Page 41 of His Hunted Witch

“Are you sure that’s our most pressing concern?” Aiden asked.

“Yes,” she said together with Kathleen and giggled.

“I’m not sure they’re worth saving,” Goldie said as she examined her cuticles.

“Girl, I’m a potion witch. How do you think I whipped up this color?” she asked, waving her purple nails.

Goldie laughed. “Magic nail polish?”

“Never smudges, never chips, and changes colors to whatever you want. It will even spread out when the nails grow.”

Goldie tried to imagine her Aunt Kat, the potion witch of their coven, making nail polish. Magic was such a serious prospect that she just couldn’t.

“Also,” Kathleen said. “Sorry to mention in mixed company, but I can take care of those roots.”

Goldie’s fingers flew to her hair. She’d dyed her hair since she was a teenager, another way to distinguish herself from her family of endless dark-haired beauties.

“Will it also spread as it grows?”

Kathleen grinned. “I haven’t tried hair dye until recently, so not yet,” she said, examining a twist of hair at the front of her head, “but I’ll get there.”

“Mother!” Aiden said in shock.

“You thought I was staring down sixty with hair the same color I was born with?”

He looked between them owlishly. “Well, yeah.”

Goldie laughed with the older woman, feeling something unclench. It was silly to worry about nails, hair, make-up, and indulgences in an emergency, but she would feel more human if she could put herself together.

“I didn’t bring everything in those bags, so I’ll be back. Oh, we could do a little Circle!” Some of Kathleen’s enthusiasm faded as she contemplated that. “I haven’t done that in…” She forced a smile. “A few years.”

Aiden had to be in his thirties. Kathleen hadn’t done magic with another witch in at least that long. The older woman blinked rapidly. “Anyway, it’s a good thing you’re a pattern witch, dear, since it will be easier to mix magics.”

Goldie froze. There were three main types of talents, but there was no way to tell them apart, or so she’d thought. She’d hid hers from her family for years, but this witch had pegged her in less than an hour’s acquaintance?

“How did you know?” she asked, fascinated.

Kathleen blinked. “Know what?”

“That I’m a pattern witch.”

She cocked her head. “You can’t tell?”

“Nobody can see someone else’s magic.”

“No, dear. It’s not your magic. It’s who you are. It’s in the little quirks. The proper grammar. The way you sit. You make little puddles of order out of chaos, a pattern witch down to the bone. Couldn’t be an elemental. Elemental witches float through life.”

Goldie laughed. The strongest elemental witch in her coven was an empath that, yes, would forget the glasses on her nose. “And natural witches?”

Kathleen glanced at Goldie’s nails. “They wouldn’t be wearing those.”

Natural witches had talents with rocks, animals, and plants. Goldie had never noticed before, but the natural witches in her coven seemed to eschew any sort of fripperies.

“What sort of pattern witch?” Kathleen asked. From words to charms to potions, each pattern witch had a different medium for weaving magic.

Goldie took a deep breath. It still felt weird to confess it; she’d been pretending to be something else for decades. “I’m kind of a scribe.”

“Kind of?”

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