Mischief in a Bottle

Life as a jinn was great. Magic didn't suck. I had a good life as an arena gladiator. Also had a charming jinn boyfriend. All of it came crashing down when my boyfriend set me up to take the fall for his crimes.

After one hundred years serving time in my bottle, I was finally paroled. On a backwater planet called Earth.

My name is Ceian; it's much longer in my language, but it works. I was so grateful for being paroled that I never asked where I was going.

Forgotten Hollow was one of those cute little mountain towns that I'd heard about but never wanted to see. I was a big city girl, and within the Eltrisphere collection of worlds, I'd seen cities ten times as large as Tokyo and Delhi combined.

Now I was in a cute town, living in a cute cottage. I wasn't alone; the people behind my parole had assigned me a centurion to keep an eye on me. They'd changed him into a goat to be less obvious. There was also my late and unlamented ex-boyfriend's cat. Having a talking goat and a talking cat was tricky in an Earth town, but it was comforting.

I'd even made friends, three mystery-loving old ladies who loved to cook. As I loved to eat and had developed a love of late-night TV cop shows, it was a good match. There was even a love interest. Detective Jack Lanclin. Tall, dark, and hunky.

Things were starting to go my way until the bodies started dropping.