Old Christmas Magic

By Kassandra Lea

Drew McLean has had a run of bad luck and it’s dampened his Christmas spirit. But the last thing he expects to find for the holiday is a demon.

While strolling in the late-night snow, Drew hears screeching tires and a sad scene is awaits him around the corner. A man kneels beside a dog hit by a car, distraught and broken.

The man is Artem, a demon sent to find a pure soul. Drew matches that description to a T. The problem is Artem’s never really been good at the demon gig.

Will a little Christmas magic help them both find what they’re looking for?

• Language: English
• Publisher: JMS Books LLC
• Release date: Dec 2, 2017
• ISBN: 9781634865524

Kassandra Lea

Kassandra Lea’s stories have appeared in a number of anthologies. She lives in southern Wisconsin. For more information, visit facebook.com/leakassie.

Book preview

Old Christmas Magic

By Kassandra Lea

Published by JMS Books LLC at Smashwords

Visit jms-books.com for more information.

Copyright 2017 Kassandra Lea

ISBN 9781634865524

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Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com

Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.

All rights reserved.

WARNING: This book is not transferable. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold, shared, or given away, it is an infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review.

This book is for ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It may contain sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which might be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Published in the United States of America.

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Old Christmas Magic

By Kassandra Lea

Chapter 1

You are a disgrace, Cyril spat, his eyes blazing red with the fires of their home. You have become a laughing stock, a fool wandering blindly through the dark. You have let the others down, but even worse, you have let me down.

Artem cowered on the ground, his black wings bent and broken, feathers falling into the snow where their touch sizzled and they melted through to the frozen ground. His arms were scratched, his body battered, and he suspected a crack ran through one of his horns. No doubt he made a pitiful sight, and now, to be before someone as great as Cyril, a demon with such respect, Artem’s pride took a considerable blow.

Somehow, he fought the urge to apologize, swallowing the I’m sorry before it could burst free and further humiliate him. Artem wisely remained quiet, his eyes trained on the ground. Cyril had managed to burn a circle around himself, his rage reducing the once pristine white blanket into a puddle, his spot resembling the hole of a moth eaten sweater.

You have been granted one final chance to get things right. Should you screw it up this time you will be banished, seethed Cyril, his clawed hands curled into fists, his own wings stretched proudly behind him, the dark feathers tinged with burnt red. You will find a soul and corrupt it before midnight of Christmas Eve. You are to find someone pure of heart and bring them to us. Only then will you be redeemed. Do you understand?

Shaking, unable to hide his fear, Artem nodded his head. Yes, he managed to choke out.

See that you do the job properly for once, Cyril warned.

And then Cyril was gone, leaving Artem alone in the winter night, snowflakes swirling around him. He shivered, not from the bitter cold which failed to affect him, but because he knew there was no way to do what had been asked of him. He was, for lack of better phrasing, a joke, a miserable representation of a demon. No matter how much he tried he just couldn’t seem to tap into the dark core of his being.

Somehow he kept getting all his lessons wrong. He kept screwing up, and now Cyril, the one who forged him from the flames, was disappointed in him, ready to wash his hands clean. Artem hugged himself, knowing that the way