by Ashley McLeo
“I think it unwise. Besides the fact that they are clearly prodigious, we have little knowledge of your daughters’ powers or what could happen to them if we cut them off. Many babes with magic can be temperamental during labor. At this rate, the best we can hope for is that they make a quick appearance and wear themselves out in the process,” Mary said.
“I’m not totally in control at this point, darling. And I could never forgive myself if we harmed them.” Brigit said.
“You are the bravest, most beautiful, most amazing ma ever,” Aengus said, bending to kiss her.
Brigit gasped, her eyes squeezing shut as a contraction shot through her. “We’re not there yet, darling! These wee buggers have yet to see the light of day, after all.”
“You’ve been a ma for months already. Now it’s time for me to help, to be a da. Should I stay here?”
“No, my love, I’m afraid my sisters will need even more space than anticipated with all the new flora about. They’ll make sure you know what’s happening.” Brigit’s voice, though kind, left no room for bargaining.
“Aye, let’s be getting you some food to go with that whiskey, Aengus. You can’t be meeting your wee darlings with only a half bottle in yer belly!” Nora exclaimed, grabbing bags of chips and cookies from the kitchen and skipping back to the sitting room.
“We’ll shout when it’s time for the main event.” Gwenn waved Aengus, Nora, and Fiona out.
“I think they’ll be able to figure that out on their own. I haven’t presided over any births, but I hear there’s a fair bit of screaming to be heard when babies make their appearance,” Aoife said.
Aengus’s laughter transformed his face, and for a brief second, he looked like a man that worry had no hold over. “You may be right there, Aoife,” he said kissing Brigit before returning to the sitting room.
A trail of multicolored pansies followed in his wake.
“How will we get rid of all this?” Aoife mused, surveying the meadow now threatening to take over the kitchen.
“I’m more concerned with getting these babies born at the mo’,” Mary muttered, wiping Brigit’s face with a cool cloth and lifting a cup to her lips. “Drink up, Brig. Your wee one still seems to be pushing water out of you. Would you fancy a snack? Some crackers? I bet you’re low on salt, too.”
Brigit wrinkled her nose, “Too dry. Do we have any popsicles? Or ice cream? Something cold, I’m so fecking hot.”
“At your command. You’ll need more water, too,” Mary said, throwing Aoife a look that clearly said, Well what are you waiting for?!
Lily chuckled as Aoife poked her tongue out at Mary before turning on her heel to fetch supplies.
“She’s coming our way,” Sara said nervously.
The air around them stilled as they held their breath. Lily knew they were all thinking the same thing. Of anyone here, Aoife would be able to feel their presence. Lily tried to clear her head. What if Aoife could hear their thoughts like they could hers? She exhaled as Aoife passed by.
“It must be a one-way—,” Lily began.
“Look!” Sara whispered, pointing behind them to where Aoife stood still in the middle of the kitchen, her nose upturned to sniff the air.
Jasmine and smoke? “Gwenn? Could you stir the large cauldron?” Aoife called over her shoulder.
Evelyn’s muscles loosened as Aoife resumed her mission and opened the freezer. “I thought for a second she smelled us. Did you see her sniffing?”
“She smelled you. It’s that damned jasmine loaded perfume you put on in the car. It was so strong then, I’m not surprised it followed you here.” Lily whispered fiercely. “What if she tried to use magic on us? She—”
“Shhhh, you guys!” Sara whispered, waving her arms and glancing back at Aoife, clearly still worried the witch might hear them. “It doesn’t matter, we’re still here, there was no magical attack. Can we please be nice and watch?”
Lily’s cheeks grew hot. What had gotten into her? Normally, she would never say things like that to a person, especially one she met only hours before.
“I’m sorry, it’s . . .”
The words died in her mouth as the sound of metal crashing at their backs rang through the room. Lily turned to see Aoife, one arm held comically aloft as a scooper filled with chocolate ice cream spun on the floor. Every muscle in her arm stuck out as Aoife stood paralyzed, sniffing the air with greater urgency this time.
Fire!
“Fire?” Evelyn asked, her eyes following Aoife’s dash from the kitchen. “Oh my God! What happened?”
Brigit’s condition had deteriorated in the time they had been distracted by Aoife. Sweat streamed like rivers down her beet red face. Her hands had lost all color from gripping the soaked sheet beneath her so tightly. Soft whimpers sailed across the room as Brigit’s chest moved shallowly up and down, fighting for breath.
“The fire’s inside her! It’s what’s making her so hot,” Aoife explained, pulling Gwenn from the cauldrons to Brigit’s bedside.
“You mean, Brig has been literally burning from the inside out this whole time?” Lily barely heard Mary’s horrified whisper.
“I’ve been smelling it for hours, but thought it was from the hearth fire,” Aoife scowled. “I could have had time to stop it or at least slow it! Now I’m not so sure. I’m sorry, Brig. I should have—”
“We’ll have plenty of time for regret later,” Gwenn interrupted. “The question now is how best to proceed?”
They stared down at Brigit, the oak mere inches from her head and the puddle at her feet dripping steadily to water the grass beneath the table.
“Brig, can you tell where it’s coming from?” Gwenn asked, raising her hands to hover over her sister’s abdomen.
Brigit’s eyes popped open, hard and full of defiance.
“Don’t do anything. You might hurt her . . . she doesn’t know any better.” She placed a trembling hand on her belly to shield it.
“Brig, I would never,” Gwenn said, hurt creeping into her voice. “I thought a wee calming spell in the area—”
“No spells. I can make it. I have to. Give me water. And ice. Lots of ice.”
Mary handed her a glass and Brigit brought it to her lips, took a sip, and promptly spit the water across the room.
“It burns! Oh, it burns!” Brigit sobbed as she hurled the water glass to the floor where it shattered.
Then, many things happened at once. A stream of water gushed from Brigit’s nether regions, marking the spot for a rhododendron bush to sprout in the space between her legs, while a half dozen bamboo stalks shot up to erect a tall cage-like barrier around her.
“Goddess be!” Mary cried. “Don’t worry, Brig! We’ll clear this mess up.”
“Could we focus on clearing down here first? Unless of course we want the twins born in a bush,” Gwenn said. She squeezed herself through the bamboo stalks and tore a branch off the bush. A crack of wood sounded from across the room and Gwenn looked up as another tree shoot from the floorboards. She ripped a second branch from the rhododendron’s trunk, and felt a new bush rub against her backside. “That’s how it is, then?” She sighed and began patting the rhododendron down as flat as possible. Creating just enough room for a pair of hands and a newborn to land without harm.
“Has her water broken yet?” Mary asked, reaching through the bamboo stalks to pat Brigit’s cheeks with a cold cloth.
Gwenn shook her head. “From what I can see the amniotic sac is still intact. I’m thinking we should perforate it soon. She looks fully dilated, though it’s difficult to tell with all this fecking greenery in the way. It can’t be much longer before the twins come on their own.”
Mary strode to the hearth and selected a long metal rod with a handle on one end and a small hook on the other from a tray of instruments.
Lily’s stomach turned. “Please tell me she’s not going to do what I think she is with that.”
Before anyone could respond, Mary strode over and handed the r
od to Gwenn, who stuck it inside Brigit. Water dripped to the floor, adding to the considerable puddle at Gwenn’s feet.
Aengus barreled back into the room. His face fell when he saw Brigit trapped behind a wall of tall bamboo.
“I’m coming, Brig!” he said, tearing a chunk of bamboo from the floor with his bare hands.
Two more stalks popped up on the other side of Brigit.
“Stop, Aengus!” Gwenn cried, rushing to her brother-in-law's side and pulling him from the table. “It’s a damn bamboo hydra. Who knows where the next one will crop up? What if it’s right underneath her? We have to be careful.”
“I need to be with her. I heard her crying,” he said, tears streaming down his weathered face.
Aoife swooped in. “Aye, Brig’s in a terrible pain, but she’ll battle through. What she needs most right now is for you to be calm and for us to work on getting these babes out. For that we need access to her, a feat becoming more difficult with every sprouted tree. This is no normal birth, brother. The best we can hope is that it’s over quickly,” Aoife said, guiding him from the birthing table.
“Let Mary and Gwenn do their work. I’m going to go check on the expulsion potion. If you’d like, you can stay over here. You’ll be able to see everything,” Aoife said, pulling out a stool two feet from where Lily sat.
Lily watched, mesmerized, as their father sat down next to them. I have his fingers, she thought, marveling at the small parts of herself she found in the man. Evelyn, the tallest of the three sisters, appeared to have inherited Aengus’s height. Sara had inherited his deep dimples. I wonder who . . . ?
Sara hopped off the counter, shattering Lily’s musings as she positioned herself in front of Aengus. Lily watched Sara’s eyes rake over the man. Then Sara did the unthinkable: She touched him.
Aengus gasped and swung his head from side to side.
Lily shot a glance at the birthing table. Thankfully they all seemed too preoccupied to notice Aengus’s strange behavior.
“Sara, maybe you should—”
“It’ll be alright, Aengus,” Sara said, her voice calm and soothing. “Brigit will survive this, and your girls will be here soon.”
Aengus’s head dropped to rest on the back of the chair, his face open to the ceiling and eyes glistening.
“Thank you,” he whispered, as two tears plummeted down his freckled cheeks.
“That was freaking wild! It’s like you were God,” Evelyn whispered, her eyes wide as Sara scurried back to the counter.
“I can’t believe you spoke to him,” Lily said, unable to tamp down her rising jealousy. Why didn’t I think to make contact with him? Why hadn’t—?
It all depends on who’s born first. If the wee one with fire is left in there, alone, with no sister for comfort, things could go badly. Merciful goddess Brighid, please, I’m begging you: Don’t let anything happen to my sister, your namesake. I’ll do anything you ask.
Aoife’s voice floated through Lily’s head. She glanced at Evelyn and Sara and knew they’d heard it, too.
“I see a head! Our first lass is coming!” Gwenn said, waving Mary over.
“I. Want. Them. Out. NOW!” Brigit screamed between breaths.
“Only a few pushes and she’s out, Brig. You can do this!” Gwenn reassured her, placing her hands palms up over the rhododendron.
Brigit gripped the bamboo at her side and with a monstrous grunt pushed.
Lily watched awed as Brigit’s torso lifted a foot in the air before collapsing back down to the table. She sure as hell had never seen anything like that in the birthing videos Rena had made her watch.
Five blood-chilling screams later, a small girl slipped into Gwenn’s waiting hands, which were supported by the rhododendron bush as it sprang up to catch the babe, its leaves swaying in greeting.
She was flawless, with ten fingers, ten toes, a headful of brown hair, and a perfect pair of working lungs.
“Is she out? How is she? What does she look like?” Brigit asked, trying and failing to see over the protruding belly between her and her first born.
“She’s the most perfect wee thing I’ve ever seen. Though I expect you’ll be having to share that honor with your sister soon, little darling,” Gwenn said, smiling down at her new niece while Mary cut the cord. Turning to a table beside her, Gwenn wiped the babe off and swaddled her in a soft yellow wrap laying in wait beside a green one. The girl’s cries quieted the moment the cloth tightened around her. Finally, Gwenn presented the babe to Brigit, slipping her tiny body through the bamboo.
“Goddess be. Look at those eyes. They’re so very green,” Brigit whispered, as she took her daughter.
Lily’s stomach flipped and she sat up straighter.
“That they are,” Gwenn agreed. “I’m thinking this may be our earth witch. The bushes about caught her before I could.”
“You are so perfect,” Brigit murmured in the way of mothers and babes.
The child let out a hearty cry.
“Aye, I’ll be betting you’re hungry, but you’ll have to wait. Your sister feels to be not far behind,” Brigit admitted with a cringe.
“I’ll let Aengus meet her, then?” Gwenn asked, reaching her hands back through the bamboo to take the girl.
Brigit nodded, clenching her jaw tight as another contraction bore down.
Lily watched Aengus hungrily as Gwenn brought her over and deposited her in her father’s arms. Her heart broke as Aengus’s face split into a smile so large Lily thought it might crack his face in half. The man looked ready to burst into song. His large hands cradled her with a gentleness no one would guess them capable of.
I’m glad I came here and let someone break into my mind, if only to see this, Lily thought, hugging her arms tight around herself.
A choked sob at her side broke the moment of peace. Lily turned to find Sara sobbing as Evelyn wrapped an arm around her awkwardly.
“I never had a father. No man came into my life until I was ten. Rich loved me, and filled that role when he could, but it was never like that. I never thought I’d have that. It turns out I already did,” Lily said the words without knowing why she felt like she had to explain.
Sara’s lips tightened into a watery smile, and Lily realized she might not be the only one with daddy issues.
“Not to be insensitive or anything you guys, but look at all that water,” Evelyn said, clearly relieved to have a reason to evade the emotional conversation.
Water, startling volumes of it, was surging from Brigit’s mouth, ears, and nether regions, wetting everything and everyone within a six-foot radius. Small tributaries were shooting off from the main geysers to form puddles and creeks in the split hardwood floors. Bamboo, bushes, trees, and flowers rustled their foliage with pleasure as they soaked up the life-giving liquid.
“This is it, Brigit. I can see her head. She’s performing her finale. Let’s be happy it’s not the fire she’s using,” Mary said, wiping her face as the water eased up.
“That is disgusting,” Evelyn said, “I mean, that came from . . . Eww! She should go wash.”
“A little water is the least of her worries,” Lily retorted, unable to hide her exasperation. Good god, a baby’s about to be born! Does she really think now’s the time to take a nice hot shower?
Time traveled at warp speed, and less than ten minutes after Lily’s birth Mary welcomed a larger and completely bald baby girl into the world. She cleaned the girl and wrapped her expertly in a green swaddle.
“They’re so different! This one’s eyes are as blue as her sister’s are green. Goddess be, we are in trouble. Aengus is going to have a task in beating the boys off you, isn’t he, little one?” Brigit cooed, holding her newest daughter tight to her chest. Aengus sidled up next to her, his face glowing with joy.
“That baby looks like my baby photos. She even has the exact same birthmark I have on my neck,” Evelyn stuttered. “That’s—oh my god, that’s me.”
Lily watched the shifting of Evel
yn’s emotions as they darted across her face. Disbelief, hurt, and sadness all took a turn before finally settling on acceptance.
“Want to hold them both?” Aengus asked, beaming down at baby Evelyn and Brigit.
“For a mo’. The afterbirth hasn’t come yet, but I am desperate to see them side by side,” Brigit said, stretching her arms through a narrow slit in the bamboo stalks for Lily. She gasped. The stalks were moving on their own accord, leaning to the side to accommodate the passing of the girl. “It seems she wants to meet her baby sister, too,” Brigit said breaking into a smile.
Aoife grinned at the contented murmurs of the new mother and father. I’ll take me time, she thought, filling one lidded cup—or secure sippy, as Mary liked to call it—to the brim with the placenta expulsion potion and another with the revival elixir. I wouldn’t like to be the one that spoiled that sweet scene. She set the secure sippy within Brigit’s reach before beginning to clean up. She heard a loud clank of metal coming from the kitchen and turned to see Gwenn throwing instruments in the sink as Mary, Nora, and Fiona began the arduous task of mopping up water. They’d had the same idea. There would be time for everyone to bond soon enough, and goddess help them, Brig and Aengus wouldn’t be rid of her once she got hold of the wee ones.
Aoife rounded the hearth to pull the iron cauldrons off their hooks and placed them on the stone ledge to cool. The last thing they needed was for someone to trip and fall into the cauldron with a babe in their arms.
She sighed when she noticed the fire burning in the hearth, on the verge of death. Reluctantly, Aoife extinguished what remained, an act that always made her feel as if she was smothering a piece of her soul. Even I’m feeling a touch uncomfortable, though, she thought, wiping the sweat from her forehead. Smoke slithered up from the blackened logs, and Aoife walked across the room. This smoke can’t be good for the babes, she thought, throwing the window open wide and wafting the smoke outside.
Darkness had fallen upon the quiet Irish countryside. Aoife hoped Gwenn had remembered to check the time for the official birth records. A full moon dominated the star-spangled sky, illuminating Brigit’s small garden and lake with an ethereal glow. The eve of summer solstice and a full moon—what an auspicious day for witches to be born, Aoife thought, delightedly. These girls are sure to be full of surprises. I best be heading back if I’m to get my hands on one while Brig finishes up, she thought, reluctant to leave the fresh air despite the greater reward. She leaned out the window and inhaled, savoring the cool air as it dipped in and swirled around her lungs.