A Nomadic Witch

Chapter 16

Jamie walked into the Witches’ Lounge, Kenna in one arm, a bag of guy food in the other. He grinned at the assembled guys and babies. The Fairy Godfathers, reunited. “Who called the meeting?”

“I did,” said a dry voice from behind him.

Daniel came over to grab the bag of food and waved at Morgan, riding kangaroo-style in Marcus’s pouch. “Traced back my hack, did you? It was a fairly sloppy one.”

“Wasn’t necessary.” Marcus’s lips quirked. “I don’t know all that many men capable of creating a baby dressing flow chart.”

Mike grinned at Jamie-that one had been their little contribution.

Aaron looked up, his daughter a tiny, curled puddle on his chest. “How’d the bath thing go?”

Marcus snorted. “She’s clean. Let’s just leave it at that.”

Yeah. Kenna’s short life had been full of a lot of overly exciting moments, but by far the worst had been the first time Jamie had tried to give her a bath. He had no freaking clue how fathers without teleporting skills managed it.

Mike sniffed at the air. “Anything good in that bag? Starving.”

“Sorry.” Aaron shifted slightly, freeing up an arm. “Steaks require more than ten minutes of warning.”

Doritos didn’t. “You’ll just have to clog your arteries along with the rest of us this time.” Jamie tossed over a bag, wincing as it almost dinged Aislin in the head. His porting reflexes were toast after the sword fight. Keeping Lizzie out of the moat had been a full-time job, and Aervyn had been too busy waving his arms at imaginary dragons to be much help.

Aaron contemplated the bag. “Whoever designed these things was clearly not a father.”

Jamie laughed as he tried to keep Kenna’s hands out of the second bag. “It doesn’t get any easier.” He remembered one very sad night on the couch watching baseball, newborn Kenna asleep in one arm, his other fondling an unopenable beer and bag of chips.

Mike reached over and amiably ripped open Aaron’s chips, helping himself to a large handful in the process. “These are banned from the house right now. Something about orange breast milk not being good for babies.”

Jamie refrained from mentioning how many Doritos Nell had eaten while pregnant. None of her babies had been born orange. However, the rules for nursing moms were mystical, obscure, and absolute. And quite often made up on the spot by an exhausted, hungry mama.

Any man with half a brain learned to dispense love, sympathy, and food, not necessarily in that order. And to eat his Doritos in secret.

“If you all have your helping of orange poison now-” Marcus put Morgan down on the floor beside Kenna and looked around the room. “I need more help.”

Jamie ignored the Dorito slander-Marcus had always been a strange witch.

Daniel reached over and tickled Morgan’s belly. “She looks happy, nothing smells, and the diaper’s not on backwards. Looks like you have it under control.”

“Not with that.” Marcus shook his head. “It’s the traveling. I need a brain trust.”

Jamie raised an eyebrow. “You have a pretty big one.” Realm had closed ranks around their grumpiest player. Even now, half the level-seven players were trying to work out exactly what had set off the alarms.

“I know.” Quiet gratitude leaked out of Marcus’s head, along with a heaping dose of frustration. “But all we’ve done so far is fancy Band-Aids.” He looked down at Morgan, busy watching Kenna trying to roll over. “It’s going to take more than that.”

“She didn’t travel at all this time, right?” Daniel leaned back, eyes pensive. “Realm made a difference. Or the wards did.”

Maybe both. “We’re working on that.” Jamie tapped his tablet, checking on his sister’s progress reports. They’d ruled out false alarms and game shenanigans. “Nell’s adding some more layers to what Ginia already had in place.”

“She didn’t travel.” Marcus’s words were terse, and somehow ominous. “But whatever came for her came in broad daylight.”

Oh, shit. Jamie froze, fingers snapping back to his tablet. Astral travel happened at night. Always. He messaged Nell, and then looked up, facing the fear lurking in Marcus’s eyes. “Maybe Realm made it easier. Changed the rules somehow.” Night and day in Realm were very ephemeral things, decided by a few lines of code.

“Maybe it’s time to try Kansas instead of Realm,” said Daniel quietly.

“I don’t know.” Marcus shrugged, and every father in the room felt his helpless anger. “I can’t ward her half as well in Kansas. And I don’t know if Realm has anything to do with this. Maybe it’s Morgan who’s different.” He swallowed audibly. “Or the magic that sent her here.”

Daniel nodded slowly, a master strategist weighing the odds. “Then fight from turf you know.”

“Trying.” Marcus’s face was a picture of impatient frustration. He squatted down beside his girl on the floor and reached for her hands, voice suddenly hoarse. “But I still think there’s something I’m supposed to figure out, and I have no earthly idea what it is.” His plea for help pounded into every mind in the room.

Jamie watched, empathy in overdrive, as the little girl with purple eyes wrapped her fingers around those of the man who loved her.

And then Morgan burped like a linebacker, and mirth hit the room like a ton of bricks.

Mike eyed Marcus, chuckling. “You teach her that?”

“Hardly.” The voice was crusty old bachelor to the core-but his eyes held an odd mix of embarrassment and pride.

Daniel leaned over and picked up his niece. “How about you, Kenna girl? Got any football burps in you? Or trucker farts?” He smiled, tossing her in the air. “Your cousin Nathan used to fart like a jet airplane.”

Kenna giggled and babbled, no farts in sight. Jamie sighed-it wasn’t for lack of trying. He looked over at Marcus. “They’re never too young to start farting lessons.”

“I’ll suggest it to Aunt Moira.” The delivery was deadpan, which only got Mike and Aaron laughing harder.

Jamie grinned-Moira had high tolerance for most little-boy stunts, but she’d always drawn the line at farting contests of any kind. He got down on the floor and tickled Morgan’s toes. “You want lessons, munchkin, you just come find me.”

She kicked her feet and puckered up. Jamie watched, fascinated, as she wiggled her lips, silently, intent on some not-quite-there trick. “What’s she trying to do?”

The embarrassed pride in Marcus’s mind spiked to entirely new levels. “Just something Lizzie showed her.”

Morgan tried again, and managed some odd spluttery sounds.

And then Marcus, studiously ignoring everyone in the room, leaned over and blew a raspberry into her toes.

Morgan laughed in belly-shaking delight-and blew one right back at him.

It was ninety shades of adorable-and if embarrassment could kill, Marcus was right on the brink.

Jamie looked over at Daniel. Someone needed to rescue the poor guy.

Mike intercepted the look and dove into the Doritos. Loudly. “So, what’s next?”

Daniel shrugged. “We think. Backtrack. Put our brains to work.”

Marcus nodded. “That would be appreciated.”

Daniel grinned and tossed Kenna in the air again. “But in the meantime, I think we need to build a better baby carrier.”

Jamie stopped, his hand halfway into the Doritos. “You think we can ward a sling?” It wasn’t a bad idea.

“No.” Daniel rolled his eyes. “I think we can build a smarter sling.” He grabbed Marcus’s pouch. “This thing was built with a woman in mind. Those of us who don’t have built-in milk machines have different needs.”

Marcus’s mind fled into a haze of embarrassment. Jamie tried not to laugh-this meeting had been hard enough on a certain grumpy guy’s ego already.

Daniel held up the pouch again. “Where’s the bottle holder? The permanently attached set of car keys?” He winked at Marcus. “Some place to hang a sword?”

Aaron grinned. “A padded chest.”

Marcus growled.

Jamie visualized a baby sling with breast implants and pushed the image out to the room. Sometimes, you just had to let your inner thirteen-year-old boy out to play.

Daniel snickered. “You’ve been hanging out with Nathan too much again.”

Permanent immaturity was hardly his oldest nephew’s fault. “You don’t think they’d be useful?” Jamie seriously coveted Nat’s chest on a regular basis, and for entirely different reasons than he used to-Kenna slept way better with a little padding under her head.

“I know where we can get some.” Aaron reached for the Doritos, eyes brimming with barely restrained humor. “I hear there’s a new shop in Halifax.”

Marcus slammed his soda down on the table with far more force than necessary. “And then perhaps we can get back to the topic of making sure my little girl stays safe?”

“We’re already there.” Daniel looked over, eyes calm, a world of sympathy in his mind. “Sometimes the easiest way to solve a problem isn’t a straight line.”

“You think adding a sword sheath and breasts to Morgan’s sling is going to fight off the mists?” The grumpy factor hadn’t dialed down a whole lot.

“No.” Daniel leaned back. Jamie could hear the gears of his mighty brain searching for words. “When you code, you start at one end and work to the other.” He waved his hand in the general direction of Realm’s playing fields. “Most programmers do. Follow a line of logic.”

“Sure.” Marcus looked as confused as Jamie felt.

“Hackers don’t.” Daniel shrugged. “We don’t get that luxury. We have to swim around, poke our noses in odd places, trawl for anomalies, connect strange dots.”

“I’ll take your word for that.” Marcus’s voice was dry as dust.

Jamie grinned. His brother-in-law had made peace with his gray-market skills long ago-but Marcus wasn’t a total stranger to those realms either. Entirely straight-laced coders didn’t have firewalls on their personal computers that made Daniel curse.

Hmph. Marcus sounded amused. Gave him some trouble, did I?

Daniel rescued his iPhone from Kenna’s quick hands. “My point is, it’s not always about brute force. You’ve thrown what you know at this thing. Brains, code, common sense.”

Jamie rolled his eyes. “Half the stash of game points in Realm.”

Daniel grinned. “That’s a good thing. Maybe a few lazy witches will start to practice their coding skills again.”

It was a fifteen-year-old argument. Jamie snorted like he was supposed to. “I hear someone’s giving the new kids lessons.” Between Daniel and Moira, Witch Level One had never been quite so… competent.

“Mmm.” Hackers knew when to duck. Daniel looked over at Marcus. “Take a break. Help build a better baby sling, or plant flowers, or buy yourself some new shirts. Wait for strange dots to connect. Stop trying to force it.”

Marcus stared. His brain churned. And then he looked down, a sudden spurt of humor breaking through. “What’s wrong with my shirts?”

Jamie snickered. Quietly. The Fairy Godfather Manual had missed a few things.

Marcus sat down at his computer. The girl-child had just puked on his last clean T-shirt-and black was a hell of a stupid color for taking care of babies.

If a baby was going to reside in the Buchanan household, he needed an entirely different wardrobe. It was only practical.

He typed in the URL for the website Aaron had recommended-and blinked in horrified shock. There were men in the world who wore flaming pink stripes?

Gingerly, he clicked on a category. Men’s shirts. Surely there were choices that were neither pink nor striped. Maybe a nice gray. Or blue. Or some sort of oatmeal color.

Gods. He was not wearing a shirt the color of baby puke.

And if he squinted a lot, you could hardly see the stripes on most of the shirts.

It had to be done. If you couldn’t solve the big problems, incinerate the little ones.

The last time he’d run out of shirts, Morgan had drooled all over his chest hairs. And then slept on the soggy mess all night long. Wincing in memory, Marcus added anything to the shopping cart that didn’t make his eyes bleed. Ten. That should be enough-at least a three-day supply. With overnight shipping, or he was going to be doing midnight laundry again.

And then he clicked back to the home page and bought the one with the pink stripes. Aaron had a birthday coming up.

Sophie walked into Aunt Moira’s kitchen, curious. “You’re sure Nell wanted to meet us here?”

“Aye.” Moira looked over, a twinkle in her eye. “Something about the menfolk having taken over the Witches’ Lounge again.”

Mike had disappeared with a few incoherent mumbles. Sophie patted her son’s well-padded bottom. “Maybe that’s where your daddy’s gone off to.”

“Yup.” Nell landed with a pfft of magic and the whiff of cookies. “Daniel, Aaron, Mike, Jamie, and Marcus. The dad collective.”

Sophie let the word “dad” slide over her image of Marcus. It was a strange and uncomfortable fit-but not an entirely impossible one.

“I’m not sure my nephew is quite ready to admit to fatherhood yet.” Moira handed out tea cups, Irish hospitality on automatic pilot. “But it pleases me that the others have gathered round him.”

“They’ve done more than that,” said Nell, eyes twinkling. She pulled a sheaf of papers out from under the cookies. “I’ve been doing some work on Morgan’s wards. Tracing odd energy lines, cleaning up sloppy code.”

The kind of work that separated the truly professional programmers from your average gamer. Sophie grinned, very glad to be in the latter category. Mopping up code was about as much fun as any other activity requiring a bucket and soap. “You found something?”

“You might say.” Nell sat down and grabbed a cookie.

“Ah.” Moira’s eyes twinkled as she slid into her chair. “You’ve a tale to tell, do you?”

“Mmm.” Nell chewed, a storyteller well aware her audience was hooked. “Ginia and Jamie have footprints all over the wards, but there were other hands in the mix as well. Daniel, tightening up some code. Marcus taking a look.”

“Good.” Moira broke a cookie in two. “He’s a careful witch, and a smart one. He’ll want to see what others are doing for his girl.”

Sophie took the offered half. Sharing was oxygen to witch blood, even when a heaping plate of cookies sat a finger’s length away.

“I ran some queries, followed footprints.” Nell stirred honey into her tea. “Kept an eye on Daniel in particular, because he’s good at finding vulnerabilities.”

Good at making them, too-he was a guy you wanted on your side. Sophie frowned. Something was up, but Nell’s tone was too light for it to be a problem. “Was Daniel up to something?”

“Testing his unauthorized entry skills.” Nell grinned. “He hacked into Marcus’s computer. Used his Realm account to do it.”

Moira’s forehead furrowed. “Whatever for?”

“To play delivery boy.” Nell handed out parts of her paper stack. “This is what they sent him.”

Sophie looked down at the top page. The Complete Manual of Babies. Brought to you by the Fairy Godfathers.

Moira’s giggles snuck out first, little bubbles of tea-laced laughter. “They wrote him a wee baby instruction book?”

Sophie was still stuck on the “Fairy Godfathers.” Mike’s fingerprints were all over that-he had a love of all things Marlon Brando. “I’m a bit scared to read the advice.”

Nell chuckled. “It’s less Mafia than it sounds. Pretty funny, though.”

Moira started reading first-and melted into little-girl giggles. “Oh, my.”

Sophie turned the page. Executive Summary-read the rest when all poop is contained and neither you nor the baby are screaming. 1. Babies love movement-cars, slings, sword fights. Stop moving at your own risk. 2. You will mess up. Babies do not break. Try again. She looked up, laughing. “I could have used one of these.” The first few days with Adam had been less than relaxing.

Nell snickered. “Keep reading-you might change your mind.”

Sophie scanned further down the page. 13. Poop is evil. And it smells. Don’t let anyone tell you differently. 14. A wet baby is as slippery as a greased pig. Never, ever get the baby wet in an area larger than a dinner plate unless they’re strapped in. And even then, proceed with caution. Oh, dear. She stopped reading, weak with laughter. “Mike’s a trooper, but Adam’s first bath was a bit unfortunate.”

“The three keys to poop containment.” Moira read out loud now, wiping her eyes. “Instant action, a HazMat suit, and duct tape.”

“Pretty sure that one’s Jamie-Kenna’s the queen of poop explosions.” Nell pointed at her page. “Here’s my husband’s contribution. ‘Burp cloths are useless for baby puke. Get a catcher’s mitt.” She grinned. “He didn’t figure that trick out until Aervyn, though.”

Sophie kept reading, curious now. Number seventeen saddened her. Sometimes babies are cranky for no apparent reason. That would be Mike again, passing on the hard-earned wisdom of their first weeks with Adam.

And number eighteen made her smile. Holding them close is never wrong, even if your arms are ready to fall off. She looked up, swirling with love for the men who had ridden to Morgan’s rescue.

Nell’s grin echoed the same sense of dopey love. “There’s a flow chart for how to get a baby dressed. And recipes safe enough to cook while sleep deprived.”

Sophie started to flip-those might come in handy, especially if they were Aaron’s doing.

“It’s lovely.” Moira’s voice held the lilt of her childhood. “And they accomplished with Marcus what we couldn’t.”

“Got something through that thick head of his?” Nell grinned. “Definitely something of a miracle.”

“Aye, it would be.” Moira’s eyes gleamed in the muted light. “But what they did was far more difficult.”

She looked down, touching the pages with reverence. “They got something into his heart.”

Marcus looked up at the sound of footsteps in his living room. “Go away-busy!” He listened as the footsteps retreated, and looked over at the small girl sitting in her bouncy chair on top of the dryer. “How come they always come when we’re doing laundry, hmm?”

She wiggled in naked happiness-all her clothes were currently in the spin cycle.

Pretty much all of his, too.

He leaned over and blew a raspberry into her wiggly belly, only mildly embarrassed by his weakness. And grinned when she blew one in return. “Show off. Bet you can’t do that again.”

She could. It had become their little routine.

He blew another one into the air along with some light wind magic, trying to keep her amused as he untangled another of her infernal onesies. The washing machine seemed to take special pleasure at tying them in knots.

She batted her hands at the imaginary raspberry-blowing monster fluffing her hair. “Easily amused today, are you?” It was a good thing-neither of them was dressed for a beach walk.

She wiggled her lips at him again. He shook his head, chuckling-the raspberries that missed were oddly endearing.

Aervyn popped into existence at his elbow. “Found you!” He surveyed Marcus’s cape, eyes lighting up. “Yay-are we playing superheroes again?”

Damn-he’d forgotten that some house invaders didn’t require footsteps to move around. And he’d be caught dead in one of Aunt Moira’s flowery pink dresses before he ran through the streets of Fisher’s Cove in his cape and boxer shorts again. “No time to play today, superboy.” He looked down at hope deflated. “Lizzie’s probably running around somewhere looking for trouble.”

“She’s a girl.” Aervyn frowned, his mind one big pout. “I don’t want to play with any more girls today.” He stomped two very annoyed feet. “I want to stay right here with you and be grumpy.”

Uh, oh. Marcus didn’t feel equipped to handle girl trouble. “We’re not having very much fun here, I’m afraid. The Buchanan household is in dire need of clean clothes, and no faeries have shown up to help us out.”

“You don’t need faeries.” Aervyn’s eyes brightened again. “I can help. I’m getting pretty good at laundry. I can fold and everything.”

Marcus sighed. He was an embarrassment to witch recluses everywhere-even the threat of stinky laundry didn’t chase off visitors anymore. “Surely there’s some other way you’d like to spend your afternoon.”

“No.” The answer was simple and accompanied with a heart-melting grin. “I like being with you. Can I stay?”

Even curmudgeon defenses could be breached. Marcus pointed at a pile of towels and rubbed the head of the small boy with the dark-haired version of his brother’s face. “See if you can turn those into something resembling a folded pile.”

Aervyn surveyed towel mountain, momentarily subdued. And then turned, a disturbing glint in his eye. “Can I use magic?”

There was no folding spell worth the energy-Marcus had tried. “Some things are better done the old-fashioned way, my boy.”

“Nuh, uh.” His self-appointed helper activated something that looked suspiciously like fire power. “I helped Elsie make this spell for keeping Nat’s towels warm so that all the yoga people can have a happy moment.” He smiled, the perfect picture of summer innocence. “I can make you happy towels, too. I bet Morgan would like hers all cozy and warm.”

Marcus, lost somewhere back at “yoga people,” tried to catch up. “You built a permanent warming spell?”

“Sort of.” Aervyn wrinkled his nose. “It lasts a bunch of weeks, but the towels get wet, and it makes the spell go wonky after a while.”

Water was anathema to fire spells-if the boy could make one last more than a single wetting, it was an impressive bit of magic. “How do you stop the power leaching?”

“I use Mama’s air-weaving-loop trick.” Aervyn looked up from his studious efforts to transform a navy-blue towel into the Creature from the Black Lagoon. “Fire will do that too, if you talk to it nicely.”

Aervyn had fire-talking skills no one else on the planet could duplicate, but another detail tickled Marcus’s memory. “Wait, you said you helped Elsie do this spell?” Witch Central’s newest trapeze flyer wasn’t a particularly strong fire witch.

“Mmm, hmmm.” Aervyn poked at a piece of his towel sculpture that apparently wasn’t conforming to expectations. “We practiced really hard. She can’t do as many loops, so it wears off faster, but that’s okay. She said she likes going back to visit Nat and make the towels warm again.”

Marcus couldn’t shake the ridiculous feeling that this might be one of Daniel’s strange dots. “Can you show me how it works?”

“‘Kay.” Aervyn patted his monster in satisfaction and reached for another towel. “It’s easier before you fold the towel. The loops don’t get so tangly that way.”

Given superboy’s idea of “folded,” that wasn’t hard to imagine. Marcus closed his eyes, following the quickly dancing power lines of a spell in progress. It did look very much like Nell’s woven-air spell-and he remembered all too well how much it had irked his fourteen-year-old self when tiny Nell Sullivan had created it. Six-year-old spellcasters weren’t supposed to devise tricks that took a month of hard and very secret work to replicate.

Replicating her son’s work wasn’t an option-Marcus wasn’t a fire witch.

But it was a heck of a spell, and Morgan would hopefully appreciate her nice, warm towels. Marcus reached out a hand to touch. Heck, he’d be darned appreciative-the cottage’s one bathroom ran to the fairly rustic. “Very nice-can you do a few more?” Babies used up towels at an astonishing rate.

Aervyn grinned and waved his fingers in the direction of towel mountain.

Marcus didn’t bother to ask. He was quite sure he was now the proud owner of a very large supply of self-heating towels.

That kind of magic deserved a reward. “Come on upstairs, my friend. I’m pretty sure someone has filled my cookie jar.” He was capable of filling it himself, but a man with a small baby didn’t turn down a steady supply of anything with calories.

Aervyn grinned-and vanished. Marcus looked over at Morgan and rolled his eyes. “I guess he’ll be getting the first cookie.” He reached to free her from her bouncy chair-

And felt the strange dots connect.

He took the stairs two at a time. Cookies would have to wait-he needed one more spell first.