Page 12 of A Dead End Wedding

Third, your three Champions shall compete with ours in battle competitions. The winners win a box of jewels and, should the Dead End Champions win, the privilege of moving on to the next Trial, which shall be explained to you later.

The archery competition begins at midnight tonight.

Tess and Susan pulled the bag out, opened it, and dumped the contents on the grass.

“Archery gear,” Susan said, looking down at bows, arrows, and even a target.

“I guess I know why I’m here,” Mrs. Frost said. “Nobody in Dead End can match me at archery. I need to go home and make sure my bowstring is in good shape. Not a chance I’m using their bows. They could have rigged them to blow up or something.”

Susan held up a hand. “Mrs. Frost, this may be too dangerous?—”

Our pocked-sized archer cut her off. “Danger, shmanger. There are going to be plenty of other competitions, according to what Jack just read out. I’m doing this one.”

“She’s not wrong,” Tess said, shrugging. “Nobody is better than her with a bow. Especially since Alaric cured her cataracts. We don’t have a chance against Fae archers without her.”

“If I’m going to meet anybody at midnight, I’d better get a catnap,” Mrs. Frost said, turning toward the parking lot as if the matter were decided. “We don’t drive at night, though, so somebody will have to pick me up.”

We walked her to her car with no further discussion, but I had serious reservations about the plan to set little Mrs. Frost against immortal Fae archers.

Tess was right, though. She was the best we had.

I seriously needed to work on my bow skills.

“We can discuss it at the town hall,” Susan said grimly.

“Not to mention the magical competition,” Tess said, frowning. “The most powerful witch in Dead End is my little sister, and there’s no way I’m letting her anywhere near this.”

“We may need to—” My phone rang, interrupting me.

Lorraine.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“You need to get over here right now, before I shoot this swamp troll!”

“Is he threatening anyone?”

“No! Worse! He asked me out on a date.”

6

Tess

Wednesday: Wedding minus 10 days

Susan said she had things to do considering this new threat to Dead End, so Jack and I walked over to Beau’s, mainly talking about how bad this was going to get, that there was no way Shelley would compete in magic against a Fae, and what to do about Mrs. Frost.

We put the whole battle aside, because we had more than enough to deal with for now.

“That’s a lot of people,” Jack said, and I looked up from my phone and the texts from Aunt Ruby to see a small crowd gathered outside of Beau’s Diner. Rather, a small crowd was gathered on one side of the, I guess we’d have to call it a patio area, now. Only one … person … stood on the other side.

“That must be the troll.”

Jack sighed. “I never liked trolls.”

“They can’t help smelling bad and having green teeth. They live in swamps, Jack.”

“It’s not the smell. It’s their attitude. They’re grumpy and rude. And they cheat at cards.”

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