Making Magic: Books of the Kindling, Book 3

by Donna June Cooper

  “Your…your deputies tell me who they think is in the house. Shots have been fired, but they weren’t…aren’t clear on who’s doing the shooting. And they’ve heard a baby crying. There’s an ambulance sitting there waiting. I tried to get more, but…” Daniel cleared his throat. “That’s the way this…thing works, I’m afraid.”

  “We’ll head this off before it gets to that point.” Jake grabbed the wire cutters Aaron had left on the table, dropped them into Thea’s tote and nodded at the door. Aaron, his eyes round and huge, walked backwards toward it, watching Jake intently.

  “Good. Good.” Daniel’s tone was a little less tense. “We’re not too far out.”

  “Well, take it easy. Don’t add a wreck to this situation,” Jake said, even though he planned to speed up that mountain himself.

  There was another thoughtful silence. “You take care, Jake. Your deputies didn’t mention you at all. But there are a lot of possible paths and they keep changing,” Daniel said.

  Not my deputies any longer. “Point taken. You two do the same.” Jake disconnected. “My truck,” he said to Aaron, motioning at the door.

  The boy stayed quiet until they had settled in and started the drive up Woodruff Mountain.

  “That gun she has won’t work?” the boy asked.

  “Nope,” Jake said. There were some assumptions being made, but the odds of Sarah getting her hands on a Glock exactly like his dad’s were slim to none, and the county had changed the zip ties they used a few years back. The ones in his dad’s gun safe were the old style. When his mom had started drinking again after his dad’s death, he had disabled the gun without telling her.

  “And you’re not calling no deputies to come help you?”

  “Nope,” Jake said.

  “Because they won’t know that Sarah’s gun don’t work,” Aaron stated. “Even if you told ’em?”

  “They couldn’t take that chance,” Jake said, surprised at the boy’s grasp of the situation. “And we really don’t want any official types to know about what you can do, do we?”

  There was a stifled noise and the boy edged away.

  He had figured it out when he saw Aaron walk into his living room without opening the door.

  Back when five-year-old Aaron had disappeared, deputies and neighbors had combed the countryside, but they’d found the boy in the closed and locked confectionary shop, getting sick on candy. And shop owners up and down Patton Street had complained over the years of this small toy or that candy disappearing from their locked store or back room.

  Jake held up a hand. “It’s okay, Aaron. I’m not telling anyone.”

  “But you’re…you’re the sheriff. And…and I don’t want… I just wanted to fix Emmy. And I… Will they put me on drugs like they did with her?”

  “You can go through walls and doors?”

  “And floors. But that’s harder ’cause you gotta brace yourself for the fall. Put the brakes on so you won’t sink into the ground—or go right on to China most like.” Aaron explained. “Takes it out of you.”

  The kid said it so matter-of-factly that Jake almost smiled. He’d wondered how the boy got away from Sarah. Smart kid went right through the floor.

  “I bet,” he said. “Were you taking the babies for Emmy?”

  Aaron’s head drooped and he stared at the floorboard. Jake hoped he wasn’t considering falling through the bottom of the truck or sliding out the door. He might be able to pass through solid matter, but who knew what would happen at this speed?

  “Yeah,” he finally mumbled.

  “To fix her?”

  The boy nodded. “Yeah.”

  “How?”

  “I watched for ’em—the right age you know—watched where they went to. If it was a place I could get in and out without ’em seeing me, I just stepped in and took ’em and stepped out and put ’em in a nice clean box. They was the kind of boxes I carry all the time to move pieces to the kiln and back, so no one took note of it. Then I snuck ’em to Emmy.” It all came out in a rush. “I was real careful of ’em. I know how to handle babies—like the pieces at the shop.”

  That wasn’t the answer he had been after, but Jake was good at letting interrogations go where they needed to go. “And what did Emmy do with them?”

  “Nothin’. She didn’t like me doin’ it. She’s been getting more and more upset about it. Real mad.” Aaron shrugged. “I can’t seem to find the right one.”

  Jake turned up Woodruff Mountain Road.

  “What will the right one do when you find it?” Jake asked.

  “It’s a her. I know that much. But it’s awful hard to tell if a baby is a boy or a girl baby,” Aaron explained.

  Jake shook his head, then winced when it throbbed. He tried again. “So what will she do for Emmy?”

  “Fix her,” he said.

  Jake remembered Emmy’s disorder. “You mean heal her.”

  “Yeah. Fix her. Get rid of what those stupid drugs did to her,” Aaron said, enthused.

  “How could a baby—that girl baby—fix what the drugs did?”

  “I dunno. Emmy said she would,” he acted as if that explained it all.

  Thankful that his vision seemed unaffected as he navigated the winding mountain road, Jake willed the headache to ease off, rubbing the back of his neck. “How did Emmy know?”

  Aaron hunched over in his seat. Jake could see the sullen, closed-down look and knew the signs. The kid was his sister’s protector—her knight, her superhero— determined to shield her from harm and nosy adults.

  “Aaron, I want to help her too. But I need to know what she might do up here, so I can protect her.”

  “The baby’s special. She—Emmy, I mean—she heard ’em talking about her. That the baby might be a healer—a real one. Not like in a story.” He was talking in low tones, as if someone would overhear. “She thought it was tourists or hikers at first, just passin’ through. But then she heard ’em again and she figured they was around here, because they mentioned the healing thing again—kind of joking like, but still—”

  “Did she recognize the voices? Were they in the store?”

  Aaron looked over at him with big blue eyes like his sister’s. “They ain’t voices, exactly.”

  Jake waited. When nothing more was forthcoming, he tried again. “What are they, exactly?”

  Aaron sighed. “Emmy hears things. She hears people talking who aren’t there. She won’t talk about it now, because of all the tests and the medicine.” He was still talking softly. “She’s always heard them, inside her head. She hears music too. She loves that part. She can tune it now, like a radio, she says. But that was just here recently. She won’t talk to me about it anymore.” His voice sounded sullen. “She’s mad at me because of the babies.”

  So, Emmy was gifted too. And they had mistaken her gift for mental illness—probably assumed it was schizophrenia. She’d had those spasms and facial tics ever since they had come to live with the Croates. Had the medicine had caused them?

  “You take the babies and do what? Have them touch her?”

  “No. I make her touch ’em. It’s the only way I can do it, ’cause she’s so mad about it. I won’t put ’em back until she touches ’em,” Aaron said. “We messed up though. Her baby ain’t born yet. She told me her baby’s coming right now.”

  Lily. Somehow Emmy had overheard someone—Grace and Nick, probably—talking about Lily. Perhaps they had been wondering out loud if she would have the same gift as her mother.

  Jake pulled up to the gate and entered the code. There were cabin guests coming in and out all the time so Sarah and his mom wouldn’t know who was approaching. To be sure, he would park the truck out of sight down at the greenhouses and walk up.

  As they drove through the woods and emerged out onto the meadow, Jake glanced over in the direction of the cemeter
y and remembered Thea and her flute.

  “What about the music? Were you playing music for the babies?” he asked.

  Aaron smiled. “That was my idea. One of ’em started crying on me so I used Emmy’s phone. She plays songs sometimes, when she’s feeling pretty good, and she records them on her phone. I played one of those songs and the baby stopped crying. It worked on all of ’em, that song.”

  And Emmy had “heard” that song, he suspected, when Thea played it on the mountain.

  He glanced over at the house as they wove down the hillside past the greenhouses. He didn’t see any guests lounging in the sunroom, but most of the cabin guests were probably down at the festival enjoying the music. That was a good thing—the fewer people up here tonight, the better.

  As he parked the truck where it couldn’t be seen from the house, he thought of his service pistol again, locked in the glove box. No. The only gun up here should be the useless one Sarah was waving around, unless Nick had hung on to his service weapon. And, of course, Grace’s shotgun. The fewer weapons introduced to this mess, the better. But…

  He opened the glove box and fished around for the zip ties he kept on hand.

  Aaron hopped out of the truck.

  “Wait a minute, Aaron.”

  The boy’s face was pale and tense as he turned back to face Jake.

  “You know what you did with those babies was wrong.” Jake held up a hand before Aaron could object. “No matter what the reason. You terrified their parents and, no matter how careful you were, something could have happened while you had one of them, or once you left them alone after. You know that, don’t you?”

  After a long moment, the boy looked down at his feet and nodded.

  “Whatever happens tonight, you and your parents and I are going to have a long talk about what you need to do to make up for those bad choices. We’ll talk about you not ever doing anything like that again. Agreed?”

  The boy nodded again.

  “Okay. Grab that bag.” He smiled at Aaron’s baffled expression as the boy picked up Thea’s battered tote. “We’ll return it to the lady while we are here. Always remember, being a hero includes big things and small things.”

  Aaron looked at the bag and grinned up at him.

  “You’re sweet on her. Miz Woodruff.”

  “Yeah, I’m sweet on her all right,” Jake admitted. “Don’t slam your door. We’re gonna be real quiet from here on out.”

  The boy pushed his door shut and circled around to Jake’s side.

  “Good job. Now, have you ever tried to take anyone besides a baby with you through a wall?”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Thea frowned as Grace panted through another contraction.

  “She’s really ill…probably…cancer…” Grace panted. “Taking heavy…pain meds.”

  Nick clenched his fist. “Don’t worry, I’ll put her out of her misery.”

  “I love…you,” Grace said, a little louder. “But…she’s in pain…and desperate.”

  “I told you two to stop talking,” Sarah shouted from the kitchen.

  Grace’s control was amazing. Thea would have been screaming at everyone at this point, including her husband. They had practiced for a warm water delivery out in the hot tub. Under a blanket on the couch in the keeping room was not where they had planned to bring Lily into the world.

  Thea sat on the floor of the keeping room, zip-tied hand and, now, foot as well. She listened to their exchange. Nick had kept himself from being tied up by convincing Sarah that Grace needed him to deliver the baby. At the moment, he had his head bowed over Grace’s bare right foot, which he was giving a thorough massage.

  Pooka let out a plaintive howl from the laundry room where Nick had corralled him, under threat from Sarah that she would shoot Emmy, who she had been dragging around like a human shield until she dumped the girl next to Thea.

  Swallowing hard, Thea tried not to think of Bailey, who hadn’t been so obedient. When Bailey had squeezed out of the laundry room door and headed for Thea, Sarah had kicked her into the mud room door. Sarah had then opened it and booted her outside for good measure. Thankfully, Sarah hadn’t shot her.

  If they all lived through this, Sarah and Marilyn were going to regret the day they had been born. A line would form to administer frontier justice. After Nick was finished with them and Thea had administered a few kicks of her own, Bailey would get to chew on whatever was left.

  Digging her fingernails into her palms again, she tried not to cry in frustration and fury. Her nose was already feeling dangerously stuffy and she was terrified of suffocating under all the tape. Sarah’s scarf smelled, and tasted, of cheap perfume and sweat, which only made things worse.

  Bailey was all right, Thea told herself. She was probably hiding under the BMW. She was a smart girl. And Jake was fine too. Aaron would get help and Jake would be fine. But then Jake’s deputies would surround this place and who knew what Sarah would do then, or what the deputies would do in response.

  From the sounds coming from the laundry room, either the wall, the floor, the door or maybe all three were being methodically destroyed by the Plott hound. Pooka might get himself shot for the trouble.

  A small hand squeezed her arm and she tried to relax. Emmy struggled to control the twitches and spasms brought on by fear. “Sh-Sh—”

  “Shut up!” Sarah shouted from where she stood in the kitchen, glaring at them. “Or I swear I will stop up your mouth like your Miz Woodruff there.”

  Emmy covered her ears and rocked, her back hitting the side of the chair where Greg now sat, rigid and pale. If Greg had left like he was supposed to, he wouldn’t be stuck here with them. The man had been so passive and meek when confronted with Sarah’s gun that Thea had thought he was having a nervous breakdown. After Marilyn had trussed him up with zip-tie cuffs on his wrists and ankles, Sarah had dismissed him as no threat.

  Nick had said that Eddie was up at Daniel’s repairing the rain gutter and Ouida was out shopping in Asheville. Hopefully they wouldn’t be back until this was resolved. The locked doors would slow them down. Neither of them carried keys because those doors were never locked. Sarah had ordered Marilyn to lock every outside door and window and pull all the curtains and blinds. Then she’d collected everyone’s cell phones and piled them up on the counter in the kitchen, so there was no chance of anyone sneaking a call out.

  Now Sarah was having an intense consultation with Marilyn in the kitchen. She was obviously trying to persuade the woman to do something she didn’t want to do because Jake’s mom kept shaking her head. What few bits Thea could catch involved finding another gun and forcing Nick to go somewhere while Marilyn held that gun on the rest of them. Every time his name was mentioned, Nick would tense up.

  Clearly Marilyn hadn’t signed up for shooting anyone, as opposed to just waving guns around, and Sarah was beginning to realize that her plans would have to change. Until the baby came, no one was going anywhere and afterward Grace would have difficulty getting around. Although with her gift, Thea assumed Grace wouldn’t require the same recovery time as the average new mom. Thea bit down on the scarf then flinched when the tape tugged at her skin.

  Back in the car, Emmy had tried to loosen the tape for Thea, but the anchoring piece was firmly stuck in her hair and would not come loose without scissors. She wished Marilyn hadn’t been so generous with the tape.

  It was strange how isolating it was to be gagged like this, cut off from everyone even though she was right there with them. Thea breathed in slowly.

  “You are useless,” Sarah hissed.

  “You sound like you want to keep it for yourself—”

  “Well, I was… I was only thinkin’ of all the good we could do with it,” Sarah cut off Marilyn’s protest.

  “But you said you would destroy it. We’d stop it and everyone would be normal again.” Ma
rilyn waved around her. “You said they were looking for a particular baby to strengthen it.”

  Sarah whirled around as if to strike her. Everyone flinched, except Greg, who must have his eyes shut.

  “You heard her!” She pointed the gun at Emmy. “She said they were her babies. And you.” She pointed it at Marilyn’s chest. “You said she had those flickering flames around her. And so did that boy. That’s the power. They were taking those babies for something evil. And that baby.” She pointed it at Grace and Nick. “Their baby is—”

  “If you don’t quit waving that thing around…” Nick moved in front of Grace.

  “You’ll what?” Sarah came to the edge of the kitchen and jabbed the gun at him.

  “Here we go again,” Grace said, then let out a long groan and grabbed for her protruding stomach.

  Nick whirled around and leaned over her, taking her hands.

  Thea watched as Grace wrapped her fingers around Nick’s and made muttered comments about Sarah’s character.

  The contractions were getting close now. Thea leaned back and watched as Sarah waved the gun one last time before returning to her argument with Marilyn.

  “I told you, Old Annie knew where that power comes from.” Sarah said, jabbing the gun back in their direction again. “That’s why she’s dead. They did it. They’re protecting it.”

  Grace laid her head back on the mound of pillows Nick had put behind her and let out a sigh. Nick was massaging her other foot so hard Thea wondered if he was going to rub her skin right off. Emmy sat and rocked with her hands clamped over her ears and her eyes shut. And Greg had opened his eyes to stare at the pillar candles that flickered in the keeping room’s fireplace.

  “It’s how the Woodruffs made all their money from way back,” Sarah said. “A powerful magic talisman up there on the mountain somewheres.”

  “I know. You told me all that,” Marilyn snapped. “That’s what makes me see…what I can see.”

  “But what I didn’t tell you is Old Annie wanted me to contact her grandpap for her ’cause he knew where it was. He told me what it could do in a reading. Old Annie found it. But they got rid of her to keep it secret. To keep it to themselves.”