Laced With Magic (23 page)
I had to get back to the lake. I wanted to stand in the same spot where I’d been standing two hours ago when I saw Steffie trapped in that hideous cage. Maybe without Chloe and Luke and all their baggage, I would be able to talk to that Isadora, mother to mother. She had lost her sons. She knew how it felt to grieve for a child. I would open my heart to her. I’d hold nothing back.
Anything Isadora wanted.
Anything
. She could have it. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for my child.
Anything
. She could have it. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for my child.
But wouldn’t she know that already? She had magical powers. She was some kind of wizard. She should know I was on whichever side was best for my baby girl.
“That’s not how it works.”
I jumped at the sound of a high-pitched woman’s voice.
“Over here,” the voice said.
I turned to my right. “Where are you?”
“You’re looking at me.”
And suddenly I was. She was about my height, twice my weight, and impossibly rosy-cheeked. “You realize you’re going about this all wrong.”
“Have we met?” I asked. “You look familiar.”
“You remember! I’m so pleased. I was with you at the town hall last night when you passed out.” Her eyes were the deep brown of strong coffee. So dark I couldn’t differentiate pupil from iris.
“I didn’t pass out,” I said. “Luke said I passed out but I know I walked into a wall.”
“You’re half right,” she said. “It wasn’t a wall. It was Isadora’s force field. No point pretending. You know everything now.”
She had a crazy-wide smile. Lots of big white teeth. Really big white teeth. Especially those incisors.
“Oh God.” I jumped back a step, unable to tear my eyes away from those teeth.
“You humans,” she said with a merry laugh. “How many times have I told Luke we don’t feed that way anymore? This is the twenty-first century. Why shackle ourselves to messy, archaic methods when modern science is at our disposal?”
I assumed it was a rhetorical question. At least I hoped it was because I was too shocked to speak. I mean, what do you say to a short, fat vampire with a bad perm and press-on nails?
“We know all about what happened tonight,” she said, linking her plump arm through mine. Those eyes! I couldn’t look away. “Someone should have taught Isadora some manners. I always said half of our troubles could have been avoided if she understood the difference between honey and vinegar.”
I finally found my voice. “Um, who are you exactly?”
Again that helium-enhanced laugh. “Oh, honey, didn’t I introduce myself? I’m Midge Stallworth and I’m the answer to your prayers.”
18
We barely had time to put our clothes back on before the first blue flame message flared to life.
Nothing like a hologram of your lover’s best friend in her bathrobe and bunny slippers to quench the afterglow.
“Fair warning,” Janice’s image said. “Half the village is on the way over. They want to show their support.”
I looked over at Chloe, who was finger-combing her hair. “Can they see us when we—?”
She shivered visibly. “I try not to think about that.”
I replayed the last ten minutes and almost singed my brain. “I figured there was some kind of spell to keep them out.”
“And there used to be a spell that kept you from seeing blue flame messages,” she reminded me. “Things are changing around here.”
“Some things won’t,” I said. “We’re in this together.”
She wasn’t the kind of woman who cried easily. Seeing her eyes well up with tears hit me hard. “You wouldn’t be in this at all if you hadn’t decided to stay here with me.”
“No magic spells,” I reminded her. “It was my choice to stay.”
“You didn’t know what you were getting yourself into. You didn’t know your daughter’s spirit would be involved.”
“You didn’t know either.”
“The thought probes,” she said, shaking her head. “I must have missed one.”
“Thought probes? What the hell is a thought probe?”
She looked extremely uncomfortable as she explained the small missile-shaped objects that copied both memory and emotion and added the components to mystical data banks the Pentagon would envy.
“You’re telling me my memories are being stored someplace?”
“I’m not sure,” she said uneasily. “Maybe not. I wove a pretty good spell around you to—”
“You put a spell on me?”
“Think of it like a flu shot. Just a little extra protection.”
“What else aren’t you telling me?”
“You know as much as I do now.”
I wasn’t sure I believed her. Not because she was a liar but because even Chloe didn’t know the depth of her knowledge.
Or her powers, for that matter.
“I know what you’re thinking.”
I met her eyes. “I thought you weren’t psychic.”
She forced a smile. “You’re thinking you never should have left Boston.”
“That’s not what I’m thinking.”
“But you’ve thought it before.”
I wouldn’t lie to her. “A time or two.”
“I’ll understand if you want to leave when this is over.”
I tried to find the right words but there weren’t any. I loved her. I wanted to see where that love would lead us. But there was little doubt I was done with Sugar Maple.
CHLOEIt was the middle of the night and my living room was filled with friends who had all converged on my cottage to tell Luke and me they were standing with us no matter what Isadora threw our way. Janice and her entire family. Lynette and her daughters, sadly without Cyrus and the boys, who were leaning in Isadora’s direction. Paul Griggs and his sons. Lilith from the library and, to my surprise, her husband, Archie, as well. The entire crew from Fully Caffeinated.
I tried to be grateful for those who were there and not worry about the ones who were missing.
Or the fact that Luke and I hadn’t exchanged a word in more than two hours.
“What’s wrong?” Janice demanded as we retreated to the kitchen to brew another pot of tea. “Did you two have a fight?”
“I’m not sure,” I said. “One second we were fine and the next we weren’t.”
“Oh, honey.” Janice looked genuinely distressed. “You know I think he’s all wrong for you but I was hoping it would work out.”
“Maybe it will.” Lynette joined us in the kitchen. She was still half-feathered but was quickly assuming her usual form. “Most humans would have run for the hills after what Isadora did tonight.”
“
I
wanted to run for the hills,” I said with a small laugh, “and I’m only half-human.”
I
wanted to run for the hills,” I said with a small laugh, “and I’m only half-human.”
“See?” Lynette sounded triumphant. “That’s exactly what I’m saying. He’s staying because of you.”
“Or his daughter.” Janice was the official glass-half-empty part of our equation. “He’s not going to leave his child in Isadora’s clutches. That’s not how he’s made.”
I tried to stifle my sigh but failed. “He says he’s not even sure that was really Steffie’s spirit.”
“What does he need?” Janice shot back. “DNA proof? The ex knew.”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to know,” Lynette offered as the last of her brilliant yellow canary plumage disappeared. “Men don’t like not being in control. If he doesn’t know for sure it’s his daughter, he can’t blame himself for failing her.”
“He hasn’t failed,” I snapped at one of my dearest friends. “This isn’t over.”
“Not yet,” Janice said, “but the clock’s ticking.”
Isadora had charmed the clock that hung over the Playhouse so that it glowed deep purple, casting an ominous reminder of her power over the entire town.
“My great-great-grandmother told me about this when I was a little girl,” Lynette said. “She said one day a Fae leader would find a way to punch holes in the Hobbs shield and take control.”
Janice rolled her eyes. “I thought you stopped smoking those strange herbs of yours.”
“I don’t smoke anything,” Lynette said, clearly offended, “and you know it, Janice Meany. Granny was there when the separation happened. She told us all about it. It was only a matter of time.”
“Separation?” I asked.
“The war between Aerynn and Isadora’s ancestor Da’elle.”
“It wasn’t really a war,” Lynette said. “I mean, they didn’t have soldiers or anything.”
“The hell they didn’t,” Janice said. “Half the villagers supported Aerynn’s view of Sugar Maple’s future in the world they already knew. The other half would have given their lives in support of Da’elle’s plan to pull the town through the mist, where they would be safe from human predation.” She flashed me a look. “Guess who won.”
“I can’t believe Sorcha never told me about this.”
“I can’t believe you didn’t learn it in grade school along with the rest of us,” Lynette said with a shake of her head. “It’s basic Sugar Maple history.”
“You know how everyone always coddled Chloe when she was growing up,” Janice said without malice. “They probably figured she already had enough on her plate, what with being born without magick. Aerynn’s a tough act to follow.”
“All this time I thought it was something between my mother and Isadora and here it’s been going on between our families from the very beginning.” Who knew?
“The Fae have long memories,” Lynette said. “They’ll wait for centuries if necessary to achieve their goal.”
“But we’ve lived in harmony with the Fae for over three hundred years now. It was only when my mother and Isadora clashed—”
“When your father entered the picture, things began to change and Isadora saw an opportunity to strike.”
I fell silent as the puzzle pieces snapped into place. “And now there’s Luke.” Another human living intimately with a descendant of Aerynn.
Lynette looked down at her hands. “I didn’t want to be the one to say it.”
“I’ll say it,” Janice piped up. “You know what they did to witches at Salem. The fear of humans is ingrained in the New England Fae. It will never go away.”
I nodded. Everyone in Sugar Maple knew. We had been founded as a sanctuary for women and men who’d escaped persecution at the hands of a town gone mad. The Fae had been tortured almost to extinction by humans. The enmity ran deep and wide.
“How did Aerynn defeat Da’elle?” I asked. “Were her powers that much greater?”
“No,” Lynette said. “Her resolve was and that made all the difference.”
“No offense,” Janice said, “but sometimes I think you’re afraid of your magick.”
“That’s a ridiculous thing to say. I welcomed my magick. I waited all my life for my powers to come in.”
When I needed it most, I had summoned up the strength to do what I had to do to vanquish my enemies, even though it meant losing my dearest friend in the process. I had used my father’s mortal resolve and my mother’s magick to make it happen. Those didn’t sound like the actions of a woman who was afraid of anything.
“That’s all swell,” Janice said, clearly unimpressed, “but until you decide who you really are, you’ll never come into your full gifts.”
“No disrespect meant, sweetie, but if you’d been more comfortable with your powers, the ex never would have happened.”
“Don’t go blaming the ex on me,” I shot back. “I didn’t summon her to Sugar Maple. I didn’t even know her name until she showed up at the meeting.”
“So why is she still here?”
“Come on, Jan. It was the middle of the night. You saw her. The woman was a mess. What did you want me to do, toss her out or ask her to sleep on the porch?” Not that both ideas hadn’t occurred to me.
“Janice has a point,” Lynette said. “You have magick. More magick than you’ve allowed yourself to realize. You could have settled this whole thing in the first thirty seconds if you weren’t so worried about what your human would think.”
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