by Tracy Deonn
A hot shower, brushing my teeth, and a bit of water and leave-in conditioner on my hair do wonders. I’m still in my towel, water dripping down my neck, when I get a group text from a number I don’t recognize.
This is Tor, Pagelings. Dinner’s at five, and the training rooms open at six. Liege Roberts and Liege Hanover will be joining us. Dress appropriately. Don’t be late. Don’t embarrass us.
As I walk through the drowsy campus toward the dining hall, I’m filled with quiet awe at how, with all that’s happened to me in the past week, the world keeps spinning. It’s three weeks until fall starts, technically, but the oppressive roar of late summer heat has already dissipated. The sky is a calm blue with few clouds, and it’s cool enough that I might need a sweater tonight. Somewhere in the distance, the Tar Heels marching band is rehearsing for the home game tomorrow. I pass by kids I don’t know who are handing out flyers for their student group. A steady stream of students wind their way through the lawn toward the libraries to study, because no matter what’s happened to me, classes are still running. There’s a quiz I haven’t studied for in English on Tuesday. A trial I’m not ready for on Thursday. Nick—my boyfriend? Partner in crime? Co-conspirator who I want to kiss again?—is one Scion away from being called to the throne of a modern-day kingdom. A part-demon mage claims I can create mystic energy inside myself, and he might be right, but even if he is, I have no idea what I am. All of this and yet… the planet still spins.
My phone buzzes in my hand. It’s Patricia, texting to ask if we could meet for a special session at the Arboretum this afternoon at one. I’m on campus already, so I accept.
I decided during my shower that even if I don’t know Patricia well, I do trust her. Sel said my red flames break the laws of aether as the Merlins understand it. Well, Patricia operates outside the Order’s rules and uses root in ways that probably fall outside their laws, too. She may not like the Order—and that’s fair, honestly—but she’s shown me more about my mother’s secret life than the Order ever could. Understanding my magic could be the key to understanding my mother’s own magic—and from there, how she might have gotten involved with the Order in the first place.
Nick texts too. Just getting up. How about u?
Same. Heading to the dining hall for lunch. Want to meet?
Sorry, can’t. My dad’s calling soon to get the full update about last night. Not gonna be pretty.
I grimace. I can’t imagine what Lord Davis will say. I wonder if Nick’s going to tell his father everything that happened with Sel, or withhold some of the details. Or wait until he gets back into town. I’m almost at the dining hall doors before it dawns on me that, out of the two of us, I’m the only one who has a reason to hide some of what transpired last night. Nick doesn’t know about the red mage flames, so he has no reason to censor his report. It bugs me that even though I know he’d protect my secret, I don’t feel ready to share it with him. But at least this way, he doesn’t have to lie for me. He’s doing enough of that already.
* * *
Stomach full of two burgers and a large serving of cheesy fries, I head toward the Arboretum to meet Patricia.
When I get there, I’m surprised to see her sitting with a young Black woman just a few years older than me. She has large, dark eyes behind round glasses, red-brown skin, and hair that runs slick and tight against her scalp before it blooms into a wide, soft puff at her crown.
“Bree.” Patricia stands, and so does the younger woman. “This is Mariah, a junior here and a fellow practitioner.”
I stare at this girl, and envy and curiosity bite at my insides, opening up old wounds. She knows root because her mother taught her.
I could have been her.
“Isn’t therapy supposed to be confidential?”
Patricia inclines her head. “This won’t be a… normal session. After what happened yesterday at the graveyard, I realized we might need some assistance to get to the bottom of your mother’s story, and your own. I asked Mariah if she would join us today to explore some of what you experienced during our walk. She will keep anything you say in confidence. I am sorry for catching you off guard.” Her apology seems genuine. “I wasn’t sure Mariah would be able to join us on such short notice. We can meet alone, if you prefer?”
There’s no deception in her face, not a hint of manipulation. She means it. And Mariah, for her part, nods in agreement. I could send her away if I wanted. But if I do, I won’t get answers.
“It’s fine,” I mutter.
Mariah smiles, steps forward, and extends a palm. “Hi, Bree.” When I shake her hand, the black of her pupils blows wide. “Wow. Death knows you well,” she declares, her voice breathy and low.
I yank my hand from hers, a shiver rippling up my palm to my recently healed elbow. “Nice to meet you, too?”
“My bad,” she says apologetically, shaking her hand like she’d just gotten it wet. “I’m a Medium. Didn’t mean to freak you out.”
My eyes widen. “You can talk to dead people?”
“Why don’t we sit first?” Patricia intervenes and indicates the blanket near the bench, where there’s three cafeteria to-go boxes.
Mariah follows Patricia’s suggestion without argument, so it seems like I’m expected to as well. Patricia kneels daintily and draws her legs and skirt to one side while Mariah settles into a cross-legged position. The blanket is soft and worn, and the grass and ground underneath holds heat from the afternoon sun.
After I decline their offer for lunch, Mariah reaches for one of the boxes. “You a member of BSM?”
“BSM?”
She smiles pleasantly. “Black Student Movement. We meet up for meals and events, and we’ve got a room in the Union, a magazine, performance groups, committees. It’s pretty dope. Lots of ways in.”
“I didn’t realize there was a BSM,” I murmur, shifting on the blanket. Another group, another place to belong, except this time it’s not a secret. I can hear my father now. You need a community, Bree.
Reading my face, Patricia assures me. “It’s only the first week of school, Bree. No need to beat yourself up if you haven’t found everything and everyone.”
The gentle grace and warmth in their faces gets me by the throat, and my face contorts into a grateful expression that’s out of my control. I take a deep breath, then give Patricia a wobbly smile. Mariah tells me more about BSM and invites me to a meeting next week, and I ask about her major, because that’s the question everyone on campus seems to ask first.
“Art history,” she says around bites of roast beef. “My parents weren’t thrilled when I declared, but I studied abroad in Paris this summer and got a curation and archival internship at the Musée d’Orsay. That helped.”
“I bet.” I hadn’t considered studying abroad at all. EC students couldn’t apply through Carolina, but exchange programs were out there for high school students.
“How ’bout you?”
“I’m Early College, so we don’t really declare a major. We take a lot of liberal arts classes and pre-reqs.”
Mariah leans forward to inspect my face, concern pulling at her mouth and eyes. “You’re so young! I didn’t realize.”
I shrug. “I’m tall.”
“No,” she says, pausing with her sandwich halfway down, “that’s not what I meant. I mean you’re so young to be so acquainted with death.”
I hadn’t heard anyone say something like that since the funeral. I look between the two of them again and see it—the pity. My wall is up before I reply, “I’m sorry, how are you supposed to help me again?”
Patricia sets her own sandwich aside. “Bree, several things became clear to me during our walk yesterday. The first is that you yourself have a branch of root, one that gives you the ability to see root in its raw form. The second is what you revealed to me in Louisa’s memory—that you are acquainted with the Order of the Round Table. If that’s true, then it follows that the only reason you’re sitting here right now is because the Order
is not aware of what you can do. Am I correct?”
I fidget under her gaze, but nod.
“I’m relieved,” Patricia says with a sigh. “Our people have learned the hard way to hide our abilities from them, even when we were working in their homes and caring for their babies.”
I hadn’t considered this and feel foolish for not asking about it earlier. How did the Rootcrafters hide all they could do, all the time, from the Scions, Squires, Pages… or anyone who took the First Oath and was granted Sight? Patricia reads my expression.
“We can be plenty invisible when they want us to be,” she says dryly. “Rootcraft knows of their origins, their mission, and how they use their ‘aether’ to fight the crossroads creatures. We also know from experience what they do to outsiders who use power. How they take them away, lock them up, or worse.”
“I didn’t tell anyone in the Order about you,” I say quickly, “if that’s what you’re worried about.”
She places a hand over mine. “I didn’t think you would. But you’re still in danger every time you go near them.”
“I know,” I murmur.
“Then why do it?” Mariah asks, confusion written on her face. “Hiding what you are on top of hanging out with the good ole boys club? Twisting yourself all up into a shape that’s convenient for them?” She wrinkles her nose. “Sounds exhausting.”
I swallow around an unexpected lump, because she’s right. The looks Vaughn still gives me. Tor’s words the night of my Oath. The look I get from a few of the eliminated Pages that hang around the Lodge. How much energy I spend wondering if they’re thinking the same thing Vaughn is about why I’m Nick’s Page—that it’s sex, or race, or both. Between Nick’s rules and the ones I already carry around with me every day, it is exhausting. I could argue that the Order’s not all white, that Sarah’s there, but then I remember what she said about her dad and the dinner parties and get tired all over again. They’re both doing a version of the same contortionist act that I’m doing: figuring out how to survive in water that you know has sharks, because you have to.
I don’t feel any of that here with Mariah and Patricia. Alice is my safe space, my home, and that would never change. But it’s been months since I’ve held space with only Black women and it’s not just safe, it’s… a release.
Lying to them right now feels like the straw that will break my back. And I can’t afford for my back to break. Not now.
“I don’t believe my mother’s death was an accident,” I begin, and their eyes grow wide. “Last week I recovered a… memory. The night she died, one of their casters—a Merlin—erased my and my father’s memories at the hospital, and I don’t know why. I believe the Order may have killed her, that something happened while she was enrolled here that made her a target. I’ve become one of their initiates to find out the truth, but I’m not with them. I’m against them.”
In the moment of silence after I finish, the wind picks up Patricia’s scarf and Mariah’s and my curls. It says something about the Order’s reputation that neither one of them denies my suspicion, or even questions it. The same emotion passes over both of their expressions, too quick for me to name.
It’s Patricia who speaks first. “And do you have proof?”
“I have Ruth’s memories of something that happened on campus when my mother was here. If I pass their Trials, I gain a title in their world, and they’ll trust me. I can ask more questions, get answers, and then I’ll get proof.”
“You seek revenge?”
My eyelids flutter. That specific word had never fallen from my mouth. But it didn’t need to, did it? It’s always been there, in a way. Revenge, retaliation, justice. But even those words aren’t enough, a small voice whispers. They don’t feel deep enough. Big enough.
What did I say to Nick? Punish them for what they did. “Punish” feels better. Punish feels… right.
“Bree? Is that what you want?”
“I want to find who’s responsible”—the words come fast, from the quiet thoughts I’ve buried deep—“use my root abilities, the title I’ll gain, and the contacts I have to bring to justice anyone who was involved.”
Patricia regards me closely. “You said you can resist their hypnosis?”
“Yes, if I want to.” Patricia and Mariah exchange a worried glance. “What is it?”
Patricia’s frown lines deepen. “What else can you do, Bree?”
I tell her everything. How it’s not just the Sight or the mesmer resistance. How I can smell castings. How I can feel Sel’s gaze on my skin. And last, I tell them about the red mage flames.
Mariah’s jaw has long since dropped, but the mage flames bit must have tipped her over. “Holy shit.”
“Language,” Patricia chastises, but her face looks pretty “holy shit” too. She covers trembling fingers with her burgundy shawl, to hide them from me, I think. “And you’ve never called on an ancestor for any of these abilities?”
“No.”
“If you aren’t asking to borrow these powers, then they’ve been bound to you somehow.”
“Bound to me—” I stutter, shaking my head. “No. I mean, bound by who?” Her warning about the Order and their powers comes back to me all in a rush. “You think I’m a Bloodcrafter? No, I’ve never—”
“I know,” Patricia says. “This is why I’ve asked Mariah here today. To get answers.”
Mariah nods to Patricia. “I definitely get it now,” she says, then points a finger at me. “You need to talk to your ancestors.”
I look between the two of them. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
The corner of Mariah’s mouth twitches. “On the other side, they have access to more knowledge than we do. When Doc Hartwood called me this morning, I set out offerings for my grandma to pass the gift to me today. Sometimes, if I’m lucky, I can help other people talk to their ancestors too.”
My throat closes tight, my stomach clenches, and my fingers grip the earth beside my knees. Could I really see my mother? Talk to her like I did Louisa? Ask her what happened that night?
“You… can help me talk to my mom? See her again?”
Mariah’s face folds, and I can tell she expected my question. “I can help you call for your people, but I don’t control who answers.”
I nod and blink stinging tears away. My chest is full of the sharp pang of loss and an unexpected feeling of relief. When I imagine seeing my mother again—something I never thought possible—it feels like there are a thousand words that want to come out of my mouth at once. So very many that I cannot speak at all.
Like she’s read my mind, Patricia leans forward to touch my knee. “Love is a powerful thing, more powerful than blood, although both run through us like a river. She may answer you, but if she does not, she still loves you.”
I nod, but my emotions are swirling inside me like a hurricane. “How does it work?”
Mariah folds her hands in her lap. “I amplify the connection between family members, and then make the request. Sort of like sonar. The ancestor who responds might be your mother, it might be a grandparent or great-grandparent, or even further back. If the signal’s strong enough. I can help you speak to them.”
I nibble on my lower lip and wonder if my mother might not want to answer my call. Would she still be angry with me, like she was the night before she died? Would she be proud of what I’m doing? Would she want me to stop? Would I stop if she asked me to?
“Okay,” I say quietly.
Mariah gestures for me to face her until our crossed legs touch, knee to knee. She takes my hands in hers and closes her eyes. Patricia nods reassuringly, and I close mine, too.
“We’ll start slow, Bree,” Patricia says. “You’ll just focus on your love for your mother.”
I pull an image of my mother up from memory and, right away, there’s pain. I see her in her favorite summer housedress, drifting through our home to open up the windows. She’s humming a melody-less tune. I’m reading a book on our living room co
uch, and when she reaches over my head to open the window, she looks down with a broad, toothy smile against copper-brown skin. Behind her glasses, love, pride, and affection live in the corners of her eyes. I smile, sending my love back, but it twists and sharpens into something else.
“Steady,” Patricia whispers. “Focus on your love for her. Now, imagine the love stretching back to your grandparents, then back further, like a strong thread connecting the generations. That’s what Mariah will follow.”
Like a Line.
I do my best to follow her instructions, imagine my grandmother as my mother described her, but as soon as I do, grief slices through me.
Patricia must sense my pain, like she always does. “Bree, it’s all right. Take slow breaths. We’re right here; you’re not alone.”
I don’t listen. All I can think of is loss. My loss of my mother, my mother’s loss of hers. And what I didn’t tell Patricia: that my great-grandmother died before my mom was born too. None of us met our grandmothers.
Mariah makes a low, whining sound. “There are wells of life, deep ones, but they’re all separated. Tied off from one another.”
Because death breaks our connection! I want to scream. Death is not a thread. It is the sharp cut that severs us. Death separates us from one another, and yet it holds us close. As deeply as we hate it, it loves us more.
My heart pounds to its rhythm.
One mother, two mothers, three mothers. Gone.
Gone.
Gone.
Gone.
Mariah gasps and releases my hands. My eyes open to find her eyes wide, her chest rising with rapid breaths. “Something terrible happened in your family… didn’t it?”
I scramble to my feet, panting and dizzy. “Bree?” Patricia reaches for me, but I can’t look at her. Or Mariah. Patricia calls my name again and again, but her voice sounds farther and farther away—and no wonder, because I’m running from her. Again.
I feel like a coward, but I don’t stop.
