Page 50 of Thistle Thorns

I made a show of pursing my lips, locking down on that secret. I couldn’t explain it anyway.

He chuckled. “Seems like you’re not even sure what you did.” Leaning forward, he nuzzled his nose against my forehead. “Do you remember what you first said to me when we met? You said I was trouble. I think this is very much the other way around.”

“Sorry.”

With his hands on my arms, he eased me away so he could drop out of the window, his boots thunking on the porch. “The elm tree’s been on my sweep, so I’ll keep doing it.”

“You’re kind of amazing, Arthur Greenwood, you know that?”

The lumberjack shifter winked. “Been waiting to hear those words from your mouth since the day we met. Now, Sawyer,” he said in a commanding voice.

The little cat under the quilts hunched.

“Don’t bother hiding. I can smell you’re there.”

The quilts rustled, and a sulking striped face emerged. “What? Wanna swallow my witch’s face again when I’m actually watching this time? I’m no peeping tom.”

Arthur and I blushed. He recovered first, tapping the windowsill in a silent request.

The tabby tomcat wiggled himself free, padded across the bed, and hopped up into the sill. “Yes, bear?”

Before Sawyer could stop him, Arthur engulfed the cat’s head with his hand, fingers kneading his cheeks and scruff and down his spine. “Thanks for helping our girl. She might’ve been unconscious, but I felt her reaction to you when you gave her some of your magic. You took away her pain.”

Sawyer had arched his spine into the lumberjack’s hand, unable to help himself. He loved his scratches and strokes. “You’re welcome, I guess,” the cat mumbled.

“Thanks, little cat,” I told him too, scooping him up for a snuggle against my face.

Apparently that undermined his tough tomcat persona, especially in front of the bear shifter, and Sawyer batted me on the nose with a velveted paw to make me let go. He spilled out of my hands to the floor, returning to the bed.

Arthur didn’t pull me in for a goodbye kiss, but his hands covered mine on the windowsill. “I think your grandmother’s right, Meadow. You should stay within the wards of the farmhouse until you have your brother back and your coven remade. You, not to mention the other supernatural citizens of Redbud, won’t be safe until that last magic hunter is caught.”

“What happened to the others with him?” I asked. I hadn’t had a chance to ask Grandmother, and Dad hadn’t mentioned them taking any prisoners to question.

“They’re fertilizer, Meadow,” he replied calmly, “their stolen magic returning to the earth.”

Not long ago, I would have shuddered at those words, but now, I absorbed them with grim acceptance.

“Cody is staying with Emmett and Monkfoot for the next few days while I’m hunting.” His hands squeezed mine, almost painfully. “I won’t stop until I find him, Meadow, but if I’m to be successful, I can’t be worrying about you. If you’re here, safe within these walls, I’ll be more effective. Please, say you’ll stay. For me.”

“I will,” I promised him, bringing one of his hands to my mouth to seal my promise with a kiss. “But you keep me updated, you hear, Arthur Greenwood? I need to help my family get Marten back, and I can’t be worried about you either.”

“Bear fur doesn’t come with built-in cell phone pockets, you know.” His fingers brushed against my cheek. “But I’ll do my best.”

His weight shifted forward, like he was preparing to say something else or drag me half through the window again for another heart-hammering kiss, but he did none of those things. Instead, he took hold of the sash and pulled it down, shutting the window and securing me inside the farmhouse. I pressed my hand against a glass pane, him touching the other side of the in perfect mimicry, his hazel eyes turning fully amber.

Then, he was gone.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

The family was well awake before dawn, assembling in the dining room for another one of Aunt Peony’s hearty breakfasts of blueberry muffins, banana bread, and hashbrown casserole. There was coffee and plenty of rabbitfoot clover tea to keep us wide awake for all the work to come.

I’d realized, after witnessing the uncustomary frantic devouring of the food and drink, that my injury and the resulting hunt for Antler Tattoo had delayed our prep work. The hearth hadn’t the strength to keep the farmhouse and its farm warded, heal me, and cook all the various potions we’d need for tonight, so we were behind. Very behind.

There was no patrolling today, other than what Sawyer—who slipped Grandmother’s attempts to collar him once again—and the hobs provided. Mostly from the safety of their tunnels. The wards on the property had shrunk to only the farmhouse and the fenced-in yard to accommodate the vast energy we’d need for the spells, so no one wanted to be outside unprotected for long.

The entire family divided themselves between the hearth room, the kitchen, and the dining room to dry, extract, pulverize, steep, mash, and otherwise prep all of the foraged ingredients, then combine them into a variety of potions that had all the Dutch ovens and every spare pot on the hearth slate stones and bubbling away. Grandmother forbade anyone to use the kettle for anything but water, so we wouldn’t cross-contaminate our tea with any potions, and Aunt Peony marked off one section of the tiny kitchen for nothing but food. Her dandelion helpers guarded it like they would a castle, though they were armed with cutlery instead of spears.

We took shifts, not just at chopping and hauling more wood for the hearth, but napping as well. A few family members were more indispensable than others and received a rare chewable-gummy stimulant that looked like a neon-blue grub (and maybe it was) instead of the time to nap: Mom, for her knowledge of spells, Aunt Peony for her acumen as a potions master, Uncle Badger, for his talent at manipulating wood, and Grandmother, for her sheer power. Some others, particularly Dad and Aunt Eranthis, visited the portal strand in the woods every few hours to check what Aunt Eranthis called “its tensile strength.” From the way her face was scrunched up more and more every time they returned, she apparently wasn’t liking what she was seeing.

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