Page 10 of Black and White, Twice the Might (Cadenbury Town #8)

W e arrive at the Mayor’s house just before six. Temp opens the door, letting us in. I’m secretly glad it was a witch the boys liked and knew.

“Welcome to the madhouse. It’s loud and noisy but never dull.”

“Thanks,” Sly says, as we follow him into the kitchen.

There are a lot of people in here.

“This is Emily Stone, mum to everyone here, whether by blood or just because she’s awesome and we love her. Emily, this is Sly, Ebby, Xander and Enoch,” he says, pointing us out.

Emily laughs. “Thank you, Temp, I love you too.” She looks at us. “Welcome to our home.”

“Thanks,” we pretty much all say.

“It smells amazing in here,” Enoch says, smiling his cute smile at her.

“Thank you, Enoch. If there are any foods you don’t like, let me know.”

“I eat pretty much anything, but if I don’t like something, Xander will eat it for me; the same if he doesn’t like stuff, I’ll eat it for him.”

“Excellent. Temp will introduce you all around,” Emily says, going back to the cooker.

“This is my other brother, Cassie and my adopted brother, Sion,” Temp says, waving at the two men. “You met Kean and Titus last night. This is Ben and Jude, and Jude’s daughter Connie.”

Temp pulls the boys into chatting with his brothers, and Sly and I sit at the table talking to the others.

“Are you all healed?” I ask Ben.

He nods. “I am. Thank you for your healing. For some reason, I wasn’t expecting the swords to be real.”

“Me either. Thankfully, Titus saved me from the headless horseman.”

Titus grins. “It was fun, though.”

Sly nods. “It really was.”

I look at Sly and raise a brow. “Me nearly getting my head chopped off was fun?”

I hear laughter from the others.

“Well, obviously not that part,” he assures me.

Before I can reply, Adhan and Ernest walk in.

“Hey, family, friends,” Ernest says.

We all greet them, and I see Enoch wave.

“Boys, dinner is ready. Can you set the table, please? Xander, Enoch, join your brothers at the table,” Emily commands.

Sly stands up. “We can help.”

Emily shakes her head. “The boys will do it, but thank you.”

Adhan touches his shoulder. “There’s enough of us to get it done quickly.”

Sly nods and sits back down, just as Nix, Cam and Nora walk in.

Nora sits at the table while Nix and Cam help set the table and start bringing food over.

In no time at all, the table is full of food, and as we sit, Sal and Justice arrive.

“Evening,” they both say.

They get a round of ‘ hellos’ and sit down. Sal kisses Jude hello, before taking Connie out of his arms and chatting to her, sitting her on his lap.

Food gets passed around, and there is happy chatter around the table.

“How was the second viewing?” Cam asks us, cutting Nora’s food up for her.

“Even better than the first one. We had more time to look around, and the house hugged us again,” Xander tells him, before we can say anything.

I put the gravy jug down. “It is the perfect house, but there are things we need to discuss before we can make a firm decision.”

“That’s okay, take as long as you need to decide, and if you decide against it, that’s completely fine,” Adhan assures us.

“Enoch, do you want to come and see the injured animals tomorrow? Elaine and I are busy in the morning, but we’ll be at her house all afternoon. I promise Elaine is lovely, but I’ll be there to protect you the whole time,” Temp says, giving him a gentle smile.

Enoch looks at me, then Sly, looking hopeful if a little uncertain.

“I can come with you as well if you want,” I offer.

Enoch turns back to look at Temp. “Do you mind?”

Temp shakes his head. “I don’t mind, neither will Elaine,” he says, looking at me. “I’ll get your mobile number later and we can arrange everything.”

“Thank you for understanding,” I say to him.

“Seriously, think nothing of it. You don’t know the town or us, it’s all good,” Temp assures us.

I nod, glad he really does understand. I don’t expect any issues, but I want my brother to feel safe and relaxed.

“How are you feeling, Nora?” Justice asks her.

She swallows her bite of food before answering. “Okay. Nix gave me the tablets, and I slept like a lot, but my bad head is almost better.”

Justice nods. “Good, your colour is looking better as well.”

“Temp and Elaine gave Nora some healing this morning,” Nix told him, stroking her head.

“Good. I’ll give you some later as well.”

Xander looks confused. “Can you not fix her up properly?”

“We could, but a lot of people saw Nora get injured. We’ll make sure she heals up quickly, but it will still take a few weeks.” Justice replies, picking up his glass.

We finish eating and the table is cleared in a matter of moments, and cake and coffee are brought to the table.

“The plan for tonight is that all you witches are out and about tonight. Ernest and Justice are covering the Haunted Walk. Nix and Sal, you’ll cover the fair. Temp and Titus will cover the house. Sly, Ebby, where do you want to cover?” Adhan asks.

“We can do a general walk around the whole area if you want,” I say.

“Perfect, thank you. Brothers, we’ll be out and about in wolf form for the Haunted Walk and normally for the fair and the house. Cam, Sion, Cassie, can you stay here with Mum and the children?”

Cassie nods. “We can do that.”

“Is that okay with you two?” Cam asks Enoch and Xander.

They both nod.

“Good, we’ll load up films and pump you full of E numbers, then send you back to your brothers.”

“Yay,” the brothers say, grinning at me.

“Tomorrow is pure healthy food,” I tell them.

I laugh as the smile falls off their faces.

“Alright, people, let's head out,” Adhan says.

We arrive at the Haunted Farm and split up. “Now, where shall we start?” I ask Sly.

He takes my hand. “Let’s walk around the outside of the haunted house to start with.”

“So, you know Justice.”

Sly nods. “I knew him as Rhett Bannister. His family were proper psychos. Rhett, I mean Justice, apparently left his home and family, and last I heard had turned his back on magic.”

“Well, it looks like he embraced it again if he’s now a grey magic user.”

“It does. He looks truly happy.”

“I wonder how much magic he uses on his patients,” I ponder.

“I’d be surprised if he didn’t use any.”

We walk around the outside of the Haunted House. Ghosts are flying around the outside, which everyone seems to love. The rest of the decorations are amazing.

As we walk towards the Haunted Walk, we encounter Adhan and Temp.

“Having fun?” Adhan asks.

“We are,” Sly says. “I’m loving the ghosts flying around the house.”

“We don’t have them during the day, just for the evening,” Temp says.

I feel a help call nudge my magic, then another.

“Ernest and Justice need help,” Temp says quickly.

We all take off at a run. I send my magic out to find them. Sly and Temp do the same.

As we run through the Haunted Walk, Adhan shifts into his wolf and speeds off.

“I’ll join Justice and the others. You guys help Ernest,” Temp says, running off in a different direction.

Sly and I run off to help Ernest. I stop running as I see Ernest and Adhan killing vampires. But walking closer are zombies. Seriously, vampires and zombies? They were holograms last night.

I hear Sly laugh and feel his magic as it flies off. Then it’s my turn to laugh as suddenly the zombies are walking on treadmills.

“Zombies on treadmills,” he says, grinning at me.

“You are such a child,” I say, shaking my head at him.

We kill a few vampires and then see Ernest kill the final one. He looks towards the zombies and bursts out laughing.

I see him look around, grinning when he sees us. “Nice,” he says, waving his hand towards the zombies.

Sly laughs as we walk closer. “I saw it in a meme once and wondered if it would work.”

Just then, we hear running footsteps and Justice and Temp come rushing over, Wolf Jude and Wolf Kean with them.

Temp bursts out laughing when he sees the zombies on treadmills. “Nice. I wish I’d thought of that.”

I feel the air shimmer, and Adhan shifts. Ernest clicks his fingers and clothes him.

“Thanks, babe,” Ernest says, taking Adhan’s hand. “You came just in time.”

“I was talking with Ebby, Sly, and Temp when they felt your magic’s call. Temp went off to help Justice, and we came this way.”

Elliot comes walking through the trees, laughing as he passes the zombies. “You should keep them on the treadmills. I take it, this was your idea, Sly?”

Sly nodded. “Yep.”

“This is so going on the website,” Temp says happily.

“Did you battle vampires as well?” Ernest asks him and Justice.

The smile falls off Temp’s face. “You had vampires as well?”

Ernest laughs. “Yep, and Shamus helped. He got the walkers to follow him to safety.”

“He’s drowning his sorrows with my mother at the moment. He was caught,” Elliot tells us, shaking his head.

“Oh dear,” Ernest says.

“I got side-tracked today. I need to catch up with Molly and Cleo and see what was decided,” Adhan says.

“Well, Mum hasn’t told us to pack up and leave,” Elliot tells him. “So that means we’re staying open.”

While he is talking, Ernest drops Adhan’s hand and walks towards the zombies.

I see Ernest poke a zombie first with his finger, then with his hand, both of which go through it. He’s braver than I am. I’m not sure I’d want to get any closer to one, even if it is a hologram. But then maybe I’ve watched too many zombie shows.

“I think the zombies are still holograms,” he says, starting to walk back to us.

I see the zombie Ernest poked suddenly leap off the treadmill and jumps Ernest. I go to call out a warning, but I’m too late.

Ernest lands on the ground with the zombie lying over his back.

Adhan quickly shifts, and he and his brothers run towards Ernest.

The zombie, by this time, has latched onto Ernest’s neck and is trying to take a chunk out of it.

I send some magic out to help, being careful not to hit the wolves, but it doesn’t stop the zombie.

Adhan reaches Ernest first and jumps the zombie, Wolf Adhan pushing the zombie off Ernest. How Ernest’s throat wasn’t ripped out, I don’t know.

I look and see Wolf Adhan tearing the zombie apart, his brothers helping. Yeah, that zombie is definitely solid.

I look around, and the other zombies have gotten off the treadmills and are walking towards us. I throw my magic out, but it doesn’t stop them, it doesn’t even slow them down.

“Everyone down,” Sly yells.

I watch everyone drop to the ground, including the wolves, as Sly sends his magic out. I hear a boom and look towards the zombies to see they have all now gone, as have the treadmills.

We get up and rush over to Ernest, who is holding his neck, his bloody neck.

Adhan kneels beside Ernest, helping him to sit up. Temp clicks his fingers, and Adhan is again clothed. Ernest leans into his side.

Justice and Temp drop down next to him. Sly, Elliot and I are kneeling close. Kean and Jude are still in wolf form, keeping watch.

“Please tell me a zombie didn’t just chomp me,” Ernest says generally, while holding his neck. Blood is seeping through his fingers, turning them red.

“Yeah, it did, Pops. We need to get you back to the manor and sorted out,” Justice says, moving Ernest’s hand and looking at the bite mark. He clicks his fingers and covers the bite with a pad and uses tape to secure it in place.

“How could a hologram chomp me? My hand went through him.”

“Dark magic. When I destroyed the zombies, I broke all other dark magic left in this forest,” Sly tells us.

Adhan looks at him. “Thank you. Can you stand, sweetheart?” Adhan asks gently.

“I can,” Ernest says, moving. Sly and Adhan help him up.

“Shall we go to The Winchester?” I say, grinning.

Temp and Elliot laugh.

“We should...” Ernest starts to say, but suddenly stops and looks concerned. “Wait, am I about to turn into a zombie?”

Silence suddenly descends as we all look at him.

Well, there’s a thought. Could he?

“Temp, call Molly, Elaine and the other witchlings back. Have everyone meet at the manor,” Adhan practically orders.

“Ernest ..,” I start to say. Just as Ernest pales, his eyes roll, and he starts to fall.

Adhan catches him and picks him up. “Everyone to the manor now,” he commands, practically running out of the haunted walk with an unconscious Ernest in his arms.

The rest of us go with them.