by Helen Scott
Pulling the obsidian crystal out of its locked cupboard, she opened the padded box just to make sure it was still safe and sound. When she was satisfied that it was, she put it back, locking the cupboard up tight. The request was strange. Most people, even if they knew about magic, didn’t know about that kind of thing. Going into the back room, she opened one of the journals her granddad had left her. She’d spent months labeling them meticulously so that it didn’t take her forever to find something.
She reread the passage on summoning crystals and was satisfied with her decision to call the customer and advise him that they didn’t have one available. They were only supposed to go to the most trusted customers, ones who knew what they were doing and understood the risks. The man who had left the message definitely did not fall into that category.
Dialing the number he left in the message, she was surprised that he answered.
“Hello?” a gruff male voice sounded on the other end.
“Hi, this is Eilidh from Speak o’ the Devil. I was just calling to let you know that we don’t stock the item you had asked for in your message.”
“Fine, fine. I’m also looking for dragon’s blood and a mandrake root.”
She paused, thinking about their known uses. When she determined that there wasn’t a big enough risk to deny the customer, she said, “We do have those.”
“Can I come by now?”
Ellie felt a little flustered at the pushy question. “I’ll be here for another hour or so.”
He agreed, and they hung up. She prepared his order before going to the back room once more. The next journal she opened was the one she needed to help Aster, or at least, she hoped it would have information in there that could help her friend. She thumbed through the pages until she found what she needed, but as soon as she settled down to read, there was a knock at the door.
She hurried out, and the man who stood in the doorway was well dressed and had a megawatt smile. Unlocking the door, she opened it slightly and asked, “Can I help you?”
“We spoke on the phone about the dragon’s blood and mandrake root?”
“Ye certainly were speedy,” she said with a smile as she opened the door and let him in.
He dipped his head toward her as he entered.
She turned and led him to the counter. Over her shoulder, she said, “I’ve got some prepared for ye already, but I wasnae sure how much ye needed.”
Something brushed her back, and she paused and looked around.
“You had some cobwebs on your back.”
Once she had the counter between them, she felt much better. “Here we are. Three ounces of dragon’s blood and one medium mandrake root.”
“Perfect.”
They finished up their transaction, and she escorted him out. He extended a hand to her.
“Pleasure doing business with you.”
She smiled, enjoying seeing a satisfied customer. His hand clenched around hers, and then something scraped against her finger. She hissed in pain.
“Sorry, this ring. I forget it’s got a sharp edge,” he apologized profusely.
She waved off his concern and locked the door behind him after he left before going to find a bandage she could put on her finger. Settling down with the journals again, she texted Alec that she’d need to be picked up at the store in a while. When he appeared next to her, she couldn’t help but smile. Her soulmate was nothing if not protective.
He gave her a quick kiss and glanced at the journal. “Pregnancy?” His eyes glittered as he whispered the word. Was he excited?
“Not me. Aster.” She gave him a quick rundown of the situation while she tried to wrap her head around the idea that Alec might want kids.
He sat down in a whoosh, and his wide eyes betrayed the same shock that she’d felt when Cin told her. “Don’t tell anyone. I’m just trying to help out with a couple questions. She cannae go to a regular doctor, but she needs to have an exam and whatever else it is that obstetricians do.”
“I might know someone who can help if there’s nothing in MacLeod’s journals.”
“Shockingly, he wasn’t as interested in pregnancy as he was with different species and beings. Five journals on shapeshifters, at least three that I can think of off the top of my head on interacting with different magical beings, a couple on the differences between mages, sorcerers, witches, and enchantresses, and two itty bitty paragraphs on pregnancy.” She huffed, knowing better than to be disappointed, but she was nonetheless.
He’d left all his knowledge, all his belongings, and all the family’s magical abilities to her, not that the last one was his choice, but he didn’t think about the fact that she might fall in love with someone from this crazy new world that he had opened up to her, or that she might want to have kids with that person.
“Come on. Let’s go talk to Nivetta.” Alec stood, extending his hand to her.
As she stood, she almost lost herself in his deep blue eyes. Even now they reminded her of the ocean. She wrapped her arms around him, and he jumped them out.
Ellie opened her eyes when they arrived and was greeted with the lush greenery of a surrounding forest. The crisp, clear air filled her nose, and she took a long, deep breath. She’d expected that they would arrive in an office or a home, not the woodlands.
“Just let me do the talking for now, okay?” Alec said as his eyes darted all around them.
She nodded. Something made him nervous.
He tugged on her hand, and they started off through the trees. Ellie picked her footing carefully, not wanting to trip and take Alec down with her. They followed a very subtle path. If the flowers hadn’t been in bloom, then she wouldn’t have even known it was there.
A small cottage rose before them. The cream walls peeked out through a covering of ivy, and the traditional thatch roof curved gracefully around the small, round windows. When she had mentioned Aster’s pregnancy to Alec, she had expected him to take her to some kind of otherworldly doctor, not a backwoods cottage.
He knocked gently on the small wooden door. A woman appeared from around the other side of the cottage. Thick auburn hair was woven into a braid that hung over her shoulder, while bright blue eyes studied them. Her long brown skirt swirled around her ankles, and Ellie thought she heard the ringing of small bells as Nivetta moved toward them. Combined with her white blouse, it looked like she was about to go to a Renaissance Fair. She carried a woven basket, which held flowers of all different kinds, as well as some vegetables.
“Alec?” the woman exclaimed as she got closer, excitement quickening her movements and giving her eyes a twinkle that wasn’t there a moment ago.
“Hey, Nivetta. Long time no see.” He smiled down at her, wrapping an arm around her in a quick hug while never letting go of Ellie’s hand.
“By the stars! What brings you here?”
“We were hoping that you would be able to help us out.” Moving to the side, he said, “This is my mate, Ellie.”
“Ellie? It’s lovely to meet you.” Nivetta smiled broadly and inclined her head but kept her hands wrapped tightly around the handle of the basket.
She smiled in turn. “You too.”
“Come inside. I’ll make some tea.”
It was music to Ellie’s ears. They followed her into the small cottage, and even Ellie had to duck to get through the door. The area inside was warm and bright. Herbs and flowers hung drying from the ceiling, and small jars lined shelves that ran along the back wall. There was a small bed in one corner, opposite which was a kitchen area. She waved them to a small seating area curved around a large fireplace, the chairs positioned so that they would have their backs to the bed. As they sat, Nivetta poured some water into a kettle and hung it over the fire.
“So, what can I help you with?” she asked, turning to Alec with a somber expression.
“We have a relative who is pregnant, and we are looking for a doctor who would be able to care for her throughout the pregnancy. I’m also hoping that you wou
ld have some way of telling who the child’s father is.”
The woman’s delicate brows shot up at the last part of the request. “The first part is easy. My daughter, Vivienne, can help. She’s a certified midwife, all up-to-date with the world and its new theories and practices, but she’s my daughter, so she does not forget the old ways. Her knowledge will be valuable if either of the parents have any magical abilities that could interfere with the pregnancy. The second part is harder. Why does she not know who the father is?”
“She was experimented on by a group of humans who are against magical beings. We are not sure what the extent of the experiments were.”
A shudder ran through Nivetta. “They can be such horrible beings,” she muttered with a frown on her face.
“So can gods,” Alec chided her gently.
She harrumphed at him and sat back in her chair, tapping her finger on her mouth in thought. “Is she a magical being?”
“Yes,” Alec said with a nod.
“I might be able to make an elixir. Would she know who it was if she saw his face?”
Alec looked at Ellie, and she shrugged. “Probably, but I’m not sure.”
“I see.”
Nivetta stood and began pacing, her skirt swishing around her ankles as she moved up and down in front of the wall of jars. Ellie looked at them for the first time, and now that she was closer, she could see in more detail that they were mostly dried plants and different powders. A pang of grief flowed through her as she thought about her granddad and how much he would have enjoyed talking with Nivetta.
“Yes, we’ll take some of that . . .” Nivetta muttered to herself as she began taking jars down and setting them on the small table in the kitchen.
The kettle began to boil moments later, startling everyone out of their thoughts. A jar almost fell from the woman’s laden arms as she walked back to the table once again, but Alec reached out and caught it before it could shatter on the floor.
“Thank you. Without that, I’m afraid your relative would have had quite a disgusting drink on her hands.” She chuckled to herself as she began taking the herbs from different pots and mixing them together, grinding them in the largest mortar and pestle Ellie had ever seen. She hummed lightly and whispered to herself as she worked. The scene was oddly soothing, and Ellie relaxed back in her chair as the other woman worked.
“Here you are.” She handed Alec a jar that was full of a viscous brown liquid. “Have her drink it at night while the moon is high. She should drink at least half, more if the pregnancy is starting to show.”
“What do we owe you?” Alec asked, an almost wary look in his eye that made Ellie reevaluate the woman she thought was helping them.
“Oh, it’s on the house. This was nothing. Just seeing your face and meeting your lovely mate is enough for an old crone like me.”
“Nivetta, I insist–”
“I won’t hear of it. The young woman has been through enough. Having a child should be a joyous thing, so I hope I provide at least some reassurance where that is concerned.”
Alec thanked Nivetta while Ellie smiled up at the woman, amazed. “Thank you so much!”
“My pleasure,” she said, dipping her head. “Here’s Vivienne’s phone number.”
The idea of a phone number seemed at odds with their surroundings, almost as though they’d gone back in time, so when she brought it up, it was quite jarring. They walked out and followed the path back the way they’d come, before jumping home. The quiet contentment Ellie had felt at the cottage fell away as the realities of life settled back on her shoulders.
Chapter 23
Dem was aggravated. He and Thad had stood in that damn poppy field for hours, trying to summon Morpheus. They’d even tried summoning Hypnos, figuring if they couldn’t get big brother to step in, then maybe Daddy would. Neither of them showed up.
Summoning a god of dreams or sleep apparently didn’t work quite the same as calling for one of the other gods. After failing at the first step to confronting Phobetor, they were back to the drawing board, and that meant they’d gone back to Thad’s. He’d checked in on Aster once more, only to find that she was still asleep and Cin still guarded her like she was Cerberus and her sister was the entrance to the Underworld.
The sea of books that surrounded them only infuriated him even further. He was a puzzle-solver by nature—decoding and pattern recognition were some of his favorite activities—but for the life of him, he couldn’t find a pattern to what was going on around them, or maybe he just couldn’t find a pattern that he liked, one that didn’t make him want to punch a wall in frustration. Every time one of them found an ounce of happiness, it seemed to take them to hell and back before they knew it was real, or that they could trust it.
Ellie and Alec appeared in the living room, on top of some of Thad’s books.
“Shit, sorry, Brother!” Alec said, backing up quickly as he hid a jar behind his back.
“What’s goin’ on?” Ellie asked.
Dem shot them both a baleful glare. He did not want them involved in this. Alec was his brother and he loved him as such, but the last time Alec had been this happy, it had brought Zeus down on their heads and resulted in them being banned from forming relationships. Any other time, he would have been genuinely happy for his brother, but right now, with Aster unconscious in the other room and pulling away from him at lightspeed, he couldn’t muster a shred of support for his brother and future sister-in-law.
“We tried summoning Morpheus and Hypnos so that they could rein Phobetor in, but it didn’t work. Now, I’m looking for any other way to trap the god of nightmares while Dem broods,” Thad answered helpfully.
“Why wouldn’t they show up when you summoned them? Isn’t that a forced thing? Like what happened to Hal?”
“It’s supposed to be, but for some reason, the rules don’t apply as strictly to the Oneroi as they do to everyone else.”
“The Oneroi?” Ellie whispered, tilting her face up to her fiancé.
“The gods of dreams,” Alec supplied quietly.
Ellie smiled up at him and stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.
Dem wanted to smash everything. The dark rage that had lived inside him since Zeus destroyed Isa was starting to come back, and that was no good for anyone.
“What did you use to try and summon them?” Ellie asked, her brows furrowed in thought.
“Their symbols and calling to them, the same as any other god or goddess.”
“Summoning crystal?” she asked, quirking her eyebrow.
Thad and Dem were both immediately laser-focused on her.
“What do you know about them?” Thad snapped out, almost accusatory in his tone.
Alec stepped forward, glowering at his brother.
“It’s okay, love,” she said, patting Alec’s shoulder as she stepped around him. “Granddad talked about them in a couple of his journals.”
“Do you have one?” Dem ground out the question.
A summoning crystal wouldn’t only bring the being into their presence, but with the right markings, it would trap them there until the summoner released them. It was highly dangerous magic. Without the right guards or markings, the summoner could be setting themselves up for an untimely death if the summoned wasn’t held correctly.
“Yes.” She nodded. “Would you like it?”
“That would be amazing. Thank you, Ellie,” Thad said as he rose to his feet.
Ellie quickly described where it was located, and his brother jumped out, leaving him with the adorable couple. They walked over to the office, and Ellie slipped inside after Alec handed her something. Why did everyone know what was going on except him? He glared at Alec, who glared right back. They had always butted heads, ever since they were kids. The difference was, now they tried to restrain themselves from bursting into fist fights at every turn.
Cin came out and looked at Dem. He sat up, expecting news, hoping that Aster wanted to see him.
He couldn’t
have been more wrong.
“Aster needs to wake up, which means you need to go. If she knows you’re here, she’ll have a meltdown again.”
“Why? I didn’t do anything!”
“Not my story to tell,” Cin said, holding her hands up defensively. “But that’s the deal. The longer you stay, the longer she has to wait for help. Your choice.” She crossed her arms over her chest.
While pride needled him at having this amazingly strong woman in his family, he just wanted answers. She wasn’t about to give any, though. Cin and Aster were as thick as thieves, and the likelihood of her breaking confidence was exactly zero.
“Fine. Someone better explain something to me soon, though, or I’m not going to be pleasant to be around.”
Alec snorted. “Cause you’re such a joy now?”
Dem flipped him the bird and jumped back to his place. Once he was home, his mind started replaying everything, trying to figure out what could have driven Aster away. She didn’t want anything to do with him, but it didn’t make any sense. It had to be Phobetor, but why wouldn’t anyone tell him what the vision was?
Something was pricking at his mind. His memory kept replaying the scene in Thad’s office. The feeling that he’d missed something important was battering at him. He slowed the memory down as much as he could, trying to examine everything and not just focusing on Aster. When he noticed it, his heart stopped.
There was a pregnancy test on the table.
The pink and cream box had a picture of the test and the silhouette of a pregnant woman on it. Why was it there? Who could be pregnant? The questions began coming quickly, one after the other, before his brain started laughing. Aster. It had to be. She was the only one who was feeling under the weather. It certainly wasn’t Robin. She and Hal would have been glued to each other, if they ever left their cabin. And Cin? Maybe, but why wouldn’t it have been in her own bathroom, which was only a few extra feet away?
He sat down heavily, the bed creaking at the sudden weight, and ran his hands over his face. Aster could be pregnant? Was it his? Was it something the assholes at The Farm did to her? She’d told him that they’d put her under anesthesia more than once, so there was plenty of time unaccounted for. Dem’s heart pounded in his chest. If it was his, was he ready to be a parent? His brain snorted at him. He was thousands of years old. If he couldn’t manage being a parent by now, then he never would.
