Healing Hands (The Queen of the Night series Book 2) Read Online Free Page B

fire truck is that?”
    Our father had been an enlisted military man who used a lot of colorful language. When I started imitating him as a toddler my mother instituted a couple of ground rules. She made my dad substitute certain words for other less age appropriate terms. Corey was substituting words again.
    He fell backwards into the chair with his eyes bulged out and his mouth agape.
    Ginger got scared and instantly became one with the wall. Her ability to camouflage herself was infinitely better than the coolest chameleon.
    “Thank you, Ginger. Would you leave the tray on the dresser, please?”  She did so, matching her colors to the surrounding furniture as she moved. It gave me vertigo watching her. I waited until she had scuttled away. That’s when I remembered how Evan had started the conversation last time. “Corey, the world is not what you thought it was.”
    “But…but…” he stammered, “The furniture moves!”
    I looked at Evan. “Didn’t I say they looked like moving furniture?”  I’d had the same reaction to the first Brownie I’d met.
    Evan brought the conversation back to urgent matters. “Corey, you just met Ginger. She is a Brownie. She lives here with Fiona.”
    “Get out!”
    “There are many magical creatures in this world.” He spoke with a great deal of patience. “You have to want to see them to know they exist…and of course, you have to be magical yourself.”
    Well, that answered one question. I’d spent so much time forcing myself to believe Corey was non-magical, and the legend referred to a different boy, I’d refused to scan his aura. I’d absolutely refused. I had no choice now, but to face my fear. Instinctively, I opened my Healer vision and gazed at my brother. His aura was filled with gold. He had as much untapped magical power as Evan, but what gifts did he possess?  Did he have Seer gifts, Healer gifts, or like me, something different entirely?  This fact, Corey’s power, changed everything.
    Evan didn’t react to the realization that Corey was magical. Of course he didn’t. Only I had heard Paul Sinclair tell the legend of the Destroyer. Evan still discussed the Brownies.
    “…Brownies share houses with magical humans. They do housework in exchange for room and board. There are five Brownies living in this house.”
    “That is so awesome!” Corey gushed. “Do they have any superpowers?”
    He’s taking this well , I mused, but we had a real problem on our hands. I interrupted. “We can’t let Corey meet anyone today. Not until we’ve had a chance to think about this. We have to keep people from visiting.” 
    Evan picked up on the frantic tone of my voice. “Go tell Fiona.”
    “You’re right. I have to tell Fiona. I’ll be back.”
    I found her on the back deck offering the morning blessing to Llew, even though it was after noon.
    “Fiona, we have to keep people from coming to visit. What can we do to stop them?”
    “Why would we want to do that?”
    “Because I have a secret I’ve been keeping from everyone,” I started, “about the legend of the Destroyer and, well, and Corey.”
    She gasped.
    I finished, “We can’t introduce him to the whole clan until our family has a chance to talk amongst ourselves.”
    She looked stumped at my admission. Fiona never looked stumped. She reasoned out loud. “It’s tradition on Alban Arthan for the clan crone, the oldest living woman in the clan, to drink from the well of the Young, and to lead the children in a procession to give the leftovers from the Yule feast to the needy. Since our family sustained a death recently,” she paused for a moment, “we would be considered the neediest family right now.”
    “Can we ask them to give it to someone else?”
    “I’ll try to get Farmer Macgregor on the cell phone. His wife, Evelyn, is the Crone. I’ll tell them you are distraught and ask them to give you privacy. I’ll ask them to donate the food to the church in Shannon’s memory.”