Halfway Unwrapped

  By

  Terry Maggert

  First published in USA in 2018 by

  Terry Maggert

  Portland

  Tennessee

  Copyright © Terry Maggert 2018

  Formatted by LionheART Publishing House

  All rights reserved.

  The right of Terry Maggert to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review —without written permission from the author.

  Dedication

  For the bride, whose humor and patience are my fuel.

  Contents

  Chapter One: Fast, for a Dead Guy

  Chapter Two: Cold Snap

  Chapter Three: The Deb Situation

  Chapter Four: The Fog of War

  Chapter Five: Cellar Dweller

  Chapter Six: Training Day

  Chapter Seven: Frankincense and Durr

  Chapter Eight: Shorter Days

  Chapter Nine: Sharing is Caring

  Chapter Ten: Model Citizen

  Chapter Eleven: Librarian, Medium Rare

  Chapter Twelve: Stitchcraft

  Chapter Thirteen: Cat’s Pause

  Chapter Fourteen: Wrong Diagnosis

  Chapter Fifteen: The Big One

  Chapter Sixteen: Hoofin’ It

  Chapter Seventeen: Pianist Envy

  Chapter Eighteen: Tiffany Overdrive

  Chapter Nineteen: The Zero Club

  Chapter Twenty: Nature Girl

  Chapter Twenty-One: Skulk and Dagger

  Chapter Twenty-Two: Two Steps Back

  Chapter Twenty-Three: Stank You Very Much

  Chapter Twenty-Four: Rock Stars

  Chapter Twenty-Five: Ultimate Evil

  Chapter Twenty-Six: Closing Time

  Chapter Twenty-Seven: Prime Location

  Chapter Twenty-Eight: Strip Mall Magick

  Chapter Twenty-Nine: Bell Shock

  Chapter Thirty: Bloodhound

  Chapter Thirty-One: Prematurely Gray

  Chapter Thirty-Two: Blast Radius

  Chapter Thirty-Three: Mean and Meaner

  Epilogue

  Reviews

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Contact Terry Maggert

  More Books by Terry Maggert:

  Chapter One: Fast, for a Dead Guy

  “Hooooooooonnnnnnn!” It was a booming voice, and clearly not human, and to my utter disgust the source was even further up the mountain. I was dangerously close to asking Wulfric for a piggyback ride and to the stars with my pride. I know my limitations, and anything to do with climbing or reaching things on top shelves is well outside my skillset. “I guess we go up the stupid hill to chase the stupid thing that smells”—

  “Stupid?” Wulfric offered, smiling from beneath his golden lashes. He wasn’t even breathing hard and seemed to be enjoying himself. He also carried what looked to be a small tree in one hand, picked up on our impromptu chase of an unknown beastie up one of the mountains outside Halfway. That’s my town, and it falls on me—and Gran, and now Wulfric, kind of—to keep it safe, which was why I was wasting a glorious late fall day fighting gravity and my short legs to get to higher ground.

  “Become a witch, Carlie. You’ll work with herbs, and charms, and weave beautiful things from magic and nature and it will all be so incredible,” I wheezed into the cool air. It was the heart of fall, and the leaves were in their last spangled hurrah of colors, fiery columns of orange and yellow that rose high above me in the clear mountain skies. If I wasn’t so peeved, it would be one of those days made for postcards, but I didn’t have the luxury of stopping because Wulfric took one step to my three, and I do have my pride. Sort of.

  My feet were punishing the trail—okay, they were moderately aggressive; at the size of my boots I don’t know if they could really punish anything, let alone the earth, but I was still pretty angry. “Aren’t you going to say anything supportive?”

  Wulfric regarded me from his sleepy expression, waiting for me to stop moving. He was irritating like that; when I get worked into a good lather, he will just watch and wait for me to run out of gas before getting involved in the conversation. It is both reasonable and effective, so I find it deeply offensive, like his ability to fall asleep during a thunderstorm. Or a tornado, or a volcanic eruption, for that matter.

  “I am, in my opinion, doing something far more important,” he said.

  “Which is?”

  “I am actually being supportive, rather than cheering you on from the base of the mountain,” he said, and I kind of wanted to kick him just then. He wasn’t just right, he was being a really good boyfriend, and that made me even grumpier. When confronted with his reason and kindness, I was left with precious little wiggle room for complaining, which I naturally wanted to complain about. “Also, I don’t like the smell of this—whatever this thing is. It is new to me.”

  “Me too,” I agreed. “Look. Under that pine,” I said, pointing.

  I’m a witch, but Wulfric lived in the mountains for the better part of a thousand years, so I put a lot of value on his opinion about the natural world. When he tilted his head in confusion, I dropped charms into my hand just in case things got weird. They usually do when I’m in the woods, so it seemed that prudence was the best choice as we walked carefully to the chewed-up patch of ground.

  “Is that a. . . a grave?” I asked. It looked like a grave to me, albeit one that lacked any evidence of a coffin or marker. The earth had been clawed from within, a sure sign that it wasn’t natural. My sigh of disgust was loud enough that Wulfric pulled me to him, leaning down to kiss me.

  “It was,” he said, kneeling to peer into the hole. It was deep enough for shadows, and there was an odor of musty decay coming from somewhere beneath our feet, but that wasn’t where the odd hint of death ended. In the air, a faint haze drifted about in nascent swirls, like the memory of something fragile, breaking apart as we moved around the earthen wound to get a look at it from every angle.

  “Hooooooooooonnnn!” Again, the foghorn call was up the mountain, but closer and somehow it sounded---

  “Did that sound, um. . .juicier?” I asked. The sound was part wet gurgle and part thunderous hoot, like a massive owl with a head cold. Whatever made the noise, it was tied to the empty grave. “Look.” I pointed at the dusty air. The motes went uphill, a kind of airborne breadcrumbs leading us to something that was clearly having a bad day.

  This day was about to get worse.

  “It’s a monster, but I was unaware of their kind getting the flu?” Wulfric asked, uncertain. As someone who’d spent the bulk of his life in a state of immortality, illness was a new and terrible thing for him since his reversion to the land of the living. Since he’s nineteen inches taller than me, that means watching him lose his mind over a cold really puts me in a tough spot. I mean, I want to laugh, of course, but I also know he’s still getting used to the idea that someday, he too will be in a hole in the ground.

  “Hoooooaarghllglglgll,” the noise came again, ending in a huge coughing fit that was, to be honest, completely squicky even at a distance.

  “Are we certain that approaching this, ah,” --- Wulfric began.

  “Walking germ factory with fangs, probably? No. I’m not really sure it’s our best move, but I do sort of have a contract with the land and people of our town. It’s not exactly on record at city hall, but, you know. Duty calls.” I flicked my charms, setting cool blue sparks tumbling from them in a silent stream. “Uphill, unless you want to call it to us?”

  Wulfric is an enormous, powerful, lethal man, but just then, he looked at me like I was a piranha with legs, speaking a different language. “What? Call the beast to us? Why?”

  “So I can dispatch it with some family magic, and then you can take me to The Pines for pizza,” I said, in what I hoped was my most reasonable tone. It certainly felt reasonable as I was saying it, but he didn’t seem convinced.

  “While I appreciate your brio, I”—

  “Did you just use the word brio?” I asked him, trying not to laugh. He gets overly serious about certain topics, like language and brands of ranch dressing, so I tried to keep a respectful look on my face as I peered up at him.

  He sniffed with some dignity before answering. “I did because it happens to fit better than verve, and the last time I used the word verve you called me—I believe the term was nerd?”

  I did laugh then because it was all true. In my defense, he’d been commenting on how I was eating a bagel, and in my protest over his wording, I’d managed to cough a tiny dollop of cream cheese onto his face. It wasn’t my proudest moment, but he acted like it was a personal attack.

  “It wasn’t little,” he said.

  “What wasn’t?”

  “The cream cheese. You don’t recall because you were too busy laughing, but I found the entire incident to be rather,” he looked down at me, brow lifted, “basic
.”

  “Did you just call me basic?” I asked, listening for the monster with one ear and watching Wulfric torpedo his chances of anything resembling an in-house booty call.

  “Yes, I did.”

  “Hoooooaaaaack!”

  “Okay, we get it! Oooooo, you’re a horrific monster, whatever!” I shouted in the general direction of the thing coming toward us. “I am not basic. You take that back or”—

  “Or what? You’ll stop drinking those pumpkin spy lotsas?” he asked, triumphant in his assault on my coffee habits.

  “It’s pumpkin spice latte, you cretin.”

  “Hmm. That explains why they’re rather zesty.”

  “They are, but that doesn’t make me basic.” I thought it over and shrugged as his logic came home to roost. He might have a point. “I am sort of going through a prosecco phase.”

  “I know. It was on the quiz I took online, that’s how I know you’re sixty percent basic. It was quite thorough. Did you know, your choice of boots”—

  “Hooooo”---

  “Oh for stars’ sake, shut up!” I barked, turning to the underbrush less than fifty feet away. It was shaking violently as something moved through it. “You can finish your insult later. Time for business,” I said.

  “It would appear so.” Wulfric swung the club in his hand back and forth, getting the measure of it. The air whistled as he did so, the breeze of his actions lifting my hair.

  The beast stepped out into the sun, and it was not what I expected. In fact, I’ve never seen anything like it in my life, or read about it, or even heard a rumor of such a thing, but it crashed through the branches with clumsy steps, waving long arms about like it had trouble with balance.

  “Is that a giant mushroom?” Wulfric asked. “With arms?”

  “Yes. Yes, it is,” I answered, tilting my head in amazement. It was a bit damp looking, oozing weird fluids and surrounded by a haze of what I could only guess to be spores.

  “Should you try asking it to leave?” For a Viking, Wulfric had a kind streak that went against legends and hearsay, but that quality was one of the reasons I loved him, not his vocabulary choices.

  “I.... guess? I don’t speak fungi. I don’t even know if it says anything other than hoon, or whatever it’s been yelling.” I stepped forward, charms at the ready and a spell in my mind, ready to come forth if things got dicey. I switched to a sort of witchy legalese and addressed the being because that’s part of my job description. “Mushroom, uh, person? As steward of these lands I ask, do you intend us harm?”

  Its arms were blue, the body gray, and there were gross red pustules all over it, like some advanced skin disease. The creature, all ten feet of it, stood still save for an occasional pfffft as it tooted spores out into the air with disturbing regularity. I couldn’t tell if it was watching us because it didn’t have a face, just a mouth, a head like a sombrero, and two legs that ended in fibrous toes. When it didn’t answer, I waved, seeing no harm in trying something simple.

  “Honey?” I asked Wulfric, who was winding up his club for a hammer blow.

  “Yes?” He stopped, log held at the ready, arms bulging and tense with potential violence. Even in that state, he seemed calmer than I am when things go haywire, so I put my hand on his chest, looking into his eyes with a smile.

  “If you smash that mushroom into goo, won’t those spores go everywhere?”

  He lowered the club. “An excellent point. What do you propose?”

  “Well, since you seem to think I’m basic, just that. Something basic. A classic, if you will.” My grin died as the mushroom creature shot forward like a gray streak, trailing spores and muttering hoon from its sagging lips. I’ve never seen a mushroom move at all, let alone faster than the human eye can follow, and its arm hit me a glancing blow as Wulfric’s club tore into the thing’s legs, cutting it down with a sound like falling pudding. It wasn’t just mean. It was moist. I knew what to do.

  “Tintreach theasa!” I hissed, calling down summer lightning from the air.

  The sky answered.

  A bolt shot straight down through the crisp air, silver and hot and pure. It hit the fungal creature with an intense bloom of heat and sizzle, vanishing through an entry wound on the wide cap. The air filled with a scent of roasted mushrooms, which was actually quite nice, but then, the creature bellowed again when it should have been cooked medium well.

  “Um.” I said, looking at Wulfric, who hefted his log of doom or whatever we were calling it.

  “Hoooo!” It was a shorter cry, probably because the thing was too busy wrapping its weird arms around me and trying to lift me off the ground, a feat that wasn’t hard given it was twice my height.

  “Enough, beast!” Wulfric was in motion, being all gallant and such while I wriggled a hand free to point my charms at the monster. I didn’t know why it was still alive, but it was angry, partially cooked, and doing a fair job at shaking me to pieces like a paint mixer with an attitude.

  I had no air for spells, only charms, and they would have to be enough. Fire was out since I had no desire to be cooked and I didn’t want the thing exploding.

  That left one choice.

  I waved my wrist as bright points of light shot through my vision, the last image I could see being Wulfric’s face contorted with anger as he swung his tree limb in a blur. I sent a small prayer skyward as the connections in my mind clicked in place, binding magic and will and hope all into a braid of all that I am as a witch.

  My spell of purest cold lanced out to strike the creature, just as Wulfric’s club crashed down with enough force that the blow reverberated in my chest. The fungal giant didn’t just die. It shattered. I fell to the ground, sputtering, covered in freezing powdered mushroom. It’s a lot worse than it sounds because I started sneezing and wondered if my life would end due to an unknown yet lethal allergy to mushroom monster dust.

  “Carlie?” Wulfric was looking down at me, face framed by the sun, his golden brow furrowed with concern.

  “Yes?” I tried not to cough. My chest hurt, my leg hurt, and I think my ear was bleeding from a speeding monster fragment.

  “Do you still want to go for pizza?”

  “Yes.” He reached down to pull me up, his huge hands gently lifting me despite the weird angle. When I was standing, it took a moment for my vision to clear. “Gross. Monster residue.” I wiped my eyes and grimaced. “I don’t mind killing them, but why do they have to be so disgusting?”

  “They are monsters. It’s what they do,” he said, and I simply nodded. Sometimes, his approach to life was perfect in its simplicity. “Like us. We like pizza. They like mayhem.”

  “Can we get garlic rolls, too?” I was limping slightly, but he made no note of it. He knew when to fuss, and I was still angry at the interloper on our land, despite the creature now being so much dust.

  “Of course, but there will be limited kissing afterward. You know the rules,” he said. I tended to treat garlic like a food group and was always a bit aromatic when we left the pizza place. I also had sauce on my shirt. Usually. It’s a gift.

  “I agree to your terms, and you must agree to mine,” I told him with as much gravity as I could muster while ruffling monster dust from my hair.

  “Which are?”

  “Cheese only. No mushrooms.” Somehow, one taste of them had been enough for the day.

  Chapter Two: Cold Snap

  “I haven’t seen anything else since then, but it’s still weird. It almost had language, but not enough to even be considered undead,” I was telling Gran while eating cold pizza and sipping hot tea. The tea was good, but then it always is when she makes it since every cup is her own personal recipe. This one was late season blackberries, along with a hint of sage. It was a nice counterpoint to the chilled perfection of cold pizza, but I had just gotten off shift at the diner, and my stomach was in charge, not my palate. During times like that, I would eat anything if it was filling. I’m kind of an opportunist that way.

  Gran regarded me from the rim of her own cup, pulling idly at a lock of silver hair. She gets this look when she’s deep in thought, as if lifting her eyes upward will reveal answers to the mysteries of the universe. My thinking face is almost identical to my angry face, but not Gran. She looks inquisitive and spiritual, almost serene, whereas people will see me deep in thought and ask if I’m in the process of passing a kidney stone. I guess age and wisdom really do have their benefits, at least when it comes to the art of modifying one’s facial expressions.