A Dangerous Witch (Witch Central Series: Book 3) (11 page)

“Of course you are.”  A mindtouch, as gentle and remorseless as the warm hand.  “Now try again.”

It was a ritual they had.  From the time she was Kenna’s size, Nell had always insisted she was “fine.”  And her fierce, insightful mama had always insisted on the rest of the answers underneath.

Because she loved, and because she needed the comfort, Nell dug for them.  “Sophie’s goo fixed my channels.  Not even a twinge.”  Which was pretty impressive, considering she’d turned into a human incinerator.

Retha winced. 

Nell almost missed the fleeting echo of horror.  More than one mother had feared for the life of her child this day.  She moved in closer, the sagging couch tumbling them together.  “I’m okay, Mom.  Really.  It wasn’t as bad as it looked.  Between Aervyn and me, that was one bad-ass shield I held up.”  And that was as much as she was going to say about the terror of being swallowed up by power that did not care if she lived or died.

Or perhaps preferred the latter.  Govin’s butterfly wings had morphed into pterodactyls in Realm’s forest this day.  The Sullivans were used to unimaginable power—but Nell had felt the flapping wings in the furnace of Mia’s magefire.

It wanted to destroy.

A shudder from the woman at her side.  And then mental steel.
 It won’t get what it wants.

Nell laid her head on her mother’s shoulder, suddenly exhausted. 
You weren’t supposed to hear all of that.

Like hell I wasn’t. 
A flicker of amusement now. 
Why the heck do you think you wandered down the hall at this hour of the night?

The easy answer had been to check on her girl.  But Mia wasn’t the only one who acted first and pondered her motives later, if at all. 

Here.
 Retha’s mindchannel linked in with a light click. 
All three of your girls.

Mia was still dreaming about purple dragons, but now they were eating spaghetti.  Nell managed a feeble grin—a food fight was imminent.  Shay had some kind of celestial music playing while streamers and flowers danced.  And then, in the way of dreaming, it shifted to yoga on the beach with Auntie Nat and some very big ice cream cones.  Comfort, in all its forms.

Ginia’s mind was more focused.  Only a single pink blossom, very slowly unfurling.

I think it’s a lotus,
sent Retha quietly. 
I believe she heals, even in her sleep.  I’ve been watching the flower for a while now—it’s very soothing.

That was impressive sleep work—Sullivans weren’t all that easy to soothe. 
Is it draining her?

No. 
A
nd good luck making her stop. 
Retha chuckled, almost silently. 
It isn’t only the fire warriors in this family who are fierce.

Truth.  Nell reached out a more mundane mind channel of her own, feeling the shapes in the room just beyond the door.  Three girl-sized lumps, all squeezed together.  Sharing a bed.

Shay insisted. 
A grandmother who missed nothing. 
She sang them all to sleep.

Nell smiled into the dark.  Three girls, fighting back every way they knew how.

-o0o-

Well, he wasn’t the late-night visitor she’d expected—but as an old Irish witch looked up into the determined eyes of the world’s best hacker, she wasn’t all that surprised, either.

Few fathers loved their children as deeply and as well as Daniel Walker.  “How’s Mia?”

“Sleeping.  Gramma’s on dream duty, and apparently Ginia’s using some kind of flower magic to keep them all in happyland.”  He poured himself a cup of the contents of the teapot. 

Moira smiled—the tea was meant for old-lady aches and pains, but it wouldn’t hurt him.  “It’s only the parents who are restless, then?”

He looked up from his hunt through her cookie jar and nodded.  “Yeah.  Nell fell asleep on the couch with Retha, and every time I close my eyes, I see my wife in flames.”

“I’ll have Sophie send you both something to drink before bed.”  And an old witch would consult—tea blends were the one thing where seventy years of intuition still beat skill and gorgeously honed power.

Daniel’s lips twitched.  “Send someone to make Nell drink it, too.”

Oh, that could be taken care of easily enough.  “Mia needs you both to be well rested.” 

Her visitor sat down at the table, flowery teacup engulfed in his hands.  “Tell me why my daughter’s hair is flaming red.”

“I only know of it as the sign of a fire mage.”  Moira fought off the certainty in her gut.  “We can’t be sure—it’s been centuries since those powers have been seen.” 

Dark eyes examined her face.  A man seeking his own data.  “You’re sure.”

“I’m an old witch steeped in history.”  She sighed into her cup.  “And Irish to boot, so I don’t escape the signs and portents easily.  But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.  There are more new magics and changed magics in this generation of witches than the past has ever seen.”

She gave him credit—he listened.  And thought very carefully.  And then, in the way of a man who knew how to play and win, committed himself.  “Nell felt it.  She agrees with you.  She says it’s nasty, angry power.”

The kind that lived on battlefields.  Moira refused to let her hands shake, but she could do nothing about the trembling of her soul.  She had to roll with her instincts, just as he did.  “We will prepare as best we can.  And hope that we’re wrong.”

His gaze never wavered.  “Good.  Then tell me what I’m preparing for.  What do your history books say?”

“The knowledge passed down is sparse.”  And terrifying.  “Fire mages had red hair.  They lived very isolated lives, kept apart from others.”  For safety.  And because fear was a pox on humanity.   “What is remembered comes mostly from the battlefront—it tells little of their lives away from war.” 

“That’s not enough.”  Daniel’s eyes were as fierce as she’d ever seen them.  “What comes for my girl?  What else do we know?”

Moira shook her head, at least as frustrated as he was.  The Irish had always been far too fond of the glories of battle, and the scribes of five hundred years ago hadn’t known the import of the words they wrote—and the ones they left out.  “It’s hints, steeped in myth and legend and too much drink.” 

The small smile that bloomed on his face was feral.  Predatory.  “Just my kind of hunt.”

She blinked.  He’d never touched a single one of her musty books before. 

“Nell has her way of fighting this.  I need mine.  When I hack a company, I research the hell out of them first.  Not the official propaganda.  The crumbs.”  The denizens of dark alleys would have run from the look in Daniel’s eyes.  “I’ve taken down some of the biggest companies in the world with those crumbs.”

She knew what it was to take puny weapons into battle.

And she knew what it was to win with them.  So did the man across her table.

Moira set down her tea and stood up.  There were a few hours yet before Witch Central would wake.  “Come, then.  I’ll show you the most likely places to start.”

-o0o-

The one who listened finally slept.  As did the man who loved her, and the lazy furry creature who seemed to have no purpose in its life whatsoever.

Only a solitary orb remained awake, resplendent in the moonlight.

Once, there would have been hushed voices and reverence, honoring the crystal ball’s beauty.  Holding it up in the crisp moonlight, calling on the forces to favor their lineages and their magic.  Or laying the sphere in the sands of ancient beaches as words of ritual permeated the night air.

Tonight, there were only the snores of the lazy furry creature.

And the worry.

Fire mage.

The orb had known three in history who possessed this power.  Foretold the events of their lives.  Felt the unrelenting destruction their fire wrought in the fabric of time.

And then it had watched them die.

All humans died.  They came and went, along with the tides and the bright round moons and the stirring of the seasons.

But the fire mages died more quickly than most.

And they never slipped away gently.

The child held the fire of a thousand suns in her hands.  The orb had seen this before, and knew what must happen next.  Those older and wiser would guide her destiny.  Put her feet on the path of serving her best purpose in this world.

Not unlike what a master had done for his tool.

The orb turned its awareness away from the quiet night.  Away from the worry that leaked out even in sleep, and away from the ache of knowing where the child’s destiny would likely end.  It wasn’t meant for humans to hold the power of the sun. 

Those who did—not all humans had the luxury of choices. 

Just like tools of magic.

The orb shivered.  And wished for the shimmering heat of the land of its birth and the quiet oblivion of the last hundred years.

-o0o-

Moira cuddled her umpteenth cup of tea, watching the first hints of sunrise out her window, wishing with every mote of her heart and soul that she could make bright red curls turn back to blonde.

There were fearsome magics in the world—she had always known that.  And some of them had stolen those she loved.  Brigit.  Evan.

But now the very worst of them had come stalking an eleven-year-old girl she loved as her own.  And an old witch had absolutely nothing to throw in its path.

“That’s hogwash.”  The voice from her back door was stern—but Marcus’s face wore nothing but concern and love.

Strength—from one who knew exactly the price magic could extract.  Moira rose and went straight into his arms, feeling his cloak settle round her shoulders.  “You’re up early.”

He smiled into the top of her head.  “Cass and Morgan are still sleeping, and I was restless.”  He held her away from him slightly.  “Seems like there was a reason.  Since when does Moira Doonan think of herself as useless?”

Her vision wavered as the tears rose.  “I’ve only a sneeze of magic left.”

He snorted, the crusty old Marcus of old.  “And since when have you let a lack of magic stop you from doing anything in the known universe?”

The irony wasn’t lost on Moira—she’d spent a lifetime cajoling people out of self-pity with exactly this blend of love and pants-kicking.  “I guess I’m feeling a mite weak and ineffectual this morning.”

“We all are.”  His voice gentled now as he guided her slowly back to the table and her tea.  “I’ve been consulting with Jamie and Nell.  Trying to work out a more predictable form of the shielding spell Aervyn helped build.”

Three of their very best spellcasters working in the wee hours of the night, trying to replicate the seat-of-his-pants work of one small boy.

“He’s not so small now,” said Marcus, eyes full of uncanny understanding.  “And Mia trusts him absolutely.”

She had spent a lifetime teaching witches to work together.  Building community, stirring the glue that would keep them strong in the face of adversity.  Moira felt the tears rising again.  “We can’t let him be on the front lines of this.”  That was a job for the old.  For the fierce.

For those who had journeyed with magic’s darkness.

Marcus didn’t move a muscle.  But she felt it.  His irrevocable commitment.  Anything coming for Mia Walker—or her little brother—would go through Marcus Buchanan first.  He knew what it was to have a life stolen by magic’s horrors.

Moira reached out a hand, holding Evan’s bright face in her mind and heart.  The twin to Marcus’s darkness.  “I still miss him so.”  One five-year-old boy, lost to the astral planes.

And now another old magic hunted a child they loved.

“This time is different.”  Marcus’s voice aimed for his old curmudgeon tones—and missed by a mile. 

It was different.  They were older.  Wiser.  And they knew what they were tangling with.

And Moira wasn’t at all sure it would matter.

Chapter 9

Nell knew she shouldn’t have been surprised.

And yet, staring at the determined, immovable faces of her three daughters, she somehow was.  “You’re sure you don’t want to go play with the dolphins?”  Sierra had shown up full of laughter this morning, talking of her new watery friends waiting just off the coastline for playmates.  Nell suspected she’d spent half the night finding them.  Aervyn had gathered Lizzie, Kenna, Benny, and his swimsuit in the time it took the rest of them to inhale.

A little boy who still trusted the adults in his world to make things right while he went off to play.

Her three girls had shaken their heads and refused to go.

“We know you’re going to have a big meeting.”  Shay got straight to the point.  “We have a right to be there.”

No one denied that, even the mama who wanted to shrink them a foot, and a half-dozen years.  “You do.”  She just wasn’t sure it was what they needed today—any of them.  In case one of the Sullivan family’s most important mantras had somehow escaped them, she repeated it.  “But it’s also okay to spend the morning being happy and playing in the ocean.”