by Shannon Page
I shook my head. “But everything about this has been vanishingly unlikely.”
“Even so. Spirits have been known to return for another cycle on this plane, but they always do so from the Beyond. And with the express permission of the witch who is to bear the child.”
“Assuming the witch in question even intended to get pregnant,” I grumbled.
“Yes, I know. But I do not think that is her spirit in there. I think you would feel it, that she would find some way to speak to you. I believe the cards are expressing themselves more metaphorically.”
“And saying what?”
“That you are facing challenges, to be sure. But these two cards together, I see them as a sign that you will have the strength to navigate this hardship, and will emerge far more powerful for it.” She gave me a sympathetic smile. “Have faith, my dear. Look at this Queen: try to see her maturity, her power, her control.”
“I do see that,” I admitted. “I just…”
“Yes. I know.” She gazed at me. “And now I can see that it is time to feed you lunch.”
It had been sitting for a few hours, but the spell Mom had used in its making had kept the meal perfectly fresh. We ate in the formal dining room, on the south side of the house. The sun had just broken through the fog, so we opened the large casement windows and enjoyed the rare San Francisco late-spring warmth as we ate cracked Dungeness crab and sourdough bread, a huge salad, and a tarragon-cream soup that was to die for. I fed morsels of crab to Elnor under the table; Mom pretended not to notice. Lemon meringue pie was our dessert, followed by coffee and little chocolates.
I really need to visit Mom more often, I told myself, pushing back from the table, rubbing my belly, and apologizing to the tiny bundle of cells who now had no room whatsoever. Good thing she was so small.
“Well, that was amazing,” I said. “Thank you.”
“It was my pleasure—the meal and the lesson both.” Mom smiled back at me, then gazed at the cluttered table. “I think I’ll save the cleanup for later, though. Our tarot work must have been more draining than I realized. Or maybe I’m still absorbing your news.”
I looked carefully at her, then shifted my sight to take the measure of her essence again. “Mom, you are tired. Are you sure you’re not sick?”
“No, I’m just overextended, I told you. I’ll take a little nap and be right as rain later this afternoon.”
“I shouldn’t have made you do all this! I could have at least made lunch.” I got up and went to her, putting a hand on her forehead so I could get a deeper reading. “I think we should get a healer in here.”
She reached up and pulled my hand down, shaking her head. “Don’t be absurd. There’s no call for that.” Before I could protest further, she added in a softer tone, “But I appreciate your worry for me. If you like, we can drop by Gregorio’s clinic.”
“I’m not allowed there, remember?”
She smiled. “The healers would let you accompany me, I think. I’d like to see Lucas about something anyway. There are always at least two healers present; one of them can take a look at me, if it will make you feel better.”
“It would, yes.” I studied her a moment longer. “And we’re going in a taxi, not on the ley lines.”
“Oh, Callie,” she said, but she didn’t argue as I sent my cat home on a ley line and pulled out my cell phone.
— CHAPTER FIFTEEN —
The taxi let us off on a familiar dilapidated street South of Market, not far from the Potrero Hill house that the healers Nora and Manka shared. This time, there was no Sebastian on the sidewalk whisking me immediately away, which gave me a chance to actually study the new clinic. It had apparently taken over an abandoned warehouse; no one seemed to have given any attention to the exterior of the hulking dark brown building. There were broken windows on the higher floors, and one whole corner had caved in and then been boarded up haphazardly. The walls that remained were covered with spray-painted graffiti.
“Well, isn’t this confidence-inspiring,” I said, stepping over a broken construction brick with a little piece of rebar sticking out of it.
“Look closer,” Mom murmured, leaning on my arm a little.
I did, and then even more closely, as I finally saw what lay underneath the disguise. In fact the building was modern and new, just wearing a skin of decrepit illusion—merely the image of the warehouse that used to be there. The illusion was unusually powerful. The graffiti were real enough, though not made by any human hand. They were potent protection and healing spells, interlaced with the more usual wards. “Oh, that is clever,” I said. Because they had been physically painted onto the building, they had an extra degree of solidity and force.
“Lucas helped with the design,” she said, a note of pride in her voice. “Come, the door is here.”
Even though I’d adjusted my sight to see the reality underneath, the illusion was still strong enough to be disorienting. We stopped at the front door, where Mother put her hand on a small panel in the center.
“Aren’t they expecting us?” I’d called Father through the æther after I’d summoned the taxi. He had agreed that we should come in right away.
“It’s just another layer of security,” she said. “You next.” She guided my hand to the nearly invisible panel.
I felt the building’s spells brushing over me inquiringly, then relenting. The steel door swung open, and we stepped in.
The entryway continued the theme of abandonment and neglect. “Just in case anyone does manage to get in?” I asked Mom, looking around the cavernous space, empty except for the beer bottles and piles of trash. And was that a rat in the corner, watching us with bead-bright eyes?
“The reception room is further on. They haven’t built out this space yet.”
“I see.”
A door off to the right stood partway open, golden light emanating from it. I followed Mom. We walked down a long hallway, eventually arriving in a small room that at least had fresh paint on its walls, if not much else. “This is the reception area?” I asked. “Would it kill them to find some plastic chairs? A fake fern? Maybe a few back issues of Pot and Kettle?”
Mother gave a soft laugh. “The important part is in the back.”
Which, of course, I knew. I was just chattering, covering my nerves.
Mom closed her eyes briefly and wiped at her forehead, which I could see was damp. She looked completely exhausted.
I stepped over to the second door, the one which presumably led to the back. “Hello? Anyone here?”
I heard Manka’s voice. “Calendula, Belladonna, is that you? I’ll be right there.”
A minute later, the healer herself stepped in. “Greetings,” she said, wiping her hands on a small white towel. “Lucas mentioned you might be dropping by.”
“We’re not dropping by,” I said, struggling with my growing unease. “Mom’s not well. It’s her essence—same as everyone else. Manka, what is this?”
“Callie, I told you—” Mom started, but Manka was already scrutinizing her. The healer took my mother’s hand, frowning as she continued her examination.
“We have plenty of beds,” Manka said after a minute. “Belladonna, if you will come with me?”
“Let me talk to Lucas,” Mom protested weakly as she complied.
“He will come to you,” the healer said. “I want you to lie down.”
I followed them into the main part of the clinic, down another hallway with closed doors on either side. Manka opened one of them. “In here.”
A strong scent of lavender tinged with a hint of ground mace filled the darkened room. The carpeting was thick and lush underfoot. I heard the burble of a creek, though I saw no water. Actually, I saw not much of anything, because the lighting wasn’t merely dim, it was so low as to be almost nonexistent. I thought I could make out a large, comfortable bed in the center of the room. A low table next to it held a teacup, a basket of what might be cookies and scones, and a pitcher of water. The wh
ole effect made me want to crawl into the bed and fall asleep at once.
Beside me, my mother sighed, as if she was thinking much the same thing.
“All right, Belladonna, here we go,” Manka said in a soothing voice.
I yawned. “Nice room. It’s not what I expected.”
Manka smiled as she helped my mother climb in and get snuggled under a poofy, sage-colored down comforter. “No one ever got well in a sterile white hospital room, did they?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve never been in one.” I yawned again.
“You might want to wait in the hall, Calendula,” Manka said. “The healing spells can be a bit overwhelming if you’re not used to them.”
“Right…” I said, trying to stifle a third yawn.
“Do not open any other doors.”
“I won’t.” I stepped back out into the hallway and took a few deep breaths, trying to clear the cobwebs from my brain. She was right. Powerful stuff.
Manka joined me in the hall a minute later. “Your mother is sleeping.”
“I’d be astonished if she wasn’t.” I looked up and down the hall, only seeing more closed doors. “Where’s my father?”
“I’ll take you to the warlocks.”
I followed her down that corridor and another one beyond. I could sense the presences of other witches behind some of the doors, though faintly. Low Essence Fever was clearly becoming epidemic.
My father, Gregorio, and—I was happy to see—Drs. Sebastian Fallon and Flavius Winterheart were gathered in a makeshift laboratory room set up in what must have been the back corner of the giant building. “Calendula!” my father said, coming to give me a light kiss on the cheek. “Where is Belladonna?”
“We’ve put her into room seventeen, and she’s sleeping,” Manka said behind me.
“I’d like to see her now.”
“Of course,” Manka said. Dr. Andromedus nodded as well, and my father hurried out.
Sebastian set a vial down on the lab bench and came over to me. “Callie? Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” I said, my hand automatically going to my stomach. I had never understood pregnant women doing that, but now I did. It was a powerful reflex. “I…I’m just worried about my mom, you know.”
“Yes, of course,” he said with a sympathetic frown, as Flavius chimed in: “We’ll take super good care of her, Callie.”
“Indeed,” Gregorio said. “You did the right thing, bringing Belladonna here.”
I smiled at him. “I know, Dr. Andromedus. Thank you for doing this.”
Gregorio gave me a kindly look. “Nothing is more important than putting everything we have into solving this worrisome mystery.”
I nodded, looking at the crowded lab bench. Piles of spell books on every subject reached nearly ten feet into the air, surrounded by dozens of cauldrons and flasks kept warm by Eternal Flame. At last I’d gotten in here, but it was still unclear to me where their inquiry might be focused. If there was any focus here at all. “What have you found out? What can I help with?”
Gregorio started to answer, then stopped, looking at me…at my hand on my belly. I sensed his second, more probing glance. The subsequent confusion on his face was plain even without magical vision.
“Yes,” I said, before he could figure out a polite way to ask. “I’m pregnant.”
“Why…that is…remarkable, Calendula.”
“Wow!” said Sebastian. He bumbled over and gave me a strong hug, pushing past Flavius and nearly knocking a flask to the floor in the process. “Congratulations! That’s awesome!”
“Thank you.” I smiled at the baffled Dr. Andromedus over Sebastian’s shoulder. “And yes, Jeremy is the father,” I said, once my friend had released me. Because of course that would have been the next awkward, impolitic question.
On to the third. “It wasn’t planned,” I went on, “but I’m very, very happy about it. And I’ve talked to Jeremy and he’s happy as well.”
“Not…planned?” Gregorio stared at me, shaking his head. It was taking him a long time to find his conversational footing. “But that is quite impossible.”
I shrugged. “I thought so too.”
“My son is…very fond of you, I know. But still, I had not imagined…”
“I know! It’s crazy, isn’t it?” I kept smiling at him. Perhaps, if I headed this off at the pass, he wouldn’t immediately dive into acting like the situation belonged to him…maybe we could even get back to the real reason we were all here…
“Of course, I expect Jeremiah has already talked to you about the matter of the contract, then,” said Gregorio. “Frankly, I am surprised he did not mention anything to me when I saw him earlier today. Our representatives—”
Oh well.
My smile grew even bigger. “Oh, Dr. Andromedus, there’s no need for representatives! Jeremy and I have agreed to just let everything be for now. Since it was so very sudden and all. I’ll keep living in my house, we’ll keep dating, and we’ll talk about any contracts somewhere down the line.” If at all.
Gregorio grew very still. Behind him, I could see that both Sebastian and Flavius were watching with avid interest. Manka had made herself scarce; I hadn’t even seen her leave the room, but she wasn’t here now.
Finally, Dr. Andromedus forced a cordial smile. “But this is…not how we do things. Contracts are for the protection of the child! And the parents.” His smile grew a little more genuine as he found his way once more. “You will want her to have the bare minimum social advantage of legitimacy, as well as the financial resources that an alliance with our house would bring, will you not?”
My smile was growing more stale by the moment. Legitimacy. Of course he wasn’t going to let me brazen this out. But why in the Blessed Mother’s name was this entity in my belly any less legitimate than any other living thing on the planet, just because some papers hadn’t been signed? “I have plenty of resources of my own,” I said, trying hard not to grit my teeth. “As does my family, and my coven.”
I had surprised the eminent Gregorio Andromedus for the third time in as many minutes, for he blanched once more. “You are not proposing to raise a daughter in a coven, are you?”
The whole blessed thing was so ridiculous, I realized, standing there in that makeshift lab room, facing my eight-hundred-year-old mentor, two young warlocks gaping at us. The whole damn system, everything I’d swallowed, my whole life. Who had made all these rules anyway? Why couldn’t a witchlet be raised in a teaching coven? Or by a single mother? Humans raised babies any old way all the time. Why were we locked into one way and one way only?
When I’d moved out of the coven house, I had thought I’d wanted more freedom, more independence and agency—the mental and physical space to do complex independent research, and easier access to my human boyfriend. But I suddenly saw that it was so much bigger than that, that this was far greater than me or my daughter. These rules and strictures and “how it’s done”s were a straightjacket on all of us—all the way up to Gregorio. Eight hundred years old, and he couldn’t receive the news of a granddaughter on the way without rushing to swaddle her in legal papers?
“I don’t plan to raise her in the coven, no,” I finally said. “I’ve hardly had time to plan anything, to be perfectly honest. I’m just going to sit with the news for a little while and see what makes sense.” Sebastian nodded, behind Gregorio. I felt a sudden pinprick of annoyance at that—come on out here and nod where he can see you!—but I pushed it aside. He had his own battles. “As I said, we might consider a contract. I just can’t know yet, and we’ve got months to work this out. Today, however, my mother is sick, and I’m very concerned about her. And I want to hear more about the clinic in general. How many witches are here now?”
“Fourteen,” Sebastian blurted, as Gregorio opened his mouth. The elder warlock turned to glare at the young intern. “Counting your mother,” my friend went on.
My father chose that moment to rejoin us. “Bellad
onna rests well,” he announced. “Her essence is low, but not nearly so low as some of the others’ we’ve seen. It’s good you brought her in, Calendula.” Now he glanced around the room, clearly just noticing the tension. “Did I miss something?”
“Your daughter has just announced her pregnancy,” Dr. Andromedus said. “Lucas, were you aware of this?”
“What?” My father turned to me, shock on his face. “Callie—”
I put a hand up. “Father, I just found out. I told Mother this morning; I would have told you, had you been there. I’m delighted about it, it was unplanned, I have no idea how that happened, and I am not interested in discussing it further at the moment.” I stared back at him. He looked stunned, and sad. My voice softened as I went on. “I’m sorry you had to find out like this. We can talk about it more—later. Because what I’m really concerned about right now is hearing about Mother’s illness, and what the rest of the witches are sick with, and what is being done about it!”
“Calendula, there is no need to become overwrought,” Gregorio put in. “I am sure you can understand how startled everyone is by this—at, as you point out, a time when we are already experiencing a great deal of turmoil.”
I nodded.
He frowned slightly as he went on. “In fact, I cannot help but wonder if the two phenomena might not be so unrelated as they seem.”
“What do you mean?” My dad and the research assistants looked confused as well.
“It seems to me that we have two sudden, inexplicable medical situations, in a species that has been quite stable for—so far as we know—millennia. Certainly witchkind has been stable for the many centuries I have been here, and those of my mentors before me. Magical essence does not just drain away on its own, without cause. And as a biologist, Calendula, working on this very issue, you know better than almost anyone that an ‘accidental’ pregnancy has always been impossible.” He gazed at me appraisingly. “If you are quite certain you did not set this in motion intentionally, it is worrisome indeed.”
“Believe me, I was not intending to get pregnant.”
