Page 31 of Postpartum Spells & Infant Hells

Astrid planted her boots wide in the muck and squared up to the old woman like she meant to take root there. "I'll clear this field for you, Pleiades, and I'll hold your fire line till my hands blister. What I will not do is put my back to this one. She works where I can watch her, or she lays no ward at all while I'm standing on your ground. I buried a friend who trusted her word once. I've no intention of digging a second hole."

Morrigan's mouth curved, unbothered as a cat in a sunbeam. "You'll find I do my finest work with eyes on me. It keeps a person honest, or as near to it as I ever get." She leaned both hands on the head of her cane, perfectly content to be hated by everyone in the yard. "Watch all you like, Norway. I've been watched by worse than you. I outlived every single one of them."

I'd half opened my mouth to wedge myself between them when Tarja's voice slid into my mind. “Don't look at me. Keep your eyes on her and listen.” The cat hadn't so much as twitched on her rail, but I felt the whole weight of her attention pinned on Morrigan.

“When Astrid spoke just now, every one of us turned to look at her without thinking. Morrigan turned too, but she moved a beat too late. It happens every time as if she's watching how the rest of us react and copying it a moment later. Living people don't lag like that, Phoebe. Whatever's wearing that face isn't quite alive. And it's working to keep up with us.”

The cold seeping up through my boots had nothing on the chill that walked up my spine and stopped my heart. I made myself hold Morrigan's gaze and keep my face flat the same way I'd schooled it over dying patients’ beds for twenty years. The last thing I wanted was for her to know I was aware that something was off with her.

"You'll help with the wards from the center of the circle, where every one of us can see your hands." I decided, though I wondered if she could really help at all. I didn’t trust her as far as I could throw her. I prayed this didn’t blow up in my face.

CHAPTER 12

The field had emptied hours ago, but the cold from Tarja’s observation about Morrigan hadn't abated. Now, I was lying in the dark, counting the strangers asleep under my roof instead of counting sheep. Five of them had crossed my wards by dusk. And the one I trusted least had taken the guest room at the end of the hall.

Aidon's arm was a warm weight across my waist. The slow drag of his breathing told me he'd quit on sleep about the same time I had. "You're going to wear a hole clean through that ceiling with your eyes, Queenie." His voice rumbled against my shoulder blade, rough and unhurried.

"Talk to me about whatever you're gnawing on, and I'll chew it with you. You know two sets of teeth will finish it faster than me lying here listening to you grind yours down to powder," he teased as he poked my side.

"There are a lot of things. Aside from the fact that we can’t trust Morrigan, I keep thinking about how fast Brenna found that cold spot." I rolled to face him and found his eyes on me. "Wilhelm said an easy door means a crowded room waits behind it. I believe him. That ground felt packed wall to wall. Then we allowed a woman we should have caged into our house. And I did it with a smile on my face!"

"Think of it this way. You walked an answer through the door. It just happens to come with a problem." His thumb moved once along my hip, grounding me the way it always managed to. "You've handed her no trust, so quit flaying yourself. You aren’t the only one under this roof thinking past tomorrow. We all are. We have to."

I would have argued the point purely to give my mind something else to do, but an alarm trickled down my spine. “The babies!” I gasped.

Our room was large, and we’d put the cribs in the closet, which was close to the door. I was on my feet before I'd decided to stand. Horror washed over me when I reached the opening. Morrigan stood over Melaina's crib with one gloved hand hovering an inch above my daughter's chest. A strand of silver light pulsed between her fingertips and Melaina. It was guttering, getting darker every time the baby exhaled.

"Step away from her right fucking now. And I might let you die quickly!" My magic surged hot under my palms, but I had nowhere safe to send it with my children so close. Aidon joined me. His anger was so hot it made my witch fire burst out, coating my hands.

"You aren't going to live through the night," Aidon informed her brutally.

"I was thickening the ward your mother set this morning." Morrigan lowered her hand and faced us without one flicker of guilt. "Mollie does fine work, but she left a thin spot which allows someone access to her heart. That is the first place they come hunting. I'd have mentioned it and spared us the dramatics, but no one would have believed me."

Tarja poured through the doorway with a growl that never once broke. Her fur was ridged from skull to tail. "She is lying to your face, and she is bold enough to think she can make a believer of you," my familiar warned into my mind. "I have watched your mother ward the babies and this closet a dozen times. Her work has never once carried the taste of turned grave dirt the way that thread does."

Aidon growled, telling me she had told us both. The room dropped another degree as his shadows climbed up under his skin. "I don’t believe you. My daughter's fear came down our bond like a hand closing around my throat. And I walk in to find the one guest we cannot trust, bent over her crib in the dark."

His eyes darkened until they were almost black. "You will tell us the truth of your own free will. Or I will reach into your mind and take it. I give you my word that you'll find the second method unpleasant."

“There is no need to threaten me.” Morrigan's chin came up, and the calm cracked just enough to show the iron holding it together. "It is a thread to follow her by. When that thing hauls a child through a breach, it knits shut inside a heartbeat and leaves the mother screaming at empty bedding. My thread would hang onto them on the far side long enough for Phoebe to chase your baby into the dark. She’d have a prayer of finding them and bringing them home. I have buried seven women who walked into that dark with no string at all. I'll not make your mate the eighth just to spare your pride a bruise."

I stepped between her and the crib, and the fire climbed to my wrists. "You don't get to weigh our pride against our children while your magic is still lit up over her chest. Take it off her. Every last thread of it. I have stopped believing one word you say."

She drew back slowly and looked from Aidon to me. Realizing she was outgunned, she began reversing the flow until the silver lifted from Melaina's chest like a hair pulled from milk. Finally, it died in her gloved palm with a smell of cold stone and old lavender. My daughter sighed, turned her cheek into the mattress, and slept on. I scanned her myself, the way Clio had taught me before I let a single breath go. Then I checked the other two.

Aidon's hand settled against the back of my neck. Through our bond, I felt him running the same frantic scan I was, measuring Melaina to be certain she'd come through whole before going to the other two.

“You are walking on thin ice,” I warned Morrigan. “Do something like this again, and I won’t bother stopping Aidon from killing you.”

“I would leave this room while you're still alive,” Tarja warned. The way Morrigan flinched and looked at my familiar before leaving was highly satisfying.

“We’re bringing them to bed with us,” I told Aidon as I bent and picked up Melaina and shifted her to the crook of my right arm.

“We need to get the wards from her and get her the hell out of our house,” Aidon informed me as he picked up Thaniel and deposited him into my free arm. His noise of protest died as he began rooting for my breast.

Aidon picked up Nyssa, and we returned to our bed. I nursed Thaniel and then Melaina, and Nyssa while Aidon burped and changed them. Neither of us slept as we kept watch over our precious bundles of joy.

By the time the sun cleared the dripping trees and we made our way downstairs, my kitchen had filled with travel-creased witches all pretending the coffee was the only reason any of them had come downstairs so early. Astrid reached me first, steering me a half step toward the pantry with a grip that allowed no debate.