Hooray! The weekend has arrived, bringing with it yet another Show-Off Saturday excerpt. This week we’ll be sampling my fantasy romance short story collection, Red’s Magick.
RED’S MAGICK
by Debbie Mumford
Audience: Fantasy Romance | Adult | Short Stories
Red’s Magick is a collection of short stories dealing with an amorous faery imprisoned in a pane of ancient Irish glass. The realm of Tuatha de Danaan may be free of Red’s magicks, but the humans who come in contact with his glass prison find themselves in extremely compromising situations.
Note: These stories are intended for mature readers.
Electronic Edition Publication Date: Feb 2011
Buy Now: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Smashwords
*~*~*
Red’s Magick
I
The Ghost in the Glass
Red swirled to the edge of his prison and peered through layers of bubble wrap and packing peanuts. Hands thrust the protective materials away and grasped the wrapped glass. Red recoiled in shock as his penitentiary jarred out of its dark womb into the diffused light of day. He blinked and squinted; the light grew brighter as the cushioning layers fell away.
“Don’t drop that!” The tone of command assaulted Red’s ears. He’d led a very sheltered life for the past couple of centuries. “The boss paid an arm and a leg for those panes of glass. You ask me, he’s nuts. Who needs ancient crap when we manufacture the very best right here in the good old US of A?”
Red didn’t understand all of the man’s words, but he ruffled at being referred to as ‘ancient crap.’ He took careful aim and pushed his spell through the miring stasis of the imprisoning glass.
The overbearing speaker sneezed, sneezed again, and continued sneezing with emphatic regularity. Red’s pane of glass settled partway back into the soft darkness of packing peanuts, forgotten while his unpackers rushed to the aid of his first American victim.
*~*~*
Maureen McBride watched with satisfaction as the workers set the panes of antique glass in the window openings between Mark Davidson’s new sunroom and great room. She’d given her buyer in Dublin specific instructions about what she wanted, and he’d come through for her. The two-foot square panes had cost her a significant portion of her decorating budget, but the effect was exactly as she’d hoped. The green-tinged, slightly rippled glass mellowed the sunroom’s brilliance and gave the great room an ethereal quality which she intended to emphasize with paint and décor. This room would be fit for a queen, and Maureen fully intended to rule from it. She’d make Mark Davidson a fine wife; he just didn’t know it yet.
“Be careful with that,” she snapped when the dark-haired man’s grasp faltered momentarily. “Those panes are irreplaceable. I’m incredibly lucky to have come up with four that match, as it is.”
“Sorry, Ms. McBride,” came the man’s unexpectedly rich baritone, “I must’ve pinched a nerve. I got a shock when I touched this one.”
Inside the pane of glass under discussion, Red peered at the figure across the room. A mortal female, and haughty; she reminded him unpleasantly of the Summer Queen. He ground his teeth and his blood boiled at the reminder of that humorless bitch. His temples throbbed with a centuries-old ache for revenge.
He settled to the bottom of the glass, despair washing over him. The Summer Queen existed far beyond his reach, safe from his small magicks.
But this mortal woman wasn’t.
Red’s spirits lifted, and he pressed his nose against his glass prison and stared hungrily across the room. Yes! The snooty female stood mere feet from him, making notes with a black stylus on a small tablet. Oh, she would do nicely. Tall for a female, she possessed delectable curves and flaming red hair. The hair settled his malicious intent. She wore it pulled back in a severe knot, but escaping tendrils confirmed his impression of long, riotous curls. The perfect scapegoat.
Now, he needed a man. He flowed to the right edge of his prison and inspected the fingers carefully pushing his glass into place. This one had felt Red’s flame when his unprotected flesh touched the surface of Red’s prison. He sniffed. Ah, of course, Celtic blood — and a connection already established. Red rolled across his glass in a series of exuberant somersaults, glad to be alive for the first time in ages.
