Free Give Me by L. K. Rigel

years and years more together. It wasn’t fair!
    “I have to find your medicine.” Lourdes had wyrded the botanicals out of the kitchen, but they had to be somewhere. With the ring on her hand, Elyse felt a surge of confidence. “Hold on, Mother. I can find the hawthorn.” At the door she looked back. “Please hold on.”
    “Be kind to your sister!”
    As Elyse crossed under the archway to the kitchen, a blast of energy knocked her to the floor. Her mother’s power. Or her own, perhaps, the power Mother had talked about keeping from her. Or the full power of the ring. If any of those were true, it only meant one thing.
    Her mother was gone.
    Elyse had to get her back. Lourdes would know what to do. She’d know of a restoration spell. Elyse struggled to her feet and ran out into the courtyard. Andromache waited near the cottage door, as if in response to Elyse’s unspoken will.
    Was this how it worked? She remembered Lourdes calling for Hector’s rig.
    “Harness!” Who, what was she calling to?
    The bit and bridle appeared in her hand, and she fitted it over the filly’s head. She had to bring the horse to the fence and step up on the rail to mount her bareback. Elyse hated to ride away from the cottage and leave Mother alone on the roof, but Lourdes was her only hope. She dug her heels into Andromache’s sides.
    It hadn’t been all that long since the glimmer glass went dark. As Elyse approached Igdrasil, Galen was on the ground with Lourdes on top of him, grinding her hips.
    “Lourdes!” Disgusting. For this, Lourdes had hidden Mother’s herbs.
    “Get away!” Lourdes set another boundary, not very strong. Maybe she thought Elyse wasn’t much to worry about. Maybe she needed to conserve her power to keep Galen in thrall.
    Elyse flicked her wrist as Mother might. The boundary dissolved in a pastel shimmer of light.
    “We’ll have a child.” Lourdes whispered in Galen’s ear, but Elyse heard it all. “Our son will be the most powerful king in the world. Sarumos will be nothing before Dumnos.”
    No!
    The universe shifted again. The air was sharp and cool and exhilarating, and Elyse tingled liked she used to close to Mother during a big wyrd. She didn’t know how, but she’d stopped Lourdes from having Galen’s child—or anyone’s—now and forever.



7
Strawberry Jam
    21st Century Dumnos
    I t was colder today. The mist had burned off, and the top was down in Bausiney’s carriage. The French girls were in their glory, seated like bookends on either side of the tour guide.
    Cammy handed Lilith her cell phone. “Take a picky of us with his lordship, will you?”
    “I thought these didn’t work in Dumnos.” Lilith turned the thing over, looking for the camera button. She had to admit she was disappointed. When Bausiney said he’d be at the Tragic Fall at ten o’clock this morning, she’d thought he meant for her alone. Bella and Cammy had had different thoughts.
    “The mobile won’t, but the camera should,” Marion said. She wasn’t joining them on the tour, but Bausiney had offered to take her up into the hills to Bausiney’s End to make sure Lord Dumnos had his breakfast.
    “How’s this, then?” Bausiney put his arms around the sisters. They were dressed in bad imitations of Stevie Nicks with fringed shawls and floppy velvet hats and rings on every finger. Their necklaces and earrings boasted moons and stars and spiders on silver cobwebs. Bausiney winked at Lilith as she clicked a few shots. Her heartbeat quickened, and she avoided looking at him as she returned the phone to Cammy.
    The carriage rolled to a dead stop at the village square. The square was like the hub of a wheel with seven oddly spaced narrow lanes as the spokes. Tourists streamed in via those spokes and clogged the entire works.
    Bella leaned over the side and looked ahead. “There seems to be some general confusion about right of way.”
    “One moment, ladies.” Bausiney bounded out into the square, gesturing