We have a WINNER!
As as often happens with Nicole, @nicolewolverton it was a landslide. Well, you’ve just gotta love her details and funny twists.
So congrats Nicole, you’ve won not only the competition, but a signed copy of The Prodigal’s Foole by R.B. Wood, @rbwood and a 5 page critique from me!
But there were other prizes this week, right? Well, that means more WINNERS!
The winner of an e-copy of The Prodigal’s Foole is: John Hancock, @Grokdad
And the winner of an e-copy of The The Prodigal’s Foole and a 5 page critique from me is: N.R. Brown, @nrbrown
Congrats everyone!
I’ll be in touch with the winners. In the meantime, here’s Nicole’s winning entry for you to enjoy.
See you next week!
“But, Janet, what if something goes wrong?”
“What could go wrong?” I asked, my finger tracing the spiky cursive flowing over the page of the spell book.
Violet paled, her carefully applied blush standing out on the apples of her cheeks. “I don’t know — but when you mess witht his kind of crap, bad things happen! I heard Steve Pinner invoked some kind of demon, and a big whirling hole opened up in the middle of his kitchen and sucked his entire family in. That’s how his dad died, you know. That story about him taking off in the middle of the night was just a front.”
“Whatever. That’s a load of crap.”
“It’s not.”
“It is.” I glared at Violet, hoping to convey the fact that I wanted her to shut the hell up. It must have worked because her lips sucked closed, chin dimpling with the effort. “Okay, let’s begin.”
I read the words, paying careful attention to the accent marks and hoping I wasn’t butchering the language to badly…whatever language it was. I couldn’t be sure — I’d never seen it before, but what did I know? I was a high school senior with three years of Spanish under my belt.
The second my last syllable died away, Violet whimpered, and the dog — a tiny brown furball of a thing — darked out of the room as though I’d lit his poofy tail on fire. The air grew heavier, an almost oily breeze eddying around me. I dropped the book on the coffee table and waited.
Violet wrung her hands.
I pretzeled my arms across my chest.
Violet covered her eyes with her fingers.
I shifted my weight from foot to foot, impatient and irritated.
Ten minutes later, the living room door…well, it didn’t really fling open, so much as it exploded inward, and in its place stood — nothing.
“What the hell?”
A mouse squeak of a voice emanated from the doorjamb. “You have invoked me, Hruuglen the Demon of Small Places! How dare you disturb my rest! There will be consequences, human!”
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. It was just a wee thing with purple skin and long black hair only two inches high.
It didn’t matter — my father tread squarely on its head on his way into the house after work. “Is your mother home?” he asked.
“No, Dad.”
He continued through the room, leaving a red-purple splotch behind.
“You’re right, Violet. Bad things happen.”
