Graveyards, Visions, and Other Things That Byte (Dowser 8.5) Read online

  Rochelle nodded. Then she flipped through to a specific page in her sketchbook and ripped it out. “I still haven’t been able to see Jade. But I think maybe once Ed slipped through the elves’ wards, I started to pick up more hints of what’s to come.”

  A small person appeared by the oracle’s shoulder. A brownie, wearing a black dress that ballooned out around her knees. She was wringing her large hands, glancing warily at each of us in turn. “I still can’t get through, mistress.” Her voice was gravelly.

  Rochelle passed the sketch she’d ripped out of her book to the brownie, who took the paper reverently, peering at whatever was depicted on it.

  “You understand, Blossom?” Rochelle asked. “A time will come and you will deliver that.”

  The brownie nodded. Then she disappeared.

  “And us?” I asked Rochelle. “We just wait here for this … something to happen?”

  “We’ve done what we can. So now we plan.”

  “Plan? Plan what? Storming the castle?”

  Rochelle turned her white-eyed gaze to the wall where BC Place was still glowing bright green. “Yes.”

  “Yes?” I echoed incredulously. “I was being sarcastic. We can’t take the elves down. You just said that we can’t even get through their wards!”

  “Except Ed,” Mory interjected mildly.

  “Great … a dead turtle piloted by a necromancer. Why aren’t we already laying siege?” I glanced at them all in turn. They were all far too calm, too collected.

  “We need more witches —”

  “No,” Scarlett said.

  I flinched. I hadn’t realized that she was aware enough to track our conversation, let alone participate in it.

  “The future is at a balance point,” the strawberry-blond witch murmured dreamily. “The oracle will tip it in the right direction.”

  I looked at Rochelle in disbelief.

  She smiled softly, serenely. Her eyes were glowing white, her hands caked with black charcoal. Magic shifted around us, stirring through the map sketched on the walls … power etched in black and white. I could feel a low thrum underneath my feet … I could see a soft glow crisscrossing over the ceiling.

  And … I believed.

  I had to believe.

  Just like I’d had to believe I would survive my childhood … my human death … the last twelve hours.

  This was why the Godfrey coven had tied Rochelle to the witches’ grid. And with all of us behind her, with all of our trust … the magic would follow.

  “What comes next, oh oracle?” I whispered.

  Rochelle bowed her head over her sketchbook, flipping to a blank page.

  “Now we need Jade.”

  Are you interested in baking the cupcakes from the Dowser Series? Well, now you can!

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  Acknowledgments

  For Michael

  Fate? Destiny? You.

  * * *

  With thanks to:

  My story & line editor

  Scott Fitzgerald Gray

  My proofreader

  Pauline Nolet

  My beta readers

  Didi Brady, Cindy Cor, Terry Daigle, Angela Flannery, Gael Fleming, Heather Lewis, Megan Gayeski Pirajno, Beth Peters, and Diane Sommers.

  For their continual encouragement, feedback, & general advice

  SFWA

  The Office

  The Retreat

  About the Author

  Meghan Ciana Doidge is an award-winning writer based out of Salt Spring Island, British Columbia, Canada. She has a penchant for bloody love stories, superheroes, and the supernatural. She also has a thing for chocolate, potatoes, and cashmere yarn.

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  For recipes, giveaways, news, and glimpses of upcoming stories, please connect with Meghan via:

  www.madebymeghan.ca

  [email protected]

  Also by Meghan Ciana Doidge

  Novels

  After The Virus

  Spirit Binder

  Time Walker

  Cupcakes, Trinkets, and Other Deadly Magic (Dowser 1)

  Trinkets, Treasures, and Other Bloody Magic (Dowser 2)

  Treasures, Demons, and Other Black Magic (Dowser 3)

  I See Me (Oracle 1)

  Shadows, Maps, and Other Ancient Magic (Dowser 4)

  Maps, Artifacts, and Other Arcane Magic (Dowser 5)

  I See You (Oracle 2)

  Artifacts, Dragons, and Other Lethal Magic (Dowser 6)

  I See Us (Oracle 3)

  Catching Echoes (Reconstructionist 1)

  Tangled Echoes (Reconstructionist 2)

  Unleashing Echoes (Reconstructionist 3)

  Champagne, Misfits, and Other Shady Magic (Dowser 7)

  Misfits, Gemstones, and Other Shattered Magic (Dowser 8)

  * * *

  Novellas/Shorts

  Love Lies Bleeding

  The Graveyard Kiss (Reconstructionist 0.5)

  Dawn Bytes (Reconstructionist 1.5)

  An Uncut Key (Reconstructionist 2.5)

  Graveyards, Visions, and Other Things that Byte (Dowser 8.5)

  * * *

  www.madebymeghan.ca

  GRAVEYARDS, VISIONS, AND OTHER THINGS THAT BYTE (DOWSER 8.5)

  * * *

  Copyright © 2018 Meghan Ciana Doidge

  Published by Old Man in the CrossWalk Productions 2018

  Salt Spring Island, BC, Canada

  www.oldmaninthecrosswalk.com

  * * *

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be produced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author, except by reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, objects, and incidents herein are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual things, events, locales, or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  Library and Archives Canada

  Doidge, Meghan Ciana, 1973 —

  Graveyards, Visions, and Other Things that Byte/Meghan Ciana Doidge — SMASHWORDS EDITION

  Cover design by: Elizabeth Mackey

  ISBN 978-1-927850-81-7