Frostbite, p.2
Frostbite,
p.2
“Jinx, go outside,” I said, voice hard.
“Outside with the creeptastic Hunger Grass?” she asked.
She had a point.
“Fine, but keep close to me,” I said, lowering my voice. “Stay away from the walls and don’t touch anything. Assume that nothing in this house is what it seems.”
“That’s not very reassuring,” she muttered.
“Good,” I said, palming my knife. “If you’re scared, we might just get out of this alive.”
“What about Maggie?” Jinx asked.
A tapping came from the kitchen, and I stilled. Tap, tap-tap, tap. There was an agonizing pause before the tapping began anew. As much as I’d love to run screaming from this bizarre charnel house, we had a case to solve and a client to rescue.
“We’re going to accept that cup of tea and find out what the hell is going on in this house,” I said.
“And if it’s a trap?” she whispered.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” I said.
I just hoped that if we did encounter a bridge, it wasn’t made of oozing muscle tissue.
On my signal, Jinx pushed open the kitchen door. At least, she swore it was a wooden door. If we made it out of here alive, I’d need a gallon of brain bleach to scrub that orifice from memory.
I gasped, staggering forward, but abruptly froze as my eyes darted back and forth from Maggie to the corpse wearing her clothes. Corpse might be too kind a word. The body was missing parts and had been gnawed on by more than rats.
That wasn’t the scariest thing in the room, not by a long shot.
I’d located the source of the tapping. Two children huddled on the floor, their knobby knees and the jut of their collar bones painful to witness. They leaned into each other in a one-armed embrace, teeth chattering against a cold I couldn’t feel.
“You can see them, can’t you?” Maggie asked, voice hopeful and eyes pleading.
“She doesn’t mean the bones on the floor, does she?” Jinx whispered from where she stood at my back.
“No, Jinx,” I said. “But those bones are important. I’d put money on it.”
In fact, the corpse huddled around the children’s tiny forms, giving them comfort, even in death.
“Can you help them?” Maggie asked.
I glanced from Maggie to the body on the floor, and took a deep breath. I lifted my eyes to the children, turning my head to use the full strength of my second sight. The children flickered, but I caught a glimpse of rows of needle-like teeth, too many teeth for their gaunt faces.
Tap, tap-tap, tap. The chattering continued, and I winced.
“What...what did you do?” I asked.
“What any good mother would do, or so I thought,” she said. “I eased their suffering. I kept them alive. I didn’t know what would happen to them.”
I was going to ask what she meant, but my mind finally caught up with what my eyes were seeing. They didn’t have mouths ringed red and sticky from berry preserves and the youngest wasn’t holding a doll to her chest. The little girl stroked a clump of her mother’s hair.
“You were starving,” I said.
Maggie nodded, eyes never leaving her children.
“They were excited for the snow, at first,” she said. “It came late that year, but it more than made up for its tardiness. The winter was never-ending. And for them, it never will end. Not without your help.”
“What can I do?” I asked.
“Tell them that they are good children,” she said. “They did what they were told. They mustn’t suffer for my evil act.”
I frowned, but stepped forward and crouched down, careful not to touch the body at my feet. Being cannibalized was one vision I sure as hell didn’t want to get sucked into.
“Ivy, what are you doing?” Jinx hissed.
What was I doing? I looked at the children, using my second sight to see every detail. Their teeth wasn’t the only unnatural anomaly. Vein-like tendrils connected the children to the fleshy cabinets and gelatinous floor.
“Maggie’s children are tethered here,” I said, replying to Jinx.
I glanced up at Maggie, searching her face for clues. Her eyes were wide, but she leaned forward.
“Is that why they couldn’t move on?” she asked. “Can you...?”
“I’m no expert,” I said, cutting her off. “But from what I see, this house is feeding on the children’s suffering. If I’m right, it might not like us removing its food supply.”
“Is this a bad time to mention I’m not really dressed to battle a haunted house that feeds on the suffering of dead kids?” Jinx asked.
“Wishing you’d taken your chances with the Hunger Grass?” I asked.
“Hell, yes,” she said. “But you’re not leaving, are you?”
“Hell, no,” I said.
“Fine, but, for the record, I’m totally cool with you losing your weirdo street cred,” she said.
“What happened to the stranger the better?” I asked.
“Our client is dead, the house is alive, and there’s grass in the yard with the ability to create ravenous wendigos,” she said. “That’s what happened.”
I’d been watching the children while Jinx rambled. They didn’t respond to Maggie or Jinx, but I could have sworn their eyes slid to me more than once. Maybe my second sight allowed some creatures to see me more clearly.
“My name is Ivy Granger,” I said. “What’s yours?”
They didn’t reply, but both children turned their heads my way, unblinking. A low growling rose from their stomachs, and they stared at me with a feral gleam in their eyes. At least I had their attention.
Fear slithered along my spine and my glance darted around the room. Did Maggie invite us here to bring her children peace or dinner? I had to try to rescue the kids no matter my client’s motives.
“I’m a friend of your mom’s,” I said.
Walls spasmed and red tears ran in rivulets down the children’s cheeks.
“Ivy, did you feel that?” Jinx asked.
“Stay there and don’t move unless I say so,” I said.
Predators chase their prey. And these two stopped being innocent children long ago.
“Your mom is here and she loves you very much,” I said. “You’ve been very good, but she needs you to do one more very hard thing.”
“B-b-bad,” the boy said.
“No, you’re not,” I said.
“H-h-hungry,” the little girl moaned.
“You don’t have to ever be hungry again,” I said. “You can move on and be with your mom again.”
I had no idea if what I said was true, but words have a magic of their own and there were strong energies in this house.
I tapped into my own sense of emptiness at losing a parent, a hole in the pit of my stomach and an ache in my chest that would never go away. I channeled a child’s yearning for their parents and told the ghost children what they needed to hear.
They were good. They were loved. They were going home.
The more I talked the more convinced I was that I could save them. And just like that, a door opened and the children turned to face my client.
“Mommy?”
“Take my hand,” Maggie said, reaching for her children. “We’re going home.”
The room shuddered, and Jinx lost her balance, but I kept my eyes on the children and the veins that tethered them to the house.
“We were bad,” the girl said.
“No, my beautiful precious boy and girl,” Maggie said. “You did exactly what your foolish mother asked of you. Can you forgive me?”
They ran to her, and as they reached the end of their fleshy chains, I sliced the veins with my blade. The knife was silver-tipped iron and sprinkled with holy water. I had no idea what the house was, but the veins blackened and withered, retracting with lightning speed.
Maggie mouthed “thank you” over the children’s heads and stepped through the glowing door.
I heard her voice through the light, calling out in a cheerful voice.
“Come on, Fluffy,” she said. “Time to go home.”
Something brushed my leg and purring filled my ears. Then it moved away and the door snapped shut.
My ears popped and Jinx frowned.
“Was that a cat?” she asked.
I blinked away tears.
“I don’t know, but I don’t think we’ll be getting paid for this job,” I said.
Jinx looked around the dusty kitchen and groaned. The house was once again a mundane structure, the only oddities were the three bodies resting in each other’s arms.
“We’re never going to see a dime,” Jinx said, staggering to the door.
The light was painfully bright, but I tilted my head to the sky and shrugged.
It’s hard to pay the bills when you’re dead. But if you die in a city filled with random faerie magic and have Ivy Granger on the case, you sure as Hell can settle your debts.
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Ivy Granger Psychic Detective Box Set (Books 1-3, Bonus Prequel)
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Demons, ghosts, vampires, and necromancers—Ivy dodges the city's deadliest villains while solving its darkest cases. Will she save the day or die trying?
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Don’t miss these books set in the world of Ivy Granger.
Ivy Ganger, Psychic Detective Series
Shadow Sight
Welcome to Harborsmouth, where monsters walk the streets unseen by humans...except those with second sight, like Ivy Granger.
Blood and Mistletoe: An Ivy Granger Novella
Holidays are worse than a full moon for making people crazy. In Harborsmouth, where many of the residents are undead vampires or monstrous fae, the combination may prove deadly.
Ghost Light
Ivy Granger is back, gathering clues in the darkest shadows of downtown Harborsmouth. With a vengeful lamia on the city streets, reports of specters walking Harborsmouth cemeteries, and an angry mob of faerie clients at her office door, it's bound to be a long night.
Club Nexus: An Ivy Granger Novella
A demon, an Unseelie faerie, a human, and a vampire walk into a bar...
Burning Bright
Burning down the house...
Birthright
Being a faerie princess isn't all it's cracked up to be...
Hound’s Bite
Ivy Granger thought she left the worst of Mab's creations behind when she escaped Faerie. She thought wrong.
Tales from Harborsmouth
A collection of Ivy Granger short stories and novellas.
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Hunting in Bruges
The only thing worse than being a Hunter in the fae-ridden city of Harborsmouth, is hunting vampires in Bruges.
Coming soon to the world of Ivy Granger
Blood Rite
Ivy Granger psychic detective takes on a simple grave robbing case, but in Harborsmouth nothing is ever simple when dealing with the dead.
Warning: This book features grave robbing, an abandoned amusement park, necromancy, and zombie clowns.
Watertight
When Torn is accused of murdering a local mermaid, Ivy Granger is plunged into the deep end of water fae politics.
With her psychic gifts and newfound wisp powers, locating Torn’s alibi should be simple. Too bad a deadly enemy with a score to settle is lurking in Harborsmouth's darkest waters.
Ivy Granger might be in over her head. Even with the help of her kelpie king fiance, Ivy only has until the next high tide to prove Torn's innocence. With the clock counting down and the bodies piling up, Ivy better hope she finds an alibi that’s watertight.
Dressed in White
Something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue...
On the eve of Jinx and Ivy's double wedding, a sinister figure is terrorizing Harborsmouth.
When reports of a homicidal jilted bride threaten their wedding plans, Ivy and Forneus set out to put a stop to the string of heinous acts. What they discover might just send the faerie and demon straight to Hell, and set Ivy on a path to rectify more than one evil deed.
Will Ivy tie the knot with her kelpie king, or will she be saying “I do” to the king of Hell? Her father's curse is on the line, and lives hang in the balance. No pressure.
Also by E.J. Stevens
Ivy Granger, Psychic Detective
Urban Fantasy Series
Shadow Sight
Blood and Mistletoe
Ghost Light
Club Nexus
Burning Bright
Birthright
Hound’s Bite
Tales from Harborsmouth
Ivy Granger Psychic Detective Box Set is Now Available.
Hunters’ Guild
Urban Fantasy Series
Hunting in Bruges
Spirit Guide
Young Adult Series
She Smells the Dead
Spirit Storm
Legend of Witchtrot Road
Brush with Death
The Pirate Curse
Spirit Guide: The Complete Series is Now Available.
Dark Poetry Collections
From the Shadows
Shadows of Myth and Legend
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About the Author
E.J. Stevens is the bestselling, award-winning author of the IVY GRANGER, PSYCHIC DETECTIVE urban fantasy series, the SPIRIT GUIDE young adult series, the HUNTERS' GUILD urban fantasy series, and the upcoming WHITECHAPEL PARANORMAL SOCIETY Victorian Gothic horror series. She is known for filling pages with quirky characters, bloodsucking vampires, psychotic faeries, and snarky, kick-butt heroines. Her novels are available worldwide in multiple languages.
BTS Red Carpet Award winner for Best Novel, Raven Award finalist for Best Urban Fantasy, SYAE finalist for Best Paranormal Series, Best Novella, and Best Horror, winner of the PRG Reviewer's Choice Award for Best Paranormal Fantasy Novel, Best Young Adult Paranormal Series, Best Urban Fantasy Novel, and finalist for Best Young Adult Paranormal Novel and Best Urban Fantasy Series.
When E.J. isn't at her writing desk, she enjoys dancing along seaside cliffs, singing in graveyards, and sleeping in faerie circles. E.J. currently resides in a magical forest on the coast of Maine where she finds daily inspiration for her writing.
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