Peregrine headed for his room with the book, Chandler snagged a Switchback from the fridge, put on her favorite do-rag, its sides embroidered with flaming salamanders, and went out to her workshop.
Once there, she took a refreshing sip of beer, then got out a miniature cauldron and set it near where the iron monkey heart still lay on her workbench. The cauldron was the size of an orange, perfect for bespelling charms.
Next, she retrieved three extralong horseshoe nails from their storage bin. The nails would form the physical portion of the triskelion charm. The iron wouldn’t repel all fae, but it would ward off some, and the protective magic she’d imbue them with would, at a minimum, be a signal that Lionel was under the protection of those with abilities, namely a witch who worked with fire and earth.
She put on her safety glasses and settled down, half-sitting on a barstool up close to her vise with the nails and her tools within reach. She secured one of the nails into the vise’s jaws, then alternated applying magic to heat the nail’s center to red-hot and using pliers to slowly work it into a hook shape. Sometimes—like when she’d created the monkey heart—she used standard equipment and safety gear. Other times, like now, she used her magic to protect her hands and work the metal. It was totally a matter of her mood and if she had extra, pent-up magic from lack of use or keyed-up emotions.
She heated and bent a second nail, falling into a rhythm as she finished that one and started to shape the third into a hook. Her mind wandered to thoughts of when she was Peregrine’s age and her abilities first emerged, a gift for working with fire that she’d shared with her father. She remembered every moment of the night when he’d first showed her how to build a bonfire and call the Great Salamander. She also recalled every moment of the horrific day not long after that, when her father burned to death saving a family from a house fire.
Tears prickled in Chandler’s eyes. She stopped working and took a deep breath. She couldn’t have prevented her father’s death, any more than she could have done anything other than witness her mother fall apart afterward, piece by piece, like a glacier giving way to the crash of the ocean. She didn’t remember anything from the day her mother killed herself. But she clearly recalled the funeral and her mother’s best friend holding her, the first time anyone had held her since her father’s death. Holding her and choosing to adopt her. A strong, single woman not afraid to love fiercely and never let go, even when life wasn’t easy.
Chandler wiped her eyes on her sleeve. She missed her adoptive mom with every inch of her being. But they’d had a lot of good years together. And Chandler had been there two years ago in the Council’s palliative care unit when her adoptive mom had passed. She and Peregrine had kissed her mom and held her hand as she took her last breath and left this life.
Blinking back another round of tears, Chandler returned to work. She secured one of the hook-shaped nails in the vise. With her magic, she fused another hooked nail onto that one and then added the last, joining them together to create the shape of a triskelion. Nails reformed into something new, like a little girl’s shattered life reinvented into something even more powerful by the unwavering love of a witch who had chosen to be her mom.
Chandler set the triskelion into the miniature cauldron, then sprinkled a layer of salt and blessed earth over it. On top of that, she placed a cone of Brooklyn’s protection incense.
“Ignis ignite,” she said, lighting the incense with her magic. As the heady scent of sage and sandalwood drifted into the air, she closed her eyes, cleared her mind, and envisioned the triskelion. “Shield of light surround you,” she intoned. “Protect the wearer from those with dark intent. Spirits of the wood. Spirits of the air. Spirits of earth and fire. Only the good come close. Scuto circumdabit te de lumine…” She repeated the spell in Latin, letting her power flow into the cauldron, bathing the salt and earth, coating and imbuing the triskelion with a force-field-like shield of energy.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, she sensed someone enter the workshop, waiting off to one side as still as one of her sculptures. Peregrine? Devlin? Lionel, maybe? She wasn’t sure. But their energy felt familiar and right now she couldn’t afford to pay attention to them, not with the triskelion nearing completion and her wavering between consciousness and the euphoria of a peaking spell.
A glow radiated up from the cauldron. Bright gold explosions flashed. Once. Twice. Three times. Light as bright as the eyes of the red dragon in her vision. The glow fizzled downward, sucking into the earth and salt, then vanishing.
Chandler bowed her head. “Thank you, Great Salamander, Serpent of the Embers. Blessed be your wisdom and strength,” she prayed. Then she turned to see who was watching.
Lionel stood next to the oil drum with one hand resting on the flying monkey’s shoulder. His gaze shifted abruptly to the workbench, like he didn’t want her to know just how intently he’d been looking at her. His smile turned playful and he nodded at the monkey heart. “Um—I hope charm making didn’t interrupt vital surgery?”
She laughed. “It’s for the monkey. But I need to find the perfect veins and arteries before I can contemplate surgery. However, your charm’s all set.” She smiled to herself. His personal charm certainly was all set, and working overtime to make her heart stumble. She took a deep breath and turned back to the workbench. Using the end of a screwdriver, she pushed aside the incense ash, salt, and earth, then retrieved the still-steaming charm with a pair of pliers. She waved it in the air for a moment to cool it down. “Hold out your hand. The protection magic will bond with you even better if you’re the first one to touch it.”
As she placed the triskelion on his outstretched palm, the witch in her took note of what lay before her eyes. His fate line was unusually distinct, with a hard break above his heart line. Palm reading was only a passing interest of hers, something that came with a general artist’s awareness of anatomy. Still, she felt drawn to comment. “You had a difficult childhood.”
He shrugged. “No more so than most.” His expression closed off. Then his dark eyes opened wider, their depths welcoming her in with unabashed candidness. “I never knew my birth parents, at least I don’t remember them. I was adopted by an amazing woman when I was five.”
His mention of being happily adopted sent a warm feeling of connection flickering through her. She smiled. “I was raised by an amazing adoptive mom, too.”
His fingers folded around the charm, squeezing it tight. “Um—I actually came to Burlington because of my adoptive mom. But I’m glad I did. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have met any of you.”
As he opened his hand and looked at the charm, her thoughts returned to the job at hand. “Why don’t you give that back to me? I’ll fix it so you can wear it around your neck. Is leather cord okay or would you prefer hemp?”
“Leather would be great, thank you.”
She opened a drawer in her workbench and took out a precut length of deerskin cord. As she started to attach the charm to it, she returned to their previous conversation. “So, your mom lives in Burlington? I assumed you weren’t local, since you’re staying in a motel.”
“My—my mom’s in Massachusetts. I came here because of the ferries—ferryboats, that is.”
“Really?” She stopped threading the cord through the charm to look at him. There were several ferries on Lake Champlain, the lake that stretched between Vermont and Upstate New York, and up to Canada. She and Peregrine often walked to Oakledge Park to watch the ferries cross. She could think of only one reason someone would come to Burlington because of the ferries. “You work on one of the boats? I thought you were a full-time journalist?”
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