Page 80 of Witch Undecided
Trudy simpered and then dematerialized.
I arched my brow at him.
“What?” He gave me a wide-eyed, innocent look.
“Never mind. Just help me with Wren.”
“Let’s get him to my office.”
“You have an office?”
“Library, but while I’m here the space is mine.”
Figured. Conah would live in a library if he had the choice. He headed for the stairs and I followed, Wren clutched snuggly to my chest. He’d be okay. He had to be. Conah wouldn’t be so calm otherwise.
Would he?
The library wasa grand room with a vaulted ceiling and enough books to keep someone busy for years. It was also a mess. Books were piled on chairs and on the floor and shoved haphazardly onto shelves.
Conah frowned as he entered. “Shame. There’s a wealth of knowledge here.”
“Sloane told me you’d been tidying up.”
“Someone needs to.”
“I’m surprised they let you go through these books. Witches are notoriously protective of their knowledge.”
“I’m an exception.” He grinned. “Anna likes me.”
But my attention was on Wren again. The silver shit was spreading across his face.
Conah set the tray down on a nearby table. “You okay?” He peered at me with concern.
“I’m good.” I held Wren out. “Fix him.”
“I can’t.” Conah gently took Wren from me, carried him to a nearby sofa, and set him down on it. “This isn’t something to be fixed. We need to keep him warm and let his body do its thing.”
“And whatthingis that?”
“Metamorphosis from infant to teen.”
“Wren’s an infant?”
Conah smiled at me indulgently. “Well in mogwai years, yes. There are three stages to mogwai development, but most mogwai never make it to the final stage.” His expression sobered. “The fae began culling this species a long time ago because in their fully grown form they’re vicious predators.”
Wren? A vicious predator. “Bullshit.”
Conah pressed his hand to my shoulder. “Cora, you can’t keep him. We need to take him back to faerie.”
“Take him back? To that shitty place where he’d been used and abused? Um, let me think about that…No.”
“He can’t stay here,” Conah said firmly.
Like hell. “You don’t know him. You don’t know what he’ll be like when fully grown.”
Conah gave me a sympathetic look. “Yes, I do. He’ll be a monster. He’ll kill everyone in this mansion and then he’ll move on to everyone outside it. Back in the day, mogwai were responsible for whole fae villages disappearing.”
I didn’t want to believe this. Wren was sweet and kind and I fucking loved the little tyke. It was like Conah telling me my baby was gonna grow up to be a serial killer. But Conah knew stuff. This was his superpower.
