Revenge of the Witch

  Revenge of the Witch

  Crypt Witch Cozy Mystery Series, Volume 3

  K.E. O'Connor

  Published by K.E. O'Connor, 2018.

  While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book, the publisher assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.

  REVENGE OF THE WITCH

  First edition. November 8, 2018.

  Copyright © 2018 K.E. O'Connor.

  Written by K.E. O'Connor.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  If you enjoyed this book, you might enjoy other books written by K.E. O’Connor:

  Chapter 1

  “There’s one of the little imps!” My sister, Aurora Crypt, pointed to a sickly green vapor as it slid from a crack in the cemetery.

  I shook my head. Only Aurora would call a potentially lethal, soul sucking demon an imp.

  “I’m on it.” I raced over, stick in hand, and slammed it on the head of the demon who was trying to escape the prison.

  “There’s another creeping through here,” Aurora yelled.

  As I turned, she slammed her own stick on top of a demon’s horned head before sealing the crack with a blast of white magic.

  It was unusual for me to work a shift at the cemetery, but the resident demons were being tricky. They’d been disrupting the stability of the prison for almost a week, launching relentless attacks on any weakness they discovered. The whole family was working overtime to ensure none of them crept out and caused chaos.

  The sticks we held weren’t your average sticks, but powerful magic staffs that weakened demons by absorbing their energy when they came into contact with them.

  “This is like a game of whack a mole, just with demons.” Wiggles, my mostly faithful talking hellhound, wandered over with a stick in his mouth. This stick was for throwing, not smacking down misbehaving demons.

  I checked the coast was clear before throwing the stick for him. I turned at the sound of a teeth jarring crack and saw Aurora slam a demon back down. For a witch who followed the white magic path, she sure looked thrilled to be pounding demons.

  She wiped a hand across her forehead and grinned at me. “What’s going on with these guys? They’ve got a bee in their twisted demon bonnets about something.”

  “Maybe they’ve stopped bitching at each other and decided it’s better to work together to break out of our prison. Not that it will do them any good.”

  “Not when we’re here with our fancy twirlers.” Aurora spun the stick in her hand like a talented majorette.

  I did the same, and the stick landed with a thud on the ground. “Whatever their plans are, we’ll stop them.”

  “Over there! Here comes another one.” Aurora pointed over my shoulder.

  I raced in the direction of a red mist covering part of the cemetery.

  “Tempest, this does not look good,” Aurora whispered as she joined me, her fingers digging into my arm. “You know what a red mist means.”

  “That we won’t get any freshly baked muffins from this demon,” I said. Demons had different ways of emerging. Some appeared in a cloud of purple mist. Others favored green, but the ones you needed to worry about the most came with a red or black tinge. It promised twisted, nasty magic. Magic that burned your skin and threatened to send you mad if you spent any time immersed in it. That kind of evil was never permitted to run loose in our cemetery.

  “We should call for backup,” Aurora said. “Mom and Granny Dottie have more experience with this kind of demon.”

  The mist curled toward us as I raised my stick. “We don’t need them. We’ve learned from the best.”

  Aurora adjusted the stick in her hand. “Are you sure?”

  “Would your big sister ever lie to you?”

  “You do about food.”

  I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye. “When have I ever lied about food?”

  “At my eighth birthday party, when the chocolate cupcakes went missing. I knew you’d taken them, but you swore to Mom you hadn’t.”

  “I don’t remember that.” Those cupcakes had been amazing. Rich and gooey and covered in popping candy. I’d eaten two every night for a week until they were too stale, sneaking the wrappers off and hiding under my covers as I read my book by torchlight. It was heaven.

  “You do! I found the moldy wrappers under your bed.”

  I turned my full attention to Aurora. “You know better than to look under my bed.”

  Aurora huffed out a breath. “My friends thought I’d lied about those cupcakes.”

  “It didn’t ruin the party. And you’re still the most popular girl in Willow Tree Falls, even if you are too stingy to serve cupcakes at your birthday.”

  “Tempest!” Aurora glared at me. “Those were my party cupcakes.”

  I tapped my stick in my hand. “We can’t focus on cupcakes. This demon smells like Baccaras. Do you remember him? I dragged him here after almost a month of searching. He stank so bad I had to burn my clothes.”

  Aurora sniffed the air and gagged. “Sulfur, rotten fish, and... what else is it?”

  “I always thought he stank like used diapers.”

  “Yes! That’s it. Baccaras smells of a soggy diaper.” Aurora grinned at me. “We can handle him together.”

  Witches and demons were never close friends. There were a number of half-demons living in Willow Tree Falls, but the full-on demons were too chaotic to be trusted. They had lifetime bans unless they got a never-get-out-of-jail card from me.

  Even though I hosted a particularly unpleasant demon, Frank, inside me in order to keep my sister safe, I had little time for them. When I wasn’t in Willow Tree Falls, I was out capturing misbehaving demons and bringing them into Angel Force to deal with.

  The ground trembled beneath our feet. It was a sure sign the demon was on his way.

  We stood in an attack stance, sticks raised and knees bent, ready to swipe his head if he dared pop his horns out for a sniff of fresh air.

  “Are you sure it’s Baccaras?” Aurora whispered.

  I shook my head. There were thousands of demons beneath our feet. I hadn’t captured them all. Some had been here for hundreds of years, maybe longer. Monitoring the demon prison had been the family business for centuries. That’s what the Crypt family did. We kept the rest of the world safe from devious demons.

  The ground rumbled again, and a spurt of steam shot from a new crack.

  “We should seal the crack before he comes through.” Aurora stepped forward.

  I grabbed her arm. “This demon needs to be taught a lesson. Try to escape our prison, and you end up with a bad headache and your power drained.”

  I glanced over my shoulder and was relieved to see Wiggles engrossed in chewing his stick. It was a habit he’d never had when he was a regular dog. Turn him into a hellhound and he developed a love of all things sticky. I didn’t want Wiggles anywhere near a demon. Even though he was a hellhound and had a hide as tough as a rhino, they still might like to play with him.

  My hand went to my stomach as Frank stirred. He’d been quiet
these past three hours since I’d started working with Aurora, but I was taking a chance being around her for so long. Frank loved Aurora. Or rather, Frank would love to kill Aurora.

  I stifled a sulfurous belch behind my hand as Frank’s energy pulsed strongly. I took two steps away from Aurora. I didn’t want her worrying about me when we had a demon trying to break free.

  “Stay where you are,” I muttered to Frank.

  “Your charming sister is so close. I can smell her. What do you expect me to do?” His voice was just a whisper in my head.

  “Slide out of me and head into the prison, like you’re supposed to do.” Frank was a stubborn son of a demon. All my attempts to get him out of me had failed. It seemed he liked living inside a witch.

  “Where’s the fun in that? If I was in there, I couldn’t enjoy your fascinating company.”

  I snorted, and my fingers tightened around the stick. I’d get rid of Frank one day and finally be rid of his sweet tooth, bad attitude, and twisted desire to choke the life from my only sister.

  “Here he comes,” Aurora yelled as the red mist intensified and a low hissing emerged from the crack.

  “Are you ready?” I asked her as the mist stung my eyes and blurred my vision.

  She nodded, her blue eyes wide but a determined look on her face. “We’ve got this.”

  “It’s time for a game of whack a demon.” Wiggles trotted over.

  “Don’t get involved,” I cautioned him. “You don’t want to be dragged into the prison.”

  Wiggles cocked his head. “You’d come and get me if that happened.”

  “Sorry, buddy. You’d be on your own if you were dumb enough to get caught by a demon.” I probably would get him out, but I wouldn’t enjoy it.

  Wiggles squinted up at me, his eyes glowing their usual hellhound red. “They’d love me down there. I’d fit right in.”

  I had to smile. He was right. Wiggles had a way of charming everybody, and now that he came with a nifty side order of hellhound, the demons wouldn’t mind him at all. But Wiggles was my best friend, and no demon was getting its mean little claws on him.

  I coughed as the mist grew thicker and swiped my hand across my face, so I wouldn’t miss the moment the demon emerged.

  “Do you see him?” Aurora yelled.

  “I can barely see where you are,” I said. “You?”

  “Nothing yet. I’ll get closer.”

  “Don’t risk it,” I yelled. “We’ll know when he’s here.”

  The ground bucked, and there was a ripping sound of stone grinding together as the crack grew larger.

  I drew the stick over my head and inched closer. Any second now, the demon would poke his head out, and he’d be sorry when he did.

  “Be careful of this one,” Frank whispered in my head. “He likes to eat feisty witches for dinner.”

  “He can keep his demon paws off us,” I muttered. “He’s not getting to play tonight.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” Frank said.

  That was an odd thing about Frank. Although his singular mission was to get free and attack Aurora, he came in handy now and again. His powers were wild and unpredictable, but when he gained control, there was little that could beat us. We were a weird and inappropriate double act.

  I appreciated it when Frank’s energy faded. Although he was a pain in the backside, he tended not to cause me much trouble when I needed to focus. I sometimes felt he was looking out for me, but that wasn’t possible. Frank was chaos and evil. He was no-one’s friendly uncle.

  I grabbed a nearby headstone to stop from falling as the ground rumbled under my feet again.

  “I think I see him,” Aurora shouted. “Over here.”

  “Where’s here?” I let go of the headstone and stumbled through the thick, sour smelling mist.

  Aurora screamed, and I increased my pace, heading in the direction of the sound.

  My eyes widened as I saw an enormous head, topped with black curling horns, jutting out of the crack in the ground. The crack had spread several yards across the cemetery, and Aurora stood at the opposite end to me, swiping her stick at the demon as his clawed arm flew through the air trying to reach her.

  “No, you don’t.” I raced over and slammed my stick into the back of the demon’s head repeatedly.

  He roared but was unable to turn, given the tightness of the gap he was in. But he was inching his way out, and I did not want to see the rest of his enormous bulk come out of that crack.

  Aurora joined the attack, and between us, we jabbed and poked, enraging him as he spat sharp shards of brimstone at us.

  “It’s working,” Aurora yelled. “He’s getting smaller. We’re taking his energy.”

  I squinted at the demon. He was getting smaller, but he was also pulsing. That was a bad sign. “We should get back.”

  “We’ve almost got him,” Aurora said. “A few more whacks, and he’ll be back inside.”

  “I think he’s going to—” the demon exploded in a hot shower of sticky red goo.

  A huge backdraft sucked the majority of the goo toward me as the demon slid into the crack, muttering curses in Latin.

  The gross smelling goo covered me from head to toe, and I was thrown off my feet as it slammed into my face. I landed on my back with a gasp and lay there staring up at the star-filled sky.

  Wiggles trotted over and looked at me before shaking his head. “What is it with you and demon goo? You enjoy bathing in the stuff.”

  “Not out of choice.” I swiped my hand over my goo covered mouth and grimaced. Demon goo always had the underlying taste of rotten eggs and sour milk.

  I sat up slowly and shook goo off my favorite black jacket. I watched as Aurora expertly sealed the crack in the demon prison, and the last of the red mist evaporated, leaving nothing but a clear night lit by a large, pale moon.

  As she walked over, I let out an exasperated sigh. Aurora had escaped all the demon goo. Her white pullover and fitted dark jeans were spotless. Other than a glow to her cheeks from the exercise we’d gotten smacking the demon, she looked like she’d just stepped out of a salon.

  Aurora held her hand out to me. “It’s time for a shift change.”

  I waved away her hand, not wanting to cover her in the sticky muck I’d just been showered in.

  Aurora ignored me, grabbed my arm, and helped me to my feet. “I can get that jacket clean. It’s just a bit of demon residue. You’ve been covered in worse.”

  I belched again, and Frank stirred, his interest more acute after Aurora had touched me. “Auntie Queenie should be here in a moment to take over.”

  Aurora nodded. She knew how tricky it was for us to spend too much time together without Frank crashing the party. She wisely dropped her hold on my arm and took a few steps back. “We did a great job tonight.”

  I smiled at her. “We make a good team.”

  “Did someone say tea?” Auntie Queenie strolled over, a large bag slung over one arm and a pastry in her free hand.

  Aurora hurried over and kissed her cheek. “We were saying it was almost time for you to get here.”

  “I’m here, right on time.” She looked around the cemetery. “It seems quiet.” Her gaze went to the goo splattered on me and the ground, but she didn’t pass comment.

  I exchanged a smile with Aurora. “We’ve been bored all night. Nothing to do but play cards and count stars.”

  Auntie Queenie sidestepped the goo as she finished her pastry. “Tempest, you get off and see how Cloven Hoof is doing. We can handle things from here.”

  I nodded goodbye and hurried out of the cemetery with Wiggles. My bar, Cloven Hoof, sat at the other end of Willow Tree Falls, only a ten-minute walk from the cemetery. It was a specialist bar, serving mildly magical and completely legal treats. Other than when we had the occasional party, it was a chilled-out place, and it was just where I wanted to be tonight. Hunting demons was stressful.

  I headed to the front door and nodded at Suki, who stood o
utside.

  Suki was a new recruit to Cloven Hoof. Being a giant wood nymph with muscular arms like gnarled tree trunks, she did an excellent job as an intimidating bouncer.

  “How’s everything going tonight?” I asked her.

  Her gaze traveled over my goo splattered appearance before she nodded. “There are plenty of people in, but they’re behaving themselves.”

  “Tempest Crypt, as I live and breathe.”

  I turned and stared at the three guys approaching Cloven Hoof. I groaned inwardly as I recognized Dewey Lavern, Puddle Lavern’s nephew. He’d always been a smarmy git when growing up. Now that he was an adult, nothing had changed.

  “Dewey, what brings you to Willow Tree Falls?” I asked him. “The last time I saw you here, you said this village was too backward for your city tastes.”

  “Visiting my auntie. Mom said the old girl gets lonely living in that cottage on her own.” He smirked and shoved his thick, dark hair off his forehead. Some people might consider Dewey attractive, but his eyes always looked cold to me. “That’s an interesting look you’re wearing.” His gaze ran over my ruined clothing.

  I flicked goo off my hand, so it splattered on the ground by his feet. “I’m trying something new.”

  Dewey kicked dirt over the goo. “These are my friends, Serath Duckle and Bart Ranger. We’re staying a few days. I’m showing them around my childhood home.”

  I nodded at the two guys with him. I’d seen them with Dewey before on his rare visits. Serath was tall and pale with large blue eyes. Bart was shorter and stockier with a stubbled chin and dark eyes that swept around as if he was looking for something.

  “Even with gross goo on you, you’re looking good, Tempest,” Dewey said. “Are you still single?”

  “As ever, just as I like it.”

  “We’ll come to Cloven Hoof later. You can buy me a drink, and we can catch up.”

  “Tempest doesn’t need to buy the drinks in here, buddy,” Wiggles said. “She owns the place.”

  Dewey stared at Wiggles. “It talks.”

  “Well spotted.” I nudged Wiggles with my calf as he growled. “Cloven Hoof might not be the place for you. You should try the Ancient Imp.”