But Y Seren was here, stuck on Lady Meredith’s dress.
Tamsyn opened her mouth, but Bowen reached over and squeezed her hand even as he shook his head. “I know,” he muttered. “If it got us here, it can get us home. I thought that, too. But maybe let’s wait until we’re alone to talk about it.”
Alone.
Right, because they would be alone tonight.
In the same bedroom.
In the same bed.
Tamsyn was glad it was dark, because she could feel her face going hot despite the numbing cold, and to distract herself from the absolute riot of very, very dirty thoughts going on in her brain right now, she nodded at the flashlight.
“Why aren’t you all just using magic? I’ve seen you do that before, conjure up glowing orbs and stuff.”
“Witches are an odd bunch,” he said with a sigh. “Some of them prefer the old-fashioned way; some think any magic that ‘small’ is . . . I don’t know, disrespectful to the forces that be or summat.”
Tamsyn smiled in the darkness. She always liked when he said that, summat, like he was a medieval blacksmith or something.
Ooh, Medieval Blacksmith might be a good one to add to the Fantasy Roster, now that she thought about it.
What did we just say about dirty thoughts, huh? Tamsyn chided herself just as the forest began to clear out a bit and the group came to a halt.
“Here we are!” Lady Meredith called out, and gestured at a tall tree standing just in front of them, its trunk so thick Tamsyn had no idea how anyone was going to saw into it.
But then no one seemed to have a saw, she realized as she looked around, and then Lady Meredith stepped forward, laying one hand on the tree. Her fingers glowed, and when she pulled her hand back, there was a perfect print there, outlined in golden light, and one by one, the other witches started moving forward and pressing their hands to the tree.
Bowen heaved another sigh, and Tamsyn looked up at him, worried. “Okay, so I can’t do that,” she reminded him. She was whispering, but Lady Meredith heard her anyway, turning and waving one elegant hand.
“Oh, are you human? No worries, darling, so is Lora.” She pointed to a dark-haired woman stamping her feet against the cold. “And Emerald, of course,” Lady Meredith added.
The teenager once again had her book out, and she stood slumped against a tree, her flashlight pointed at its pages. “My father was human,” she called out to Tamsyn without looking away from her book, which Tamsyn now noticed was a tattered copy of Rebecca.
“Is that how it works?” Tamsyn asked Bowen. “One witch plus one human equals another human?”
“Depends,” Bowen said. “I’ve done some research on magical genetics, but it really is random. There’s been some research in Norway . . . no, Iceland . . . yes, Iceland. About climate maybe having an effect? Or moon phases, which seems more likely, and you . . . did not want to know this much about it, did you?”
“Are you kidding? Every day, I wake up and pray, ‘Lord, please let someone give me an in-depth explanation of the effect of climate and the moon on magical witch babies.’”
Bowen smiled down at her, that fondness back in his gaze, and it felt so easy, so right, to reach up and rest a hand on his cheek, tweaking his beard as she added, “I never dared to dream I’d have my prayers answered and get bonus Scandinavian data.”
“You’re a pain in my arse, you know that?” Bowen replied, and Tamsyn grinned, her hand still on his cheek, her spirit entirely too light for someone trapped in the freaking 1950s, and then Elspeth loudly sighed and said, “You see, Harri? That is what two people in love look like.”
Tamsyn dropped her hand so fast someone would’ve thought Bowen’s face was suddenly on fire, and she went to step back, except, oh right, they were supposed to be married, so she probably wasn’t supposed to basically shriek and leap ten feet away from him when someone suggested they looked in love.
Except . . . they hadn’t been pretending in that moment. They had just been being themselves, and Elspeth had still thought—
“I was planning on marrying you, Elle. I gave you my great-great-grandmother’s ring made of gold mined from the mountain my family home sits on, the family home I was planning to gift to you as a wedding present, so I’m not sure how much more in love you expected me to appear.”
“Oh, because that’s what love is, isn’t it?” Elspeth fired back. “Possessions. Traditions. Your bloody Penhallow lineage and finally getting a wife who could bring some power back into your bloodline.”
“I never said that!” Harri shouted back, and Tamsyn inched closer to Bowen to whisper, “I feel like your chances of getting born are shrinking, not gonna lie.”
“Hmmph” was Bowen’s only reply.
Elspeth and Harri were still arguing even as they pressed their hands against the trunk of the tree, and after they stepped back, Bowen moved forward, his fingers spread wide as he laid them against the black bark.
Tamsyn waited for the glow to appear, but there was nothing, and Bowen frowned at his hand, pulling it back and flexing his fingers, then laying it back against the tree.
Still nothing.
“The fuck?” Tamsyn heard him mutter to himself, and Lady Meredith trilled out, “Language, Mr. Penhallow!”
“Apologies,” Bowen said, turning away from the tree, but Lady Meredith only shrugged.
“I don’t mind the odd bit of cursing myself, but one must set a good example for Madoc, isn’t that right, dear?”
Madoc had already laid his small hand against the tree and was now patting his glowing handprint. “It’s not even that bad a word, Mummy. It’s Anglo-Saxon, and we are Anglo-Saxons, too, or we were before we were Welsh, so we can say fu—”
Bowen clapped his hand over the boy’s mouth, giving a pained smile to Lady Meredith. “Again, apologies.”
“Well, at least we didn’t get him that parrot he wanted,” Lady Meredith said, more to herself than anyone else, then she nodded at Bowen’s hand, still covering Madoc’s mouth.
“And as for your powers, I wouldn’t fret. Happens to many men, so I hear!”
Tamsyn muffled a snort, and Bowen scowled while Lady Meredith turned back to the group with a clap of her hands. “The log is selected!” she cried, and as Tamsyn watched, the tree began to shiver and fade until it vanished from sight altogether.
Bowen had let go of Madoc and returned to her side. “It’ll be back at the house,” he told her, answering her unasked question, “already burning in the fireplace. Lot more convenient than cutting it down, hauling it back . . .”
