“Ma, can you cast a protection spell for the chickens? There are a couple of foxes around and I’d rather not have to go after them,” Bran said. “I’ve set up some extra fencing, but they’re freaking smart.”

  “I’ll do that tomorrow morning,” May said. “Those foxes are clever little kits.”

  We had almost finished eating when May suddenly froze. “Something’s wrong⁠—”

  Even as she spoke, I sensed Fancypants connect to me. He screamed my name, his voice echoing through my thoughts, and something hit me hard…only it wasn’t me. Somebody was attacking Fancypants. He was so afraid.

  “What the hell!” I scrambled up so fast that I sent my plate spinning off the table, where it crashed to the floor. But I didn’t notice. I was already half out of the door, panic spurring me on.

  Bran jumped up. “Elphyra?”

  “Fancypants! Hold on, I’m coming!” I raced out into the night, slipping on the icy porch. I managed to stay on my feet, leaping down the steps to land in the snow. “Damn it!”

  Searing pain sliced through me.

  I stumbled, falling to my knees as I slipped into a fog of confusion and anger. We were bound together now. The whirl of fear and anger overwhelmed me, and I curled into a ball in the snow, too confused to move. Bran knelt by my side—I saw him through the haze of pain. He scooped me into his arms. I leaned against his chest, holding onto his shoulders.

  “Fancy…Fancy…he needs me,” I whimpered as Bran carried me inside.

  “I’ll go,” he said. “Ma, take care of her.”

  “She’ll be all right. Put her on the sofa. We’ll be fine. Go start the truck and we’ll be out in a moment,” May said.

  Bran deposited me on the sofa. May brushed my hair out of my face and sat beside me. She pressed her hands to either side of my head and whispered something soft, like a chant. A few seconds later, my mind began to clear, and the pain receded. I whimpered again, trying to speak, but she shushed me.

  “Come on, let go of the pain. Let it go. It won’t help you or Fancypants,” she said, her voice soft but commanding.

  I tried to resist, afraid to let go of the bond—terrified that I wouldn’t be able to help him. But after a moment, she reached into my aura and yanked the pain away, pulling it out by the roots. I let out a brief cry, but within seconds, everything began to clear.

  A moment later, I sat up. “Fancypants! May—what’s happening?”

  “I don’t know, but I needed to dampen your bond so you can focus. Can you still sense him?” She pulled me to my feet.

  I took a deep breath and let it out, trying to calm myself. Fearing that I wouldn’t be able to reach him, I cast out—searching for the bond. A few seconds later, I let out a gasp. There he was—still afraid, calling for me.

  Fancy… can you hear me? I’m here, hon, I’m here. Your Elphyra’s here. Can you tell me what’s going on? We’re on the way.

  After a moment, Fancypants let out a whimper. I don’t understand what happened. Everything was going fine; then the door slammed open and two men came in. I yelled for the cats to run and hide, and I tried to fight back, but whatever they sprayed on me sent me into a spiral…

  Where are you? What did they do?

  Where am I? I’m scared. They locked me in a cage and I’m in the back of a van—I saw it when they carried me out. I can’t make fire right now, and I can’t fly. My wings are so heavy.

  May and I were outside by now, where Bran had brought the truck around. We climbed in, and he put it in gear as we maneuvered down the driveway toward the road. I struggled to keep contact—Fancypants sounded slightly garbled, like he was tripping over his words.

  What did the men look like? What color is the van? We’re on the way.

  The van’s green. The men… The next moment, an image appeared in my mind of two men. It was blurred, but I vaguely saw their features. Fancy yawned so deeply that it scared me. I can’t…I’m…

  The next moment, the connection dropped.

  “All right, someone kidnapped him. Why didn’t the alarm go off? We armed it,” I said, brushing away my tears. Fancypants needed me, and he needed me ready to help.

  “I don’t know, but let’s drop May off at the house, and she can call us with the details,” Bran said.

  “What if someone’s still prowling around? Let me call Faron, so he can come back and make sure that nobody’s waiting for us.” I pulled out my phone and dialed Faron. “Hey, can you come home?” I asked when he picked up. “It’s an emergency.”

  “I just checked out and I’m on my way,” he said, not even stopping to ask what was going on. “I’ll be there in five.”

  “When you get there, May will tell you what happened. Please hurry and be ready for a fight just in case.” I hung up as we bumped our way along my driveway, coming to the house. The door was open. “The cats!”

  “I’ll make certain they’re okay. Go now. Faron’s on his way,” May said, carefully getting out into the snow. She slammed the door and waved us on.

  “Will she be okay till Faron gets home?” I asked.

  Bran nodded. “They’re gone. She’ll look after things. But now, I need you to do something.”

  “What?”

  “I need you to ground yourself and consult your intuition. When we come to the end of the drive, which way do we turn? Which way did they go with Fancy?”

  I started to ask how I was supposed to know, but then I understood. He wanted me to follow my intuition—to reach out and trust myself to know which way Fancypants had been taken. I closed my eyes and began to ground and center myself. I took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. Three more deep breaths later, I sank into the welcome mist that surrounded my trance.

  I dug deep, sending tendrils from my feet and hands through the truck, through the road, deep into the earth itself. It didn’t matter that we were moving; the grounding was energetic, holding me fast. Slowly, a warm glow rose from the center of the earth, like glowing magma, except I was protected from the heat, except for a warm glow.

  I cast about, seeking the energy signal that would indicate Fancypants had passed by. Would I find him? Would I be able to sense him? The fear ran deep, but out of the corner of my mind’s eye—I caught a glimpse. A flash of dragonette scales and fire, a hint that he had been at the end of the drive and turned to the right, onto the main road.

  “Go. Right at the driveway,” I said, trying to keep hold of that tiniest of connections. He felt like he was asleep, and I had the impression they had drugged him. “They’re doing their best to sever the bond so I can’t track him.” My fear was giving way to anger.

  Bran sensed my mood change. “Elphyra, keep your wits about you. You don’t want to go in swinging at the wrong time. We need to keep him safe while we hunt for him,” he cautioned.

  “I hate that you have such a level head,” I grumbled. “But you’re right. I’ll try to keep my emotions in check.”

  All I wanted to do was find Fancypants, and tear the head off whoever had kidnapped him. Severing the bond between a witch and a dragonette could kill either, or both. May had gone through such a loss, but it was because of a birth defect, not because someone deliberately severed the bond. Melda’s death had torn her up, and she seldom spoke of the little green dragonette. But the pain still lingered in her heart.

  “Keep as focused as you can,” Bran said. “If you lose the trail, tell me.”

  I brought my focus back to Fancypants, following that one tenuous thread of connection. We neared another junction in the road: the right way towards the center of Starlight Hollow, the left—toward the highway and the Olympics. Bran pulled off onto the shoulder of the road as we neared the turnoff.

  I tried to determine which way to turn. It was like following a trail with a few scattered breadcrumbs, but now, the forest floor became cluttered with debris. I wasn’t usually quite so empathic, but now, all I sensed was a whirl of emotions was drifting on the wind from everyone who had passed through the area. I tried to capture the traces of Fancypants, and—after a few minutes—I finally sensed the faintest connection.

  “They turned left,” I said. “Toward the mountains.”

  Bran hesitated. “Should we go, or should we turn around and see what we can do from home? How strong is the lead?”

  I wanted to go on, wanted to drive blindly through the night searching for him, but I already knew that I wouldn’t be able to pinpoint him next time, unless they had stopped somewhere. If we continued on, I might have the chance of tracing him again, but chances were likely that he was beyond my detection. If we turned around and returned home, we could enlist May and Grams’ help. We should also call Daisy to ask her to check her files and see if there were any poachers around. Given where we lived, that wouldn’t surprise me.

  With a sigh, I shook my head. “Home. My instincts tell me I’ve tracked him as far as I can this way. There are so many emotions around here that I can’t filter through all of them.” Tears flecked my eyelashes again as I stared glumly into the night.

  “Home it is,” Bran said. But before he pulled back onto the road, he took my hand in his. “You aren’t failing him. We’ll find him. It makes sense to enlist all the help we can get before anymore time gets away from us. Promise me you aren’t blaming yourself.”

  But he already knew I was.

  “If I had only…”

  “Only what? We locked the door. The alarms were set. We did everything right, love. There’s nothing to take the blame for. You didn’t leave the window open; you didn’t invite the kidnappers in. Try to stay strong. We need to be at the top of our game to bring him home.”

  “Home,” I whispered. “I need him, Bran. I need that little dragonette. I can’t imagine my life without him in it.”

  “We’ll find him,” Bran said, putting the truck into gear.

  As we backed out onto the road, turning around, I cast one last glance behind us. The road seemed so long and dark.

  “I love you,” I whispered. “Come home to me.”

  But I was certain my words never reached their intended destination, and I could only wonder whether whoever stole him was someone I knew—and what lengths they would go to in order to keep me from finding him?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  May and Faron were at my kitchen table, and she had her crystal ball in front of her, along with a deck of tarot cards. Both cats were eating their dinner. I breathed a sigh of relief that they hadn’t gotten out.

  May straightened. “Did you…”

  “We managed to trace him to the Elwa Junction, but I lost the scent there,” I said. “What should I do, May?”

  “Well, for one thing, I’ve contacted Daisy Parker. She needs to be aware, just in case something comes through the department,” May said. “She’s on the way.”

  “Thank you,” I said, totally at a loss.

  Faron stared at me, a look of concern on his face. “I’m so sorry. What can I do to help? All you have to do is ask.” He crossed to the counter. “Do you want some tea? Coffee?”

  “Coffee, please,” I said. “I need to call Grams. She can help us, too.”

  “I called her as well, dear,” May said. “She’s on her way.”

  The gentleness of her voice and her concern hit me and I broke down in tears. I slumped into a chair. “Thank you,” I whispered.

  “We’ll find him,” Bran said, rubbing my shoulders from behind me. “We’ll bring him home.”

  At that moment, the doorbell rang and Faron hurried to answer. When he returned, Grams was with him. She pushed past him to give me a hug, then turned to May.

  “What’s next? I’ve never had much to do with dragonettes, but tell me what to do and I’ll do it.” Grams kissed the top of my head, then sat down next to May.

  “First, tell us everything you were able to sense, Elphyra,” May said. “Even if it seems miniscule. Also, has anything odd happened lately? You’ve had your little meltdown but now you need to buck up. Fancypants is depending on us.”

  “You’re right,” I said. I wiped my nose with a tissue that Faron handed me and cleared my throat. “We think they headed toward the Olympics at the Elwa Junction. But there were so many emotions lingering in that area that it clouded my ability to keep hold of him. He said that two men in a green van locked him in a cage.”

  “Green van, huh? We’ll tell Daisy when—” The doorbell rang again. “That’s probably her now,” Bran said, heading to answer the door.

  I looked at May. “I keep losing my focus, May. What can I do?”

  “That’s because of the bond between you,” she said. “When something like this happens, it plays havoc with your emotions and senses. Think of it as astral static. As to what you can do about it—there is something, but I doubt you’ll like the idea.”

  I sighed. “What is it? If it will help⁠—”

  “Oh, it will help, but it can be frightening. I can create a dampener on your emotions. It won’t destroy the bond, but it mutes it. It’s not permanent, but it can—at times—force the dragonette and the witch to re-bond after they meet again. However, it will allow you to focus on what needs to be done.”

  I worried my lip. “Will Fancypants think I abandoned him?” That was the last thing I wanted—I didn’t want him feeling like I’d just cut him out of my life, like some old tissue I had blown my nose on and then discarded.

  “No, dear. He won’t notice. This won’t sever your bond—no fear about that—but it will give you the ability to focus without Fancypants’s fear clouding your vision.” She motioned to Grams. “Can you cast a circle while Bran and I go get the tincture I need?”

  “I can. Do you want me to invoke the elements, as well?” Grams opened her bag and pulled out her dagger.

  “Invoke the elements and focus on air—we need the clear sight. I’ll be back in five minutes⁠—”

  “I can get them for you, Ma,” Bran said. “Tell me which one?”

  “The one labeled Lemon Clear Sight. Can you also bring the sage spray, and my clear quartz Merkabah stone?” As May motioned for me to follow her into the living room, Bran took off out of the kitchen door.

  May and I settled on the sofa as Grams readied her dagger. She walked to the north side of the room and encircled the edges, drawing the magic circle of power. Her voice rang in the room, echoing with strength.

  I cast this circle once around, by the powers of sacred ground.

  I cast this circle once again, by the powers of sacred wind.

  I cast this circle once on high, by the powers of sacred fire.

  I seal this circle as the Mother’s daughter, by the powers of sacred water.

  By the powers of three times three, as I will, so mote it be.

  Her magic filled the room, settling over us like a blanket of starlight. I breathed in and caught the faint scent of jasmine and oleander. My Grams was a powerful witch, she was. I was learning from her—learning the family secrets and spells. I was learning about the heritage I’d never been privy to because of my father’s untimely death, and my mother’s disinterest. We were taking it slow, step by step, but I was starting to recognize my great-grandmother’s energy signature.

  On the other hand, May was training me in kitchen witchery—how to infuse everything I cooked or planted or made with love or anger, depending on what was necessary. This was the type of magic that Bran used, though he focused his magic through tending to the earth and to his animals. Both of them were considered Earth Stewards in the human magical community, and they blended the folklore of the earth with actual magic.

  “Can you feel it?” Grams asked, lowering her voice.

  I closed my eyes and reached out. There—there it was. One of Grandmother Spider’s children was weaving a web of protection around us. My great-grandmother worked with the spirit of webs every so often, and she had drawn her energy in for today. I wasn’t fond of spiders, but I did nothing to break the spell. The astral servants of Grandmother Spider were both fair and fell, depending on which energy was called for.

  When I closed my eyes I saw the astral eight-legged servants, scuttling around to weave the web of protection around the outskirts of the circle. These spiders were both terrifying and beautiful, their eyes sparkling jewels, their legs and bodies formed of thin copper wirework. And yet, they were no machines. They were actual beings.

  My great-grandmother possessed powers I only had a glimpse of yet. But she had assured me that one day, I’d be able to reach out and touch those same energies.

  May let out a soft sigh. “You cast one hell of a circle, Morgance.”

  “I’ve had plenty of practice,” Grams said.

  At that point, Bran returned. He handed May a bag. “Here, I found the tincture, sage spray, and the stone, but something else wanted to come. I don’t know why, but I brought it back with me.”

  May took the bag, then froze. “Melda.”

  “I wouldn’t have brought the urn if I hadn’t heard her, Ma. She wanted to come.”

  I glanced over at May, who looked like she had no idea of how to react. “What is it?”

  “Not what,” she whispered. “But who…Melda’s ashes are in here.”

  I looked over at Bran. “Is that…”

  “Melda was my bonded dragonette,” May said. “I keep her ashes in my bedroom. I’ve never included her in spellwork before, not since she died.”

  “I didn’t want to hurt you,” Bran said. “But I swear, I heard her.”

  “I believe you,” May said, setting the bag on the table. “Very well, she wants to be part of the ritual. To be honest, she’s been around. I feel her now and then, resting on my shoulder. I rarely respond because…”

  “Because you don’t want to hold her to this realm?” Grams asked.

  May nodded. “Yes. But if she wants to stay, it’s up to her. I’d welcome knowing she was watching over me. I miss her.” She turned to me. “We’ll do everything in our power to find Fancypants.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “I can’t imagine losing him. I hate that he’s out there, waiting for me, and I’m not there. What if he thinks I’ve abandoned him?”