A Lost Witch (A Modern Witch Series: Book 7) (18 page)

And it was giving her the added, fascinating experience of eavesdropping.  On real, living, breathing conversations.

At Chrysalis House, eavesdropping had been fraught with sadness.  Families trying to talk to a mind that was living somewhere else.  Patients occupied with the host of characters, real and imagined, who inhabited their heads.  Staff murmuring about Things of Concern.

The easy chatter in Knit A Spell was another kind of world entirely.

You’re used to living inside your head, girl. 
The mindvoice was gruff—and kind. 
Nobody here bites.
 
You might let Hannah come out to play.

It was still hard to believe that voices in her head were a good thing. 
That will make your job a lot more difficult.
  Caro’s brain clamp was tighter than anyone but Lauren’s, but the idea of pushing on it still made Hannah want to vomit.

Caro snorted.
  It’ll be a fair shade easier than keeping the lot of them from coming to look over your shoulder.

Hannah blinked.  So far, they’d sent a few cheery hellos her direction and then let her be.

I’ve magic enough.
 Said in mind tones that brooked no argument. 
And if Helga has to sit still and ignore you for much longer, she’s probably going to burst a blood vessel.

Hannah peered around the edge of the loom, looking for the small, bird-like woman.  And nearly got steamrolled by her arrival.

Helga grinned, a friendly hand on Hannah’s shoulder and eyes carefully on the weaving.  “So, you’re Caro’s new resident artist, are you?”

That sounded like an awfully fancy title for someone cowering in a corner.  “I just like something to keep my hands busy.”

“Don’t we all, my dear.”  A small being reached up for the edge of the loom and Helga swooped, kissing a round baby cheek.  “Oh, no you don’t, monkeypants.”  She looked over in companionable amusement.  “Watch out for this one—he’s a wrecking ball with a cute face.”

Hannah shuddered at the eye contact, but nothing shimmered. 

“He’s not the only one who’s trouble,” said a new voice wryly.  The woman who came up on Helga’s left sounded dour, but she squeezed Sam’s toes as she spoke.  “I suppose someone should come over here and supervise the two of you.”

“Right.  Says the woman who accidentally fed him some of her bologna sandwich yesterday.”  A third head popped around the other side of the loom.  “Hi, I’m Jodi, Sam’s mom.  The other two delinquents over there are not my fault.”

Hannah hid a giggle.  It was like the Three Stooges.  With knitting needles and a really cute baby.  And Caro’s brain clamp was holding like iron.

“A weaver, huh?”  Helga had pulled over a stool and passed little Sam off to Marion.  “Is that hard, or could someone old and dull manage to learn it?”

Hannah grinned at the irrepressible energy bouncing on the stool beside her.  “You don’t seem dull.”  Or old, really.

“Oh, I didn’t mean me.”  Helga winked.  “I thought Marion might like to learn.”

This time, the giggle escaped.  Hannah looked up and saw Caro watching from a few feet away.  “Are they always like this?”

“Nope.”  Jodi pulled up a stool beside Helga.  “We’re totally on our good behavior right now.  Don’t worry, it doesn’t last very long.”

“Truth.”  Helga eyed Hannah narrowly.  “Don’t suppose you have a criminal record, do you?”

Every other kind.  “I don’t think so.”

“Drat.  Consorting with a criminal is one of the few things left on my bucket list.  I’ll just have to corrupt Sammy here instead.”

“Don’t you dare,” said Jodi, laughing.

“Just a teeny little crime?  Loitering?  Vagrancy?”  Helga’s puppy-dog eyes were back on Hannah.  “Anything to make you not entirely boring?”

They were entirely adorable.  Something in Hannah deeply yearned to join the fun.  “How about a decade in the nuthouse?”

“Ooooh.”  Helga’s eyes gleamed.  “That one’s not even on my list.”

“You’ll fit right in around here then,” said Marion, twinkling eyes belying the tone.

Helga leaned over and kissed Sammy’s nose.  “I’ll be right back, troublesome boy.  I think it’s my turn to sacrifice my knitting.”  She grinned over at Hannah.  “He likes to pull needles out of socks.  One of us always has a project on the go for him to tangle.”

They’d made room for a recently crazy witch just as easily as they did for a small boy.

Hannah wrapped her arms around her ribs, surprised to find them still in their regular place.  It was very clear.  In about ten minutes, she was going to have more friends than she’d had in ten years.

The snort in her head felt almost comfortable. 
If you think it’s going to take ten minutes, you’re not nearly as smart as I think.

Hannah grinned.  And leaned into the melee, heart in total, happy overload.

Chapter 13

Lauren felt the last fog of sleep fading, chased by the wafting scent of coffee mingling with the much closer scent of salty brine.

She peeled one eye open.  Devin stood at the side of the bed, dripping wet, a piece of seaweed hanging over his left ear.  She raised an eyebrow.  “You went swimming?”  Nova Scotia had excellent lobster stew, but the water here was freaking cold.

“Yeah.”  He sat down on the bed, totally unconcerned about the water.  “Had some steam to burn off.”

Both eyes were open now.  There was more than one way to enjoy her husband’s never-ending energy.

He laughed, swooping in for a kiss.  “That wasn’t in Moira’s instructions.  I’m supposed to feed you a sturdy breakfast and get you out in the sun for a while.”

That sounded suspiciously like caretaking.  “I’m feeling really good.”  Dinner and a rowdy night of witches and music and dancing under the stars had made for a very effective sleep potion.

“I can tell.”  He lay down beside her this time, settling her head on his warm, salty shoulder.  “We’re just trying to keep you that way.”

They’d seen the schedule.  One lesson with Hannah, 3 p.m. 

Lauren wound herself around her husband’s still-damp frame.  It wasn’t nearly 3 p.m. Yet.  “I can go ask Moira for some updated instructions.”  There was more than one way to make a load feel lighter—and the spritely matriarch of Fisher’s Cove was likely to vote in favor of all of them.

Devin snorted and rolled them over on the bed. 

Lauren grinned, even as salt water dripped off his curls.

Coffee was just going to have to wait.

-o0o-

Day two of feeling like the most ordinary person in the room.  Hannah loaded her shuttle with a new color and grinned.  So far this morning, Helga had told trapeze-flying stories, some of them possibly true, Marion had spluttered indignantly at Jodi’s new, slightly lewd, and very funny knock-knock jokes, and Sammy had attempted to stick his head through the loom warp and nearly succeeded.

“That’s pretty.”  Helga touched the raspberry yarn winding onto the shuttle.  “Don’t mind our monkey—he’s just interested in your new toy.”

She didn’t mind him at all.  “I don’t suppose he can be cloned.”

Jodi snickered from her seat on the floor, twenty-five colors of yarn arrayed around her.  “Be really careful what you wish for.” 

Not today.  She’d spent the last twelve years doing that.  “I like the lime-green one next to the blue.”

“Not the orange?”  Jodi frowned and switched the balls around.  “I want it to be really bright.”

The future afghan had all the colors of the rainbow and several more Hannah hadn’t even known existed.  “Pretty sure you’re covered there.”

Helga snorted.  “Wise guy.”

Hannah grinned.  “I learn fast.”  And damn, she’d wound way too much yarn on her shuttle.  Shaking her head, she started to unwind.

“What are you doing that for?”

“This yarn’s pretty, but it’s fragile.”  Hannah shrugged Jodi’s direction.  “It’s made for knitting, not for weaving.  If I put too much on the shuttle, it will shred on me.” 

Helga looked both puzzled and interested, so Hannah kept trying to explain.  “See these warp threads on the loom?  The old ones from Caro’s grandmother?  They’re awesome weaving thread, really twisty and strong.”

“They’ll eat this soft stuff for breakfast, will they?”  Helga patted the raspberry yarn again, intrigued.

“You could try spinning the yarn for your weft.”   Marion was busy trying to knit Sammy’s sock faster than he unraveled it.  “Get yourself a spindle.”

Hannah had only the vaguest sense of what a spindle was.  A stick with a round thing attached—she’d seen a few in the background of some of the blurry tourist videos of weavers she loved to watch.  “That seems like the slow way to do things.”

“Depends on your definition of slow.”  Caro unloaded a new delivery onto her counter, one gorgeous waterfall of color at a time. “It’s how most of the world’s weavers make what they need.  Oma did.  High twist, not flimsy like this soft stuff we like to put on our needles.”

Hannah, distracted by all the pretties, suddenly had the unreasonable urge to learn how to knit.  She touched the magnificent loom instead—one fiber addiction at a time.  “I don’t know how to spin.”  No matter how tempting yarn better suited for her purposes might be.

Marion chuckled as Sam snagged one of her needles.  “You’re smart enough to learn.”

There was plenty of far more practical learning to be doing at the moment.  Her first attempt at biscuits had been hard and flat enough to use as skipping rocks.  “Maybe someday.”

“Marion knows how to spin.”  Caro’s hands kept moving, transferring skeins from counter to shelf—but the air in the room had suddenly thickened to Louisiana swamp.

Hannah sat motionless on her stool, trying to read the thick, smelly fog.  Marion’s remaining needles shook in her lap, perilously close to shedding stitches without Sammy’s help.  Caro’s hands were steady—but her eyes, turned away from the group, were drenched with worry.

And the rest of the small audience, feeling the sudden tug in their fabric, had joined Hannah in her still, silent watching.

A stitch had been dropped—and no one knew how to pick it up just yet.

Hannah breathed into the stillness and tried to trust.  She knew one other person who liked to poke holes in the patterns of peoples’ lives—and he was one of the best people she knew.

Perhaps Caro shared a bit of Dr. Max’s skill for unraveling.

Jodi reached over and laid her hand gently on the arm of the dour and sturdy woman.  “You know how to spin?”

Marion’s eyes never left the floor.  “I did, once.  It was a very long time ago.”

Kind hearts waited for the words that were clearly so hard to say. 

Hands trembling, Marion picked up her knitting again.  “I spun for my wedding veil.  It was a silly, filmy thing.  Took me almost a year to make.”  Several stitches tumbled off her needles and Marion gave up, clenching yarn and needles to her chest, eyes unfathomably sad.  When she finally spoke again, her cheeks were damp.  “Every time I tried to pick up my spindle again after that, I remembered how much in love I was that year.  How happy and full of silly dreams.”

Hannah’s heart wept for the young bride’s shattered dreams.  And for the stolid, fifty-year-old woman who tipped her head into Jodi’s shoulder and gave up all semblance of British propriety.

It’s about damn time,
said Caro’s quiet mental voice.

Hannah looked over, shocked—and saw sadness and persistent, steady love.  Sometimes unraveling was the only way to heal.

And apparently Chrysalis House wasn’t the only place where it happened.

-o0o-

It wasn’t very often a visitor arrived bearing beautiful yarn and a frown.

Moira reached into her fridge for iced tea—it was a wee bit warm for a cup from the kettle just now.  She poured two glasses and carried them over to the table.  “It’s usually me visiting your shop these days.”  Caro was a homebody and not at all fond of Realm’s transporter beams.

“Can’t stay long.  Helga’s minding the counter.”

Helga was very competent—and a mite mischievous.  “Well, we’ll skip the Irish custom of asking about everything on earth and beyond, then.”  Moira smiled, well aware her guest wasn’t fond of meandering conversations at the best of times.

Wool and needles emerged from Caro’s bag, something in riotous shades of orange that should have hurt the eyes but called to the fingers instead.  “Had a bit of an unexpected morning.”

Moira raised an eyebrow.  Caro wasn’t a witch easily surprised.

“No, I’m not.”  Hands fiddled with yarn, untangling a small knot.  “Marion dissolved into tears today right in the middle of knitting group.”

Some women cried easily.  Marion wasn’t one of them.  “Oh, my.  The hard kind of tears, or the happy kind?”  Not that they couldn’t often be both.

“The kind that open old hurts so they can maybe heal.”

Ah.  Moira reached out a hand, finally understanding.  “So you’ve come to share hope for an old and dear friend.”

Caro looked out the window, watching Marcus walk by with Lizzie on one side, Morgan on the other.  “Must be something in the air this year, blowing dust off the old curmudgeons.”

That was a lovely, poetic thought.  “You’ve done well to create a space where Marion felt free to let go of her dust.”  Much of the magic of healing was doing exactly that.