A Celtic Witch

Chapter 16



Marcus stood outside Moira’s back gate and contemplated the inn’s side entrance. In Realm, he’d invoke invisibility, waltz up to the second floor, and leave his package outside Cassidy’s door.

In real life, he had a toddler holding his hand, the package was wrapped in screaming pink tissue paper, and Tuesday was the day Aaron scrubbed the inn from top to bottom.

They would be about as invisible as a Las Vegas casino sign.

Maybe he could bribe Lizzie to make the delivery—but he’d have to walk the entire length of the village to do it. He looked down at the bright pink tissue paper and cursed for about the hundredth time of the morning. In the dead of night, it had looked boring and gray.

So many things that seemed sane at 2 a.m. turned out badly. He looked down at his daughter. “Let’s go home, shall we?” They could just pretend it had been a nice walk, deep-six the package in the back of the hall closet, and get on with the rest of their day.

Morgan looked up at him, a classic Buchanan scowl scrunching her features. “G’an. Fowers.”

Moira was the last person on earth he wanted spying the package under his arm. “We’ll get flowers later, sweetheart.”

“Fowers.” Said in the tone of voice that suggested his daughter was going to have no trouble locating the terrible twos.

In the summer, there were flowers all over the village. In the dead of winter, his options were very limited. Marcus bent down, resorting to sheer bribery. “How about we go bloom a whole bunch of flowers right in front of our cottage?”

It was an excellent offer—she’d been asking every time they passed through their rather barren yard. So far, he’d managed to convince her that Buchanans didn’t festoon their land with flowers, mostly by the expedient method of picking her up and carrying her inside.

Morgan tipped her head, considering. And then gave him one of her classic impudent grins and turned back to the gate. “G’an. Fowers.”

Hecate’s hells. The gods must be laughing at him this morning. Marcus racked his brain for a better bribe—and then heard footsteps behind them. He offered up a quick, wordless prayer for a minor earthquake. Or a moose to fall out of the sky.

Anything that might distract the three women standing behind him.

“Good morning to you, nephew.” Moira leaned past him and touched Morgan’s cheek. “And hello, sweet girl. Have you come for a visit?”

Morgan smiled, purple eyes bright with confidence that Gran would give her everything she wanted. “Fowers.”

“Of course, sweetheart. Any that you like.” Moira looked up at Marcus, a clear message in her eyes. No one got to be rude in her presence.

Marcus ran through all of the words that had ever landed him cauldron-scrubbing duties. Quietly. And then tucked the package in the folds of his cloak and turned to face the music. “Good morning, Sophie. Cassidy.”

Sophie, kind to the core, averted her gaze from his cloak. He was pretty sure that wasn’t enough to save him.

Cass watched his face, puzzled. “Good morning. We were just out for a bit of a walk on the beach.”

Her mind wasn’t as sad today. Marcus scowled. He didn’t want to know that. “We’re going home.” They weren’t—the defiance in his daughter’s head was perfectly clear.

“Were you bringing me a wee gift?” Moira reached for the package with innocent delight.

Damn. He’d forgotten that the seventy-four-year-old woman liked getting presents at least as much as the average toddler. “It’s not for you.” He waited a beat—she was going to be far too happy about what happened next.

He’d licked a cold railing in winter once. This was about to be worse. Taking a deep breath, Marcus handed the package to its intended recipient. “A small gift. I was hoping it would cheer you up.” It was his last charitable act of the decade. Or possibly longer.

Cass reached for the pink monstrosity, eyes puzzled. The other three members of their motley little gathering watched in silence, fascinated.

And Marcus wished harder for teleporting skills than he ever had in his life.

He could not, however, manage to yank up his mind barriers tight enough to keep out what happened next.

Cassidy peeled off the outer layers of pink, carefully stuffing the paper in her pockets. And when she got to the simple frame inside, only stared.

Someone watching from a distance might have thought she didn’t like it. The man uncomfortably linked with her mind caught the full force of her sad, tangled, overwhelmed, astonished gratitude.

And to his eternal shame, it made him babble. “I did it up on the computer. I’m not much of an artist, but digital renderings aren’t terribly difficult.” It had taken him half the night. “I should have put it in a tube so you could take it with you.” Only an idiot gave a big glass-covered piece of dubious art to someone who spent their life on the road.

Moira moved to Cass’s side, infernally curious, and lifted her hands to her cheeks, quite overcome. “Oh, my. It looks just like her.”

Of course it did. He’d begun with a photograph of Nan borrowed from Sophie’s camera. Not a good one, but adequate for his purposes. Finding some stock footage of Ireland hadn’t been terribly more difficult.

He bent his head, embarrassed in every atom. He should have just given her a cookie. Or a puppy. Or any of the normal things people did to try to cheer someone up.

Cass looked up, astonished pleasure all over her face. “It’s wonderful. You did this for me?”

“He’s very talented,” said Sophie quietly, throwing him farther under the bus. She moved to look at his work. “And I don’t think I’ve ever seen one he’s done that’s quite this lovely.”

Sophie was one of about three people in the world who knew he’d done all the artwork for his Realm high keep himself.

Cass reached out to touch the digitally painted face of her grandmother. “Could I get a smaller copy?”

A politeness. Something she could tuck out of the way more easily. Marcus reached for the portrait of the woman with Cassidy’s eyes. “Certainly.” Escape. Finally.

Her hands clenched on the frame. “No. You misunderstand.” Cass cuddled the unwieldy square to her chest, eyes unnaturally bright. “I want this one. I’ll treasure this one. I was hoping for another copy I could send to Nan.”

Strange things were happening to Marcus’s knees.

And he had no earthly idea what to say.

“Fowers.” Morgan, blithely unaware of most of what was going on, wobbled impatiently from one booted foot to the other.

“Ah, do you want to go see the gardens, lovey?” Cass smiled down at the small girl. “Why don’t you come with us, then? We were headed to pick some bouquets for the inn.” She looked back up at Marcus, her eyes still riding high with emotions he didn’t want to see. “I can walk her home when we’re done.”

“I’ll take her.” Marcus was amazed he could speak at all.

Cass gave him an odd look. “I don’t mind.”

“I need some air. We’ll get you your flowers.” Buckets of them. He’d take escape however it came.

“Not alone, you won’t.” Moira smiled at him sweetly, face all elderly innocence. “I remember the last time I left the Buchanan boys alone in my garden.” She reached for Morgan’s other hand. “Let’s go teach your da how to properly cut a flower stem, shall we?”

Marcus followed where he was led. And felt amusement scattering his embarrassment to the winds. Evan was still getting him into trouble.

And his wise old aunt was still helping him out of it.

-o0o-

A fire crackled in the parlor’s ornate fireplace, warming the inn and the two women sitting on the room’s most comfortable couch.

One stared into the fire, body language anything but serene, a beautiful piece of digital art in her lap.

The other waited for her new friend to be ready to talk.

“He holds her so tightly.”

Sophie wondered if Cass could hear the knots of confusion in her voice. Something was building in their Irish visitor—and Morgan wasn’t the main cause. “He has reason to.” And clearly she’d been voted the witch to have that conversation.

Green eyes were looking her way now. “Reasons you can talk about?”

Oh, to have a life where the lines were clearer. Sophie fussed with the knitting in her lap, looking for a signpost in the wilderness. “Tell me what you’ve learned of him so far.”

“He’s kind.” Cass nested deeper into the other end of the couch, tucking a pillow under her knees. The portrait of Nan hadn’t budged from her lap. “He’s absolutely devoted to Morgan, and Lizzie would follow him to the ends of the earth even though he does nothing but growl most of the time.” The words slowed. “And he’s known some kind of very great sadness. It’s left him bitter, I think. And it made him gentle.”

Wow. Marcus would have fits if he knew she read him that well. Sophie weighed the scales a moment longer and made her peace. Cass deserved to know what she flirted with—and perhaps Sophie could lighten his burden by being the one to tell it. “He had a twin brother. They did everything together, every moment of the day. And they both had magic very young. Marcus made storms, and Evan was a fire witch.”

Cass winced. Even in Ireland, they knew what that meant. “You must have been very busy.”

“It happened before I was born.” Sophie swallowed hard—it still hurt terribly to speak of a small boy’s loss, whether she’d known him or not. “They were so busy putting out fires that they didn’t notice he was an astral traveler as well. One night, his spirit flew to the stars and didn’t come back.”

Horror hit Cass’s eyes.

“Marcus tried to save him—nearly crippled his own channels in the doing.” She’d seen the echoes of anguish in the auras of the healers who had spent months nursing the broken boy. They’d repaired what could be mended.

“Oh.” The sound whooshed straight out of Cass’s heart. “How old were they?”

“Five.” Younger than Lizzie—a bright sprite whose biggest worry was a good hiding place for her light saber. Sophie gave up on her knitting and stared at the fire, still trying to make her own peace with unfathomable unfairness.

Cass sat quietly on the other end of the couch, tears tracking slowly down from green eyes. Sorrow for a boy she’d never met. And for the man who had lost him.

Sophie finally choked back her own sadness and looked back over at the witch who had been fetched to be part of this. “He lost half his soul that day. And grew up into a sad, cranky, lonely man.”

Cass managed a smile. “He’s more than that now. What happened?”

The very best part of the story. One that leavened all their sorrows with giggles and delight. “Evan sent Morgan.”

Eyes widened—but not in doubt.

Good. Sophie picked up her knitting again. Breathing deeply, she settled in and began the tale of a small girl with lavender eyes and the two brave men who had fought the universe to keep her safe.

And wondered, even as she wove the tale, how the newest chapter would end.

-o0o-

Moira made her way slowly through the dormant beds and old creeping vines of her garden, happy to keep pace with Morgan’s steps and her nephew’s glacial thinking.

She felt oddly disinclined to push him. “There are some lovely flowers in bloom over by the pool. Some for the inn, and perhaps for a few of the villagers as well.”

“Aaron can pick his own damn flowers.”

Well. She might not be planning to interfere just yet, but tolerating that kind of manners was quite different. “Don’t growl at me just because you’re cross with yourself.” Her nephew had been visibly, nakedly kind—and that wasn’t going to rest easy in his heart.

The man still fancied himself a curmudgeon.

The glare wasn’t any friendlier than the growl had been. Moira shook her head, feeling a mite cranky herself.

And then a hand reached for her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I’m feeling protective of Morgan today, probably overly so. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”

A faerie could have knocked her over with a wee sprig of Irish moss. Moira stared, garden mission forgotten. He was entirely wrong about what was making him grumpy, but that didn’t change her astonishment any.

“What, a man can’t apologize?” Marcus raised an eyebrow. “Lizzie says it’s good for me and I need to practice.”

She tried not to laugh, truly she did. And succeeded not a whit—it was far too easy to imagine their youngest healer saying exactly that.

Marcus shook his head, moderately amused.

Since when did he find Lizzie’s antics openly funny? Moira considered him. Really looked. And what she saw pleased her greatly. “There are far too many women in this village trying to mold you, aren’t there? And we’re not looking at the man you’ve become.”

A man well capable of holding his fate in his own hands.

She turned away from his startled gaze. It wouldn’t do for him to see the depth of her pleasure. “Very well, then. Let’s find some flowers, shall we?”

“That’s all you’ve got to say?” He sounded skeptical—and a little dazed.

“Were you hoping for more?”

He stomped down the path after her. “Perhaps.”

She grinned at her sleeping garden. “I’d be happy to offer an opinion, if you’ve a question to ask me.”

It pained him, she could tell. He kicked and scuffed through her dry leaves like the small boy who’d squashed her prize petunias. But when she reached the patch of flowers by the pool and turned, he had a question in his eyes.

A serious one.

Marcus grabbed for a flower at random. “Do you think I hold Morgan too close?”

Ah. He would put her first—for the last year, he’d done little else. “At this age, I’m not sure there’s such a thing as holding them too tightly. And she spends plenty of time playing with Lizzie and visiting with the rest of us.”

His exhale was harsh. “It’s hard to let her do even that much some times. I’m afraid I’ll turn around one day and discover she’s gone.”

Such love lived in him. And such fear still. Moira picked a pretty tiger lily. “You’ve had a life where many who love you have left.” His brother. His parents, unable to deal with either the child who had gone or the one who remained.

His baby daughter, not tethered tightly enough to this plane. Her, they’d been able to bring back.

“I have to let her grow up unafraid.” He stared at Moira, eyes fierce. “I want you to tell me if I’m holding her too tightly. Please.”

Her heart broke a little for him. And rejoiced. “You’re a very good father, Marcus Buchanan.” She looked at his brave face and decided to answer a question he hadn’t asked. Just one. “It’s not Morgan you hold too tightly.”

His face froze—and his fingers mashed one of her favorite violets.

She rescued the bloom and steered him toward the less-tender daisies. “Evan was once the reason you closed yourself off from possibility. Don’t let Morgan be that reason now. It’s not necessary. She’s well-loved and resilient—whatever makes you happy will make her happy.”

It was obvious that the idea that he deserved to be happy still fit like a coat three sizes too small. It was also obvious that he was at least considering what she obliquely suggested. The emotions running across his face were a lovely and breathtaking story of a man contemplating a leap off a cliff.

Moira turned to her petunias and snipped. A canny old Irish witch knew when to leave budding miracles well enough alone.

-o0o-

So many things were clearer now. And some important ones far more muddy.

Cass sat in the window seat of the inn’s second floor reading nook, nested in a pile of pillows. And looked at the portrait of Nan, full of life and luminance and comfort, leaning against the wall.

The man who had made it saw so much.

Sophie’s story was still causing fracture lines in Cass’s heart. Simple, painful words, told by a woman who felt every one of them deeply.

And like the best music, it had come with many layers.

Morgan, and her father’s need to keep her close and safe.

The abject bravery of a man who had faced his deepest fear and his oldest sorrow to protect the small girl with the lavender eyes.

A baby he’d dared to love.

A miracle and a tale for the ages. And it had all happened in a sleepy, out-of-the-way fishing village.

It had been the story of a hero. Of a heart crusted with sadness that had still opened to the light. And the astonishing community that had loved the man. The kindness—decades of it—that had saved him. She had watched Nan heal enough patients, and fail to heal enough others, to have some idea of what the journey must have been.

Her musician’s ear had taken in all the layers, all the notes. The woman had no idea what to do with what she’d heard.

Because the man who wore teal sweaters and bloomed flowers for his daughter in the dead of winter wasn’t broken. Scarred, yes.

But not broken.

And there had been one thing Sophie hadn’t said—but it wove through every word.

Marcus Buchanan deserved a life that never shattered him again.

He didn’t need an itinerant Irish musician treating his life lightly. Especially one who had apparently tumbled into a bit of a crisis herself. Cassidy Farrell had always known who she was, what she wanted to be. That was suddenly about as clear as the dim shadows out the window.

Evening dark approached. The gloaming.

Cass looked again at the picture of Nan, sitting in the Irish hills of impossible green and light. And knew that no one would have less patience for a confused witch feeling sorry for herself.

Or for one who tread heavily on a kind heart.

It was time to find the part of this song that knew where it was going. Or an ending and an exit Cassidy Farrell knew how to play.

-o0o-

So peaceful when she slept. Marcus reached a hand down to Morgan’s curls, smiling when she cuddled into his hand.

She hadn’t been nearly so happy when he’d tossed her into their cold and clanky tub to rinse the split-pea soup out of her hair. It was green—he should have known better. Punk girlchild.

He had no idea how he’d ever breathed without her.

Aunt Moira had that much wrong. He was already happy.

Not sparks-and-pipe-dreams happy, but the kind of everyday contentment that still astonished him when he thought of it. Even when the bathroom was drafty, his daughter was cranky, and the kitchen still had cold soup congealing on the floor.

He’d lived with pristine floors and faultless plumbing. It hadn’t held a candle to this.

One last look and Marcus backed out of Morgan’s bedroom, doing the automatic dance that would keep him off the two floorboards that squeaked. And shook his head ruefully. Fear was a damn stupid reason to be avoiding a sorely needed bathroom renovation. It wasn’t the ramshackle cottage that held the secret to his happiness.

She was sleeping in her bed.

He slipped into the kitchen, wanting the cup of tea that heralded his precious solitary hours in the dark. Come summer, he would sit out on his porch and watch the colors light up the sky. This time of year, that was still courting frostbite.

He reached for the light and then paused, attention caught by the shadows moving outside the window. Well-lit shadows tonight—the moon must be full.

It was strangely beautiful, the row of practical, commonsense cottages down each side of the road, punctuated by the occasional weathered tree and a whimsical trellis or two. It still amused him that the fanciest of those belonged to Uncle Billy, the village’s best fisherman. Said he used it to repair his nets.

Nobody said anything about the pretty clematis that trailed up it the rest of the time.

Two human-shaped shadows walked down the road arm in arm, pausing now and then to peer at something in the moonlight.

He watched them, his two shadows, oddly caught by the ease between them. And then the taller of the shadows turned and Marcus saw the lumpy shape on his back. Ah. Mike and Sophie. Their son liked to be outside.

He’d seen less of the two of them out on the road lately. The village whispers said it was Cassidy’s magic.

For the sake of the two shadows on the road, Marcus hoped not. He felt her mind far too often. And the part that loved this little fishing village by the sea was at war with the one that had twenty-six years of practice being a fiddler on the eternal bardic road.

He knew from painful experience that the happy parts rarely won those kind of fights. And how miserably hard it could be to try to look in the mirror and see someone new.

He imagined it was that much harder if the current person in your mirror was the talented, buoyant, vibrant Cassidy Farrell. Giving up Marcus Buchanan, crusty old bachelor, was hard enough.

Sophie and Mike leaned into each other outside his window, their shadows merging briefly into one.

It occurred to Marcus that he’d had that, once. A twin. One half of something greater.

He couldn’t stop the small voice wondering what it might be like to have that again.