In Sickness, Health, and Fire

By Domonique Kendrix

Gardenia wanted nothing more than to have a joyous celebration of her engagement to Lance, but thanks to the imps, that was not an option. If they had just stolen a little food, she might have let it go. If they had broken a couple things, maybe she would have threatened to hurt them if they ever came back. But no, they had done something so much worse. They had turned her fiancé into a tiny flame, and she was forced to keep him in a lantern so he wouldn’t go out.
With a bag of iron on her back, a machete in one hand, and Lance’s lantern in the other, she made her way into the hills to search for the imps. Gardenia had tried to avoid the family tradition of dealing with magical creatures, but she would not let that stop her from going straight to the imps’ lair to put the fear of death into them. She did not know how such weak creatures had such complicated magic. She was not even sure whether they knew how they even cast the spell in the first place, but they were going to turn Lance back, or die.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Domonique Kendrix
• Release date: Sep 13, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463260715

Domonique Kendrix

I’m a Southern California native, raised on fairy tales, fantasy, and anime. I’ve been imagining up stories that take place far from the desert I live in, for as long as I can remember. No matter the destination of the story, my readers can find something real-world and relatable in them. I enjoy writing fantasy and fairy tale themed stories with various sub-genres and themes. I love creating romantic stories, but I still enjoy stories where the love of family or friends can drive a person to save the day. When I’m not reading or writing, I can be found watching ridiculously bad sci-fi monster movies, or visiting places around California.

Book preview

In Sickness, Health, and Fire

Domonique Kendrix

Copyright © 2019 Domonique Kendrix.

This is a work of fiction. Any names or characters, businesses or places, events or incidents, are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter One

Gardenia had never been so deep into the hills. She wished she could have said it was an enjoyable experience, but it was the middle of the night and she had already beheaded one too many rattlesnakes. She had no guilt. The snake shouldn’t have been above ground, or in her way when she was as furious as she was.

The entire day should have been special. She should have been at a party basking in love and friendship, but she had to be in the wilderness on the hunt.

The makeup she had applied for her engagement party earlier that day was still on her face and the sweat from the summer heat and uphill climb was making it run. She was sure that she looked like a monster, and she would have it no other way. She had almost been too angry to change out of her dress, but her friends and family had managed to persuade her that it was not practical to go climbing through the hills and forests in anything other than pants and boots. She was grateful that she had been convinced to stop at home to change. It had given her time to prepare what she needed to make her vengeance against the imps as traumatic as possible.

Gardenia left her hair in its intricate braided half-updo, ornaments and all. If she needed to surprise one of the little beasts with a sharp hair ornament in a painful place, it would be an asset. She just hoped to find them soon.

Gardenia irritably kicked a rock out of her path and said, I should have expected them to live way up here. Little cowards would definitely want to run as far from the scene of their crimes as they could. But why is it so hard to find the exact spot?

Just look for the mess, and you'll find them, her fiancé said from inside the lantern. It was the opposite of the warning she was used to. 'If you are in the forest and you see a mess of odd objects, walk the other way. That's where the imps are,' was what she had been told when she had first come to the town, those four years ago.

Gardenia had never been worried about the imps. She did not really think of them as more than a nuisance, but she had been warned that she should not mess with them. Although, it went against her nature to ignore magic mischief, she had respected the townspeople's wishes, because she knew imps were petty. They would cause more trouble, if she didn’t do something that completely deterred them from coming to town. Now she wished she had gone and put the fear of death into them, after she saw their first few not-so-harmless pranks. Now they had made it personal, and she was going to make sure she was in their nightmares.

The 3-foot tall imps had arrived like a trio of winged raiders, creating chaos at the party meant to celebrate her engagement to Lance. She was furious. They drank the wine and the beer straight out of the barrels, spilling everywhere, as people chased them. Everyone had tried to catch them before they broke anything or ate anything too important, like the cake, but they had gotten to it anyway, and knocked it on the floor. That was nothing compared to what they did next.

They saved their very worst deed for last. As her fiancé made a grab for the most vicious imp and tried to stop him from toppling candles and setting fire to the dance hall, the little beast cast