“Is Sparky okay?” I heard Harvey ask from somewhere behind them.
Doc’s gaze traveled over me, searching, his eyes pained. “Are you?”
“For now, but I’m starting to itch and I’m afraid of what that means.” I held out my arm and showed what was now just a pale scar where the knife wound had been. “My amazing wound-healing abilities would give Detective Hawke a whole new reason to think I’m a witch.” I wiggled my fingers in the air. “Eye of newt and testicle of eel, make my skin meld and heal.”
“Hey, that’s pretty good,” Harvey said, peering around Doc’s side. I saw a glimpse of my family mirror in his hands. “Although I’m not sure about the eel testicle part. We should ask Corny-the-walking-encyclopedia if eels have balls when he’s up and kicking again.”
“Is Cornelius okay?”
“He’s better than you at the moment,” Cooper said.
Harvey squinted at me. “How can you tell it’s attached to her?”
“Look at her eyes,” Cooper told him.
Harvey did and flinched. “That would make the hair stand up on a fur coat.”
I scowled at them. “Yeah, well I’m not feeling super-fantastic on the inside either right now, thank you very much.”
“We need to get the lidérc out of you as soon as possible, Killer,” Doc said, his eyebrows pulled together.
I scratched my collarbone a little too hard, drawing blood. “I agree.” I frowned down at the blood on my fingernails and then pressed my shirt against the scratch. “Please tell me you can do that mirror trick you did at Zelda’s.”
His gaze held mine for several seconds, his face ashen. Or maybe it was just the lights making him look pallid.
“Damn it, Killer,” he said finally, leaning my mace against the wall. His voice sounded rough. “We’re walking a tightrope here without a net.”
My eyes watered for a moment at the fear mixed with pain that I saw cross his features. “We don’t need no stinkin’ net,” I tried to joke.
He scrubbed both hands down his face, blowing out through his fingers. “You ready to go into that mirror?”
I didn’t know, afraid of what would happen if we couldn’t get this devil out of me.
My ear itched, but I didn’t want to touch it. What if the sucker fell off when I scratched it?
“Screw it. Let’s do this, Doc.”
“What’s the plan?” Cooper asked, looking cool and collected, his years of being front and center at crime scenes evident.
“I’ll go in the room with Violet and the mirror while you—”
“No!” I held out my hands, playing traffic cop. “If you come in here, Doc, it might latch onto you, and we don’t know what will happen then. Your abilities could amplify its power and allow it to escape the wards.”
His face paled even more as he frowned at me. “I have to get that out of you. We don’t know how much time you have.”
“What if I go in there?” Cooper offered. “We know what happens when it gets its hooks into a human—a simple possession, right?”
“Yes,” I answered. “But what if it uses you as a vehicle to cross the ward like it did Katrina King? It’s safer to keep it in me right now, because it can’t take over my mental game.”
At least that appeared to be true. I returned to my chair, dropping into it as a wave of exhaustion swept over me.
Doc crossed his arms. “Listen, Violet. One of us has to come in there with the mirror. Who’s it going to be?”
“Maybe you can push the mirror toward me and—”
“Mon dieu!” Harvey said, only his voice sounded higher than usual and more stilted. “Step aside, Constable, and let me through.”
Constable?
Before Cooper or Doc could stop him, Harvey pushed his way past them and crossed the threshold with the mirror in hand.
I gaped at him as he limped over, one leg dragging slightly. “Harvey, what are you doing? Did you just speak French a moment ago?”
“Of course I spoke French,” he said with an American Northeastern accent I knew too well. “I was raised speaking French, as well as German, English, and several other languages.”
“Prudence?” I cocked my head as I stared up at him. “Is that you?”
“Are your questions always this asinine in the midst of a battle? Now take the mirror, Scharfrichter.” Harvey—I mean Prudence—shoved the mirror at me.
But it was Harvey standing in front of me, not Prudence or even Zelda, and his eyes were still blue, not rolled back in his head showing only white orbs. “How in the hell are you doing this?”
“Enough with these frivolous questions. Hold up that looking glass and stare into it, as I showed you this morning.”
I did as told, glancing at Doc and Cooper over the top of the mirror. They had matching incredulous stares, apparently as bamboozled as I was by the turn of events.
Harvey bent down in my face, holding my chin, studying my eyes. “Have you started hallucinating yet?” When I just stared at him, I mean her, wondering if maybe she was a hallucination, Prudence walloped me upside the head. “Answer me!”
“Okay, okay!” I shoved her hand away. “No, I don’t think I’m hallucinating.” I turned to Doc and Cooper. “You two are seeing and hearing this, right?”
“Uh, yeah,” Cooper said, still not sounding sure.
Doc just nodded.
Harvey—or Prudence—lined up behind me in the mirror.
“What are you doing here?” I asked his reflection.
“I am finishing what you started.”
“Why are you helping me?”
“You do not have the experience to use this mirror without peril, let alone capture a lidérc with it.”
She was right on both counts. “So, you do want to keep me alive.”
“Regrettably, yes. You have a Duzarx to slay.”
Crap, I’d forgotten about that thing. “Oh, yeah.”
“Furthermore, it will take the two of us to hold back the chaos that is escalating here in the Hills.”
I smiled, which made my forehead itch. “That’s sweet. You need me.” I scratched my head.
She reached forward and slapped my hand away. “I need a
