A Witch's Last Resort, page 1
WHAT REAL HUMANS ARE SAYING ABOUT THE TERRIBLES!
“A hypnotically ridiculous book! I’d love to be one of Vlad’s Maggots.”
—Joaquin, age 9
“I’ve read monster stories, but none were this original or this funny. I’ve read other funny, original stories, but none about a group of monsters.”
—Harrison, age 10
“I LOVED this book. Five out of five stars!”
—Ellie, age 11
“High-appeal characters presented with plenty of laughs.”
—a grown-up (presumably) at Kirkus Reviews
The Terribles are terror-ific!
READ ALL THE BOOKS IN THE SERIES!
Welcome to Stubtoe Elementary
A Witch's Last Resort
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2023 by Travis Nichols
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
Random House and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.
Visit us on the Web! rhcbooks.com
Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at RHTeachersLibrarians.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 9780593425756 (trade)—ebook ISBN 9780593425770
The artist used goblin blood and cursed parchment to create the illustrations for this book.
Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.
Penguin Random House LLC supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to publish books for every reader.
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For Karina Elise and the rest of the coven.
But mostly her on this one.
Contents
Cover
Read All the Books in the Series!
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Map
What Is This Place?
Elise’s Arrival
Creepoball
Terrible Topics: What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?
Quade’s Garden
Food Eternal
The Witchy Resort
The T.U.F.F. Stuff
The Cool Kids
Science vs. Magic
Election Day
Goo Boats
Terrible Choices: The Sleepover
Brace Yourselves
Œ∆å◊∂ Ô•§ü
Elise Ships Out
Spoiler Alert!
About the Author
_142777980_
What Is This Place?
Well, now you’ve gone and done it. You found out about an island way, way out in the middle of the fish-stinking ocean where (most of) the world’s monsters settled down a while back.
They’re real, but they’re far, far away.[*1] Feel free to take that bit of information and repeat it to yourself a few times before bed to help you sleep better. Then, with a well-rested mind, you can focus on more important things, like organizing your sock drawer and cleaning out your closet.
*1 Again, mostly.
However, if you have a little bit of time, you can stick around and learn some more about Creep’s Cove.
That’s the name of the island, by the way. Creep’s Cove. Anyway, Creep’s Cove was founded by a group of assorted creatures, ghosts, aliens, weirdos, and human fringe scientists[*2] as a refuge for the monsters (and monster-adjacent people) of the world.
*2 A fringe scientist (or pseudoscientist, etc.) is someone who studies and practices sciences that are not accepted by the mainstream. Examples include cryptozoology, ufology, astrology, and haunted baking.
On this island, the residents can roam freely, work, pay their taxes, clean their gutters, and just be themselves. No crossbow-bearing monster hunters. No screaming, pants-peed human kids. No wretched sunlight. Yep, Creep’s Cove is an honest-to-ghoulish, radioactive-ooze-dripping, volcanic-smog-drenched paradise.
There’s even a school for kids around your age and/or maturity level. It’s called Stubtoe Elementary, and it’s run by an endlessly tentacled entity named Ms. Verne. You’ll read about her along the way, but you’re probably most interested in getting to know the kids a little better. Here’s the Stubtoe Elementary yearbook. A book within a book? WOW! Have you ever loved reading something so much so fast in your entire life?
ALLIE
Species:
B’lith-CHUP
Favorite subjects:
Astronomy, weird math, dissection
BOBBY
Species:
Gelatinous glob
Favorite subjects:
Lunch, TV
EMMA
Species:
Former human-ish
Favorite subjects:
History, pickling
ERIK
Species:
Human-ish phantom
Favorite subjects:
Music, dead languages, art
FRANKIE
Species:
Human
Favorite subjects:
Experimental biology, meteorology, chemistry
GILLY
Species:
Swamp spawn
Favorite subject:
Ancient curses
GRIFF
Species:
(Invisible) human
Favorite subjects:
Reading, dance
LIZZIE
Species:
Kaiju, reptilian
Favorite subject:
Recess
LOBO
Species:
Werewolf
Favorite subject:
(shrug)
QUADE
Species:
Sasquatch
Favorite subject:
“Oh, I think they’re all really neat.”
VLAD
Species:
Vampire
Favorite subjects:
Drama, hypnotism
So let’s dive face-first into this collection of stories. Get comfy, make sure your lighting is nice and your posture is good, take a deep breath, and imagine yourself aboard a rickety wooden boat approaching the hazy shore of (dramatic pause) Creep’s Cove.
Elise’s Arrival
The air smelled like salt and ash. Elise, a long-nosed, raven-haired, greenish-skinned girl, leaned against the rail of her mom’s creaking sailboat. Out on the horizon, a thick cloud of black smoke hovered over Creep’s Cove.
Elise’s mom ran a seasonal[*1] resort on the island that was visited by witches and sorcerers from all over the world. Jagged Rocks Resort, Spa, and Portal to the Underworld was THE place to trade spells, work on your moontan, and relax on the beach with one of the resort’s famous extra-sticky, extra-stinging jellyfish smoothies.
*1 Around the equinoxes (late March and late September)
This was Elise’s first trip to Creep’s Cove. She had spent previous equinoxes with her dad, a mushroom farmer and potion designer in Belgium. Now she was finally old enough to start learning the other family business. And she’d be attending Stubtoe Elementary to get to know people of different sorts than she was used to.
“What if they don’t like me?” asked Elise. “I don’t like it when people don’t like me. I don’t like it at ALL.”
“What’s not to like?” replied Elise’s mom. “You’re my kid, and everyone likes me. I know you’ll make some friends. Just be your brave self. And remember—no matter what—you’re never alone.”
“Right,” said Elise. “I have Kimburdly.” Elise pulled a bright yellow slug out of her cloak.
“No, I wasn’t talking about Kimburdly.”
“Ah…Keveen.” Elise lifted her hat and grabbed a striped orange slug. “I’ve always got Keveen.”
Elise’s mom sighed. “No, not Keveen. You’re never alone because—”
“Yes, I know,” said Elise. “Because Mosby and Leeeee are always with me.” Elise held out her arms, and two slugs, one purple and one bright white with red spots, slid out from her sleeves.
“No, Elise,” her mom said. “You’re never alone because your coven[*2] is always with you. But that reminds me. I need you to promise me that you won’t turn any more kids into slugs. Give them a chance, okay?”
*2 A coven is a close-knit group of witches or otherwise close-knit gro
Creepoball
Elise stood at the front of a classroom full of strangers. When she’d arrived at school, she was asked to choose between a few get-to-know-you options.
Sing a song about yourself
The Hot Seat
None of your business
Elise chose the Hot Seat, which meant everyone would ask her one question each.
“Where do you live when you’re not here?” asked Lobo.
“Belgium. In a forest.”
“Are there other kids there?” asked Quade.
“Yeah. Mostly witches. Some gnomes and trolls and stuff.”
“What’s your favorite subject?” asked Frankie.
“Spells. And recess.”
“YEAH!” yelled Lizzie.
“What’s your favorite spell?” asked Vlad. “I’m a bit of a conjurer myself.”
“I like turning stuff into other stuff,” replied Elise.
“What’s, I don’t know, cool where you’re from?” asked Griff.
Elise looked around the room. “Who asked that?”
Griff waved his pencil around in the air. “Back here. In the sunglasses.”
“Oh,” said Elise. “Um…what’s cool? I guess…hats are cool? A bunch of kids got into making slime for a while.”
Griff feverishly took notes.
“Begin.Transmission…,” said Allie. “What.Are.Your.Guts.Like?…End.Transmission.”
Elise poked a finger at her stomach. “I guess they’re just normal people guts.”
“What is the absolute saddest thing you’ve ever seen?” asked Erik.
“That’s a really good question,” said Elise. “Seven or eight things come to mind. I’ll get back to you.”
“Have you chosen a best friend here yet?” asked Lizzie.
“I don’t know.”
“What’s your favorite food?” plerfed Bobby.
“I like, um, little pies with a bunch of stuff in them.”
Bobby worgled in approval.
“WHYYYYY?” groaned Emma.
“Why what?” asked Elise.
Emma’s arm fell off.
Ms. Verne thwapped a tentacle on her desk. “AHBQŒ ƵðÜÖÁßü ƒ•••ohßôû ØΩ∂∫q¶œÐ!”
“Hooray!” shouted Lizzie. “Recess! Our favorite thing, bestie!”
* * *
—
“Do you have creepoball where you’re from?” asked Quade.
“Never heard of it,” replied Elise.
“Teams!” yelled Lizzie. “Quade, Gilly, Emma, Frankie, Erik, Allie—losers. Vlad, Lobo, Griff, Bobby, Elise, me—winners.”
Griff and Gilly dropped a tarnished leather-bound trunk on the ground. Gilly opened the lid and motioned for Elise to look inside.
“Behold,” said Gilly. “There be seven orbs in play, says I.”
Elise scanned the trunk’s velvet-lined interior. Inside were seven balls of different sizes and colors. Some were wiggling and glowing.
Vlad leaned in and pointed at each orb. “It’s pretty straightforward,” he said. “Wood, water, fire, stone, skin, wind, and slime. Each one is connected to a specific, overlapping task worth a different amount of points.”
Elise nodded along. “Okay. Makes sense.”
“Great,” said Vlad. He snapped his fingers. Quade lifted the velvet shelf out of the trunk, revealing an assortment of items. Vlad pulled out four shovels and passed them around.
Erik took a shovel and stuck it into the dirt. “These are the gougers. Each team gets two.”
Lobo removed a massive clump of waxy, knotted twine. “This is the snarl,” he said. “The team Slacker’s job is to uncover the wagger. Then it’s up to the Knotters to fasten three to seven of the orbs, depending on the current phase of the moon, of course.”
“Of course,” said Elise.
The group continued to explain how to play creepoball, interrupting each other with rules, goals, and bonuses. Elise understood less and less as time passed. Soon she was barely paying attention. She heard little bits here and there. There were five or six different positions to play. Some players used the gougers to dig holes (maybe) to bury different orbs or carry one orb to another orb…or something. There were all sorts of different points to be earned: one for this, three for that, ninety-nine for something else. Then—wait—something about a staring contest?
“And that’s pretty much it,” said Vlad. “You can pick the rest of it up along the way.”
“I’ll be team Slimer,” volunteered Griff. “Yeah, I’m really into slime. Slime is cool.”
Lizzie moved Elise over to the snarl. “You can be our Slacker. When two orbs have been scrubbed, or when Griff glazes the slime orb, uncover the wagger. Got it?”
“I…maybe?”
“Great,” said Lizzie. “But remember, if the water orb is within six yards of the fire orb, the Howlers are going to be all over you. And Bobby’s pretty much the best Howler ever, so watch out.”
“Water orb. Fire orb. Howler. Okay.”
Lizzie ran to the center of the field. “ARRRRRIGHT! LET’S PLAY SOME CREEPO—”
Ms. Verne rang the bell. Recess was over.
“AAAAWWWWWWWW!” groaned Lizzie.
* * *
—
As the class packed up the creepoball supplies and headed inside, Elise tapped Frankie on the shoulder.
“What’s up?” asked Frankie.
“I know I’m new here,” said Elise, “but creepoball seems…”
“Impossibly confusing?” offered Frankie.
“Yes.”
“There’s a good reason for that. When Creep’s Cove was founded, everybody had different games and sports they played, and as a way for everyone to get along, they—”
“Ohhh,” said Elise. “They just smooshed everything together.”
“Exactly,” said Frankie. “Honestly, nobody understands more than half of the game. The staring-contest part makes no sense to me. And I have no idea what the stone orb is for. The key is to just focus on your part and, well, stay out of Lizzie’s way.”
“Oh, but she was on my team.”
“Not if the skin orb is gouged. Then we’re all at risk.”
“I see,” said Elise.
“Do you?” asked Frankie.
“No,” said Elise.
“Me neither,” said Frankie.
Quade’s Garden
Quade’s house was tucked behind a bunch of dead trees and ashy boulders. Inside there were a few pictures of relatives on the walls and a large painted vase in the living room that Quade’s parents dusted twice a day. Otherwise, it was pretty plain.
Frankie was at Quade’s house one afternoon, and she noticed that he was poking at his bowl of dried fruit in what she thought might be that sad-looking type of way. Then he sighed loudly, so she knew her hunch was correct. Way to be an observant friend, Frankie.
“Fun fact,” said Frankie. “Sighing inflates the alveoli—the little air sacs in your lungs—providing more oxygen to your brain. The origin of conscious sighing as an emotional response, however, is still a bit of a mystery. So…is there a problem with your fruit, or do you have something on your mind?”
