A Little Green Magic (The Little Coven #1) - Isabel Wroth Page 0,52

a nursery, with one cradle and one chest of drawers. The photos of her belly kept getting bigger and bigger, and then there were no more belly photos. On February 1st, her water broke.

Ilsa made a quick entry at seven forty-three a.m. to say the birth was imminent, and right next to the photo of her sitting in a blow-up kiddie pool, holding a pair of naked, wrinkly little babies to her chest was a simple notation, the ink smudged and the paper wrinkled in places from where Ilsa's tears had dried.

11:58 p.m.— Ilex Finley Greene.

12:05 a.m.— Ivy Renee Greene.

“Ivy? Are you okay?” Rowena asked carefully.

Ivy shook her head as she studied the photo through blurry eyes, choking on a searing lump of emotion. Captured on film, her mother had an expression of raw, unfettered joy on her face even as she wept.

Ivy had the evidence in her hands, but she couldn't believe it. One of the babies was bald as a cue-ball, the other with a wild mop of fiery red hair. “I... I have a brother.”

Uriah held her, gently rocking her from side to side when her tears spilled over.

Ivy dropped the journal like it was on fire and turned around to huddle against Uriah, not sure if she shook because she was in shock, or if it was anger that pumped through her veins like lava. “I can't...”

Uriah settled his hand over her hair, keeping her tucked close while she struggled to understand the violent thrash of emotions tearing her up inside. “It’s okay, Ivy. You don't have to keep going.”

She felt the vibration of his voice where she curled into him, but the words were lost on her as her mind spun in dizzying circles. Ivy tried to remember ever hearing about her brother or seeing any evidence at all that he'd been part of her life.

They were twins. Shouldn't she feel like part of her was incomplete?

How anyone could be so desperate to have a child, that she would willingly carry two, and sacrifice one for the other?

By the time she calmed down enough to see and think straight, Ivy realized she was no longer sitting out in the sunshine, but curled up in Uriah's lap on the living room couch, and shadows of twilight shimmered through the windows.

“Did I fall asleep?”

Uriah gave her a snuggle and dropped a kiss on her hair. “No, honey. You checked out for a while. The girls stuck around long enough to put up some different protection spells around the house, Fae proof, and took off after I told them you needed some time. How're you feeling?”

Ivy blinked her dry, scratchy eyes and tried to summon up some cohesive thoughts, but all she could focus on was that last picture.

“I have a brother.”

“Older than you by seven whole minutes,” Uriah answered, a smile evident in his tone.

With her cheek pressed to his chest, Ivy listened to the steady rhythm of his heartbeat, struggling to focus on it and nothing else. “I don't understand.”

Uriah settled deeper into the couch, one hand kneading at her hair, the other roamed up and down her back. “Rowena read the next entry; your mom wrote it two weeks after you were born. It sounded like it took her that much time to let what happened really sink in.

“She said the Green Man showed up at the house only a few hours after the birth and barely spared you more than a glance. He wanted your brother.

“She wrote that she tried to make a new deal, to keep both of you, but the Green Man made it clear his gift of life could easily be taken away. He didn't even give her time enough to tell him the baby's name before taking him.”

For a long time, Ivy said nothing. She couldn't. Her body felt like a clogged pipe, unable to process the thoughts and emotions filling up her mind like a sink, filled with murky water that had nowhere to go. Eventually, she was able to focus on a singular thought, her voice sounding numb and dull.

“Did you know, Ilex is the traditional name for holly?”

Uriah brushed a sweet kiss across her temple. “I did not know that.”

“Holly and Ivy have been used all the way back to ancient times as representations of the male and female. Two of the many sacred plants present in traditional Beltane rituals.”

“That's telling,” he commented.

“Is it?”

“Mmhm. She could have gone with generic, popular baby names, but instead named you