Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 70779 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 354(@200wpm)___ 283(@250wpm)___ 236(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70779 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 354(@200wpm)___ 283(@250wpm)___ 236(@300wpm)
And then I saw it—there, glowing at the end of the alley, was a door.
I don’t mean the whole door was glowing—it was more like the frame of the door was outlined in light.
“There—the door! Use it—use the key!” my Grandfather urged me.
“Wh-which…k-key?” I gasped, so out of breath I was barely able to get the words out. If I got out of this mess, I was definitely going to hit the gym, I promised myself. Not to lose weight—just to be sure that it was easier to run for my life. I skidded to a stop in front of the door which was outlined in silvery light and started fumbling for the keys around my neck.
“Pop-pop…which key?” I panted again.
But there was no answer from the little voice in my ear. Instead, I heard a low, ominous growling coming from the other end of the alley. Turning my head, I saw three sets of glowing red eyes glaring in my direction.
Shit.
Yanking the necklace off my neck, I grabbed for the keys as they slid off the chain. I only had time to try one of them and if I guessed wrong, I was dead!
But maybe I’m getting ahead of myself. Even though it ended so disastrously, the day I learned about my third gift started normally enough.
How could I know it would end with me opening a portal to Hell…and then finding my way into Hidden Hollow?
1
WILLOW
My alarm went off at six—the same time it does every morning. But even before I opened my eyes, I heard a “Mmmmrow?” and a paw patted my cheek.
“All right, Miss Sassy,” I muttered, batting at my cat. “I hear you—I hear you.”
I wanted to roll over and go back to sleep, but I knew the bundle of calico fur sitting on my chest wouldn’t let me. Besides, it was time to get up and open the shop. There are always a few practitioners who want to get in early and grab some supplies before the start of business hours.
Yawning, I rolled out of bed and went to get a quick shower. Twisting my long, wavy black hair up on top of my head to keep it from getting damp, I swiped the steam off the mirror and glanced at my face. I have what they used to call a “roseleaf complexion”—which really just means I’m too pale and my skin bruises easily. The skin I got from my Mom. My thin nose and full lips came from my Dad.
My pale green eyes, that have no other color in them, I got from my Great Grandmother—at least that’s what Pop-pop always said. He claimed that his mother was a great beauty—so gorgeous that the artists begged to paint her and put her picture on cigar boxes. Which was a big deal back in the day—like being an Instagram model, I guess.
My eyes weird some people out though, because they almost seem to glow in the dark. “Cat eyes” my ex, Carlo used to call them.
He always hated cats.
I tried to push Carlo out of my mind as I stepped into the shower. He was a chapter in my life best left closed. The day he had signed the divorce papers, over two years ago, had been one of the best days of my life. I had been set free of a horrible, abusive marriage and I wasn’t about to take my freedom for granted.
Especially since I was fairly sure my Pop-pop had paid for my freedom with his life.
That might be hard to understand unless you know that my Grandfather had Romany blood in him—he always claimed that he was descended from a Gypsy Queen. And when I told him you can’t say “Gypsy” anymore, because it’s considered a slur, he would always wave me off.
“Please! It has always been an ugly name for our kind, Willow my love!” he told me. “But I will not let them make me ashamed! I have the blood of the Gypsy Queen in my veins and The Power that comes with it.” Then he winked at me. “Someday, you will have The Power too.”
I would always wave him off. I might have his blood in my veins, but I didn’t have any of the powers that my Grandfather did. Maybe because my blood was too diluted. Pop-pop was only half Gypsy—or Traveler, which is the nice way to say it—himself. Which made my Dad only a quarter Traveler and so I was barely an eighth.
Pop-pop’s other half was Italian—I could always tell when he got upset or excited because his accent got thicker. He could swear a blue streak in Italian too, which never failed to impress me when I was younger.
As for magical powers, Pop-pop really did have some, though it was hard to tell how much was genuine and how much was sleight-of-hand and skillful deception. He knew about a million card tricks and he was always making coins appear from behind my ear.