Page 111 of The Hearth Witch’s Guide to Spite & Spellwork

“I want to.” Saga’s own certainty in that surprised her. “And if I don’t do it now, I think I’ll just avoid it indefinitely, but…I need you to understand where I’m at right now, emotionally.”

Avery just nodded. Saga liked that about her. When she listened, she just listened. Saga never had to worry about her interjecting with an opinion before she had expressed what she needed to. That was comforting. It made her feel like she could take her time.

“The number of nights I spent as a kid, wishing on stars or praying to Brigid that somehow…I’d got it all wrong. That there was some secret reason my mother didn’t want me. That I was special and loved and sending me away was for the best, and one day I would understand why…” She could see the unspoken question forming in Avery’s expression. “But now that I might actually have that? The thing I was so desperate to believe? I’m scared it might break me.”

“May I?” Avery reached across the table, palms up and beckoning.

Saga’s hands slid into place, and Avery’s fingers gently clasped around them with a firm, reassuring squeeze.

“I think we make stories for ourselves, especially when we are young, to help us through what feels unbearable. And when something challenges that story, it can be frightening—even if what changes is it stops being a story.” She thoughtfully ran a thumb over Saga’s knuckles. “I knew Lahiri was correct that day—that no child should have to live with the burden of finding their parent brutally murdered. I do not believe someone’s memory should be altered without their consent, regardless that it might make life easier for them, but I do—and did—understand the damage witnessing that can cause.”

“You saw your mother, didn’t you?” Saga asked softly. “That’s why you snapped at him. Because the story you’ve always told yourself was that if you hadn’t lived with that, you wouldn’t be who you are now. You needed that pain to be useful, and while you may not agree with his methods, the idea that you didn’t have to go through that if someone had just done the same for you…”

A breath forced itself out of Avery, sounding like a laugh half-strangled by a suppressed sob. “Miss Trygg, I have been meaning to talk to you about your perceptive nature regarding my behavior. It is becoming a problem.”

Then they both laughed, genuinely, and Saga was grateful for a break in the tension.

“Are you ready for this?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be.”

They pulled back the top of the file together, and at first, to Saga, it seemed nothing had changed.40 She leaned forward to read the top document. “The Winter Court vs. Audrey Hudson.”

“All rise,” the sentinel posted below the judge’s seat called.

Saga heard the gallery rise in the court before she realized they were no longer in her living room. At least it seemed that way. It looked like a courtroom, though the ceilings and woodwork were far more ornate than she’d seen in any movies on the subject. It must have been one within the Palace of Judication, as she recognized the art nouveau–style embellishments to the architecture. “This is…”

“Disorienting?” Avery asked.

“Amazing,” Saga breathed. “Also disorienting. Where are we?”

“Still in your apartment. Think of this as a shared dream of—Oh sweet fate, of course it’s him.”

Saga followed Avery’s glare of displeasure to the judge’s seat, where an impossibly tall man was taking his seat. He must have nearly been seven feet tall, all limbs and angles.

“Lord Gideon Blackthorn presiding as magistrate in the matter of Audrey Hudson,” the sentinel announced.

She could see the family resemblance, but there were aspects to Avery that Saga realized had been softened by her human heritage. There was a sharpness to the man’s features that gave her the impression she’d cut herself just by letting her gaze linger. His hair was longer, straight, and fell freely to his shoulder blades. He had the approximation of a human appearance, but it was not simply his ears or fangs that identified him as something else. While a beautiful picture, each feature had something just a little unnatural about it that gave a sinking sense of dread. His limbs were a bit too long, his eyes a bit too pale, his teeth a bit too white. Looking at Gideon Blackthorn, Saga understood what fables had been desperately trying to convey to children for years: Do not be fooled by fey’s similarities to humans. They are anything but.

All standing in the gallery bowed, and without the courtesy of a glance, Gideon flicked his hand for them to sit.

Saga’s eyes widened, recognizing faces among them. “That’s my grandfather—and Leigh—and Mamó!”

“And you,” Avery pointed out.

In the front row of the gallery, each wearing their worry differently, sat William Hudson, Leigh, Riddle, and Saoirse O’Donnell with a six-year-old Saga on her lap.

“Good morning, Your Worship,” greeted the sentinel. He reached up to hand Gideon a file. “This is a criminal hearing regarding a violation of the fifth law of magic, which is as follows: Magic shall not shift the sands of time.”

“Bring in the accused, and the advocates,” Gideon instructed. His face was stoic, but Saga noticed as he looked over the contents of the folder, his nostrils flared.

The sentinel opened the side doors, and Audrey Hudson was ushered in by two more sentinels, followed by a cockatrice in a pinstripe suit and a centaur.

Avery pushed herself to stand. “That’s Justice Norton.”

Saga followed, though she was more tentative in her movements. Was she actually moving or was the movement also like a dream? Could she move around unhindered or was there a risk of hitting her shins against the furniture she could no longer see? “Who?”

“Well, I suppose back then he was still Mercy Norton.” Avery frowned. “I hope he wasn’t too blinded by arrogance to—except apparently he is not blind?”