“I’ll cool you off,” he promised with a smile. Diana looked at him with interest. Matthew’s smile broadened.
His wife—his heart, his mate, his life—stepped down off the porch and into his arms. Diana’s eyes were the blue and gold of a summer sky, and Matthew wanted nothing more than to fall headlong into their bright depths, not to lose himself but to be found.
9
“No wonder we don’t celebrate Lughnasadh,” Sarah muttered, pushing open the front door. “All those awful songs about the end of summer and the coming of winter—not to mention Mary Bassett’s tambourine accompaniment.”
“The music wasn’t that bad,” I protested. Matthew’s grimace indicated that Sarah had a right to complain.
“Do you have more of that temperamental wine, Fernando?” Sarah flicked on the hall lights. “I need a drink. My head is pounding.”
“Tempranillo.” Fernando tossed the picnic blankets on the hall bench. “Tempranillo. Remember:
It’s Spanish.”
“French, Spanish, whatever—I need some,” she said, sounding desperate.
I stood aside so Abby and Caleb could get in the door. John was conked out in Caleb’s arms, but Grace was wide awake. She squirmed to get down.
“Let her go, Abby. She can’t hurt anything,” Sarah said, heading for the kitchen.
Abby put Grace down, and the child toddled straight toward the stairs. Abby laughed.
“She has the most amazing instincts when it comes to trouble. No stairs, Grace.” She swooped in and swung Grace up in the air before depositing her back on the floor and pointing her in the direction of the family room.
“Why don’t you put John in the keeping room?” I suggested. John had abandoned his Spider-Man mask and was wearing a T-shirt with the superhero on it instead.
“Thanks, Diana.” Caleb whistled. “I see what you mean about the tree, Matthew. So it just sprang up out of the hearth?”
“We think some fire and a bit of blood might have been involved,” Matthew explained, shaking out one of the blankets and following Caleb. The two had been chatting all evening about everything from academic politics to Matthew’s hospital work at the John Radcliffe to the fate of the polar bears.
Matthew arranged a blanket on the floor for John, while Caleb ran his fingers over the bark on the Blasted Tree.
This is what Matthew needs, I realized. Home. Family. Pack. Without other people to take care of, he retreated to that dark place where his past deeds haunted him. And he was especially prone to brooding now, given Benjamin’s recent reappearance.
I needed this, too. Living in the sixteenth century, in households rather than simply in houses, I had grown accustomed to being surrounded by other people. My fear of being discovered had receded, and in its place had grown a wish to belong.
As a result I’d found the coven potluck surprisingly enjoyable. The Madison witches had occupied an intimidating place in my imagination, but tonight the assembled witches were pleasant and, except for my high-school nemeses Cassie and Lydia, welcoming. They were also surprisingly powerless when compared to the witches I’d known in London. One or two of them had some elemental magic at their disposal, but none were as formidable as the firewitches or waterwitches of the past. And the Madison witches who could work the craft couldn’t hold a candle to Sarah.
“Wine, Abby?” Fernando offered her a glass.
“Sure.” Abby giggled. “I’m surprised you made it out of the potluck alive, Fernando. I was positive that someone was going to work a bit of love magic on you.”
“Fernando shouldn’t have encouraged them,” I said with mock severity. “There was no need to both bow and kiss Betty Eastey’s hand.”