“In a lot of ways, healing is like any other magic. You concentrate on what you want to change, and you make it happen.”
“Or, in my case, explode.”
Cal just shook his head and said, “But when you’re healing something living, you have to take it into account, too.”
“And I do that how?”
Cal’s fingers tightened on mine, and my heart thumped in response. The library felt very quiet and very still around us. “You’ll feel it.”
I swallowed, which was hard to do what with my mouth suddenly drying out. “Okay.”
I closed my eyes and felt my magic traveling up from the bottoms of my feet. So far, so good. I thought about those brown spots on the petals, all the while keeping Mom’s face firmly lodged in my brain.Heal, I thought, feeling too self-conscious to actually say the word out loud. The flower stirred under my hand, but when I cracked my eyelids, it looked as brown as ever.
I closed my eyes and took more of those deep breaths Dad was so fond of, thinking that it was no wonder Prodigium were always getting their asses handed to them by humans. I mean, every time I had to do an intense spell, there was all this focusing, and relaxing, and picturing, and breathing…. It wasn’t exactly the most effective battle strategy against something like The Eye.
I should’ve known better than to think about The Eye, though. As soon as the name popped into my head, my control shattered.
And so did the terra-cotta pot.
Black soil rained down on my feet, and the purple flower drooped even further. I could have sworn it actually bobbed accusingly at me.
“Ugh,” I groaned, as Cal quickly scooped the jagged pot out of my hands. “Sorry, but I warned you I was destructo-girl.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he said, even as his hand curled protectively around the plant. “You almost had it.” He glanced down, probably to survey the damage. “Oh, wow,” he said, surprised.
I wiped my dirty hands on my jeans. “That bad?”
“No, it’s not that,” he said. “Look.”
He held the pot out to me. The flower was still awfully droopy, but just behind it were two other smaller, non-droopy flowers. And these were vibrant purple, without a brown spot to be seen. “Whoa. Did I make those?” I asked.
Cal nodded. “You must have. So much for destructogirl.”
I gave him a rueful smile. “Yeah, well, shiny new flowers or not, there’s still a broken pot, and a very sad old violet.”
“Maybe,” he said with a nod. Then he paused, and I could tell that whatever he was going to say was really important. There was even a chance he might use more than five words to say it. “Or maybe your magic isn’t that destructive after all. The rain of Doritos, the bed thing, this…Maybe it’s just that youcreate too big, you know?”
When I could find my voice, I said, “Cal, that might be the nicest thing anyone’s said to me since we got here.”
He twirled one of the naked roots between his fingers, and didn’t meet my eyes. “It’s true.” Then he glanced up and gave one of those half smiles I was really starting to like. “And it’s also true that I need to find another pot for this guy. I, uh, guess I’ll see you at dinner.”
“Great. We can pick out our colors.”
“What?”
“For the wedding. I’m thinking melon and mint. Supposed to be really hot next spring.”
Cal laughed out loud, the first time I’d ever heard him do that. “It’s a plan. See ya, Sophie.”
“Later,” I called after him, suddenly struck by a pang of sadness. Archer had called out, “See ya, Mercer,” at the end of nearly every cellar duty. I’d never hear him say that again.
It sucks that we miss people like that. You think you’ve accepted that someone is out of your life, that you’ve grieved and it’s over, and then bam. One little thing and you feel like you’ve lost that person all over again.
I thought about him sitting in the corn mill, waiting for me. What had he wanted to tell me so badly that he’d risk his life to say it?
I tightened my fingers around one of the jagged shards of pottery so hard that I nearly drew blood. “It doesn’t matter,” I murmured. The whole Archer thing was beyond done. And, I reminded myself with a glance upstairs, I apparently had way bigger problems than a messed-up love life.
chapter 23
Dad’s office was actually one of the smaller rooms at Thorne. Inside was pretty nice, though. There was a cherrywood desk and ivory carpets, plus comfortable leather chairs and sturdy-looking bookshelves. He also had nice view of the river.
Dad was at his desk when I opened the door, doing what all British people do when they’re freaked out: drinking tea. I leaned against the door frame. “So…this sucks, right?”
He waved me into the office. “Close the door behind you.”
Once I had, Dad opened one of the desk drawers. The grimoire looked even worse in the bright light of his office, but there was still a sense of menace coming off of it that made me want to cross my arms over my chest.
“I glamoured another book to look like the grimoire, and remade the glass,” Dad said to my unspoken question. “Still, I’ll need to get it back soon. The glamour won’t hold forever.”
He threw the book onto his desk, where it landed amid all the paper. “I’ve looked through it three times already. The possession ritual isn’t in here.”
Gingerly, I lifted the book and opened it. I’d felt the magic coming off of it even when it was in its case, but I still wasn’t prepared for the wave of power that hit me. It felt like when you stick your face out the window of a fast-moving car. My lungs burned and my eyes watered just looking at it. My stinging eyes scanned the first page, but there were no words I could make out, only strange and unfamiliar symbols.
Still, I recognized one of them. It looked a lot like the mark Dad had put on the Vandy’s hand when he’d banished her.
Before I could even turn the first page, I dropped the book back on the papers. “Holy hell weasel,” I breathed.
Dad nodded. “Now you see why I had to let you do the majority of the heavy lifting while opening the case. There was no way I could have used that much magicand had the strength to search for the ritual.”
“Now you tell me.” I sank down into one of the leather chairs opposite Dad’s desk. “How did you even know what you were looking for? There aren’t any words in this thing.”
“It wasn’t easy. Even I didn’t realize how powerful this book is.” He opened the front cover, and I winced; but since I couldn’t see the pages, I didn’t feel the magic this time. Dad, however, visibly shuddered. “This grimoire was written in the language of angels.”
“Shouldn’t that be, like, harp music or chanting, and not hard-core hieroglyphics?”
Dad either wasn’t listening to me, or he chose to ignore that. “What I don’t understand is why justthat ritual was taken,” he murmured, almost to himself. “Of all the rituals, why that one?”
“And when did someone take it?” I added.
Dad blinked at me like he’d just suddenly remembered I was in the room. “What?”
“That book has been in that cabinet since, what, 1939? 1940? So did someone rip that page out sometime over the past seventy years, or was it torn out before the grimoire was even locked up?”
“I hadn’t thought about that.” He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “Curiouser and curiouser.”
Startled, I glanced at him. “I say that sometimes.”
Even with his face tight with worry, Dad managed to look a little amused. “It’s fromAlice in Wonderland. Appropriate, don’t you think?”
Yeah, except that our rabbit hole was a heck of a lot darker, I thought.
I pretended to study the bookcase in the far corner. I’d expected boring books about Prodigium history or shifter economy, and there were a few of those, but I also noticed some recent fiction, as well as several Roald Dahl books. Dad went up in my estimation another notch.
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br /> “Do you think whoever—or whatever—raised Daisy and Nick had that piece of paper?”
“They would’ve had to.”
I turned back to him. “And that’s bad.”
“Worse than bad.” He leaned forward. “Sophie, Virginia Thorne raised a demon to use as a weapon. I can only think that whoever raised Nick and Daisy had similar motives.”
I blew out a breath. “Dad, this is a total cluster…um, a mess.”
He flashed me a wry smile. “I think the word you were about to use is probably the best summation of the current situation.”
“So what do we do?”
“There’s nothing we can do right now except wait and see how it all plays out.”
I tapped my fingernail. I’d never been very good at concealing my emotions, and fear was practically making my internal organs shake. Whoever had that ritual could technically raise a whole army of demons if they wanted to. And if Prodigium had that on their side in a war against The Eye? I fought back the image of Archer lying broken and bloody at the feet of some demon, of all that horror spilling out into the human world as it had before. Trying to keep my voice light, I said, “Well, waiting is lame-sauce.”
“I’m not sure I know what that means, exactly, but I think I share the sentiment.” Dad put the grimoire back in his desk, closing the drawer with a soft click.
I hoisted myself out of the chair. “Dad, do you really think finding out who did this can stop a war from coming?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly. He was looking at me, but I got the feeling he wasn’t really seeing me. “I hope so.”
As far as reassurances went, it wasn’t great, but it would have to do.
I was almost to the door when Dad said, “Before you go, Sophie, would you tell me why you’ve been carrying a Saint Anthony’s medallion in your pocket for the past two days?”
“Huh?” Then I remembered the coin Archer had given me. Reluctantly, I pulled it out of my pocket and handed it to Dad. “It’s just something I found. How did you know I had it?”
He turned it over in his fingers. “I could sense the magic.” He glanced up at me. “Saint Anthony’s medallions are very powerful objects. Witches and warlocks used them in the Middle Ages, usually if they were travelling. You could give them to someone and use them to telepathically show your location. Very useful if you got lost or captured, both of which happened quite often in those days.” He flicked it back at me. “I’m actually not surprised you found one. We have dozens in the cellar at Hecate.”
Well, that explained it, then. Secret demon hunterand thief. Man, did I know how to pick ’em.
I entertained the idea of going back to bed, but when I opened the door to my room, I discovered Nick and Daisy waiting for me. Nick was holding the picture of my mom, while Daisy lounged on my bed, flipping through my copy ofThe Secret Garden.
“Is this your mom?” Nick asked. “She’s a hottie.”
While Nick no longer set my teeth on edge, I still wasn’t crazy about him—or Daisy for that matter—pawing through my stuff. “What do you guys want?”
Nick whistled through his teeth as he placed the photograph back on my nightstand. “We were just coming to check on you. Heard you got hurt doing a spell today.”
“Oh,” I said. “Uh…yeah, I was practicing with Dad. But I’m fine now.”
Throwing himself down on the bed next to Daisy, Nick folded his arms behind his head. “Ah, yes, all the breathing and focusing stuff.”
“Such a waste of time,” Daisy murmured, tracing her finger over an illustration of Mary Lennox wandering the halls of Misselthwaite.
I let that go. “Well, as you can see, I’m fine. Thanks for worrying about me.”
Nick made quite the production of getting off the bed. “I think we’re being dismissed, my love,” he said to Daisy before pulling her to her feet.
“But we didn’t get to talk to Sophie about the party,” she said, a hint of whine in her voice.
“What party?” I asked.
Nick smiled. “Your birthday party. Apparently, the Council is throwing quite the shindig.”
Thanks to all the moving around Mom and I had done, I hadn’t had a birthday party since I was eight years old. That had been at Chuck E. Cheese. Something told me the Council had something more elaborate in mind.
“They don’t need to do that,” I said, shoving my hands into my pockets. “Especially with all that’s going on right now.”
Nick flashed me a wolfish grin. “That’s Prodigium for you. Very ‘fiddle while Rome burns.’”
Daisy looped her arm through his. “Besides, it’ll be fun. They’ll go all out for—” She broke off suddenly, and her smile turned into a grimace of pain. All the blood seemed to drain from her face, turning her ivory skin ashen. She dropped her head, and Nick caught her elbow.
“Daisy?”
Her hands clutched the footboard of my bed, and she took several deep shuddering breaths. Then she raised her head and opened her eyes. I half expected them to be violet-red, like Alice’s had been the night she’d killed Elodie, but they were her usual light green. “I’m fine,” she said, but her voice was tight. “Just a little…magic flare-up. Nothing to worry about.”
Nick’s face creased with worry, but Daisy waved him off. “I’m fine,” she said again, steering him toward the door. “Now let’s let Sophie get some rest. She looks a bit rough.”
I couldn’t have looked any worse than Daisy, but I didn’t say anything as she and Nick left. Only once they were gone did I catch that familiar scent of burning wood in the air. But this time, it was no hallucination.
There, in the footboard of my bed, were two singed and smoking handprints.
chapter 24
For the next three weeks, I kept a closer eye on Nick and Daisy. There were no more “magic flare-ups,” but it seemed like both of them were drinking more than normal, and every time they sat in on “demon yoga” with me and Dad, they ended up leaving early. After one of the lessons, Dad gave them a copy ofDemonologies: A History. I found it later, stuffed in a tall brass urn.
A couple of days before Vix was supposed to leave, Lara drove Jenna, Cal, Vix, and me into London—Dad put the kibosh on any more Itineris travel—and I finally got to do all the touristy stuff. When we went to the Tower of London, Lara gave us these little brochures that talked about the Prodigium history of the place, like how Anne Boleyn was really a dark witch (no surprise there), and that one of Queen Victoria’s grandsons had been held in the White Tower after becoming a vampire.
It was a fun day, I guess. I mean, there was fish-and-chips, and a ride on one of those double-decker buses. But going to London made me realize how accustomed I’d gotten to only ever being around Prodigium. Hex Hall was super isolated, obviously, and so was Thorne. It had been nearly a year since I’d been around humans, and I was surprised by how nervous I felt. I kept waiting for someone to notice the weird brochures, or Vix’s and Jenna’s bloodstones, and realize what we really were. It was an unsettling sensation, and I wondered if that’s how other Prodigium felt all the time. So I breathed a sigh of relief when our car turned down the gravel drive later that evening.
Our next trip to London came two days before my birthday. Not only did we have to take Vix back to the airport, but also Jenna, Nick, Daisy, and I had an appointment at Lysander’s, a super-posh boutique. Lysander was a faerie, but he kept his shop glamoured so the rich human women who shopped there didn’t know it. This day, however, the store was closed to everyone but us.
“The costume is great,” I said to Lysander, “but a crown? Really?”
He glared at me, his black wings beating. I’d only been in his shop for thirty minutes, but I was pretty sure the guy already hated me. “It was my understanding that you were to go dressed as the goddess of witchcraft, andHecate wears a crown.”
“It’s not really a crown, Soph,” Jenna offered from her spot on a nearby white satin settee. “It’s more like a tiara.�
�� She had her chin in her hand, and there was practically a little black rain cloud over her head. We had taken Vix to the airport, so Jenna was Sulky McSulkerton. Nick sat next to her, with Daisy on the other side. They’d tried on their costumes earlier, and while they’d both looked great—Nick in a white doublet, flowy shirt, and black pants; Daisy in a simple column of purple silk—I had no idea who they were supposed to be.
“Lysander’s right,” Lara added. She was sitting in a chair, her legs demurely crossed at the ankles. “The crown is an essential part of the costume. And besides, it looks lovely.”
I turned around on the little raised platform and studied myself in the three-way mirror. It had been Lara’s idea that my birthday party be “fancy dress.” At first I’d assumed that meant black tie, kind of like the All Hallow’s Eve Ball back at Hex Hall. But apparently in England, fancy dress means costume party.
It has also been Lara’s idea that I go as Hecate, as a nod to the school. I thought that was kind of crappy—it made me feel like I was Hex Hall’s mascot or something—but Dad liked it, and since he was the one footing the bill for this whole thing, Hecate it was.
Still, as I took in my reflection, I couldn’t help but wish I’d put up a little bit more of a fight. It wasn’t that the costume wasn’t gorgeous. Lysander was the go-to guy when Prodigium needed fancy clothes, and he had certainly outdone himself on this dress. It was made of a shimmery black fabric that sparkled with silver in the right light, and despite it covering pretty much every bit of me except for my shoulders, it was undeniably sexy.
And then there was the crown.
Jenna could call it a tiara all she wanted, but it was a filigree band of platinum topped with a diamond and sapphire crescent moon, and it definitely felt crownlike.
I fought the urge to pull at the dress where it fastened around my neck. “It’s beautiful,” I said for what had to be the third time. “It’s just awfully…elaborate.”
Lysander made a disgusted sound and threw up his hands. “It should be elaborate! You’re meant to be agoddess!”
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