A Lost Witch (A Modern Witch Series: Book 7) (20 page)

-o0o-

Cookies, milk, a pile of dusty old books, and eight waiting faces.

Witch Central’s finest, collected to solve the problem of Hannah Kendrick’s intractable precog. 

Lauren looked at the youngest two, seated together on the floor at the end of the coffee table.  Some people would underestimate that wing of the team.

Those people would be sorely mistaken.

She looked at Kevin, half hidden by his pile of books.  A dispassionate gatherer of data—and a fine place to get this meeting underway.

He met her gaze and cleared his throat.  The room quieted—nobody in this group underestimated anyone.  Kevin touched his stack of dusty tomes.  “Ginia and I’ve been doing some reading.  Sophie helped, and Marcus too.  And Aunt Moira told us what to look for.”

“Aye, and a good job of digging you did.”  The Irish lilt that had steadied them for decades wafted calm through the room.  “Tell them about your clues—the two of you did very well.”

“There aren’t so many people with precog, even going back as far as we have written history.  But it’s kind of like astral travel—it’s scary magic, so people write a lot about it when it happens.”  The boy looked down at his hands.  “And it doesn’t usually end so well for the witches.  Mostly they die.  And before that, lots of them go crazy first.”

Ginia snorted and glared at her grandmother.  “And the rest just decide to get you all wet with a garden hose.”

Lauren shook her head, amused and impressed, as the room dissolved in laughter.  Concern for their two resident precog witches, banished in seconds by one impudent child healer.

“Indeed.”  Retha looked around the room.  “And for as long as I’m winning water fights, you don’t need to worry about me.  We’re here about Hannah.  Jamie and I can live with the weak powers that we have, and I don’t think either of us will end up any crazier than the average Sullivan.”

One child healer, seconded by the crone who shared her blood. 

Kevin cleared his throat.  “That seemed to be pretty true in the old books, too.  People with a little bit of precog did okay.  The ones who got it bad were usually teenage girls.”  He glanced over at Ginia. 

Devin leaned over and tugged one of his niece’s curls.  “All teenage girls get a little crazy.  You ever feel yourself getting weird, you just come find me and I’ll squirt you with a hose.”

The look that came back his way would have caused a lesser man to shrivel.  “You think that will make me not crazy?”

“It’ll make you mad.”  Dev grinned, unrepentant.  “You can’t be mad and crazy at the same time.”

Lauren let out a quiet breath.  Her husband had the courage of his convictions, even when he was totally making things up.  And he’d managed to distract almost everyone in the room from Kevin’s very astute, very scary point.

Ginia Walker had a grandmother and an uncle with precog, and scads of witchy genes.

Very carefully, Lauren scanned the minds in the room.  Almost everyone was caught up in the niece-and-uncle banter.  Except for three.  Jamie, Retha, and Nell.

And all of those three beamed her back the same message.  Just one more quiet worry the Sullivan clan had insistently dumped on the back burner in favor of life.

Lauren drank in Ginia’s dancing, impudent eyes, took a deep breath, and joined their ranks.  “Anything else, Kevin?”

“One thing.”  He nodded.  “A woman who cured herself by always wearing a blindfold.”

“Visual triggers.”  Jamie leaned forward, frowning.  “Dammit, there has to be a way to shut those down.”

They were trying.  And in 2013, blinding a witch didn’t seem like a feasible option.  They needed to come up with something, though.  Their newest arrival was blooming under Caro’s careful nurturing—but the drain on the brain-clamp team was enormous.

“Maybe we can code it,” said Ginia suddenly.  “Like Realm, only backwards.”

A whole lot of coders leaned forward, minds gearing up sharply.

And then a dozen phones claxoned. 

Lauren yanked hers out and read the screen. 
I can’t hold it.  Someone better get here fast.

Oh, hell.

-o0o-

It was so beautiful.  Mesmerizing, really.  Hannah watched Marion’s spindle twirl as it moved toward the floor.

“You’ll learn better if you watch my hands,” said Marion gruffly.  “The spindle takes care of itself.”

Based on several very lame attempts, that wasn’t anywhere near true.  Hannah looked up in the general direction of Marion’s hands.  And was caught, for the umpteenth time that morning, by her face.

It was like someone else had slid under the bones and muscles and skin of the woman formerly known as Marion.  A possession, of the best possible kind.  Hints of a smile darted from cheeks to eyebrows to a wiggly bit of chin.

Happiness, working its way to the surface.  Not the kind that exploded to life, calling the world to look and see.  The other kind.  The quiet place of a soul connected to its purpose.

Marion, communing with some deeply important part of herself.  Reclaiming it.

Hannah sent a wish into the growing string of green yarn.  Marion had let go of that piece once.  Might the warp be stronger this time.  The light in those eyes was too precious to die.

She felt the shimmer before she saw it.  And the terror that always came with her attacks.

But there was something else this time.  The desire for an answer.  To see if her wish might come true.

It’s darn strong this time, girl—gonna need your help to hold it back. 
Caro sounded really short of breath.
 I need you in your center.  NOW.

Hannah breathed.  Ran.  Headed for the place of her soul’s haven.  But she looked back as she ran.  And when she saw a much older Marion, sitting in a rocker, a young child with a spindle in her lap, she couldn’t regret it.

Even as she felt her attack win the race.

-o0o-

Retha stepped over a broken plant stand, wincing.  They’d landed like invading elephants in a china shop.  Lauren crawled out of a basket of yarn as Tabitha and Lizard made more graceful entries, looking around wildly.

Help.  Now.
 Caro’s stretched, taut mind would have demanded instant obedience even if her words hadn’t.  Four mind witches, already linking up their magics, gathered at her back.

And stared in horror.

They’d all held the clamp on Hannah’s precog.  And none of them had ever seen anything like this. The motherloop writhed, ten times the size of the channel it had once been. And Caro’s clamp clung to the sides, tossed, twisted, and not anywhere close to staying closed.

Bigger clamp?
 Lauren was looking, assessing.  Their planner.

Retha had seen water hoses that looked like that.  You didn’t just stop the flow. 
We have to let the pressure out somehow or it’s gonna blow.
  Maybe.  Brains were not hoses.

Haven’t you people ever done anything illegal and stupid? 
Lizard’s mindvoice was very abrupt—and very certain. 
We have to choke it off earlier.  Decrease the pressure at the clamp.  Otherwise we just burst something.

Kill the rivulets.
  Lauren grabbed Tab’s mental hands. 
Let’s go.  We’ll take the left side—Retha, Lizard, you take the right.

That meant abandoning Caro.

No.  I got her too.
 Lauren had already split her mental channels, one end pushing hard on Caro’s back. 
Move it, people—I still suck at this splitting stuff.

She was the only one in the world other than a five-year-old boy who could even try.

Retha turned and realized that her other team member was already moving.  Lizard stood in the middle of a mental island, tossing out things that looked very much like cowboy lassos.  She threw the ends in her hands at Retha. 
Get ready to pull ’em tight, but don’t do it yet.

Damn.
  Lauren sounded impressed—and breathless. 
That’s way smarter than what we’re doing.

That’s why you pay me the big bucks. 
Lizard was firing out lassos with both hands now.

Getting left in the dust by kids again.  Retha held on to the rope ends with one hand and tried tossing out loops with the other.

Harder than it looks.
 Tab was clearly low on gas. 
Caro doesn’t have much left.

Okay, people.
 Lizard joined Retha and wrapped the ends around her back. 
We pull on three.  Caro, as soon as you see the flow get smaller, get the fracking clamp on.

Gotcha, boss lady.

Retha wished she had enough energy left to snicker—Caro’s cowboy accent was awfully damn good.

One.  Two.
 Lauren and Lizard braced, the strongest of their teams, ready to take the brunt of the impact.
 Three.

The motherloop shuddered, a rattling snake rejecting the turn its future had just taken.

Four witches held firm and insisted.

And Caro Genady doggedly reeled in her clamp.

Retha managed to hold on to consciousness long enough to see the motherloop slither into relative quiet.  And then cursed as she felt her head turn into cotton candy. 

This was so going to earn them all some green goo.

Chapter 15

He was angry.  And trying very hard not to let her know.

Lauren set down the morning’s second cup of coffee and sat on the couch beside her husband.  She’d learned a lot about being his partner in the last year.  Water magics sat deep in his soul—and with Devin, the tides were fast, furious, and always honest.

He laid his head on top of hers, his fingers still stroking one comatose ball of kitten.  Fuzzball had figured out very quickly that Devin Sullivan was the resident softie.  “I’m working through it.”

She’d never seen him lay responsibility for his moods on anyone else.  Not ever.  Even when she probably deserved it.  “We took a risk putting Hannah in Caro’s shop.”  Lots of new faces and one person holding the clamp.

“We take a risk by breathing.”  His fingers traced over her hands.  “And you’re all already working right to the edge.”

Real estate was a demanding profession some days, and so was witching.  Devin usually rolled well with both.  She touched his mind.  “That’s not what’s making you angry, is it?” 

“I’m not mad at you.  At me, some.”  He sighed.  “And at the world that keeps insisting on putting my wife in harm’s way.  I don’t like peeling you off the floor.”

She wasn’t a big fan of it either, but Lauren let that float away on a breath.  She’d woken up feeling wimpy, and limp-noodle visuals weren’t going to help that any.

Her marriage needed tending.

It was a rare morning when Devin’s soul was shaking.  She wiggled closer, tucking herself into his lap.  Now wasn’t the time to point out that he put himself in harm’s way all the damn time.  This wasn’t about logic or reason or double standards or a man thinking clearly.

This was about a heart aching because he loved, and the world wasn’t safe.

His arms wrapped around her, sending solace both directions.  “My family pulls crazy stunts all the time.  I should be used to it by now.”

She snuggled in and let him talk.  The brain trust was meeting again in an hour.  Until then, she wasn’t moving.

His anger was already beginning to soften.

And the wobbles in her soul, the ones that always came after the moments of terror, would find a safe place to land.

They both needed this.

His fingers ran down her hair.  “You have me awfully figured out, huh?”

It wasn’t really a question.  She smiled into his chest. 

Some days, they got it right.

-o0o-

Moira landed in the Witches’ Lounge beside Retha and smiled as the pails of beach pebbles landed to their left.  She’d gotten used to the Realm transport spells, but Aervyn’s porting was always so much gentler. 

Jamie eyed the pails suspiciously.  “What are those for?”

Nell arrived, two large paper bags in her hands.  “We’re making centerpieces for the tables at the wedding.”  She held up the bags.  “Candles.  Pretty glass dishes.”

“Nuh, uh.”  Jamie sounded very much like his adorable nephew.  “I don’t do decorating.”

“Well, I do have some copper candlesticks that need scrubbing.”  Moira exchanged a look with Retha, much amused. 

“I don’t scrub.”  Lauren was the last arrival in the room, but she caught on fast.  “What are we doing with the pebbles?”

Moira kissed her cheek and did a quick healing scan while she was at it.  Tired, but not dangerously so.  Enormous pots of spaghetti, some very underappreciated doses of Ginia’s best green goo, and a good night’s sleep had done their work.  “We’re keeping our hands busy while we chat about Hannah.”  She sat back down—Lauren had called the meeting, and she was more than capable of guiding it.

The pebbles were just a little light watering.

Nell reached for a handful of the small stones, set them in a shallow glass bowl, and added a tealight in the center.  She handed it to her brother.  “Like so.  Dev’s going to add a water spell later so the rocks glisten in the sun.  Decorating committee decree.”