Page 34 of Postpartum Spells & Infant Hells

Nina caught everything I was thinking. Of course, she had. She'd been reading this family since she was six and learned my moods faster than she learned to braid her own hair. She straightened and lifted her chin at the whole nervous lot of us. "Don’t even bother. I want to do this," she announced, holding my eyes instead of dropping them. "Everyone can stop circling me like I'm some breakable heirloom you're afraid to dust and tell me what to do."

Aidon made a sound low in his chest. "I want you to stand behind me, well clear of that bridge, while the grown people in this room find another solution," he ordered with enough of a growl in his voice that Thaniel jerked awake against Mom’s shoulder and started to whimper. "I will not trade one of my children to save the others. Not for any reason."

In an impressive feat, Nina’s expression softened and hardened at the same time. "You claimed me as yours when you didn't have to, and I love you for that. It means the world to me that you’ve never treated the triplets like they matter more. Don't go making me less yours now that the job's gotten teeth. Your daughter would be able to handle this."

That struck exactly where she'd aimed it. Aidon's jaw flexed, and his power pulled back. I crossed the floor to her before anyone could rush in and fill the silence with the wrong thing.

I cupped her cheek in my free hand. "You think Aidon and I were circling you because we doubt you, but you've got it backward," I told her. My voice came out rougher than I'd meant it to. "We’re terrified, sweetheart. The second your magic gets involved, it could paint a target on your back. It will let Kaltherax feel your power. A creature like him covets someone like you. We don’t want him coming after you instead."

Nina leaned into my palm, and for the space of a single breath, she was the little girl who'd once crawled into my lap after a nightmare and insisted, fiercely, that she was only there because I'd looked lonely. "I understand enough to be scared too," she admitted as her gaze flicked around the room and over her siblings. "And I understand that being scared doesn't matter when they're the ones who need me. They’re my sisters and brother, and they’re just babies."

“Mollie and I will muddle the spell so neither of your signatures is so obvious,” Nana announced. “Now, let’s get to work. We don’t have much time.”

Everyone agreed and hopped up. By the time the sun sagged low and bloody behind the tree line, the backyard was a maze of various magical threads. Nina and I had glamoured the nursery. Hades had sent four Underworld scholars who looked as though they'd been carved out of old library shelves and funeral smoke. Morrigan had spent the entire afternoon under enough supervision to make a prison warden weep with professional envy.

Bone ash and moonstone dust marked the grass in long, interlocking paths. She’d told us what needed to be said, and after much careful consideration and debate with the scholars, I recited it with her. Nana had joined in. She said it was to share the burden, but I knew she didn’t want the target squarely on my back.

Stella stood nearby, ready to help. She and Mom had overseen everything and watched Morrigan like a hawk to make sure she didn’t make a move from what she had previously outlined. Knowing they would notice if she stepped out of line allowed me to focus on what needed to be done. With the last ward line laid down, the only thing left to do was open the road.

"The other families are holding their babies and waiting on us," Stella reported, glancing up from the laptop Jean-Marc had angled toward her. "The mother in Tucson threatened to throw her little water elemental in the car and drive up here until I reminded her that she needed to be smart for her baby and stay there. The parents in Reno and Quebec have gathered their families and swords. They’re waiting for an update. And the family in Saskatchewan bought protective charms from their local coven. They also swear their boy hasn't spiked a fever once since the sun came up."

"I like a lot of them," Nana declared from her post beside the triple-warded carriers, where she'd planted herself with the shotgun across her knees and a vial of potion bulging in her apron pocket. "Folks who fuss or ask questions or gather weapons before a fight tend to outlast the ones who go quiet and noble. Noble just earns you a headstone with a pretty quote carved on it."

Mom crouched over the carriers and tested the straps, cinching the triplets in. Her hands moved with the unhurried calm that had always made me feel better. "They're sealed under plenty of layers. Nothing is getting to them," she told me, pressing a kiss to each downy head before she straightened. "If the worst should happen, Mythia and I will take them through the pantry into the pocket room Hades made.”

My head snapped around at that. “What did you just say? When did this happen? I demanded.” My gaze narrowed on my mate, who was looking out the window.

“He did it after bringing his scholars. I didn’t tell you because it’s smart. We need to know the babies will absolutely be safe. And don’t worry, no one can stumble into the room without the activation charm and right chant,” Aidon explained. “I won’t be sharing that until we are alone.”

“I forgot you didn’t know about that.” Mom had the presence to look abashed. “Now that you do, rest assured, Nana will buy us the seconds we need to get to the pantry."

Mythia hovered at the carrier's edge. Her wings stirred the moonstone dust until Therion, one of Hades’ scholars, hissed at her to hold still. "Nothing will get to them, Phoebe. We’ll make sure of it," she vowed, both small hands wrapped white-knuckled around the charm at her chest. "If it comes down to it, I'll bite Kaltherax myself, and I'll aim for somewhere that makes him regret ever crossing our paths."

Aidon huffed a rough laugh. His shadows were pooling dark around his boots. "I'll pin it down and let you have first bite," he quipped then extended his arms. "Come here, Queenie. Before the scholars start chanting, and I lose my last chance to beg you to reconsider."

I crossed to him and let him fold me in, even as the life anchor warmed beneath my feet. "You already know my answer, so ask me for something I can actually give you." I flattened my palm over the slow beat of his heart.

Aidon dropped his forehead to mine. His breath was warm against my mouth. "You know I had to try." His hands tightened at my waist hard enough to bruise. "I can't lose you. Promise nothing will happen to you," he demanded.

"If it’s in my power, that will never happen," I promised him. Though my attempt at a smile faltered, and his eyes went dark.

He brushed his mouth against my temple and stepped back into the death anchor. "I love you," he told me as his shadows climbed his forearms. "You’re my everything."

The four scholars had been huddling together all afternoon, but the second Aidon settled into the death anchor, they unfolded and went to work as if they'd done this a hundred times in a hundred different places. Asphodos took the center first. He was the eldest of them. He was all dust and patience. He raised the black stone bowl in both spotted hands as though it weighed more than the night itself.

"We open on my cue, Pleiades. Not one breath before it," Asphodos instructed. "When the bridge catches, you need to hold it. Do not chase after anything. The dead will come to you. Or they won’t come at all."

"Understood," I returned, planting both feet on the life anchor while my pulse tried to outrun my thoughts.

Therion Vael dropped into a crouch on the death side without waiting to be asked. He scored the last lines into the wet ground with the flat of a black blade. Every cut he made was exact and unhurried. He sealed it with a word I didn't know before he slid to the next. "The death gate is prepared," he reported to Aidon. "Keep your shadows behind the line, son of Hades. If they spill over before she's anchored, the gap will take them as payment."

Lethea Mourne, another of Hades’ scholars, paced the far edge of the circle with her head bowed. She murmured in a language that lifted the hair along my arms. She was the only woman among them, and she spoke to the dark the way Mom spoke to the babies at three in the morning. Her voice was low, certain, and endlessly kind. "They're frightened, and they've earned the right to be," she explained as she pressed one palm flat above the seam. "They've waited a very long time for someone to help them. I'm telling them the road is real this time."

Mnemar, the last of Hades’ scholars, was sharp-eyed and quick. "Forty-seven souls are held to this ground," he explained without glancing up from the page. "Count them with me, Pleiades. It will not be good if the tally goes wrong by even one."

The word tickled something in my mind. ‘Count them before you trust them.’ I'd been hearing it whispered for weeks. I finally understood what was meant by that. It was written into the bones of the ritual.

Asphodos lowered his chin, and the four began to chant. It was low, rough, and not built to soothe anyone living. The ash lines caught with pale fire under Therion's blade. The moonstone answered in cold blue sparks that smelled of rain on granite. Lethea's murmur threaded through all of it like a lullaby sung over a grave. The air above the center of the circle thinned until a seam of gold light bled through.