![]() His skin was a sickly yellow-gray, the color stark against Tamsin’s pale skin. Tamsin used a finger to push aside the blanket obscuring his tiny face. The baby didn’t stir when he was transferred from his mother’s arms to Tamsin’s. Still, in her nearly five years serving the townspeople of Ladaugh, Tamsin had found that most of them felt more at ease in her cottage when they had something concrete to focus on. ![]() Witches themselves were the vessels, intermediaries siphoning natural magic from the world around them and nudging it in the right direction. Tamsin needed none of those things, of course. ![]() The woman hesitated, eyes darting nervously over the objects assembled on Tamsin’s cluttered wooden table: hazy, sharp-edged crystals bundles of sage and lavender tied with white string thick, leather-bound books with creamy, black-inked pages. She turned, gesturing for the woman to hand over the bundle of blankets. “I’ll do anything.” Tamsin’s lips curled. The woman was so close-so close to uttering the three words Tamsin needed to hear. “Please save my son.” But Tamsin did not turn. “Please.” The woman’s voice caught at the end of the word, her plea transformed into a cough, a desperate whimper. She pulled her shawl tighter, swept her long hair around her, but it made not a single bit of difference. ![]() ![]() The fire did nothing to shake the chill in Tamsin’s bones. Tamsin ignored it, turning toward the fireplace, which had been stoked to a blazing roar despite the midsummer heat. “But my child.” She held out the unmoving bundle in her arms. ![]()
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