A Nomadic Witch (A Modern Witch Series: Book 4) Read online

  “Lauren.” Mike raised an eyebrow. “Nobody filled you in?”

  Apparently not. Witches weren’t always the best communicators at the crack of dawn. “I thought Marcus tried to leave.”

  “Yeah.” Mike added bowls of berries to the tray. “Lauren cracked him over the head with Morgan’s crying and he came back. Or something like that. Sophie was a little vague on the details—Adam was hungry.”

  All this before 4 a.m. Berkeley time. Nell covered a yawn with her hand. Next time they were going to fetch a witch who kept more polite hours. She picked up the tray—time to go find out what the heck had happened.

  The sheer exhaustion in the living room was obvious before she made it halfway down the hall. Nell stepped into the doorway, surveying the wreckage—moms of five were good at that. A pale Sophie lay on the couch, Adam curled in the crook of her arm. Moira looked twenty years older than the last time Nell had seen her, and Lauren turned toward coffee fumes like a woman halfway across the Sahara.

  Yikes.

  Nell dispensed coffee, sugar, and quick hugs, and then took a seat and waited for a roomful of witches to recuperate.

  It was Lauren, gulping coffee along with her Nutella fix, who recovered first. “Hand out enough of these cookies, and I’m pretty sure you could be president.”

  Sophie’s grin was wan, but real. “The world might not live through Aervyn in the White House.”

  Jokes were a sign of witch recovery. “Give me some warning next time, and you can have warm, fresh ones.” A sleepy Jamie had thawed the ones in his freezer before sending them over, but a few had crispy edges—he wasn’t at his best at 4 a.m. either.

  “None of us had any warning.” Moira still sounded like she’d been up a week. “’Twas Sophie who found Marcus leaving in the first light of morning. The rest of us got rather rude awakenings.”

  Nell listened as three voices filled in snippets of the story. And listened harder to what wasn’t said. “Where are Marcus and Morgan now?”

  “Napping.” Sophie was beginning to look more human. “Mike hit them both with a sleep spell, and he’s not very subtle.”

  “So he tried to ditch the baby and leave town, you dragged him back by the ear hairs, and he’s going to wake up with a headache and a baby who can travel snuggled in his arms?”

  Sophie winced. “Yeah.”

  “We don’t know that Morgan can reach the astral plane.” Moira gripped her teacup like a lifeline. “Only that she might.”

  Nell knew the levels of traveler magic—she’d lived in vigilant fear of them for Aervyn’s first three years. Some babies just got cold, touched in passing by the mists. Some floated, still firmly tethered to their bodies. Only a terrifying few stretched that connection to the whisper-thin strand necessary to reach the astral plane. But to a parent holding a cold child in their arms, it was a possibility that caused jibbering terror. Only a few would truly travel—but most of those didn’t come back. Whisper-thin cords broke all too easily.

  And Morgan had gotten cold twice now.

  A quick tug on fire power and Nell pumped more heat into the living room. It wouldn’t help Morgan—but it might help the rest of them clutching coffee and tea, yearning for warmth.

  “Thank you, my dear.” Moira gazed into her tea, an old witch seeking answers to the unknowable.

  Nell stared into the liquid depths of her own cup. The most solitary witch she knew, responsible for a baby with the potential for life-threatening magic. And so many hearts helpless on the sidelines.

  Nell knew her job now. “I’ll get Jamie and Daniel on organizing a standby circle.” They had about twelve hours until dusk. That should be plenty of time—travelers were safe during the day.

  Three witches stared at her, astonished.

  “We’ve enough witches to watch her from here.” Moira cozied her feet under a soft green blanket. “A monitoring spell’s easy enough to set.”

  “The circle’s not for Morgan.” Nell reached for another cookie. “It’s for Marcus.”

  It was Lauren who connected the dots first—quietly. A sense of power for him. And it will give a lot of unhappy witches something to do.

  Yup. Sitting watch would help keep the feelings of impotence at bay. We’ll have enough volunteers for three circles.

  The light slowly dawned in Sophie’s eyes. “He needs to know we’re there for him. Ready.”

  Nell nodded. “Yes. Ready, but not too close. We’ll use Realm—give him some panic buttons to push.” A circle in waiting, a finger tap away.

  “You’ve such wisdom in you, my dear.” Moira’s eyes finally had some of her usual zip in them. “And enough Irish canniness to make my gran proud.”

  “Are you calling me a sneaky witch?” Nell grinned—she’d learned from the best. “I figure he won’t tolerate the usual variety of witch invasion. So we’ll use the back door.” The witches who loved him needed one.

  And even if the world’s crankiest witch didn’t realize it, he needed one too. Nell knew what it was to fear the magic running through your baby’s veins.

  You needed love at your back.

  Chapter 10

  Something tickled.

  Marcus swatted at the irritating fly.

  More annoying tingles, this time on the other side. Again, his brain sent the annoyed command to swat. His arm, however, appeared to be missing.

  And his eyes were fused shut.

  A warm hand dropped to his forehead, cheerful words invading his morning. “Sorry, forgot about your eyes. Mike’s sleep spells are kind of strong.” Another tickle, stronger this time, and the owner of the good cheer came into view.

  Marcus growled—he was in no mood for girl healers. “Go away.”

  “Can’t.” Her hands moved quickly now, one hovering over his main channel flows, the other checking the warm, baby-shaped lump draped over his arm. “Somebody needs to make sure you two survive until breakfast.”

  He refused to ask how the baby was doing, but Ginia’s mind seemed unconcerned. And Morgan’s drifted in the light haze of dreaming sleep.

  A state she would probably stay in as long as he was willing to be used as a human pillow. Budge an inch and she’d wail like an opera singer, but the starving monster chewing on his intestines wasn’t going to wait patiently, dammit.

  “Drink this.” A cool glass slid into his right hand. “I have a bottle for when she wakes up, and Aaron’s bringing scones over in a few minutes. If you behave, you can have a blueberry one.”

  Marcus stared at the green goo in disgust. No way in hell he was drinking that. And why did all healers treat him like a toddler? “I’m perfectly fine, and more than capable of making my own breakfast.”

  “Uh, huh.” Ginia’s eyes danced with early-morning humor. “I thought you knew how to launch a decent Realm attack, too. What were you thinking, leaving all your castle guards hanging out in the meadow like that?” She did something sharp to his missing arm and all the feeling flowed back in. “Someone might come along and turn all their swords into flowers or something.”

  Marcus groaned, wondering what he’d done to deserve annoying preteen girls in his life. “I had to leave rather unexpectedly.” Babies had no respect for game play. And apparently, his next visit was going to be spent trying to reverse engineer whatever mischief Warrior Girl had unleashed on his guards.

  Flowers were probably the least of it.

  “Drink the goo. You need it after yesterday.” Ginia touched the frown on his forehead. “I moved them back to your keep.”

  What?

  She shrugged. “Uncle Jamie has to leave Realm all the time when Kenna cries, too, so we have an unofficial rule on level seven now—kind of like a baby time-out.”

  She tapped the glass. Marcus sipped. It wasn’t entirely awful.

  Ginia bent over and picked up a tiny sock off the floor. “Nobody messes with the dads’ stuff until they get back. People don’t all know you have a baby yet, so I moved your guards.”

  H
ecate’s hells. He wasn’t a father, and he didn’t have a baby. She wasn’t staying. “I don’t require any special treatment.” Marcus pulled his arm out and dumped the suddenly protesting Morgan into Ginia’s arms. “I suggest you use that bottle you brought.” He was going to acquire himself some industrial-strength earplugs.

  No crying baby was going to undo his sanity.

  And she wasn’t staying.

  Four-and-a-half feet of fury stuffed a squalling girl-child right back at his chest. “You can have all the bad manners you want, but she’s your baby and you know it.” Ginia’s eyes were a miniature version of her mother’s. “And if you don’t feed her, right now, I’m going to turn every single one of your castle soldiers into poopy pink pigs.”

  Gods. Even Morgan had stopped her wailing in the face of Warrior-Girl-healer wrath. Marcus popped the bottle in the baby’s mouth. That had been a very creative threat, and she’d clearly meant every word.

  He tried very hard not to be amused.

  And even harder not to respond to the small girl radiating simple happiness in his arms.

  ~ ~ ~

  Marcus pulled his cowl closer around his neck. Normally he wasn’t the Realm-skulking type, but people with napping babies who could awaken at any moment needed new strategies.

  No way was he leaving himself open to Warrior Girl rescue again.

  “You seem cheerful this morning.”

  Marcus looked over at his uninvited company and scowled. It was hard to skulk accompanied by a gypsy dressed in flamboyant purple. “Don’t you have a quieter avatar you can use?”

  Jamie grinned and shrugged, turning to show the infant riding in some contraption on his back. “The munchkin likes this one. Apparently all girls come programmed to prefer gaudy colors.”

  Ha. The gypsy costume long predated Jamie’s little girl. “I’m busy.”

  “So I see.” Jamie eyed the spellcubes in Marcus’s hands. “Who are you listening in on?”

  Marcus sighed and tossed the eavesdroppers back in his rucksack. The darned things were easy to build and bloody difficult to deploy, thanks to their highly recognizable spellshape. “No one.”

  The gypsy squinted out into the street, empty except for a quiet little librarian—and grinned. “It’s about time someone started paying attention to him.”

  They watched as Kevin’s primary game avatar walked down the street, touching the walls of each building and muttering. All while reading out of the old book in his hand.

  The old book that radiated magic.

  Marcus frowned. It took a lot of game points to bring magical objects into the highest level. “What’s that thing do?”

  “Dunno.” Jamie shrugged, eyes intently curious. “Never seen it before.”

  Marcus snorted—magical objects didn’t just pop into Realm fully formed. Carefully, he pulled a spellcube back out of his sack. Mysterious happenings tended to be bad for the level’s top-ranked players. No one ever worried about the lowly librarians until it was too late.

  He wondered if Kevin knew he walked in gigantic shoes. The game’s best-ever non-witch player had also preferred a librarian guise.

  “He knows.” Jamie grinned. “He’s easily the game’s best historian. Question is, how many of the people in this level remember The Hacker?”

  Those who didn’t forgot at their peril. “Kevin doesn’t have Daniel’s coding skills.”

  “Nope.” Jamie started the odd dance parents used to soothe fussy babies. Kenna quieted on his back. “But he watches and learns, and he’s dug some very interesting stuff out of the code archives.”

  No one in their right mind ventured into the archives—that was where lines of code went to die, much of it material that had never worked properly in the first place. “Is it safe in there?”

  “Mostly,” said Jamie wryly. “Activating it is a different story, but so far he’s been very careful.”

  Marcus shook his head. “The boy just needs some good coding lessons. No point digging around in the old relics.”

  Jamie snickered. “Don’t let Moira hear you say that.”

  He had due respect for the past, but unlike most of the denizens of Fisher’s Cove, no desire to live there. Then again, his present had gotten rather inhospitable as well. Marcus sighed. So much for a few moments of mindless escape.

  “Sorry.” The gypsy’s eyes were full of purple-hued empathy. “The first few weeks are hard.”

  Weeks? He’d barely made it through two days. “I’m not cut out to care for a child.”

  “None of us really are.” In a move that resembled Houdini exiting a straitjacket, Jamie slid the contraption holding a very sleepy Kenna around to his front and snugged her in to his chest. “And you didn’t get an easy draw.”

  “It appears I have no choice in the matter.” Marcus winced at the whine in his voice.

  “Sure you do.” Jamie’s eyes held something a lot steelier now. “And you already made it. You came back.”

  It had hardly seemed like a choice.

  Jamie brushed at random bricks on the wall. “We have a circle on standby for you, if you need it. The triplets are designing a bat-signal app for your phone.”

  It would probably be pink. Marcus resisted the relief trying to creep into his gut. A circle didn’t always work—the mists had unspeakable power.

  The gypsy stroked his girl-child’s fuzzy head. “Morgan’s safety lies with all of us, Marcus.”

  “It might not be enough.” It could easily not be enough. And thinking that way would only make him crazy. He kicked an errant pebble in the dirt. “I have to go back. She’ll probably be waking up soon.”

  Silence.

  Marcus looked up—and finally figured out what it was in Jamie’s eyes.

  Understanding. And respect.

  ~ ~ ~

  Nell lowered herself into the hammock, smiling as the sides rose up around her. Her own personal cocoon.

  She remembered the day Daniel had strung it for her. Aervyn had been about three months old and porting to random locations in his sleep. While starting fires. She’d been exhausted, running on magical fumes, and terrified for her tiny boy’s safety.

  And then her husband had taken her by the hand, led her out to a quiet corner of the back yard, and tucked her into her very own escape pod. There were few moments in her life when she’d loved him more.

  A hand, bearing brownies, appeared over the edge of the hammock. “Want company?”

  She scootched up to one end—they’d figured out how to get both of them into the escape pod long ago. “You brought chocolate. What broke?” The last time he’d arrived bearing brownies, it had been a follow up to teaching Aervyn the finer points of a knuckleball pitch. The heirloom vase had not been impressed—although as Gramma Retha had pointed out, it had encountered errant baseballs more than once in the past. Being a Sullivan family heirloom was risky business.

  Daniel climbed in and handed over the much bigger brownie. “Nothing that I know of. Lull in the storm. Nathan took Aervyn to the park to climb trees, Mia and Shay are coding, and Ginia’s snoring on the living room couch.”

  None of her children ever napped in their beds. “Did you remind Aervyn not to port the neighborhood kids again?” Not all mothers greeted the sight of their child twenty feet up a tree with equanimity.

  “Yup.” Her husband grinned. “I even did it before I gave him his brownie. Do I get bonus dad points for that?”

  Nell chuckled. “Not enough to make up for feeding him brownies an hour before lunch.”

  “Says the woman who used to exist on Doritos.” Daniel shook his head in mock disbelief. “I know our marriage vows had lots of stuff about sickness and health and getting old, but nowhere in there did it say anything about you getting all responsible and nutritionally concerned on me.”

  She stuck a foot out of the hammock to start them gently swinging. “I’ll give you a pass on the brownies, but I’ve always been responsible.”

  He reached for h
er fingers. “I know.” His eyes held all the reasons why he loved her. “And I’m guessing that a baby girl with purple eyes is bringing back a lot of memories for my very responsible wife.”

  She was. “It’s why I came out here, I guess.”

  “No child arrives with the promise that they’ll always be safe.”

  “I know.” Nell squeezed the hand that had always been there for her. “But with some, the dangers are right in your face.”

  “If we let them be.” Daniel picked brownie crumbs off her belly.

  “Choose life unafraid.” Nell repeated the three words he’d given her the day Aervyn had entered the world in fire and storm. They’d been her lifeline ever since—even on the days fear pummeled her chest and stole her air.

  He nodded. “We do it. Your brother’s doing it.”

  “Nat helps.” Nell offered her last crumbles. “She knows how to breathe through fear better than anyone I know.” Her sister-in-law was one very tough cookie—and she kept Jamie’s feet on rock-solid ground.

  “Kenna’s a lucky kid.” Her husband’s eyes shadowed some. “I wonder what Morgan’s story is. Maybe she wasn’t so lucky.”

  That, they didn’t know—but Nell knew her guy. “A sweetheart with lavender eyes is wrapping you around her little finger, is she?”

  “She looks like our girls. Fuzzy hair and big eyes.” His fingers laced in hers again. “And Marcus looks like he’s been hit by a Mack truck.”

  “Yeah.” And she was still trying to wrap her head around how that had happened. “I hope Evan knows what he’s doing.”

  Daniel just shook his head, amused. “You’re second-guessing a ghost?”

  She grinned. Probably a waste of time—especially when she was curled up in an escape pod with her husband and all five children were otherwise occupied. “Nope. But I am wondering just why you came out here.”

  His chuckle sent familiar need curling in her belly. “Took you long enough to figure that out.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Marcus looked up at the sound of his front door bursting open, wondering who they’d sent to keep tabs on him now. Not that it mattered—a baby who howled if he left the room made it difficult to shower or brush his teeth, much less run for the hills.