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  Fang Ten

  A Magic Island Paranormal Cozy Mystery

  Emery Belle

  FANG TEN

  A Magic Island Paranormal Cozy Mystery

  Book 3

  By Emery Belle

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  © Copyright 2019

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Contents

  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

  Afterword

  About the Author

  For my daughter,

  who has brought a new kind of magic to my life.

  Chapter 1

  I glanced down at the address in my hand and back up at the cheerful yellow brick building in front of me, my stomach knotted with nerves. Even though I was grateful beyond words that the High Court had spared me from permanent banishment from the island—no thanks to Lord Macon, of course—I had hoped to serve out my community service hours in something a little less… terrifying. But a punishment was a punishment, and unless I completed my hours on schedule, Lady Amabelle had warned me that I’d be sent packing back to the mainland.

  So I had no choice but to enter the lion’s den.

  Taking a deep breath, I squared my shoulders, plastered the brightest smile on my face I could manage, and pushed through the front door, the bells above my head tinkling merrily. The first thing I saw was a petite blonde about my age hurrying up to me, her expression strained, her long hair escaping her ponytail. A chubby baby dwarf was toddling after her, tugging on the ends of his short beard and wailing at the top of his lungs.

  “Welcome to Wonder Years Daycare,” she said, scooping up the dwarf and balancing him on her hip. He grinned at me, two bright spots of color appearing high on his fat cheeks, then made a loud hacking sound and lobbed a glob of spit directly into my face.

  “You must be Wren,” the woman added, offering me a handkerchief and a sympathetic smile. “We’ve been looking forward to meeting you—as you can see, we could use all the help we can get. I’m Astrid, the assistant manager, and this is Topsy.” She patted the dwarf on the head, and he nuzzled his cheek against her shoulder, looking positively innocent. When she glanced away, he gave me a wicked grin and stuck out his tongue.

  “I have to warn you,” I said as Astrid beckoned for me to follow her through the building, “I don’t know the first thing about kids. I’ve never really been around any.” Other than the orphanage and various foster homes where I’d grown up, of course, but I didn’t feel the need to disclose any of that to a stranger. Truth be told, I’d never really gotten over my rough start in life, even though those days were far behind me. Being the little girl that no one ever wanted to adopt was a wound that was forever buried deep within my soul, like a splinter that wouldn’t budge no matter how many times you picked at it.

  “That’s okay,” Astrid said brightly, navigating around two toddler vampires who were comparing the size of their fangs and giggling loudly. “You’ll just be a general helper—you know, playing with the kids, giving out snacks, trying not to get eaten…”

  She winked when she saw my stricken expression. “I’m kidding, of course. Just a little joke I like to tell the newcomers. In the entire history of the daycare, we’ve only ever had one… incident.” I waited for her to wink again, but this time, her face was grave, and I swallowed hard and tried to look nonchalant, as though murderous babies were an everyday occurrence.

  “We like to separate the youngest kids by species,” she said as we walked down a hallway lined with doors painted in bright primary colors. “They aren’t yet at a point in their development where they can master their impulses, and so it’s safest not to provide any temptations.” She stopped at a yellow door with hand-drawn pictures of smiling suns and rainbows. “This is our zombie room.”

  Frowning, I looked at the door. Something seemed… off… about it, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Then it hit me. There was no doorknob.

  “Ah, yes,” Astrid said knowingly as she saw me looking around for one. “That’s for security measures, of course. We used to have knobs on all the doors until one of the lion shifters got loose and broke into the brownie playroom.” She shuddered. “Luckily they beat him back with their mops and brooms, but we could have had a disaster on our hands. Now stand back.”

  She pulled out her wand and tapped the door twice. The wood seemed to waver and wobble, as though we were looking at it underwater, and Astrid stepped right through it, tugging me along after her. I heard a sucking sound as we emerged on the other side, and when I glanced back, the door looked as solid as ever.

  The chattering that had filled the playroom stopped abruptly as the zombie babies caught sight of us and licked their lips in unison, their silver eyes glazing over with a look that could only be described as hunger. In fact, I’d seen that exact same expression on Glenn’s face every time he plopped himself down in front of a fresh platter of peanut brittle.

  I eyed Astrid’s wand, wishing I had one of my own for protection, then gave the nearest zombie baby—a little girl in pigtails with a smattering of freckles across her pale cheeks—a tentative smile. “Hi, I’m Wren. What’s your name?” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Astrid shaking her head frantically, trying to catch my attention.

  But it was too late.

  “Fresh meat,” the little girl squeaked, climbing slowly to her feet as I tried to step away but found myself backed up against the door. The other babies in the room lifted their noses and sniffed the air with relish, and I saw Astrid’s grip on Topsy tighten almost imperceptibly as the dwarf tried clawing his way further up her shoulder.

  The babies stood up as one and began walking slowly toward us, their heads tilted to the side, their tiny feet dragging slightly on the carpet, which… did it have to be that particular shade of blood red? Wasn’t that like buying a set of bedsheets that smelled like freshly baked donuts?

  “Uh-oh,” Astrid said, her hand tightening around her wand, though she kept it tucked inside her pocket.

  “Can’t you do something?” I hissed as they trudged closer, their silver eyes roaming over our bodies with the kind of fervor I usually reserved for digging into a juicy hamburger. “Isn’t there a spell you can cast that will make us look a little less delicious?”

  “Hattie encourages us not to use our wands against the kids,” Astrid whispered back. “She doesn’t want us to scare them, you know, create any long-lasting psychological scars… She’s really into the whole idea of nurturing them over relying on our magic to dominate them. She thinks it’s better for their self-esteem.”

  “Yeah, well, you can tell Hattie—whoever that is—to take her psychobabble and shove it up her—”

  “Kiddies!” a singsong voice called, and a short, spry-looking older woman materialized next to us carrying a tray of milk and cookies, both of which were tinged green. “Time for our yummies!”

  With a wave of her wand, she se
nt the tray flying into the middle of the room, and the zombie babies immediately turned their attention away from us and congregated around it, shoveling cookies into their mouths faster than I could blink. Within minutes, their eyelids began to grow heavy, and they shuffled off to the corner of the room, which was lined with rows of comfortable-looking cots. As soon as their heads hit the pillows, the sounds of light snoring filled the room.

  “Really, Astrid,” the woman scolded, collecting the tray with another wave of her wand and tucking it under her arm, “you should know better than to bring a newcomer in here before the babies have had their snack. One quick bite to the brain and my entire business will get shut down.”

  After Astrid muttered an apology, her cheeks coloring with embarrassment, the woman turned her attention to me, giving me a kind smile as her navy-blue eyes sparkled behind her thin glasses. “Why don’t we start you off with something a little easier, like the ogre room? They mostly just sit around and drool.”

  She ushered me back through the door, leaving Astrid behind to watch over the napping zombies. “I’m Hattie Bumble, by the way, owner of this little slice of heaven. Although I guess what you just witnessed was more like the deeper levels of Hades.”

  “I’m—” I began to say, but she cut me off with a casual wave of her hand.

  “No need for introductions, Wren Winters, Lady Amabelle’s an old friend of mine, and she gave me the full briefing on your little showdown with Lord Macon and the High Court. I have to say, at first I was just a tad concerned about hosting a felon…”

  Felon? I opened my mouth to argue, but Hattie fixed me with a steely glare that caused me to hastily close it again.

  “…but she assured me that you would be no trouble. So.” She clapped her hands together. “It’s almost snack time, and I could use your help in the kitchen. I know you haven’t graduated past your training wand yet, so how handy are you with a regular old knife?”

  Without waiting for me to respond, she barreled on, “We pride ourselves on giving the kids nutritious snacks throughout the day… It’s best not to let them get too hungry. Keeps the monsters inside docile.”

  We reached the kitchen, and she held the swinging door open for me so I could enter first. I looked around, feeling slightly disappointed at the sight of the normal refrigerator, double sink, and cracked tile countertops—we could have been in a kitchen in Anywhere, USA, not a paranormal island set deep into the Pacific Ocean teeming with magical creatures of every possible variety. That feeling quickly dissipated, however, when Hattie marched over to the refrigerator and began perusing its contents, with me hovering over her shoulder and trying to keep the queasy feeling in my stomach at bay.

  “Here are today’s selections,” she said, pulling out various plastic storage containers and peeling off the lids one by one. “For the ogres,” she said, indicating a tub filled with yellowed fingernail shavings and eyeballs that were staring at me accusingly, as if I had plucked them from their owners with my bare hands. Next came a series of miniature vials of blood for the vampires separated by blood type—it seemed that O-positive was the flavor of choice. After that Hattie showed me a jar of candied worms for the little gnomes, raw meat for the werewolves, and foil-wrapped chocolate coins for the leprechauns.

  As I tried to keep my breakfast firmly in place while listening to Hattie drone on about the perfect temperature to heat the blood for the vampire infants’ bottles, a high-pitched wailing caused me to nearly jump out of my skin and look around wildly.

  “Oh, that’s just the banshee,” Hattie said, looking supremely unconcerned as the mournful wailing continued, causing every last hair on my body to stand on end. She frowned down at the vial of A-negative blood she was funneling into a bottle, syringe in hand. “Now where was I?”

  “Don’t banshees warn of impending death?” I asked nervously, cringing as the wailing died down and then immediately started up again, this time sounding more urgent. “Maybe we should see what’s—”

  Hattie shook her head blithely, waving the syringe around as she did so, and I ducked to avoid being splattered by the droplets of blood flying from its tip. “Don’t pay her any mind, Wren,” she said, filling the bottle and dropping the syringe. She then picked up a butter knife and demonstrated how to slice the eyeballs into even strips before passing the knife to me and indicating that I should continue where she’d left off.

  “That banshee is a baby, only three months old, and she has no idea how to control her powers,” Hattie continued. “I’d wager my antique wand collection that she bit the head off her doll and is mourning its death, not trying to warn us of anything sinister. Besides, I don’t feel a day older than three hundred and seventy-two, which, incidentally, was the best year of my life.”

  She peered at me. “And you look perfectly healthy to me. A little peaky, but that’s to be expected, I suppose. After a few more days here, you’ll be tougher than unicorn leather.” She opened her mouth to continue but was interrupted by Astrid appearing at the kitchen door looking frantic, Topsy still in tow.

  “Hattie,” she said urgently, “I need your help. The yetis are trying to play Twister with the brownies, and three of them have already been flattened.”

  Hattie swore loudly and hurried out of the room at a speed that belied her age, leaving me alone with the various delicacies. With a loud sigh, I grabbed an eyeball and picked up the butter knife. “Don’t give me that look,” I said to it as I squeezed my own eyes shut and prepared to slice through it.

  Was this really the High Court’s idea of an easy punishment, or was Lady Amabelle trying to teach me a lesson? Suddenly, permanent banishment from the island didn’t seem so bad after all.

  “A few housekeeping notes to take care of before we get started with today’s lesson,” Lady Winthrop said, striding into the room without so much as a hello.

  Garnet and Hunter, who had been pretending to curse each other with their training wands, immediately straightened up, and I glanced up from perusing the chapter on offensive spells in our spellbook. After finding myself confronting not one but two murderers in my short time on Magic Island, I figured I needed all the help I could get. I was itching to get my hands on my own wand so I could practice my magic freely, but so far Lady Winthrop had made no mention of when that time might come.

  She perched on the edge of her desk and straightened her ruby red robes, then looked down her glasses at each of us in turn. “I trust that you have taken the last couple of weeks to bond with your familiars, because the time has come to start their formal training.”

  I stifled a groan as an image of Pierre sprang to my mind; the dog was disobedient on a good day, and the thought of trying to wrangle him was laughable. In fact, I would bet good money that he was back in my dorm room right this very minute, chewing on my new color-changing purse. I’d purchased it for myself as a gift for successfully surviving my run-in with Wendall, the brownie who had murdered the yeti model Emeril to stop him from using a mind control potion on the other brownies who worked at his winter estate. And no, you can’t make that stuff up.

  “Your first familiar training lesson will take place this Saturday on the academy’s lawn,” Lady Winthrop continued, flicking her wand so that the date and time scrawled itself on the blackboard behind her. “Calvin, your instructor, is an accomplished wizard with years of experience working with many different types of animals, and we are fortunate that he has agreed to head our familiar training program. He has wrangled even the most difficult of creatures.”

  Her eyes cut to me and she gave me a knowing smile; apparently, Pierre was quickly becoming island-famous. Too bad it was for all the wrong reasons… like just yesterday, when he knocked over an elderly witch in the middle of the town square because he mistook the wand she was carrying for a sausage. I made a mental note to see if there was such a thing as liability insurance for familiars.

  “In other news,” Lady Winthrop said as Garnet shot me a pitying look, “next Saturday
evening the latest batch of witches and wizards who have graduated from the academy with full honors will be formally invited into the Sparrow Coven. This is, of course, a momentous occasion for these men and women, and the private robing ceremony will be followed by dinner and dancing at Sparrow Manor for the entire coven. As academy students, you are invited and encouraged to attend the festivities, and you are each permitted to bring a plus-one.”

  Garnet’s face lit up, but my stomach plummeted into my feet. I’d only been on the island for a few short weeks, and my plus-one options of the male persuasion were excruciatingly limited. Other than Hunter, who only had eyes for Garnet, and Monty, the shrunken head that resided in my dorm room, I was limited to Glenn, my guide and the closest thing I ever had to a father, and Sebastian, my coworker at The Islander Gazette. The latter had made it clear recently that he was interested in getting to know me as more than a friend, but Garnet had warned me that he had a love ’em and leave ’em reputation that would cause me nothing but heartache. And even though he was incredibly easy on the eyes—to put it mildly—and had been nothing but a gentleman to me so far, his face wasn’t the one I saw when I closed my eyes at night…

  “Who are you going to bring?” Garnet whispered to me a few moments later as Lady Winthrop stood at the front of the room, preparing to demonstrate the first of the offensive spells we would be learning. “I wish she had given us more warning—how are we supposed to find dates in such a short amount of time?”

  I noticed Hunter leaning toward her, cocking his head and appearing to be listening intently. Somehow, I didn’t think Garnet was going to have to worry about finding a date.