by L. J. Smith
In the moonlight Cassie could see Nick’s carven, handsome features with their hint of defensiveness.
“I think it was a confusing time for both of us,” Cassie said as honestly as she could. “We’ve always had a connection, Nick, and we probably always will. But that doesn’t mean . . .” She couldn’t finish her sentence.
Cassie couldn’t ignore the depth of Nick’s feelings for her, not when his love was so strong it allowed him to fight his possession. But she would be lying if she said that what she felt for him was equally as strong, or the same.
“I know I haven’t been fair to you,” she continued. “You were there for me when I needed you, in a way no one else has been. But Adam is my one true love. I have to let you go, for real this time.”
Nick’s jaw tightened. She’d caught him completely off guard by being so blunt. In fact, she’d caught herself off guard as well.
“I think we may be facing the end, Nick, all of us. Once the ancestors have eternal life, they’re likely to unleash another bubonic plague on the world. It’s more important than ever for us not to be distracted.
“I really do love you,” she added, after a few seconds of uncomfortable silence. “But not the same way I love Adam. And you deserve someone who loves you that way.”
Nick nodded, stone-faced, and then brushed off Cassie’s words in his usual manner. “I’ll get over it,” he said, as if their moment was nothing. “What we should be thinking about right now is Faye. Look at that moon.”
He pointed at the sky. “That’s our stopwatch.”
Cassie didn’t allow herself to glimpse the waxing gibbous moon another time. It was too terrifying to look at.
“If only we could catch Faye in a moment of weakness,” he said. “But she’s never weak. She’s Faye.”
It was true, Cassie thought. The last time Faye had allowed herself to be vulnerable was—
Of course.
Cassie snapped to attention. The sound of the ocean was crisp in her ears. It was whispering to her, sharing its deeply hidden secrets.
“What is it?” Nick asked.
“I know just the place,” Cassie said. “To catch Faye with her heart open.”
Chapter 23
Cassie stepped across the crooked stream and around the few small ponds that led to Suzan’s grave. It was evening but still light as day, barely a shadow upon the ground.
Even from afar, Cassie could see that Suzan’s headstone was whiter and cleaner than those surrounding it. It was newer. The dirt it stood upon was just sprouting with freshly planted grass. It would take weeks for the tiny green pinpoints to grow as long and lush as the adjoining lawn. As Cassie expected, Faye was there, standing over the stone. She’d wrapped herself in a knit black shawl, even though the breeze tonight was warm and summery and the humidity high.
One evening a while back Cassie had come upon Faye in just this spot by accident, but she left her undisturbed. She’d understood at the time that mourning Suzan’s death was a process Faye needed to go through on her own. But after that encounter, it didn’t take long for Cassie to notice that Faye visited there every week at the same time, on the anniversary of Suzan’s death.
Tonight was no different. Cassie approached her quietly and respectfully. It took a few moments for Faye to turn around. When she did, Cassie noticed her eyes were red rimmed and soft. She quickly wiped a long-tailed tear from her cheek.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, her voice sounding hoarse and raspy.
The warm breeze rustled the foliage over their heads, and Cassie began speaking before Faye had the chance to react more harshly. “Death is a terrible, frightening thing, isn’t it?” she said.
Faye stared out into the distance to the east, where the coastline was visible. She didn’t reply, but she also made no move to run away.
Cassie continued talking. “But eternal life isn’t the solution to what happened with Suzan. Dark powers won’t bring her back, Faye, you know that. And losing Suzan only proves just how much we need each other right now.”
Faye began shaking her head, so Cassie spoke louder and faster. “The ancestors are manipulating you into believing they really care about you, but they don’t. All they care about is—”
“Enough already,” Faye said, cutting Cassie off. “Do you really think I don’t already know all that?”
Her tone was condescending but not outraged. It sounded to Cassie, well, almost sensible.
“That’s why I went over to the other side to begin with,” Faye said. “I was the only one who could do it without suspicion.”
“I don’t understand,” Cassie said.
Faye’s expression, framed by a background of rolling hills and granite cliffs, completely altered. She brought her voice down to a whisper.
“I went to their side to spy on them. I couldn’t go back with you all because I didn’t have enough information, and I didn’t want to blow my cover.”
Cassie was taken aback. “Do you mean—”
“I outsmarted all of you,” Faye said. “Aren’t you used to it by now?”
Cassie tried to look past Faye’s cocky surface, to decipher if she was telling the truth.
“As I suspected, the ancestors are a bunch of backstabbers,” Faye continued. “I thought it all along, but now I have proof.”
She glanced left and right. “I found something at the warehouse. A small glass bottle that contains a lock of Scarlett’s hair and some other things. Her fingernails, a drop of blood, and a piece of hematite, which is Scarlett’s working stone. It’s bespelled, Cassie. And if the ancestors smash it to the ground, Scarlett will be stripped of her powers.”
Cassie was quiet for a few seconds, shocked that even the ancestors would stoop so low, but also feeling a little ashamed. Cassie had been so quick to assume the worst about Faye.
“I underestimated you,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
“I knew you would.” Faye let her eyes drop to Suzan’s grave. “That’s how I was sure my plan would work.”
Cassie had the urge to give Faye a hug, but she knew better than to try. “She’d be proud of you,” she said instead, placing a hand on Suzan’s headstone.
Faye looked away, but Cassie noticed a solitary tear fall from her chin onto the fresh grass.
“I’ll steal the bottle,” she said, “and come to your house tonight. Time’s just about up.”
Faye sat on the edge of what used to be her bed in the secret room, soaking in all the attention. The Circle listened in awe as she described every detail of the previous few days—how she’d managed to fool everyone.
“This calls for a celebration,” Chris said. “A party on the beach. It’s been so long since we went night swimming.”
Even Cassie got swept into the idea. This was cause for celebration, wasn’t it? She was about to run for her swimsuit when Nick let out a deep, aggravated breath.
“I know getting Faye back feels like a big victory to the Circle,” he said. “And it is, but it doesn’t automatically solve any of our problems.”
He passed his severe eyes over each of them. “We’re not in the clear just yet. We need to destroy these ancestors, and we need Scarlett to do it. Remember?”
Faye sprang up from the bed and took charge of the floor. “Nick is absolutely right,” she said. “And fortunately I’ve learned some things during my Oscar-worthy performance as a double agent.”
She held her head high as she waited for everyone to begin listening intently. “Eternal life is what the ancestors have been after all along,” she said. “First they needed to be resurrected. Scarlett did that for them, but she also tried to set herself up as their leader. And that was her fatal mistake. They don’t think she’s even worthy of being a Blak. Cassie’s the one they wanted. She’s the stronger sister.”
Faye paused to let her words sink in. “The ancestors are only using Scarlett to get eternal life, but as soon as they have it, they plan to betray her.”
“Untr
ustworthy demons, go figure,” Sean called out.
Faye began prowling the room like a panther. “They don’t like the idea that Scarlett tried to situate herself as their boss. They see her as a greedy young girl, a know-it-all.”
Faye went for her bag and carefully pulled out the small glass bottle she had told Cassie about. It was corked tightly with a rubber stopper. “Once the ancestors perform the eternal-life spell, they’re going to smash this bottle to the ground, stripping Scarlett of her powers forever.”
She held the bottle up high for everyone to see.
“I went along with their plan,” she said. “I didn’t say anything because then they’d turn on me, too. But I can promise you that Scarlett has no idea how much the ancestors resent her.”
“She’s got it coming,” Deborah said.
Chris agreed. “We should let them hurt her. It’s what she deserves.”
Cassie thought back to the scene of Scarlett and all the ancestors having dinner together at the warehouse. Scarlett had been so content in that moment, foolishly so.
“All Scarlett wants is to feel connected,” Cassie shouted out. “To have these ancestors be her family. That’s why she’s so blind to their deception—she wants to believe in the best of them.”
“Well, poor Scarlett,” Doug said, pretending to wipe away tears.
“Don’t you see?” Cassie said. “That’s our in.”
Cassie reached out for the glass bottle. “I’m going to go talk to Scarlett and show her this.”
Faye handed it over without argument.
“Why can’t we all go?” Melanie asked.
But Cassie only repeated herself, examining the tiny but dangerous bottle in the palm of her hand. “I’m going to talk to her, sister to sister.”
Chapter 24
Cassie glanced at the time on her cell phone. She was sitting on a green wooden bench watching kids play on a jungle gym. Mothers pushed their toddlers on a squeaky swing set. She’d arranged to meet Scarlett here at the public park to talk, but it had been almost an hour and she was still waiting. She checked the time on her cell phone again and mentally rehearsed her speech. But it was all beginning to feel like a wasted effort if Scarlett wouldn’t be there to hear it.
The group of children Cassie had been watching were ushered away, immediately replaced with a new set—uniformly loud and rambunctious, and equally doted upon by protective parents and nannies. Sometimes Cassie looked at children like these, with their heedless innocence and their unconditional love, and she wondered, Was I ever like that?
But the thing was, she wasn’t. That version of childhood had never been available to her.
Kind of like sisterhood, she thought. Self-pitying or not, Cassie had been shortchanged on both. And here she was, still not having learned her lesson, still trying for what she could never have.
Just as Cassie was about to give up, Scarlett appeared beside her. Maybe she’d been watching out of sight, testing Cassie to see how long she could keep her waiting before she’d give up and go home. She was wearing blue jeans, a white T-shirt, and her favorite brown bowler hat. There was no apology for arriving more than an hour late.
“Have you been sitting here awhile?” she asked. “You’ve got a little sunburn on your nose. With your fair skin, Cassie, you should really be more careful of the sun.”
Cassie’s patience had been worn thin. With Scarlett and her oversize attitude hovering in her face now, she had the urge to lash out at her. All the mental preparations of the past hour had slipped right away, all the rehearsing of every perfect word had been replaced by a tingling in her gut and the itch to knock Scarlett right back down to size.
“Before you start shooting your mouth off,” Scarlett said, “just know that you can’t convince me to leave my Circle. Even though you’ve got Faye on your side right now, we’ll get someone else to cross over.”
Cassie silently counted backward from a hundred to remain calm.
Scarlett joined Cassie on the bench and observed the kids at play. “What a bunch of brats,” she said flippantly. “I never want kids.”
“I asked you here today to warn you,” Cassie said, giving no credence to Scarlett’s attempt at levity. “It’s not our Circle that’s against you, it’s your own.”
Scarlett rolled her dark eyes. “Here we go,” she said.
“I’m telling you the truth,” Cassie insisted. “The ancestors plan to strip you of your power once they have eternal life.”
“And you know this how, exactly?” Scarlett asked, giddy with sarcasm.
“They confided in Faye,” Cassie said. “Once they have what they need, they won’t hesitate to dispose of you.”
“No.” Scarlett shook her head. “I don’t believe you. They’re my family. They’re our family, Cassie. If only you’d let yourself see it.”
Cassie thought again of Scarlett’s dinner with the ancestors. How hard she was trying to build a home out of that dilapidated warehouse—a kitchen, a living room, a treasured dining table and chairs from discarded, long-forgotten castoffs. Maybe the two of them weren’t so different. They both had so much empty space to fill within them.
“You and I are each other’s family,” Cassie said. “They’re nothing more than our selfish, evil ancestors who don’t care about us.”
She could see Scarlett was having a hard time accepting this brutal truth. “Think about it,” she said. “They’ve been dead for centuries. They have no humanity left in them. Imagine being stripped of your power—or worse. Is that a gamble you want to take?”
Scarlett opened her mouth indignantly and then closed it again. “You’re lying.”
“If I’m lying, then why do I have this?” Cassie opened her bag and carefully pulled out the glass bottle.
Scarlett froze at the sight of it.
“Faye took this from the warehouse,” Cassie said. “That’s your hair, your blood.”
Scarlett took the bottle from Cassie and examined it. Her dyed red locks were unmistakable.
“I understand the importance of building a family,” Cassie said. “But they’re using you, Scarlett, and you deserve better than that.”
Scarlett cupped the bottle gently with both hands and brought it into her lap. For a moment the sound of a child’s laughter drowned out every other sound. It was immediately followed by another child’s crying.
All the meanness escaped Scarlett’s face. “But they’re so much more powerful than we are, Cassie. Even if I join your side, there’s no stopping them.”
“Yes, there is.” Cassie felt the crushing sense of helplessness she’d been experiencing for days slightly rise, but it was a tenuous moment. This is it, she thought. Don’t mess this up now.
“I have a spell,” she said, “that we can use to burn our father’s Book of Shadows and destroy everything that’s come from it. Including the ancestors. We’ll be free of all of it forever.”
“Where’d you get this spell?” Scarlett asked defensively, but Cassie sensed a tinge of hope in her voice.
“From an old witch,” Cassie answered. “Our father stripped him of his power years ago. It’s a spell he created.”
“And you trust him?” Scarlett asked.
“It’ll be dangerous; he told me as much. It’s never been performed before. But I believe it’ll work—with your help.”
“You believe or you hope?” Scarlett asked.
“Both, I guess,” Cassie answered.
She joined Scarlett in staring forward for a moment. “Timothy knows a lot about our family. If this spell wasn’t something our father feared, he wouldn’t have had to strip him of his magic.”
Together Cassie and Scarlett watched two toddlers in matching blond pigtails each pulling on the arm of a plastic doll. Both girls were hysterical, tears the size of winter hail tumbling from their eyes. Seconds before, the toy had just been lying on the grass, ignored. Their father had to step in to mediate. He yanked the doll from both their hands, tossed it out of si
ght, and then distracted his daughters from their grief by guiding them, hands held, to the monkey bars. Just like that, their anguish was forgotten. The tears were still wet on their cheeks as their faces brightened.
Cassie turned to Scarlett. It wasn’t lost on either of them that they’d missed out on something crucial in not having a proper father or sister.
Scarlett choked back tears, and Cassie realized a hard knot was forming in her own throat as well. She had to strive to keep herself dry-eyed.
“I guess you’re all I have left, Cassie,” Scarlett said. “You’re my only chance of saving myself. How’s that for pathetic?”
Cassie reached for Scarlett’s hand and squeezed it in her own. “We’re each other’s only chance, Scarlett. Pathetic or not.”
Chapter 25
In the dark of night, the group walked upward, past all the other houses on Crowhaven Road, including Cassie’s house at Number Twelve. When they reached the highest point, it looked just as Cassie remembered it. Timothy’s spell called for performing the book-burning outdoors, on grounds that would have had some significance to Black John, so here they were at the ultimate point on the headland, where Black John’s ruined house used to sit, Number Thirteen. It was the last place Cassie ever wanted to be. She walked to the cliff’s edge and stared down at the waves below.
The Circle stepped over and around the bits of foundation left over from the razed house. Cassie had brought three things with her: Black John’s Book of Shadows, a sack containing the Master Tools, and the wooden boxes Timothy had given her.
Scarlett, Faye, Diana, and Adam kneeled down closest to Cassie as she unclasped the larger box’s brass latches and lifted its heavy top.
Cassie unpacked its contents: robes, crystals, incense, and candles; a black-handled dagger, a spade, and some wooden logs. Then she found a tiny vial of clear liquid that could have been holy water but she understood was a potion. Lining the bottom of the box was a yellowed piece of paper that contained detailed pictorial instructions on how to prepare the spell, but no words. Probably so anyone from any time, a speaker of any language, could read and understand it. Timothy had thought of everything.
