Chapter 575: Not Strong Enough
Gram flipped a panini on the grill, crisping toast and hot chicken filling the kitchen with aromas so delicious my stomach growled despite my crabby mood.
As I took my plate, cheese bubbling out the edges of my sandwich, Gram caught my eye and snapped me once on the shoulder with her raised spatula.
"He's not strong enough for you," she said before pressing the lid down on the next sandwich with a loud hiss.
My teeth ground together as I turned my back on her, forgetting, under her challenging stare, I'd only moments before considered kicking Liam to the curb over his mother. But I'd chosen, hadn't I? Whether Gram liked it or not. And she'd never said anything like that about Liam before.
Not that I went looking for her opinion on my love life, thanks.
Shenka slid into a chair beside me, sympathy written all over her face as Sassafras hopped up on the table, crouching over his kitty paw placemat, amber eyes locked on the milk carton. "He'll get tired of his mother eventually," Shenka said, patting my hand. "He's just so sweet."
Gram snorted, tossing a second sandwich onto a plate and levitating it to Shenka who poured milk with her magic, Sass's bowl filling first before the carton poured a full glass for me. Charlotte took her usual place, standing by the doorway. Watching over us.
I wished she'd just come and eat. It wasn't like we were all that formal or anything. Far from it. And considering, if this were a normal house, all the magic in use would have been rather cool, she should have taken our casualness at face value.
Speaking of faces, I found myself forgetting my bodywere and glaring at the carton of milk with evil intent, wishing Sonja O'Dane's mug was on it.
Missing.
That would be awesome.
Gram joined us a moment later, her own steaming lunch following her as she claimed a chair, one fuzzy foot hooking the leg and pulling it over as her plate settled in front of her. A final plate landed in the empty space reserved for Charlotte. While the weregirl refused to join us, Gram never stopped trying.
I picked at the corner of the cooling cheese, a sour taste in my mouth killing my appetite.
"Sweet will get him nowhere." Gram took a giant bite, breathing out steam through her open mouth before she chewed aggressively, eyes locked on mine. "And will hold you back, girl."
Wow. "Since when did you develop this hate-on for Liam?" First I'd heard of it from her. A whiny voice in my head complained it wasn't fair even as I smothered it with a burst of anger.
No whining. Never again.
"No one said anything about hate," Sassafras said, looking up from the plate of tuna Shenka set in front of him. "But Liam isn't as strong as he could be. Not his fault, considering how he's been raised." Sass took a quick lap of milk before sniffing the fish. "But we all know he's never been allowed to develop to his full potential."
Sonja again. Sheesh.
"Listen to me, Sydlynn Thaddea Hayle." Gram never used my real name, let alone my full one. I found myself sitting up straighter, petulance long gone, goosebumps rising on my skin. "That boy has a huge heart and he loves you."
But.
"But." She shook her head, white hair floating around her head in wisps like a puffy halo. Almost comical, considering Gram was no angel. "He doesn't have the strength you need. He'll never stand up to you. He'll cave, over and over again."
"I'm not that bossy." Yeah. Stop laughing.
Gram arched an eyebrow, a terrible little grin pulling at her lips. "You're a Hayle," she said. "We invented bossy."
Shenka giggled, covered it with a cough while Sassafras snorted milk.
Even Charlotte's normally blank expression twitched in humor.
Traitors.
"If you end up with that boy," Gram said, sitting back, one foot bouncing violently at the end of her crossed leg, "you'll turn him into a weakling yes-man. And you know it."
"I like nice and sweet," I shot back, pushing my plate away as my anger rose. "And there's nothing wrong with a partner who says yes."
You know she's right, my vampire whispered.
Shut up, I snapped back.
"This coven, your responsibilities, they will try to devour you, girl." Gram's voice dropped, tone sad and hollow. "Trust me. I know."
Okay, fair enough. She lost seventeen years of her sanity, all for the coven. But I wasn't her.
"I can't pick who I love," I said.
Oh, Syd.
Liar, liar.
Gram's steady gaze told me she knew I was full of crap. "You'll need support," she said, reaching across the table to me. "Shenka will be part of that." My second nodded quickly, looking back and forth between us. "Sassafras." The demon cat's eyes flared with fire. "But they can only do so much. Sass's job is to watch over your heirs. Shenka's is supporting the coven. Yours is keeping the family safe. And your mate..." Gram squeezed my fingers. "Your mate's job is to be there when you need someone strong to lean on, who'll challenge you when you're being an idiot. Push you when you want to quit. Love you, no matter what." Was that a tear in her eye? My heart constricted as I thought about my grandfather, what I knew of Ivan Dumont. His betrayal of our family. Of Gram.
"Ethpeal is one hundred percent correct." Sassafras finished his bowl of milk, swiping at his whiskers with one paw. "I've seen generations of Hayle witches come and go and one thing is certain-a strong mate means a happy coven."
Anger flared inside me, the need to defend Liam so powerful a snap of magic shattered the plate under my uneaten lunch. Shenka jumped with a tiny cry, but neither Gram nor Sassafras so much as flinched.
Temper, Sydlynn, my vampire sent.
Whatever.
"I'd like to know why you think you have the right to say anything," I snapped at Gram, unreasonable anger driving me to bitterness. Damn her, I'd chosen! "Your husband was a family traitor."
Oh. Crap. Damn it. I hadn't said that out loud. Had I?
This time Sass did react, a hiss of fury sending sparks of amber magic over his puffed-up fur as he glared at me.
"Watch what you say," he snarled.
Shenka didn't move, barely breathed, staring at me, as though waiting for an explosion. But Gram just sighed and nodded. "You're right," she said. "What do I know?" She stood, taking her plate with her, half a sandwich untouched as the temperature in the room seemed to drop to zero. I shivered, hugging myself, wanting to take it back. Gram didn't deserve to be treated this way. She was always up front with me, always honest. And I knew absolutely, without question, she had my best interest and that of the coven, at heart at all times.
Perhaps you're so angry, my vampire sent, because you know she's right.
Twinge.
I didn't get to deliver the sharp comment on the tip of my mind. I jerked in response to the sudden jab of another mind reaching for mine, gasping out loud as I clutched at my head. Even through the powerful family wards, the pointed attack made it through. I watched Gram spin with a frown of concern in the periphery of my vision, Shenka reaching for me, Sassafras's magic surging toward me, Charlotte's eyes flickering from blue to wolf as she left her post to come to my side. But I lost them all as I balled up my power in preparation to fight back.
Syd! I knew that voice, the power behind it. Not an attack. I pulled back just in time, only a heartbeat before I blew Mia's mind into a gazillion fragments.
What's wrong? My body trembled with releasing tension before she seized me in a surge of desperate energy fading almost as quickly as it rose.
Help me Syd please help they're taking it and I can't stop them and I don't know what to do please help they're dying-
I was losing her, Mia's touch failing, falling away, weaker by the second. Gram's power linked with mine, Shenka's right behind her, Sassafras's demon magic pushing us further as I wound myself around the last of Mia's touch and held onto her.
A single image made it through, from Mia's perspective, a slow tumble to the right as she fell onto polished marble stairs, dark shapes looming over her before she slipped away from me.
With one last whisper.
Please help-
I dropped out of the connection, already on my feet, all thoughts of Liam gone.
The Dumont coven was under attack.
***
