Free Wickedly Magical by Deborah Blake Page A

table before sweeping out the door.
    One by one, most of the people in the room left, with or without comment. Finally, the only ones left were Jonathan, Grace, Barbara, and a few others who sat there looking stunned.
    Barbara picked up the stickpin, wiped it off on the tablecloth, and stuck it carefully back through her lapel. The medallion she put in her pocket, even though it no longer posed a danger. Better safe than sorry. Besides, the Queen would no doubt want to trace it back to its origins, so she could express her displeasure personally to its owner for being so careless as to allow it to fall into Human hands.
    As she stood up, Jonathan gazed at her numbly, still clutching at his chest as though he couldn’t quite believe the necklace was no longer there.
    “Why?” he asked her. “Why did you do this to me? Everything was perfect until you ruined it. Why?” The last word came out as a wail.
    Barbara looked down at him dispassionately, unmoved by his grief. He’d done too much damage to too many lives for her to feel sorry for him.
    “Two reasons,” she said. She held up a finger. “One—you had something that didn’t belong to you and you abused its power for your own selfish gains.”
    A second finger went up in the air, and then swiveled to point at Elena and Katya, sitting together at the children’s table, looking bewildered. “And two, you stole another man’s children, and then, when he wouldn’t give them up without a fight, you used that same power to destroy his reputation. I might not have gotten involved for the first one, but the second made this my business. You should have left Ivan Dmetriev alone.”
    Grace jumped up out of her chair and went around to face Barbara. “Ivan? What on earth does Ivan have to do with this?”
    “Ivan called me in to help,” Barbara said, “when you and your boyfriend left him no other choice. You turned the justice system against him, so he came to me for justice instead.”
    “What are you, some kind of bounty hunter?” Grace asked, more belligerent than afraid. “You can’t do anything. The law is on my side. I’m their mother.”
    “Nothing so mundane as a bounty hunter,” Barbara said with a grim little shadow of a smile. “I am a Baba Yaga. And your Human laws are not my concern.” She dropped just enough of her veil to let her real self show out through her eyes, and Grace turned pale and took an involuntary step backward.
    But by the time Barbara walked down to the smaller table, there was nothing to see but a kindly old woman. She held her hands out to the girls. “Hello, Katya. Hello, Elena. Do you remember me? I’m a friend of your father’s. He sent me here to bring you home. Would you like that?”
    Katya hesitated, but Elena put her tiny hand into Barbara’s and gazed up at her with trust in her round brown eyes. “Yes please,” she said. “I miss my daddy.” After a moment, Katya took Barbara’s other hand, and they started to walk towards the door.
    “Wait a minute!” Grace screeched, running over to block their way. “You can’t just take my children.”
    Barbara raised one silvery eyebrow. “No? You took them from their father. I am simply taking them back.”
    “But—but, I’m their mother,” Grace stuttered. “They belong with me.”
    “Fine,” Barbara said. She looked Grace in the eye. “You have a choice. You can come with us, and take the chance that you can work out some kind of agreement with your husband. Or you can stay with Jonathan. But you can’t have both. I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, and believe that you only helped Jonathan smear your husband’s reputation because you were under his influence. But if you choose not to go back and repair the damage you’ve done, and voluntarily stay with the man who did it, I will make sure you never see these children again.” Her expression was hard, her tone unwavering. “It’s your choice. But you have to choose now, because