by Debora Geary
Nat wanted to envelop him, but she was pretty sure that was a bad idea. What can I do?
Exactly what you’re doing. I’ve lightly linked his mind to yours. Jamie sounded almost smug. Should have thought of this yesterday. He’ll feel that gorgeous serenity of yours riding quietly in his head. A little bit of an anchor, in case today gets crazy for him.
Nat almost laughed out loud. Her mind had been anything but serene lately. And then she saw Benny’s head turn, and his big brown eyes looked deep into hers. Seeking. Trusting.
She had one child already anchored in her heart. Two wasn’t any problem at all.
For the first time in weeks, Nat Sullivan took in a slow, deep, entirely peaceful breath.
And showed Benny where home lived.
-o0o-
“Oof.”
Lauren managed to slide one eye open, wondering why her husband was making strange noises. And discovered a pair of bright eyes three inches from her nose. “Argleblurg.” It was the best she could do before coffee.
Their visitor giggled and bounced on Devin’s chest. “Wake up, sillies. It’s Solstice. And our birthdays.”
Lauren snuck a peek at the beside alarm. 7:41 a.m. Well, not the middle of the night, but still.
“We’ve been up for hours already.” Aervyn grinned. “Mama said I could come.”
“I’ll bet she did,” said Devin wryly. “Bouncing off the walls, are you?”
“Nuh, uh.” Aervyn rubbed the top of his head. “But I banged into the ceiling once. And Kenna tried to help with the waffles and some of them got kind of extra crispy.”
Lauren caught her husband’s sidelong glance. “Did Kenna come by herself?” Her brand-new little brother had been very overwhelmed the night before.
“No.” Aervyn’s smile lit every dark corner in the room. “Benny came too. Mama says we all need to try to be a little quiet so we don’t scare him and stuff, but he’s sitting on Auntie Nat’s lap and eating a really humongous waffle. Well, mostly the whipped cream, but his mind feels awfully happy.”
Lauren was already pulling on sweatpants and a hoodie. No way was she missing a single moment of this.
“Kenna gave him a big smoochy kiss and he giggled.” Aervyn was still providing running commentary as they yanked on clothes. “And I’m gonna give him my very best fire truck, because I have four and Uncle Jamie says Benny doesn’t have any yet.”
Lauren stopped long enough to give his head a big squeeze. “Happy birthday, superdude.”
He grinned into her belly. “I already got a cousin for a present. It’s gonna be a really good day.”
No argument with that.
Lauren prepared for transport. To heck with coffee.
-o0o-
Moira took a chair at Nell’s enormous table, soaking in the miracle sitting on his mama’s lap and sticking his fingers in a big mountain of whipped cream.
This was the day of the year that saw the least light. And today, it was going to be packed to the gills with the most joy.
Small hands tugged on her sleeve. “Up.” Kenna, as imperious as ever.
Moira reached down for the small girl. “Happy birthday, sweetling.”
Kenna settled into the cozy green velvet covering Moira’s knees, eyes serious. “I hab a bwother.”
“Indeed you do.” And that would rework the fabric of many lives, but none more than the small, fierce girlchild in her lap. “You will need to take very good care of him. That’s what big sisters do.” Even if they were only older by about a month.
“I big.” Pride flashed in Kenna’s eyes. “I hewp Benny.”
One well-loved heart, opening to include another. Moira touched the small girl’s cheek. “Yes. Just like Aervyn helps you, and Ginia helps Aervyn, and Nell helped your daddy when he was little.” It wasn’t one of the immutable laws of the universe, but it should be.
Nell grinned from a stool behind the counter. “I seem to remember this speech.”
“As well you should.” Moira handed Kenna a slice of bacon and let her eyes travel away from the small girl. “She seems to be taking the news much better than you did.”
“Give it time,” said Nell dryly. “I think it took a few years before I tried to mail my brothers to China.”
Devin laughed. “And yet you love us still.”
It was the kind of light teasing that fused together the Sullivan clan. Moira watched as the currents of steadfast love eddied around the small boy licking whipped cream off his thumbs. He was quiet yet, but they’d all been warned.
Moira was quite sure she saw a spark of something wild and alive in his eyes. One that Witch Central would fan in no time at all. Nowhere else in the world was exuberance so welcomed.
Jamie slid into the seat beside her, setting down a plate of waffles and letting his head rest on her shoulder for just a moment. “Another grandbaby for you.”
“Aye.” They were all special, whether they shared her blood or not. But this one… She would hold him soon. Rock him and tell him tales of the wonderful family he’d called to be his own. “You walked through fire to find him, Jamie Sullivan.”
It would be the job of an old witch to make sure Benny knew that.
“Nah.” Jamie’s eyes were stuck on his wife. “She’s the one who got us here. I just held her cloak.”
“To walk at the side of an amazing woman is a journey all its own,” said Moira softly. “Benny will grow up watching his father do that, and it will shape the man he will become.”
She stopped talking and chuckled quietly.
The last bit of that would need to be repeated one day.
Jamie’s brain hadn’t heard a word past “father.”
-o0o-
Nat took a seat in her living room, smiling at the chaos.
The day-long birthday party had smoothly segued to their place from Nell’s kitchen, following Benny back to his new home. Something about him being more comfortable there.
Nat knew better than to argue with the triplet organizers.
She had a belly full of waffles and a heart full to bursting and nothing could be wrong on this wonderful day.
Kenna sat on the floor with Lizard, reading Dr. Seuss and eyeing her new brother from a distance. Nat wasn’t worried about that anymore. Watching them wake up together had told her all she needed to know about the adaptability of Kenna’s heart.
She was two today, and she had a brother. Sometimes life was very simple.
Kenna giggled, sinking in to her favorite part of the story. And then Lizard’s head snapped up, along with every other mind witch in the room.
Nat turned to follow their collective gaze.
Jamie stood in the open doorway, a look of stunned elation on his face.
The room hushed.
He walked slowly across the area rug and crouched down in front of the boy quietly playing with Aervyn’s best red fire truck. “Hey, Benny, want to come outside?”
The toddler looked up, curious, but hesitant.
Jamie picked him up gently, and then looked at Nat, his whole body vibrating. “We should all go outside.” He stopped, eyes full of overwhelmed love. And choked out two more words.
“It’s snowing.”
-o0o-
Lauren was one of the first to make it outside. Ten years in Chicago meant she was faster climbing into her snow gear than the average Californian. She pulled Devin in her wake—he had no snow gear on at all and didn’t care. Snow was just frozen water in his world.
There was already a good inch of it on the ground. And they definitely wanted front-row seats when Benny and Kenna made it out the door.
Devin laughed, catching a snowflake or ten on his tongue. And then slowly turned left, his attention caught by something Lauren couldn’t see. She peered around his bulk, wondering what suddenly had his undivided attention.
Aervyn came around the corner of the house, Govin flanking him on one side, Sierra on the other. Faces intently focused on energies only they could see.
Lauren felt her heart literally melt.
Their three best weather witches. Covering Berkeley, California, in snow.
“Holy hell,” said Devin, voice full of hushed awe. “That is one of the most insane spells I have ever seen.”
Lauren couldn’t see it—and she didn’t care. It was the love beaming out of a newly minted seven-year-old’s mind that held her captive. Aervyn had worked for weeks on a gift for Jamie. And tossed whatever he’d been making aside in favor of this single perfect moment.
One dream, delivered right down to the last mind-etched detail.
Devin peeled off, like every other air and water witch in the vicinity, heading to feed the snow team power.
The flakes fell faster.
The front door opened again and this time it was Kenna who spilled out, bundled in screaming pink and enchanted by the white stuff falling from the sky.
Behind her came a small boy, rapidly losing his cautious look. And following him, Nat and Jamie, still looking entirely stunned—and radiating a supernova of joy.
Lauren got down on her knees to catch the birthday girl as she charged into the unfamiliar snow. One auntie, formerly from Chicago and well acquainted with how to have fun in a surprise winter storm, to the rescue.
Not that anyone had any doubt about what would happen next.
It was time to build a snowman.
Epilogue
There were not enough thanks in the universe.
But Nat had spent all day trying to make them. Starting with the birthday boy and his entirely magical winter wonderland and finishing with her best friend, who had pulled in every marker in existence to bring Benny home.
And apparently hers hadn’t been the one that had finished things.
Nat aimed at her quarry. And laughed when the poet realtor started squirming before she even arrived.
“No big.” Lizard looked wildly uncomfortable. “If one more person says thank you, I’m going to turn them into an immortal snow duck.”
Nat was pretty sure there were at least three of those already. “I know you keep your mind barriers pretty tight, but I hope you can feel how much this means to us.”
The young realtor only wriggled more. “I take plenty around here. It was good to be able to pay it back a little.”
This was not little. Nat tried again. And froze as defiant poet eyes finally met hers.
“I get it, okay? There are people interfering every day over in that crazy castle I somehow own. Including somebody who bought a truckload of acrylic art paints.” Lizard stuffed her hands in her pockets. “If I tried to pay all that back, I’d be a thousand years old before I got to sit down again.” She paused, voice pitched so low Nat barely heard it. “But I’d have done it just for Benny. Just to hear him laugh today. So would every single one of us.”
Yeah. Nat gave up and pulled her in for a hug.
And then let her flee. Jamie was making his way through the snowman forest, a very sleepy boy in his arms. “The circle’s about to begin.” He kissed Nat’s forehead. “Nell’s going to take Kenna into the fire trio with her and Aervyn for one last birthday treat. I’ll sit here with you.”
That would keep Auntie Nell very busy—Kenna wasn’t generally well behaved enough yet for circle work. Nat leaned into her husband’s chest, traversing the new experience of having more than one child’s needs to think about. Benny smiled up from his cozy nest inside Jamie’s jacket. “’No-man.”
It was the very first word he’d spoken—and he’d been repeating it for hours.
There had been no child happier with the white manna from the sky. It had chased away the caution in Benny’s eyes and given him a way to meet the enormous clan that was now his, one rolled snowball at a time.
Those eyes were drifting closed now, one small boy entirely tuckered out.
Nat had thought she couldn’t love him any more.
Jamie’s head tilted into hers. Yeah.
Mia handed Nat a tea light, eyes shining. The circle would begin soon.
And Nat would never again see a candle without remembering the moment when Benny arrived at their door. Something she was pretty sure three nieces had figured out. The entire yard was full of flickering flames—even many of the snow creatures held a tea light.
A hand slipped into the crook of Nat’s arm, an old witch laying her fingers gently on Benny’s sleeping head. “A blessing on you, sweet boy.” Moira leaned her forehead into Nat’s, eyes brimming with tears.
“Thank you.” Nat thought her tears had run out this day. Wrong again. “For so very much. For believing this was possible—that he was possible.”
“I doubted mightily,” said Moira softly. “And I was terribly afraid that I was leading you astray on the whims of an old woman.”
They had all been so terribly afraid. And anguished. And grieving. Weeks full of dark. Nat looked around at the sea of light and let it soak into the deepest, most hurt corners of her heart.
The circle began their calls, Shay’s beautiful music lifting them up into the night.
Nat reveled in the magic that swirled through snowmen and witches and tiny little boys alike. Her fiery girl, eyes awed, stood tall with Auntie Nell on one side and Aervyn on the other.
She’s doing really good, sent Aervyn, grinning.
Nell’s mindvoice chuckled. That’s because we told her if she wasn’t careful, we’d melt all the snowmen.
Nat felt Jamie’s silent laughter beside her. That was an impressive incentive—Kenna loved the snowpeople dearly.
And then the circles, inner and outer, turned as one, alerted by some unseen signal, every face seeking their oldest and wisest.
Moira looked around at them all, love shining in her eyes as she began the words of the Solstice message. “Tonight, we give thanks for the time we are given to go deep into who we are, to learn truly what kind of seed we are capable of being. A time to discover the possibilities dormant in our hearts and to walk the pathways of our own souls.”
Nat breathed into the exhaustion of her own feet, so very tired from their walk. The darkest days of this year had not been gentle. But like every other heart present, she knew the words that came next.
Moira’s voice grew resonant, carrying out into the snow-covered streets of Berkeley. “And tonight, we remember the one thing that has always been true and always will be.”
She reached out and laid a gentle hand one more time on Benny’s head. “The light always returns.”
-o0o-
Lauren pulled a warm blanket over her snoring husband’s bulk. He’d lasted all of ten minutes on the couch in front of the fire.
She imagined Witch Central slept on couches and floors and beds all over town. It had been an entirely epic day.
The weather witches, well supported by cookies and an impromptu team feeding them power, had kept the flakes falling until the ground had been carpeted in a foot of snow. Much to the delight of every kid and most of the adults in Berkeley.
Rumor had it snow had fallen as far as ten miles away.
And then the fun had truly begun.
By the time night had fallen, Nat and Jamie’s entire block had been studded with snowmen. Or more correctly, with snowmonsters, snowgirls, snowducks, snowbunnies, and one very big snowfiretruck. On the way home, Lauren had even peered out the car window and seen the snowman grunge band hanging out in front of Trinity’s castle.
Kenna and Aervyn had promptly embraced it as a worthy celebration of their birthdays. The triplets had circulated an unending supply of cupcakes and hot chocolate, a couple of fire witches had manned a very careful, very shielded bonfire to warm up cold snow-building crews, and people for blocks around had cheerfully joined in the singing of Happy Birthday, even if they had no idea whose birthday it was.
But nothing had come close to the incandescent joy of Nat and Jamie.
Benny hadn’t been able to resist the lure of white stuff falling from the sky. Or the chance to push ginormous balls of s
now around his new yard.
And when he and Jamie, pushing the snowman’s belly, had run into Nat and Kenna, pushing the head, Benny’s giggles had rung out into every corner of the universe.
That ten-second movie reel would stay in Lauren’s head forever. And this one was as real as it got.
She bent down to kiss Devin’s forehead. And then moved quietly over to the bay window.
The orb looked as it always did. Silent, catching a few stray rays of light from the night sky.
She knew better now. Gently, Lauren set her hand on top of the rounded glass. Thank you. And then she smiled and pushed the ten-second memory in her head into the vague presence under her fingers.
Messages could go both ways.
Next up…
Book 3 of the Witch Central series
should be out in June—and this time,
the orb speaks of glitter...
For those who have just found my witches,
I have lots of reading to keep you busy!
The whole crew of Witch Central and
more of Moira’s village can be found in
my seven-book A Modern Witch series
and the WitchLight trilogy.
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A Quick Note on Characters :)
Yes, my books have a lot of them! If any of you, new readers or old, would like a helping hand keeping things straight, a group of my fans has created a wonderful character wiki, with all the information you would ever want.
