She pushed him ahead of her out of the room, leaning against the wall outside as soon as she closed the door behind them. It took her a moment to get her stomach under control, certain she was about to be sick. Owen looked worse than she felt, if that was possible.
“I’m sorry,” she said. It was as close as she’d been able to get to admitting her part in all of it. “I have to go get cleaned up and changed now.” She wanted to kick herself for following her apology with that nonsense. It made it seem like she was sorry for having to leave him alone in the hall.
He felt the same and raised his eyebrows in disbelief. “That’s your main concern right now? By all means, go have a luxurious bath.”
Taking his arm, she pulled him alongside her as she headed upstairs. “It’s not that. I have to- I have to time travel again.” His eyebrows shot up further, disappearing under his disheveled hair.
“You can’t be serious? After what we’ve been through, after what nearly happened to you because of all that? I would think you’d be off that forever.”
“I’d like to be. Really I would. But my father’s gone and done something foolish.” She cleared her throat. “Because of me. So I have to, as many times as it takes to find him. I’m so tired of being the one who’s ruined everything. I’ll make this right for my mum and brothers if it kills me.”
Owen closed his eyes and huffed out of his nostrils like a horse. “I don’t think you can take all the credit for ruining everything,” he said wryly. She looked down at the floor, unable to meet his eyes. “Well, I can’t let you be killed. Again. I’m coming with you.”
She should have told him no. Unequivocally no. But she didn’t want to be alone, didn’t want to be without Owen again. They never should have split up, she knew that now. If she hadn’t been so selfish, perhaps she could have made things work in Moldavia and they could have properly harnessed their powers. Setting off to to do magic on her own had been the first of many stupid decisions.
“You’d better get cleaned up as well, then. Apparently we’ll be going to a ball.”
Chapter 24
Freshly scrubbed and dressed in their parents’ old finery, they stood and watched the carriage leave. Even the gait of the horses seemed angry as they charged away from the estate. Owen realized Ariana had taken his hand and he shook it off to half-heartedly galumph after the carriage. Did he hope Maria might look out the window or call for the carriage to stop because she’d made a mistake?
He stopped following when it rounded the curve, leaving nothing but a bit of dust that quickly settled. As if she’d never been there at all.
“She didn’t make a mistake,” he said to himself. If only, if only, if only… He didn’t know where to start his long list of regrets.
Ariana caught up with him and pulled him by the sleeve to the nearest rose garden. The front drive was littered with patches of red, yellow, pink, white, and every hue in between. He vaguely remembered the gardens being more neatly ordered and manicured, but his mother seemed to like them wild and they’d spread over the years. His father didn’t like flowers at all, merely tolerated them for the sake of the house. Owen had caught him scowling at an overflowing vase more than once in his life. The smells of the show-offy blooms nearly knocked him over, but Ariana breathed them in as if it gave her life.
“Let’s sit for a while, shall we?” she asked, voice laced with misery.
He felt a headache coming on from the suffocating blooms but sat beside her on an ancient wrought iron bench. They were silent for a long time, stunned by everything that had happened and anxious about what they had to do.
“I’m worried for my father,” he finally admitted. His own sorrows were too jumbled to voice. “Do you think he’ll be all right?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “But he got to speak to your sister again. That’s something.”
Something good or something bad, though? They all traipsed to the grave together once a year on Lucy’s birthday, but he knew his father went more often than that on his own. Owen always wondered how he stood up to the half-sister he never knew. Did his father wish he could trade them out?
He shook his head, shoving away his selfish thoughts. Those were his own worries and fears, and he was mostly sure they were unfounded.
“How awful though,” he said. “After all these years he must have had some kind of peace about losing her, and then she turns up again.”
“But not really,” Ariana said, seeming to understand. “Do you think he’s comforted that she’s one of them?”
He frowned at the way she said it, but he felt quite the same. More confused and frightened than ever by their existence. Lucy had meant well and wreaked havoc all the same. But she’d saved Maria. And Ariana. Or had that been him? Once again he wished he’d never found that horrible book, never knew what he was. That had been all Lucy’s well-meaning interference.
“Do you think that will happen to us?” he asked, not having any clue about his father’s state of mind and not wanting to speculate.
“God, I hope not. Do you think Maria will ever speak to me again?” Ariana changed the subject with a shudder.
He shrugged. “She might.” He doubted it, though. “She’ll never speak to me again, though.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. Then started to cry. A snivel at first but soon it was loud, snorting sobs that shook her shoulders. “I ruined everything. It’s no wonder
