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“I even want to know what happened?” Ellen asked as she took Mary’s bleeding hand and carefully cleaned it. Chances were, she didn’t. If this had happened during school hours, Ellen would have to do a bunch of paperwork. If it hadn’t, that meant it was a hunting injury, from a hunt Mary hadn’t told Ellen she was going on.
Mary hung her head. “It’s a paperwork issue, sort of. I know better than to let these boys get to me, but you know how I took the older kids to the pond to study wildlife?” Ellen nodded. Their school was a home school for hunters’ children, and Mary was the science expert. “I caught Tom putting a spider on Jo.”
Ellen smirked. Knowing her daughter, she could guess the rest of the story about having to stop Jo from breaking Tom’s nose. “Shoulda just let Jo handle it. She’s more than capable, even if Tom is twice her size.”
“I thought about it, but… Dean beat us both to the punch. Literally.” That got an eyeroll – they were raising hunters’ kids. They’d had to talk to Dean several times about the kids needing to be able to protect themselves, not rely on him to do their fighting for them. Even the girls, and especially even Sam. “And then Tom shot off his mouth about how he knew Jo wouldn’t do anything to hurt him and I wouldn’t either, since we’re girls and all girls are good for is talking and boring things to death with endless useless lessons.”
“Please tell me you had Meg with you?” Ellen interrupted. Best way for Tom to get that beat out of him was for his little sister to kick him in the ass in front of his friends.
Mary shook her head. “Meg and Sam were with Pamela, remember? Their special lessons for the kids with powers?” Damn. There went that hope. “Which meant I had to deal with him myself, and with Dean, too. He knows better.
“That explains a lot, though.” Pamela wrapped an arm around Mary. “About halfway through the lesson, Sam and Meg both got really upset and walked out of class. They both said something about idiot brothers, but when I did my scrying, I didn’t see any real danger to them. Earned discipline, that wouldn’t show up.” She placed a gentle kiss on Mary’s cheek. “I wish I’d gone with you.”
“I know, but as useful as your scrying is, you’re not very helpful in learning to spot bugs or identify different types of fish by their scale patterns or observing camouflage.” Pamela chuckled – couldn’t argue with that. A visual lesson was not one to take the blind teacher along on. “Would’ve been nice to have Sam and Meg there, though, and I do kind of feel bad for Amy and the twins missing out on the field trip.”
“At least Tom’s dad isn’t going to be a dick about you giving his son a thrashing, and the only complaint Dean’s dad will have is that you didn’t go hard enough,” Ellen drawled. “Hope you’ll forgive me talking shit about your husband while you’re injured, Mary, but you know what an idiot John can be.”
“Yeah, I do.” Mary examined her hand as Ellen finished bandaging it. “There’s no way I can wear a glove over this, is there.”
“Nope. Sorry. You’re going bare-handed until that’s healed.” Ellen patted the bandaged hand. “Don’t worry, love, everyone outside the hunting world already thinks we’re horribly mannered, ill-bred, scandalous old hags because we refuse to wear clothes that make it impossible for us to fight. Not wearing gloves won’t ruin your reputation one bit.”
“Not to mention the scandal of us keeping each other company when our husbands are away?” Pamela joked. “It’s not like we bother to hide our relationships, even from John and Bill and Jesse.”
“Yeah, that’s true.” Mary grinned at her girlfriends. “So, kids are looking after themselves and each other now, comfort me for my injured hand and pride of motherhood?”