her. “Look, Jenna, can we just skip to the part where we both say we’re sorry and hug?”
She gave a startled laugh, and for the first time, I noticed there were tears in her eyes. “Yeah, let’s do that,” she said with a sniffle, before gingerly wrapping her arms around me.
We sat there, our arms around each other, until I asked, “You’re still not coming back, are you?”
She shook her head. “I can’t.” When she pulled away, tears were streaming down her face, and even her pink stripe looked dimmer. “I have to do this, Sophie.”
I wasn’t sure if I could talk around the sudden lump in my throat, so I just nodded.
“But it’s not like I won’t be able to see you ever again,” she said, squeezing my hand. “You could even come visit the nest at Christmas.”
“Nest?” I asked, raising both eyebrows.
Jenna shrugged, embarrassed. “That’s what you call it when a bunch of vampires live together.”
I tried to think up a witty comment, maybe something about hippies and communes, but I was too sad to be snarky.
Between the thought of going back to Hecate alone and nervousness over meeting Archer, I was too much of a basket case to work with Dad. It wasn’t until the day before he left that I felt up to working with the grimoire. No one seemed to have noticed that it was missing, and once I went to check on the glamoured book Dad had left in its place, I could see why. Even I couldn’t tell it wasn’t the same book, and the trace of magic coming off the glamour was so faint that you couldn’t feel it unless you knew it was there.
We studied it in the same room where I practiced controlling my powers. The force coming off those pages still made my heart race and my head ache. Regardless, I sat down next to Dad on the floor, the book spread out before us, and listened as he explained every spell. He had been right: the magic contained within those pages was some of the darkest stuff I’d ever heard of. There were killing spells, and rituals that would bind another soul to yours so you could make someone your slave. Dad went over each one, his voice level and calm, no matter how bad the enchantments were. There was only one spell he didn’t talk about, which was weird. The markings for it only took up half a page, and they looked pretty simple, but when we flipped to that page, Dad drew in his breath.
“What?” I asked, fidgeting on the cold marble floor. “It can’t be any worse than that one about babies.”
“It’s not that,” Dad said. He pushed his glasses farther up on his nose. “It’s just that I didn’t know this particular spell actually existed.”
“What does it do?”
Dad paused before sliding the book over to me. “Touch it.”
I raised my eyebrows, but did what he asked. I don’t know why, but I pressed my whole palm to the page so that my hand nearly covered the markings. As soon as I did, I felt a weird thud in my chest, like someone had just punched me lightly in the sternum.
“Um, ow,” I said, drawing back my hand. “Are you going to tell me what I just did?”
He pulled the book back. “No. Hopefully, you’ll never need to know.”
And apparently that was that, because Dad shut the grimoire and stood up. “I think it’s time to put this back,” he said. “There’s nothing more to be learned from it, and I now see why the Council keeps it locked up.” He glanced down at the book with disgust. “If it were up to me, we’d destroy it.”
“So do it.” After some of the stuff we’d read in that thing, nothing would make me happier than seeing it in flames. The thought of it in the wrong hands was truly shudder-worthy.
But Dad shook his head. “Alexei Casnoff wanted it kept intact as a reminder.”
“Of course he did.” I winced as I stood, and Dad hurried to help me up.
“How are you feeling?”
“Hard as it may be to believe, better. How’s your arm?”
He absentmindedly rubbed it. “Stings, but it could’ve been much worse.”
He slipped the grimoire inside his jacket, and we made our way back downstairs. I could tell there was something bothering Dad, but whether it was all that stuff in the grimoire or the birthday party incident, I didn’t know.
We were all the way to the foyer before he said, “Sophie, I have to tell your mother about what happened.”
I suppressed a groan. I’d known this was coming, but I was hoping we could put it off until after Dad got back. I had a lot going on, and the last thing I wanted was a worried mom on top of all of that.
“Dad, she’s just going to freak. And probably come here and get me, and then you guys will start yelling at each other, and I’ll have to act out by wearing lots of eyeliner and doing drugs. Do you really want to deal with that?”
Dad smiled and ran a hand over my hair. The gesture was so parental and normal that I didn’t know how to react. “Perhaps it can wait until after my trip,” he said. “I’m not quite ready to give you back yet.”
His voice was full of affection, and I wondered if a person could actually choke on guilt, because it rose up in my throat as bitter and scalding as black coffee.
I looked away, hoping he wouldn’t see it, and said, “Where are you going, anyway?”
“Up north, near Yorkshire. Another attack.”
He didn’t have to say by whom.
“While I’m there,” Dad added, “I’m supposed to meet with a warlock in Lincolnshire. He’s supposedly done some extensive research on demons, and I’m hoping he may be able to help me with tracing Nick’s and Daisy’s origins. Hopefully, when I come back, we can begin to resolve this matter.”
When he got back, I might have news of my own about Nick and Daisy. Not that I had any idea how I was going to tell him what I’d found out. I didn’t want to pursue that train of thought, what with it being all stomach- twisting, so instead, I asked him something else that had been bugging me. “Hey, Dad, remember earlier this week, when I got stabbed?”
“I have a hazy recollection, yes.”
“Is it worth it? Being head of the Council? I mean, if people are always gunning for you, why not hand it over to someone else? You could go on vacation. Have a life. Date.”
I waited for Dad to embrace his inner Mr. Darcy again and get all huffy, but if anything, he just looked rueful. “One, I made a solemn vow to use my powers to help the Council. Two, things are turbulent now, but that won’t always be the case. And I have faith that you’ll make a wonderful head of the Council someday, Sophie.”
Yeah, except for that whole sleeping with the enemy part, I thought. Wait, not that I would actually be sleeping with…I mean, it’s a metaphor. There would only be metaphorical sleeping.
My face must have reflected some of the weirdness happening in my brain, because Dad narrowed his eyes at me before continuing, “As for dating, there’s no point.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m still in love with your mother.”
Whoa. Okay, not exactly the answer I was expecting.
Before I could even process that, Dad rushed on, saying, “Please don’t let that get your hopes up. There is no way your mother and I could or will ever reunite.”
I held up my hand. “Dad, relax. I’m not twelve, and this isn’tThe Parent Trap. But that’s…it’s good to know. I always thought you and Mom must have hated each other. I thought that’s why Mom and I moved around so much—because she was trying to make sure you could never find us.”
His eyes slid away from my face, focusing on a spot above my shoulder. “Your mother had her reasons,” was all he said. Then he sort of sighed and turned away. “All the magic in the world can’t simplify affairs of the heart,” he murmured as he headed toward his office.
“Tell me about it,” I said to his retreating back.
Two days later, he left for Yorkshire, and I prepared for what I’d come to think of as my “field trip” with Archer. Calling it that seemed safer and more businesslike than “meeting” or, God forbid, “assignation.” Still, I spent most of the day in my room by myself because I was afraid Jenna or Cal would be able to tell something was up with me. I was so nervous that I was shooting off tiny flashes of magic like a sparkler.
I didn’t even attempt to sleep, and I thought three a.m. would never come. Finally, at 2:30, I threw on a black T-shirt and some cargo pants, hoping that was an appropriate ensemble for meeting one’s former crush who had turned out to be one’s mortal enemy.
As I walked down the gravel path toward the mill, I tried to tell myself that despite my churning stomach, I
