Nell really was a dangerous witch. “And what have you decided?”
Half of Aervyn’s head reappeared from behind a beer mug of milk-the cottage drinking glass collection was still a little sparse. “I don’t know yet. She’s kind of annoying, and she cries a lot and doesn’t pay very good attention when I show her magic tricks.” He grinned. “But she likes it when I port her places.”
Marcus felt his grumpy old adult neurons firing. “Is that safe?” Kenna was only a few months old-that seemed a little young for magical joyrides.
“Uncle Jamie said it’s smarter than leaving her to her own devices.” Aervyn’s forehead wrinkled. “But I don’t think Kenna has any devices yet-she chewed on Auntie Nat’s iPhone once, but Gramma Retha made her give it back.” He winced. “She yelled really loud. Kenna, I mean-not Gramma Retha.”
Marcus had reason to know Retha had excellent lungs too, but he was more interested in the tidbit that babies liked iPhones. Good to know.
“If you wanna try it…” his cookie-monster companion leaned in and whispered, “Uncle Jamie says it’s a really good idea to put a waterproofing spell on the phone first.”
Baby drool on his precious electronics. Gods-had he really fallen that far? “Morgan won’t be staying long. We need to find out where she really belongs.”
“She belongs with you.” Said with the calm conviction of a witchling used to believing his elders. “Aunt Moira says so, and she’s never wrong about babies.”
Maybe not-but she was wrong about one grown man. They all were. Even if Morgan was Evan-sent, he could hardly keep a baby.
“Sure you can.” Aervyn, blithely mindreading, offered milk-soaked cookie crumbs to the suddenly friendly cat. “Mama says you have a really hard head, but it’s not totally stupid.” He grinned. “Well, she used a different word, but her head said ‘stupid.’”
Marcus could only imagine-Nell’s opinion of him had never been very high. However, she sent him cookies and company, and both managed to squirm into his heart on far too regular a basis.
Aervyn hopped off his stool and crawled into Marcus’s lap. “So, were you really mean?”
Marcus rested his chin on a curly head. “I guess I was.”
It did strange things to his heart when the easy love that always flowed from Aervyn’s mind didn’t waver. “You can have that last cookie, then. It will help you to be sweeter when Morgan wakes up.”
For just a moment, Marcus wished he lived in a world where things could be that simple.
Sophie scooped up the last of the jars from the table. Herbs and lids back to being properly matched-and Lizzie had gotten some nice practice identifying plants in their dried, crumbly forms.
It was more fun when they were green and could be tempted to grow a pretty flower-but any Fisher’s Cove healer who couldn’t tell the difference between feverfew and lady’s mantle from just a careful whiff would likely end up locked in Moira’s kitchen until they could.
Lizzie had been smart enough to focus on herbal crumbles.
She looked up from the table, the last mysterious sample still rolling in her fingers. “Lady’s mantle? It doesn’t smell like that, really-more like moldy chamomile, but it vibrates like lady’s mantle. Maybe a little slower, though.”
It had taken Sophie ten years of hard practice to pick up plant vibrations. Lizzie and Ginia both did it with ease. Nothing like a couple of witchlings to keep you humble. “Those are good clues. It’s tricky when your fingers and your nose are telling you something different. Your job is to figure out which one to trust.”
Her pupil frowned. “Can I taste it?”
Always an alternative fraught with risk. “What do you think?”
“Well, if it’s feverfew, then tasting it would be fine. But if it’s lady’s mantle, then it will taste like oyster poo and make me burp for three days.”
Sophie hid a grin-oyster poo was a particularly apt description. “Well, if you had a patient to dose and you weren’t sure if you had the right herb, what would you do?”
“Protect the patient.” The answer came quickly-healer ethics weren’t Lizzie’s problem. “So I guess I’d have to taste it. Or give some to Sean, because he deserves three days of burps.”
Well, maybe her trainee’s ethics still had the occasional hiccup. “What did he do now?” There was always something-Sean breathed trouble.
“He said only girls have babies, so it must be really easy.” Lizzie’s eyes held mutiny now. “I told him that boys would be too scaredy to push out a baby. Except for maybe Uncle Aaron-he’s really brave.”
Aaron had earned a ton of respect during the twins’ birth. Little Aislin had arrived weak and blue and he’d willed life into her, one slow breath at a time.
It had taken Sophie a week to help Lizzie understand why none of the healers in the room had intervened. What any of them could have done with one finger had taken every ounce of Aaron’s love and will-and that had been the right choice.
Learning when not to use magic was one of the harder lessons of being a witch.
“One day Sean will learn how wrong he is.” Sophie bent down to kiss Lizzie’s head-and made a mental note to have a chat with their misguided troublemaker. “And being a daddy isn’t an easy job either.” She touched the mystery herb-gently. She didn’t want burps. “Do you have it figured out yet?”
“It’s lady’s mantle.” Lizzie sounded more definite now. “Ginia said feverfew feels slimy if you listen to it for long enough. This one’s not slimy.” She looked entirely relieved to have avoided oyster poo.
Sophie was duly impressed-it was an old jar, and crumbled well beyond visual recognition. “It’s time to replace it anyhow. We can do some moon harvesting-tomorrow night’s the right timing.”
Staying up late was still a serious treat for a six-year-old girl. Freed from lessons, she hopped around like a dizzy ping-pong ball. “Can Ginia come?”
Lizzie, an only child, adored her fellow healer trainee. Sophie blessed the technology that let two girls on opposite sides of the continent gather at will. Healing was often a very lonely craft. “Of course. We’ll do a moon circle first.”
“I’ll go tell Gran.” Small feet dashed for the door and then skidded to a halt. Lizzie turned, face scrunched up. “So, is Uncle Marcus Morgan’s mommy now?”
Almost a year back in Fisher’s Cove, and Sophie still wasn’t used to the lightning changes in topic that came with being six. “He’s taking care of Morgan for a while.”
“Like a mommy.” Lizzie’s eyes brightened.
Apparently Sean wasn’t the only witchling with some gender prejudices. “Aaron and Mike both take care of babies. It’s not just a mommy’s job.”
“They’re daddies.” Lizzie shrugged and turned to leave. “That’s just a fancy name for a mommy with more ear hairs.”
Sophie shook her head in the direction of the now-empty doorway and chuckled. She’d learned not to argue with six-year-old logic. Especially when ear hairs were involved.
He was not losing a staring contest with a baby. Marcus glared and tried to add reason to his cause. “You need to sleep, girl-child. You might think you can out-cranky me, but it’s not true, I promise you.”
Eyes that belonged in Moira’s garden stared at him-and looked not remotely sleepy. “At your age, you’re supposed to take at least three naps a day.” Or so the Google had assured him. “The afternoon’s half gone and you haven’t slept a wink in hours.”
He eyed his easy chair wistfully. Once upon a time, he’d actually been able to sit down when his legs got wobbly and tired. And his arms had lost all feeling several hours ago.
Dammit, he was not a whiny witch. And this negotiating and coddling of small creatures was getting ridiculous. Marcus straightened up and glared at the baby in his arms. “Morgan of Mystery, it is damn well time for you to go to sleep.”