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“No. You aren’t. You are the bloodline.”
Tammy furrowed her brow. She’d heard Mom and Mary Lou occasionally talk about being descended from an ancient bloodline of powerful magic users, but the whole Elizabeth thing shot it in the head. Mom lost her ability to participate in the witchy trifecta because of the immortality. Scratch that, she tried, but wasn’t strong enough at magic, thanks to the vampirism.
Anyway, it had never occurred to Tammy before right now that bloodlines had a nasty habit of being inherited. She’d spent her whole life thinking of Mom as the one who happened to be descended from the magic users, it never clicked thatshewas the next generation after Mom. Well, Anthony, too, but he had immortality problems.
Immortality problems Tammy did not have.
Nor did she have an Elizabeth problem anymore.
She stared, stunned at the tiny woman floating in front of her.I tried to make an answer appear above me and… there’s Maple. Did I do that or was it a case of lucky timing?
As if hearing her thoughts, Maple smiled in response. “Yes. You have magic. Your mother is no longer mortal, so it passes to you.”
“There’s still a problem.” Tammy looked at her hands. “Even if I do have magic, I have no ideahowto use it. I’ve never even tried.”
“You only have to learn.” Maple beamed at her. “Easy for one in your line.”
“Easy…?” Tammy tilted her head.
“Yes.” Maple leaned in, sniffed at her, then glided backward, almost frowning. “Sad. Bit too old to start learning.”
Tammy sighed for the fifth time that afternoon. “Figures. People only recently stopped telling me I’m too young to do stuff. Now I’m too old?”
“I have an idea. A fix!” Maple turned a somersault in mid-air.
“Umm. Wait a sec. This isn’t going to turn into like a Star Wars thing where you train the kid who’s too old to start learning and I become a girl version of Darth Vader, is it?”
Maple hovered before her, blinking. “You confusing.”
The notion that a faerie would totally fail to understand a movie reference made complete sense—and happened to be hilarious, or perhaps the hilarity came entirely from the small woman’s facial expression.
Tammy burst out laughing.
Maple made her physics book fly up and bonk her over the head. “No laughing! Annie is in danger.”
“Sorry.” Tammy rubbed her head.
“I forgive.” The fairy queen dropped the book and folded her arms. “I have an idea to fix.”
“So you said. What is it?”
“You are too old to start learning, so I fix your age.”
Tammy blinked. “Whoa. Hang on. You’re going to make me... young again?”
“Yes.” Maple smiled.
She cringed. Going through being a kid too young to do anything—and having a bedtime—again did not appeal. Mom would probablyadorehaving a second go at Tammy being a child. Problem being, the idea didn’t really appeal that much to Tammy.
“No… not like that.” Maple shook her head. “You sleep. Like dream. You will only be gone for one night here. Years in faerie world.”
Tammy fidgeted. It sounded bizarre, weird, and… strangely appealing. Could she genuinely have magic? Might it be possible she really wasn’t a helpless, boring, ordinary person after all? If so, it would mean shecouldhelp Mom and the others deal with the crazy stuff and wouldn’t be this helpless child everyone else needed to protect, this kid who had to sit at home while everyone else ran off to do fantastic things. Homework could go straight to hell. This sounded way more important—and interesting.
“Okay.” Tammy nodded. “I’m in.”
Maple made a ‘come here’ wave to the side. A small notepad and pen leapt from Tammy’s desk and flopped on the bed beside her knee. “Leave words for Samantha. You will not be here for one night. Back in morning. Don’t want Samantha being worried.”
In almost any other case, Tammy would hesitate and ask permission first. However, she didn’t want to risk losing this chance. Also, she was eighteen now. She didn’t have to ask permission like a kid for every little thing. Telling Mom she went somewhere should suffice. Also, it wasn’t like she intended to run off to a party with college boys she didn’t know. Mom knew Queen Maple.
