I wanted to pull her bassinette into the kitchen with me while I worked on the potion, but on the chance that Thorn woke up, everything had to look normal. It had to appear that I didn’t know. Lilith had said that was the best way.
How anyone could have not known that man wasn’t Thorn is the real mystery. I knew as soon as we walked into the house after the showdown with Zane. “Get me a beer, babe,” he’d demanded. Something about it just made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I felt stupid for not realizing it back at Samara’s house. But at that time, tensions were high, others were around, and we didn’t have much interaction.
The dead giveaway was that he hadn’t held or so much as looked at Laney. So, I’d quietly enlisted Lilith to help me pull that thing out of my husband.
I hadn’t wanted to ask my parents for assistance because they would have shown up with the entire Coven and surrounded the house. The matter required a more subtle approach, and Lilith was always willing to keep a secret… and yank souls from bodies.
So, that’s what we were doing.
“Chocolate chips,” Thorn barely spat out as he watched Lilith throw the rest of the muffin in the garbage.
“Yep,” I said and stepped closer to him with the jar. “The cookie recipe was easy enough to modify. So easy, even an inexperienced baker could do it. We just said they were oatmeal raisin because you might have suspected if I’d come out and said we made you chocolate chip muffins. Couldn’t take that chance.”
“You can’t do this,” he whispered.
“Oh, but I can,” I said. “We can. You said yourself that dark magic still worked. I hate to tell you but ripping souls out of bodies and storing them in jars is… pretty dark.”
“You can’t do this,” he said again. “You can’t put me in a jar.”
“I can, and I will,” I said. “Unless you tell me what’s in those little black spell bags. If you tell me how to make them, we’ll consider it a fair bargain. I’ll let you go.”
“You’re making a witch’s bargain?” He asked, but I saw his eyes light up.
“I am,” I said. “Tell me how to make the bags, and I won’t put you in this jar.”
He rattled off a list of common ingredients. It was stuff like belladonna and bark from a hangman’s tree. Things that were readily available in Coventry.
“You see,” he said when he finished the ingredients, “It’s not really about the bags. It’s about getting under your skin. I was priming you with anxiety.”
“I know that,” I said with a snort. “I’m not stupid. I opened the bag and looked inside. What I didn’t know was what they were for, but we cleared all of that up yesterday.”
“Then why did you ask? You have to let me go now,” he demanded, but his face betrayed his concern.
“That’s true. I have to let you go,” I said. “But the reason I asked was to give my Auntie Lilith time to finish casting a circle. See, she doesn’t have to let you go.”
Lilith walked over to me, and I handed her the jar.
“I’ll go into the child,” he hissed. “You wouldn’t dare risk this kind of magic with her.”
“Do you really think I would bring my child into dangerous situations unprotected?” I asked. “Sure, it makes me nervous when you and your… friend kept talking about her like she’s a side of beef at the market, but you can’t harm her. Not really. Laney is wearing a witch’s bone amulet,” I said, and Zane… Thorn’s face fell. “My father procured it for her when all of this began, and apparently, if you even try to possess her, you’ll be destroyed. It’s powerful enough to protect her from many forms of magic and good old human violence too. And, since it’s technically necromancy and made with the bone of a dead witch, it still works too.”
“It’s always good to know a few witches who are familiar with the dark arts,” Lilith said.
“It is indeed,” I agreed.
“Now, let’s put him in the jar. I really am hungry,” Lilith said. “That’s my third batch of those muffins. I didn’t have time for breakfast.”
“Alright, what do I do?” I asked.
“Spit in the jar,” Lilith said.
“What?” I asked.
“You and Deputy Do-right have a baby together. You are of one flesh. So, spit in the jar. Unless you want to pee in it. That would work too,” Lilith said with a chuckle.
“I think… I’m just going to spit in it. We can discuss some of this magic you know later,” I said.
“That magic is saving your boring husband, and don’t you forget it,” Lilith said.
It had protected my daughter too. So, I spit in the jar.
A second later, the magic in the jar sucked that inky blackness out of Thorn. Zane, the dark smokey presence, funneled into the jar, and it had ripped every drop from Thorn’s body. Lilith put the lid on.
“Let me see that,” I said. “I want to make sure that lid is on good and tight.”
“You can’t,” Lilith said. “You made the bargain, remember?”
“I’m not the one putting him in the jar. Hey, wait a minute. How am I not the one who put him in the jar? I spit in it, and that activated the magic?”
“I was holding it, and I gave you the instructions. You were simply adding an ingredient. It’s all very technical and archaic. You’re right. I’m sure it’s fine,” she said and handed me the jar.
“As long as he doesn’t get out,” I said.
“He won’t,” Lilith said.
After I made sure the lid
