.” She itched her empty eye socket. “Woman must have been damn old when she popped this boy out.”
Keller ran a hand through his short, red hair. “Where is he, Serafine?”
She frowned, going from playful to dead serious in a blink. “Ohio. Small town called Willowick. He works at a coffee shop, and he is mighty handsome. Didn’t get his mama’s hook-nose. Papa must have been a good lookin’ fellah.” Serafine kept frowning like she knew something Keller wasn’t going to like, and maybe she did. Who knew what the old woman saw? She might know the kid’s shoe size, his favorite food, the sound of his voice…
Other witches thought Keller’s kind were scary. Seers weren’t as violent but just as off-putting.
Serafine remained in her chair, frozen in place, with an uncharacteristically dour expression. She was usually filled with taunting laughter and knee slaps. “Go on, now, Keller. Go on and do what you’re supposed to. Bring him home.”
He stood, but before leaving, Serafine latched onto his hand. Her boney fingers felt like a skeleton’s claw.
“Bit of advice,” she said. “You’re gonna be far away and won’t be able to draw from the Charleston vortex. Conserve your magic. Y’all are gonna need it.” With that, her expression cracked, and the woman cackled.
Her warning words followed Keller into a cool October night. Even back in his car, he swore he still heard the ancient crone’s awful amusement.
DYLAN
It’s time to wake up. Wake up, Dylan.
Whispered. Raspy. Far away.
The echo of laughter.
Dylan, wake up. WAKE. UP!
He startled out of sleep and tumbled into a dark morning. He blinked up at the ceiling of his apartment for a few seconds before a cat’s paw bopped him on the nose. Dylan lifted his head to find Binx on his chest—the black cat he’d named after the immortal feline in Hocus Pocus, one of Dylan’s favorite films. He rubbed his eyes while petting the cat that purred under Dylan’s attentions. Picking up his cell phone, he noted the time: 4:30 AM. Time to get up.
Binx mewled unhappily as Dylan sat up, dislodging the cat from its perch. Dylan stretched his arms over his head and reached for the hairband he knew, even in the dark, waited on his nightstand. He pulled his shaggy, black hair into a messy bun on top of his head and stepped out of bed.
On his way to the kitchen, several other cats circled his ankles and vied for his attention. He pet them each on the head as he went—his collection of strays. He, admittedly, had a problem. He couldn’t turn the furry critters away, and it was almost like they told each other about him. New stray in town? Go to Dylan’s window. Of course, most of them were feral and only came to visit, but he always left his bedroom window open for that reason, with cat food and water readily available. Binx, though wild, was a regular—a leader of the pack who woke Dylan most mornings with a paw to the face.
Although the dream had been doing that lately.
No, not a dream. A voice. He’d been hearing it for almost a week but didn’t give it much thought. Who dared try to understand the mind’s machinations? Certainly not Dylan, who’d spent years in therapy but was still sometimes overcome with grief he couldn’t control. “Ambushes” his therapist called them.
He opened his fridge and chugged a ready-made protein shake. He pulled on his usual morning attire—a hoodie and track pants—grabbed his bag, kissed the framed photo of his mom by the front door, and left.
Outside, the small town of Willowick was silent. Dylan never ran into anyone on his walk to the community pool, and he liked it that way. He spent his days surrounded by people, smiling. It was nice to just be by himself for a while before the day began. That was part of why he loved swimming: the silence.
At the YMCA, a mere couple blocks from his apartment, Dylan walked in and waved at the front desk lady, who’d been waving at him at 5 AM for the past six years. As if they’d made an agreement, neither of them ever spoke. A nodded acknowledgment was enough, especially at that ungodly hour.
Already, he felt the humid, chlorine-scented air. He took a deep breath of it, that comforting, familiar scent. Minutes later, he was in warm water.
Stroke, stroke, stroke.
Nothing could touch him there. Nothing ever had. Underwater was Dylan’s happy place.
He completed his usual thirty minutes of freestyle before climbing out of the pool and toweling off. He removed his swimming cap last. Thanks to the sheared sides of his head and the bun, most of his shoulder-length dark hair was dry. He set it free and shook out his copious curls.
Following a quick jog home, shower, and change of clothes, Dylan again left his apartment—and froze on the staircase, tapping his chest. He turned back around. His necklace hung from the lamp by his bed. He always left it there when he went swimming because he didn’t want to damage it, but wore it the rest of the time. His boss at the coffee shop, Emelda Perez, had gifted him the trinket after… Well, when he’d needed it most. It was a simple black stone dolphin on a thin silver chain. He vaguely remembered she’d said something about “healing” at the time, so he’d worn it, in need of plenty of that. Years later, he still rarely took it off.
“Healing.”
Emelda said weird things like that all the time. When he’d come to work hungover one day, she’d literally thrown fresh rosemary at his head, imploring him to concentrate. Then, there was the time one of the rich Willowick housewives had come in to pick up cupcakes for her husband’s birthday and, upon her leaving, Emelda had muttered, “Woman needs to wear skullcap.” Dylan let Emelda be Emelda, especially since she did the same for him: allowed him to always be her “gay ray of sunshine.”
Necklace clad, Dylan arrived right on time to work: six in the morning. He was the opener at Java Amor because his co-worker Julia was famously irresponsible and Emelda spent her mornings getting her many kids dressed, fed, and on to the bus to school.
The darkened café smelled like coffee and remnants of pastries from the day before. Like the chlorine burn of the pool, the smell comforted Dylan. It represented home to him, ever since he lost his mom. He flipped on the lights—brightly colored glass chandeliers—and started the routine.
Ridiculous chalkboard outside: check.
Ovens pre-heated: check.
Coffee brewing: check.
Like the strokes of swimming, the repetition made Dylan smile and breathe easy. He turned on his Halloween playlist, and Screamin’ Jay Hawkins howled about “putting a spell on you.”
Surprisingly, Julia staggered in through the back door before Emelda, green hair askew. She had a different hair color nearly every week. That or maybe a new piercing or tattoo. She grumbled at Dylan as she walked by and reached for her apron before unlocking the front door.
“Good morning to you, too,” he sing-songed just to annoy her.
She grumbled some more and poured herself a huge mug of French roast.
At 6:30 AM, locals who closely resembled zombies walked in. Regulars, so Dylan knew their drinks and who liked scones versus bagels versus fresh fruit or something else altogether.
Then, at seven, Emelda. She crashed through the front door. “Dylan!” she screeched.
He snort-laughed immediately. Even Julia, who had yet to say three words, chortled behind him.
Emelda, barely five-foot-four, pointed toward the sign on the sidewalk outside. “I said no!”
“What? I’m single,” he said.
“And he hasn’t been laid in weeks.” Julia yawned.
“How do you know that?”
“Because I haven’t seen any bad decisions circling you lately.”
Okay, so maybe Dylan had a thing for bad boys.
Emelda stuck her fingers in her ears and sang, “la-la-la.” She was basically a surrogate mother to him, so hearing about his sex life rightfully brought on dramatics. She unplugged her ears and rounded the counter while muttering rapid-fire Spanish that Dylan didn’t understand.
Dylan knew damn well what the chalkboard said outside:
“Good morning! Your barista is:
1. Hella gay
2. Desperately single
For your drink today, I recommend:
Give me your number.”
It was Dylan’s favorite thing to write on the Java Amor chalkboard, and sometimes, the joke even worked. He gestured to his clothes. “I wore a special t-shirt so no one would think the sign is about Julia.”
Emelda squinted. “Is that a dinosaur riding a rainbow?”
He nodded. “Mm-hmm.”
Emelda lifted her tiny hands to the sky. “Dios mio, I would fire you if you weren’t like a son to me! Julia! Do something about him!”
Julia grumbled. “There’s nothing to be done. He was born this way,” she quoted Gaga.
Emelda pinched Dylan’s shoulder—hard.
“Ow!”
She smacked him on the shoulder repeatedly but without any heat. Plus, she was, like, half his size. “And the music!”
She must have noticed “Monster Mash.”
“What have I told you about the music?” She disappeared into the back of the shop. Quiet mariachi music replaced Dylan’s Halloween mix, and Emelda did not return, probably focused on prepping her famous sopapillas in an effort to not murder her favorite employee.
In their small Midwestern town, varied demographics weren’t a thing. Emelda Perez was the only Mexican woman for miles, and she reveled in it. Her entire coffee shop was covered in murals that reflected the larger-than-life paintings of Diego Rivera. In preparation for Dia de los Muertos, sugar skull cookies dominated the shelves. Business always boomed because Emelda had found her niche. She was something unique in a whitewashed town. And she adored Dylan. She’d been close friends with his mother, and she was partly to thank for Dylan’s recovery. She had picked up the broken eighteen-year-old he once was, dusted him off, and helped him heal. She loved him like one of her own children, and he loved her right back.
After the morning rush, Emelda finally emerged from the kitchen. She poked him in the shoulder, and Dylan winced at the stress he felt radiating off her. His mother had once called him an “empath.” He always felt much more than he wanted to.
His beloved boss flapped her hand in his face. “I need help with the children’s Halloween costumes. You’ll come over this weekend.”
“What if I have plans?” he asked.
“You cancel them.” She hustled back to the kitchen, from where the scent of cinnamon wafted into the air.
Dylan shook his head and smiled at his next customer. “What can I get for you?”
The well-dressed businessman gestured with his thumb to the sidewalk out front. “Is that sign outside for real?”
Since the man was completely not Dylan’s type, he offered a tight-lipped smile. “Just a joke. What can I get for you?”
Julia scoffed into her coffee at his side.
Paws on Me by Silvia Onyx
1
SETH
I’m Seth Morrison. I’m a cop, a police lieutenant to be precise. I’ve been on the force more years than I want to think about. I’ve seen good men get killed, turn dirty, lose themselves in the bottle, and lose their fucking minds, but I’m still here doing what I do. I don’t know any other life. People tell me I need a break, a vacation, to relax. I don’t want to fucking relax. I just want to do my job and keep this city from falling apart.
I park my car, grab my coffee from the cup holder, and charge up the front steps of the station. I could take the side door, it’s closer to my office, but I love the chaos of the bullpen. When I open the door, I breathe deeply, enjoying the variety of smells: coffee that’s been on the warmer too long, the sickeningly sweet smell of candy and doughnuts, pine-scented cleaner used after God-knows what accident, and something unnamable that simply smells like cops and hard work. I shake my head as I try to imagine not being here nearly 24/7. This is where I belong.
My stomach rumbles. I should’ve had dinner, but after pretending an afternoon nap was a night’s sleep, I’m running late. I’ll grab something from the vending machine while I dream about a juicy burger and thick home fries. It sure would be nice to have someone cook for me. I don’t seem to get along with stoves. Years ago, I tried being married. That worked for about thirty seconds. My wife wanted me to work shorter hours. I wanted her to not be fucking our neighbor.
Friends tell me I should make an effort to date, but I’m more comfortable at a gruesome homicide scene than making small talk at dinner with a woman or a man. Yeah, I like both. I stopped going out with men when I entered the academy. I couldn’t deal with the shit the guys would give me. Now, I don’t advertise what I like, but I pick up a guy now and then. I’m discreet, but if somebody finds out, I’ll deal.
One-night stands I can handle, but relationships are beyond me. People think police work is draining, but I’d rather spend all day in the field and all night at my desk filling out fucking paperwork -- and often I do -- than try to decode relationship signals. I inevitably screw things up and never understand why. Sex I need. Romance I don’t.
My phone rings. I pull it out of my pocket hoping the call will save me from the mountain of paperwork on my desk. It’s Drew Danvers, detective and vampire. That’s right, a vampire who works for the good guys. We’ve got a werewolf in homicide too. And he’s a damn fine cop.
I remember when the shifters came out of the closet, scaring the hell out of us humans. One by one other monsters made themselves known. Most people assumed they were all assholes who wanted to eat us, but I quickly learned not to judge a person because he sucked blood or turned into a wolf. Instead I judge people based on how they treat others.
I answer the call. “What’s up, Detective?”
“Two dead werewolves found in a closet at Shift. Hacked up pretty bad. The scene’s a circus. Jenkins called in sick. I’m on my own, and—”
“I’ll be there in ten.”
“Thanks, sir.”
“No problem. Murder scene or paperwork, which would you choose?”
He laughs, and I hang up.
Ten minutes later, almost to the second, I pull into the parking lot of Shift, a shapeshifter club in the river district. The area was up and coming several years ago, before the economy went to hell. Now crime is on the rise, and if things don’t turn around, it’ll soon revert to the shithole it used to be.
I step inside the club. A crime lab team is there, and several uniformed officers are talking with employees. I spot Drew in the entryway of an office. He’s frowning as he questions a tall hairy hunk of a man. I’ve seen the man around the area several times, and, like always, he makes my cock sit up and take notice. The first time we met, I was out on another call and a riot broke out when a werewolf with too much attitude got kicked out of Shift. I helped break up the fight and ended up pulling a guy off him.
Our most recent encounter was a week ago. When I want to grab a beer and be left the fuck alone, I go to Mitch’s, a dive just down the street from Shift. Last time I spent the evening there, he sat next to me at the bar and came on strong. I was in a shitty mood. I wanted him, and it pissed me off. He’s not my type. He’s young, hip, and outrageously flirtatious. I walked away, but I regretted it later that night when I couldn’t stop fantasizing about him.
The man looks my way and catches me staring. His grin says he knows the direction my thoughts are going. Then the fucking bastard winks at me, and Drew scowls.
I grab one of the uniformed officers as he finishes with an employee and question him about the scene. When I learn all I can without talking to Drew, I head toward him and the shockingly gorgeous man. I now know his name is Brandon Lord. He’s the owner of Shift, and as I suspected, he’s a bear shifter. Before I reach them, I see trouble headed down the hallway.
Drew’s lover, Jason, reaches them before I do. As I feared, Brandon gives Jason the same lascivious grin he gave me at Mitch’s. Budget cuts have hit the Atlanta PD hard. We let officers go, and we’re pathetically understaffed. For the last few weeks, Drew has worked every night from dusk ‘til dawn, and he’s slept at the office more days than not. He’s poised to snap with only slight provocation, and nothing is slight where Jason is concerned.
But Brandon is oblivious to Drew’s mounting anger. He looks Jason up and down. “Mmmm. Venison. I could go for some of that.”
Jason grins. “Sorry, I’m ta—”
He never finishes the sentence. Drew slams Brandon into the wall and wraps his hand around the bear’s throat. Brandon’s eyes widen as he struggles. Bears are damn strong, but he’s still no match for a vampire. Drew’s eyes go dark and cold, his scary vampire look. His fangs shoot out. This could get ugly fast.
Jason tugs on Drew’s arm, and I push between the two men. “Danvers, he’s just flirting. It’s not worth a suspension or worse.”
Drew fights me and Jason for a moment, but ultimately, he backs away. Jason wraps his arms around Drew, pinning his lover’s arms to his side, and whispers in his ear.
With Drew under control, all my awareness goes to the fact that Brandon is pressed against my back. I want him as much now as I did last week. I need to step away before he realizes how affected I am, but I have to make sure he and Drew aren’t going to go at it again.
Jason still has his arms around Drew, and he’s nuzzling the vampire’s neck. If he keeps that up we’re all going to see more than we want to. At least Drew’s no longer showing fang.
I step away from Brandon and turn to face him. He grins down at me, that same cocky-as-fuck smile he’d given me earlier, making me even more aware of how close we are and how big he is. At 6’2”, I’m hardly small, but he’s got several inches on me. And while I’ve got a rather thick pelt, the fur visible above the vee of his t-shirt is seriously impressive.
I take a step back. “Are we going to have any more trouble here?”
He shrugs. “How the hell was I supposed to know the stag was his boyfriend? I see a hot guy, I flirt. No harm intended.”
“This is a murder investigation, not a party. Answer our questions and quit playing around, unless you’d rather we take you down to the precinct.”
He smiles mischievously. “You gonna cuff me if you take me in?”
“Impeding a murder investigation will get you thrown in jail.”
He rolls his eyes. “I found two dead guys in my closet when I came to work tonight. My business is shut down, and I am losing money every minute that you’re here, but at least I still have a sense of humor.”
“Well, I don’t.”
He shakes his head. “Are you taken too?”
I take another step back. “You’re making a lot of assumptions.”
I look over at Drew and realize he and Jason are grinning like loons. Fuck. All I need is the two of them ragging me.
I glare at Drew. “Detective, do you think you can question this man without killing him?”
Drew smiles, giving Brandon his dangerous vampire look. “Probably.”
“Fine. Fleetfoot, head back to the lab. Take my car. I’ll get a ride with Danvers.” I throw him my keys, and he snatches them out of the air as he gives Drew’s hand a final squeeze. Jason is better in the lab than any tech we have. We only send him into the field when we’re desperately short-staffed. I run a hand through my hair, wishing I knew how I’m going to hold the homicide division together if we don’t get more funds.
Brandon holds out his hand. “I’m Brandon Lord. I own Shift.”
“Lieutenant Morrison.” I shake his hand. His skin is surprisingly smooth, his grip tight and warm. I want to feel those big hands running over me. I want to rub his furry body with my own. Fuck! I should assign someone else to this case right now and get the hell away from him. But some crazy restlessness he’s dredged up in me makes me fight my instincts.
“Nice to meet you, Lieutenant.” His voice is low and rich, and his grin lets me know he’s well aware of my reaction to him.
I need to get away. His smell alone is making me hard. “I’m not here to play games. Drop the act and treat this case seriously, or I’ll find an excuse to throw your ass in jail.”
He grins. Fuck, he knows he’s got me rattled. “I’d never kill anyone, Lieutenant. I’m just a cuddly teddy bear.”
The bear shifter and the bear. Ridiculous. I need to leave now. This man is no cuddly toy. I don’t think he’s our murderer, but he’s far smarter than he wants me to believe and likely far more dangerous. “I know what cuddling leads to.”
Brandon laughs, a deep, infectious sound. I can’t help but respond. Now I want him more than ever. Taking this case is a supremely stupid idea. Staying on it now is unprofessional, but I won’t walk away.
Lily MortonLily is a bestselling gay romance author. She writes love stories filled with heat and humour.
She lives in sunny England with her husband and two children, all of whom claim that they haven't had a proper conversation with her since she got her Kindle.
Lily has spent her life with her head full of daydreams, and decided one day to just sit down and start writing about them. In the process she discovered that she actually loved writing, because how else would she get to spend her time with hot and funny men?
She loves chocolate and Baileys and the best of all creations - Chocolate Baileys!
Rick R. Reed is an award-winning and bestselling author of more than 60 works of published fiction. He is a Lambda Literary Award finalist and a multiple Rainbow Award winner. His works have been translated into German, French, Spanish, Italian, and Russian. Entertainment Weekly has described his work as “heartrending and sensitive.” Lambda Literary has called him: “A writer that doesn’t disappoint…” Rick lives in Palm Springs, CA, with his two rescue dogs, Kodi and Joaquin. in his spare time, he enjoy cycling, hiking, cooking, photography, and reading.
Amanda MeuwissenAmanda Meuwissen is a queer author with a primary focus in M/M or gay fiction and romance, dabbling in every subgenre. She is a board member for Big World Network, a non-profit publisher working toward education and growth opportunities for aspiring authors in underrepresented, economically disadvantaged, and rural communities.
As the author of LGBTQ+ Fantasy #1 Best Seller, Coming Up for Air, LGBTQ+ Horror #1 Best Seller and #1 New Release, A Delicious Descent, and #1 New Release in Fantasy Erotica and Gay Erotica, Last Courtesan of Olympus, Amanda’s extensive library of titles continues to grow.
Her organization of the massive 22-author series collaboration, Tales from the Tarot, has raised two thousand in donations for SAGE, a charity dedicated to advocacy and services for LGBTQ+ Elders, and her contributing title to the series, Cleric of Desire, continues to be an inspiration to readers as it delves into demi-gender identity.
She lives in Minnesota with her husband, John, and their two cats.
Bestselling romance author.
Bisexual witch.
Feminist. Pro-choice. Anti-censorship.
Timothee Chalamet freak.
Horror movie aficionado.
Vampire mermaid in a past life.
Sara Dobie Bauer somehow survived her party-hard college years at Ohio University to earn a creative writing degree. She lives with her precious Pit Bull in Northeast Ohio, although she’d really like to live in a Tim Burton film.
Silvia Onyx writes high heat paranormal romance with shifters of all descriptions. Her character-driven stories bring you right into the shifters' world. When not writing, Silvia loves to read, crochet, play with her oodles of planners and notebooks, and enjoy time with her family and beloved dogs. She also writes contemporary romance as Silvia Violet.
Lily Morton
Rick R Reed
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EMAIL: rickrreedbooks@gmail.com
Amanda Meuwissen
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EMAIL: ak.meuwissen@gmail.com
Sara Dobie Bauer
EMAIL: sara@saradobie.com
Silvia Onyx
EMAIL: silviaviolet@gmail.com
The Prince and the Ice King by Amanda Meuwissen
Light from the Grave by Sara Dobie Bauer
Paws on Me by Silvia Onyx
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