I’m so excited to bring to you my first novel about witches! My favorite book/movie has always been Practical Magic. I dreamt of being in that house and having witch powers. Now, I can live through Sage Carson, a powerful witch, who must protect the nine sacred stones that protects the witches from the demons.
I want to entice you to get lost in Sage’s world by giving you a sneak peak into The Witches Stones, book one in The Gray House Series!
Here is the first chapter-enjoy!
Prologue
Agatha Gaunt peered through the dusty kitchen window towards the little girl playing in the yard. The old woman smiled as she watched the six-year-old skip through the colorful flowers that covered most of the yard. The little girl skimmed her fingers over the perennials lightly, as she skipped along the line of flowers. Her long wavy red hair seemed to dance in the wind as she moved, and the flowers gravitated towards her, longing for her touch.
The little girl finally stopped and plopped down on the freshly cut grass under the old willow tree. She began to hum a tune her mother used to sing to her every night before she went to bed. As she hummed the tune, dozens of monarch butterflies suddenly appeared, fluttering around her head. She giggled as they tickled her face with their wings.
The old lady’s eyes brightened as she watched the little girl use her powers. Nodding her head, she turned to the fat black cat lying on the window sill next to her, lazily cleaning his paws.
“She has the gift, Sam,” she told the cat. “She will be the protector.”
The cat lazily looked up at her. Uninterested, Sam went back to cleaning his left paw. She patted the cat’s head and pulled herself out of the creaky wooden chair she had been sitting on, then walked to the kitchen door and opened it.
“Sage!” she called out to her. “Time to come in!”
Sage jumped up after hearing her grandmother’s voice, scaring the butterflies away.
“Okay, Grandma Agatha!” she yelled back and quickly ran up to the kitchen door where she was greeted with a hug from her grandmother.
As she went inside, they were unaware of the dark figure that had been watching her from the woods next to the house. He had been observing the little girl as well.
A smile crept over his face as he turned to leave. He slowly disappeared into the woods, humming the same nursery rhyme as the girl had. He was satisfied with what he had learned of the girl and he would be back to claim what was his.
Chapter 1
Sage looked up at the old house through the windshield of her jeep as she drove up the gravel driveway to her grandmother’s home. She looked up at the big white pillars that stood guard and the old porch rails looked as though they helped protect the house as well. It still looked the same as it always had during her childhood there.
She parked the jeep and looked out the window. She hadn’t been back to Gray House for years. She always meant to visit her grandmother more often, but she had been caught up with her booming bakery business back in New York. When she got the news of her grandmother’s passing, she was both guilt ridden and devastated.
She stared at the old familiar house and shuddered suddenly, though she had heard the weatherman over the jeep’s radio say it was seventy-five degrees outside, which was very unseasonably hot for October in Canterbury, Connecticut.
“Wow!” her daughter, Payton, cried from the backseat. “What a neat old house!” She jumped out of the jeep and ran towards the house.
“It is pretty cool,” stated her husband, Mathew, observing from the passenger’s seat. “Like the haunted houses they use in ghost movies.”
“Well, I assure you, this one is not haunted,” laughed Sage.
He grabbed a suitcase from the back and looked at her. “Are you coming?”
“In a minute,” answered Sage.
She smiled at her husband as she watched him go up to her grandmother’s house. As she stared at the house, she was reminded of her childhood there.
She had come to live with her grandmother when she was six, after her parents were in a terrible car accident. That had been the first time she had even met her grandmother, Agatha. She had never understood why her mother and father never told her about her grandmother. It was also the first time she found out that her grandmother was a witch, and that she and her mother were witches as well.
It was a tradition in the Gaunt family that a witch was not to be told that they were a witch until their sixth birthday. That was the age that a witch’s powers were developed enough and they would be able to handle learning the craft best.
Ironically, the very week of her sixth birthday, was the same week Sage’s parents died.
She remembered the conversation she had with her grandmother during the first week she arrived about her mother, Bella, and her father, Collin. Sage had asked her grandmother why her parents never mentioned her, and the Gaunt family.
Her grandmother had told her that her mother was the best student she ever had, and she had the gift of sensing when evil was near. Which is why she didn’t understand how she could’ve fallen under Sage’s father’s spell.
“Was Daddy a witch too?” asked Sage.
Agatha shook her head. “Your father wasn’t a witch,” her grandmother assured her. “But, every bone in my body told me there was something “off” about him. He came to town one day, fitting the clique of a ‘handsome’ man. His red wavy hair was slicked back and he was dressed in a black leather jacket, torn blue jeans, and he wore black motorcycle boots. He seemed to cast a spell over your mother. When your mother saw him at the local diner, she instantly fell in love with him. Nothing I could say to her would change her mind about him. Then, one day, they ran off to the courthouse and got married. She was eighteen, so there was nothing I could do to stop it. She stopped contacting me after that, but I kept a protection circle around you and her always.”
As Sage grew up at her grandmother’s home, she learned all about the history of the Gaunt family—they were a powerful line of witches and the protectors of the nine sacred witch stones.
The stones had protected all the witches for hundreds of years, passed down to each generation of the Gaunt family.
These witch stones kept all the white witches safe from the dark shadow demons. Her grandmother explained to her that these demons were not like regular demons. They were demons who were also part witch. They were against the other witches and their goal was to take over the witch world, and to turn all witches into demons. If they were ever to obtain the nine powerful stones, they would rule the witch world. Her grandmother also preached to Sage about the importance of the Gaunt witches sticking together to fight against the warlock demons who wanted the stones.
There was one dark shadow demon, Joshua Varnold, who was a very powerful leader of the dark shadow demons. His magic was stronger than the other demons. He was very greedy for the power of the stones, so he tried to steal them from the witches by trying to cast spells on them. He failed to defeat the Gaunt family, so he sent many demons over the years to try to steal the stones. Agatha assured Sage that, as long as a Gaunt family member had the stones, the witch world stayed protected from Joshua and the other dark shadow demons.
Sage also learned of her grandmother’s ability to see the future. She warned her that there would be those who want her dead because she stood in their way. It was a harsh thing to say to such a young girl, but her grandmother was just protecting her.
She soaked in everything her grandmother told her over the years. She studied the craft and practiced her self-defense spells against the demons.
While she loved learning witchcraft, one thing that Sage loved the most, was when her grandmother would teach her how to bake. She would beg her grandmother to teach her every secret recipe she had in her old weathered recipe book. She was sure that there was some magic in each muffin or cake they made because she never tasted anything like the baked goods they made together. The locals would tell her that they just felt happier after taking a bite of any of her baked goods, no matter what mood they were in before. The women’s town committee knew this as well, and would hold a profitable bake sale every weekend, selling Agatha’s baked goods.
So, every Saturday morning, Sage would wake to the sweet aroma of cinnamon rolls baking in the oven. She would jump out of bed and rush down the long oak stairs and into the kitchen. She would be just in time to see spoons in bowls stirring by themselves, and cookies floating in the air and landing into the towel-lined baskets. She would grab a spoon and bowl, and start pouring ingredients into it to help her grandmother bake.
Over the years, she became an excellent baker as well as she knew magic. She worked with her grandmother, baking and making potions for anyone daring to stop by the old house.
She missed her parents, but she had to admit, she had a great childhood with her grandmother. She left home when she was twenty-one. She wanted to explore what was beyond those big grey doors and this small town, so she decided to move to New York when a friend from school called her and told her that they were looking for a baker to make wedding cakes at their bakery. She told Agatha she didn’t need to worry about her leaving. She assured her that she had taught her well, and she knew how to defend herself against anything that came her way.
“Wear this necklace always,” Agatha warned her as she placed the necklace in Sage’s hand and closed her fingers over it. Sage opened her hand and looked at the necklace. The necklace had a black onyx pendant on it. She remembered from her crystal training that it was a powerful protection stone that absorbs and transforms negative energy, and helps to prevent the drain of personal energy.
“Your mother refused to wear it,” her grandmother had said, looking down at her hands.
Sage grabbed her grandmother’s hand. “Grandma, it’s not your fault she died,” she tried to assure her, and squeezed her hand.
“I hope that’s true,” Agatha replied and then looked up at Sage. “Because I know that their accident was not an accident— someone murdered them.”
“Mom!”
The sound of Payton’s voice brought Sage back to the present. “I’m coming, sweetie,” she waved and walked a little faster towards the house.
She rubbed the protection stone on her necklace between her fingers. When she got to the front door where her husband and eight-year-old daughter were, she noticed that they were both anxiously waiting to go in.
“I can’t believe this is our house now!” cried Payton. She jumped up and down the leave lined porch that stretched across the front.
As Sage watched her daughter, she was amazed at how much she looked like Mathew. She had his same freckled nose and the same big smile that spread across her face. At least she inherited Sage’s wavy red hair instead of Mathew’s jet black straight hair.
She watched as the little girl looked like an angel with her white flowy flower dress that twirled as she spun around in a circle.
“I told you, Payton, we won’t be living here,” Sage reminded her. “We are only staying for two weeks while I prepare to put it up for sale.”
Mathew piped in. “Don’t jump the gun just yet, Sage. I would consider living here. My consulting business allows me to work from home. This would be a great town to raise Payton in—”
“Hold it right there,” Sage said, cutting him off. “Don’t forget that I have a thriving bakery business in New York. I can’t just up and leave it.”
“Move it here!” Payton chimed in as she ran over to the steps. “I would have a big yard to play in if you did!” She jumped off the last step of the porch and ran over to the garden, admiring all the orange and yellow mums that covered half the garden. She looked up and noticed the dark woods that connected to the edge of the perfectly cut green lawn.
“Are those ours too?” she asked as she pointed towards the woods.
“Yes, Payton, they are,” answered Sage.
“Oh, cool!” exclaimed Mathew.
“Can we remember why we are here?” asked Sage. “My grandma passed. Can we not think about the house right now?”
Mathew sighed. “I’m sorry, honey. I just always wanted a big old home like this of my own. I just got caught up in that dream.”
Sage felt bad that she shut him down on thinking they could ever live here. Mathew had grown up in the city, in a small apartment with four other brothers. He would sit for hours listening to Sage’s stories of growing up here with her grandma, and he was fascinated about knowing about Sage being a witch and her mother’s family history.
She thought about back when they met. It had been a long busy day at her bakery. She had been standing on the top step of a ladder, trying to reach a flour bag tucked way in the back of the shelf, when he had walked in. When she saw him, she was taken aback at how handsome he was, which made her start to lose her balance on the ladder. Mathew ran up just in time to stop the ladder from toppling over and Sage as well.
“T-Thank you,” Sage stuttered, blushing. She stepped down the ladder and fixed her hair.
“Not a problem,” Mathew answered, smiling.
Sage fell in love with his smile and his deep blue eyes, hidden behind his black rimmed glasses.
“What can I do for you?” she asked, still a bit embarrassed.
“I’m looking for a birthday cake for my three-year-old niece,” he commented. “Not sure why I got chosen for this job, but I was told that you were the best around here.”
Sage smiled. She nervously played with her hair. “Well, whoever told you that must be a smart person. Was it your wife?” She could have kicked herself for sounding so cheesy.
Mathew chuckled at her attempt to see if he was married. “Nope. I’m not married. My sister told me about you. She said a friend of hers had you make their wedding cake and they loved it.”
“Oh, okay!’ Sage tried to contain herself. She wondered if her mother felt this same way when she met her father.
They talked about what cake he wanted, which turned into the both of them asking questions to each other about the other. Two hours later, he finally asked her out.
They dated for three months before he asked her to marry him. She said ‘yes’ and they were married a year later. Sage didn’t want a big fancy wedding, so they ended up flying to Hawaii and having a small, quiet ceremony.
Payton came a year later. The three of them were very happy together and Mathew made a wonderful father. Sage couldn’t have asked for more of a perfect life. She longed for a normal life, so she rarely used her magic. She never abused it either. Only when life got a bit hectic, did she rely on it. Occasionally, one might find a broom sweeping the floor by itself, or laundry magically folded and gently placed in the hallway closet.
She hadn’t even tested Payton yet to see if she inherited the Gaunt witch powers. She knew that at age six, she was supposed to start teaching her, but she figured she would tell her in time—right now she just wanted Payton to have a normal life for a bit.
“Earth to Sage!” teased Mathew, as he waved his hand in front of Sage’s face, bringing her back to the present.
Sage let out a nervous laugh. “Sorry, this place brings back lots of memories.”
By now, Payton had run back onto the porch. “Can we go in now?” she whined.
“How about you two first help carry in our luggage?” Sage suggested to her husband and daughter.
“Fine,” Mathew answered and motioned to Payton to go to the jeep. They both headed back there and grabbed their bags.
Sage took out the old tarnished key from her bag and unlocked one of the carved double doors. It creaked as she opened it—the same creak she heard a million times before whenever she opened it when she lived there.
Inside, everything looked the same as it always had. The same sweet smell of baked goods and peppermint oil still filled the air as if her grandmother had just baked something.
She placed her stuff on the huge oak dining room table. She glided her hand over the table, reminded of all the magic spells and lotions that were made on this very table. She walked over to the little three season porch that her grandmother housed her magic ingredients. She called it the spell room. There were still countless hanging plants lining almost every inch of the large windowpane, which should’ve blocked the sun from shining through, yet it was still as bright as could be in there.
Sage noticed the shelved line wall that held all of Agatha’s ingredients. There was a glass case of essential oils that stood nearly six-feet high. She remembered how her grandmother would diffuse different oils around the house, depending on what was needed at the time.
Next to the oil shelf, hung a shelf with ceramic pots holding herbs she used to treat different problems, like warts, boils, or whatever alignments a person would ask her to heal. The little apothecary room looked magical with all its ingredients.
A glimmering light in the corner of the room caught Sage’s eye. When she got closer, she realized it was a clear quartz hanging on a fishline that wrapped around a hook on the window pane. As the sun shone through the crystal, it casted a rainbow of lights shimmered all over the little room.
She walked up to it and studied it. It reminded her of the sacred stones, and she wondered if they were still where Agatha kept them safely hidden in her bedroom. Nothing bad ever happened while she lived there, so she was hopeful that they were still safe with her grandmother gone. She knew it would be her duty to protect them now. She only hoped they were still hidden and word did not get out to the demons about her grandmother.
She was just about to leave the spell room when Mathew walked in.
“Wow, what a layout,” he commented, looking around. “Is this where all the magic happened?”
“Seriously?” said Sage, rolling her eyes. “You’re a dork.” She playfully punched him on the arm and motioned for him to follow her into the kitchen.
Mathew followed her like a kid being ignored by his mother. “What? I am being serious,” he said, as he continued to follow her to the kitchen sink. “I heard all the stories, now I want to put the stories with the house.”
“Later,” Sage promised him. “Right now, let’s just get settled in.” She turned her back to him and pretended to look for something in the cupboard. She wondered why she was acting this way. She loved it here and wanted to share it with her family. Maybe, she still felt guilty about not visiting her grandmother more.
Just then, she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to apologize to her husband, only to find herself standing alone.
Grandma?
Sage touched the spot on her shoulder where the hand was. Was her mind playing tricks on her? She wondered if her grandmother’s spirit was still here. She was a witch, afterall. Were her powers strong enough to come back?
Sage felt another touch on her back. She spun round quickly this time, hoping to catch whoever was playing tricks on her. She jumped when she saw Payton standing there holding her suitcase next to her. The white dress she was wearing now was covered with mud.
Payton noticed her mother looking at the dirty dress, so she tried to hide the dirt spots with her hands.
“Sorry, Mom. Daddy let me check out the woods and I fell over a fallen tree limb.”
Sage smiled and rubbed the top of her head. “That’s fine,” she said. “Let’s go see my old room. That’s where you’ll be sleeping.”
“Awesome!” Payton squealed in anticipation. She skipped as she followed Sage to the stairs. They walked up the old creaky staircase, and, when they reached the top, Payton took off to explore each room.
“Your room is the last one on the left,” Sage called out to her daughter after she disappeared into one of the other bedrooms.
“Oh, Mom!” she gasped as she walked into her mother’s childhood room. “It’s the most beautiful room I’ve ever seen!”
“I thought you might like it,” Sage said as she joined her. Her grandmother had kept her bedroom the same as she had left it. Her bed was huge with a canopy on top. A beautiful white quilt laid on the bed and it smelled as though it had just been washed and hung out to dry that day. Heavy purple velvet curtains hung around the canopy bed and drawn back with gold tassels tied to the wood posts that had spiral designs carved all over them.
“I love it, Mom!” Payton cried, throwing herself on the bed.
Sage looked at the two tall bureaus standing guard on each side of the bed. Sage smiled when she remembered the times she used to hide her journals and sketches of wedding cakes in the big drawers.
Sage went over to one of the bureaus and pulled open the third little drawer on the left. “You can hide treasurers in here and this one actually locks!” she told Payton.
She opened the bottom drawer, hoping that the key she hid there years ago was still there. She felt around the old clothes her grandmother kept in there. Finally, she found it tucked in the clothes and pulled it out. It had three circles that met in the middle and connected to the long lock.
She handed the key to Payton. “Keep this key somewhere safe.”
“I will!” she promised. She jumped off the bed and started practicing unlocking the lock with the key.
Sage walked over to the door. “Make sure you change your clothes before you get mud all over. And unpack your stuff and put your clothes in the drawers.
“Then can I explore the house?” asked Payton.
“Yes, after everything is put away,” Sage reminded her. She waved to her daughter, and went to find her husband. She thought it odd that he disappeared. She figured he was wanting to explore the house as well. He was just like a kid when he was excited about something.
She found him in the living room in front of the enormous fireplace. He was messing with the poker, pushing the logs around. Sage came up behind him and wrapped her arms around him.
He put his hands over her arms. “Hey you,” he said, hugging her. “I love it here. I hope you leave all your options open to consider moving here.”
“Mathew,” she said softly. “I loved growing up here, but we have a life in New York. What about my bakery?”
“People need cakes here too,” Mathew teased her. “Besides, you sell your cakes online as well, so your clients can just order them that way.”
“You know, I’m really tired from the trip out here,” Sage said, trying to change the subject. She rubbed his upper arm and then looked up at him. “Can we talk about it later?”
“Sure,” he answered, and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
The dark figure that hid in the shadows had been watching them since they arrived. It quickly grew impatient as it glared at them.
“Find the stones!” it growled at them, unheard by either one of them.
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