Page 38 of Thistle Thorns

“Simply, our magic is different from theirs. Ours is Life, and theirs?” She shrugged. Guess we didn’t have a book in any one of our dozen libraries back home that covered the subject of In-Between creatures and their magic. “The In-Between is more of a sphincter anyway. It enables a quick passing through; we were never meant to linger in it like we did. Your friend, the quiet one, she’s got a little arcane magic, doesn’t she? She was the reason why the portal didn’t close.”

Because of whatever the demon cult did to her. Maybe Shari Cable had started out one-hundred-percent human, but it didn’t seem like she was that now. “I’ve never asked her about it. Maybe she’s a hedge witch.”

When I didn’t elaborate, even after Mom had fixed me with a look that back at Hawthorne Manor would have had me spilling the beans, she finished applying the potion to the mirror and stepped back.

When she was clear of the protection barrier, Grandmother closed her hands into fists and blinked, snuffing out her power.

Her silent, assessing stare had me reporting, “We’re about halfway done. I brought the dry pieces up.”

“Forsythia, I’m quite parched after all that chanting,” Grandmother said, watching me. “Would you go make me some tea, please? I’ll be down in a moment.”

As I moved to follow my mother down the ladder, my grandmother said, “Stay, Meadow.”

I paused at the trap door.

She clasped her hands in front of her, an imperious lift to her eyebrows. “Is there something you wish to say to me?”

With those words, an opportunity presented itself that I might never get again. With a flick of my glowing fingertips, the trap door fell, shutting us away in the attic. Magic glowed in my eyes. “Yes.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

“Is there something you wish to say to me?”

Only a billion and a half things, and we’ll start with— I swallowed, the physical act a mimic of the mental act of shoving away those unhelpful thoughts.

Despite my frustration, now was not the time to be combative. My body trembled as I sucked in a steeling breath. Grandmother and I would never see eye to eye on Arthur, or any shifter, or my friends and life here in Redbud, but there was something we could always agree on: the importance of family. Getting Marten back. I would focus on that.

On the exhale, I came to her side like I was her treasured pupil again. She gave me a cautious look, hands unclasping in case she had to defend herself. It hurt that we had come to this, and I vowed then and there that as far as it was up to me, I would try to be at peace with her. Within the scope of my morals and in the defense of my own path, of course.

“Arcadis said he wasn’t a demon at all, but Unseelie fae,” I said calmly.

“The distinction is hardly worth making,” Grandmother replied, not dismissively. Her eyes flickered over my face, questioning my choice of conversation. It certainly hadn’t been the tirade she’d been expecting. “But yes.”

Other than knowing there were two courts, Seelie and Unseelie, that they abhorred iron—though maybe that was just the Seelie, since iron didn’t seem to have any effect on gem-entrapped demonic half-hearts—and viewed us supes as thieves of their power, I didn’t know much else. Perhaps not an omission in my education as other things had been—their secretive nature and traveling portals made it difficult to get any information down on them. That, and the fact that most who went through those portals never returned.

“How does that detail help us get Marten back?” I asked.

She cocked her eyebrow at me, impressed at my deduction. Magic and spells were precise. Details always mattered. “Arcadis is fae, and that means he’ll want to bargain. But fae bargains are tricky, nuanced, and completely unbreakable. Knowing that, we’ll craft our demands, and our replies to his inevitable counteroffers, very carefully.”

“He’ll try to entrap us,” I summarized.

She nodded. “Get everything he wants”—her ivy-green eyes dropped to his ring on the chain around my neck—“and leave us worse off than we already are.” Then Iris Hawthorne squared her shoulders, gazing at the shimmering waterfall mirror. “But I’ve dealt with him before. He’ll be desperate for that ring, so we’ll be negotiating from the high ground.”

“Is that how you got him to cleave his heart for the protection spell? Because you held the high ground?”

Grandmother once again glanced at the ring hanging next to Arthur’s pendant. “Yes.”

“Was it this ring?” I exclaimed.

“When it was made clear to me what the next century would hold—you, Meadow—I traveled to the Moors of Tarsaghaun for the wights—pure spirits. In this realm, the resemble animals of white vapor and are nigh impossible to catch. But they are travelers of the In-Between.

“During the last fae war, the Unseelie were sealed away in their courts and their access to this mortal realm cut off, except by only the darkest avenues.”

Sacrifice, I realized, my thoughts turning to Shari. Then I shuddered, remembering what her quilt had shown us. What that cult had been preparing her for.

“Obviously providing a way for such a fae to return here would be of exceptional value,” Grandmother continued, clasping her hands together. “So I summoned my battle magic and captured a wight, transferring its spirit into the diamonds in that ring. It took five to contain it all. It’s ancient magic, something I didn’t want you youngsters toying with.”

Hence your rebuke and scorn anytime one of us tried to use a crystal in a spell. You didn’t want us taking a crystal with a spirit trapped in it and releasing it. More ignorance instead of just telling us the truth.

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