Flame in the Dark (Soulwood #3)(75)

Mud stopped with the mug halfway to her mouth. Her eyes went slowly wide. Her mouth dropped open. The mug tilted, forgotten, and I grabbed it before it spilled. Her eyes were far away, focused on something only she could see. Then they snapped to me. “You’un gonna marry Ben?”

“I admit I like Ben. But there’s problems with Ben. With any churchman.”

“There’s always problems with churchmen.”

“True.” I handed the mug back to her and said, “Don’t spill it. You know how I told you about claiming land?” She nodded. Sipped. “You remember how the church wanted to burn me at the stake?”

Mud went still as dirt and swiveled her eyes up to me. “Yup.”

I took a breath. “Beings who can claim land like I can, like I think you can, aren’t human. And a sizable number of church folk want to burn all nonhumans at the stake. That means you too. Maybe our sisters. Mama and Daddy. Sam.”

Mud sipped. Sipped again. Picked up the sandwich with one hand and slowly ate half of it. Her forehead was scrunched with thought. “Can we kill the witch killers first?”

I thought about that. About feeding the earth with their blood. Or even sending the vampire tree to kill on church land. No court would ever convict me because no court would understand how I had done it. But more important than getting caught was the morality of not committing murder. “Probably, but I won’t kill unless I’m attacked. Or you or the Nicholsons are attacked.

“I can read the land like . . . like Daddy can read the Bible. I can commune with it. It can heal me if I’m hurt. Save my life if I’m dying. And if I read the land too long or too deep it grows roots into me as a way of claiming me back.”

Mud’s eyes went so wide I was afraid they’d pop out of her head. I hadn’t told her that part yet.

I held out my hands to show her. “I have to be cut free and that makes the land angry sometimes. And then there’s the foliage that grows out of my fingernails and my hairline.” I touched the nape of my neck, finding a tiny sprig there, curled and twisted, newly sprouted, faster than usual, perhaps as a result of the burning. I pulled my hair aside and showed her the leaf, as if maybe she had forgotten my leaves from last time. I put my hand to my belly, feeling the hardness there, from roots that had grown into me and left their mark. I seldom thought about them, unless reminded. And I decided I had told her enough for now. Roots growing inside me might be too much for my sister.

Mud picked up the stew bowl and started eating, thinking. I waited. Nibbled on my own sandwich, smoothing my pants with my free hand. I was wearing black today, with black office shoes and a black jacket, a soft and flowing navy shirt over a black T-shirt, to protect my skin from the weapons harness. I was thinking of stupid things. My heart was racing and my fingers tingled. I cleared my throat.

“You’un ain’t said exactly. I know we’uns not fairies. Is we’uns plants?” Her voice was calm, not excited or panicked. Calmer than I was.

“No. We bleed blood, not sap. We’re meat. Mostly.”

“Would Ben Aden burn you’un at the stake if’n he found out you’un wasn’t human?”

A knowing skirled through me like a dancing wind. “I don’t know,” I whispered, accepting fully what I had just said. “Even if he knew what I am and he still wanted me, I’d be putting him in danger to marry him. I’d be putting all my babies in danger. So . . . No matter how much I might like Ben Aden, I won’t be marrying him.” I placed the sandwich on the plate. It tasted like sawdust. “And if you are the same creature as me, then you need protection too.”

As I spoke, tears had gathered in Mud’s eyes. She put the mug on the tray. And threw herself into my arms. Hugging me so tight it was like being strangled by roots. I hugged back. Realized we were both crying. Rocking. She had grown in the last months and weighed more than I anticipated. The chair was moaning beneath us. I stood and lifted Mud and myself to the couch. Grunted more than I expected. I was getting soft working at PsyLED.

I shoved cats out of the way and pulled the afghan over us, holding my sister, not sure if she was happy or horrified or something too complicated for a single word. Time passed. I felt the car on my road again. Surely an hour hadn’t gone by.

“How you think we’ll get them to let me live here?” Mud asked.

“I’ll have to work on that. But maybe the mamas can be persuaded. Maybe we’ll have tea. Talk. Show some stuff.”

Mud giggled into the warm space between my neck and shoulder. “Leaves?”

I laughed with her, a single note of shared hilarity. “If necessary.”

Her merriment faded. “Is Sam one of us?”

“I don’t know. He knows I’m . . . different, though. And he knows he’s different, though he never mentioned growing leaves.”

“Esther? Priscilla? Judith?”

“I don’t know. But it’s genetic, so even if they’re human, their children might be like us.”

Mud pushed away and stood, smoothing down her skirts and smoothing back her bunned-up hair. “You let me know when you’uns is gonna have that tea. I reckon I’m gonna need to be with you’un for it.”

“I will.” I stared up at Mud as Sam parked and got out of the truck. She had to be nearly five feet tall now. Growing like a weed, though that would stop since she had started her feminine cycle. Mud was going to be a short woman. Which brought a soft smile to my face. “You scared?”