by Alys Arden
It was impossible not to be impressed by something so beautiful.
Dammit.
The three of us looked to each other, Isaac’s eyebrow raising, implying that it was enough evidence for him. Dee’s stern brow released, and that left everyone looking at me.
Despite thinking everything about this was a bad idea, I tossed my hands in the air.
The three of us hopped up the steps to the porch, and Annabelle pounced on Désirée, as if she’d just been told she’d gotten through Rush Week.
Dee stiffened, shock still in her eyes. It must have been weird for her, having known Annabelle for so long. But then her uptown smile spread across her face, and they were hugging, Annabelle going on about how of course they were sisters in magic, because they were also sisters in life.
I was elated to have our fourth, but I kind of wanted to throw up, just a little. I took solace in the fact that Dee was using the tone she reserved for her dad’s publicist when he was forcing her to do something on camera.
Annabelle Lee Drake is a key to saving my mother?
Isaac’s hand slid around my waist. “She’s legit,” he said, leaning in. “And I’ve seen her Spektral power. She can—”
“You’ve done magic with her?”
“Shit. I thought this is what you wanted.”
I turned to him, smiling, snaking my arms around his neck, and pulled him close. “I’m kidding.” His heart was racing—I knew he didn’t want to mess up the coven. I knew he didn’t want to mess up us.
“Nice job,” I said. “One encounter with her, and you figured it out. I’ve been going to school with her for a semester, and Dee’s been best friends with her since pre-K.”
“Well,” he said, making an effort not to gloat, “we have matching marks. It helped.”
I pulled myself closer and whispered, “Can you please never use the words ‘we’ and ‘matching’ together in reference to Annabelle again?”
“You know, you’re kinda hot when you’re jealous.”
Just as his lips nearly touched mine, Désirée cleared her throat.
I turned around.
“So,” Annabelle said, “when do we do the binding ceremony?”
I moved to the front door. “Can you give us a second, Annabelle? We’ll be quick.”
“Sure. Go do your witchy tribunal or whatever. I’ll just . . . wait here.”
The three of us walked inside and into the blue room.
“Just to be clear,” I whispered, “we are not telling her anything. No Casquette Girls Coven, or curses, or vampires. We can’t trust her yet.”
“Then how will we re-bind the circle?” Isaac asked. “If we’re lying to her about her past?”
“Binding her in will just have to wait until we know we can trust her!” It was difficult to keep my voice from rising.
“Adele’s right. It’s too major. A wrong move like that could bring the whole coven down.”
A mouse-like sneeze came from the corner of the room.
“Dammit, Annabelle!” Isaac reached down, scooped his hand into Dee’s jar of salt on the coffee table, and tossed it toward the doorway. A salt outline of a girl appeared.
“Busted,” she said.
“Way to prove we can trust you, Annabelle,” I said, trying not to reel from excitement by the fact that she was invisible.
“I don’t want to be outside. I want to be in the witchhouse, with the witches. I’ll prove myself, whatever you want! I’ll make you want me in the coven.”
“Spoken like a true Aether,” said Désirée.
“I’ll also make you regret the day you were without an Aether.” She reappeared. “My persuasion power is very useful. Surely there’s something you need—something I can get for you.”
“Okay. Figure out why all of my aunts are at my house right now,” Dee said with a smirk. “One’s in from Dallas and the other from Savannah having secret little cabals with my gran. All we’ve learned from our spycasting is that something bad is happening in the spirit world. Maybe if we figured out how to fix it, she’d see why I joined this coven.”
“Secret cabals? Retrieving secrets is kind of my specialty.”
“Annabelle, you can’t magically coerce Ritha,” Dee said. “Get over yourself.”
“Ouch. Who needs to coerce anyone when you have invisibility?” A sly smile spread across her face.
A similar smile transferred to Désirée. “I like the way you think, Annabelle Lee Drake.”
“That’s why we’re besties.”
I turned to her. “Dee, spying is what got you kicked out in the first place.”
“Exactly, so what do I have to lose?”
“Oy vey.” Isaac looked to me.
I sighed, sharing his sentiment.
“Well then, it’s settled,” Annabelle said. “We leave after curfew. In the meantime, what do we do? Make potions? Talk to the dead?”
Désirée huffed. “If it were that easy, we wouldn’t have to spy.”
“Well, it should be that easy,” Annabelle said.
“Why?”
“Because we have Isaac, and he can talk to ghosts, duh?”
I looked up at Isaac, who slid his arm around my hip and pulled me near. “I swear I just figured it out today.”
My eyes slanted.
“And I was standing inside this property when I told her. I didn’t think she’d be able to hear me!”
CHAPTER 25
I Spy
“Isaac, why don’t you give Annabelle a tour of the house?”
There was something about the way Adele asked that made me feel like she really meant, Why don’t you distract Annabelle for a while?
So while she and Dee went back to the breakfast room to confer, I crossed our new recruit to the other side of the house, careful never to take my eyes off her as we meandered through each of the front parlors. I was glad everyone had calmed down, but there was still something slick about Annabelle. Three was supposed to be a crowd, but Adele, Dee, and I always got along just fine, even after Adele and I got together. Four meant teams could be formed. Teams within the coven were not good.
“I looooove New York,” she said, from the corner, looking over to me as her fingers strummed an upright harp, filling the room with an ethereal wave of music. “My mom takes me and my sister there twice a year.”
“Oh yeah, for what?”
She moved on from the harp to a tea cart that held booze that looked as old as the house. “Shopping. Broadway shows. Frozen hot chocolate from Serendipity.”
I’d never been to Serendipity for a twenty-dollar cup of cocoa, but it was so easy to picture her there with all the other tourists. Then on to Fifth Avenue with an arm full of shopping bags, her chauffeur catching z’s in the driver’s seat in a parking garage, waiting to take them back to the Waldorf Astoria so they could lounge before dinner at Tavern on the Green.
“I’d love to go to college there, but Drakes go to Vanderbilt. Maybe I could go up north for grad school. Where are you going?”
“Um . . . I don’t really know. I’m sure a GED is going to destroy my apps, so probably nowhere.”
“Please, your dad knows the president.”
“I’m not really thinking about the future too much right now, just trying to help people have a present. But, uh, SVA and Pratt and Parsons. That’s where I applied. And technically Columbia, my pop’s alma mater.”
“I’ve never heard of them, sans Columbia.”
“They’re mostly art schools.”
“Aww. I can totally see it now. You and Adele in art school together in New York, living in a loft, staying up all night at coffee shops, going to student film screenings and underground parties.”
I turned away, pretending to examine a painting on the wall of a Parisian street scene, unable to keep myself from blushing as she pretty much described my dream freshman year. But I knew it was just a fantasy. I could see the Red Sox moving to New York before Adele would. Not that she had anything aga
inst New York. I just couldn’t imagine her leaving New Orleans, no matter how bad it got here.
“I always thought I’d do pre-law, just like my parents, but ever since I’ve come into my magic, I’ve started to think about journalism. Can you imagine? As an Aether? People would tell me anything. I’d be able to scoop everyone.”
I laughed. “I’m not sure if that’s terrifying or badass.”
She smiled.
There was nothing in any of the rooms that I thought a girl like Annabelle would find cool, but she seemed to be fascinated by everything and handled anything she touched with care. I explained how the house was when we arrived, and she showered us with praise over all the improvements we’d made. It was only by playing tour guide that I realized how much we’d made the bottom floor of the brothel our own. The front two parlors were still fit for lounging, but the dining room now looked more like an Old World apothecary. The kitchen looked like a chem lab, with bottles and vials and cauldrons covering most surfaces, and the library was covered with stacks of books and papers with all of our research, most of which I’d also covered with sketches. The back two rooms with all the windows, one dubbed the sunroom and the other the breakfast room, were now like two big greenhouses. With the help of some special Earth juju from Dee, the plants looked tropical-island worthy.
Annabelle seductively swept her hand across a fern. “This place is so spectacular.”
Every move she made—every time her hips turned, or her weight shifted, or her eyes hung on you—it seemed precise, as if she was trying a little too hard to be sexy. It slipped away as soon as we crossed the hall and joined the other girls in the breakfast room.
“Ready to hit the Borges’ shop?” Annabelle asked.
Adele looked up to her. “Why do we have to go? You’re the one with the invisibility.”
“Because we’re a coven? I mean, you don’t have to come. I don’t want to make you do anything you’re uncomfortable with.”
I pulled Adele away, as I could see her mentally pouncing on Annabelle. “Come on.” I swept her hair away from her eyes. “It will be fine. If shit hits the fan, I’ll fly us out of there, and these two can deal with the wrath of Ritha.”
I was joking, of course—I’d never leave Dee behind—but it was enough to get Adele to slip her hand into mine.
“Fine.”
Outside, Annabelle paused at the gate. She turned back, excitement in her eyes. “I just got an idea.” She took my free hand in her left and then Dee’s in her right, and we were all linked. Then we just stood there for a second in front of the gate.
“Adele?” Dee asked.
Adele released my hand, stepped forward, and twisted the handle manually. Dee and I exchanged a glance—it was perfectly clear to both of us that Adele wasn’t okay with Annabelle knowing anything about her magic.
When she came back, I squeezed her hand.
She reciprocated, but not without a worried glance my way, reminding me that she still thought this was a bad idea.
“Don’t worry, Adele,” Annabelle said, “the Borges can’t catch us if they can’t see us.” She closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, and began to whisper words I couldn’t make out. The invisibility shield once again revealed itself to us. A sparkling, iridescent bubble.
Annabelle didn’t gloat. She stepped forward, pulling us behind her in a chain, and then looked back at me. “I need some breeze from behind. Gently.”
I nodded, and a swirl of wind brushed over our shoulders. As we walked through the gate and away from the property, the shield pushed out ahead of us and broke away from the mothership—a little satellite shield surrounding us.
At first there was a lot of awkward bumping into each other as we tried not to step outside of the bubble, but then Dee and I stepped behind Adele and Annabelle, making it easier to sync our strides.
A guy pedaled leisurely down the street on a bike, apparently not worried about the curfew, right past us without so much as a glance or head nod. Ignoring us would have been normal in New York, but here, it meant he definitely couldn’t see us.
As we continued past closed shops and bars and boarded-up houses, Adele ignited the dormant gas lamps on the houses, lighting our way. “So cool,” she said, unable to hide the excitement in her voice. “I feel like a twinkling fairy.” Her excitement instantly lightened the mood.
Annabelle gave Adele the smile I’d seen earlier, when we’d been alone and she’d let her guard down.
“There’s one way it could be cooler,” I said.
Annabelle scowled.
I concentrated on the bubble, unsure I could even pull it off. I imagined one of my feathers floating through the air.
Light as a feather, breezy as a bubble. Light as a feather, breezy as a bubble.
Air swirled around us, and when I opened my eyes there was a slight change in gravity as we rose a foot off the ground. Squeaks came from the girls as we floated another foot higher. Then another and another until we were drifting along the rooftops of the two-story houses.
Adele turned around, smiling with pride and delight, and the only thing that kept me from grabbing her and kissing her was the floating magic needing so much concentration.
I could only hold us that high in the air for two more blocks; then we bobbed up and down lower to the ground, the girls gasping each time the bubble rose.
When we got to the block behind the Voodoo shop, I lifted the bubble high again and floated us over the Borges’ tropical courtyard, giving them the same view I got every night. For a second I wished I was alone with Adele, floating among all the alluring plant life.
I blew us toward the alleyway that connected the courtyard to the main street, and we bobbed up and down along the side of the house. Voices became audible as I lobbed us over the gate.
“Is that Theis?” Adele asked.
I hovered the bubble about three feet off the street near the front of the shop. A guy was standing on the steps, and Ritha was in the doorway.
“What’s he doing with my gran?”
“Who’s Theis?” Annabelle asked.
“Ren’s boyfriend,” I said.
“Who’s Ren?”
“How much time do you have?” Adele answered with a laugh.
Ritha handed Theis something in a pouch. “Do you remember the instructions? That’s not kiddie stuff.” He nodded. “If this doesn’t work, you let me know immediately. We might have a much bigger problem on our hands.”
“Thanks,” Theis said. “It’s going to be fine. He’s just under a lot of stress with the house and the insurance agents, and he’s been drinking too much.”
“Then why are you here if you don’t think there’s a problem?”
“Well . . . he’s never used ‘to stop the voices’ as an excuse to drink.”
“Voice? Or voices?”
“I don’t really pay attention to his gibberish when he’s tanked.”
“My advice would be to start. Pay attention when he’s drinking. When he’s sleeping. Or any other time he thinks no one else is listening.”
Theis looked nervous as he kissed her cheek good-bye. It was weird. Like some kind of magical drug deal.
We watched as he continued down the street and turned the corner. The last time we saw Theis while we were hiding behind an invisibility spell, Nicco was sinking his fangs into his neck for dinner. I could almost guarantee that Dee and Adele were recalling the exact same memory.
I turned back to Ritha—her arms were crossed in front of her chest. “Désirée Borges, if you think I can’t sense you from fifty feet away, my own grandchild, my would-be heir, then we are even more disconnected than I imagined.”
She went inside and shut the door without looking back. The lock snapped. The whole cool tone and calmly locked door seemed much worse coming from a Borges than yelling and slamming things. Adele looked back at me with an expression that said, Ouch.
“This was a stupid idea,” Désirée said.
“I’m sorry,”
Annabelle piped up.
“I knew better. I just want to know what’s going on. I’m not used to having any secrets with my family. Whatever, let’s just get out of here.”
And with that I raised the bubble, and we soared above the city at rooftop height.
“Hey look, it’s Onyx!” Adele said, trying to change the subject. She pointed down as we floated high over the Daures’ courtyard.
I dipped down so she could see the cat before I realized there was a woman there, sitting next to him on the fountain.
“Isaac,” Adele whispered. “We don’t need to trespass!”
“I’m sorry, it’s not exactly easy to navigate a four-person bubble!”
I knew I wouldn’t be able to gain enough momentum to rise again without bouncing off the ground. We dropped even lower.
“Onyx, what if I never see Alessandro again?” the girl said, sniffling and holding her head in her hands. “What if we never find him?”
Shit. Now I felt like a real jerk, invading this girl’s private moment. Chill out, Isaac. She can’t see us.
Adele shot a look back at me.
“Sorry, just getting bounce!”
Our feet touched the ground, but just as I was about to push off again, the girl looked up from the cat—straight at me. Her hard gaze caught me off guard, and my magic fumbled, leaving us grounded.
“Protégez la,” she said, directly to me.
“Come on, Isaac,” Adele said nervously. “I don’t want to get caught snooping here on my first day of work.”
“Ye of little invisibilty-bubble faith,” said Annabelle.
I didn’t take my eyes off the girl.
“Protégez la!” she said louder.
The cat stood straight up, back arched, and hissed.
I bounced us back into the air, but the girl’s gaze didn’t break from mine. Her neck craned as we rose higher over the fence. “Protégez la! Protégez la!”
I slipped my arms around Adele and pulled her into my chest, focusing on the bubble and not the girl at the Daures’. Adele tried to twist around, but I just held her tighter.
We bobbed down the street and floated over the gate. When we were mere inches off the ground, the bubble dissipated back up into the dome and our feet touched down, back to regular gravity.
