We tried the Pairing Ritual again last week and nothing happened. Marshall said he didn't care if we weren't paired officially, he wants to get married anyway. The spell is meant to put witches together for procreation, not love.
Nan insisted I try again and got suspicious when it didn't work. She took me to a healer, who did all kinds of tests, tried everything she could think of, but failed. She referred me to other healers who specialize in infertility, and Nan took me to see them as well.
Three conclusive diagnosis later, turns out, it's not the magic. It's me. How ironic is that? A Green Witch who isn't fertile?
I can't have children.
As soon as I told him, Marshall suddenly had a fiancé. Some witch from the Spirit Lake Coven. Turns out, he didn't like his match, and I was his backup plan until it came out that I can't reproduce.
The entire coven is whispering about it behind my back. I can't go anywhere without someone giving me pitying looks, and Nan is so disappointed I can't bear to look her in the eye.
She says it's not my fault, that not every woman is destined to have a baby, but she's just saying that to make me feel better.
It's not working.
I told Nan I could see a human doctor. That maybe it's not a matter of magic, but she was so horrified I didn't dare bring it up again. It's forbidden, but it's the only thing I can think of to do.
Pain was etched right there on the page. Her mother's struggle so vibrant Ivy felt it like it was her own. Ivy turned the page, overwhelmed with sadness as she read the next entry, detailing Ilsa's clandestine trip into the city to meet with a human fertility doctor.
The tests and scans told her the same thing the magical healers said, but the human doctors used the phrase, ‘without medical intervention,’ which gave Ilsa hope that it was still possible.
There were two more entries about not giving up, of having gone to three other human doctors for options, in-vitro fertilization came up more than once, but there was no way for Ilsa to get a male witch to donate his sperm without explaining why, and Ilsa had already broken several laws by allowing a human to get a hold of her blood.
Her grandmother found out Ilsa broke the law of the times then, and it was too much to be ignored. Ilsa was punished by her coven and cast out, forced to make her own way in the world without any aid from her only living relative. Ivy felt the pain of that so deeply, she had to stop and explain to Rowena why she was crying.
“I guess mom and I had much more in common than I thought,” she murmured, turning her face into Uriah's fur when he leaned his big head over her shoulder to chuff gently at her.
It took her a minute to get herself back together, but it was for nothing when she read the next entry, dated six months after her mother had been banished from her coven.
Nan died today. The elders won't even let me come back for her funeral. They said they'd done me a favor telling me. She died alone, and it's all my fault. Now I have no one.
The next several pages were spells and concoctions Ilsa had tried in order to force her body to comply with her wishes over the course of a year. She'd taken trips to Peru, Thailand, Japan, India, and Tibet with detailed appointments she'd kept with all kinds of magical practitioners, seeking an ancient cure for her infertility with no success.
Eighteen months before Ivy had been born, Ilsa made a single diary entry.
I think I found a way.
That was it. Six words and a sketch of a stag. Two weeks went by before Ilsa wrote another entry, her excitement plain in the way she wrote and how her handwriting was closer together and not so neat.
I did it. I found a way, and he says it doesn't matter what the healers or doctors said. One night with him, that's all it will take.
No spells, no disgusting potions, no treatments that leave me feeling sick for days. One night, and I'll have my baby.
He says it has to happen on Beltane (for obvious reasons) but it seems so far away. I guess it will give me time to find a mid-wife and a home for me and my baby. I can hardly believe it, but we made a deal, him and me, and I honestly thought the cost would be higher. I get my baby and he gets his. That's it.
I won't be alone anymore.
Ivy frowned, quickly scanning the next several entries for the name of her father, but she didn't find anything but her mother's excited records of finding the perfect house for them and a mid-wife willing to help Ilsa with the birth.
On May 1st, Ilsa made another short entry.
It's happening tonight. A few more hours, and I'll be pregnant.
There was a photo tacked to the opposite page: her mother standing in front of a mirror in what looked like some dingy motel room, wearing nothing but a sheer black robe and a tear-filled smile of hope.
Ivy pulled the picture gently off the paper and stroked her thumb over her mother's face, tracing the spill of thick, wild red hair held back in a loose braid.
Ivy could see herself in her mom's features, their nose and eyes were the same. As was the bone structure of their faces, and willowy but curvy figure.
“I forgot how beautiful she was,” Ivy murmured, reluctantly handing the photo to Rowena.
Her coven leader studied the photo with a soft smile, her gaze kind as she passed the photo to Astrid. “Except for that red hair, you look just like her.”
“Totally,” Astrid agreed, handing the photo to Juliet, who whistled in appreciation.
One by one, her coven sisters examined the photo, proclaiming Ilsa Greene a stunning woman. Ivy took it from Kerrigan and carefully tucked the photo back in place.
“She met someone, a man,” Ivy reported. “He told her could get her pregnant in one night after every other practitioner and human doctor told her it was impossible. I still haven't found a name yet, but she says she made a deal with this guy, that she gets her baby and he gets his.”
“That sounds... off,” Callie commented gently.
Ivy agreed with a nod, but Kerrigan gave a shrug. “Desperate people do desperate things.”
“She was definitely desperate,” Ivy agreed sadly, turning to the next page. Ivy's mom hadn't made an entry until May 4th.
It worked, I know it did. It's hard to describe the sensation because I hurt so badly, but it's there. I'm pregnant, and I feel... dirty.
A Green Man's magic is neutral, not dark or light, and Beltane is a night of fire and passion, but somehow, I feel like I participated in a black sabbath.
It was just us: him and me alone in the woods. We lit the bonfire together in the space I prepped yesterday for us.
When we made our deal, he said I didn't need anything but him, but I did it anyway. I planted jasmine, figs, and poppies around the circle. I harvested bottlebrush blossoms to sprinkle on the bed of thick red blankets I brought. I even bathed in milk and honey and covered my entire body in primrose oil.
What could it hurt? It made me feel good, made it feel real, and I thought he'd appreciate I was trying to show my gratitude for what he was doing to help me.
He didn’t. He laughed and as soon as the sun went down, he unleashed his magic without a word of warning.
It hit me like a freight train, and I honestly don't remember much of what happened other than to say he was on me, in me, all night.
I woke up sprawled naked in the dirt, covered in scrapes and bruises. There was blood under my fingernails, smeared up and down my arms, and semen all over me. So much semen.