A Lost Witch (A Modern Witch Series: Book 7) (25 page)

They’d be back.

This whole being the roving-protector-of-the-mind-witches gig was hard work.  He kept his face to the action and sent a mental probe in the general direction of the woman behind him. 
You okay?  Still dry?

Yeah. 
Even Lauren’s mindvoice sounded breathless. 
Tabitha’s got my back now, thanks.

Jamie shook his head and moved off, looking for more distracted witches to defend.  They had every mind talent in Berkeley present, working as a phalanx to keep Hannah’s magic at bay long enough for her to participate in a Witch Central summer tradition.

They could have toppled a president with this much concerted mind power.

He looked over at the play structure that was the heart of the Great Water Smackdown.  Helga stood on top of the slide, dueling water pistols on both hips, soaking wet and still taking dead aim at the troublemakers below.

Aervyn stood behind her, porting them up a water supply and lobbing water balloons with endless enthusiasm and really bad aim.  Daniel tossed one back that burst on his son’s ribs, and mindlaughter rang out through the back yard.

Jamie chuckled—and then spluttered as a hose blast hit him square in the head.  He cleared the water out of his eyes long enough to catch his wife’s unrepentant grin, and then got hit from the other side. 

This time, he didn’t need to see—his mother’s hose blasts always came with a trickle of mind glee. 
Aren’t you supposed to be busy making sure Hannah stays in one piece?
 

I raised seven children and you don’t think I can do two things at once? 

He was smart enough not to answer that. 

I’m only on backup duty.  And I figured if I was going to get wet anyhow, it was more fun to be armed.

His mother hadn’t ever voluntarily chosen noncombatant status. 
Where is Hannah, anyhow?

Preparing our final ambush.  You have been warned.

That sounded dire.  Jamie swiped water out of his face and did a quick-and-dirty survey of the terrain.  Mia and Nathan had hunkered down behind a raspberry bush, and Nat was working her way their direction.  What that team lacked in magic, they more than made up for in guile and good aim.

Helga and Aervyn were still on top of the play structure, Devin and Sierra amiably working their way up the slide to join them.  Jamie grinned—not a strategist amongst the four of them, but they were easily going to win the team award for having the most fun.

And then he spied Hannah and realized no one was going to hold a candle to her raging joy.

She’d bellied her way out on a tree limb, legs twisted into a pose that he’d have bet only Nat could do.  Ginia perched on a nearby branch, face wreathed in unholy glee.

His mother was partway up the tree, guiding a trio of hoses attached to rotating sprinkler units.

And Nell was at the base, armed with a mountain of water balloons, three super soakers, and more attitude than everyone else in the back yard combined.

Oh, shit.

Jamie ported himself to the tree fort and did a quick count.  All mind witches accounted for and safely out of the way.

Duh,
sent Lauren dryly. 
We know what’s coming.

Oh, pretty much anyone who’d ever lost a battle knew what was coming now.  One by one, the combatants in the back yard turned to face the tree.  And contemplated their doom.

Aervyn was the first to let loose a banshee yell.  He catapulted down the slide, water balloons in his hands and Helga hot on his heels, and headed straight for his mother.  One witchling and one kamikaze old lady, into the breach.

Devin let out a maniacal Scottish war whoop and joined the charge.  Sierra shrugged and followed him.  Jamie grinned—it was a suicide mission, but they were water witches and already thoroughly soaked.

Daniel and Nat were slinking along the back fence in opposite directions.  Jamie squinted.  Those two were dangerous to ignore—they both had deadly aim.  He chuckled as he figured out the answer.  Highly talented decoys.  Mia and Nathan were headed for the hose hookups.

Smart—except he was pretty sure they were going to discover Shay Walker, stealth warrior, on guard.  Quietest member of the team about to unleash total dominion, but by no means the weakest.

From the tree fort, the strategy was obvious.  Let everyone attack Nell—and then turn on the water.  Jamie had the oddest urge to throw himself into the thick of it.  He was way too dry.

However, he was a witch with a job to do.  One that didn’t allow for sulking.  He checked in on his mind-witch troops one more time.  All good—and all enjoying a big, secondhand dose of Hannah’s glee.

The noise level from the genial melee had hit combustion point—and then an ear-splitting whistle blasted out of the tree.  Hannah grinned, a sprinkler-clad hose in each hand.

And then swung down, hanging upside down from her knees on a wildly swaying branch, and opened fire.

Water spray blanketed the back yard, right at belly-button level.

And Witch Central, thoroughly defeated, sat down on the grass and laughed themselves silly.

-o0o-

Hannah dropped from the tree, landing on her feet with a thunk that reminded her that thirteen and nimble ninja were both quite a few years in her past.

She was soaked, giddy, and in serious danger of having her waterlogged shorts fall off.  And drinking up every single drop of the wet and happy communal mirth in the back yard.

Ginia’s arm snaked around her waist.  “We did it!”

She looked quickly for the rest of her team—Retha, making her way gingerly out of the tree and daring any of her grown sons to help.  Nell, sitting in a soggy puddle of mud with Aervyn in her lap, his arms waving wildly.  Shay grinned from her post over by the hose hookups.

Partners in the best afternoon of her adult life.

And then Hannah took a deep breath and looked around for the real people who had made this glistening hour possible.

Caro, Tabitha, and Lizard sat in three lawn chairs, lemonade glasses at the ready.  Lauren sat on the grass beside them, looking a little damper than her companions.

They all looked happy, victorious, and tired down to their bones.

She was used to taking—all people living in mental institutions were.  People gave—everyone from Dr. Max to the ladies in the lunchroom to her big brother and his weekly deliveries of her favorite Indian food, all so that Hannah Kendrick could stay on her feet and get through her days.

But here, out in the real world, it felt so very wrong.

They’d exhausted themselves—so she could
play
.

You’re damn right, and we’d do it again.
 Retha Sullivan sounded almost angry.  And then she got up from her chair, apology on her face and in her mind.  “Don’t mind me, dear, I’m just a little hungry.”  She kissed Ginia’s cheek.  “Go get us some cookies, okay, lovey?”

Hannah watched Ginia scamper off, feet splatting through the puddled mess of a back yard—and felt some of the joy of the last hour seeping back in.

“Let it.”  Retha’s hand was warm on her wet shoulder.  “Play is the stuff of the universe, my dear.  And watching you hang out of that tree and blast my miscreant progeny was the highlight of my summer.”

“Summer’s not over yet.”  Caro joined them, her knitting abandoned on the lawn chair.  “There’s nothing wrong with us that a cookie can’t fix.  And it was entirely worth it.  It’s about time Helga went down in defeat.”

“I want to grow up to be Helga one day,” said Lauren, holding out a plate piled high with treats.

Hannah took a brownie, frowning.  The witchy realtor had seemed a lot drier when the water fight had ended.

Lauren snickered.  “That’s exactly what my husband said right before he accidentally lost control of the buckets he was putting away.”

Utter silliness.  Hannah hugged her knees and soaked it up.  They were all leaving bright and early in the morning—but what they’d woven today couldn’t be undone.

So many threads now, running from her heart out into the world.

And ones shiny and glittery, old and silly, sturdy and tested—threading back.

Chapter 19

Groom ready, requisite pranks finished, nephew fished out of the tide pools, and daughter curled up asleep in a quiet corner.

Jamie took the odd moment of calm to look out at the assembled guests.

Not everyone was entirely light and easy.  Lauren, fresh in from a shift with Hannah and exhausted from doing yeoman duty on both coasts.  Devin, apparently still unsettled by weddings—or like the rest of them, unsettled by the odd sight of Marcus Buchanan entirely happy.

So far, they’d been unable to convince the groom that he was supposed to be a jittery, irrational mess.  The man had been positively jovial, which was disturbing the witchy order of things.

Music wafted out over the airwaves.  Kevin, sitting in an out-of-the-way corner of Moira’s garden, unaware of the magical amplification of his music. 

The bride would approve.

Nat’s arm slid into his.  Jamie smiled down at his wife.  “They let you off flute-playing duties?”

“Shay’s taking over.”

Much to everyone’s delight, his niece’s baby flute skills had morphed into real talent over the last six months.  Jamie looked around for her sisters.  More often lately, the triplets could be found separately.  Finding their own ways.

He smiled Devin’s direction.  Sometimes those ways merged again.  Something important had gotten better when Dev moved back to town.

Nat squeezed his hand, as always, aware of his moods.

For a witch with precog, weddings came with an extra dose of zing.  Major life events seemed to trigger the visions. 

He shrugged off the chalkboard that wouldn’t quit.  Precog usually ignored him 360 days of the year, and it could damn well add today to the list.

A disturbance in the force divided the crowd to his left.  Sean and Lizzie made their way to the front, eye patches and swords firmly in place.

Nat grinned.  “What’s a wedding without a pirate or two?”

Jamie chuckled.  If that was the biggest excitement of the day, this was going to be one very staid and boring witch wedding.

He highly doubted it.

-o0o-

Quiet had already become strange.

Hannah sat on the couch in Caro’s very comfortable townhome and contemplated just how quickly ordinary life had begun to feel… normal.

Already, her soul chafed against today’s restrictions.

They were necessary ones.  Witch Central had vacated, headed for a wedding of one of their own in the far reaches of Canada.  No mind witches in residence with enough power to hold her renegade magic in check, so she was in voluntary lockdown.

In a very cozy, very lovely home—but still lockdown.  Nova Scotia felt as far away as Jupiter.

Her feet began to wander aimless figure eights around the furniture—something she’d done in her spartan bedroom at Chrysalis House to while away the time.  The vestigial remnants of a life spent keeping terminal boredom at bay.  She’d always thought of it as weaving with her feet.

Her lap loom sat in the corner, accusing, a pile of bright cottons by its side.  A fine plan to get through the day—until she’d found herself entirely rebelling against solitude.

She’d expected to be afraid, cowering in the relative safety of a boarded-up house while her protectors were away.  Instead, her soul was a tiger pacing the walls of captivity.  Looking for a way out.

Defiant, she cracked the front blinds.  Angled up so no one could see in—but she could at least see the sun. 

The divided rays of light on her face only made the prison feeling more real.  It was going to be a very long day.

-o0o-

Such a beautiful energy gathered here in this place.  Moira soaked it in, enchanted.

Witchdom, deeply enjoying a family so deserving of the happiness pouring into their lives.  Cassidy, content to finally let her traveling feet rest, had been absorbed into the fabric of life in Fisher’s Cove without so much as a hiccup—and oh, the music she had brought with her.

The small fishing village by the sea danced now.

Marcus had returned home from Cassidy’s final tour a man who smiled.  One who sang under his breath and picked random flowers for his daughter’s hair—or anyone else’s in the near vicinity.  Moira had a lovely pickerel weed tucked into her keepsake book from just such a happening.

He touched, he laughed, he gave with a generosity she’d always known but never expected to see comfortable in the light of day.  A man who lived in the sunshine now.

And the wee girl walking up the makeshift garden path between the two of them basked in all the light.

Moira smiled through her tears, honoring the power of the tiny babe who had managed to craft herself a family from the clay of a grumpy old bachelor and a lifelong traveling musician.  Unlikely materials, those.

Tears and laughter followed the trio making their way to the center of the gathering.  Cass glowed, as a bride should, and Morgan enchanted all the wedding guests still breathing.