My Three Little Daisy Buds Part One
Rosella stood outside the school with Maria, waiting for the twins to come out. Even two weeks in, she still wasn’t used to her own school days, much less the routine of picking Lorelai and Jasper up. But Roman was even less used to it. So here Rose was, having to call Maria in again, because fourteen-year-olds weren’t allowed to drive.
The Director of Black Ridge’s assistant never spoke much, and Rose was glad for that. She never knew what to say to this young woman who claimed she was human, but had magic spiralling around her wherever she went. Rose didn’t think Maria was powerful, but she was intimidating. And like everything else in this mundane society, Maria didn’t fit in any of the boxes Rose had in her head. Not for humans or Supernaturals.
The shrill bell of the elementary school startled Rose from her thoughts, and she quickly looked away when she realized she’d been staring at Maria openly.
Parents, teachers, and what looked like hundreds of children swarmed the school doors, and Rose had to remind herself that she wouldn’t lose Lorelai and Jasper in this chaos. She and Maria stood right by the entrance closest to the kindergarten classrooms, and the twins knew to come right out to them. It was a far better plan than to have Rose go in to find them. When she did that the first day, she got so overwhelmed that she missed them entirely and spent what felt like an extra hour finding them.
Rose just wasn’t used to being around so many humans at once. They felt different, smelled different, sounded different, and lived so differently than anything Rose was used to. It wasn’t that she was never around humans before she moved in with Roman Pizarro and his two five-year-old children a few months ago. But being around them all the time, every day, was weirdly exhausting. Not to mention that Rose was terrified of being discovered by the wrong people.
Finally, Rose saw Lorelai and Jasper coming towards them, Lorelai pulling her brother behind her. She walked them confidently to where Rose and Maria stood, like she instinctively knew where they were. Rose wouldn’t put it past the twins for having that kind of intuition. Not only because of the trauma they’d already suffered in their short lives—losing their mother and then being put in the care of a twenty-eight-year-old father who hadn’t known they existed—but also because of what Rose sensed in them the moment she met them. There was magic in their blood.
“Rosie!” Lorelai exclaimed when she finally saw her and ran to throw her arms around Rose’s legs.
Rose gratefully wrapped her arms around Lorelai, able to let out a tight breath. Jasper came more slowly behind his sister, but he grabbed Rose’s hand when she extended it out to him. It took a month and a half before Jasper felt safe enough to speak to Rose, much less touch her. He was even less comfortable around Roman. Rose couldn't blame him.
“How was your guys’ day?” Rose asked
She felt Maria move slightly closer to her side, as more people moved around the school.
The Director’s one job concerning Rose was to keep her safe and under the radar. For the first couple of months, the Director really only had Roman on that job as the rest of her team focused on finding the man responsible for this heightened security in the first place. But since Rose and the twins started school, Maria was put on the job too, coming around the house to see how the kids and Roman were managing, picking the kids up from school when Roman wasn’t around, and acting as Rose’s bodyguard whenever they were out of the house.
“It was weird!” Lorelai answered, like that explained it all.
“What do you mean?” Rose asked, but was already brushing it off. They could talk about it in the car.
Surprisingly, it was Jasper who explained. “Those big guys that took us away from Mommy came for a girl in class today.”
Rose turned back to them in confusion, but it was Maria’s voice that had her concerned.
“What the…”
Maria barely spoke at the best of times, so at the sound of her voice, Rose’s defenses immediately went up. She looked around and saw two police officers escorting a little girl, who seemed even smaller than the twins, out of the school, a teacher at their side.
“They said Gwynie’s mommy was in trouble,” Lorelai tried to explain, “so Gwynie had to go with them. Just like we had to go with them when our mommy was in trouble.”
As the officers came closer, an uncommon but familiar feeling washed over Rose. It took her a minute to remember what the sensation signified and another second to pinpoint where it was coming from.
Rose looked at both officers. No.
The teacher? Also no.
Then Rose’s gaze connected with the little girl, the one Lorelai called Gwynie, and Rose knew.
“Maria,” Rose breathed with urgency. “The girl…”
But they were already at the police cruiser that Rose just noticed. She was still getting used to taking everything in in a landscape that already felt so full. The police car hadn’t stood out to her, but it must have to Maria, which was probably why she was so tense when they got there.
“What about her?” Maria asked, looking concerned. She should be.
“We need to find out her name.” Rose kept watching them. “And I need to talk to the Director. Now.”
For some reason, Maria listened and walked over to the officers. Rose could just make out Maria taking out a badge, which Rose had no clue she even had. Maria’s work was part of a secret branch in the government, one that worked with Rose’s family. Regular police officers shouldn’t know what it was, but whatever Maria said worked, because suddenly the officers were nodding and talking openly with Maria. She nodded a couple of times and then came back towards Rose and the twins.
“The girl’s name is Gwyneth Dare,” Maria said quietly, as she gestured for Rose and the twins to start walking to the car. “Her mother was just apprehended and charged with the murder of her husband, Gwyneth’s father. They live on a farm just outside the city.”
“Take us to the Director,” Rose said as they climbed in. “I need to talk to her.”
“Does Gwynie need a new home, too?” Lorelai asked as Maria drove off. “Is she like you, Rosie? Will she come live with us, too?”
Maria’s eyes briefly shot towards Rose’s in the passenger seat before they went back on the road.
“I don’t know, Laylay,” Rose said. “But she does need a new home. Just like we did.”
Rose could tell Maria wanted to ask her about Gwyneth, but she didn’t. Rose didn’t know what to say if she had.
They finally made it downtown to a high-rise building where Rose was introduced to Director Abba three months ago. The day everything changed for her.
Maria led them up the elevators and through the halls to the Director’s office. Rose didn’t know when, but she knew Maria had given Director Abba a heads-up before their arrival.
Without even knocking, they went inside.
The twins were obviously nervous, and Rose hated herself for not dropping them off at the house before coming here, but she also didn’t like them out of her sight if she could help it. She didn’t know if that was for her benefit or theirs.
Rose clutched both Lorelai and Jasper’s hands as they entered.
Director Abba looked up from her desk, face unexpressive. “What can I do for you, Rosella?”
Rose held her head high. “There’s a little girl at the twins’ school, Gwyneth Dare—”
“Yes, the one whose mother killed the father,” the Director interrupted. “I’m aware.”
“Does the girl have any family to take her in?”
“Why does that concern you?”
Rose didn’t break the Director’s stare. “Does she?”
The Director huffed a sigh, but answered. “No. The father was an only child with elderly parents who died before Miss Dare was born, and he isn’t close to any extended family. The mother doesn’t seem to have any family whatsoever, which is all I could find out before you barged in here. Now, would you like to tell me why you’re wasting my time with a little kid I have nothing to do with? Do you think it’s another one of Roman’s?”
Rose shook her head, holding on tightly to the twins. She wasn’t sure she actually wanted to say the truth in front of them, but she just hoped they didn’t understand the full scope of what she said.
“Gwyneth Dare has Fae blood, I’m assuming from her mom’s side. And it was powerful. I think there’s a reason they lived on a farm outside the city instead of in, and if Gwyneth goes into the regular foster care system, or to some unknown relative on her human father’s side, she’ll be unsafe. She’s too young to know how to control her abilities, and being close to too much iron in the city will weaken her.”
“Then how has she been able to go to school in the city?”
Rose shrugged. “She’s only half-fae, and from what I’ve been told, the Fae can withstand the city for short periods of time.”
The Director arched an eyebrow. “And what are you proposing I do about this?”
“You’re the Director of Black Ridge. Supernatural relations is your job, and I thought you wanted to protect us. Not just my people, but others too. Isn’t that why you brought in Maria?”
Maria visibly startled by the door.
Rose may not know what Maria’s ties were to the Supernatural world, but they touched her blood and soul. She wondered if Maria’s abilities were part of the reason why the Director thought Roman’s household was the best fit for Rosella, with his twins of magic-users. Could Maria sense the twins’ magic? Was that why she came around so frequently to make sure not only Rose was okay, but the twins as well?
Rose’s own senses of the magical world were dimming the longer she was away from her people, but she could still detect the type of magic surrounding a person, a Supernatural. The twins had magic-using blood in their family—what humans called witches, wizards, or sorcerers. Their father, Roman, didn’t have a drop of magic in his blood, so it could only have come from their mother.
Rose didn’t know much about Roman’s brief lover, Evita Flores, besides the fact that she and Roman parted ways before she told him she was pregnant. She also knew that Evita barely scraped by when she got sick and died shortly thereafter. Roman also mentioned once that Evita left her family in Cuba when she was young, and Rose wondered if she was able to come to Canada so easily because she knew the Supernatural world and knew how to use her own abilities. But Rose hadn’t told anyone else about the twins’ blood.
Although that didn’t mean Maria and the Director hadn’t come to the same conclusions.
“And others in your employ,” Rose continued. “So I thought Gwyneth would fall into that same category. She needs help.”
Director Abba watched her carefully. “Those others in my employ are able to work for me. Miss Dare is too young.”
“Then let Roman take her in. He’s already fostering me. Let him foster Gwyneth, too.”
“What about the city’s iron? Roman’s not moving outside of the city anytime soon.”
“I can shield Gwyneth,” Rose said. “If I generate enough energy—well, magic—I can lessen the iron’s effect on Gwyneth.”
“I thought the whole point of you living with Roman was to keep you under the radar. Isn’t using your magic the antithesis of that?”
“My kind doesn’t use magic. We are magic. But our magic, and the ability for others to feel it, is amplified when we are around our kind, and yes, when we expel large amounts of it. But I wouldn’t do anything drastic.”
Director Abba didn’t look convinced.
Rose sighed. “Do you know how my kind can shapeshift into an animal? It’s usually one animal based on our family. Well, I can shift into two, and not only can we shift into them, but we can separate them from our bodies. If I keep at least one of my animals out in the world at all times, the energy generated should expel enough magic to offset the iron’s burn.”
Director Abba actually seemed to consider it. “What about the mother? According to your theory, she would be a full-blooded Fae. Do you want me to get her out of murder charges, too?”
“She’ll waste away in prison. The iron…” Rose started to say, but she really only cared about the little girl. If the mother did kill her husband—and got caught—Rose wasn’t sure she needed protection.
“Most humans waste away in prison,” the Director retorted. “And they don’t have the iron as an excuse.”
“As long as Gwyneth is safe, I don’t care. The mother made her decision.”
“The murder could have been self-defense.”
“Then shouldn’t your human courts clear that up and give her a fair sentence?”
Director Abba looked at her in disappointment.
Rose knew what she said wasn’t true; she’d watched enough human movies and shows, and read enough books growing up, that she knew that the human justice systems were corrupt to their core, but that wasn’t her fight. Not right now.
Finally, the Director gave a slight nod and stood up. “I will get the necessary documents set up for Roman Pizarro to foster Gwyneth Dare. I’m assuming you didn’t run this by him, so I will also break the news and weather his temper tantrum. Anything else?”
Rose just gripped Lorelai and Jasper’s hands and shook her head, ready to leave.
Director Abba nodded to Maria by the door. “Take them home. We’ll reconvene later.”
Not for the first time, Rose thought there was more to the Director and Maria’s relationship than they let on. Their actions and looks fit more between mother and daughter than boss and employee.
The reminder sent a pang through Rose’s entire body, but she shoved down the grief before it could fully emerge.
They followed Maria out without another word.
Next: PART TWO (coming soon...)
SUMMARY