Page 32 of Thistle Thorns

“But we already know the spellcaster,” Shari said in her quiet voice. She looked from one face to another like the answer was painfully obvious before wiping the rain off from the end of her nose with the cuff of her puffy coat sleeve. “Antler Tattoo Guy.”

“Antler Tattoo Guy?” Grandmother echoed.

“Has a pair of deer antlers on his throat. Right here.” Shari indicated the spot on her own throat. “Leaf-like tattoos everywhere else. Looks just like the leaf brand on the fairy’s ankle.”

“It’s what?” Daphne, Flora, and I exclaimed.

Shari just blinked. “I was the one keeping its leg pinned when y’all were fussing with its face last night, remember? I wasn’t about to look away and then get kicked in the head, so naturally I kept my eyes on what was in front of me.” She shuddered. “I felt like a creepy Victorian voyeur ogling a woman’s ankles.”

“I’m looking for myself,” Flora declared.

“Me too,” Mom said, following her outside.

Grandmother seized my arm and yanked me close. “Antler Tattoo Guy?”

“The magic hunter from today. The one with the black hair and blue eyes, smoking the cigarette. He had a scarf on covering up the tattoo.”

“And you didn’t think to mention this sooner?” she hissed.

“You saw the fae markings on his skin!”

“Antlers,” she muttered, releasing me as Mom and Flora returned. Mom only nodded gravely.

The present Hawthornes became very, very quiet.

“What is it?” Daphne asked suspiciously.

“Ummm,” came Aunt Peony’s singsong interruption. “Supper’s ready.”

The tension shattered in the hearth room like a glass chandelier falling to the floor, and all of us except Grandmother flinched.

She turned on her heel and stormed towards the dining room.

When no reprimand came, Aunt Peony thrust her head back out the kitchen window and hollered, “Otter!” Guess my cousin had been out patrolling after all. “Quit lollygagging. Bring this pot over to the hobs then be back quick as you can!”

Dale, who’d been quite forgotten about as a kitchen helper, was quick to snatch up the smaller basket of steaming biscuits and hustle outside, not wanting to get in the crosshairs of another Hawthorne family argument.

I turned to my friends as the rest of my family started making their way to the dining room. “Would you, um, like to stay for dinner?”

“So long as Flint is chained to your porch, I’m not going anywhere.” Flora shucked her jacket and boots by the back door and marched into the kitchen as boldly as if she were a Hawthorne herself.

“We don’t want to be a bother, dear,” Daphne said quietly, removing her hat and hanging it on an empty peg by the door, “but I did mean what I said. Moral support.”

“It smells really good, too,” Shari said, sloughing off her coat. She kept her bag with her, though, the knitting needles poking out of the top. No sooner did she untie the orange legs of her turkey hat than they jiggled as the hearth released another warning pulse.

I heard the Hawthorne witches strike their cuffs, each of them obviously on a hair trigger now that there was a feral fairy chained to the porch and a gang of magic hunters quite possibly trying to track it down.

Shari adjusted her bag and gripped the knitting needles poking out of the top. “Sounds like someone’s knocking on your front door.”

I blitzed through the kitchen, the little hallway, and past the foyer connecting the dining room and den to reach the door first. Every Hawthorne, except Aunt Peony and Otter, stood from where they’d previously been sitting at the table, magic wreathing their hands. Ivy-green for all blood Hawthornes, yellow-green for Dad, and brown-green for Uncle Badger.

“Get away from the door, Meadow,” my grandmother ordered.

But that warning pulse had been an announcement just like the one it’d released in response to Daphne and Shari. And, I daresay, the hearth and house seemed happy with its visitor, for the doorknob practically leapt into my hand and the heavy door eagerly opened with the lightest pull.

Arthur Greenwood took up the entire doorframe, broad shoulders blocking out the dark skies behind him. Mist clung to his trimmed beard and hair, dotting on his eyelashes. He’d obviously changed after work, no longer in his customary red plaid flannel, khaki pants, and suspenders. His boots were buckled black leather, his pants thick denim against the cold, and the black leather of his motorcycle jacket creaked as he stepped inside, ducking slightly to avoid hitting his head on the lintel.

He’d come as the Coalition enforcer, not as the Redbud lumbersnack.

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