glitter. Archer moved past me, out of the plants. When I followed a few seconds later, he was nowhere to be seen.
As I walked over to the gift table, I kept looking around for him, but it was obvious he’d already left. I sighed and reached up to take off my crown. I was probably making a huge mistake, but Dad wanted to know where Nick and Daisy came from, and if Archer—or The Eye—had that information, why shouldn’t we use it?
“There you are.”
Cal appeared at my elbow, and it was all I could do not to jump guiltily. Then I saw what he was wearing. “Where did you get that?”
Cal was dressed in a Hex Hall uniform. The blazer was a little tight on his broad shoulders, more so when he shrugged. “It was mine. Mrs. Casnoff brought it with her. I don’t really, uh, do costumes. Figured this was a good compromise.”
I’d thought no one but Archer could make that uniform look good, but Cal proved me wrong. The bright blue was nice against his tan skin and golden hair, and he looked younger. There was a dimple in his cheek as he smiled at me—something I’d never noticed before. “You make a good Hecate,” he said.
I would have snorted and made a sarcastic comment, but there was something in his eyes that made me just say, “Thanks.”
All of the sudden, something else he’d said clicked. “Wait, Mrs. Casnoff brought it? Is she here?”
“Yeah,” Cal said, nodding over toward the ice sculpture, where, sure enough, Mrs. Casnoff stood. She was wearing a draping gown in the same bright blue as Cal’s uniform.
When Mrs. Casnoff saw us, she walked over to us. “Sophie,” she said, her voice warmer than I’d ever heard it. “Happy birthday. It’s good to see you.”
I actually believed she meant it, which was weird.
Weirder still was the smile she gave me as she said, “I was just talking with several of the guests about your decision not to go through with the Removal. We’re all so pleased.”
Great. Nothing better than my superpersonal decision being party chitchat.
“Well, that’s probably a first for you,” I tried to joke. When she just looked confused, I clarified. “Being pleased with me.”
And then she completely freaked me out by laughing. Granted, it was a low, short laugh, but still. Before Mrs. Casnoff could blow my mind any more, Dad walked over, wearing a long black robe and carrying a staff topped with a dark red jewel carved to look like a pomegranate. Once again, I had no clue who he was supposed to be. He and Mrs. Casnoff just nodded at each other, so I guess they’d said their hellos earlier.
“Are you having a nice time?” Dad asked, and there was such a hopeful look on his face that I forced a bright grin.
“Yeah, best birthday party ever!”
I think I oversold it a little bit, but Dad seemed relieved. “Good. I know it’s a bit much, but…well, it’s the first time I’ve celebrated one of your birthdays. I wanted it to be special.”
Guilt and other general yucky feelings bounced inside me. To keep Dad from noticing, I turned my attention to the gift table. That one present was still floating above the rest, spinning in lazy circles. As I looked at it, it drifted toward me, landing softly in my hands.
“I think that one wants you to open it,” Cal observed.
The wrapping paper was a deep purple, and the silver ribbon curled and undulated around my fingers like it was underwater. It was a beautiful gift, but the magic coming off it felt awfully strong. Probably from the floating spell, I thought as I tugged at the bow.
It was the smell I noticed first, that weird metallic scent you sometimes get in a lightning storm. There was a sudden flash of red light, and a sound like a sonic boom. I heard Dad or Cal shout, and the next thing I knew, I was on my back, a painful stinging sensation in my shoulder.
My ears felt stuffed with cotton, but I had the sense that people were yelling, and I watched pairs of feet run by my head. It reminded me of prom, when I’d sat in that pool of punch, watching chaos erupt all around me. Then my shoulder stopped stinging and started burning, badly enough that I moaned. There was a crush of people around me, and I saw a tall figure wearing a mask push his way to the front of the crowd. His mouth was tight, and I thought I saw fear in his familiar brown eyes. I almost opened my mouth to tell Archer to get out of here before I realized how stupid that would be. Then the people shifted, and he was gone.
Cal’s face swam into view. I couldn’t hear him over the ringing in my ears. I’m pretty sure he mouthed for me to lie still, which seemed easy enough.
He held my hand, and while the pain didn’t go away, a woozy sense of calm spread over me. So I was pretty dispassionate as I rolled my head to the side and watched Cal pull a six-inch shard of demonglass out of my shoulder. As soon as it was out, the burning faded, but I knew I’d have yet another scar. “That present sucked,” I muttered.
Dad slipped an arm around my shoulder and helped me sit up. As he did, his sleeve fell back to reveal several slivers of demonglass embedded in his forearm.
“I’m fine,” he said before I could ask. “Cal can get them out later. Are you all right?”
My shoulder was still on fire, but there was no pain anywhere else, and other than the shock of being blown backward and stabbed, I was peachy. “I think so. What was that, like a magic pipe bomb?”
The present lay in tatters on the floor, its ribbon coiling and snapping like a snake. Cal stomped on the ribbon, and it went still. “Seems like it,” he said grimly.
“And it was ensorcelled to seek you out,” Dad added. He looked so worried and angry that I decided not to give him a hard time for using a word likeensorcelled.
“Thank God they couldn’t get their hands on very much demonglass,” Lara said, and I glanced up, surprised to see her. She was wearing some sort of eighteenth-century gown, with wide hips and a square neckline. Her hair was hidden underneath a towering powdered wig. “It seems like that was the biggest piece,” she continued, kicking the shard that had pierced my shoulder. Roderick was behind her, his black wings beating slowly, stirring the air. Lara turned to him and said, “Search the grounds. If Cross is still here, we’ll find him.”
My brain still felt woozy, and my voice was weak when I said, “Cross?”
It was Mrs. Casnoff who answered me. “Clearly, The Eye was behind this. Who else would do such a thing?”
“And since there’s only one Eye who can do magic,” Lara said, her voice sounding almost identical to her sister’s, “it’s obvious. Archer Cross just made another attempt on your life.”
chapter 27
The next nine days stretched out like taffy. Mrs. Casnoff went back to Hecate, which was kind of a relief. Having her at Thorne had been a little too “worlds colliding” for me. I spent most of my time in my room, recovering from my injury. But staring at the wall gave me lots of time to think, mostly about Archer. I’d seen the look on his face right after the explosion had gone off. He’d been scared. Shocked, even, and not in the “Whoops, my assassination didn’t go off as planned” way. He hadn’t known it was coming, which meant he couldn’t have been the one who planted the gift. Which meant there was someone else who wanted to kill me, a thought that made me want to never leave the safe cocoon of my bed. Still, I decided to keep my meeting with Archer. I had a feeling that all of this was connected somehow. Nick and Daisy, the attempt on my life, The Eye suddenly getting way more hard-core. The sooner I got to the bottom of it, the better.
There was one good thing that had come out of nearly being shish kebabbed; Jenna started talking to me again. She came by my room the morning after the party to check on me, standing uncertainly in the doorway. “How are you feeling?”
I scooted back onto my pillows and tried to shrug. That sent a fire bolt of pain through my whole upper body, though, and I grimaced. “Oh, you know. Like I got stabbed by glass from hell. But it’s getting better.”
Jenna took a couple of steps into the room, her expression grave. “You could’ve been killed.”
“Yeah, but I wasn’t.”
A couple more steps and she was beside my bed, sitting on the edge. “Soph,” she started, but I interrupted
