Free Feathers (A Witch Central Morsel) by Debora Geary Page A

you sliding down a waterfall this time too.”
    Lauren snickered.  That was a dare.
    And possibly grounds for a second suitcase.
    -o0o-
    It was like they were moving to Antarctica.  A warm Antarctica.  For years.  Nell looked at the pile of accumulated important stuff in her living room and shook her head.  The girls had insisted they were packing themselves for this trip.  Which meant Aervyn had promptly followed suit.
    Letting them might rank as one of her dumber parenting decisions of this decade.
    Nathan walked into the room, carrying swim trunks and a baseball, and grinned.  “Better tell Uncle Matt we need a bigger shack.”
    The medical clinic’s accommodations were rustic at best, and all her children adored them.  But the huts were small, leaky, and prone to visits from monkeys who liked to borrow things.  “I think we’d better take the circus tent.”  Helga’s gift to the girls on their last birthday. 
    Her oldest son rolled his eyes.  And would be the first person to volunteer to set the tent up. 
    She waved her fingers at his baseball and trunks.  “That’s all you’re taking?”
    “Sure.”  He shrugged.  “Uncle Matt and Téo have lots of food.”
    Teenage-boy priorities.
    Nathan slung his form into a chair, the baseball tracing casual figure eights in the air.
    Nell smiled.  Her son was getting very good at magic he wasn’t supposed to be able to do.  She scanned his energy streams, just in case he’d grown a little air power overnight.  Nope.  Using water power and sheer will, just like Devin did on a broom.
    “Mama.”  His groan of disgusted protest came with a grin that said he wasn’t really all that put out.  “I’m not a kid anymore.  I scan myself, you know.  You can stop checking up on me.”
    She was smarter than the average mom.  “Mmm-hmm.  And when’s the last time you scanned your sisters?”
    The baseball lurched a little.  Nathan snagged it out of the air with a fast hand.  “Yesterday.  During water tag.”  He looked at her, totally deadpan.  “But they’re still kids.”
    She threw a pillow at his head, chuckling.  And opened her mind a little more than usual.  She knew what it was to be older sibling to a crazy trio.  Nathan handled it much the way she had—with a little bossiness, a clear sense of who he was, and deep, patient love.
    All three of which he would probably deny.  He was just their big brother.
    “I’m okay.”  He cut her a quick look over his baseball’s new trick.  “At least nobody’s filling my room with fireworks in the middle of the night these days.” 
    She smiled—it was one of her very favorite memories.  Aervyn had pumped out magic from the moment he’d been born.  And one night, when he was about eight months old, his exhausted parents had woken up to absolute silence.  No baby in their bed.
    They’d found him down the hall in Nathan’s instead, cooing happily and making fireworks.  And a year and a half later, when Aervyn had learned to port, the first place he’d gone was his big brother’s bed.
    A baseball zoomed in front of her nose.  Nathan grinned.  “Lost in space, huh?”
    Lost in memories.  She snagged the ball out of the air on its next pass.  Daniel wasn’t the only parental Walker with fast hands.  “Careful.  If you break my nose, I won’t be able to cook lunch.”
    “My friend Chani broke his nose.  You just stuff a hundred miles of gauze up it and then you’ll be fine.”
    That didn’t sound like much fun for Chani.  “Thanks a lot.”
    He grinned, totally unrepentant.  “I have better control than that.  And Uncle Jamie would feed me if you couldn’t.”
    Probably.  Her brothers had passing acquaintance with the appetite of a teenage witch.  “You’d get sick of spaghetti after a while and you’d come crawling back, totally heartsick about what you’d done to your poor mother’s nose.”
    “Nah.”  The merriment in his eyes doubled.  “Aunt