Before I could ask who, Baruch crashed into our room through an enormous, jagged hole in the wall that had not been part of the decor when I’d first arrived. It would have been comical, had he, Cisco, and Bastijn not been battling a flaming creature.
“Turn it off, Ethan,” Baruch growled.
Not a creature. A man.
A Rasha.
Baruch wailed on him with a flurry of punches, ignoring the burns to his skin, but his super strength didn’t even slow Ethan down. Neither did smashing his fist into Ethan’s nose. Ethan’s head jolted sideways, blood spraying out in an arc, but he kept grappling.
I held up my hand against the splattering drops.
Helen’s head lolled back like she was about to faint.
“Stay with me,” I said.
Danilo and I ushered her toward the front door. I kept one arm slung around her, rubbing her back as she sobbed into my chest.
Cisco flexed his fingers and the cement under his feet cracked. Vines slithered up, tiny at first, but growing into fat ropes in the seconds they took to wrap around Ethan’s legs and bring him crashing down.
Ethan flared brighter. Bastijn squatted down and touched the bare earth that Cisco had exposed. The floor rumbled.
Danilo and I each seized one of Helen’s arms and ran as dirt geysered up, burying Ethan’s body. Smothering the fire.
In all the video games I’d played or watched Ari play growing up, earth was weak to fire. It burned. But now I saw how wrong that was. Plants burned, but earth suffocated. The still-visible flames on Ethan’s head flickered and died under an avalanche of soil and stone.
There was a collective sigh of relief, then Cisco stepped forward. “Listen, man–”
Eyes rolling back in his head, Ethan bucked so hard that a bone broke with a sharp snap. Dirt trickled off his half-exposed body.
Helen fainted. I’d lost my hold on her because I was shaking violently.
Rohan ran in from the front foyer. “Everyone is outside…” Ro charged a half-dozen steps in my direction, then stopped. He kept a careful eye on me, but didn’t treat me any differently from the other Rasha who’d been in the room.
I appreciated that, willing down my trembling with a steely control.
“What the fuck?” Danilo pressed a soot-streaked fingertip to his scorched side and hissed.
Cisco had lost a shoe somehow, staring at his sock like he couldn’t compute its existence. “Ethan went rogue.”
A pulsing throb started up at the nape of my neck. My skin prickled from head-to-toe, like it had shrunk in the wash.
“He killed Rabbi Wahl,” Bastijn said, his gaze hollow. He checked Helen’s pulse. “Zander, too.”
“We’re sure that was actually Ethan and not a demon?” Cisco said.
“Were the wards breached?” Ro said.
The pulsing ran down into my shoulder and along my arm. I turned my palm over, drawn by the smear of Ethan’s blood along one side.
“I’ll check,” Baruch said. “What about the rest of the staff? Bystanders? Do we need to set up some kind of perimeter? Deal with a possible police presence?”
“From outside there was no sign of anything odd happening,” Danilo said.
“Most of the staff hadn’t actually seen anything because it all went down so fast,” Rohan said. “I sent the calm ones home and the others I put in a taxi to Dr. Ramirez. He’ll take care of them.”
The room went hazy and gauzy, the only clear image Ethan’s blood on my skin. I sniffed my palm. Yesssssss.
I touched my tongue to it and stiffened, an electric jolt snapping through me.
Eww. No. I wasn’t some weird vamp wannabe.
I flicked my tongue against it again. Just the tip.
Then a longer lick, its taste as intoxicating as the finest wine.
Ro strong-armed me, muscling me toward the stairs. He shielded me from the others, whom I could only see through a milky cloud tinged at the edges with red. His mouth was working but I couldn’t hear him, deafened by the slow glug of my heart.
Tick tock.
The beat of my heart.
Blood to rule the might.
Ethan’s blood.
Freezing water sluiced over my head. I blinked, shaking like a wet dog, and jerked my head out from under the bathtub tap, sputtering.
Ro held himself in check, his mouth a flat line. “You said Lilith wasn’t controlling you.”
“She’s not.”
“I was calling you for twenty minutes. Smacking your cheek. Pinching you. You didn’t react. And that was after your eyes had gone cloudy and you stiffened up like a board. We barely got out of the room in time.” A muscle jumped in the hard set of his jaw.
I sank down against the white floor tiles, my back against the tub. Water ran from my hair down under the neck of my shirt. “Snowflake, I’m fine. I promise you she’s not awake.”
“You might not know. And if I’m talking to Lilith right now, she’s hardly going to admit to running the show.” Ro wrenched off the cold water with such force I half expected the tap to snap off. He’d probably broken about seven California bylaws letting it run that long.
Ro’s guilt wasn’t going to ease up if I explained exactly what was going on, and he wasn’t going to get any less angry at me, but how could I hope for us to move forward if I left him in the dark?
Full disclosure sucked, but not having Rohan in my corner was worse. I nudged the bathroom door shut with my foot, and using my shirt to blot myself dry, told him about the lamia, drawing on Lilith’s leaking magic, and my looming one-month deadline before she broke free. I did it as quickly and succinctly as I could, praying that our fragile re-connection held.
Ro had gone full-body knifeman by the end of my story, gauging deep slashes into the bathroom floor tile, his fingers tensed like claws.
“The black magic called to me downstairs,” I said. “Not like ‘come to the dark side’ or anything, more in recognition.”
“Because it’s part of you!”
“Let’s not overreact. Is Lilith shitting her magic into my body? Yes. But I’m hardly the Wicked Witch of the West.”
“You are literally using dark magic. It kills people.” He yanked his blades out of the floor, retracting them with visible effort. “One month.”
Even after our time apart and our choppy emotional waters, it seemed I still couldn’t handle Rohan being in pain. I was the one at risk, and all I wanted to do was soothe his hurt. I patted his leg.
“The witches are working on it and meantime, absorbing it like I am may be the best course of action. I’ve become my own magic purification system.”
He scrubbed a bladeless hand over his face. “You’re acting like you’ve solved it, but you’re just hoping for the best.”
“Is letting the magic float around inside me the better option?”
“I don’t know.”
“Neither do I. Neither does Esther. We’re in unchartered territory here. The fact of the matter is that the dark magic is inside me and I can’t just sit here and do nothing.” I’d lived my life feeling helpless and at the mercy of the universe’s cruel whims for too many years. Fuck that.
“And what if you hasten along your death because you’re messing with things you don’t understand? Or you hurt some innocent person because this dark magic has totally screwed with your ability to see right from wrong anymore and you think you’re infallible?”
Caring a little less about his feelings right now. “My moral center is intact. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Addiction and fucking up because you think you know best?” He barked a harsh laugh. “Yeah, sweetheart, I do. I also know exactly how easy it is to pull the wool over the eyes of the people closest to you.”
Rohan had lived that path and it had cost him Asha. Much as I wanted to wrap my anger around me in a cloak of self-righteousness, I appreciated that this situation had to be a living hell for him and I refused to flashback him into the wor
st time in his life.
I pushed to my feet. “I’m doing what instinctively feels right, and I’m being open and honest with the people I trust to watch my back on this. But I can’t swear that the magic won’t tip me into a bad place. And I understand if you can’t be around that. I really do.”
There were only a few feet between me and the door. If I blinked my eyes really fast and moved right now, I could get out of here with my dignity intact.
“Jesus, Nava. Did I say that?” He stood up and wrapped me in his arms, holding me with his cheek pressed to mine, until the tension left my body, and his racing heartbeat slowed. “You can’t drop this on me and then expect me to roll with it. I want to destroy her. I can’t…” He swore under his breath, his arms tightening around me.
“You won’t have to put me down like a rabid dog.”
Rohan gave a pained laugh. “Don’t you dare joke right now.”
I smiled against his neck.
“Lilith can’t have you, okay?”
“Okay.” And in that moment, surrounded and secure in the arms of the person I cared so much about, it was.
We sat side-by-side on the edge of the tub, Ro holding tight to my hand. “What happened downstairs?” he said.
“Ethan.”
“What about him?”
“He didn’t go postal. He was bound. Just like the demons. Dark magic. ‘Blood to rule the might.’”
“Ethan’s blood. What did you learn?”
“The recognition. Right. I was able to put my understanding in context because of the first part of the zizu prophecy.”
Rohan mimed wiping his brow. “Oh, good. Wouldn’t have wanted that creepshow to fade into obscurity.”
“Ro.” I kissed his knuckles.
He sighed, but looked at me. “The attack. Was it Sienna’s doing?”
“I couldn’t tell, but I’m gonna go with yes. The wards weren’t tampered with, were they?”
“No.”
“How’s Helen?” I said.
“Danilo took her to Dr. Ramirez as well.”
“What happened? Because that was a shit show.”
“From what we could piece together,” he said, “Ethan asked to speak with Wahl and Zander, then soon as they were in the same room, fried them. Didn’t care who saw. That’s when Baruch broke through a wall to tackle him and pull him away from everyone else, and you were there for the rest.”
“Why those three?”
Ro shrugged, his expression tight with frustration. “You want to go back to the bungalow and get cleaned up? There’s not anything more we can do here.”
“Yeah, but one other thing. When I–” I coughed, but it was reflex, not the magic silencing I’d experienced up until now. “The first time I met Lilith, she’d asked for permission to experience a memory. There wasn’t blood exchange involved and I gave my consent, but once it had started, I couldn’t have stopped it or refused her taking as much as she wanted off that memory. Whatever Sienna did to compel Ethan, there’s no chance he could have fought it.”
I was actually able to articulate details of my interaction with Lilith. What if drawing on her magic was allowing me to regain control of my words, my body, my life?
“The others need to know that,” I said, “but I’m not sure how to tell them without sharing all the backstory. I’m sorry, Ro. I don’t know who to trust here.”
Ro stood up. “I don’t either. We’ll clear Ethan’s name somehow. We’ve been friends for years. He’s a solid guy. No way he went rogue.” He extended a hand and pulled me up. “Meantime, the first order of business is to figure out why Sienna used Ethan to go after those two.”
“No,” Baruch said, having eased the door open and stepped inside. “The first order of business is: who’s Lilith?” He crossed his arms, puffing up his chest and pretty much obliterating any view of the hallway behind him. “And why is there a zizu prophecy helping you understand dark magic?”
Ro hadn’t shared the entire story with Baruch, and the big, unhappy man didn’t let us go until he was satisfied that he’d wrung every last detail from us. Including what would happen in a month if I was lucky, and sooner if I wasn’t.
Tree Trunk had gone Nava Red.
I bounced nervously on my toes. “Baruch?”
He stood there, scarily still and scarily silent, but the most terrifying part was his blinking that gave away nothing.
I tugged on Rohan’s sleeve, my eyes anxiously darting to Baruch.
Ro squeezed my arm in reassurance, then stepped forward, partially shielding me, and clapped Baruch on the shoulder.
“Mandelbaum has extra tzitzit,” he said in a calm voice. “Baruch, you got someone you trust back at HQ who could get one for us?”
Baruch pinched the bridge of his nose and I held my breath that he didn’t go nuclear. That I hadn’t lost him. I’d barely found a way to live without Drio and we hadn’t even been friends for much of our relationship. Losing Baruch was an ache I wouldn’t be able to staunch.
He exhaled slowly and deeply. “The witches are confident they can keep you from losing your magic?”
He was worried about me, not angry. My shoulders relaxed down from my ears as I considered how best to answer him.
The witches had been optimistic when my chances were still fifty-fifty, before I’d drawn on Lilith’s magic. Had I decreased my odds? Maybe, but if I let myself go down the rabbit hole of despair, I’d lose my shit entirely. I needed to stay strong; the fate of the world and my happily-ever-after depended on it.
“Yes. They’re confident.”
“Then no problem,” Baruch said.
“That’s it? It’s that simple?” I said.
“Is there an alternative?” Ro said. I shook my head. “Then, yeah. It is. But take me along for back-up when you deliver it to Baskerville.”
“Of course. Though I did have back-up the first time.” I dug my burner phone out of my pocket with grimy fingers. I’d be sanitizing it later. “See?”
Baruch’s eyes darkened somewhat at the photo I’d snapped of Ms. Clara in her latex glory. Minus the freaky mask.
“She used the whip?” His voice sounded rougher than usual.
“Oh, yeah. Ever seen her do that wrist-wrapping trick? She’s balletic with that thing.”
“You’re a menace,” Ro murmured, his eyes twinkling.
Baruch stole one last glance at the photo, then smoothed down the front of his shirt. “Have you told us everything?”
Everything except Ilya’s memory wipe, but I wasn’t about to drop two bombs on Rohan in a row. “Yup.”
“Why can’t you find Sienna?” Baruch asked.
“She’s shielded herself from any location spells and gone off any technological grid. Her place was cleared out. Dr. Gelman couldn’t even find a hair to trace back to her.” My hand flew to my mouth. “I have to tell Esther what Sienna’s done.”
Just once I’d like to be the bearer of good news. I was never getting my rugelach.
“May I leave the bathroom now?” I asked.
“We’ll reconvene back at the bungalows,” Ro said. “Baruch is staying at Mom and Dad’s.”
Normally I would have been overjoyed. Now, I nodded in resignation, and answered my phone.
Before I could even say “hello,” Ari was freaking out on the other end, asking if I was okay. “Ace. Calm down. I’m… uninjured.” I couldn’t lie and say I was all right, because I still had Ethan’s blood on me and I was holding on to my sanity by my fingertips.
There was shouting on Ari’s end and then Kane was on me, demanding I answer the same question. He had the phone wrestled away from him by Leo who bombarded me with yet more concern.
Baruch plucked the phone away. “Who is this?” he barked. He held the cell away from his ear as Leo yammered at him, her voice cutting off with a shriek as Ari reclaimed the phone.
“Nava is holding up,” Baruch said. “Rohan is taking her home. You can speak to her later. What? No. Ari. No. I–
Ben zona!” He blinked at the phone, stupefied. “He hung up on me. Your brother is as annoying as you are. He’s also coming to Los Angeles.” He tossed me my cell back, suddenly looking incredibly weary. “We need a strategy.”
A text from Ms. Clara lit up my phone. Mandelbaum coming to L.A.
“I’d say this was the last straw, but…” I gave a harsh laugh, handed Rohan the phone, and walked out the door.
11
I didn’t call Esther until I’d showered and burned my clothing. Okay, not really. Billie had promised to dispose of them. Being clean and Ethan-free, plus the sandwiches and shot of whiskey that she’d brought, helped dissipate my shell-shock a tiny bit, as did the chocolate chip cookies, warm from the oven. Not one or two either. Like a dozen of them. And she told Ro they were all for me.
“You look like you need the chocolate, lovely.” She tucked an escaping strand of blonde hair back into her bun.
“You are the best human being in the history of the world.” I was wedged into the corner of the couch in the bungalow living room with pillows stuffed around me and a bright knit blanket thrown over my legs.
She smiled at me, all grandmotherly. “I like this one, Rohan. She’s a fine judge of character.”
He planted a kiss on her plump cheek. It was a sweet maternal tableau made sweeter, though decidedly less innocent, by the fact that Ro had also showered and was only wearing boxer shorts, his chiseled abs on display. “I like her, too. But I’m glad you approve.”
“Billie, do you have stories of Ro as an irrepressible child?”
“Dozens, dear.”
“Can I come help you make cookies some time and can you share them, starting with the most embarrassing?”
“Any time.” She tucked the bundle of dirty clothes under her arm, told me to call if I needed her, and left.
I took a photo of Ro munching on his second cookie and posted a nauseatingly cute caption to go with it. “Yo, cookie thief. I didn’t even hear you ask for the first one.”
“It’s for the mission,” he said, spraying crumbs.
“Funny boy.”
“Funny boy who let you wear his clothes.”
“True.” I was enveloped in a pair of his sweats that were too baggy, an old skater T-shirt, and a Fugue State Five sweatshirt that he’d dug out of the depths of his closet especially for me.
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