by Sarra Cannon
"Your mother never talks about her sister Cora?" I asked, looking at the names on the paper. "Or her Aunt Janine?"
Zara shook her head. "It's as if no one remembers they existed," she said, her normally cheerful voice cracking slightly. "Isn't that the weirdest thing?"
I shivered, thinking of Lydia Ashworth's sister. No, it was not the weirdest thing. I knew exactly what it meant when no one could remember you existed.
It meant you'd been sacrificed. Or at least that's what it had meant in Lydia's sister's case. Was the same thing happening to the seconds in the Winter family? And if so, what were they being sacrificed for?
"What is it that the seconds do?" Angela asked.
"What do you mean?" Zara asked. She seemed dazed.
"Their job. You said that each of the three daughters have their own specific purpose," Angela said. "What's the second's purpose?"
Zara stared ahead for a long moment, her lips parted slightly. "I should know the answer to this," she finally said, "but for some reason I can't tell you. I can't remember."
"Your memory's been altered," Angela said, placing her hand on Zara's. "I have a lot of experience with memory spells, and I recognize the signs in your tone and demeanor. If no one had pointed this out to you, you probably never would have realized it on your own."
"Why?" Zara asked, her face crumpling. "What do you think happened to them? Why would someone try to hide it?"
No one answered her, because no one knew the answer. Except maybe me, but I was still trying to put things together in my mind. I didn't want to upset Zara any more than she already was.
"There's something else here that's odd," Lea said.
Jackson peered over my shoulder. "What?"
"The dates each new Prima took over," she said. She pointed to the dates on the paper when the reigning Priestess Winter died and her eldest daughter took over as Prima. "2004, 1977, 1955, 1929, and so on. These dates are significant. These are all years when some of the largest and most powerful demon gates in this area of the country were massacred, the gates closed and all of their witches and demons murdered."
I gasped. "Are you sure? How do you know that?"
"I've been studying this since I first came to the human world almost fifty years ago," Lea said. "I always wondered if there wasn't some kind of pattern or significance to the dates, but I could never figure out it. Sometimes there were 25 years between the massacres, sometimes there were thirty years or more. There were some smaller gates destroyed along the way, but it was the big ones that were always spread out like this. I could never put a pattern to it."
"You're talking about the killing of an entire demon gate coven, right?" I asked. "Like what you showed me in Aldeen when Priestess Winter cut that prima's throat?"
Zara clasped a hand to her mouth and sat down. I cringed. I hadn't meant to be so heartless. Did she not know what her mother was capable of?
"That's exactly what I'm talking about," Lea said. She pointed to the dates on the tree when the oldest Priestess Winter died in each generation. "Aldeen was small, though. Every single one of these dates marks the death of the most significant demon gates on this side of the United States. Gates with powerful prima demons and more than a hundred witches in their covens."
"Wait a second," Jackson said. He pushed toward the front and ran his finger furiously along some of the dates. "Zara, you said you were five years old when your mother took over as prima right?"
Zara nodded, her light eyes wide and scared.
"That's when you said she started acting strange and different, as if she wasn't herself," Jackson said. "Look at the birthdays of all the third daughters, and then look at the dates each Priestess Winter died."
Zara's hand moved to her mouth and tears ran down the side of her face. "Each time the new prima took over, her youngest daughter was exactly five years old," she said in a whisper. She looked up at Jackson, doubt and fear in her eyes. "What does this mean?"
"I don't know," he said. "But it's got to be significant in some way."
"Each Priestess Winter has died before the age of 65," Lea said. "Doesn't that seem strange to you? Primas are supposed to be notoriously difficult to kill. That should be especially true of the priestesses. So what did each of these women die of so young?"
"Zara?" I asked, putting my hand on her shoulder. "What did your grandmother die from?"
She shook her head. "I don't know. I can't remember." A sob escaped from her mouth and she clamped her hand over the top of it.
"It's possible someone messed with that memory too," Angela said. "Most people know how their grandparents passed away, especially if it happened at such a young age, like sixty-one."
"Ever since I was a little girl, I felt something strange was going on in my house, but I didn't want to believe it," Zara said, her eyes red and full of sorrow. "I had no idea there were so many secrets being kept from me."
"We're going to figure this all out," I said, trying to keep my voice calm for her sake. "There has to be a reason why things always happen in this pattern and why someone took special care to alter your memories."
Zara turned and buried her head in my shirt. She began to cry, sobs shaking her body. I knew those sobs all too well, and it broke my heart to hear them coming from someone like Zara.
They were the sobs of a girl who'd only just realized the true pain of betrayal.
Dark Magic
I sat at the small table in the house Jackson and I shared, staring at my notes about Zara's family. The key to understanding Priestess Winter was here somewhere, I could feel it. If we could figure out a weak spot, we would have a real chance to bring her down. But what was I still missing?
The pieces of the puzzle were scattered across the table. I'd been over them at least twenty times since dinner. Jackson had already gone to bed, but I couldn't sleep. The clock was ticking now with the Resistance expecting Lea to murder me in just three days.
I sighed and went over the details again.
Each first or Prima Futura in the Winter family always had three daughters of her own. The first daughter would always grow up to become the next Priestess Winter. The second daughter was a mystery, possibly sacrificed for the sake of dark magic? The thirds became guardians of the priestess, trained to fight and to protect, and never allowed to have families of their own.
Each time a third turned five years old, two major events occurred within that year. Her grandmother died, making her mother now the reigning Prima and Priestess Winter. Also, a major demon gate was destroyed, killing hundreds of witches and demons.
What could those two things possibly have in common?
Were those witches fuel for another sacrifice of some sort? I knew the answer to Priestess Winter's power was here in front of me. I just couldn't seem to put it together.
I fell asleep at the table hours later, dreaming of ritual daggers and dark magic.
Tennessee - 1995
"I missed something yesterday," Lea said when she joined us at breakfast the next morning.
The whole group had gathered to discuss the day's plan and talk about what we knew so far.
"Something about my family tree?" Zara asked. Her eyes were still red this morning. Had she been crying all night?
"Yes." Lea ripped a piece of bacon in two and popped one half into her mouth. "Last night, I kept going over the dates in my head. I knew I was missing something, so I wrote down every demon gate I could remember that had been destroyed in the last fifty years."
She pulled a small piece of paper from the pocket of her black leather pants. I reached for it and she leaned over the table to pass it to me. There were eight dates listed. Five in black and three in red.
"What are the ones in red?" I asked.
"Those are the major towns. The ones I was saying had the most powerful prima demons and at least a hundred or more witches in the coven. Those dates correspond with the year Priestess Winter died and her oldest daughter became the new Priestess Winter
." Lea paused until I looked up and met her dark gaze. "All of them except one."
I looked at the dates and noticed one at the very bottom was circled. Tennessee - 1995. I suddenly felt as if I'd had the breath knocked out of me.
"That's the year I was born," I said.
"Exactly," Lea said, raising a single eyebrow. "This was a large demon gate town with an extremely powerful prima demon. Besides the original five gates like Winterhaven, this was probably one of the most powerful gates in existence. According to the pattern, Priestess Winter should have died that same year. Only she didn't. The Priestess Winter who murdered that town's prima didn't pass away until 2004. It has to mean something."
My head pounded. I'd barely gotten any sleep, trying to see the meaning in all this information. Now, she was giving me another piece that seemed to show I was stuck in the middle of all this somewhere. But how?
Angela took the small paper from me and studied it. "1995," she said. "What town did you say that was?"
Lea leaned forward, elbows against the table. "A small town just outside of Nashville, Tennessee. Clement, I think it was called."
My head snapped up. "Clement?" I asked, my heart racing. My breath stopped in my chest and the world began to spin as I remembered my conversation with my father. "Clement is the name of the town where my grandfather died."
Angela put her hand on my arm. "The year makes sense," she said. "That's the year my father left. When he went back to the demon world to take over as the King of the South. Maybe our grandfather was the prima demon there in Clement."
I put my hand on my chest. "He couldn't have been the prima demon in that town. Lea, you said it was an older gate, right? One of the earliest ones created?"
She nodded. "It was opened sometime around 1915."
"See? Our grandfather couldn't have been trapped in Clement since 1915," I said. "He was ruling the Southern Kingdom when our father first came to Peachville in 1985. None of this makes sense. Why would he have been killed along with the rest of that town? Is it possible he was pulled through for a regular initiation?"
Jackson shook his head. "No way. The hunters never would have chosen someone as powerful as your grandfather for a normal initiation ceremony."
Angela brought a hand to her temple. "Then why would he have even been there?" she asked.
I took a deep breath and looked at Lea. "There's only one way to find out."
What Happened That Day
Lea shook her head. "No."
"I want to see it for myself," I said. "This could be the key to understanding how all of this fits together. Why my grandfather died. Why Priestess Winter usually dies after she kills a large demon gate town. We need to know the answers to these questions before it's too late."
Jackson shook his head. "I don't know if that's such a great idea right now," he said. "It takes an extreme amount of power to recreate an event that took place so many years ago. Don't you remember what happened last time Lea showed you a memory? The Order found us and took you away from me. What if they tracked her magic before and that's how they found you?"
"They knew I was with Lea that time," I said. "This time they probably don't even know she's come back to the human world. Besides, it's worth the risk. Something happened that day to throw off the pattern. We need to see what it was."
"I agree with Harper," Angela said. "We need to know what happened in Clement that was so different. And what did our grandfather have to do with it? I think it's worth a look."
Jackson stood and paced behind my chair. "It's too dangerous," he said. "We can explore the truth of what happened there after we free Aerden. I don't think it will make any difference in whether our ritual works or not."
"In order to perform this ritual, we're going to have to reactivate the blue portals. Priestess Winter is going to feel it," I said, standing. "She'll come for us. If we don't figure out what her weaknesses are, it won't matter if the ritual works to free Aerden because we'll all be dead."
"We've survived this long," Jackson said. "Freeing Aerden won't change that."
I shook my head. "Don't you see? Freeing Aerden will change everything," I said. "You think Priestess Winter has been coming after me with everything she's got? She's sent an insane tiger, a few undead hunters, her daughter. Not once has she actually come after me herself. Not once have I had to fight her. So far, she's been going easy on me compared to what she's capable of. My father said she's abnormally powerful. More so than any regular prima or witch. We can't win against her without some help."
Jackson ran a hand through his hair. His jawline tensed. "I don't like this."
"Can you do it?" I asked, turning to Lea.
"Yes," she said. "I've recreated memories of places and events from much farther back than this. But Jackson's right. It will take way too much power. I would be drained for days. Maybe a week. We don't have that kind of time."
"Courtney," I said, turning to Mary Anne. "She's at Lark's right now, but she would be able to recharge Lea's power. Can you go get her? You should be safe once you get past the Chen's security system."
Mary Anne nodded. "Should I bring everyone? Or just Courtney?"
"Bring Lark and her mom too if they're willing to come," I said. I'd been dying to see Lark ever since we first got back to Peachville. "We could use their help too."
Mary Anne and Essex ran off to get three more wristbands from inside.
"Will we all be able to go see the vision?" I asked Lea.
She shook her head. "It's easier if it's just you and me," she said. "It would take too much energy to bring everyone."
I looked at Angela. "Are you okay with that?" I asked. "It's your family as much as it is mine."
Angela stood. "I'm not sure I want to see what happened that day," she said. "To watch my own grandfather be murdered is a memory I don't really want, to be honest with you."
Her words weighed heavy on my heart. I hadn't even considered the emotional impact of watching his death. I was too focused on getting the information to even think about how it might affect me. Would I be able to handle this?
I swallowed down any doubt and turned back to Lea. "Then it's just you and me," I said. "Please do this for me. We need to see what happened that day."
She looked to Jackson and their eyes locked. My heart beat faster as a silent conversation passed between them. Finally, Jackson slowly nodded, then lowered his head.
Lea turned to face me. "Alright," she said. "You owe me one."
I Came To Set Her Free
Lea and I stood together in the center of the village. My heart beat double-time in my chest. She placed her hands on my shoulders.
"Are you ready?" she asked.
I pressed my lips together firmly and nodded, trying to control the roller-coaster in my stomach.
She spoke in her demon tongue. Chills rippled down my arms.
We turned to black smoke, disappearing from the crow village and landing in a large room. Dim lights buzzed overhead.
I brought my palm to my forehead and squeezed my eyes shut. Even after all my practice shifting into demon form, I wasn't prepared for the violence of Lea's time travel. I felt as if I'd been slammed against the ground.
"The demon gate is in here?" I asked, finally able to open my eyes and look around. We were in some kind of basement from the looks of it. The floor was gray cement with dirty boot prints and water stains. A set of metal stairs led up, but Lea pointed in the opposite direction.
"Yes," she said, and motioned for me to follow. "In the bigger demon gate cities, there aren't large open fields or deep woods anywhere like in Peachville or Aldeen. The Order needs to hide their portals away from the rest of the world, so in cities like this or D.C. or New York, the gates are deep in the basements and bottom levels of buildings. Sometimes they're in houses, like in Winterhaven, and sometimes the portal is in the basement of a normal-looking office building, like this one."
"I thought you said Clement was a small town."
"You've been here before?" I asked.
"I've been to them all," she said.
My eyes widened. "Them all? As in all of the demon gates that were closed?"
"No. Them all as in all of the demon gates in the world."
I swallowed. She'd been to every gate? But there were thousands. I guess I hadn't really given much thought to what Lea had been doing for the past fifty years. She'd originally come through to the human world to find Jackson, but when his power had been entombed in the statue in Peachville, she'd moved on to look for other ways to fight against the Order.
I knew she and the other shadow demons in her group had spent a lot of time visiting demon gate towns and trying to convince the witches of the Order that what they were doing to the demons was wrong. I hadn't realized how extensive her travels had really been.
"It's just down this hallway," she said. "Can you hear them?"
I listened, at first hearing only the sound of our footsteps. Then, in the distance, the hum of words spoken in unison. My skin began to tingle.
"I hear it."
"We're close."
Lea lengthened her stride, and I jogged to keep up. The humming grew louder.
"This is it," Lea said. She met my eyes in the semi-darkness, then opened a door labeled 'Employees Only'.
Light flickered across the walls inside.
No one looked up as we entered, and I had to remind myself that to them, we didn't exist. We were ghosts eavesdropping on the past.
The portal stone in the center of a five-pointed star glowed a deep ruby red. The witches of the Order all wore black robes similar to ones I'd seen in Peachville. The prima stood at the top of the star, hood drawn. I recognized her by the ruby necklace around her neck. It was identical to mine except for the color of the stone.
