A Celtic Witch (A Modern Witch Series: Book 6) (5 page)

Hell, playing backup fiddle to Buddy tonight was going to be one of the highlights of her year.

She wiggled her fingers, working out the kinks of three decades of intense fiddling, and contemplated her inbox.  Three hours until the music started, and she should probably be responsible for at least some of them.

Or not.  If she ignored business for long enough, Tommy eventually got to it.  What was the point of having a manager if you couldn’t occasionally be an irresponsible musician? 

Besides, the inbox almost always took.  It very rarely gave.  Cass leaned back in her chair, remembering the glow in Ellie’s eyes.  They would go supernova when she got to play tonight—Buddy hadn’t been all that hard to convince. 

Her life could use more things that glowed and gave back and filled her soul.  Even some of her audiences felt like work these days.  People in fancy clothes who had paid hundreds of dollars for their seats.  She much preferred the ones who toasted her with a beer from the shadows of their local pub.

A future she’d run away from at nineteen, fiddle in hand and fame in her sights.

All of which was an awful lot of whining from someone who loved what she did and got paid a whacking load of money to do it.  It was okay to feel tired—that’s why she escaped once a year and headed for this place.  The “edge of the world,” as Tommy called it.

A good fiddler lived for the edges—the places where the music threatened to tumble into wrack and ruin or soar to the heavens.

Cass breathed deeply, the one remnant of a long-ago drift through the world of yoga.  She also lived for the quiet moments, the comfortable ones.  Tonight would be a several-hours-long gift of those.  Sitting on a rickety chair, playing with the one man she’d never out-fiddle, both of them background for fun, chatter, and a lively tumble of people following the square-dance call on the dance floor.  Not taken for granted, exactly—just a comfortable part of the fabric of life in this cold, hard rock of a place.  A gift she cherished beyond measure.

She couldn’t live here—but to visit was pure, soul-filling pleasure.

And tonight she would try to say thank you.  The Scottish ancestry of most of Margaree’s inhabitants didn’t lend itself to big displays of emotion, so Rosie would have to speak for her.

Her fingers idled on the laptop keys, restless.  Readying.  Maybe it was time to do some shopping—Mum’s birthday was coming up.  Cass pulled up her browser and then chuckled.  Mum would faint if the Internet started sending her presents.  Maybe Dave would part with his recipe for porridge bread.  Mum would consider that a very worthy gift.

The small light in her chat window was glowing purple again.  Cass switched over and opened a coding window—she was feeling distractible.  “What are you on about now, little purple shadow?”

She snickered as it flashed at her twice.  Ghostie with a sense of humor.  With a couple of quick keystrokes, she made the text size bigger.  Impromptu 2 a.m. fiddling sessions weren’t increasing her sleep quotient any—no point squinting. 

Huh.  The log file was very interesting.  Cass reached for the bar of excellent chocolate she’d wheedled out of Dave on her way up.  Digestive aid for the beef-stew overload.

She’d hitched a little ride on the Internet bug that had been following her around.  The surprise was that apparently the bug had noticed.  There were several logged attempts to shake her rider—not serious ones, by the looks of them.  Just testing.

“Hmm, we’ve seen each other now, have we?”  Cass dug deeper into the scrolling lines of the log file and wondered, for the umpteenth time, what her life might have been like if she’d discovered computers before she picked up a fiddle.  Carefully, she scanned the tracker’s source code.  Competently done, and nothing appeared malicious.

A harmless virtual fly, following her around the ether from somewhere in California.

Curious, that.  She leaned forward, peering at her screen.  The heart of the ghostie’s coding was a few sparse lines—designed to exert a gentle pulling force.  “I’ll be damned.  You’re a little tugboat.”  Pulling where, she had no idea.

Intrigued now, she wrote a couple of new code lines of her own.  And threw up a firewall, just to be safe.  “What are you tugging on, then?”

She hooked her lines into the tracking bug.  Hit run.  And jerked her fingers up as the keyboard gave them a sharp yank.

Her firewall frizzled, fried by whatever had just reached out and tried to grab her.

Cass leaped out of her chair, putting several feet between her and her possessed laptop.  Well, damn.  The freaking bug was trying to pull
her.
   Adrenaline surged in her veins, the Celtic fighter awakened.

And then she heard the rocks’ soothing croon.

The little bug from afar meant no harm.

Cass glared.  Since when had the rocks been on speaking terms with Internet ghosties?

The rocks had no answer for that.

-o0o-

One of the true pleasures of old age was watching grown women you’d known since birth squirm like four-year-olds.  Moira pushed the glass a little closer to its intended recipient.

Nell eyed the innocent tumbler like it held witchbane.  “What’s in it?”

“I’ve no idea, my dear.”  Moira laughed, reaching for the second glass with a green silly straw.  It could only be meant for her.  “Some sort of dessert cocktail.  Aaron made them for us—he says the inn guests have been enjoying them.”

And Aaron was rather particular about keeping herbs, potions, and mischief-making small healers out of his kitchen.

Nell sipped, and her eyes brightened.  “It tastes like brownies in a glass.  Raspberry ones.”

It most certainly did.  Moira made a mental note to bloom more raspberries for their industrious innkeeper.  Lizzie’s indoor bush was doing marvelously well this winter, aided and abetted by several witches who adored raspberries.

Sophie, done shedding her dripping outerwear, took a seat at the table, reaching for the third glass.  “I was wondering why the bush was empty this morning.”

Crack-of-dawn berry raids had been one of the more entertaining parts of March so far.  Moira grinned.  Old ladies were up very early.  “I’ll go bloom a few more after we sit and talk a while.”

Nell snorted.  “No need.  I brought Aervyn.”

That would certainly take care of it.  “You might send him round to visit Marcus too.”  Her nephew could use a cheerful male influence in his life.  And maybe Aervyn could make some of the carrot stash disappear—the witchlings were complaining.

“I thought Marcus was messing with my tracking spell.”  Nell took another sip of raspberry goodness.  “But he claims innocence.  Whoever it was tried to activate the fetching code last night.”

That didn’t sound like her nephew.  For one, he wouldn’t have failed.  “What happened?”

“Dunno.”  Nell shrugged.  “But I set a snare that probably zapped someone’s channels a little.  Were any of your witchlings cranky this morning?”

“No.”  They had four healers in the village—even minor channel shock would have been detected within the hour. 

Sophie shook her head slowly.  “Even Marcus was happy this morning.  Grew some daffodils for Morgan.”

“Oh, really.”  Moira leaned back, considering.  That wasn’t tricky magic, but it required a fair dollop of earth power.  “I didn’t know he had that in him.”

“Neither did he.”  Sophie’s wry tone didn’t hide her large affection for their dour witch.  “Someone hasn’t exactly been practicing with his new power.”

“He hardly had a sneeze’s worth.”  Moira looked down at her own hands—some days, she had little more than that left herself.

“Well, he’s got more now,” said Sophie gently, also hearing what hadn’t been said.  “How much more, I don’t know.  It took him two tries to pull up a daffodil, but a little practice might improve that.”

Nell snickered.  “I think he’s getting some right now.”

They both followed her gaze out the window to Marcus in his hulking winter black, squatted down at the side of the road.  And Morgan, a tiny sprite in day-glow green raingear and purple boots, standing beside him, signing for “more.”

They could read his strained patience from here.  And even Moira’s eyes could see a breadcrumb trail of daffodils running all the way from the inn, bright faces dancing in the winter rain.

Ah, small children could go where even the angels feared to tread.  “It will be good for him.”

“Maybe.”  Sophie gazed on their sudden gardener a moment longer.  “It’s been a long winter.  He’s restless.”

“Aye.”  And to her way of thinking, that was a very good thing.  Moira smiled and pulled out a treasured bit of gossip.  “I hear he was singing in the library yesterday.”  The village, denied funding for a library of its own, had quietly turned a corner room of the church into an ode to books.  At this time of year, it was a hopping place.  And wee Kevin had sharp eyes and a sense of humor. 

Apparently Marcus had been humming
Born to Run
while holding a copy of
The Very Hungry Caterpillar
in his hands.

Nell topped up all their glasses.  “That sounds happy, not restless.”  She shrugged and sipped.  “And totally weird for Marcus.”

The inhabitants of Fisher’s Cove were getting used to his happy moments, but visitors were still fairly astonished at their local curmudgeon’s slow transformation.  “He needed to learn to enjoy contentment for a bit, I think.  But I’ve been waiting for his soul to begin squirming.”

Both her companions looked surprised.

So young they were.  “He’s a forty-eight-year-old man who had a lot of his life stop at five.  Marcus Buchanan still has a fine lot of living to be doing.”  And she was very pleased to see it stirring.  “He was stuck in unhappiness for so long—it’s taken a while for his heart to realize it can grow wings now.” 

Sophie smiled slowly.  “He’s not going to find that a wildly comfortable process.”

Not at all.  But the caterpillar was indeed hungry—and that was a very good sign.

Hopeful.

Just like a trail of yellow daffodils in the heart of a Canadian winter.

-o0o-

Playing square-dance night at The Barn was always good for shrinking her ego back down to regular size.  Cass grinned as a small boy stopped his dancing long enough to actually notice the musicians.  Everyone else ate and talked and stomped around the floor greeting friends and working off their cabin fever.

Only Ellie’s glistening solo an hour earlier had stopped the chatter.

Most people would give them a nod or two sometime in the night, but Margaree expected its music to be good, lively, and long-lasting.  There were fifteen fiddlers who could have filled her chair and kept the dancers happy.

In the rest of the world, listening to Cassidy Farrell play was a great privilege.  In Margaree, she was just another “pretty good” fiddler.

And she loved it.

Buddy winked at her over his flying bow.  Damn, she was woolgathering again—he’d switched to playing background fiddle.  Her turn to show off a little.

Her hands moved before her brain did, tracking the feet of the four couples in the square closest to the stage.  Rosie crooned invitation, beguiling them to take notice of her patinaed wood and shiny strings.

It was the tall man with the white beard who noticed first.  Jenkins.  He looked her way, eyes twinkling.  Challenge accepted.

She gave him a chance to circle through the rest of his square.  With the quick nudges of people long used to each other, the other seven were ready less than a minute later.

Rick, the caller, looked over at her and grinned.  Time to have a little fun.

Cass drew her bow across Rosie’s strings.  A single, drawn-out double-stop. 

And then she began to play.  Fast and furious, with the glorious precision, lightning-fast licks, and supreme artistry that had made her famous.

The square of eight whirled to keep up, their ears barely needing Rick’s calls.  The music told them where to go.  Feet flew, centrifugal force tossing skirts, hair, and the occasional squeal high into the air.

All around the floor of The Barn, couples halted, with headshakes and laughter as they made their way to cider, grandbabies, and a good place to watch the show.

Buddy picked up the undercurrent of Rosie’s mad singing, his long, slow harmonies helping to keep at least a few feet on the ground.  Jenkins’ white beard flew by, two ladies clutched in his arms.  The small boy who had noticed her earlier had somehow made his way onto a dancer’s shoulders and was hanging on for dear life, his grin as big as the moon.

The audience had picked up the clapping, stomping rhythm of Rosie’s anthem, and more than one inhabitant of The Barn was giving their Irish roots a go, including one teenage girl whose feet were little more than a blur.

Cass looked again and grinned—the girl was face-to-face with her grandmother, and by the looks of it, the teenager was getting herself thoroughly out-clogged.

Gods, she loved this place.

She made quick eye contact with Buddy.  One more run-through, from the top.  Faster.

Bow in a blur now, she gave Rosie over to the madness, fingers and dancers and the smell of cider melding into a dream world.  Flying through the universe at the speed of light.  Even the rocks under her feet danced.

And then she reached the last note.  Flung it out into the world, dueling winter and cold and the thousands of miles between her heart and those she loved most.

Celtic defiance.  Nobody did it better than Cassidy Farrell.

Even if she’d had to leave home to do it.

The throngs on the dance floor clapped and whooped and hollered—for Margaree, that was a standing ovation.  Cass brandished her bow in quick acknowledgement of the dancers and took a seat, heart thumping and soul glad.

It wasn’t the accolades she played for here.  It was the rightness.

Buddy nodded once and started up again.  Something the speed of mere mortals this time.  Cass shouldered Rosie, grinned, and found a more comfortable position on her stool.  Back to second fiddle.  Buddy was set to go for hours yet, and it would be entirely embarrassing if her butt got numb before his did.