The Enchanted Writes Book One by Odette C. Bell Read Free Book Online Page B

started to float and so did Brick. The moment
he did was the moment he began to move. The freeze spell had
obviously worn off and been replaced. He turned his head to her,
his surprise evident.
    Before he could say anything, Henrietta
turned to the witch. She saw that familiar red crackle of fire
begin to race over the creature's skin.
    Henrietta had to do something; now that they
were floating in the air, the two of them were sitting ducks.
    Hole.
    She wrote it as the word formed in her
mouth, and she said it out loud too.
    Something horrible happened. A massive
gaping black void opened up in the ground. Everything in the
warehouse dropped away. From the old crates, to the broken and
rusted 44 gallon drums, to the piles of yellow magazines and trash.
They all fell through the cavernous hole that was now the ground.
The hole was deep, impossibly deep, and pitch black. Where it led
to, she had no idea.
    Only one thing mattered. The witch. She
looked down at her feet for a split second, gave a cry, and fell
through the hole.
    The fire along her skin extinguished and the
black darkness below engulfed the witch.
    Henrietta was shocked, and it was such a
powerful, tactile sensation, that she crumpled her shoulders and
arms in, wrapping herself into a ball as she floated above the
giant, enormous hole.
    “Quick, bring the floor back,” Brick
snapped, “before this spell dissipates.”
    She wrote floor, and soon the floor
reappeared below them. Her float spell stopped with a snap, and she
fell about half-a-meter down until she flopped face-first onto the
floor with a thud.
    Brick managed to land on his feet, and
snapped up to a standing position. “Warrior Woman Henrietta,” he
began, and there was a distinctly proud note to his voice. “You
have vanquished your first witch,” he was almost cheering.
    Henrietta lay there with her face pressing
into the cold musty floor for a few more seconds. She tried to
process what had happened. Magic, witches, giant holes forming over
the ground....
    She heard a soft barking that grew
louder.
    She flopped over onto her back, and then
forced herself to sit up, not caring that her ridiculously short
skirt showed far too much.
    Barney. Her beautiful old corgi was now
resting in Brick's arms, and the mutinous dog was licking the man's
face.
    She scampered to her feet. “You give me back
my dog.”
    Brick handed Barney over.
    Henrietta opened her mouth, readying for a
volley of whatever torrid frustration, anger, and accusations she
could think of. They dried up. For the love of god, she had fought
a witch.
    Her mouth was open, her lips slack, her skin
deathly white.
    Brick looked at her, but at the same time
ran his hands over his jacket smoothing it, and then fluffed up his
collar until it was stiff against his neck. He brought two fingers
up to his hat and tipped it at her. “Well done. You have
successfully taken hold of your destiny.”
    She shook her head mutely.
    “You may now return home. You will need to
sleep. I fancy you will also require time to... adjust.” Brick
smiled widely. “I will see you tomorrow night.”
    “Sorry?” her voice shook.
    “To hunt more witches,” Brick said as he
took several steps back. Without another word the bugger did a jump
that saw him land like a cartoon character on the heavy metal
rafters, swing around and then do a fantastic somersault right
through the broken glass skylight above.
    There was a soft pattering of feet on the
roof, followed by silence.
    Which left Henrietta Gosling standing in
ridiculous boots, with the shortest skirt in the world and the
gaudiest jacket ever, clutching her dog to her chest with one arm
as she held a magic wand with the other.
    Eventually she walked home, though she was
damn sure to keep to the side streets, and as far away from traffic
as she could.
    For a good half hour after she arrived home,
she sat on her bed, or walked around her room in her heels,
listening to the sound of them clicking on the floor,