Granda shrugs. “To each their own. I don’t fully understand it, but I believe in life choices.”
“That’s okay. You don’t have to. The point is, Dora took us upstairs to give me a Tarot reading. I’ve known since I met her that she carries a deep connection and a lot of fae power, but I didn’t know who or what she was.”
“But you found out?”
“It turns out Bruin knew her in another time…an Arthurian time. When she lived as a man, a powerful druid magician who was an advisor to the kings of the time.”
“Yer friend is Merlin?”
“She goes by Pan Dora now, but that’s what Bruin led us to believe.”
Sloan nods. “I believe she is. I’ve done some research over the past weeks, and the physical descriptions all match. Plus, I found this.”
He shuffles through the heaped texts and pulls out a book on Arthurian lore. The inside cover is a detailed picture of Merlin in a flowing green cape riding on a horse with a magical staff in his hand.
I take a closer look at the picture and nod. “Yeah, put a fuchsia wig and an animal print sheath dress on him, and that’s Dora.”
Granda flops into his seat. “All right, so tell me about this amulet she had ye fetch.”
“It was a favor for a favor sort of thing. We needed someone to go to the Lakeshore Guild on our behalf and stall them while we fixed the ambient magic shortage, and she wanted her medallion back from where she hid it in a graveyard years ago.”
“Why couldn’t she get it herself?”
“We didn’t ask,” Sloan says.
“Honestly, Granda, we were in a bind, and it didn’t seem like a big deal. For whatever reason, she needed us to fetch her medallion, so we did.”
He leans forward and taps his finger on the picture on the page. “And yer sure this is the amulet here?”
I nod. “Positive. What is it?”
“It’s the Morrigan’s brooch. It’s said to be enchanted as the catalyst to bring her back to the living realm. The person who possesses the Eochair Prana won’t get anywhere without holding the brooch as he casts the summoning spell.”
That won’t happen. I’ve taken steps to ensure it.
Pan Dora’s words come back to me now, and I wonder what that means exactly. What has she done to ensure it? “Do you think she destroyed the brooch?”
Granda shakes his head. “I doubt that’s possible. A cursed or enchanted object of that age and power would be resistant to destruction. Trying might well activate the summoning and bring about the end yer trying to prevent.”
“Okay, so how widely known is it that they’d need the book and the brooch?”
“Is that what they need, though?” Granda asks. “We know nothing fer certain and can’t take the chance of making assumptions.”
I rub my forehead and squint. “You’re hurting my head, Granda. We’re still guessing.”
“Weel, that’s the truth of a great many things in the research world, mo chroi. Educated guessing is often the only way for us to move forward.”
I yawn and scrub my fingers through my hair. “Okay, I’m done for the night. Do you mind if we pick this up in the morning? I need to crash.”
Granda nods. “Sweet dreams, luv. Until the morning.”
I smile at Sloan on my way out. “I didn’t ask, and I should have. I’m sorry to have assumed. Will you be able to take us home tomorrow? Can you spare a few days being trapped in Toronto with us?”
He dips his chin. “I’ll be back in the morning. We can leave at your leisure.”
* * *
The morning comes all too soon, and I take my coffee and oatmeal out on the patio to spend my last moments with Dart before Patty comes to bring him back to the lair. “Before you go, little dude,” I say. “Granda has a surprise for you.”
I gesture to where Granda rounds the side of the house, pushing a wheelbarrow. In the bucket of the wheelbarrow is… “Yep, that’s for you, buddy.”
Dart looks at me, and his opal eyes shimmer.
As Granda dumps the dead calf on the lawn, I nod and walk him over. Dart doesn’t need much encouragement. The moment he lifts his nose to the breeze, he lets out an excited squeal and runs to consume his breakfast.
“Such a happy wee thing.” Gran joins us with a smile on her face and a bouquet in her hand.
I chuckle. “That wee thing will soon be the size of my SUV. I swear he grew overnight.”
“He likely did.”
“I hate to send him back. He’s so happy here and was so sad in the cavern.”
“Do ye believe bein’ with his dragon siblings and the wyrm queen is the best fer him?”
“At this stage, yeah, I do.”
“Then that’s where he needs to be. The beauty of a mother’s love means it’s as unconditional as it is never-ending. Distance won’t change that.”
We stand there in silence as Dart eats his calf. Bones crunch. Fur flies. Blood sprays. Yum. When Granda comes around the house with a second calf, my mouth falls open. “Well, he won’t go back to the lair hungry, that’s for sure.”
Gran chuckles. “That one is for Patty to take back for the young. There’s no reason why roadkill needs to go to waste in a cleanup facility. I’ve arranged with the works department to bring the dead animals here for us to take them off their hands.”
Granda brushes his hands against his pants and wraps an arm around Gran’s hips. “Yer Gran’s taken it upon herself to ensure the dragons don’t go hungry.”
Gran shrugs. “Waste not want not. The meat might as well be eaten.”
“Agreed.” I love the idea. “How did you explain that to the road works department?”
She shrugs. “I didn’t have to explain. One of the head administrators is a druid. When I informed him that we have a brood of hungry dragons in the area, which is causing the sinkholes and loss of livestock across the county, he was more than happy to have me take the dead off his hands. It lends to the cycle of life quite nicely, I think.”
“It does indeed.” I hug Gran, thankful every moment of every day that they reached out and are now a part of my life.
* * *
By the time Sloan arrives, breakfast is long over, Patty has picked up Dart and the calf, and Gran and I have gone over the instructions for how to administer the remedy for Mr. Tree. “How long do you think it’ll take before we see an improvement?”
“An improvement from the poison, within hours. He’s still suffering from the state of yer friend, luv. He’ll not fully heal until she is well and revived.”
“Yeah, Garnet’s working on that side of things. It’s so sad, Gran. It’s obvious that their feelings for each other are deep and genuine, yet they’re apart and both living alone.”
Gran smiles. “Yer a true romantic. There are a great many things that can divide a loving couple: a misstep, a loss of trust, a tragedy. There’s no way for ye to fix somethin’ that—from what ye said—has been broken for decades.”
“Maybe not. But I can hope that this tragedy brings them closer so they realize they still care for one another, can’t I?”
Gran smiles. “Och, that ye can surely do. Come. I’ll even give ye a spell to help cleanse old wounds and clear their minds and hearts.”
“You have a love potion?”
“No, nothing like that. All it’ll do is sweep away the hurt and pain of the past and give them a clearer view of where they are now.”
“I’m sure that’s all they need.” I follow Gran to her work area at the back of the house and tickle some of the hanging plants and roots dangling from the dirt ceiling from the hill above. “Oh, another thing I wanted to ask you about. My fae are cold. How do I keep them warm through a Canadian winter? Toronto is downright uninhabitable at times, and they’re already chilled.”
Gran goes over to her bookshelf and pulls out a slender book about as big as a third-grade reader. She hands it to me, and I read the cover. “Caring for your Grove Inhabitants.”
“
If I knew when ye left last time that ye’d have fae taggin’ along with ye, I would’ve sent it with ye then. Better late than never, I suppose.”
I flip open the pages and frown. “It’s empty. Is it written in magic ink or something? Do I need a decoder ring?” I hold the book up to the light and move it this way and that. Still, no writing appears.
Gran chuckles and closes the book in my hands. “Ask it what ye asked me.”
I blink at her but do as she says. “How do I keep the fae in my grove warm through a Canadian winter?”
I open the book again and smile. The pages are now filled with spells and instructions and all kinds of ideas on different ways to approach my problem. “All I do is focus on what I need for my grove fae, and the book will tell me?”
“That’s how it works. Focus your intention, and the magic will do the rest.”
I hug her tight and breathe her deep into my lungs. “Thanks, Gran. I love you.”
Chapter Twelve
Sloan poofs Liam and me into my house. Although I’ve only been gone two or three days, it’s good to be home. “There’s no sense for you to sleep down on the pullout,” I say as Sloan heads for the basement stairs. “You and Calum were roomies last time and it went well enough. You might as well take Brenny’s bed. No one will mind.”
Sloan gauges my sincerity, and I know he’s hesitant. We’re all still a little sensitive about Brendan’s things. “I’m fine in the basement too. It’s not a bother.”
“No. The weather is turning, and you’ll be warmer upstairs. Come up, and I’ll get you settled. Let’s be quiet though because Da’s probably sleeping. He’s on nights while everyone else is on days or afternoons.”
I tug Liam as I head up the stairs. “I have a couple of ideas for how to make that bullet into a pendant. Come up, and I’ll get out my jewelry wrapping kit to hook you up before you go. Did you tell your mom we’re on the way?”
“No, I thought we’d surprise her.”
The three of us jog up the steps, and I balk at the top of the stairs. Auntie Shannon is stepping out of the bathroom in a towel, sees us, and screeches.
While I’m trying to figure out what she’s doing here, Da rushes out of his room naked. “What’s wrong?”
Well, allll righty then. “I think we surprised her.”
“What. The. Fuck?” Liam says.
Poof. Sloan’s gone.
“Wow.” My eyes bug. “So, this happened.”
Da curses and ducks back into his room. Shannon normally shares my pasty, pale complexion but her cheeks have blotched up as red as two beets. “You’re home. Liam… I’m so glad you’re all right.”
I look over at Liam and pat his cheek. “Breathe. You look like you’re going to pass out.”
“I might. So, you and Niall? How long has this been going on?”
Scenarios spin in my mind, and I come up with a plausible answer. “Liam got shot. You were distraught, and Da was there for you. Right?”
Da comes back, and thankfully he has his man bits in a pair of track pants so my retinas can stop burning. Naked isn’t anything new in a house of all men, but a naked father when there’s a naked Auntie Shannon in the mix is too much.
“Shannon and I are grown adults,” Da snaps, “and we’re the heads of yer households. We don’t answer to either of ye.”
Liam seems frozen in some form of paralyzed torture. “I...wow, okay. I’m just thrown. That’s all. I get it. Fi’s right. I was shot. You were upset and lonely. The two of you have been tag-teaming our patchwork family for a decade together. I suppose it makes perfect sense. It just happened.”
Auntie Shannon looks like she might crumble, and my heart goes out to her.
“Don’t cry, Shannon. You and Da both lost your other halves in life, and you’ve both been alone raising kids for over a decade. S’all good. It caught us by surprise. That’s all.”
“It isn’t because Liam was shot,” Shannon admits. “Niall and I have been seeing one another for a while now.”
Liam frowns. “Define a while now. Since Brendan was shot?”
Da steps in beside Shannon and puts his arm around her. “Go get dressed, a mhuirnin. Ye’ll catch yer death.”
She takes the opportunity to get outta Dodge, and Da straightens. He meets us with a hard scowl and raises a finger. “This is none of yer business. Whether we’re in love or find comfort in one another on occasion or succumb to drunken booty calls, it’s not yer concern.”
I palm thrust my face trying to get those images out of my cranium. That my father even said drunken booty call when talking about him and Auntie Shannon blows my world. While he’s right, he’s also soooo very wrong.
“Then I should be upfront and tell you that Liam and I have been doing the naked tango on the drunken occasion too. Nothing serious. Just frivolous sex when we want to rip our clothes off and get it on.”
Da’s brow comes down in a dark scowl, and Liam chokes. “She’s totally fucking with you, Niall. Never happened. Not once. Not ever. She’s throwing me under the bus to make a point.”
Da looks at me, and I throw my hands up. “Well, don’t give me that bullshit about us not getting to have an opinion. By your face just now, you definitely had one when you thought Liam and I were boinking.”
“It’s not the same at all.”
I wave that away. “I agree you’re adults and I think it’s natural that you two ended up here, but don’t tell me we don’t get to have feelings about it. We get to be curious. We get to worry. And we get to weigh in.”
Da harumphs and rolls his eyes. “Fine. Over the years, there have been a few isolated moments when we’ve turned to each other. Very rare and only as friends with shared lives. When ye went missin’ this summer, and we lost Brendan, it became more. Shannon isn’t yer mam, but she loves ye both like her own, and we shared those fears and losses.”
“I get that.” I wrap an arm around Liam’s hip. I’m not sure if I need to hold him up or if he’s holding me up, but it feels necessary. “And it ‘becoming more’ is nice. We’re happy for you, aren’t we Liam?”
Liam runs a hand over his face and exhales. “Well, yeah, of course. Niall, you’ve been my father figure since I was in grade school. There’s no man who I respect more. This is good. I’m glad the two of you are happy.”
“Do you mean that, son?” Auntie Shannon comes out from behind Da. “There’s been so much going on… I didn’t want to add to the strain of our lives. We weren’t exactly hiding our feelings, only seeing where things went first before dragging you kids into it.”
I nod. “Okay, that’s fair. Liam and I will go into my room, and I’ll get him the chain we came up for. When we come downstairs, we’ll all be reset, and everything will be normal.”
Da chuckles. “Will it now. Yer sure?”
“I’m sure. S’all good. We’re happy for you both.”
* * *
I close Liam and me in my room, and he crosses my floor and flops on my bed. “Did Sloan pop us into an alternate timeline? Because holy hell, I did not see that coming.”
I laugh and text Sloan. You are such a scaredy-chicken, Mackenzie.
Cluck. Cluck. Not my circus, not my naked monkeys.
I open my closet door and pull out the plastic organizer with my jewelry wrapping supplies in it. I take it back to the bed, climb up beside Liam, and cross my legs. “Give me your bullet.”
He hands it to me, and I wrap it in a twenty gauge black dead soft wire. The groove near the base gives barely enough depth to secure a couple of laps around the cylinder before creating a loop to hang it from. After clipping off the excess, I wrap the ends with my pliers and make sure everything is twisted tight. I pull out a length of gold chain and a length of black leather. “Preference?”
“The leather.”
“Okeedokee.” I string the leather through the little loop and—“Voila.”
He smiles, and the panic and confusion of finding out our parents are sexing it up has se
emed to pass. “Awesome. Thanks, Fi.”
“My pleasure. Now, are we ready to head down?”
“Is hiding in your bedroom for the rest of my natural life an option?”
“Nope.”
Liam sighs and loops his “I-was-shot-and-this-slug-proves-it” pendant over his head. “All right, then. If you won’t let me hide and wallow, I suppose I’ve got to pull up my big boy pants and get over the awkwardness of knowing my mother has sex.”
I snort. “That’s what’s bothering you?”
He makes a face and shivers. “Yeah. What else would it be? Mothers aren’t supposed to have sex. That’s just wrong.”
I chuckle and put away my supplies. “If you say so.”
* * *
To Liam’s relief, Shannon has her coat on and is ready to head home when we go downstairs.
I hug him before he heads out the door. “I’m glad you’re not dead, but if you step in front of bullets meant for me again, I’ll kill you myself.”
He chuckles. “Love you too, Fi.”
I giggle and push him toward the door. When they leave, Da follows me into the kitchen. He leans back on the kitchen counter while I pull out the fixings to make Sloan and I some lunch—wait, it’s almost dinner here.
Time change. It’s hell on your tummy.
Fine. I switch gears and grab the Swiss Chalet takeout menu from the basket on the fridge. “Are you game for takeout, Da?”
He looks at the mailer and nods. “If ye like. That’s fine with me.”
I grab my phone and open the app, choosing the family special I always order, same sides, delivery, and paid with the credit card on file. I hit send and smile. “Supper is in the oven. It’ll be on the table in twenty-five minutes.”
Moving over to the table, I set three placemats out and head to the cupboard for glasses.
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