Molly closed her eyes and mouthed what looked a prayer, maybe for guidance and protection for her gifted children. Or maybe she was cussing silently. I couldn't help it.
I laughed and squeezed Angie.
Molly's sisters, both the witch sisters and the humans ones, owned Seven Sassy Sisters'
Herb Shop and Cafe near Asheville. Business was booming, both locally and on the Internet, selling herbal mixtures and teas by bulk and by the ounce, the shop itself serving gourmet teas, specialty coffees, breakfast, brunch, and lunch daily, and dinner on weekends. It was mostly fish and vegetarian fare, whipped up by Mol's oldest sister, water witch, professor, and three-star chef, Evangelina Everhart. Her sister Carmen, an air witch, newly widowed and newly delivered of a bouncing baby, ran the register and took care of ordering supplies. Two other witch sisters, twins Boadacia and Elizabeth, ran the herb store, while the wholly human sisters, Regan and Amelia, were waitstaff in the cafe.
Boadacia and Elizabeth, the youngest and most adventurous of the bunch, were always trying new incantations and spells, and had been known to get into trouble with the results. It sounded as if they had a minor demon trapped in a circle and weren't quite sure how to dispel it.
Usually, they spent quite a while trying to extricate themselves from the messes they made before calling in the big guns, their elder sisters. I could imagine the ruckus when they admitted to Evangelina that they had messed up again. The eldest often had assisted with the cleanup and her tirades were legendary and generally ignored by the twins.
"Angie, how did you know that Aunt Jane went swimming this morning?" Molly dropped Evan Junior into the highchair that had appeared at my table with my guests.
"Did you dream it? Were you awake and just thought it? What?"
Angie shrugged as I sat her into her chair, the table nearly to her chin. "I want oatmeal like Aunt Jane fixes it."
"It's important, honey," Molly said. "How do you know things like that?"
"I just do. I see Aunt Jane a lot. But sometimes other people. And Aunt Elizabeth sometimes talks to me inside my head. Can I have oatmeal?"
Molly's mouth formed a thin line, and I knew what the expression meant. Visions and mind-speech were new and troubling indications of her daughter's power, which shouldn't have manifested until she was sixteen, and which should have been tightly bound beneath the magical constraints applied by Big Evan and Molly when the power came upon her too potent and far too young.
"I'll fix it," I said, meaning the oatmeal. Pans banging, I turned on the gas and began making oatmeal the way my housemother had taught me so long ago. As the water heated for oatmeal and tea, I flipped on a light switch and realized that we had power. I plugged in the refrigerator and adjusted the AC down to a bone-chilling seventy-four, making a circuit around the house to close all the windows. It was already a sweaty eighty-five degrees inside. Thank God for air-conditioning.
While my guests ate, I asked Molly, "Why would the big bad ugly eat Little Evan?"
Molly touched her ear and gave a warning glance at her kids that said she couldn't say much in front of big ears. "Some things think witchy X and Y chromosomes are tasty."
Witchy X and Y chromosomes meant the things that made Little Evan a male witch, or what some called a sorcerer. I nodded. Demons like to eat male witch babies. Ouch.
"Comosos are tasty," Angie repeated, trying on the words. "Like Aunt Jane thinks deer is tasty. Would Little Evan go crunch?" Angie wasn't going to be deterred.
I grinned and poured hot water over tea leaves, a strong gunpowder green that had a good caffeine kick. "Probably. But we love Little Evan." When she tried to interrupt, I said, "Even Beast loves Little Evan. But we don't talk about Beast or big bad uglies, right?"
"I can't even tell Uncle Ricky-Bo? Biscause he's wanting to know stuff."
"Especially not Ricky-Bo," I said dryly. "He's nosy. Speaking of Mr. Nosy, I need to go to NOPD and do some more research. You okay today here, Mol?"
"We have power, and I can wash clothes over at Katie's, including the stinky diapers piling up on the back porch. I'm fine." Molly was a firm believer that diapers were the most dangerous disposable item ever invented, to be used only in emergencies. She used cloth with old-fashioned pins. Before I could ask