“My husband and I were elated. But since Daniel came home, he’s not been the same. He was such a calm bundle of joy—always smiling. Now?” She cuddles him close to her, and tears well up in her eyes. “It’s as if someone replaced him with a different baby. We even had testing to be sure he’s ours. It matched perfectly. I can’t explain it, but…” Her voice lowers to a near whisper. “I don’t think he’s my Daniel.”

My gut pinches, and an aura spreads up my torso. “He experienced a great trauma of being separated from you. Give him time to adjust.”

“Doctors and psychologists have told all of us parents that our children are healthy and weren’t abused in any way—to give the children time to recover. I’ve met with the other parents. They have similar feelings. Their young ones are exhibiting behavior problems in daycare or preschool, and they still haven’t spoken yet. We are at our wit’s end.”

Daniel elicits a more intense scream, and she places a pacifier in his mouth. He spits it out. How I ache for this woman and the other parents. To have their children home but face yet another struggle with their behaviors.

“Would you like me to try?” I ask, holding my hands out. “Give you a break?”

“Sure. Thank you. Maybe you can cajole him into taking his pacifier.”

She places Daniel in my arms, and I rock him back and forth. I sense the tension in his body. It’s as if he’s sending me a message, telling me he’s in the wrong place. My intuition flares up, prompting my cheeks to flush. What are my witchy instincts trying to tell me?

“There’s something terribly wrong.” She takes Daniel from me and places him in the stroller, a tear rolling down her cheek. “I’ll have to come back later. Thank you for rocking him.”

“I hope your situation improves. Take care, Jenny.”

She nods and pushes the stroller onto the paver sidewalk, stopping briefly to cover Daniel with a blanket. The townies probably think everything is copacetic with the children’s’ return. How wrong they are.

I spend the last hour of work tidying up. Fold Yule T-shirts. Straighten up the board games. Dust the shelves. I ring up customers in-between. I love the holidays, but shoppers make a mess of the store. When a lull in shoppers blesses me with a break, I prepare to leave and send Ronnie a text to check on her.

Me: How are you doing, Mama?

Ronnie: Derek and I took a hike yesterday in North Basin, and I lost a glove.

Me: I’m sorry, but it’s great you took a hike. Get that baby moving.

Ronnie: You know it! Unfortunately, the only movement I’m feeling today is from Braxton-Hicks contractions.

Me: Where do you think you dropped it?

Ronnie: Couldn’t be too far down the trail. Took them off close to the parking lot.

Me: I’m leaving work. I could stop and look.

Ronnie: It would be soaked by now. Don’t worry about it.

Me: I have my car today. I’ll drive there. Not a big deal.

Ronnie: You’re such a good friend!

Me: Get some rest!

Ronnie: Thanks, Gwyn!

Jeff carries boxes in and begins restocking the shelves. He’s careful to avoid my gaze as he crouches in front of the herbs. The silence is palpable. When I put on my jacket, he stands.

“Is it four already?” he asks as he walks behind the counter.

“Yeah. I logged out of the register. Will you tell Shane I said goodbye? The Fellowship is having a short meeting this week since we volunteered at the Bearsden Shelter for Thanksgiving. We’re making last-minute plans for the Yule Celebration.”

“Will do.” He logs in to the cash register. “Enjoy the rest of your evening, Gwyn.”

“You, too, Jeff. Tell Ashley I have Monday in my calendar.”

He smiles awkwardly, and I exit the store. I snap open my umbrella, but the rain has slowed to a drizzle. With twenty minutes left until sunset, the park is gray and gloomy. I hope I don’t have to walk too far down the trail to find Ronnie’s glove.

I click on my phone’s flashlight app and aim it toward the gravel on the park’s trail. Her gloves are black. This is like finding an obsidian crystal in a rock bed. I wave my phone from left to right, crunching on the path as I go. Footsteps kick up stones in the distance. I look up.

“Ashley?” What is she doing here alone?

The whites of her eyes expand. “Gwynedd. I didn’t expect to cross paths with you here.”

This is peculiar. “Jeff is working. Who’s watching Aidan?”

“Oh…uh…” She shakes her head. “An undergrad offered to babysit.”

“Why are you hiking alone?” And on a rainy day—bizarre.

She chuckles. “You’re on the trail by yourself.”

“Ronnie dropped a glove here on a hike. I’m fulfilling my friendly duty and searching for it.” I wave my flashlight beam. “She’s about to pop any day and doesn’t need to be out in this dreary weather.”

Ashley averts her eyes. “Well, I should get back. The undergrad has to leave soon. Good luck finding the glove.”

“Yeah, thanks. Tell that sweet boy Miss Gwyn says hello.”

“I certainly will. He babbles about you every day. See you on Monday.”

She takes off jogging in the direction of the trailhead and I continue on the path, shining the flashlight to and fro at the ground. Suddenly, my body seizes. A magnetic pulse of magic pulls at me, and tachycardia clenches my heart. Putting the glove quest aside, I run toward the bog, gasping for breath. I reach the water and observe a strip of fog floating above the pond, no different from before. But the unexplainable magnetism continues to drag me closer. The dismal weather has kept hikers away, except for Ashley. It’s safe to inspect the area. I chant, summoning my witch’s energy, and an amber glow appears.

Using my magic, I examine the bog again but sense nothing new. Could Skye’s hypothesis be right? Is there a masking spell over this area? I try one more time with both hands, establishing an intention around Ronnie’s baby. The fog shimmers with flashes of silver. The pinching in my gut intensifies.

I rub my abdomen until the sensation subsides and look down at my feet. Ronnie’s water-soaked glove rests in a mud puddle next to my left shoe. Did my witch’s intuition send me running to find this?

As I remove the dripping clump of yarn and wring out the water, Ashley’s surprised expression flashes in my head. Why would Ashley leave Aidan with a busy, undisciplined undergrad for a muddy hike in near darkness? Two plus two does not equal four.

While I recap my experience at the park, I remove my wet socks and lay them on Archie’s steamer trunk. He leans back on the loveseat and pulls my feet into his lap, massaging them.

“You think your intuition directed you to the bog for a glove?”

“It appears so. Seems overly dramatic for a weather accessory, but Ronnie really was sad about losing it. Who am I to judge the universe? There has to be some kind of connection related to deep caring. It’s why we worry constantly about the people we love. Our sixth sense sends us warnings or answers when we need them.”

He wraps a throw blanket around my feet. “Aye. But you would expect it to have the decency to be more accurate.”

“You’d think. I wish I could supercharge it like Seamus. But even he couldn’t identify the magic residue at the Pumpkin House.”