"A Higher Purpose" (Witches of Cullowhee) by Lucy Varna (Novella)

Genre:  Paranormal Romance

Type of Short Story:  Novella

Summary:  The day Adam Cowan walked into the coffeehouse she managed, Ella Southards panicked. Here was the man of her dreams, literally, but he had made his appearance twenty years and a failed marriage too late for her bruised heart.

Adam came to Cullowhee to take a much needed breather from his past. In the reluctant Ella, he sees the possibility for a fresh chance at love, if only he can convince her to gamble on him.

As Adam persuades Ella to make a place for him in her life, she begins to wonder at the timing of his arrival there, and if her life might hold more promise than she'd ever dared to dream.

Excerpt:

He came in early that Monday, shaking off the cold rain with the absent-minded air of a man with things to do.

When Ella Southards saw him, her heart flipped in her chest, then boomed so hard it took her breath.

His features were astonishingly familiar to her: the wavy brown hair that tended to curl at the ends because he'd forgotten to cut it; the long nose and thin lips and heavy brows above chocolate eyes in a face that was thin, intelligent, friendly; the athletic build, earned through work and not trips to the gym; clothes that were more shabby than chic, but still labeled him as Somebody. Not somebody famous, but somebody with a life, somebody with a purpose.

She recognized him, but she'd never met him. Never seen a photo of him, never heard anyone talk about him. But she knew him, nonetheless.

"Ma'am."

The voice of the customer in front of her, waiting for the coffee-like concoction she was supposed to be preparing, brought her back to the present. With a smile of apology, Ella finished making the drink and rang up the sale. As she shut the cash register drawer, a soft glint of gold winked from her ring finger, and the surprised astonishment she'd felt at seeing him faded into a muted despair that had been her companion for far longer than she liked to contemplate. She'd remembered him, but had forgotten that she had nothing to offer any man, especially not this one.

Without giving herself the time to look at him again, to wallow in the reality of his presence, she signaled to her co-worker that she needed a bathroom break. Carrie Long, a petite twenty-year-old chemistry major, was a sweet young woman, but her effervescent optimism was a bit more than Ella could stand at the moment.

She slipped into the back, used the bathroom so she wouldn't be caught in a lie. Dawdled for a moment in front of the mirror. Caught herself smoothing her hair back and wishing for better makeup, a face lift, a tummy tuck, and nicer clothes, all at the same time. Exasperated, she checked her watch, determined that he'd had enough time to order something from her eternally perky co-worker, and that it was safe for her to get back to work.

On the way back in, she grabbed a box of coffee cups, hoping Carrie would forgive her for taking a bit too long in the restroom, and not talk about the dishy gentleman who was currently uppermost in Ella's mind.

Carrie sidled up to her and grabbed some cups to help restock. "Check out Mr. Hottie over there by the door," she said.

Ella suppressed a sigh. Carrie refraining from noticing, and talking about, a good-looking man had probably been too much to hope for. "Who?" she asked, not looking up.

Ella caught the are-you-kidding-me eye roll out of the corner of her eye. "Tall, dark, and handsome at number two," Carrie said, as if it were perfectly obvious. "Coffee, straight up, and a doughnut. No froufrou crap for him."

"Ah, a manly man," Ella said.

"And nice, too." Carrie gave up all pretense of work and settled her elbows against the counter.

"So he asks politely before he drags a woman back to his man-cave?"

Carrie laughed and nudged Ella playfully with her elbow. "Har, funny," she said. "Aren't you even curious?"

"Nope." Ella purposely used her no-nonsense Mommy tone. "I have a firm policy of not ogling manly men. Besides," she added, "I'm married. Takes all the fun out of it."

Carrie snorted. "Yeah, right. You're married, not blind." She grabbed the empty coffee cup box and tugged a bit. "And you're only half-married, anyway. It'll be over soon, right?"

Ella relinquished the box and shook her head. "Not soon enough, but that doesn't really matter. Until it's legally settled, I'm still married."

Carrie's face melted into sad sympathy for a moment before she abruptly stuck her tongue out and made a funny face. "Neener, Ms. Stick in the Mud," she said in a light tone. "One of these days, I'll get you to admit you think he's hot." And she flipped her blonde ponytail and grinned when Ella muttered a mock stern, "Very mature, Miss Priss."

He stayed at the small table for an hour while he drank coffee (black) and ate a doughnut (powdered sugar) and peered intently at the screen of his open laptop. The rain abated, people drifted in and out. Ella discovered a pressing need to clean under the counter any time he looked up. Carrie chattered prettily away until they'd run out of chores and people to wait on, then took a textbook and highlighter out of her backpack to study in the fits and starts around customers.

Another hour passed with him typing madly away, hunched over at the small table. The cup of coffee sat forgotten among crumpled napkins. Ella hadn't the nerve to bus the table around him or offer a refill, as she normally would. Thankfully, Carrie didn't notice the aberrant behavior, being absorbed in a weighty tome on the ethics of responsible journalism, her minor.

Finally, he rose and stuffed his laptop into its bag. He picked up his trash and stood for a moment as if unsure about the etiquette of leaving it on the table or discarding it on his way out. Carrie was putting away her book in anticipation of the lunch rush and noticed his dilemma. With a pretty smile (and, really, Ella admitted with some envy, what about Carrie wasn't pretty?), she bounced over to help, chatting with him in a friendly way that brought a matching smile to his face.

When he left, Carrie turned to Ella with a triumphant grin. "Adam Cowan," she said. "New to town, divorced, one child. Paleogeologist with multiple degrees, one in math, by the way, coming out of a long stint of field work, and writing a book on his finds. Sexy voice." Carrie sighed dreamily. "If only he were a bit younger."

"You got all that from a one minute conversation?"

Carrie laughed mischievously. "I'm good, but not that good. No, I recognized his name. He's doing a lecture series at the college on science and math journalism. Every Monday night at seven 'til the end of term." She paused and slid Ella a sideways look that was not as innocent as it should have been. "Not that you're interested or anything."

Ella pulled a wry face at her co-worker and shooed her back to work.

"Very mature, Madame Grouch," Carrie said, and Ella entered the lunch rush in a lighter mood for the co-ed's antics.

He came back to the coffeehouse several times over the next few weeks, and more than a few times she saw him jogging shirtless past the window along the sidewalk. Ella avoided him whenever possible, and passed that time without ever having to wait on him personally. Carrie was deep in the middle of juggling a heavy course load and managed only a few knowing looks. To her credit, she only teased Ella once about attending Adam's lecture series.

As the days passed, Ella settled into life as a nearly-single woman. She met with her lawyer, learned that a final hearing had been set for the divorce, and ignored her husband's phone calls. After leaving the coffeehouse each day, she worked on some freelance accounting work she'd taken in to make ends meet, and finished knitting a sweater intended to be a Christmas present for her son, with whom she spoke by phone or e-mail nearly every day.

She met Harold Tennenbaum, her old math professor, for lunch one day, but didn’t give in to his urgings to return to school to finish her degree; nor did she agree, at his request, to join a research project in desperate need of her particular skills. "I'm too old," she insisted. He merely shook his head sadly, as if he understood that it wasn't her age holding her back at all.

Most of all, she did not think about him, the man who had haunted her for so long, or the reason fate might have brought him into her life at that moment and not another.

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"Warden" by Kevin Hardman (Novella)

Genre:  Fantasy, Paranormal, Horror

Type of Short Story:  Novella

Summary:  Part lawman, part tracker and part magician, the Wardens are monster-hunters - tasked with protecting the people from the various, nightmarish creatures that have invaded the world of men. However, despite being descended from a long line of Wardens, 16-year-old Errol Magnus believes it to be the absolute worst job on the planet: How could a single occupation simultaneously be the most boring, abominably stupid and extraordinarily dangerous profession imaginable? 

But when his older brother Tom - the current Warden for their region - goes missing, Errol has no choice but to enter the Badlands, where monsters abide in mind-boggling numbers, to find him. During his search, Errol crosses paths with - and finds himself stalked by - the legendary Wendigo, a monster with preternatural strength and speed, as well as enhanced senses of sight, smell and hearing…and an insatiable hunger for human flesh.

Now Errol must do the impossible and not only escape from the monster (something no one has ever done before), but also avoid the unearthly legacy it leaves on all its victims - a terrifying curse known as Wendigo Fever.

Excerpt:

“Good Lord!!!” Gale shouted, going pale and bug-eyed, as well as placing a hand over her heart. Errol followed her gaze to the window, where he caught a quick glimpse of something…horrid. Ruinous, desiccated flesh clung lazily to a nightmarish, skeletal face. Small wisps of gray-white hair hung in random clumps from a dome-shaped skull that housed two lidless eyes.

It was only in the window for a second, and then the thing - some sort of ghoul - was gone, its footsteps clumping audibly as it apparently walked down the porch towards the edge of the house.

Errol grabbed his crossbow, already cocked and loaded, and raced out onto the porch. The skeletal thing was almost at the corner of the house when he fired. The bolt took it in the upper right shoulder, sinking in deep. Knocked off-balance and sent spinning by the shot, the creature fell off the porch and into the dirt.

Errol stood still, breathing heavily, with Gale behind him as the ghoul started to get up. He could now see that the bolt hadn’t just gone in deep; the head had travelled all the way through and was actually sticking out of the monster’s chest.

The thing reached up and gripped the arrowhead. With a grunt, it yanked the bolt out, spewing an arc of green ichor from the wound. Still holding the arrow, it began walking towards them. Belatedly, Errol recalled that he hadn’t brought any more bolts outside with him (not that he would have had time to cock and load the crossbow anyway). Reaching down, he pulled his throwing knife free of its scabbard and threw it in one smooth, seamless motion.

The knife flew true, straight at the monster’s throat. Almost absentmindedly, the creature batted the blade aside with the arrow it still held. The knife went into one of the porch’s supporting posts with a metallic twang, vibrating.

The thing closed the distance between them in surprisingly quick fashion, so fast in fact that Errol only had time to place himself protectively between Gale and the monster before it was standing right in front of him. It thrust the arrow at Errol…

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"Shada" by Craig Hansen (Novella)

Genre:  Young Adult, Paranormal, Suspense

Type of Short Story:  Novella

Summary:  If you could speak to the dead, anyone at all, who would it be?

When Jeni asked this question, Shada Emery figured it was a joke. So both she and Willow joined in the fun, naming their favorite dead celebrities.

And then there was Ember Cole.

Ember wants one more talk with her Grandpa Normie, whose death a year ago began a year of tragedy. So when Jeni suggests a camping trip into the dense woods of northwestern Wisconsin to hold a seance, Shada and Willow put off their misgivings and agree for the sake of their friend.

Ember hopes to find the answers she seeks among the dead. But sometimes the dead have their own agenda.

Excerpt:

“If you could talk to a dead person, anyone at all, who would it be?”

Jeni Taylor let her question hang in the air, her expression hard to read. She wore the strangest smile I’d ever seen and even though she was busy treading the slow-moving waters of the Elk Ridge River, her eyes sparkling in the bright summer sun, it seemed to me nothing about her question was light or casual.

The four of us were all together that day: Jeni, Ember, Willow, and me. We enjoyed swimming in the Elk Ridge because none of us could afford a membership at the Y, and the community pool was always overflowing with younger kids obsessed with splashing. Besides, the river had a bridge running over it that provided an excellent diving spot about thirty feet above the surface of the water. The Elk Ridge ran deep in the middle, shallow to about five feet out. None of us had ever touched the river bottom in the middle, and not for lack of trying.

Two of us stood at the edges of the shallow area, one on either side, while the other two would take turns diving into the deep. As we did this, we would swim to one shore or the other to take over spotting duties while the spotters took their turn to dive.

“Shada, watch me!” Willow, the youngest of us, shouted. I looked up as she performed a cannonball from the bridge into the deep water. Her blonde hair trailed behind her as she dived, and when she came up, it had turned dark. She swam over to Jeni, wiping the river water from her eyes and blowing water out of her nose.

“That’s easy,” Willow told Jeni. “I’d want to talk to William Kirby.” As Willow turned around, I could tell she enjoyed the idea.

“Who’s that?” Jeni asked.

“I think he’s the guy who created the Fantastic Four with Stan Lee,” Ember shouted from the bridge.

“That’s Jack Kirby, Embie,” I said.

My brother Robbie was big into comic books, especially classic ones from thirty years before he was even born. His closet was filled with more white boxes of the things than it was with clothes. Such a nerd. I liked superhero movies with hunky male actors. All four of us did. But the comic books they’d come from? That was my brother’s obsession, not mine, but even I knew who Jack Kirby was. Robbie had left for college two months early and I already missed him.

Willow giggled at Ember. “I said William Kirby, not Jack.”

“So who’s that?” Jeni asked as she began climbing up the steep river bank, a familiar path through the weeds that lined the way, tramped down by frequent use, mostly from the four of us. She reached the top and walked out on the bridge toward Ember.

“Only the father of entomology,” Willow said, rolling her eyes in astonishment, as though all of us should have learned this long ago. “He lived in Britain in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and coleopterology was one of his specialties. Just like me.”

“Does anyone know what Willow’s talking about?” Ember said.

“It’s all Greek to me,” Jeni said, climbing over the railing to stand next to Ember.

“Actually, it’s Latin.” Willow could get annoying after a while with her tendency to correct others. We were probably her only close friends. “Entomology is the study of insects in general. Coleopterology is the study of beetles in particular.”

“God, I should have known,” Jeni moaned. “Willow and her beetles.”

“I think it’s nice Willow knows things,” Ember said. She seemed to be stalling, keeping the conversation going instead of the diving rotation moving.

“Yeah,” I yelled up at Ember, “you think it’s especially cool when you’re in science class together and she sits next to you. Your test scores improve dramatically.”

Jeni snorted in amusement and Ember saluted me with one finger extended. Willow, the only one to take the comment seriously, said, “She’s a grade ahead of me! We’ve never been in the same science class.”

“It’s called a joke, Willow,” I told her.

She pondered for a moment, and then, speaking in a deep monotone voice like a Star Trek Vulcan, she replied, “I find your humor ... illogical.”

We all burst out laughing, and Jeni took Ember’s hand. “Let’s get this line moving,” she said.

“Just a second,” Ember replied, but even as far away as I was, I recognized the mischief in Jeni’s eyes.

“No. Now,” Jeni said. Pulling Ember with her, holding hands, Jeni stepped out to the edge of a wooden beam and, reluctantly, Ember did, too. They swung their arms together in unison, in a silent three count. Then they both leaped forward and straightened their bodies out, pointing their feet down at the water so they led with their toes, and pierced the water like twin needles, the pair of them kicking up a splash big enough that some of it reached me near the north bank. They’d been standing closer to the north bank than the south, so Willow missed out on the splatter.

They broke the surface almost simultaneously. Jeni was smiling again, and Ember came up coughing, spitting out river water.

“You two are crazy!” I yelled at them. They were already ten yards downstream and didn’t seem interested in swimming back to the river banks. Willow and I knew that meant they wanted to drift down river on their backs for a while, so we left our positions and swam east toward them to catch up. Since they were just going with the flow of the slow stream, it didn’t take long. Then we were all floating on our backs, letting the river carry us along, staring up at the cloudless blue Wisconsin summer sky.

Once we were all together, Jeni spoke up again. “Okay, so Willow wants to talk with creepy bug dude.”

“William Kirby,” the youngest girl corrected.

“Fine, whatever,” Jeni said. “What about the rest of you? Shada?”

I was silent for a moment, pondering my options. I must have taken too long, because Jeni called my name again.

“I’m thinking!” I protested.

“Well, think faster,” Jeni sniped, and then laughed.

“Probably some cool musician type guy,” I said. “Mick Jagger, maybe?”

“Pick someone dead,” Jeni said.

“Mick Jagger’s dead, isn’t he?”

The others girls laughed and Ember replied, “Mick Jagger is definitely not dead. Unless it’s something you read on the Web before coming here today.”

“How’s Mick Jagger still alive?” I asked. “He’s gotta be, like, older than my grandma, and she died two years ago.”

“So, your grandma’s dead,” Jeni said. “Why not talk to her instead?”

“I didn’t like talking to her when she was alive,” I said. “She was always grouchy and smelled like stale prunes.”

“That’s not nice,” Ember said.

“It’s the truth,” I replied. I noticed I was veering close to shore and kicked a few times, using my arms like oars to steer myself back closer to the center of the river. “Anyway, I don’t want to talk to her. I’d rather talk to someone famous.”

“What about Michael Jackson?” Willow offered. “He’s dead.”

“Michael Jackson was gross,” I replied. “My dad loves Johnny Cash music. So maybe him.”

“That’ll work,” Jeni agreed. “So we’ve got Willow down for that bug guy, Kirby, and Shada wants to talk to dead singers. What about you, Embie?”

“Who do you want to talk to?” Ember replied. “It’s your question.”

“I’ll tell you soon enough,” Jeni said. “I asked you first.”

“Then I pass.”

“You can’t pass.”

“I can if I want to.” Ember’s voice sounded firm, resolute. “You go.”

“God, okay!” Jeni huffed in frustration. “I know who I’d choose anyway. Sacagawea.”

“The girl who guided Lewis and Clark to the Pacific Ocean?” I asked.

“That’s the one,” Jeni said. “She was only like seventeen and pregnant when she did that, and she died when she was, like, only twenty-four or twenty-five.”

“Was she Lakota, like you?” Willow asked.

“No,” Jeni said. “She was Lemhi Shoshone, but that doesn’t matter. She’s just someone I admire. So now we know who everyone would like to talk to except you, Embie. Time’s up.”

Ember stopped floating then and began treading water. “Hey, I can barely see the bridge. We’ve drifted a long way downstream. We should probably start swimming back.”

“Yeah, I’m hungry anyway,” Willow said, “and our lunches are back there under the bridge.”

“Fine,” Jeni conceded. “But you’re not off the hook, Ember. I still want your answer.”

We all swam hard against the mild current, doing front strokes, and for a few minutes we couldn’t talk. But even though she hadn’t said anything out loud, all of us knew Ember well enough to know who she’d want to talk to if she could.

He died one year ago.

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"River Rat" by Reeve Thomas (Novelette)

Genre:  Young Adult, Paranormal, Romance

Type of Short Story:  Novelette

Summary:  One hundred years ago, a father threw his pregnant daughter from a bridge. The baby swam free of his mother, and the first river rat was born. Most folks in the little river town do not believe in such tales. But to sixteen-year-old Floyd Lebus, it's simply his family history. 

Floyd lives with the entire clan of river rats in a cluster of ramshackle houses on the cliffs overlooking the Kentucky River. The Lebus family is tolerated by the townsfolk, as long as they stick to their own kind.

Mandy O'Dell is not Floyd's kind, but she is drawn to the river and to Floyd that summer. His love for Mandy causes him to test the boundaries of family tradition. Their forbidden union unearths buried secrets, and Mandy may suffer the brutal consequences.

Excerpt:

He couldn’t say why he did such a horrible thing; he couldn’t sort it out in his own mind. It was useless to try to explain it. He didn’t intend for things to get so messy that afternoon, with a man shot, and a girl in the river.

It didn’t seem real. Yet, he was there, holding the gun in his hand, watching the girl go over the bridge. She seemed to fall in stop motion animation. The bright colors of her clothing whirled. She became a spinning pinwheel of arms, legs, hair, and screams. Her screams he remembered well. Or was it only a single scream? A bungee cord shriek stretched from the bridge, bouncing off the water. He remembered the water, too, dull and green, and the smell of the river.

****

A river rat like Floyd Lebus was accustomed to a fishy smell. It was the very smell that seeped from his pores, and caused girls at school to shrivel their noses at him in disgust. Fishy Boy Floyd, they called him. The nickname, like the smell, lingered.

Upon close inspection, Floyd even resembled a fish: glossy, wide-set bug eyes, thin, nearly transparent, slimy lips, ears that stuck out like fins, a green-blue hue to his skin, and patches of scaly, everlasting eczema on his cheeks. Fishy Boy Floyd lived up to his name.

The source of all of Floyd’s trouble was Mandy O’Dell. She was pretty in an unpolished way. At school, she wore her long, wavy, blond hair pulled back, and she dressed modestly. During the summer, she wore paper-thin sun dresses, and let her hair swing loosely down to her waist. Her skin was sun-darkened; her face was dotted with freckles. It was her eyes that first caught Floyd’s attention though—her amber-flecked, green eyes were like the river when the sun hit it.

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"The Scribe (Mindjack Origins)" by Susan Kaye Quinn (Novelette)

Genre:  Young Adult Paranormal, Science Fiction

Type of Short Story:  Novelette

Summary:  Twenty-three-year-old Sasha is in search of a mindjacker Clan that won't force him to use his unique skill--he can't face the prospect of erasing any more souls. A revolutionary Clan leader offers him a chance to serve a higher purpose, but Sasha's wary that it's only a trick to use his ability. When a beautiful female jacker seeks refuge with them, and her former Clan leader wants her special skill back at any cost, Sasha has to decide if there are any causes worth the price of using his ability one more time.

Excerpt:

Chapter One

A knife thunked into the dryboard panel I had just installed, piercing the thin board a mere two feet away from me. I reflexively lashed out with my mind toward my attacker only to run smack into the granite that was Anna Navarro’s mindbarrier. I wasn’t the strongest mindjacker around and, as far as I knew, no one could jack into her mind anyway. I’d probably just riled her by trying. She stood stock-still in her sleeveless black shirt and urban camouflage pants, returning my glare from the opposite side of the training area.

I wanted to ask, Are you insane? Instead, I pushed up the long sleeves of my shirt. “That was a perfectly good dryboard panel, you know.”

“Knife training today,” Anna said, ignoring me. “Or would you prefer close combat training again? Your call, Sasha.”

I swallowed. My bruises were still tender from yesterday’s close combat training. I had quickly learned that she had more muscles than I did, even though I was a guy and had done my fair share of manual labor. I worked the pitch-black knife loose from the board, scowling at the gash it left behind and the extra work I would have to do to repair it. Any complaints would be wasted on Anna—she thought I should be training, not fixing up the place. But the half-finished bathroom wouldn’t dryboard itself, and fighting Anna with a blade wasn’t exactly appealing. I walked the knife over and extended it, handle first. If I played it straight, maybe she wouldn’t actually stab me with it.

“I am certain I don’t want to fight you with one of these.”

“It’s not me you have to worry about.” She eyed me, as if she could size up my capability as a fighter by examining my sawdust-covered jeans and workshirt. Or possibly she was measuring me for a coffin. “You never know when a fight will find you, and you may not always have a choice of weapons.”

She pivoted away from me and threw the knife again, sinking it into one of the hundred-year-old oak beams that held up the converted door factory which served as the headquarters for her future mindjacker revolution. Our revolution. I rolled the words around in my head, but they still didn’t feel right. Her twin brother Julian recruited me into his new Clan as soon as I walked in the door, but I kept wondering if I’d made a mistake. Every other Clan had used me for their own purposes, and I wasn’t convinced Julian would be any different. And Anna seemed positive that I didn’t belong here. I couldn’t blame her for being suspicious—I wouldn’t let someone like me into my Clan either.

“If you’re not going to use your true abilities,” she said, “you’re no better than any other jacker. And sometimes you’ll be on the losing end of the jack.”

I shrugged. Little did she know, I’d been waiting for that to happen for a while. I vowed never to use my ability on anyone again, and one day, an angry jacker would put an end to me because of it. Some days I even welcomed the idea.

“Or,” she continued, “you’ll be closely matched. Then your weapons training could mean the difference between walking away or ending up in someone else’s Clan. From what I’ve heard, that hasn’t worked out so well for you in the past.”

Anna pulled another knife from the back of her pants and lunged at me, slicing the air in front of my face. I jerked out of her slashing reach and stumbled into a 55-gallon drum. It tipped, dumping trash we had cleared yesterday: rags clogged with grease, lumber singed by the laser saw, and machine parts eroded by a hundred years of rust.

I recovered my balance and righted the drum. “You don’t know anything about me.” My gaze locked on the knife as she switched hands and circled me. It was only a rubber training blade, probably dull and not life threatening. Still, I didn’t want to finding out how much it would hurt if she stabbed me with it.

“I know enough to see that your fighting skills could use some work.”

“And maybe I wasn’t clear,” I turned with her, keeping my eyes on the rubber blade, “about not opting for knife training.”

“As much as my brother would like to win this war with his words alone,” Anna said, as if I hadn’t spoken, “it’s going to take more than asking nicely to create a future where we can be free.” She lunged, and I landed a solid blow on the wrist of her knife hand, making her drop forward. My other hand swung a punch to her gut. She blocked it and brought the knife around. I pulled back, but its rough tip dragged across my chest. I swiped at her knife hand, getting nothing but air as she danced away from the engagement.

“Don’t lose track of the knife,” she said.

“Well, there’s a handy tip.” I glowered at her, then took a fighting stance as she circled me again.

“If you’re going to be a part of this Clan,” she switched hands and changed her grip, so the knife now pointed down, “you need to contribute something. I assume that you still don’t want to use your real skill.”

“That would be a good assumption.” Other Clans used my ability—to control, to punish, to gain power—always for the greater glory or security of the Clan. There was a time when I didn’t even know there was something wrong with that. When my mentor, Arlis, found me, I was a dazed changeling horrified at permanently erasing my gym teacher’s mind. He took me in, helped me recover, and taught me how to control my ability to erase a person’s mind, down to every last memory and personality quirk, and rewrite them into someone new. It took a long time for me to realize that anyone who plucks a thirteen-year-old boy out of school and turns him into a weapon isn’t a savior, he’s a monster.

“Your brother, Julian,” I said to Anna, “seems to understand that destroying people’s souls isn’t the most righteous way to fight for his cause.”

She flipped the knife up and down, alternating forward and reverse grips. “Just because he won’t force you to use your ability, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t use it anyway.”

Her words set my nerves on edge more than the knife. That was the truth that I feared—she and Julian were just waiting for the right moment, the right pressure, to trick or force me into using my ability. I wouldn’t do it, but even thinking about it set off a twitching in my stomach that made it seize up.

She tucked her free hand close, then swiped a back-slashing strike across my neck with the knife. I dodged back, the tip missing by inches, and shot my arm out, knocking the inside of her knife-arm and latching onto her wrist as it swung past. I jerked her arm down and twisted, using her momentum to throw her off balance and trying to break her hold on the knife. As she fell in closer, she hit me clean to my stomach with her free hand, forcing me to double over her and lose all my breath. I twisted harder, and she dropped the knife. I released her and fought for air as I snatched the knife from the floor then scrambled back before she could hit me again.

“Better,” she said, rubbing her wrist.

My lungs sucked in air, but the shakes in my stomach were climbing up my throat. I didn’t want her to see me lose my lunch. I dropped the knife to the floor, where it clattered dully on the oil-stained concrete, and turned away to the bathroom. The door wasn’t installed, but the dryboard gave me a little privacy. I bent over the sink and splashed near-freezing water on my face. The hot water line wasn’t hooked up yet, but the shock of cold successfully quelled the shakes. The mirror reflected back the dripping face of a man ten years older and a lifetime more worn than the thirteen-year-old changeling Arlis had whisked away from school to join his Clan.

Following Arlis had taken me down a path where I had destroyed more souls than I could track. They invaded my sleep, becoming a tangled mess of personalities and histories that nearly drove me mad. I left Arlis behind and worked the handyman trade, but was quickly pulled back into the underground mindjacker Clans. I had sinned so much, what was the point in stopping? There was no redemption for me, no more than it was possible to return the memories and lives I had stolen.

I wanted to believe this Clan with Julian would be different. He was practically bursting with hope for the future. Maybe I could help him deliver on that promise of hope for others, even if there wasn’t any left for me. Perhaps then there would still be a reason for me to exist.

I looked away from the dark, soulless eyes in the mirror, not sure who was I kidding.

I heard Anna scuff the concrete outside the threshold. I swung blindly, missed, and then caught her by the throat with my other hand, shoving her up against the half-constructed wall. I held off on the punch that was about to follow, partly because I didn’t want to put her through the dryboard I had just finished putting up, and partly because she had a crazy sort of grin above my hand clenched around her throat.

Heat rose up my neck and I dropped my hand. “Sorry, I thought you were…”

“I wasn’t,” she said, her eyes lit up. “But maybe I should have been.”

I rubbed the back of my neck, having a hard time meeting her eyes.

“Julian wants you up front,” she said.

“I need to finish work on the bathroom.”

“He has a new recruit coming,” she said. “He wants you to be there.”

I eyed her. “Why?”

She tapped her fingers against the wooden frame I’d put up for the door, avoiding my gaze. “You know he can’t jack, right?”

I narrowed my eyes. I’d seen Julian subdue a jacker from my old Clan that no one else could stop. And he had asked me to jack into his head, just to show me that it couldn’t be done. Jacking Julian wasn’t the normal mental wrestling that one mindjacker did with another, each fighting for control of the other’s mind. When I mentally reached out to push into Julian’s head, all of my nightmares raged out from the depths of my mind, tipping me toward the madness that made me leave Arlis in the first place.

I would never try that again.

“What do you mean, he can’t jack?” I asked. “Julian’s some kind of extreme jacker, like the rest of us. You with your hard head, me with my ability. I don’t understand exactly what he does, but it trumps jacking by a long shot.”

She dropped her hand from the door and looked me in the eyes. “Julian can manipulate your instincts, but he can’t jack you directly. That means anyone he can handle will be easy for him to control, but if he can’t reach their instincts, for whatever reason, he’s virtually powerless.”

“He’s not exactly defenseless,” I countered, a chill running through me.

“Agreed,” she said. “And I thought he could handle anyone, anytime. I never worried about him, until…”

“Until Serena came along,” I finished.

Anna’s jaw worked, the angles of her face flexing under her brown skin. “Look, I don’t know who these recruits are that he’s bringing in, and neither does he. Julian’s far too trusting. Until we know better, we have to assume that every one of them could be another Serena, or even worse.” She had the same brilliant blue eyes as Julian. They both could burn you with a look—his eyes blazing with hope, hers with something more raw. Anger? Hatred? She was legitimately dangerous, yet here she was, frowning with worry about her brother. It almost made her seem human.

“I get it,” I said. “You want to make sure someone’s there who can protect him, in case things go south again.”

“Exactly,” she said. “And I’ve been banished from the new recruit interviews.” She clenched a fist and pressed it against my fresh dryboard. I hoped she wouldn’t put a hole through it.

“I can’t imagine why that is.” I struggled not to laugh in her face. She might have another knife tucked in her pants.

She didn’t take my bait. “Sasha, I need to know.” She laid her palm flat on the wall and leaned closer to me. A reflexive sense of self-preservation made me rock back against the sink. “If it came down to it, and you had to use your ability to protect Julian, would you do it?”

“He said I wouldn’t have to…”

She waved away my protest. “I’m asking you—would you do it? To save him? Because he’s key to everything, the revolution, all of it.”

“I thought you said your cause wouldn’t be won with his words.” I couldn’t help but grin.

“Not on his words alone.” She narrowed her eyes. “Would you be thinking you could have a chance at a new life, if he hadn’t convinced you it was possible? Would you have even tried to come to us, if you hadn’t heard about how different he is?”

Well, she was right about that. Julian could sell ice cream to an Eskimo; or in my case, salvation to a hopelessly lost sinner. Charismatic didn’t touch it. His hope was an infectious disease that had infiltrated my mind.

“No, I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for him,” I said. “And I appreciate that he’s willing to take a chance on me. But I’m not going to use my ability on anyone. Ever again. No matter what.” She didn’t know what she was asking, and she didn’t need to know. My victims lived and breathed, but they were hollow copies, empty of the uniqueness they were born with. The simple truth was that I’d rather have my pitiful life end now than destroy another soul. And I couldn’t chance bringing on the nightmares again. They would only carry me off into madness, and who knew what kind of harm I could do then.

She gave a tight nod. That obviously wasn’t the answer she wanted. “I’ll be watching the new recruit from back in the racks. I’ll be nearby, within jacking range, if there’s trouble.”

She pulled a knife, sheathed in a strap-on case, out of a pocket in the leg of her pants and handed it to me. “You know where the guns are,” she said, referring to the ancient wooden cabinets up front in the kitchen area where she kept her arsenal. “Make sure you’re armed before she gets here.”

I took the knife, not sure I would know what to do with it, and even less sure that weapons would make a difference. I strapped it under my pant leg anyway.

Julian’s first recruit, Serena, nearly killed us all before Julian stopped her. She had already wiped out my old Clan, setting one member against the rest, until he killed everyone but me. I only escaped because I managed to steal his soul first. If this new recruit was like Serena, Julian might be able to stop her too. If Julian couldn’t control her, then Anna’s weapons would be all we had.

Because using my ability wasn’t an option I was willing to consider anymore.
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“Emotionally Charged” by Selina Fenech (Novella)

Genre:  Paranormal Romance

Type of Short Story:  Novella

Summary:  Livvy always dreamed of the day when a rich, handsome hero would appear and whisk her away from her mundane life. She never thought she would have to become the hero.

Reading the emotions of people around her is easy for Livvy. When an earthquake strikes her city, a supernaturally attractive group of rescuers show her that her power goes beyond that. She’s now one of them. Special. But the dream life she’s been swept into seems too easy, and soon turns into a nightmare.

Excerpt:

I stared at the crack that ran up our living room wall. To my parents, it said insurance claims and dodgy contractors doing repairs. To me it said excitement. The crack gave me shivers like it was carved up my spine.

We’ve always known our town was near a major fault, but it’s one of those sleepy fault lines that doesn’t do anything for decades, centuries even. Then just when everyone in our middle-class paradise had achieved a false sense of security it decided to give a big heave. Like it was screwing with us on purpose, to spice up this suburban daydream, give us a slap and wake us up. There had been a small tremor that I can’t remember when I was a baby. This latest, just after my seventeenth birthday, was a magnitude 6.8. It woke me up.

Dad was on the phone to his cop buddy getting all the updates. Tilting my head to his conversation, I kept my eyes on the crack, worried that if I looked away it would disappear and life would return to normal. Boring. Dad repeated the main points of interest for Mom to hear as she cleaned the wreckage in our home. Power was out everywhere and likely to stay that way a while. Mom had already insisted on lighting candles even though it wasn’t dark yet. The whole room smelled of struck matches. With power out, there also came the warning of people taking the opportunity to loot while the city was still in chaos. I raised an eyebrow in consideration. No. Wrong team.

Dad’s news report continued. A few buildings had collapsed completely, lots of injured and a few deaths. They were setting up shelters in town for people who lost homes. One was being run at my high school.

I bet they needed volunteers. Not as exciting as looting, but that was where I had to be. My life had so little excitement even handing out blankets had my mind brewing up romantic dreams of adventure.

I peeled my eyes from the crack. “I want to go and help.”

Mom looked up at me from the floor where she worked at brushing up shattered ornaments that had shaken from our shelves. Her collection of ceramic owls would never be the same. Lines around her mouth and forehead told me she was going to give me the worried mother talk. But I could tell she wasn’t really thinking about me. She was just sad about her well put together home being ruined, and worried about her shop downtown. I could read the emotions all over her. With each emotion there’s an energy that shines from a person that I can almost see. Not like an aura or anything; that sounds so new age crazy. I’m just good at telling how people feel. Always have been. It’s nothing special but it does come in handy. When you know how someone is feeling, you can give just the right response to get what you want.

I pre-empted Mom’s speech with soothing words. “I’ll just be helping out in a shelter, under the watchful eye of other aid workers, responsible adults and doctors. Probably the safest place at the moment, right?”

Mom tightened her lips. She looked at the dustpan and brush in her hands as though that was all she could focus on right now. Her startling blue eyes turned back toward me. Why couldn’t I have gotten those? I got brown instead, to match my hair which she won’t even let me dye. Her eyes were still telling me no. She opened her mouth but I beat her to it.

“Just think how appealing it will look on my college application as an extracurricular activity. And I can swing past your shop and make sure it’s okay.”

Mom’s expression brightened. Score to me. “I hope there’s not too much damage. I just had that porcelain shipment in. I’d go check myself but there’s so much to do here. Could you go there first thing? Just, if you’re late back I don’t want you out on dark streets if there’s no power still.”

She stood up, gave me a kiss, then went to empty her dustpan, sighing as shattered owls tumbled into the trash. I saw a pink one roll in and knew it was her favorite. Dad gave her a hug as though they were standing by the grave of a beloved relative. All just a fake display. No real emotion came from either of them other than slight worry and irritation. How do people ever get so stodgy? How could they not be humming from excitement at all of this? I knew I was, but to crave romance and danger to the point of bursting was my natural state.

Dad told Mom he was going to start calling around for repair quotes now, get in before the rush. I had been out for Sunday shopping with the girls earlier and the mirror confirmed I was still presentable. They were my best jeans, but I didn’t care if they got dirty. I threw my red trench on, phone, keys and wallet already in the pockets, and headed for the door.

“Buses are still running, Livvy,” Dad called over. “There’s a pretty clear route to your high school. Just a couple of hours, okay? Be safe!”

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"Elfbitten: A Taryn Malloy Fantasy (Book 1)" by Leila Bryce Sin (Novella)

Genre:  Paranormal Erotica

Short Story Type:  Novella

Summary:  Taryn Malloy is a Bright Elf, her magic lives in her blood, fueled by sex and lust. Recovering from a terrible break-up, Taryn’s best friend, Roxy, decides it’s time for Taryn to get back in the game. She’s wallowed long enough and let her magic diminish to a dangerous level. Tonight, Roxy is taking Taryn out to a club that caters to the carnal needs of the supernatural community of their city. Roxy is determined to make Taryn forget about Cillian and she knows the only way to get over one elf is to get on top of another. A night of elves, fairies, vampires, revenge and more is exactly what Taryn needs.

Excerpt:

I lifted my hand in front of my face and snapped my fingers, watching the spark flash between my fingers.  I hadn’t been able to do even that much just this morning. Ever since Cillian and I had broken up – well, since he dumped me really – I had been on a total self-pity spiral. Roxy had come by every couple of days to make sure I was eating and showering, which of course I was. I was probably eating too much, but I hadn’t bothered to change into real clothes or leave my apartment. The plants around my place had started to die since I wasn’t tending them anymore and I couldn’t ask Roxy to waste perfectly good magic to bring them back to life for me.
This morning, six weeks to the day after my break up, Roxy had lost all patience with me and my pity party. She’d nearly ripped the door off the hinges when I wouldn’t roll out of bed to answer her demanding knock, her power ripping through my apartment, effectively knocking me out of the bed. Her eyes shined with magic and anger when she stormed into the bedroom, her hair floating on the waves of power emanating from her core.
“That is it, Taryn Malloy!” she yelled, stalking around the bed and grabbing me by the back of my nightshirt. “Cillian Moran is not worth this!” she dragged me across the floor until we reached the bathroom, I spun on my back when she let go so she could reach in and turn on the cold water tap of the shower. I tried to scramble to my feet, but because it had been so long since I had raised any power, she was faster and stronger than me by far and she simply grabbed my ankle and dragged me back. She picked me up around the waist and nearly tossed me into the shower, the icy water shocking me and stealing my breath in a gasp.
Roxy slammed the glass doors shut and held them there until I got to my feet and banged against the panel demanding to be let out. She slid one side open just long enough to rip the soaking shirt off of my body and push me back in.
“Wash!” she commanded, sliding the door shut in my face, cutting off my protests. Eventually I conceded and took the shower, if only to keep from freezing. When I got out, she gave me a towel and a robe and took to combing out the mess of tangles my hair had become.
“We’re going out tonight,” she said, pulling the brush through my hair as I sat at my vanity, cupping a mug of coffee between my hands. “You should’ve been able to fight back, or at least resist me, and you were as weak as a human, Taryn.”
“I know,” I muttered.
“Do you think he’s sitting at home wallowing in pain that you’re gone?”
“I wasn’t the one that left, Roxy.”
“Exactly. You’re giving him too much.”
“He doesn’t know what I’m doing.”
“Doesn’t matter,” she argued, setting the brush down on the tabletop. “You’re still acting this way for him; he doesn’t deserve that. How long did he say he’d been seeing the fairy whore?”
“Six months,” I whispered into my mug.
“And you were together for three years.”
“I know, Roxy!” I yelled, throwing my cup against the wall. It shattered into hundreds of ceramic pieces, the coffee splattering the wall, dripping to the floor. I had sprung to my feet without realizing it. My fists were balled so tightly my ragged nails were cutting into my palms. The scent of blood wafted up, making my mouth water. “You don’t think I know he’s been humiliating me for six fucking months? I know, Roxy!” I screamed. “He’s been fucking her all over town and everyone fucking knew but me! I’ve been here! In our home! Cooking for him, cleaning up for him, paying our bills, and he’s been out fucking her!” I was panting in my rage, my body was shaking with the effort to contain my pounding heart and Roxy stood there, calm and smiling.
“Good. It’s about damn time you got angry.” She turned away from me and walked into my closet, disappearing from sight. I blinked, coming back to my senses, wondering what she was doing, so I followed her in. When I got there, I found her laughing.
“What?”
“Oh my gods, Tare, are these crotches from his pants?” she asked, holding up a handful of fabric.
“Yes, they are,” I said simply. The night Cillian had told me about his affair, after I had thrown him physically from the apartment and locked the door in his face, I had gone on a rampage destroying anything of his I could find. I spent about an hour on the floor of our closet cutting out the crotches of all the pants he hadn’t packed, crying my eyes out like an idiot.
“That’s brilliant,” Roxy said, dropping the sad scraps of fabric to the floor. She started rummaging through my closet until she came up with the outfit she wanted me to wear tonight, insisting that the best way to get over a man was to get under a new one.
Roxy never had to worry about getting over or under or next to a guy, refusing to ever commit to a relationship. After seeing what Cillian had done to me, she insisted it was just another example of why her way of life was the best. Staring at those scraps of fabric, I couldn’t really argue with her.  But I really thought Cillian and I had something; I really thought we were going to be married and live happily ever after. More embarrassing than that, I thought his strange behavior over the last few months was due to the fact he was finally going to propose. Even when he sat me down to talk that night, I thought that was the moment he was going to do it.
I closed my eyes against the memory and shook my head to clear it. I refused to play that scene over again. Roxy was right; I needed to at least make an attempt at getting my life back together. I felt the skin at my shoulder pull when I shook my head and touched the sore spot where the Hunter had bitten me. It sent a zing of power through my body, making me clench my thighs. I had been without my magic for too long. Having some measure of it back made me look back at the last six weeks with disgust. Yes, Cillian had been my world for the last three years, but look how easily he had cast me aside! And I nearly killed myself mourning the loss of our relationship. As a Bright Elf, I lived off of the magic created by life giving acts, like love and lust. Going six weeks secluded and alone, sad and despondent, had drained any magic I had stored before that awful night. If Roxy hadn’t done what she did this morning, I might’ve only had a couple more days to live.
I sat up straighter in my seat, squared my shoulders, and threw back the last swallow of my drink, the purple concoction stoking the fire in my belly and making my head swim briefly. I grabbed Roxy’s drink and slid off of the stool, landing light footed on the tile floor. I turned my head to look for Roxy, seeing her sitting in the shifter’s lap, the pixies crowded around them as she chatted happily, one arm draped around his shoulders. I was surprised to see her simply talking, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that didn’t last very long. I felt the tender skin on my shoulder pull again and realized I had no idea what the wound looked liked.
I turned for the door and, before I could stop myself, I looked over to the dark corner I had spied the vampire sitting in. He was gone. I felt a confusing sense of disappointment when I realized he wasn’t there. More terrifying than that, I realized, when I caught his eye, I had hoped he would approach me. I touched the bite mark again, sending a pleasant shiver through my body. I was feeling reckless tonight. 

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