Dear Reader,And the winner of the PDF copy of Witch's Fire is....Maggie Dove!!!! Woooohoooo, Congrats!!!
Cheers, and happy Sunday :)
Kayden
Showing posts with label Tabitha Shay. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tabitha Shay. Show all posts
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Tabitha Shay, and Witch's Fire
Dear Readers,
I hope you’ll enjoy the blurb from my latest release, Witch’s Fire, book five in the Winslow witches of Salem series. In this excerpt, Kirrah is just realizing the potential of her magical powers.
Enjoy…Tabs
BLURB/WITCH’S FIRE/BOOK FIVE/SHAY
In a world where magic is dying―two people meet under unusual circumstances…
Realm of light―New to this witchy stuff, Kirrah Walker crashes her broom into a stranger and knocks him unconscious. Feeling guilty, she takes him home with her and nurses him back to health. However, she soon discovers a terrible secret―the stranger is on a mission to assassinate a witch. Now Kirrah must decide if she’ll set him free or keep him tied to the headboard of her bed…
World of darkness―Prince Stry, future King of Ru-Noc awakens to find he’s not only a captive, but captivated by the charming witch who flutters around him like a nervous butterfly. Her magick is wild and so out of control, he knows in his heart he should steal her soul, but kissing Kirrah is habit-forming.
Kirrah and Stry―magical beings who must face the fear of their past, acknowledge their future and trust in destiny in a world gone mad…
EXCERPT/WITCH’S FIRE/BOOK FIVE/SHAY/R-RATED/LANGUAGE
Apparently her plain, ordinary, run-of-the-mill broom was in no hurry to cooperate with a landing.
Even if she knew the right words to bring it down, it had stopped listening to her commands the minute it soared away with her.
Zoom!
“Ahhhhhhh,” Kirrah screeched. She hadn’t known the broom had warp speed. “Ohh! Oh, shit, broom. Slow down!”
Of course, it totally ignored her.
In her mind, she heard its evil cackling. The broom was up to more tricks. It streaked across the sky faster than a speeding bullet.
Sure, it was exhilarating, a little on the chilly side, and every now and then she had to spit out some kind of attack bug, but it was fun, if a bit scary as hell soaring among the clouds.
She wasn’t used to flying, so it was even scarier when the broom rocked unsteadily, like now, and kicked in passing gear. Kirrah choked her fingers around the scrawny handle, which only seemed to make the broom even more unsteady.
Was that a gagging sound she heard?
“Release me.” Cough. Splutter. Cough.
Kirrah’s thought her eyes might bulge right out of their sockets. “You talk?” She stared at the handle. No mouth. “Nah, you can’t talk.”
“You’re choking me.”
“Oh, oh, shit-shit-shit! You can talk.”
“Re-lease…me,” the broom said in a strained voice.
Kirrah eased the choke-hold she had on the handle.
“Weeee,” the broom chortled excitedly, climbing even higher.
Kirrah controlled the urge to tighten her fingers again.
What a miserable night this had turned out to be. One minute she’d been standing in her kitchen doorway gazing up at the dark sky, intoxicated by the frigid night air and admiring the tiny sliver of moon playing peek-a-boo with the clouds.
She’d been talking to herself―a terrible flaw she’d recently developed―and wishing aloud for a closer view of the moon. The next moment―the mundane little broom swooshed beneath her butt and took off in the night with her perched precariously on top of it.
“Good heavens,” Kirrah shrieked, so startled, she barely had time to grip the broom handle before it soared off into the dark and zoomed over the treetops with her held captive. That was when she realized…she was a for-sure-and-certain witch.
Leave a comment and have your name entered in a drawing to win a free E-copy of Witch’s Fire…Winner’s name to be announced tomorrow…
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Don’t forget to scope out the wonderful art of some of my characters…
Publisher…
http://www.moongypsypress.com
Books available in print at Amazon.com
E-format at Fictionwise and Barnes and Noble
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Showcasing Moongypsy: A Note From Kayden...
Dear Readers,
This month we’re showcasing the paranormal side of the brand new publishing-house, Moongypsy Press. I’m so thrilled to present our talent to you, and not just the authors either, but the behind-the-scene wizards that allow us to give you perfection in pages.
We’ve already gotten started, but aren’t nearly finished yet…
Books Coming Soon From Moongypsy Press, Tentative Launch: January 25th 2010
The Book Of Absolute Truths, By Trent Kinsey
Who’s To Blame, By Trent Kinsey
Witch’s Fire, By Tabitha Shay
Darkness I Weep, By Julie A D’Arcy
Deep Water Legends, By Kayden McLeod
As well, we have a gallery of Dawné Dominique’s Cover Art for MP, and Trent Kinsey posts about his desire to know about your paranormal experiences…
And also coming this month, our very own Marketing-Manager, Tina will be stopping by to tell you about what’s up and coming with us, and the owner of MP, Foery will be giving us an excerpt from Laird of the Mist, and coming to say hello! In addition, a have a few more authors lined up.
We’re all so excited for Launch…none of us can really sit still! Tehe. So come on, and join us for a ride of a lifetime!
BE SURE TO JOIN OUR READERS GROUP, OPEN NOW:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mpreaders/?yguid=404012103
Happy Reading…
Kayden McLeod
Friday, January 8, 2010
Tabitha Shay Presents: Witches's Fire
---TAG---
IN A WORLD WHERE MAGIC IS DYING
TWO STRANGERS COLLIDE…
BLURB FOR WITCH’S FIRE
In a world where magic is dying―two people meet under unusual circumstances…
Realm of light―New to this witchy stuff, Kirrah Walker crashes her broom into a stranger and knocks him unconscious. Feeling guilty, she takes him home with her and nurses him back to health. However, she soon discovers a terrible secret―the stranger is on a mission to assassinate a witch. Now Kirrah must decide if she’ll set him free or keep him tied to the headboard of her bed…
World of darkness―Prince Stry, future King of Ru-Noc awakens to find he’s not only a captive, but captivated by the charming witch who flutters around him like a nervous butterfly. Her magick is wild and so out of control, he knows in his heart he must steal her soul, but kissing Kirrah is habit-forming.
Kirrah and Stry―magical beings who must face the fear of their past, acknowledge their future and trust in destiny in a world gone mad…
EXCERPT--Slowly, she drew her fingertip down the length. Up. Down. Up. Down. Her finger marched like a little soldier. Up. Down. Her eyes widened as ‘it’ lengthened even more. “Holy, dunghill!” Her fingertip stilled, right in the center of the now very firm bulge.
Abruptly strong fingers locked around her wrist. “You keep licking your lips and stroking, button, and I’m gonna want to do a little licking and stroking of my own. Only―it won’t be up and down. I’ll do my own sweet dance to the sound of a different rhythm. And believe me, buttercup, I know how to put every inch of it to good use.”
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Welcome Tabitha, and her new pending release!
Hi Everyone,
I thought as a special Trick-or-Treat surprise, I'd post Chapter Two from Witch's Fire, Book Five of the Winslow witches of Salem. WF is scheduled for release in April, 2010 from Eternal Press.
Happy reading and Happy Halloween!
Tabs
Chapter Two of Witch's Fire
Beltaine, Beltane, Beltanee: Also known as May Day.
Ru-Noc
Magical Forest
Near Sanctuary
Immortal Realm
Beltane
Kirrah Walker soared high in the sky.
Literally.
On a plain, ordinary, everyday, purchased-at-the-Dollar-Store-broom. A simple item made of straw, wood and a bit of wire.
Nothing magical about it.
Right?
Kirrah moaned. “Right, except for the rider.”
However, her lack of control of the magic at her fingertips was pretty ugly. The broom might not have started out charmed, but it was now. So charmed, its entire features had morphed.
The straw was now switches.
The handle was broader, longer and darker, and polished to a shine so rich she could see her reflection in it.
Or she could if it was daylight.
No wire to hold the switches in place. So how did they remain? She had no clue. They were attached to the broom and it was all that mattered.
This broom definitely was not from the Dollar Store.
What happened to the one she’d purchased?
Did it still exist on some other plain?
Not only was this new broom bursting with energy and magic, it had turned into a speed demon from hell. It went from zero to eighty in one point two seconds, a flash across the night sky easily mistaken for a shooting star.
The problem was she didn’t know what she’d done, what she’d said, to hex it.
Kirrah sighed once again. Well, those weren’t the only problems. They were simply part of it.
It was all the broom’s fault!
She hadn’t done a single thing to encourage its crazy antics. For heaven’s sake, she knew very well there hadn’t been one thing special about the broom when she purchased it.
Hah! Try telling it to the ferocious beast racing through the night sky like an over fueled jet with a pilot hell bent to reach his destination.
For a moment, she and the broom hovered above a tree top. Kirrah puffed a tangled curl that drooped over her left eye out of her field of vision.
“I feel the need for speed. Woo hoo!”
Kirrah widened her eyes. “Oh, my goodness, you didn’t just speak.”
“Yes, I did.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Did.”
“Didn’t.”
“Okay. Have it your way, witch, but you better hang on to your ass, is only warning you get.”
“Ohh! Oh, shit, broom! Slow down!”
“Can’t. Gotta itch for speed.”
Oh! Oh! This wasn’t possible. A talking broom? A flying broom? She’d lost her ever-loving-mind. Kirrah breathed deeply. She panted. She chanted, though God only knew if what she chanted simply encouraged to broom to show off. “I don’t believe in witches. I don’t believe in witches.”
“How you not believe in witches when you one? When you fly on back of broom?”
“It’s a dream. It’s all a bad dream.”
“Real dream. Good dream.”
“Shut-up!”
“Humph.”
Kirrah decided it wasn’t so much the flying that created problems, although that too, had its moments. The problem was landing. Now that she was higher than a kite on the Fourth of July, she hadn’t a clue how to get herself and the maniac broom back on the ground.
So here she was, racing among the clouds, looking down on rooftops, treetops, feeling dizzy―with no earthly idea how she got here.
Apparently her plain, ordinary, run-of-the-mill broom was in no hurry to cooperate with a landing. Even if she knew the right words to bring it down, it had stopped listening to her commands the minute it soared away with her.
Zoom!
“Ahhhhhhh,” Kirrah screeched as the broom revved up its speed another notch. She hadn’t known the broom had warp speed. “Ohh! Oh, damn, broom. Slow down! I’m getting dizzy.”
“Told you to hang on.”
“Stop speeding.”
It totally ignored her.
In her mind, she heard its evil cackling. The broom was up to more tricks. It streaked across the sky faster than a speeding comet. Sure, it was frightening, okay, a lot frightening, a little on the chilly side, and every now and then she had to spit out some kind of attack bug, but it was fun, energizing, exhilarating―even if it was scary.
She wasn’t used to flying. Ha! That was saying a lot. It was even scarier when the broom rocked unsteadily, like now, and kicked in passing gear.
Kirrah choked her fingers around the scrawny handle, which only seemed to make the broom even more unsteady.
Was that a gagging sound she heard?
“Release me.” Cough. Splutter. Cough. Cough.
She thought her eyes might bulge right out of their sockets. “You really do talk? It wasn’t my imagination?” She stared at the handle. No mouth. “Nah, you can’t talk.”
“Can―to. You’re―choking―me―you―dumb―shit.”
“Oh, oh, poop―poop―poop! You can talk.”
“Told―you. Re―lease―me,” the broom said in a strained voice.
Kirrah eased the choke-hold she had on the handle.
“Weeee,” the broom chortled excitedly. It whirled and spun as if it’d been given a new lease on life and climbed even higher.
Kirrah controlled the urge to tighten her fingers around it again. What if she killed it? Then they’d crash.
What was she thinking?
It wasn’t like the broom was actually alive. Was it?
What a miserable night this had turned out to be. One minute she’d been standing in her kitchen doorway gazing up at the dark sky, intoxicated by the frigid night air and admiring the tiny sliver of moon playing peek-a-boo with the clouds.
She’d been talking to herself―a terrible flaw she’d recently developed―and wishing aloud for a closer view of the moon. The next moment―the mundane little broom propped in a corner transformed and swooshed beneath her butt. It took off in the night with her perched precariously on top of it.
“Good heavens,” she’d shrieked, so startled, she barely had time to grip the broom handle before it soared off into the dark and zoomed over the treetops with her held captive. That was when she realized…she was a for-sure-and-certain witch. It was one of those Ah-ha moments she sometimes had.
Oh, yeah, she’d suspected for a month or so she might be a witch. Might be. Maybe. No proof, though, other than hearing a man’s deep accented voice summoning her for the past week. Yeah, that had raised her suspicions. But hell, she’d read every single one of those Christine Feehan vampire romances. She thought a fanged creature was using a mental link to summon her. She wasn’t about to acknowledge a real live breathing vampire. She frowned. Or a real dead non-breathing one, either. Eeeww.
Kirrah tried hard to convince herself the fireplace didn’t roar to life every time she walked past it, flames shooting up the chimney like happy fireflies. Candles didn’t light up for any apparent reason and the burners on the stove didn’t flare to life.
What was it with fire…and her?
It was like she had some kind of mysterious power over it.
But it wasn’t just fire. Light switches flipped off or on. Inanimate objects floated through the air simply because she wished for them. Now that had spooked the poop outta her the first time it happened. But she’d convinced herself things were merely short-circuiting around her.
But here was proof. Genuine proof. Oh, yes. It was a red-letter day―er, night. Yes, siree. She was a fricking-screeching-cackling-full-fledged-certified-broom-riding-witch!
Should she wear black?
Wear a pointy hat?
Blacken her teeth?
Search for ruby slippers?
Kirrah shivered as the cold night air whizzed through her tangled mop of hair. Nervously, she gripped the handle of the broom a little tighter, but not so tight she strangled it. Every now and then her ears popped with the change in altitude.
Her skin felt clammy and cold.
She bet she was pea-green. Oh, heavens. Puke-green and vertigo didn’t go well with her outfit. Oh. Oh, dear. If she fell off the broom, she’d be nothing but a little puddle of―dizziness swept over her.
Kirrah choked the broom.
It coughed. Sputtered, but charged on like a rocket.
“I want down, broom. Now!”
She was deathly afraid of heights. The way her stomach bubbled, she was sure to throw-up. Again. Kirrah prayed the broom from Hell wouldn’t decide to do another loop-de-loop.
Uh-oh. Too late!
Satan’s little toy-of-joy must have read her mind, because it shot straight up, did a stunning acrobatic spin, belly over belly, and left her belly somewhere behind.
“Oh-my-God,” she wailed. “Go down! Down, I say! I want down!”
The broom performed another spectacular gyrating spin, then plunged straight down in a suicide spiral, before leveling off at the very last second. It wove through the woods like an out-of-control rocket―straight toward a man who stood innocently gaping at her and the wild-ass broom.
He wore one of those, I-don’t-believe-what-I’m-seeing expressions, eyes wide, lips parted with utter disbelief. Speechless.
Oh, yes. He was properly impressed, all right.
He was also standing in a danger zone.
“Get out of the way,” Kirrah yelled, flapping one arm, motioning for him to move, but the warning came too late. She slammed into him at a peculiar angle, side-swiping his head and smacking him on the side of his forehead with the broom handle.
Splat!
Heavens. It sounded just like a watermelon struck by a baseball bat. Eeewww.
“Oops.” Kirrah wrinkled her nose in dismay. Squeezing her eyes tightly shut, she clenched her teeth together. She really didn’t want to see this, but knew she should check on the man. Kirrah opened one eye and shot a glance over her shoulder as she barreled past him like a speeding bullet―just in time to see him do a perfect flip-flop, head over heels.
“Ohh! Oh, dear.” But she didn’t have time to consider the injuries inflicted on the poor soul. No. She needed to concentrate on the wicked broom. It sputtered, hacked, sputtered. She eyed her hands. She might wish to, but she wasn’t choking the broom, so it must be running out of gas. “About time, too.”
Kirrah yelped and clutched the broom handle. Swear to the stars, the thing suddenly swerved, rocked unsteadily, then shot straight toward a giant Ark tree like a heat-seeking missile.
“Oh, no. No, broom. Change direction. I command you to change direction.”
The broom, as usual, ignored her. She tried pulling up on the handle. No use. There was only one choice left her. She bailed. “Ouch!” Rubbing her bruised and aching backside, Kirrah watched the broom make a big loop and head straight toward her.
Quickly, she ducked and swore under her breath. It whistled past her head and crashed head-on into the massive tree. “Tyrant! Maniac! You could have killed us,” she yelled.
The broom wilted. It clattered to the ground at her feet, gave one final sputter, then stilled.
“Don’t you ever do that to me again.” Kirrah shook her finger at the dejected broom, eyed her finger and thought better of it. What if she hexed it again? Magic lay in her fingertips. Crazy magic she’d never been able to control and that always involved snakes, spiders or other nasty little beasties. Now, runaway brooms.
She couldn’t help herself though. She laughed and clapped her hands in delight. Her body felt exhilarated, her face flushed. The sheer joy and the incredible thrill of the wild ride had to feel like getting struck by lightning. Every nerve in her body tingled. Pumping a fist in the air, she cheered, “Woo-hoo! Oh, my, but that was fun, broom.” A low moan snared her attention and snapped her out of her cheering mode. “Oh, goodness.” She’d forgotten all about her hit-and-fly-victim. “Uh-oh. I think we might be in a spot of trouble here, broom.”
Hmmm. How was she going to explain flying on a broom? She didn’t have Aunt Penell here to put a hex over her latest victim.
And she was simply awful at casting spells.
Kirrah pushed herself up and limped over to where the stranger was laid out cold as a corpse on a mortuary slab. She cut her gaze over him. “Holy smokes.”Her eyes widened in appreciation. “When the gods passed out bodies, you ordered a big one.”
At least six-foot-four, the man’s biceps bulged, bared by a loose fitting brown leather vest. He looked scrumptious. Thick hair the color of a ripe wheat field and lightly sprinkled with a cinnamon color fell across wide shoulders. Tawny-colored stubble dusted his chin and jaws. Apparently the man wasn’t into shaving regularly. He looked rough, untamed and like a big lion.
Snug brown leather pants hugged his lower body. A smattering of dark blond hair lightly furred his chest where the vest fell apart. The trail of silky hair narrowed into a straight line to the waistband of his tan leather pants and disappeared.
Kirrah licked her lips. Holy crap. The man was seriously ripped, a sexual beast in leather. A soft head though, for the blow from the broom handle had knocked him out cold.
Still, he was rugged. Raw, sexy, take-me-home-with-you-and-I’ll-give-you-my-babies, alluring, wicked male.
Huh. What was she going to do with him? Kirrah chewed on her lower lip as she puzzled over this latest problem in her life. He reminded her of someone. Who? She gnawed on her upper lip and mulled it over. Travis Fimmel! A Calvin Klein underwear man, oh, yeah, baby! Talk about a hottie! She should know. She’d drooled enough staring at pictures of the Auzzie cutie on the Internet to last a lifetime. Man, she’d had the biggest crush on the hunky male model a couple of years back.
Oh, but this man looked even yummier. More mature. Muscular. Sexy. Had she thought sexy already? Never mind. Her mouth watered. It was just incredible the handsome hunk was served up to her a-la-carte―and only slightly damaged.
First chance she got, she was taking a bite of this forbidden fruit. All she needed was some whipped cream. Or she could just go for licking the ice cream cone, lots of slow, delicious licking.
Kirrah moved closer and leaned cautiously over him. “Oh!” She gasped as his lids suddenly snapped open. He stared at her, but his eyes didn’t really look all that focused. He blinked and moaned deep in his throat.
Uh-oh. Oh, dear. He really looked confused. Sounded baffled. This wasn’t good.
How bad were his injuries?
Would her automobile insurance cover the damages? Shit. She’d have to go over her policy when she got home, but she was pretty sure there no were clauses covering accidents while flying on a broom.
Should she abandon him and leave him as a hit-and-fly victim? The thought had possibilities. In her mind she saw the imaginary ice cream cone melting into a milky, useless puddle. No sweets tonight, she thought. Anyway, he probably thought she’d tried to kill him.
“What…happened?” he asked, lifting a hand to his forehead.
He didn’t remember? How cool was that?
Kirrah grabbed his hand. “Don’t touch it. You’re bleeding.”
“Bleeding?”
“Only a little.” She squeezed one eye shut and sort of clenched her teeth. Damn. She hated confessing her responsibility, but her inner devil insisted she come clean. Drat the little guy, always interfering in her life. “Oh, well…there’s also a―a teensy-weensy bump.”
“Teensy?” The man winced as he touched his head. “What the hell does teensy mean?”
“Ooh. You don’t understand English very well? Teensy means uh―uh, miniature, smaller than miniature…sort of.”
“I speak proper English, not the jumbled-up butchered words you speak.”
How insulting! Butchered-up, indeed. Kirrah’s temper―which she swore was always mild―revved up a notch. Well, she wasn’t a redhead for nothing she thought. “Jumbled-up? Butchered? Ha! You speak proper English my patootie.”
“It doesn‘t feel tiny.”
“Huh? What doesn’t feel tiny?” She gave a half-hearted shrug when she realized what he was talking about―and it wasn’t her patootie. Guilt slapped her again and her temper deflated. “Well, maybe not so little, but not real big, either,” she quickly added. “It might be somewhat…er―bigger than a…duck egg?” she ended with a questioning note.
“Bigger than a duck egg? Is that your idea of tiny?”
“Well, that’s better than it being large as a goose egg…right?” There was no call for him to yell. She decided to ignore his rudeness. After all, his slight injury was her fault. She’d forgive him for being grumpy, too…he probably had a slight headache. “Do you remember what happened?”Please, say no.
“Better yet, have a long lasting case of amnesia,” she blurted before she could stop herself.
“What?”He glanced around as if trying to figure out where he was and why she was praying out loud for him to have amnesia.
Did he know what amnesia was?
The man looked very discombobulated to her.
Did amnesiacs look discombobulated?
“Uh…let’s try this again. Do you remember what happened?”
His tawny brows knitted in a deep scowl. “No. I haven’t a clue.”
No? The man said, No? Yes. Yes-yes-yes! Kirrah grinned. Happy days! She barely stopped herself from jumping up and dancing a jig across the forest floor. Amnesia! Her new best friend. Woot-woot! Oh, yeah. This little problem was going away real fast.
“Aww, what a shame,” she clucked sympathetically. “I’m so sorry you have no memory and all because of a lit-tle lump the size of a chicken egg on your poor, too soft head.”
“Yeah.”
Kirrah frowned. He sounded bewildered, but since he agreed that his head was soft, she decided she loved his strange accent. He thought her English was jumbled? His words were so thick he sounded like―like―who? A little like―yes, that was it―Count Yorga or was it Count Dracula? Oh, dear. Weren’t they both vampires?
In any case, he sounded just like the male voice in her head the last few days. The male voice she’d totally ignored, but been crept out by. So far as she knew, only vampires entered a person’s head uninvited and chatted with them.
Maybe he’d been following her. Stalking her?
Why else had he been here, right in her flight path?
What if he was an ax murderer?
Kirrah glanced around. Until now, she hadn’t noticed just how creepy it was in the forest. They were in the woods, the dark woods, and except for the big ole’ shiny full moon hanging like a perfectly round, gigantic light bulb between the nests of clouds, very little light penetrated the inky black around them.
Could he change into a bat? Would he?
Did he have fangs?
Rabies?
Shit! Did he bite?
“Are you a vampire?” She narrowed her eyes. “I’m warning you, mister, I have powers that would scare a demon. Yes, I―I can conjure snakes and red-eyed spiders, the kind that bite. Hard.”
“What?”
“Ah, a man of few words.”
“Man?”
Darn it! Her mystery man didn’t seem to have many words in his vocabulary. He sounded more bewildered by the minute. He struggled to sit up, but collapsed back onto the ground, groaning. “Are there any other kind?” he asked a bit drunkenly.
“Any other kind of what?” Kirrah bit her lip worried about the slur in his voice. Blast it! She must have knocked him for a loop. Oh, Lord. He was moaning so pitifully. All the color had bleached from his face, except for the little lump that was honest to goodness, barely the size of a bird egg―a humming bird. Admittedly, it looked ghastly with all the purple-grape color spearing across his forehead like a wine stain.
“Snakes and spiders? Don’t they all bite?” he asked, falling back again.
“Oh. Yeah. All mine bite. Rabidly.”
The glance he flashed her clearly stated he believed she’d lost her mind. Ignoring his speaking look, Kirrah frowned, and assisted him to sit up. “Are you sure you don’t remember anything?”
“No.”
“No?”
“Yes,” he snapped, sounding quite cranky. “No, I don’t remember a thing. Yes, I’m sure. And dammit, my head hurts like hell. You hit me!”
“I thought you didn’t remember,” she said accusingly.
“I don’t remember. But you did. Didn’t you? You hit me...with a―a club.”
“I did not! Why would I hit you with a club?”
“I don’t know, but you hit me with something. Didn’t you?”
“I can’t be sure. My memory, you know, a bit out there.”
“A bit out there? Female, you’re a bit out there!”
“No need to get nasty just because you have a slight headache.”
“Slight headache?” he muttered. “Did you or did you not whack me with a broom?”
“Boy, for someone who can’t remember, you remember too darn well.”
“Did. You. Hit. Me?”
“I’m. Not. Admitting. Anything. And you can’t prove I hit you. No witnesses.” She glanced around, shivering. “It’s awfully dark out here. So-oo, Mr. Vampire, let me help you to your feet. You can be on your merry little way. No harm done.”
Once he was on his feet, he leaned heavily against her. “I’m not a vampire. I’m a wa-wa…” he paused, drawing a shaky breath.
“You’re a wa-wa? What’s that?”
“No. I’m a wak-wak…”
“A wak-wak? Are you spoofing me?”
“Not―spoofing…I’m a wa-wa…”
“Yeah, I think I got that part.” Kirrah grinned. “Come on, Mr. Wa-Wa. Let’s get you to the house. I can‘t leave you wandering alone in the woods when it’s plain you don’t know if you’re a wa-wa or a wak-wak.”
“I don’t know what I am,” he admitted, stumbling against her. “Oh, sheeahta!”
“Sheeahta? What does that mean?”
“Shit. It…uh…means shit. I―I’m going to―” he broke off, retching.
Kirrah screeched, did a little side-step jig and wrinkled her nose at the awful sour smell now clinging to the front of her white cotton tee-shirt. “Eeewww. Well, Mr. Wa-Wa, I think we may have a teensy-weensy problem here.”
“Teensy-weensy?”
“Uh―no. We aren’t going to the jumbled, butchered English thingy again.”
“We aren’t?”
“I think maybe you have a concussion. Not a big one, you know, little, like the lump on your forehead, but still, maybe, a―a wee concussion. How many of me do you see?” Kirrah waved her hands in front of his face when he didn’t answer right away. “How many, Mr. Wa-Wa?”
He lifted a brow and directed a steely gaze at her.
Gosh, he had pretty eyes. They glittered like topaz jewels now that they weren’t quite so cloudy with pain.
“I see half,” he said.
“Half?” Kirrah wrinkled her brow in consternation. “I don’t think seeing half a person is part of the test. Oh, dear. Maybe I accidentally fractured your very thin, frail skull. Now look closely and try again. How many of me do you see?”
“Half.”
“You’re supposed to see double.”
“Yeah? Well there are barely enough of you to see a half, so how could I see a whole, much less two of you? Not much to you, button.”
“Huh.” Kirrah tossed an accusing glare over her shoulder. “This is your fault, broom. You’re just plain evil. You knocked Mr. Wa-Wa plumb cuckoo.” She frowned, watching the broom fall into step behind her. “Stop pouting, broom. I am not taking responsibility for this. I told you to stop doing all those insane zigzags and belly rolls. Did you listen? No. You’re the one who crashed into him, dashing about like―like a winged creature of the night, except, you haven’t any wings. If you were flying for crap, you wouldn‘t get a turd.”
Kirrah stilled, her footsteps dragging to a sudden halt. “For Pete’s sake,” she gasped. “You probably don’t even have a pilot’s license.”
“Who Pete?” the broom asked following behind her. “Don’t know any Pete. Is this big fellow Pete?”
“No! I don’t know,” Kirrah snapped. “And stop talking. You wanna get us both in trouble?”
“Who are you talking to?” Mr. Wa-Wa asked.
Kirrah jumped and pasted a quick, innocent smile on her mouth. “No one. Are you hearing things, too?” Drat, the man. He’d just scared ten years off her life by being inquisitive. “See? There’s no one here beside me but you, nothing in front of me, but the trees.”
“Uh-huh.” He leaned heavier against her.
Kirrah gave a delicate shudder as wariness tripped down her spine. “Are you feeling sick again? Please don’t throw-up on me again,” she requested earnestly. “Could you give me a little more warning besides the words, Oh, dunghill? Which simply aren’t informative at all as to what to expect is coming up? No pun intended.”
He slanted a disbelieving gaze at her. “Dunghill?”
“Yep. Instead of sheeahta? Dunghill is the word my friend Hannah uses, instead of,” she shrugged. “You know.”
“I’ll try,” he assured her. “No promises, though. It’s a foreign word to me. Won’t come naturally.”
“Well sheeahta is a foreign word to me.”
“Who were you talking to?”
Kirrah sighed. “What?”He sounded suspicious to Kirrah. She was certain he thought she was up to some kind of trickery. “Back to that, huh?”
The man had a one-track, cracked mind. Should she tell him? She could hope he wouldn’t remember their conversation, but honesty compelled her to tell the truth. She never lied. At least, she almost never lied, except in an emergency and that didn’t count. “The broom that’s following behind us,” she blurted, before she could change her mind.
“The broom that’s―”
Mr. Wa-Wa attempted to glance over his shoulder, wobbled unsteadily, then moaned and clutched his head. “Oh, uh…dunghill!”
“What? No! Don’t you dare,” she shrieked.
“That’s the word you told me to use it when I’m feeling―”
His sentence broke off sharply. His eyes bugged and Mr. Wa-Wa blinked like an owl at her. Then his eyes rolled to the back of his head. He promptly passed out, slumping heavily against her.
Kirrah winced as the full force of his weight toppled hit her. She wasn’t strong enough to hold him up, and she wasn’t about to let him crash-land on top of her. She’d be buried beneath at least two hundred twenty pounds of pure muscle.
She let go and jumped back.
Mr. Wa-Wa hit the ground like a felled tree.
Kirrah’s jaw dropped. She covered her eyes with her palms and scrunched her shoulders. “Oh! Oh, this awful. Forget sheeahta. Forget dunghill. This is an, Oh shit day!” Slowly, she dropped her hands to her sides and opened one eye. She made herself look at him. His face was pale as death. A ribbon of blood trailed past his ear and along the right side of his neck. From where she stood, he looked horrible. “Oh, goodness gracious, broom,” she wailed. “I think I killed Mr. Wa-Wa.” She kneeled beside him and slipped her hand beneath his head. “Oh, shit, broom. This is bad. Stop snickering, broom. It isn’t my fault he hit the back of his head against a protruding rock. I didn’t see it when I let go of him. I swear I didn’t.” She looked up, saw the broom dance a little jig. “Stop that,” she scolded. “Why are you so happy? I could get the electric chair for this. This is just awful. At least it didn’t make that splat sound this time. He didn’t even moan, broom. No, you―you couldn’t really call it a moan. It was more like a―a―long, drawn-out, Ooomph.”
Kirrah lifted one closed eyelid and examined his pupil. “Oh, dear, I think maybe he’s really concussed this time.” She wrung her hands. “Of course he’s concussed. Why wouldn‘t he be? Don’t panic, Kirrah. It’s not like you killed him. He’s alive. It’s really too dark to tell how his pupils are reacting. Maybe he’s not concussed. Maybe he’s…”
She bit her lower lip. Of course it was too dark to be certain about anything. “The blood, well, maybe he’s a bleeder. No sense making snap judgments. Maybe he isn’t concussed. Maybe he’s just a big softie with an even softer head.”
And maybe brooms could fly.
Oh. Yeah. Brooms could fly.
“Well, broom, we’ve certainly done it this time. He’s out for the count.” Kirrah turned him to his side and gently rubbed her fingers over the knot on the back of his head. She drew back her hand, aghast at the amount of blood on her fingertips. “I hope you have a sense of humor, Mr. Wa-Wa. I think you’re going to need it.”
Wrapping her arms tightly around the man’s broad shoulders, Kirrah spoke quietly to the broom, “Take us home, broom. No dive bombing. No loop-de-loops. We wouldn’t want Mr. Wa-Wa to awaken and be frightened out of his slightly addled mind. Or toss his cookies all over me again, so no showing off.”
Kirrah held the man close. If he remembered anything at all when he woke, he’d be frightened enough. He’d probably shout and cringe with fear when she confessed she was a real live, cauldron-stirring, spell-casting witch, one prone to minor accidents.
He’d probably run all the way to the next town. He did seem to have a weak constitution. Two teeny-tiny blows to the skull, and he was out like a light bulb. The only thing in her favor was the fact he’d had difficulty remembering she’d flown into him. She winced. With any luck at all, maybe this time when he woke, his memory would be worse. Maybe he’d never recall what happened at all. She grinned. Yeah.
Kirrah smothered a moan and considered whacking him on the head again just to make sure he retained his questionable amnesia. “Better not.”
She’d be in enough trouble as it was when he regained his memory.
“Home, broom,” she ordered tersely, dragging Mr. Wa-Wa to his feet. “Gods, he weighs a ton,” she grunted. “Take us home. And don’t even think about showing off or I’ll ground you. If you had wings, I’d strip you of all flying privileges. Yeah.” She sniffed with righteous anger. “I’d rip off your wings.”
“Witch mad at broom?”
“You could say that, yeah.” Kirrah tossed her tangled mass of auburn hair over her shoulders and sighed.
She swore she heard the broom heave a disgruntled moan and mutter, Well, dunghill.
I thought as a special Trick-or-Treat surprise, I'd post Chapter Two from Witch's Fire, Book Five of the Winslow witches of Salem. WF is scheduled for release in April, 2010 from Eternal Press.
Happy reading and Happy Halloween!
Tabs
Chapter Two of Witch's Fire
Beltaine, Beltane, Beltanee: Also known as May Day.
Ru-Noc
Magical Forest
Near Sanctuary
Immortal Realm
Beltane
Kirrah Walker soared high in the sky.
Literally.
On a plain, ordinary, everyday, purchased-at-the-Dollar-Store-broom. A simple item made of straw, wood and a bit of wire.
Nothing magical about it.
Right?
Kirrah moaned. “Right, except for the rider.”
However, her lack of control of the magic at her fingertips was pretty ugly. The broom might not have started out charmed, but it was now. So charmed, its entire features had morphed.
The straw was now switches.
The handle was broader, longer and darker, and polished to a shine so rich she could see her reflection in it.
Or she could if it was daylight.
No wire to hold the switches in place. So how did they remain? She had no clue. They were attached to the broom and it was all that mattered.
This broom definitely was not from the Dollar Store.
What happened to the one she’d purchased?
Did it still exist on some other plain?
Not only was this new broom bursting with energy and magic, it had turned into a speed demon from hell. It went from zero to eighty in one point two seconds, a flash across the night sky easily mistaken for a shooting star.
The problem was she didn’t know what she’d done, what she’d said, to hex it.
Kirrah sighed once again. Well, those weren’t the only problems. They were simply part of it.
It was all the broom’s fault!
She hadn’t done a single thing to encourage its crazy antics. For heaven’s sake, she knew very well there hadn’t been one thing special about the broom when she purchased it.
Hah! Try telling it to the ferocious beast racing through the night sky like an over fueled jet with a pilot hell bent to reach his destination.
For a moment, she and the broom hovered above a tree top. Kirrah puffed a tangled curl that drooped over her left eye out of her field of vision.
“I feel the need for speed. Woo hoo!”
Kirrah widened her eyes. “Oh, my goodness, you didn’t just speak.”
“Yes, I did.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Did.”
“Didn’t.”
“Okay. Have it your way, witch, but you better hang on to your ass, is only warning you get.”
“Ohh! Oh, shit, broom! Slow down!”
“Can’t. Gotta itch for speed.”
Oh! Oh! This wasn’t possible. A talking broom? A flying broom? She’d lost her ever-loving-mind. Kirrah breathed deeply. She panted. She chanted, though God only knew if what she chanted simply encouraged to broom to show off. “I don’t believe in witches. I don’t believe in witches.”
“How you not believe in witches when you one? When you fly on back of broom?”
“It’s a dream. It’s all a bad dream.”
“Real dream. Good dream.”
“Shut-up!”
“Humph.”
Kirrah decided it wasn’t so much the flying that created problems, although that too, had its moments. The problem was landing. Now that she was higher than a kite on the Fourth of July, she hadn’t a clue how to get herself and the maniac broom back on the ground.
So here she was, racing among the clouds, looking down on rooftops, treetops, feeling dizzy―with no earthly idea how she got here.
Apparently her plain, ordinary, run-of-the-mill broom was in no hurry to cooperate with a landing. Even if she knew the right words to bring it down, it had stopped listening to her commands the minute it soared away with her.
Zoom!
“Ahhhhhhh,” Kirrah screeched as the broom revved up its speed another notch. She hadn’t known the broom had warp speed. “Ohh! Oh, damn, broom. Slow down! I’m getting dizzy.”
“Told you to hang on.”
“Stop speeding.”
It totally ignored her.
In her mind, she heard its evil cackling. The broom was up to more tricks. It streaked across the sky faster than a speeding comet. Sure, it was frightening, okay, a lot frightening, a little on the chilly side, and every now and then she had to spit out some kind of attack bug, but it was fun, energizing, exhilarating―even if it was scary.
She wasn’t used to flying. Ha! That was saying a lot. It was even scarier when the broom rocked unsteadily, like now, and kicked in passing gear.
Kirrah choked her fingers around the scrawny handle, which only seemed to make the broom even more unsteady.
Was that a gagging sound she heard?
“Release me.” Cough. Splutter. Cough. Cough.
She thought her eyes might bulge right out of their sockets. “You really do talk? It wasn’t my imagination?” She stared at the handle. No mouth. “Nah, you can’t talk.”
“Can―to. You’re―choking―me―you―dumb―shit.”
“Oh, oh, poop―poop―poop! You can talk.”
“Told―you. Re―lease―me,” the broom said in a strained voice.
Kirrah eased the choke-hold she had on the handle.
“Weeee,” the broom chortled excitedly. It whirled and spun as if it’d been given a new lease on life and climbed even higher.
Kirrah controlled the urge to tighten her fingers around it again. What if she killed it? Then they’d crash.
What was she thinking?
It wasn’t like the broom was actually alive. Was it?
What a miserable night this had turned out to be. One minute she’d been standing in her kitchen doorway gazing up at the dark sky, intoxicated by the frigid night air and admiring the tiny sliver of moon playing peek-a-boo with the clouds.
She’d been talking to herself―a terrible flaw she’d recently developed―and wishing aloud for a closer view of the moon. The next moment―the mundane little broom propped in a corner transformed and swooshed beneath her butt. It took off in the night with her perched precariously on top of it.
“Good heavens,” she’d shrieked, so startled, she barely had time to grip the broom handle before it soared off into the dark and zoomed over the treetops with her held captive. That was when she realized…she was a for-sure-and-certain witch. It was one of those Ah-ha moments she sometimes had.
Oh, yeah, she’d suspected for a month or so she might be a witch. Might be. Maybe. No proof, though, other than hearing a man’s deep accented voice summoning her for the past week. Yeah, that had raised her suspicions. But hell, she’d read every single one of those Christine Feehan vampire romances. She thought a fanged creature was using a mental link to summon her. She wasn’t about to acknowledge a real live breathing vampire. She frowned. Or a real dead non-breathing one, either. Eeeww.
Kirrah tried hard to convince herself the fireplace didn’t roar to life every time she walked past it, flames shooting up the chimney like happy fireflies. Candles didn’t light up for any apparent reason and the burners on the stove didn’t flare to life.
What was it with fire…and her?
It was like she had some kind of mysterious power over it.
But it wasn’t just fire. Light switches flipped off or on. Inanimate objects floated through the air simply because she wished for them. Now that had spooked the poop outta her the first time it happened. But she’d convinced herself things were merely short-circuiting around her.
But here was proof. Genuine proof. Oh, yes. It was a red-letter day―er, night. Yes, siree. She was a fricking-screeching-cackling-full-fledged-certified-broom-riding-witch!
Should she wear black?
Wear a pointy hat?
Blacken her teeth?
Search for ruby slippers?
Kirrah shivered as the cold night air whizzed through her tangled mop of hair. Nervously, she gripped the handle of the broom a little tighter, but not so tight she strangled it. Every now and then her ears popped with the change in altitude.
Her skin felt clammy and cold.
She bet she was pea-green. Oh, heavens. Puke-green and vertigo didn’t go well with her outfit. Oh. Oh, dear. If she fell off the broom, she’d be nothing but a little puddle of―dizziness swept over her.
Kirrah choked the broom.
It coughed. Sputtered, but charged on like a rocket.
“I want down, broom. Now!”
She was deathly afraid of heights. The way her stomach bubbled, she was sure to throw-up. Again. Kirrah prayed the broom from Hell wouldn’t decide to do another loop-de-loop.
Uh-oh. Too late!
Satan’s little toy-of-joy must have read her mind, because it shot straight up, did a stunning acrobatic spin, belly over belly, and left her belly somewhere behind.
“Oh-my-God,” she wailed. “Go down! Down, I say! I want down!”
The broom performed another spectacular gyrating spin, then plunged straight down in a suicide spiral, before leveling off at the very last second. It wove through the woods like an out-of-control rocket―straight toward a man who stood innocently gaping at her and the wild-ass broom.
He wore one of those, I-don’t-believe-what-I’m-seeing expressions, eyes wide, lips parted with utter disbelief. Speechless.
Oh, yes. He was properly impressed, all right.
He was also standing in a danger zone.
“Get out of the way,” Kirrah yelled, flapping one arm, motioning for him to move, but the warning came too late. She slammed into him at a peculiar angle, side-swiping his head and smacking him on the side of his forehead with the broom handle.
Splat!
Heavens. It sounded just like a watermelon struck by a baseball bat. Eeewww.
“Oops.” Kirrah wrinkled her nose in dismay. Squeezing her eyes tightly shut, she clenched her teeth together. She really didn’t want to see this, but knew she should check on the man. Kirrah opened one eye and shot a glance over her shoulder as she barreled past him like a speeding bullet―just in time to see him do a perfect flip-flop, head over heels.
“Ohh! Oh, dear.” But she didn’t have time to consider the injuries inflicted on the poor soul. No. She needed to concentrate on the wicked broom. It sputtered, hacked, sputtered. She eyed her hands. She might wish to, but she wasn’t choking the broom, so it must be running out of gas. “About time, too.”
Kirrah yelped and clutched the broom handle. Swear to the stars, the thing suddenly swerved, rocked unsteadily, then shot straight toward a giant Ark tree like a heat-seeking missile.
“Oh, no. No, broom. Change direction. I command you to change direction.”
The broom, as usual, ignored her. She tried pulling up on the handle. No use. There was only one choice left her. She bailed. “Ouch!” Rubbing her bruised and aching backside, Kirrah watched the broom make a big loop and head straight toward her.
Quickly, she ducked and swore under her breath. It whistled past her head and crashed head-on into the massive tree. “Tyrant! Maniac! You could have killed us,” she yelled.
The broom wilted. It clattered to the ground at her feet, gave one final sputter, then stilled.
“Don’t you ever do that to me again.” Kirrah shook her finger at the dejected broom, eyed her finger and thought better of it. What if she hexed it again? Magic lay in her fingertips. Crazy magic she’d never been able to control and that always involved snakes, spiders or other nasty little beasties. Now, runaway brooms.
She couldn’t help herself though. She laughed and clapped her hands in delight. Her body felt exhilarated, her face flushed. The sheer joy and the incredible thrill of the wild ride had to feel like getting struck by lightning. Every nerve in her body tingled. Pumping a fist in the air, she cheered, “Woo-hoo! Oh, my, but that was fun, broom.” A low moan snared her attention and snapped her out of her cheering mode. “Oh, goodness.” She’d forgotten all about her hit-and-fly-victim. “Uh-oh. I think we might be in a spot of trouble here, broom.”
Hmmm. How was she going to explain flying on a broom? She didn’t have Aunt Penell here to put a hex over her latest victim.
And she was simply awful at casting spells.
Kirrah pushed herself up and limped over to where the stranger was laid out cold as a corpse on a mortuary slab. She cut her gaze over him. “Holy smokes.”Her eyes widened in appreciation. “When the gods passed out bodies, you ordered a big one.”
At least six-foot-four, the man’s biceps bulged, bared by a loose fitting brown leather vest. He looked scrumptious. Thick hair the color of a ripe wheat field and lightly sprinkled with a cinnamon color fell across wide shoulders. Tawny-colored stubble dusted his chin and jaws. Apparently the man wasn’t into shaving regularly. He looked rough, untamed and like a big lion.
Snug brown leather pants hugged his lower body. A smattering of dark blond hair lightly furred his chest where the vest fell apart. The trail of silky hair narrowed into a straight line to the waistband of his tan leather pants and disappeared.
Kirrah licked her lips. Holy crap. The man was seriously ripped, a sexual beast in leather. A soft head though, for the blow from the broom handle had knocked him out cold.
Still, he was rugged. Raw, sexy, take-me-home-with-you-and-I’ll-give-you-my-babies, alluring, wicked male.
Huh. What was she going to do with him? Kirrah chewed on her lower lip as she puzzled over this latest problem in her life. He reminded her of someone. Who? She gnawed on her upper lip and mulled it over. Travis Fimmel! A Calvin Klein underwear man, oh, yeah, baby! Talk about a hottie! She should know. She’d drooled enough staring at pictures of the Auzzie cutie on the Internet to last a lifetime. Man, she’d had the biggest crush on the hunky male model a couple of years back.
Oh, but this man looked even yummier. More mature. Muscular. Sexy. Had she thought sexy already? Never mind. Her mouth watered. It was just incredible the handsome hunk was served up to her a-la-carte―and only slightly damaged.
First chance she got, she was taking a bite of this forbidden fruit. All she needed was some whipped cream. Or she could just go for licking the ice cream cone, lots of slow, delicious licking.
Kirrah moved closer and leaned cautiously over him. “Oh!” She gasped as his lids suddenly snapped open. He stared at her, but his eyes didn’t really look all that focused. He blinked and moaned deep in his throat.
Uh-oh. Oh, dear. He really looked confused. Sounded baffled. This wasn’t good.
How bad were his injuries?
Would her automobile insurance cover the damages? Shit. She’d have to go over her policy when she got home, but she was pretty sure there no were clauses covering accidents while flying on a broom.
Should she abandon him and leave him as a hit-and-fly victim? The thought had possibilities. In her mind she saw the imaginary ice cream cone melting into a milky, useless puddle. No sweets tonight, she thought. Anyway, he probably thought she’d tried to kill him.
“What…happened?” he asked, lifting a hand to his forehead.
He didn’t remember? How cool was that?
Kirrah grabbed his hand. “Don’t touch it. You’re bleeding.”
“Bleeding?”
“Only a little.” She squeezed one eye shut and sort of clenched her teeth. Damn. She hated confessing her responsibility, but her inner devil insisted she come clean. Drat the little guy, always interfering in her life. “Oh, well…there’s also a―a teensy-weensy bump.”
“Teensy?” The man winced as he touched his head. “What the hell does teensy mean?”
“Ooh. You don’t understand English very well? Teensy means uh―uh, miniature, smaller than miniature…sort of.”
“I speak proper English, not the jumbled-up butchered words you speak.”
How insulting! Butchered-up, indeed. Kirrah’s temper―which she swore was always mild―revved up a notch. Well, she wasn’t a redhead for nothing she thought. “Jumbled-up? Butchered? Ha! You speak proper English my patootie.”
“It doesn‘t feel tiny.”
“Huh? What doesn’t feel tiny?” She gave a half-hearted shrug when she realized what he was talking about―and it wasn’t her patootie. Guilt slapped her again and her temper deflated. “Well, maybe not so little, but not real big, either,” she quickly added. “It might be somewhat…er―bigger than a…duck egg?” she ended with a questioning note.
“Bigger than a duck egg? Is that your idea of tiny?”
“Well, that’s better than it being large as a goose egg…right?” There was no call for him to yell. She decided to ignore his rudeness. After all, his slight injury was her fault. She’d forgive him for being grumpy, too…he probably had a slight headache. “Do you remember what happened?”Please, say no.
“Better yet, have a long lasting case of amnesia,” she blurted before she could stop herself.
“What?”He glanced around as if trying to figure out where he was and why she was praying out loud for him to have amnesia.
Did he know what amnesia was?
The man looked very discombobulated to her.
Did amnesiacs look discombobulated?
“Uh…let’s try this again. Do you remember what happened?”
His tawny brows knitted in a deep scowl. “No. I haven’t a clue.”
No? The man said, No? Yes. Yes-yes-yes! Kirrah grinned. Happy days! She barely stopped herself from jumping up and dancing a jig across the forest floor. Amnesia! Her new best friend. Woot-woot! Oh, yeah. This little problem was going away real fast.
“Aww, what a shame,” she clucked sympathetically. “I’m so sorry you have no memory and all because of a lit-tle lump the size of a chicken egg on your poor, too soft head.”
“Yeah.”
Kirrah frowned. He sounded bewildered, but since he agreed that his head was soft, she decided she loved his strange accent. He thought her English was jumbled? His words were so thick he sounded like―like―who? A little like―yes, that was it―Count Yorga or was it Count Dracula? Oh, dear. Weren’t they both vampires?
In any case, he sounded just like the male voice in her head the last few days. The male voice she’d totally ignored, but been crept out by. So far as she knew, only vampires entered a person’s head uninvited and chatted with them.
Maybe he’d been following her. Stalking her?
Why else had he been here, right in her flight path?
What if he was an ax murderer?
Kirrah glanced around. Until now, she hadn’t noticed just how creepy it was in the forest. They were in the woods, the dark woods, and except for the big ole’ shiny full moon hanging like a perfectly round, gigantic light bulb between the nests of clouds, very little light penetrated the inky black around them.
Could he change into a bat? Would he?
Did he have fangs?
Rabies?
Shit! Did he bite?
“Are you a vampire?” She narrowed her eyes. “I’m warning you, mister, I have powers that would scare a demon. Yes, I―I can conjure snakes and red-eyed spiders, the kind that bite. Hard.”
“What?”
“Ah, a man of few words.”
“Man?”
Darn it! Her mystery man didn’t seem to have many words in his vocabulary. He sounded more bewildered by the minute. He struggled to sit up, but collapsed back onto the ground, groaning. “Are there any other kind?” he asked a bit drunkenly.
“Any other kind of what?” Kirrah bit her lip worried about the slur in his voice. Blast it! She must have knocked him for a loop. Oh, Lord. He was moaning so pitifully. All the color had bleached from his face, except for the little lump that was honest to goodness, barely the size of a bird egg―a humming bird. Admittedly, it looked ghastly with all the purple-grape color spearing across his forehead like a wine stain.
“Snakes and spiders? Don’t they all bite?” he asked, falling back again.
“Oh. Yeah. All mine bite. Rabidly.”
The glance he flashed her clearly stated he believed she’d lost her mind. Ignoring his speaking look, Kirrah frowned, and assisted him to sit up. “Are you sure you don’t remember anything?”
“No.”
“No?”
“Yes,” he snapped, sounding quite cranky. “No, I don’t remember a thing. Yes, I’m sure. And dammit, my head hurts like hell. You hit me!”
“I thought you didn’t remember,” she said accusingly.
“I don’t remember. But you did. Didn’t you? You hit me...with a―a club.”
“I did not! Why would I hit you with a club?”
“I don’t know, but you hit me with something. Didn’t you?”
“I can’t be sure. My memory, you know, a bit out there.”
“A bit out there? Female, you’re a bit out there!”
“No need to get nasty just because you have a slight headache.”
“Slight headache?” he muttered. “Did you or did you not whack me with a broom?”
“Boy, for someone who can’t remember, you remember too darn well.”
“Did. You. Hit. Me?”
“I’m. Not. Admitting. Anything. And you can’t prove I hit you. No witnesses.” She glanced around, shivering. “It’s awfully dark out here. So-oo, Mr. Vampire, let me help you to your feet. You can be on your merry little way. No harm done.”
Once he was on his feet, he leaned heavily against her. “I’m not a vampire. I’m a wa-wa…” he paused, drawing a shaky breath.
“You’re a wa-wa? What’s that?”
“No. I’m a wak-wak…”
“A wak-wak? Are you spoofing me?”
“Not―spoofing…I’m a wa-wa…”
“Yeah, I think I got that part.” Kirrah grinned. “Come on, Mr. Wa-Wa. Let’s get you to the house. I can‘t leave you wandering alone in the woods when it’s plain you don’t know if you’re a wa-wa or a wak-wak.”
“I don’t know what I am,” he admitted, stumbling against her. “Oh, sheeahta!”
“Sheeahta? What does that mean?”
“Shit. It…uh…means shit. I―I’m going to―” he broke off, retching.
Kirrah screeched, did a little side-step jig and wrinkled her nose at the awful sour smell now clinging to the front of her white cotton tee-shirt. “Eeewww. Well, Mr. Wa-Wa, I think we may have a teensy-weensy problem here.”
“Teensy-weensy?”
“Uh―no. We aren’t going to the jumbled, butchered English thingy again.”
“We aren’t?”
“I think maybe you have a concussion. Not a big one, you know, little, like the lump on your forehead, but still, maybe, a―a wee concussion. How many of me do you see?” Kirrah waved her hands in front of his face when he didn’t answer right away. “How many, Mr. Wa-Wa?”
He lifted a brow and directed a steely gaze at her.
Gosh, he had pretty eyes. They glittered like topaz jewels now that they weren’t quite so cloudy with pain.
“I see half,” he said.
“Half?” Kirrah wrinkled her brow in consternation. “I don’t think seeing half a person is part of the test. Oh, dear. Maybe I accidentally fractured your very thin, frail skull. Now look closely and try again. How many of me do you see?”
“Half.”
“You’re supposed to see double.”
“Yeah? Well there are barely enough of you to see a half, so how could I see a whole, much less two of you? Not much to you, button.”
“Huh.” Kirrah tossed an accusing glare over her shoulder. “This is your fault, broom. You’re just plain evil. You knocked Mr. Wa-Wa plumb cuckoo.” She frowned, watching the broom fall into step behind her. “Stop pouting, broom. I am not taking responsibility for this. I told you to stop doing all those insane zigzags and belly rolls. Did you listen? No. You’re the one who crashed into him, dashing about like―like a winged creature of the night, except, you haven’t any wings. If you were flying for crap, you wouldn‘t get a turd.”
Kirrah stilled, her footsteps dragging to a sudden halt. “For Pete’s sake,” she gasped. “You probably don’t even have a pilot’s license.”
“Who Pete?” the broom asked following behind her. “Don’t know any Pete. Is this big fellow Pete?”
“No! I don’t know,” Kirrah snapped. “And stop talking. You wanna get us both in trouble?”
“Who are you talking to?” Mr. Wa-Wa asked.
Kirrah jumped and pasted a quick, innocent smile on her mouth. “No one. Are you hearing things, too?” Drat, the man. He’d just scared ten years off her life by being inquisitive. “See? There’s no one here beside me but you, nothing in front of me, but the trees.”
“Uh-huh.” He leaned heavier against her.
Kirrah gave a delicate shudder as wariness tripped down her spine. “Are you feeling sick again? Please don’t throw-up on me again,” she requested earnestly. “Could you give me a little more warning besides the words, Oh, dunghill? Which simply aren’t informative at all as to what to expect is coming up? No pun intended.”
He slanted a disbelieving gaze at her. “Dunghill?”
“Yep. Instead of sheeahta? Dunghill is the word my friend Hannah uses, instead of,” she shrugged. “You know.”
“I’ll try,” he assured her. “No promises, though. It’s a foreign word to me. Won’t come naturally.”
“Well sheeahta is a foreign word to me.”
“Who were you talking to?”
Kirrah sighed. “What?”He sounded suspicious to Kirrah. She was certain he thought she was up to some kind of trickery. “Back to that, huh?”
The man had a one-track, cracked mind. Should she tell him? She could hope he wouldn’t remember their conversation, but honesty compelled her to tell the truth. She never lied. At least, she almost never lied, except in an emergency and that didn’t count. “The broom that’s following behind us,” she blurted, before she could change her mind.
“The broom that’s―”
Mr. Wa-Wa attempted to glance over his shoulder, wobbled unsteadily, then moaned and clutched his head. “Oh, uh…dunghill!”
“What? No! Don’t you dare,” she shrieked.
“That’s the word you told me to use it when I’m feeling―”
His sentence broke off sharply. His eyes bugged and Mr. Wa-Wa blinked like an owl at her. Then his eyes rolled to the back of his head. He promptly passed out, slumping heavily against her.
Kirrah winced as the full force of his weight toppled hit her. She wasn’t strong enough to hold him up, and she wasn’t about to let him crash-land on top of her. She’d be buried beneath at least two hundred twenty pounds of pure muscle.
She let go and jumped back.
Mr. Wa-Wa hit the ground like a felled tree.
Kirrah’s jaw dropped. She covered her eyes with her palms and scrunched her shoulders. “Oh! Oh, this awful. Forget sheeahta. Forget dunghill. This is an, Oh shit day!” Slowly, she dropped her hands to her sides and opened one eye. She made herself look at him. His face was pale as death. A ribbon of blood trailed past his ear and along the right side of his neck. From where she stood, he looked horrible. “Oh, goodness gracious, broom,” she wailed. “I think I killed Mr. Wa-Wa.” She kneeled beside him and slipped her hand beneath his head. “Oh, shit, broom. This is bad. Stop snickering, broom. It isn’t my fault he hit the back of his head against a protruding rock. I didn’t see it when I let go of him. I swear I didn’t.” She looked up, saw the broom dance a little jig. “Stop that,” she scolded. “Why are you so happy? I could get the electric chair for this. This is just awful. At least it didn’t make that splat sound this time. He didn’t even moan, broom. No, you―you couldn’t really call it a moan. It was more like a―a―long, drawn-out, Ooomph.”
Kirrah lifted one closed eyelid and examined his pupil. “Oh, dear, I think maybe he’s really concussed this time.” She wrung her hands. “Of course he’s concussed. Why wouldn‘t he be? Don’t panic, Kirrah. It’s not like you killed him. He’s alive. It’s really too dark to tell how his pupils are reacting. Maybe he’s not concussed. Maybe he’s…”
She bit her lower lip. Of course it was too dark to be certain about anything. “The blood, well, maybe he’s a bleeder. No sense making snap judgments. Maybe he isn’t concussed. Maybe he’s just a big softie with an even softer head.”
And maybe brooms could fly.
Oh. Yeah. Brooms could fly.
“Well, broom, we’ve certainly done it this time. He’s out for the count.” Kirrah turned him to his side and gently rubbed her fingers over the knot on the back of his head. She drew back her hand, aghast at the amount of blood on her fingertips. “I hope you have a sense of humor, Mr. Wa-Wa. I think you’re going to need it.”
Wrapping her arms tightly around the man’s broad shoulders, Kirrah spoke quietly to the broom, “Take us home, broom. No dive bombing. No loop-de-loops. We wouldn’t want Mr. Wa-Wa to awaken and be frightened out of his slightly addled mind. Or toss his cookies all over me again, so no showing off.”
Kirrah held the man close. If he remembered anything at all when he woke, he’d be frightened enough. He’d probably shout and cringe with fear when she confessed she was a real live, cauldron-stirring, spell-casting witch, one prone to minor accidents.
He’d probably run all the way to the next town. He did seem to have a weak constitution. Two teeny-tiny blows to the skull, and he was out like a light bulb. The only thing in her favor was the fact he’d had difficulty remembering she’d flown into him. She winced. With any luck at all, maybe this time when he woke, his memory would be worse. Maybe he’d never recall what happened at all. She grinned. Yeah.
Kirrah smothered a moan and considered whacking him on the head again just to make sure he retained his questionable amnesia. “Better not.”
She’d be in enough trouble as it was when he regained his memory.
“Home, broom,” she ordered tersely, dragging Mr. Wa-Wa to his feet. “Gods, he weighs a ton,” she grunted. “Take us home. And don’t even think about showing off or I’ll ground you. If you had wings, I’d strip you of all flying privileges. Yeah.” She sniffed with righteous anger. “I’d rip off your wings.”
“Witch mad at broom?”
“You could say that, yeah.” Kirrah tossed her tangled mass of auburn hair over her shoulders and sighed.
She swore she heard the broom heave a disgruntled moan and mutter, Well, dunghill.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Welcome Tabitha, and her new book Witch's Magic
Hello Readers!
My fellow Paranormal author at Eternal Press, Tabitha Shay, has just released her latest book in the Winslow Witches series, Witch’s Magic. I’m excited to present to you the prologue of this latest fabulous book. So, please read on!
Hint, hint….where to buy: www.eternalpress.ca
http://www.tabithashay.com
Disclaimer: Explicit Language….eighteen plus, please.
Until next time…
Tabitha
Prologue of Witch's Magic
We are in Transylvania, and Transylvania is not England. Our ways are not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things.
~Dracula (Bram Stoker)
Transylvania
Anghel Crypt
Resting Place of Dracula
Mortal Realm
A Do Not Disturb sign swung from an old, rusty chain at the foot of his coffin. He knew it was there.
By the gods, he’d hung it himself before retiring at least five centuries ago.
So why am I being disturbed? Damned illiterates, can’t they read? How was a creature supposed to rest if…?
I said wake up! I need your help.
Annoyed at the rude intrusion blasting his mind and interrupting his most private thoughts, Count Dracula snorted. I hoped it was merely indigestion giving me heartburn or the wind rattling my chain, but truly, do I hear an upstart who dares to enter my sanctum? Go away!
He had not walked among his clan in many centuries. And there was good reason. The world held no surprises. No happiness. No romance. Chivalry was as good as dead. Buried. Well, dead, maybe not buried. He shuddered at the thought of being under all that dirt. And by the gods, he was the most chivalrous being he knew.
Still, it was downright depressing. There were no more knights in shining armor. No damsels in distress. No Rapunzels with thick ropes of hair to toss out a tower window and her one true love scale the wall to rescue her from the evildoer. No unicorns. The last dragon was slain right before he decided he’d had enough of the world.
He’d seen and done it all to the point of boredom; to avoid spending useless years with nothing better to do with his time than to suck and fuck, he took to his coffin centuries early. To be content a vampire needed challenge. Romance. Sex. Oh yeah, lots of the hot stuff.
Brutal honesty forced him to admit he was glad he no longer spent time with his clan, but he hadn’t exactly resigned his position of Ruler of the Ancient Tribunal. It was more like he’d materialized into a bat one night and winged his way off the job, leaving an abrupt message he’d had enough. He’d planned to spend the next several millennia in the sacred Sleep of the Druze, an ancient sleep, and one only the very eldest achieved.
He hadn’t obtained his goal…yet.
The only thing he craved was peace. Rest. Quiet. He had no need to feed, except when the hunger became too much to ignore. He was perfectly happy snatching a bothersome rat when one ventured too close to his coffin. Then he had a quickie snack and went back to sleep.
Rats were good. Dammit, they were!
They might not be hardy, filling or nutritious, but they contained enough blood to sustain life…for a few weeks at a time.
Being one of the Ancients, his need for rest was much more crucial than his need to feed. At his age, all he wanted to do was prop up his feet, so to speak. Yes, peace and quiet was all he craved now. Well, and the occasional female. Two. Three.
No one had dared to disturb him...until now.
So who was this, this person who called to him? A voice he did not recognize. Not surprising. It had been a long time since he’d mentally connected with anyone. He’d pretty much forgotten the sound of speech.
He stirred inside the raggedy satin-lined coffin hidden in a decaying old crypt, all but lost by the passage of time. The only ones who knew where he slumbered were the two other members of the Ancient Tribunal. So how had the upstart rapping on his coffin dug him up?
Get up!
Dracula cocked an ear. Nope, he didn’t have a clue who was silently yelling at him. It wasn’t an Ancient who summoned, but one of the Children, one of the Young Ones.
Annoyance surged through his veins, veins dried and withered to threads from lack of sustenance. Waking an Ancient who had not fed thoroughly for years was strictly forbidden to the Young Ones. It created a danger for all who came near him for several hours.
There were rules, and reasons for those rules. If awakened in a state of extreme hunger, he’d attack and feed until he drained the person dry; then he’d go for the next, and the next, until he was engorged.
Gluttony was a shameful act for his kind. He’d die from embarrassment if discovered devouring his food, that is, if the undead weren’t already in that precarious state.
It was imperative he be awakened slowly.
Nourished slowly.
Regain his strength slowly.
And it was extremely vital at least four females awaited him when he rose. Everyone knew a vampire who’d Druze-slept woke violently horny.
You dare break the laws of our people? Disobey my orders? Ignore my sign? Disturb my slumber?
Yes! Now, get up!
Stop knocking on my coffin! I’m at rest. I need my rest. Go away, upstart.
I need your help, your wisdom, your guidance.
Do I know you?
Don’t pretend you don’t know who I am, Grandfather. You might be Ancient, but there’s nothing wrong with your memory.
Huh?
And don’t pretend you’re deaf. I know your hearing is acute. You can hear a pin drop three miles away.
Huh! Do you have four females waiting for me?
No. You don’t have time to fuck.
No time to fuck? Incredulous, Dracula’s eyes popped open. Aw, shit! There are two spiders doing ‘it’ on the ceiling of my coffin! He shuddered. You know what that means? I’ll be sharing my sleeping quarters with hundreds of their little bastards. I detest the creatures. Always moving in and taking over a fellow’s home. I suppose that means I must give up my bed.
He cleared his throat. Son, listen to me very closely. One must always make time to fuck. Spiders do.
“Filthy vermin. Freeloaders. Go find your own house!” He slapped at the ill-mannered eight-legged arachnids doing the ‘nasty’ above his head.
I’m not your son. And no, there is no time. A war comes, a terrible war.
You woke me because of a lousy war? Pish! There have always been wars. There will always be wars.
Not like this one.
A sigh. What is different about this one? Nothing. Don’t you recall your bloody ancestor and all his wars? Do you have any idea how many people I impaled? Now those were the good old days. Chop. Chop. They got in the way, up on the pike they went. I made damn certain of it. Just thinking about it makes me tired. Let me go back to sleep. There will be casualties, son. There are always casualties. We live. Some die. Others do not. Our kind goes on…if we breed. To breed we must fuck! No time to fuck, my ass! I want to talk to the person who schooled you. He didn’t teach you a thing. Who was he?
You.
Oh.
There’s no time for sex, Grandfather. Not this time. There’s no time to waste. We are too few.
Uh-huh, that’s from not fucking!
For the gods’ sake, this war might see the end of our kind.
A snort. Why do you think such nonsense?
Because this war isn’t simply battles amongst our own, but one that will include the forces from all realms: Vampyre, Demon, Witch and Were. Only the gods know which other realms might become involved. I’m afraid it’s only the beginning. You must rise.
I don’t want to rise.
You’ve slept long enough, Grandfather. Get up. I can’t do this by myself. Get up. Now!
All right! Stop ordering me to get up. No need to get snappy. How do you know this war comes?
I’ve seen it in visions.
Visions? If you’ve seen it in visions, then when will it come? I could sleep until…
No. Get up. Now!
A drawn-out suffering sigh.
When will it begin?
It has already begun…
My fellow Paranormal author at Eternal Press, Tabitha Shay, has just released her latest book in the Winslow Witches series, Witch’s Magic. I’m excited to present to you the prologue of this latest fabulous book. So, please read on!
Hint, hint….where to buy: www.eternalpress.ca
http://www.tabithashay.com
Disclaimer: Explicit Language….eighteen plus, please.
Until next time…
Tabitha
Prologue of Witch's Magic
We are in Transylvania, and Transylvania is not England. Our ways are not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things.
~Dracula (Bram Stoker)
Transylvania
Anghel Crypt
Resting Place of Dracula
Mortal Realm
A Do Not Disturb sign swung from an old, rusty chain at the foot of his coffin. He knew it was there.
By the gods, he’d hung it himself before retiring at least five centuries ago.
So why am I being disturbed? Damned illiterates, can’t they read? How was a creature supposed to rest if…?
I said wake up! I need your help.
Annoyed at the rude intrusion blasting his mind and interrupting his most private thoughts, Count Dracula snorted. I hoped it was merely indigestion giving me heartburn or the wind rattling my chain, but truly, do I hear an upstart who dares to enter my sanctum? Go away!
He had not walked among his clan in many centuries. And there was good reason. The world held no surprises. No happiness. No romance. Chivalry was as good as dead. Buried. Well, dead, maybe not buried. He shuddered at the thought of being under all that dirt. And by the gods, he was the most chivalrous being he knew.
Still, it was downright depressing. There were no more knights in shining armor. No damsels in distress. No Rapunzels with thick ropes of hair to toss out a tower window and her one true love scale the wall to rescue her from the evildoer. No unicorns. The last dragon was slain right before he decided he’d had enough of the world.
He’d seen and done it all to the point of boredom; to avoid spending useless years with nothing better to do with his time than to suck and fuck, he took to his coffin centuries early. To be content a vampire needed challenge. Romance. Sex. Oh yeah, lots of the hot stuff.
Brutal honesty forced him to admit he was glad he no longer spent time with his clan, but he hadn’t exactly resigned his position of Ruler of the Ancient Tribunal. It was more like he’d materialized into a bat one night and winged his way off the job, leaving an abrupt message he’d had enough. He’d planned to spend the next several millennia in the sacred Sleep of the Druze, an ancient sleep, and one only the very eldest achieved.
He hadn’t obtained his goal…yet.
The only thing he craved was peace. Rest. Quiet. He had no need to feed, except when the hunger became too much to ignore. He was perfectly happy snatching a bothersome rat when one ventured too close to his coffin. Then he had a quickie snack and went back to sleep.
Rats were good. Dammit, they were!
They might not be hardy, filling or nutritious, but they contained enough blood to sustain life…for a few weeks at a time.
Being one of the Ancients, his need for rest was much more crucial than his need to feed. At his age, all he wanted to do was prop up his feet, so to speak. Yes, peace and quiet was all he craved now. Well, and the occasional female. Two. Three.
No one had dared to disturb him...until now.
So who was this, this person who called to him? A voice he did not recognize. Not surprising. It had been a long time since he’d mentally connected with anyone. He’d pretty much forgotten the sound of speech.
He stirred inside the raggedy satin-lined coffin hidden in a decaying old crypt, all but lost by the passage of time. The only ones who knew where he slumbered were the two other members of the Ancient Tribunal. So how had the upstart rapping on his coffin dug him up?
Get up!
Dracula cocked an ear. Nope, he didn’t have a clue who was silently yelling at him. It wasn’t an Ancient who summoned, but one of the Children, one of the Young Ones.
Annoyance surged through his veins, veins dried and withered to threads from lack of sustenance. Waking an Ancient who had not fed thoroughly for years was strictly forbidden to the Young Ones. It created a danger for all who came near him for several hours.
There were rules, and reasons for those rules. If awakened in a state of extreme hunger, he’d attack and feed until he drained the person dry; then he’d go for the next, and the next, until he was engorged.
Gluttony was a shameful act for his kind. He’d die from embarrassment if discovered devouring his food, that is, if the undead weren’t already in that precarious state.
It was imperative he be awakened slowly.
Nourished slowly.
Regain his strength slowly.
And it was extremely vital at least four females awaited him when he rose. Everyone knew a vampire who’d Druze-slept woke violently horny.
You dare break the laws of our people? Disobey my orders? Ignore my sign? Disturb my slumber?
Yes! Now, get up!
Stop knocking on my coffin! I’m at rest. I need my rest. Go away, upstart.
I need your help, your wisdom, your guidance.
Do I know you?
Don’t pretend you don’t know who I am, Grandfather. You might be Ancient, but there’s nothing wrong with your memory.
Huh?
And don’t pretend you’re deaf. I know your hearing is acute. You can hear a pin drop three miles away.
Huh! Do you have four females waiting for me?
No. You don’t have time to fuck.
No time to fuck? Incredulous, Dracula’s eyes popped open. Aw, shit! There are two spiders doing ‘it’ on the ceiling of my coffin! He shuddered. You know what that means? I’ll be sharing my sleeping quarters with hundreds of their little bastards. I detest the creatures. Always moving in and taking over a fellow’s home. I suppose that means I must give up my bed.
He cleared his throat. Son, listen to me very closely. One must always make time to fuck. Spiders do.
“Filthy vermin. Freeloaders. Go find your own house!” He slapped at the ill-mannered eight-legged arachnids doing the ‘nasty’ above his head.
I’m not your son. And no, there is no time. A war comes, a terrible war.
You woke me because of a lousy war? Pish! There have always been wars. There will always be wars.
Not like this one.
A sigh. What is different about this one? Nothing. Don’t you recall your bloody ancestor and all his wars? Do you have any idea how many people I impaled? Now those were the good old days. Chop. Chop. They got in the way, up on the pike they went. I made damn certain of it. Just thinking about it makes me tired. Let me go back to sleep. There will be casualties, son. There are always casualties. We live. Some die. Others do not. Our kind goes on…if we breed. To breed we must fuck! No time to fuck, my ass! I want to talk to the person who schooled you. He didn’t teach you a thing. Who was he?
You.
Oh.
There’s no time for sex, Grandfather. Not this time. There’s no time to waste. We are too few.
Uh-huh, that’s from not fucking!
For the gods’ sake, this war might see the end of our kind.
A snort. Why do you think such nonsense?
Because this war isn’t simply battles amongst our own, but one that will include the forces from all realms: Vampyre, Demon, Witch and Were. Only the gods know which other realms might become involved. I’m afraid it’s only the beginning. You must rise.
I don’t want to rise.
You’ve slept long enough, Grandfather. Get up. I can’t do this by myself. Get up. Now!
All right! Stop ordering me to get up. No need to get snappy. How do you know this war comes?
I’ve seen it in visions.
Visions? If you’ve seen it in visions, then when will it come? I could sleep until…
No. Get up. Now!
A drawn-out suffering sigh.
When will it begin?
It has already begun…
Saturday, August 1, 2009
A Small View of Tabitha Shay’s Vampire World
Hi Readers,
When I first began writing the Winslow witches of Salem series, I had no plans to write a series. Certainly, I had no idea of bringing vampires into the brand new world I was creating. I’m sure as with most authors, once I sat down and began to have a bit of a vision quest, the ideas went totally berserk. I couldn’t get a handle on them. First, the witch world of Ru-Noc grew. But then, I knew I had to have an antagonist.
Where were these characters going to come from? And why? What did they want? And again…why did they want it? Okay. I was on a roll. I had my witch characters…the good, the bad, the ugly.
Aha! As my world of magic grew and grew, I had to stop and think a bit more. Was this battle between good and evil only going to involve this one single realm? Then…Why should it? Why shouldn’t they have neighboring realms other than humans? If I have a witch world, then why not include all the other species we’re familiar with? Vampires. Werewolves. Demons. The plot thickened.
Slowly, my other realms began to take shape, but I didn’t want to overwhelm my readers with so many worlds and characters all at once. So I stuck to the original idea and developed my witch world. Then as each book progressed, I began to filter in the other realms and with these other realms, also came the good, the bad, the ugly.
It wasn’t just Ru-Noc that was in trouble and on the brink of war, on the brink of becoming extinct.
Like Ru-Noc, each of my realms has their great leaders…their heroes and heroines who fight just to keep their way of life alive, but as the battles start taking shape, as these wars begin to overlap, each hero and heroine find themselves pulled into the other realms when they really want no part of them.
As the heroes and heroines meet and fall in love, they discover they can no longer live in a vacuum and ignore what is happening in their neighboring worlds. Thus, the witch world spills over into the vampire realm, but more than this, the male witches suddenly discover their numbers are few. Their females are breeding with their one major enemy, the Demons. Their species is being eradicated.
In my vampire realm, they have their own war going on and choose to leave the witches to their fate. The vampires I create are mostly the typical vampires we’re all used to reading about. They can’t go out in the sunlight, but some have learned to tolerate a few minutes of early morning sunlight. They have to have blood to survive and they certainly aren’t ashamed of this fact. The males are sensual, sexual beings who have no problem ‘sexing’ any female from any race, be they witches, werewolves, humans…well, you get the idea.
Some sleep in coffins. Some don’t.
Their world is made up of laws and rules that have worked perfectly well for them for many centuries…but that is all about to change. After all, they no longer live in medieval times.
My vampires are an ancient race, even more ancient than my witches, but they didn’t begin life in the human realm they now co-exist in. They come from the realm known as Pi-Ram. They choose to live in Romania/Transylvania and have broken their bonds with their home realm…they think.
Of course, they arrived in Romania long before Vlad the Impaler made his debut. My vampires can read minds without sharing their blood. They have several rulers and each Prince of Darkness has a small principality where they will eventually become the ruling king, but they still answer to the ONE KING…Dracula.
You know I couldn’t leave out the Father of Vampires…right?
Dracula, of course, is ancient. He’s a bit on the testy side, a total womanizer, but he loves his clans and will do whatever it takes to see that their way of life continues.
When the vampires first enter the witch series, Valerian, one of the ruling princes is on the verge of becoming king of his domain. But you just know there’s a fly in the ointment. He has a twin brother, Brasov who challenges his right to be king and since so many centuries have passed and no one can recall which of the brothers was born first, a decision must be reached.
A race for the throne begins in a most unusual way. Who becomes the ruling king will be decided by the Ancients, based on which brother takes a First Bride and breeds an heir first.
Sounds easy?
Not so.
Finding and acquiring a First Bride and even managing to keep her once obtained suddenly turns into a major challenge for our sexy vamps. The Brides come from different species, but the one thing they all agree on: First Bride…Only Bride.
They aren’t willing to share their new mates…only, the Prince’s of Darkness have laws they must live by. Three Brides is the law and there’s no changing it.
Our hunky vamps are caught up in their private battle to win a Bride when out of the blue they’re attacked by the same race that is slowly wiping out the witch realm...Demons.
Suddenly, the battles taking place in Ru-Noc is at their own front door and the vamps find if they want to survive, they’ll have to join forces with the witches…easier said than done when the witches aren’t too keen to become the vamps next meals.
Now dear reader, we have all kinds of wars taking shape and everyone is losing, except of course….the Demons.
In my next installment, I’ll tell you a little about the Werewolf realm I’ve created, Na-Cyl. Note: Na-Cyl is Lycan spelled backward.
Until next time…happy reading.
Tabitha Shay
When I first began writing the Winslow witches of Salem series, I had no plans to write a series. Certainly, I had no idea of bringing vampires into the brand new world I was creating. I’m sure as with most authors, once I sat down and began to have a bit of a vision quest, the ideas went totally berserk. I couldn’t get a handle on them. First, the witch world of Ru-Noc grew. But then, I knew I had to have an antagonist.
Where were these characters going to come from? And why? What did they want? And again…why did they want it? Okay. I was on a roll. I had my witch characters…the good, the bad, the ugly.
Aha! As my world of magic grew and grew, I had to stop and think a bit more. Was this battle between good and evil only going to involve this one single realm? Then…Why should it? Why shouldn’t they have neighboring realms other than humans? If I have a witch world, then why not include all the other species we’re familiar with? Vampires. Werewolves. Demons. The plot thickened.
Slowly, my other realms began to take shape, but I didn’t want to overwhelm my readers with so many worlds and characters all at once. So I stuck to the original idea and developed my witch world. Then as each book progressed, I began to filter in the other realms and with these other realms, also came the good, the bad, the ugly.
It wasn’t just Ru-Noc that was in trouble and on the brink of war, on the brink of becoming extinct.
Like Ru-Noc, each of my realms has their great leaders…their heroes and heroines who fight just to keep their way of life alive, but as the battles start taking shape, as these wars begin to overlap, each hero and heroine find themselves pulled into the other realms when they really want no part of them.
As the heroes and heroines meet and fall in love, they discover they can no longer live in a vacuum and ignore what is happening in their neighboring worlds. Thus, the witch world spills over into the vampire realm, but more than this, the male witches suddenly discover their numbers are few. Their females are breeding with their one major enemy, the Demons. Their species is being eradicated.
In my vampire realm, they have their own war going on and choose to leave the witches to their fate. The vampires I create are mostly the typical vampires we’re all used to reading about. They can’t go out in the sunlight, but some have learned to tolerate a few minutes of early morning sunlight. They have to have blood to survive and they certainly aren’t ashamed of this fact. The males are sensual, sexual beings who have no problem ‘sexing’ any female from any race, be they witches, werewolves, humans…well, you get the idea.
Some sleep in coffins. Some don’t.
Their world is made up of laws and rules that have worked perfectly well for them for many centuries…but that is all about to change. After all, they no longer live in medieval times.
My vampires are an ancient race, even more ancient than my witches, but they didn’t begin life in the human realm they now co-exist in. They come from the realm known as Pi-Ram. They choose to live in Romania/Transylvania and have broken their bonds with their home realm…they think.
Of course, they arrived in Romania long before Vlad the Impaler made his debut. My vampires can read minds without sharing their blood. They have several rulers and each Prince of Darkness has a small principality where they will eventually become the ruling king, but they still answer to the ONE KING…Dracula.
You know I couldn’t leave out the Father of Vampires…right?
Dracula, of course, is ancient. He’s a bit on the testy side, a total womanizer, but he loves his clans and will do whatever it takes to see that their way of life continues.
When the vampires first enter the witch series, Valerian, one of the ruling princes is on the verge of becoming king of his domain. But you just know there’s a fly in the ointment. He has a twin brother, Brasov who challenges his right to be king and since so many centuries have passed and no one can recall which of the brothers was born first, a decision must be reached.
A race for the throne begins in a most unusual way. Who becomes the ruling king will be decided by the Ancients, based on which brother takes a First Bride and breeds an heir first.
Sounds easy?
Not so.
Finding and acquiring a First Bride and even managing to keep her once obtained suddenly turns into a major challenge for our sexy vamps. The Brides come from different species, but the one thing they all agree on: First Bride…Only Bride.
They aren’t willing to share their new mates…only, the Prince’s of Darkness have laws they must live by. Three Brides is the law and there’s no changing it.
Our hunky vamps are caught up in their private battle to win a Bride when out of the blue they’re attacked by the same race that is slowly wiping out the witch realm...Demons.
Suddenly, the battles taking place in Ru-Noc is at their own front door and the vamps find if they want to survive, they’ll have to join forces with the witches…easier said than done when the witches aren’t too keen to become the vamps next meals.
Now dear reader, we have all kinds of wars taking shape and everyone is losing, except of course….the Demons.
In my next installment, I’ll tell you a little about the Werewolf realm I’ve created, Na-Cyl. Note: Na-Cyl is Lycan spelled backward.
Until next time…happy reading.
Tabitha Shay
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