Excerpt from All in Bad Time

Noreen approached the sink and stretched up on her toes to see what was going on. "They look like—they look like—" She watched for a moment and then turned from the sink. To the horror of all of them, she grabbed a dishtowel and retched into it.

     "Noreen!" Rose ran to her side and held her shoulders. Noreen waved a hand toward the sink. Rose walked to the counter as the others crowded in behind her.

     The sink held creatures, green, living things, crawling on what looked like leafy legs as they swarmed over each other. From what appeared to be their heads some spat a red substance, and others turned on them, tearing at leafy legs until more of the goo covered the victims.

     "That looks like—" Kerry paused.

     "Blood." Max stared at them with disgust.

     Kerry's mouth twisted. "I didn't put the leaves down the disposal. And they turned into that."

     "But why?" Rose stared at them both.

     "To scare us," Kerry said in an angry voice. "Look at us! It worked on me."

     Max grabbed her hand and started to lead her back to the table. "So we'll stop reacting."

     "Don't just walk away." Kerry pulled him back to the counter. "Give me that spatula, the one in that jar of tools." She took it from him and turned to the sink. "I'm going to shove them into the drain and I want you to turn on the disposal."

     "Ewww!" Dolores had come back. "How can you stand to do that?"

     "It's a damn sight better than watching them crawl out of the sink." Kerry shoved the soft plastic blade of the spatula into the mass of leafy creatures and pushed them toward the drain. She twisted the faucet handle. "Turn on the disposal."

     The machine began to grind as Kerry continued to push the bodies into it. To her horror, some of the red substance splashed onto one sleeve of her sweatshirt. "Ugh, hand me a paper towel."

     Dolores gave her one and Kerry wiped frantically at her sleeve. Then she peered into the sink and slumped against the counter. "Turn it off. They're gone."

     "So was this magic?" Aura Lee demanded. "Squirmy things that make you sick to look at?" She shuddered. "How can we go on if we have to deal with things like this?"

     Rose sank back into her chair. "How many times have we asked that question? We either go on or we walk away."

     "When you think about it, they just looked like bugs." Brenna shrugged when Kerry glared at her. "It's a dumb sort of magic spell."

     Max flashed a smile. "Dumb but effective. And separating magical elements into the benign and the malignant, we could label the strawberry leaf spiders as malignant."

     "I'd agree with that." Rose reached for her coffee.

     "There are different amounts of good and evil in magic," Max said. "The strawberry leaf spiders are lightweight conjuring. Old, deep magic, like the talisman Caldicott described, is formidably strong. You can scare people with the shallow stuff, but you can change the world with the deep, dark stuff. That's why the old earl who killed Caldicott's Duncan wanted that talisman—to alter the wishes of millions of people and present England to the Nazis, wrapped in a bow."

     "It's scary as hell to think how devastating the talisman would've been if it hadn't been taken away from him," Rose said.

     "No wonder he and his followers continue to look for it." Andrea clutched her coffee mug. "We're babes in the woods. How can we fight them if they’re the ones doing these things to us?"

     Rose sighed. "We can't afford to look at it that way." Her gaze challenged each of them. "We can't withdraw. I admit to anger that we never had a real choice about becoming engaged in the battle. But I'd rather we be involved in ending it than imagining people less prepared than we are having to deal with it."

     "I don't feel like charging the barriers yet," Kerry said in a rough voice, "but I know we're on the front line. Here we are. It's us or nobody."

     "We go into battle ill-prepared, but we go. Our tattered banner will stand for imperfect glory. But glory it will be." The light in Noreen's eyes was militant. "Anna Fordham Willis, circa eighteen twenty-two to eighteen seventy-nine."

     "Oh, I wish Cottie were here to join us." Aura Lee sniffed mightily.

     Rose let out a breath. "I think she is."

     One by one they clasped each other's hands until the circle was complete.